Back in the pagoda, in yet another instance of the fifth floor...


    "Greetings, se?orita mother margarita! If it isn''t Eagerton and Edgerton''s painter progenitress in the flesh! Are you going to paint me like one of your French girls? Or how about a period piece if it''s that artistic time of the month?" Stupidity oozed out of Ares'' blowhole like faeces out of a sewer. Unfortunately he was chock full of garbage and thus the stream was never ending.


    Margaret tilted her head, sighed, and decided to just ignore this barking wolf. "I take it you''re already aware of why the matriarchs are here? You must be talking with the others, right?"


    "That I am. Being omnipresent is actually really neat. Is this what it''s like to be a bug with compound eyes? Huh, the more you know."


    "Oh? You''ve just given me a wonderful idea for a painting! I''ve never painted anything from the perspective of a creature with compound eyes. Hm, maybe it doesn''t have to be from the perspective of a bug? Maybe it could be more symbolic... Ah! Eureka! I''ll paint each of the ommatidia such that they resemble glass. In each I''ll depict the same man committing multiple different crimes, failing to live a meaningful life, and losing everything he holds dear. The ommatidia will be like mirrors painting a picture of the self, indicating such a person''s life is worth no more than that of an insect! The critics will eat it up... Ah but who cares about those stooges anyhow? I''ll enjoy painting it, that''s what truly matters... Now what should I call it? I need to convey my intent but it needs to be subtle. Something not overtly proud of itself but rather something that will contribute to the piece... Oh! ''Minibeast'' will suffice! Minibeast of course meaning a tiny animal but the key component here is the term ''beast''. Beastly, savage, uncivilised and brutish like that of the depicted man. The double meaning is perhaps too perfect not to use so I suppose that settles it! Now what of the composition? Which order should I depict his heinous habits in? And what of the colours? Murky and dark like the soul? Bland and dull to symbolise the monotony of his repetition; to emphasise his normalisation of evil? Ooooh the choices are limitless!"


    "Uh, ok... I see where Eagerton got his passion from... Uh, anyway, should we get started on the whole pressure thing?"


    "Now what canvas should I use?"


    "... Margaret..."


    "And which brush?"


    "Oi."


    "And the type of paint should be..."


    "HEY!"


    "Landscape or portrait?"


    "Alright, that''s it." Ares activated his annihilation enhancement and threw his pressure at Margaret who was currently living in her own world, detached from reality.


    "ACK? Flattened on the floor like a pancake, Margaret croaked under the weight of Ares'' pressure. When it seemed like she got the memo, Ares freed her from his pressure prison and used telekinesis to help lift her to her feet.


    AHEM


    "M.a.r.g.a.r.e.t. Can you p.l.e.a.s.e show me your pressure. I may have infinite time but I don''t have infinite patience! If you wish to paint and/or plan out a painting, please do that outside the pagoda. Of course if it''s just making notes or whatever then go for it but you came here to learn pressure manipulation at a high level, right? Let''s focus on that for now and not let ourselves get distracted or you might not have enough time to learn what you need to before I''m gone for good..." Ares didn''t really mind if Margaret wasted her time, and he had no real reason to interrupt her, but she was wasting this fantastic opportunity! She came here for one express purpose and she was throwing it away! Ares did not look forward to the fact that he was almost definitely going to have to keep dragging this woman back on track for her own sake...


    "Ah, yes, right. So how are you going to gauge my pressure? Do I need to be nude?"


    "What? No? Also Enyo will probably kill me so please don''t strip..." Ares mumbled ''what the hell is wrong with these Starlights?'' under his breath before continuing onward. "... All I need you to do is show me what you can do with pressure. Normal pressure, physical pressure, pressure enhancement. Whichever one you want to work on. If there''s one you can''t use then I''ll help you learn it provided the other techniques are up to scratch. Leaving the techniques you are capable of using in the dust is pointless because the basics of them are needed later on down the line for enhancement anyway."


    "I can''t use enhancement but my physical pressure is the best of the matriarchs, Overall, I''m third in terms of pressure mastery as both Calla and Rhea have pressure enhancement at their disposal. I''m also third in terms of overall strength... If I''m being honest, it does bug me. I think Serene doesn''t care as much about it as I do which just makes me even more annoyed. It feels like the only person I''m actually beating doesn''t even care enough to try. At that point I might as well be last! I don''t know how useful pressure enhancement will be for me, seeing as how I rarely fight up close, so I think it would be for the best if I just stick to what I''m already good at and improve myself further in that direction."


    Margaret began her demonstration and it didn''t take Ares more than a few seconds to understand what made Margaret special. She was summoning physical pressure quickly, and that was impressive considering her lack of training with an expert, but was really stood out was her ability to multitask. Ares could generate multiple instances of physical pressure at the same time but it slowed down his manipulation by a decent amount. It was something he was still working on. The Backfire Bindings were making it easier but he wasn''t quite content with how long it took him to multitask. As the number one pressure master he needed to do better otherwise it would be embarrassing. Also after summoning one instance of physical pressure, moving onto the next, and deciding what would be optimal for any given situation, wasn''t easy. The fact that Margaret could create more than one piece of physical pressure as competently as she could, and that she could rapid fire her creation of physical pressure, was rather unique. Then again she was a creative at heart so her ability to think on the fly and visualise what the end goal of her physical pressure was must have been a major contributor.


    The physical pressure Margaret summoned was respectable too. Decently sized, could very well be lethal, and if she charged it then the power she could wield was no joke. in terms of pure control, she was definitely the best utiliser of pressure Ares had seen thus far amongst the matriarchs. She could draw out her pressure from the reserves fast and the process of merging it with mana was almost as fast as Ares back when he was still learning. If she got good at this she could use it to fill in the gaps between her magic. While she painted a massive attack that would deal the important blows, she could summon smaller attacks to keep her foe busy. She would spam out her opponent without leaving them any breathing room. The crux of her current issues was that, even if she landed a good hit with her magic she couldn''t exploit it properly afterwards. Another bit of magic would take too long to launch a follow-up and right now controlling her pressure at the same time as her magic was confounding her. She had to divert some mana to mix with pressure and some to cast arts simultaneously. This was something Ares himself had accomplished relatively easily thanks to his creation of Annihilation Echoes aiding in developing the necessary skillset but it wasn''t something Margaret had learnt properly.


    "You can multitask exceedingly well but there''s a caveat. You can only multitask if you''re doing the same task twice. If you try to do two different tasks at the same time that''s where you falter." Margaret never told Ares this but he could see the hesitation in her pressure manipulation whenever mana was involved. It was slight but Ares was an professional now and such a thing wouldn''t escape his notice! "For now, practice using magic and physical pressure at the same time. Create one physical pressure attack at a time and keep it simple. Maybe fire a pressure paintball at a wall with your right hand on repeat or something. While you''re doing that, try treating it as a background task so you can use magic simultaneously with your left hand. If you fail, start again. The longer you do this the more the physical pressure side of things will come naturally to you, allowing you to focus on casting magic or arts. This is just a matter of rote learning until you''re comfortable with what I''m asking of you.


    I will also be teaching you physical enhancement down the line and no amount of complaining is going to change my mind on the matter because it''s more important than you give it credit for! You don''t avoid investing in pressure enhancement because you aren''t going to hit people with it, that''s silly. You learn it because there will always be a time and place for it as it''s an all-rounded ability that will do you many favours in the future including benefitting your pressure control in general. You never know when it will be the deciding factor in a fight as anyone who''s currently at your level will fall behind you the second you learn it. If you can learn enhancement but choose not to you might as well stop cultivating because you aren''t taking it seriously at all. This should be mandatory for every cultivator who''s capable of learning it. if people in the wider world outside the barrier knew you were reluctant to learn enhancement despite having the pre=requisite talent to do so they would curse you and every generation of your lineage. I''ve heard your painting style is like a dance? That''s a physical activity and I promise you enhancement will aid you in that. You won''t regret it as a cultivator or as an artist. So yeah, let''s start with this but, when you''re done, we''re moving onto enhancement no matter how unpleasant it is!" Ares gave Margaret no quarter on this matter. She had to eat her greens! No, learning enhancement was not pleasant, and yes it took a while, but you would be better off for it than had you spent that same time learning anything else. The value of enhancement was greater than any singular art you could create.


    "Fine, point taken. Hm, I suppose I ought to force Eagerton and Edgerton to learn it too. The Starlights as a whole have disregarded enhancement but maybe that was actually a mistake... I''ll try to spread the word when I return to my home planet and make those who are capable of achieving it give it a whirl. I think even Ya Ye was reluctant so I''ll convince him to come here down the line. He wants to meet you anyway so killing two birds with one stone and whatnot. Before I get started, when firing off physical pressure with my right hand, does it have to be the same attack every time? I''ll be bugged to death if I''m forced to limit my creativity in such a manner. I would rather not trivialise the process if possible not because I don''t want it to be easy but because I sense an opportunity to have this also function as an artistic endeavour."


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    "Uh, sure, whatever floats your boat. If you do wind up struggling though I would ask you to prioritise the task at hand. If you absolutely must stretch your brain every now and then I would prefer it if you just took a break instead of continuing with the task. There are plenty of empty houses here so if you want to paint, or what have you, then feel free to make use of any of them. I would rather not try and give you advice only for your response to be something along the lines of ''I wasn''t taking it seriously, I just got bored again''. Learning pressure is something you should really concentrate on as what you learn and how you learn it matters but, don''t get me wrong, that''s why I encourage you to take breaks. If your physical pressure is going to be more artistic, and focus on the creation aspect of it, then those breaks might actually prove invaluable. It''s entirely possible for you to discover more about the way you interact with pressure during your down time provided you''re doing something relevant. Instead of trying to cram it in all at once by doing everything simultaneously, you can just do your art and the pressure separately but frequently. If you really must complicate the task then so be it but I don''t think it will be helpful. Actively avoiding doing as such will build your desire to create, at which point you can unleash it all during a break, and then return and repeat the process. It will create a fluid and seamless transition between the two and develop your ability to slip from magic/art to pressure with ease. But this is just advice at the end of the day and you''re free to ignore it provided you think you have a better approach. I''m not here to force you to do anything you don''t want to, I''m just speculating how best to help you based on what I know. My pressure mastery is top notch but it''s not like I''ve been in this newfound position for altogether too long at this point. There are plenty of things I might not know about, or have never seen before, so follow your own path if you''re convinced it''s better for you."


    Margaret thought long and hard about what Ares had just told her... At least that was what Ares hoped she was doing... If she was thinking about the damn ''Minibeast'' again he was going to boot her out the pagoda! In fact, he very nearly did when he watched her turn around and walk into an empty house. He peeked inside and saw her setting up a canvas to start painting her stupid Minibeast! A few deep sighs later, the Ares clone went and sat up against a building to wait patiently. He''d encouraged this, he just didn''t think she would START with the painting. Why was she ''taking a break'' before she''d even started the task she would need to take breaks from?! This was a lack of self control unlike anything Ares had ever seen before! No wonder the Starlights were almost as insufferable as the revenants... They really did live in their own vibrant world half the damn time. Well whatever, it seemed Margaret had come up with a game plan and Ares'' job was simply to facilitate it. If it was someone he didn''t care about, a random stranger, he would have just forced them to learn it his way. Hell he wouldn''t have even leant a hand in the first place. As this was his mother''s friend / his colleague''s mother, he bit the bullet and caved. Hassle though it was, he would enable Margaret to do things her way. She was an artist so restricting her freedom would almost definitely impact her practice negatively so, more than any of other other matriarchs, Ares had to take a hands off approach to teaching her. Now that he''d offered a suggestion and explained the basics, it was all up to her.


    Meanwhile, in the final instance of the pagoda in which a matriarch was present...


    Pat pat


    Ares was sitting on his mother''s lap as she groomed his hair. He''d annoyed the other matriarchs but how could he be heartless enough to do that to his own mother?! Well, it''s not that it wasn''t in the cards, just not yet anyway. He''d only gotten to know her recently so messing around with her was a no go because he wanted to get to know her better. Know thy enemy! Also, he just enjoyed spending time with her as she was incredibly friendly with her ''babies''. Constant hugs and hot chocolate, that was her motto... Although Ares actually had yet to have one of her famed hot chocos. He''d heard a great deal about them from his brothers and sisters during the banquet and now he was realising he was never going to get to try it! Well the real Ares would but the pagoda clone? Probably not gonna ever happen... Ah well, at the very least the pagoda clone had nearly infinite ingredients at his disposal to cook whatever he wanted. That was one of the many great things about this place. Sure it had it''s downs but it also had its ups to balance things out. Being able to summon an ingredient on demand was great for experimenting with all sorts of whacky dishes he normally wouldn''t waste time on. The real Ares would never recover the clone''s knowledge of the accursed dishes he created but that was fine. No doubt the real Ares would go on to meet countless respectable chefs that could teach him things that were actually valuable. High level cooking techniques and recipes for mythical dishes that required the most elusive of ingredients. In many ways, clone Ares was jealous. Still, real Ares was probably just as envious of clone Ares for being able to chill for all eternity somewhere his duties could never bother him.


    When Calla was satisfied cleaning her baby, she gave him a lick, wagged her tail, and dangled him by the scruff of his neck before plopping him to the side. Calla was always happy to spend time with Ares considering how many years of his life she''d missed out on beforehand so, although she was here to learn how to improve with pressure, she took some time out to pamper her baby boy... Well he was an adult male at this point, 18 and up was considered as such for cultivators, but Calla''s children would always be babies to her. Now that all of that stuff was dealt with, it was time to train! Calla didn''t really need much training comparatively because she was the best wielder of pressure amongst the matriarchs. Her physical pressure was so-so but her normal pressure and enhancement were both top notch. She''d put in a lot of effort to raise her effectiveness with both as they were great tools for assisting her in combat. The way she fought leveraged her incredible speed so normal pressure, which could slow others down, and enhancement, which just made her even faster, were irreplaceable to her. As she showed off her enhancement, Ares was genuinely impressed and borderline flabbergasted. Despite living in this lower domain hell-hole she''d managed to get an enhancement of 70% 70! Veteran was the previous limit known to cultivators and he had 80! Calla was a really amazing cultivator no doubt. Combine an enhancement at that level with her adept trait and it wasn''t surprising she was ranked definitively first amongst the matriarchs. There was even a respectable chance for her to become a Goddess at some point in the future if she kept up her cultivation pursuit.


    Apparently Aster had a strong affiliation for the space-time pillar so him becoming the next God of the pillar wasn''t possible. Unless Xhilihx did Astraeus in, the God of that pillar wasn''t changing any time soon. As things stood, Astraeus wasn''t so weak that Xhilihx could just rock up and swallow him. Currently, it was more like Xhilihx repeatedly snuck by him and tried to swallow the planets Astraeus was guarding while he wasn''t looking. This did make Xhilihx sound like a puppy at a dining table but it wasn''t inaccurate. Anyhow, point being Aster wasn''t becoming a God anytime soon. Plus Caribou existed and overcoming him wouldn''t exactly be a walk in the park either. Though, supposedly, Aster''s affiliation with the spatial aspect was tremendous so maybe it wasn''t out of the cards for him to become a legendary cultivator in his own right? If he could even be bothered anyway. What Ares had heard of him thus far indicated he wasn''t the type to care about titles; he just wanted to live a peaceful life on his home planet, dunking his children headfirst into the earth and calling them ostriches every now and then.


    Ares clapped when Calla was done and gave her two thumbs up. "There''s not really much of anything for me to do. You''re a bit rough around the edges but there isn''t anything you can''t fix by yourself with a bit more time and effort. That being said, the optimal way to iron out those wrinkles is by fighting strong opponents. I''m guessing Rhea doesn''t have the time to entertain you and she might not even be enough of a challenge to function as anything more than a punching bag. I don''t feel good about attacking you but for the sake of helping you improve I shall... Sorry..." Ares honestly felt bad about this and he didn''t want to do it. The guilt was hovering over his head but he knew what had to be done so he waited until Calla prepared herself.


    Calla hopped over in front of Ares and gave him another big hug while rubbing his head. "Don''t worry sweetie. Don''t feel bad, you''re a good wolfie! I used to die all the time when I was younger! I was a real adventurous type who got killed by all kinds of gruesome traps! Spikes! Pits! Crushing machines! Legacy tombs are pretty brutal you know? It''s not like I''ve won every fight ever as well. Getting beaten up in a Training Field by various mentors is something I''ll never forget so try not to be too reserved because it really is ok. I can handle it!"


    Ares just sighed and mentally readjusted. No amount of reassurance was actually going to ''reassure'' him but he appreciated the thought of her consoling him at least. He hadn''t expected a fight with his own mother and potentially even killing her so soon after meeting one another. What helped him ease into the situation was that he was being helpful here and what he was about to do served an actual purpose. It wasn''t mindless violence so that was something at least. "Alright, I think I''m good to go. I''ll adjust my pressure to be enough to be slightly more powerful than you. As you get stronger I''ll increase the pressure in increments until there''s nothing left for you to improve on. If there''s anything specific you want to do then let me know otherwise we can just fight normally."


    Calla let go of Ares and nodded. She walked back a few steps before turning around and facing Ares again. She was almost ready to square off but there was one more thing Calla wanted to do before the match started. She was weak in her human form so, naturally, she was going to bring out her revenant form. This was a big moment for Ares, specifically, as he''d never seen a revenant transformation before. Neither the process nor the end result were familiar to him so getting to finally see it would be nice. Maybe he could learn something about how best to approach his own transformation whenever that happened later? Or rather the real Ares, anyway. Clone Ares couldn''t transform...


    ...


    ...


    ...


    Or could he?! The only requirement was bloodline awakening but the clone had already achieved that thanks to the pagoda equalising his cultivation to match Calla''s! Actually, he probably had all the passives of the various cultivation realms he''d ''skipped''... Ok, new plan! Let Calla transform and help her for a while but, after that, maybe she could teach him a thing or two? Sure real Ares wouldn''t benefit from this but if the clone had access to the revenant transformation it would be... Well it would just be even more unbeatable than before... Infinity times two was still just infinity at the end of the day... But still! Ares wanted to transform! The clone had just assumed it would never experience it but now it realised there was no reason for that to be true! Who knows, maybe having access to it could end up mattering in some way? If some hitherto unknown prodigy came creeping up on him in the pagoda it would be a nice safety net. Also, if his revenant form was special, he could spread awareness of it outside the Primordial Blade''s barrier without having to hassle the real Ares to do it via Transmit! Long story short, today Ares'' clone would transform!