Pef entered the command center in the Indigo realm to find the General waiting, her stoic face somewhat worried.

"Yes, General?" he asked with a raised eyebrow.

"You are giving all the Silver Burgers to these outsiders! My plans require the Legion to be strong, yet you..." she growled with a displeased tone.

Pef sighed and sat in his armchair, then read the daily updates on his mind-crystal, leaving the glove to filter through an exabyte of raw data.

The Middle Heavens were quite huge, since only the Cloud Province had thousands of multiverses inside its borders. Gathering only the important news took a good portion of the Legion intelligence network, without considering on-going operations.

At least the shape of the battlefield was known by now, so the updates had become somewhat easier to parse: movements and deaths, new promotions, beast attacks, that sort.

"The sword guys will be our main ally in this universe. Their leader, Sword Ancestor Jin is providing us all his teachings, a million Chaos Cycles of distilled sword training. I don't see you complain about those free lessons." Pef pointed out with a wry glance at a hanging holo-screen, showing Jin and Zen sparing in his Battle Arena.

Already the results of those lessons propagated throughout the Legion and their allies, nine years of high-ranked Sword Dao raising the combat level of their troops by two orders of magnitude.

The General had the decency to abstain and just nodded.

"What do you really want?" he asked a minute later.

The Mirror Goddess perked up and almost raised a finger, before quitting while ahead, just as Pef turned towards her with a warning glare.

The General also turned towards the Mirror Goddess, with her face calm as an ocean before the storm. "Not now, Gena!" before turning back towards Pef. "I want a preview test. Perhaps rewards for those who perform." she said in a patient voice, while pointing a finger almost up.

'She wants to fight a Bronze Realm beast. The Royal Nest Starfield.' the glove deduced after continuing the trajectory of the finger to its most probable destination.

'Bees?' Pef asked in half-wonder.

'The Old Bronze Queen has spawned three new migration waves. Three daughters in Silver Realm. One of them will Ascend into Copper Realm soon.' the glove continued as it compiled the relevant information for its user.

'Ants against bees. There is more. What else?' Pef asked with suspicion.

'It is highly probable the bees produce honey. A kind of honey able to Ascend someone.' the gloved inferred with its prodigious intellect.

"Honey?" Pef said out loud.

The General just nodded, with an annoyed look towards Pef's glove.

'I would like to taste such honey.' the Taotie muttered in Pef's mind.

'Of course you would.' Pef thought inward. "They will have numbers. There is a reason why nobody else raided that place." he warned the General in a cautious tone.

"But, only one Bronze Beast. You take care of it, I will deal with the rest. Perhaps the White Tiger may join, if he wants some honey." The General proposed in a level voice.

Pef shrugged as he began sending orders towards his wives. Then he turned towards Gena Feng who was still trying to raise a hand, and fighting herself not to. "Yes, Gena?"

"You will need Master Jin. His disciples too. I would propose all the Immortals we have, as well. Even so, even odds." the Mirror Goddess muttered with a wary glance towards the General.

Pef blinked in surprise then scratched at his cheek. 'Even odds, really?'

'I did say they have numbers on us. Likely similar to a first rate sect, or more.' the glove said after a moment of calculations.

'Thousands of Tier 9s? Huh, the Taotie will be fed properly then.' Pef answered with a calm tone.

This would be a proper war, not a mere test.

He stepped outside and entered the private ring where Zen and Jin trained. "Hey guys. I need some honey for my next recipe. Royal Honey." he explained with a finger pointing towards the distant Royal Nest Starfield.

Zen just blinked in confusion, while the Sword Ancient followed the trajectory and paled. "The Old Queen?" he asked with a ghastly voice.

"This is the Way." Pef confirmed with a small grin. It wasn't exactly what the Mandalorian Code demanded, but a Cook needed ingredients, to make a cake, and eat it too.

Zen just shrugged, unconcerned with the undertones of the discussion. "I'm in. Might as well test my Soul River in real combat."

"You are serious?" Jin asked, just to make sure.

"You can bring your entire Sect. They also need real combat." Pef added as an afterthought. The Mirror was rarely wrong, might as well indulge her.

"Even so...we will need many more fighters." Jin muttered as his eyebrows tilted in concentration.

"Indeed. I will bring my army as well. It will be fun!" Pef continued with a glance towards Zen. The Shadow Clone was growing admirably, even without the support of the Nether Lotus Flame.

Zara had also obtained her 7th clone recently, and sent her in the kitchen, to learn proper Cooking from her husband. It may take the Cooking clone decades to match him, but he couldn't underestimate total focus on a single Dao.

In a way, Pef was quite envious on his wife, who was able to focus her clones on different Daos and achieve excellent results in less time. But then, he knew that the moment he saw her Skill. Comparing an Immortal Flame with a Naruto Tailed Beast wasn't fair, but they did provide similar benefits, both in sentient advice and energy support.

"Can you tell me what is that Sword River?" Jin asked as a barter.

It was clear what he saw wasn't what Pef did, but then again Kalima had a different river as well. The Dao was without end, so it wouldn't limit itself to a single river.

Pef turned towards the man and measured his for a minute, while planning with the glove for the next step.

"If I told you, I would limit your path to my own understanding. However, I will tell you there are more Dao rivers. Some people can bathe in them, others walk on their surface, and most are just carried along. You seek the Sword Soul, thus you must follow the Way of the Sword." he explained in a tangential manner.

The Sword Ancestor frowned deeply as he parsed the words, then bowed towards the Divine Cook like a mere student.

"I have seen the Sword River, but I never imagined someone would simply take a bath inside. To meet someone who did, is my greatest honor, Divine Cook." the old man said in a humble voice.

Pef sighed inward, then waved a hand. "I was brave and stupid. Lucky to survive as well." he said in a humble voice as well, then returned to his Blue Realm.

He would need to prepare some large scale contraptions, if the bees had such large numbers.

In the Battle Arena, Teacher Jin turned towards his young and foolish pupil. "Did I hear right? You want to join the battlefield?"

"I will not die, Teacher. You can test me." she answered with a small shrug.

Instantly, her head flew off, as a Void Sword sprang out and decapitated the low Sky Realm disciple.

Only instead of blood spilling out in a fountain, her body dissolved into a shadow and reformed intact. "I am not exactly...normal." she added with a careless tone.

"You have a Skill. And quite a decent one." her teacher mused while measuring the girl with new eyes.

"That's what he said too. Apparently, it will be rather easy to reach Tier 10 with this Skill." Zen agreed, while pointing her thumb backwards towards the Celestial Restaurant.

"Hmmm. Not dying is quite a boon on any battlefield. But killing is different. Your sword didn't gain that name by bathing in milk." the old man muttered with a wry voice.

Zen swept the blade of the sword in her hand with her other palm, feeling the carnage the sword had caused during its long existence. "I know, Teacher. Don't worry, I also walk the path of the Sword. This is the Way."

"This is the Way." her teacher agreed with a grin.