( Max's POV )

A month passed by in the blink of an eye as Max assumed his duties as both the supreme lord and the vampire monarch.

Since there were no news about the seeds of creation and destruction, Max focused on levelling up inside the levelling pagoda and exploring the universal warehouse himself.

Since there were no move restrictions on him anymore, he picked up abilities that he thought were extremely useful starting from two ( Divine ) sword arts which could help him alleviate the current deficit in his fighting style.

The first sword art that he learnt was called - [ Celestial Blade Dance ]

Max found this technique exceptionally useful in one-on-one combat.

This technique allowed him to maintain a defensive stance that covered all potential openings, leaving no apparent weaknesses.

As he sparred with the universal queen as his opponent Max realised that using celestial blade dance he could fluidly match the queen's six armed movements, as he was able to understand their speed and rhythm.

The way the technique worked was that it cut off an enemy's attack at a fixed distance from his body irrespective of the attack's trajectory.

Depending on any angle that the attack was incoming from, Max knew precisely the angle to deflect the strike and maintain the perfect distance in a way that if the opponent tried anything funny and forcefully shorten the distance between himself and Max, then Max would deflect his blade and slash his head in one fell swoop.

Learning this technique gave him an edge, allowing him to anticipate and counter an opponent's moves effectively as he realised that if the queen could not penetrate his defences when he used this sword art by using just sword techniques herself, then this was probably a great defensive blade stance.

Ofcourse the scenario would be different if she was allowed to use other combat moves and spells, however, by just using the sword, even when she had six arms and great speed, she could not close in on Max.

It was for this reason that Max admired the art's simplicity yet perfection, as it offered no flashy manoeuvres but rather a flawless execution of basic strikes, tailored to exploit the slightest lapse in an opponent's judgement.

But since learning defence was not enough, the second art that he learnt, the [ Eclipse Edge ], was a stark contrast to the first as it was ideal for offence and situations requiring a blend of stealth and power.

This technique was particularly effective against opponents with robust defences, as it used alternating speed and force to leave them struggling to adapt.

During a duel with a heavily armoured opponent, the user of Eclipse Edge began with rapid, light strikes to probe the enemy's defence.

Then suddenly as one found a weakness the user shifted to a powerful thrust, channelling their full force into a single, penetrating blow.

By doing this, the goal was to catch the opponent off-guard by the sudden change in intensity as they would then fail to adjust their defence in time.

Max who possessed both extreme speed and strength believed that with the right utilisation of this technique he might be able to penetrate the perfect warrior's armour as he assumed that since his opponent was the greatest celestial to ever live, he must use a weapon and armour corresponding to his stature as well.

In one month he was able to raise the mastery of both these sword arts to intermediate level and also raise his own level by 2 as he slowly progressed on the road to becoming a celestial while shoring up his weaknesses.

*********

( Odin's POV )

Odin examined the shattered remains of what was once a bustling planet outside of the controlled universe.

Ever since he met with Max after he solidified his position as the supreme lord, Odin turned his attention to finding the seeds of power as he began to look for the traces of either creation or destruction energy throughout the universe.

Today, he coincidentally stumbled upon the ruins of a planet which was supposed to house a complex ecosystem consisting of archaic spiders, beetle worms and butterflies.

All these species were able to assume a Bipedal form apart from their monster form after crossing the tier4 threshold, however, there were no traces of the planet or the life on it remaining once Odin came to visit it.

Someone or something had brutally destroyed the planet using destruction energy and since monarch's capable of using such force could be counted on one finger, Odin had a strong hunch that this was the work of someone who was in possession of the seed of destruction.

The power required to destroy a planet was immense and unless one was a tier6 god or higher, the backlash from using such strength would immediately kill them as well which made Odin assume that it was either a local god or someone extremely vengeful who destroyed this planet and all life on it.

The only question that Odin had was who? And whether the person who used this energy died and someone else stole the seed after or was it used by a god and the seed was still with them.

Odin believed that time was of the essence and immediately began to trace the faint energy trail of the seed of destruction as he did not care if the current user of the seed stole it later or he was the one to destroy this planet as for Odin capturing the seed was the only priority.

There were not many individuals in the universe who could stand up against the mental corruption of a seed and if it fell in the wrong hands, thousands of planets could be destroyed before the rampage of the destroyer could be brought to halt which was precisely why Odin felt like time was of the essence at the moment.

He wanted to stop whoever the owner was, before he either self-destructed and the trail of the seed went cold, or before he began his rampage as a madman.