After the final second, a similar scene was seen at the site of the massive beehive that had been under the attack of Phestus.

The beehive was no longer what it once was when Phestus first arrived.

What had been her was a sprawling mass of beeswax that stretched beyond the vision of anyone who gazed at it.

Even if one was to fly high, they still wouldn’t be able to tell how big this beehive was because the beehive itself stretched beyond the horizon.

Now, what was left was a mess.

Multiple holes were burned through the walls of the bees, allowing anyone to see what was happening on the inside, and what was happening on the inside was not pretty at all.

The sweet stench of boiling honey was mixed with the rotting smell of burnt bees.

Bees as far as the eyes could see, as well as some other creatures like lions and some of their vassals, were mixed within.

Some of the bodies hung from the edges of the blasted walls, some lay in piles, some were sinking to the bottom of the golden honey pools.

As sweet as this place smelled, the sight was horrific.

Unlike the cats and the other felines who could put up a fight and had the backing of their allies, the bees were not so privileged.

Everyone was out to get them for their honey and almost all their allies were pretentious about it.

Not to mention this wasn’t True Honey so it wasn’t like the bees were significant in the Original Heaven.

Their enemies, the Wasps, were merciless and unrelenting in their quest to see the bees fall.

It was no surprise that when word of the bees being attacked by the lions got out, no one came to their rescue. No one knew why the lions had suddenly decided to attack the bees but they were not willing to play hero, either.

Let the bees suffer a bit, they would say to themselves from the comfort of their territory, glad that it wasn’t them that was targeted.

The bees were not among the top races of the Original Heaven and they had just one Supreme Level Immortal.

Thankfully, that supreme level immortal survived the absolute Annihilation Phestus had planned for him.

Unfortunately, she was left wounded with a lot of bees around her suffering the same fate or worse.

Why? They would ask themselves, screaming in agony across the higher plane of their hive mind.

Why would the lions do this?

The supreme leader had a guess but she didn’t want to admit as it would be too scary.

The bees of the mortalverse have been on the receiving end of harassment from the lions and it was clear what they wanted.

At the same time, she had been keeping tabs on the Primordial Bee, the Queen of Queens in Hive Heaven, and feeding her information about what to do.

The lions of Original Heaven may have guessed this and decided to help out.

The Supreme Leader had fought back, obviously. She had torn through countless machines brought by Phestus and engaged him in a world-shattering battle.

Alas, when the fight was far from drawing to a conclusion, Phestus had suddenly disappeared.

Just like that.

The bees were left with millions of dead bodies and thousands of injured powerhouses.

What an unexpected loss.

And what did the lions lose?

Well, a good number of them died but she had the nagging feeling that the lions really didn’t lose much.

All through the fight, it felt like she was trying to reason with a child who was confident that the parent would come and save him at the right time.

They fought with such reckless abandon and there was no clear pattern. They didn’t rush in to destroy a particular target, they didn’t pursue a particular honey pool.

They didn’t even drink the sweet honey that was lying around.

They just fought, then vanished.

This left the bees extremely wary and the supreme leader started having a very uncomfortable feeling.

Something was not right.

And what was that golden hue in the distant sky that she had seen during the fight?

Questions were popping up and there was no one to answer.

/////

Leonine Heaven.

A heavenly gate opened close to the bottom of the Apex Pyramid.

The portal was beautiful and its edges were lined with the familiar golden colour of the Leonine Heavenly Realm.

"Ah, it’s been a while," N’bayé said as she elegantly stepped out of the portal one step at a time.

Her tall figure stopped a few meters after walking out. She looked up, gazing at the magnificent Apex Pyramid that had a wide range of colour themes here and there.

"I see..." She muttered, appreciating the work of art for what it was.

Her tier six aura collapsed and spewed out of her body, her senses taking over the little stones in the surrounding kilometres to imprint her observation runes.

This was something she was already used to.

No matter where she went, as long as there was no one saying that she should not do it, she would start imprinting her magic runes on as many objects as she could.

This was her magic style and it was something a lot of Maguses would do. Better to not be caught unprepared.

As N’bayé’s red robe fluttered in the slow-moving wind, she glanced at the lion system screen flashing at the top of her vision.

So many things were happening now, she could tell by all the Log Announcements.

There were a lot of alerts about lions dying and there was also that strange notification about something called a Heavenly Breakout.

N’bayé had a guess.

However, there was one particular notification that was visible only to the consorts of the All-King.

[Avatar Consort Ascension in progress... Prepare for forced evolution...]

There was no timer, but N’bayé could already sense the changes.

Looking around, she could sense that her other pride sisters were inside the Apex Pyramid.

This was not a sensation that occurred due to her magic, but a new sensation that was starting to appear ever since that notification popped up.

The changes had already begun. Her insides were slowly transforming into something different.

N’bayé sighed.

This was a good thing, right?

She shook her head. On the bright side, forced evolution meant that they would all be getting power upgrades.

How powerful would they become? N’bayé did not know as that was entirely up to Kael and how he had planned everything.

She knew that Kael was deeply frustrated by the weakness of those around him. And he was not willing to replace any of his consorts without giving them a chance.

If he was, he would have abandoned Ruda. But now, Ruda was still linked to the Lion System and was probably going to undergo this forced evolution wherever she was too.

N’bayé had no information on these things, so she could not even make any calculated guesses.

All she could hope for was that their usefulness to Kael would become more apparent after this.

Just when she was about to walk into the Apex Pyramid, there was a loud screeching sound.

N’bayé paused her footsteps and frowned.

That screeching sound...

She turned her head and looked at the golden sky just as the sound was getting louder and louder.

*EEEEEEEEEEEEIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!*

It was getting so loud that it became unbearable, even for N’bayé.

This was the same noise that they usually heard when reality was forcefully being broken.

But she had never heard it like this, she had never heard it this...loud.

What manner of monstrous activity could anyone do to cause the universe to weep like this?

A weeping wail so loud that it started to spread from one heavenly realm to another, almost covering all the heavens in the Heavenverse.

The screech only lasted for three seconds but it seemed to have been happening for countless centuries at that moment.

And then, the screech started to change, becoming deeper and more dominant until it fully evolved into the most horrendous roar N’bayé had ever heard.

*HUMMMM*

She felt the air and earth vibrate, the hair on her skin stood up. Her eyes dilated. She felt like prey standing in the way of an apex predator.

*CRASH CRASH, SHATTER!*

An all-devouring crack appeared in the sky, standing like a horizontal black line that fell down to the golden abyss.

Instinctively, N’bayé took a step back, her eyes burning brightly with the light of magic runes.

And then, she felt it.

The fall.

The collapse.

The intrusion of a world that felt so familiar and yet so foreign.

Her eyes caught it.

A golden lion figure standing at the center of the crack.

That was Kael.

The appearance of Kael was followed instantly by the appearance of more than a million other figures.

At first, there was a stunned silence, N’bayé stared at the breathtaking scene with shock filling her usually cold heart.

Then...

"HAHAHAHAHAHAAAA! YESSSS! WE’RE FREE!"