Faustus blinked.

Was his reputation really that great?

"Then now, do you believe what I said?"

Faustus asked.

How could Conrad not believe him now?

What level of potential did one need to suppress an entire generation of heaven’s chosen in the Endless Starfield?

It was simply unimaginable.

"I believe you."

Conrad gave a bitter smile.

"It seems I won’t be able to complete this job for the Godkin."

If he could not complete the job, then he could only continue drifting through the Endless Starfield, continuing to be a rootless wanderer.

Otherwise, he would have to clash head-on with Faustus.

But right now, Conrad did not dare.

He had always been cautious by nature, and he did not want to take even the slightest risk.

The Starfolk could no longer afford any more turmoil.

When Faustus heard this, he immediately smiled.

"I know what you want. We can cooperate."

"Isn’t it just a living world?"

The Godkin held so many planes in their hands. So what if he seized a few from them?

The corner of Faustus’s mouth lifted.

Conrad’s eyes widened, and even his breathing became hurried.

The Godkin ruled over more than a dozen planes, yet they were not even willing to give the Starfolk a place to settle down.

If the Starfolk wanted a piece of territory, they had to risk the extinction of their entire race and go to war with Faustus...

But judging from Faustus’s tone, it seemed as if he did not care much about a living world at all.

"What you want is nothing more than a living world."

Faustus said, "And I just so happen to know of the All-Race Star Chart. Getting a living world will be easy."

Hiss—!

Conrad could not help sucking in a cold breath.

At that moment, he felt like a beggar on the street who had suddenly encountered a wealthy man sitting on a mountain of gold.

The wealthy man said to him: You want bread? Too small. Your vision is too small! I’ll give you a mountain of gold instead...

What else could Conrad say?

For ten thousand years, all the Starfolk had sought was a stable place to settle down, so they no longer had to suffer the torment of wandering the stars.

They were like homeless wanderers who had drifted outside for an entire lifetime, asking for nothing more than a small house that could shelter them from wind and rain.

But there was no free meal in this world.

Nor would pies simply fall from the sky.

If one wanted to obtain something, one had to exchange something for it.

Faustus called it "cooperation," but perhaps that word was not quite so pleasant in reality.

Right now, all initiative was in Faustus’s hands.

How they would cooperate depended entirely on what Faustus demanded.

Conrad understood this perfectly, so he hurriedly asked,

"What are your conditions?"

The corner of Faustus’s mouth curled upward.

"Very simple. Become a vassal race of the human race. I’ll arrange a living world for you. Sign a racial vassal contract, and I’ll give you everything you want."

A vassal contract.

That meant bringing the entire race under Faustus’s command!

Conrad fell silent.

But in truth, he did not hesitate for long.

He had already reached the end of the road.

If he went to war with Faustus, even returning alive would be difficult, and the Starfolk would certainly be doomed along with him.

If he refused to fight and returned to the Endless Starfield, the Starfolk would still be finished sooner or later.

One side was life.

The other was death.

Everyone wanted to live.

Only those who had crawled out of hell knew just how difficult it was to stay alive.

"Fine. I agree."

Conrad agreed readily, but he was still wary of the Godkin.

"But... how do you plan to deal with the Godkin?"

Faustus had confiscated the blade handed over by the Godkin.

Would the Godkin just let this go?

Impossible!

After suffering such a huge loss, the Godkin would never let the matter end here.

What Conrad feared most was this:

What if the Godkin brought over a group of demi-sages next time?

That was Conrad’s greatest concern.

With the Godkin’s enormous power, they had plenty of methods to deal with disobedient opponents.

Otherwise, with the Godkin ruling more than a dozen planes and countless living beings, there would inevitably be some rebels.

If a single supreme-grade invincible being could render them helpless, would the Godkin still have the face to call themselves overlords?

Unless one was truly invincible beneath Divine-grade, no one could withstand all the dirty tricks of the Godkin.

But in Faustus’s eyes, Conrad’s worries were not even a problem.

"I’ll be honest with you."

"As long as Divine-grade does not appear, I am invincible."

Faustus’s confidence was absolute.

"No matter how many come, I’ll kill them all."

When Faustus said he was invincible, he meant truly invincible.

He could even wrestle with Divine-grade powerhouses.

It was just that even if he said this out loud, few would believe him, and even fewer could understand it.

Conrad thought Faustus meant he was invincible at supreme-grade.

But in reality, Faustus was far stronger than he imagined.

Boom—!

Even so, after hearing Faustus’s words, Conrad’s heart surged violently.

He looked at this heaven’s chosen before him, the one who had reached the summit of Cloudcrest Peak, and the shock in his heart was impossible to describe.

As expected of the one who had reached the summit.

This absolute confidence was something even he did not possess!

He was a demi-sage, yet even he did not dare claim to be invincible beneath Divine-grade.

But Faustus dared.

And he said it with complete confidence.

"Remember this."

Faustus continued, "A vassal contract is not a master-servant contract. To put it plainly, it is a relationship between superior and subordinate. That is my bottom line. If you want to negotiate anything else, then there’s nothing more to discuss."

He had to make the ugly words clear first.

Faustus did not intend to grip the Starfolk too tightly.

The burden on his shoulders was already heavy enough. He had plenty of matters to worry about for the human race. If he added the Starfolk on top of that, he would only make himself even more tired.

He also had no intention of letting the Starfolk live together with the human race.

The Aerial Realm would not be opened to them.

As long as they obediently stayed in one place and did not cause trouble, that would be enough.

Conrad smiled bitterly.

"That is acceptable."

He sighed.

"The Godkin are no good people either. If they were truly sincere toward us, they would not have sent us to risk our lives against you."

"In the end, we Starfolk are nothing more than chess pieces. Perhaps we would even be schemed against by the Godkin in the end. From beginning to end, all we wanted was a piece of land where we could survive."

Originally, Conrad had no choice.

Aside from risking his life for the Godkin, he had no other path of retreat.

But now, he had another road.

Submit to Faustus.

As long as Faustus could truly remain invincible beneath Divine-grade, the survival of the Starfolk would be secured!

Conrad was not afraid that Faustus was deceiving him either.

The Godkin hated Aetheria to the bone. Compared to the Starfolk, the human race had even less room to retreat.

Conrad was willing to believe him.

...

Very soon, Faustus signed a vassal contract with Conrad.

This contract was looser than a master-servant contract, but it still bound the two races together.

The contract clearly stated the responsibilities the Starfolk had to bear as a vassal race, such as obeying the commands of the human race and abiding by the rules of the human race.

To put it plainly, the human race was the superior.

The Starfolk were the subordinate.

Faustus then brought out those Divine-grade items and had Conrad undo their seals one by one.

In truth, this was also one of the reasons he had chosen to persuade Conrad to surrender.

Although Conrad was not a sage, he already possessed a portion of a sage’s Strength.

Even though undoing these seals was still rather strenuous for him, he at least had the qualifications to do so!

After Conrad finished unsealing all of them, Faustus finally took out the All-Race Star Chart.

"This is the Star Chart."

The Star Chart!

Conrad’s eyes lit up, and he stared fixedly at the map.

With the Star Chart, one could know where living worlds were located.

The reason he had managed to find Aetheria was also because he had obtained its coordinates.

Without coordinates, he would not even be able to find the door.

In other words, with this map in hand, one could find all the living worlds within this region of the starry sky.

The corner of Faustus’s mouth curved.

"You are a demi-sage, so you should be able to smash open a world barrier. As long as you break through it, we can fight our way in and occupy the entire world!"

As long as he could enter, his class-change quest would be considered complete.

And as for invasion and occupation, that went without saying!

Conrad nodded.

"I possess a portion of Divine-grade authority. I simply cannot open up a sage rank. Breaking through a world barrier will not be difficult."

"That’s good."

Faustus unfolded the Star Chart and pointed at one cluster of light.

"This place is called the Divine Wind Realm. It is a small world under the Godkin."

Conrad’s eyes almost popped out of their sockets.

"Wait! You’re planning to move against the Godkin’s territory?"