If there was one being in the entire alliance who wasn't afraid of Felix or his void nation, then it had to be Elder Dragon...His treatment of Felix was just as disrespectful as the first time they had ever met.
"To be honest, shedding some tears was helpful to process my grief." Felix replied with a faint cold smile, "You should try it sometime...If you don't have a reason to shed a tear, it will be a pleasure of mine to help you with that."
The other rulers were taken back by Felix's indirect threat as they didn't think that he would be this ballsy to threaten the Elder Dragon!
'If he thinks that killing Duchess Alina or becoming a ruler makes him on the same level as Elder Dragon, then he is really asking for a beating.' High Chieftain Lokaka sneered.
As anticipated, Elder Dragon didn't seem to be too entertained by Felix's response.
"I see that your tongue has become sharper." Elder Dragon said calmly, "Child, it's best to know your place before I make you."
"Make me? We will see about that." Felix chuckled in derision.
With Felix's current level, he had not an ounce of fear or worry when dealing with Elder Dragon.
Elder Dragon had noticed this, which made him quite disgruntled.
"Keep behaving like this, there will be a day when your masters won't be there to save you."
Elder Dragon assumed that Felix's provocative actions were powered because of his masters backing him up.
"There will come a day when you realize that there is always a bigger fish than you." Felix remarked with a creepy smile, "It's coming sooner than you expect."
Seeing the rising tension between those two made everyone realize that if they left them talking, there would come a moment when Elder Dragon would end up losing his cool and do something all of them would regret.
So, before he could react to Felix's mysterious warning, Queen Alfreda cut him off.
"Enough, we are here to discuss what beyond the great void...All of us have the stuff to do and if you want to bicker with each other, do it at your own personal time."
"My apologies." Felix said.
"..."
Elder Dragon merely breathed a steaming smoke through his nostrils in displeasure, but he still respected everyone's time.
"Empress Emily, please take it away." Queen Alfreda requested.
Empress Emily expanded a 3D image of the universe in the center of the assembly, resembling a sphere with a hundred billion colorful galaxies within it.
It all looked fine and normal...However, if one zoomed at the bottom right of the universe, he would be shocked to see a humongous spherical blackness that we separating almost the entire bottom half of the universe from the rest!!!
It seemed out of place like a tumor inside a brain scan.
Empress Emily explained with an emotionless voice, "As you all know, our universe is believed to be still expanding without any interruption ever since its creation. However, the great void is challenging the base of this theory with its existence."
Felix and the others nodded with serious expressions as they stared at the great void...It was obviously non than that spherical blackness.
When there weren't many technological advancements, everyone believed that the great void was the end of the universe as it simply covered an unbelievable surface aura.
However, when technologies got advanced, the metal race was the first one to pick up light signals from behind the great void, which made them certain that life existed beyond it!
Unfortunately, the spatial size of the great void spanned over tens of billions of light years from the two nearest galaxies!
This distance was too much for even High Chieftain Lokaka to bridge with his wormhole. So, the only method left was to use multiple wormholes during the journey.
However, because none of them had ever been there or knew what was on the other side, this method was doomed to fail.
That's because opening a space worm without an exact location would result in being transported to almost anywhere inside the great void.
This was exactly what happened during the previous exploration attempt as High Chieftain Lokaka ended up getting lost in the great void for months before being able to get close enough to connect himself with his previous location in the alliance.
Ever since then, no one dared to attempt another expedition without some sort of a compass.
"This device might be the key to finally solving this mystery...We call it Light Mapper V1." Empress Emily showcased a cubical silver device that had some sort of a glass camera on all of its surfaces.
It might appear small here, but its real size was almost that of a small spaceship!
"How does it work exactly?" Queen Allura inquired.
"I can't tell you that." Empress Emily said bluntly.
"Tsk."
Queen Allura didn't push any further as she knew that the metal race almost never share information about such important new technologies before they take advantage of them first.
If this device really worked as a compass to the other side of the universe, then its value was priceless.
After all, an entire unexplored region of the universe meant billions of new possibilities for every race!
"It's still a prototype and has many flaws that need to be solved...However, we believe it won't take us much time before we fix them all and use the device in our expedition."
"If that's so, then we have to create a new expedition team and prepare them for the journey." Queen Allura proposed, "I suggest each inner circle member will have the option to send one exploration team to represent their race."
"I guess it's fair that way." Queen Alfreda agreed.
The rest nodded in agreement as well.
They understood that if news of this device was released to the inner circle members and they weren't invited to the expedition, hell would break loose.
"We have to set some rules in case the expedition has succeeded and we reached the other side." Emperor Lokhil remarked.
"Of course." Queen Allura said, "The most important rule is to set up signal towers in each planet, meteor, moon, or surface during the exploration."
Since there wouldn't be many people using the consciousness technique that enabled anyone with access to their consciousness space to become a tower signal himself, then they had to be primitive and use tower signals again.
"In addition, for each civilization we meet across, we must not antagonize them. It's best to offer them the same conditions to join our alliance."
"What if they are much stronger than us?" Emperor Lokhil frowned, "We have no clue what kind of monsters and races are on the other side."
"That's a risk we have to be willing to take for the prosperity of the alliance." Queen Alfreda said calmly.
While they were discussing this, Felix was listening with one ear and using the other in his conversation with his tenants...It was on this subject as well.
Felix had already asked them about the great void before and what lay behind it since they lived for billions of years...If they had no clue about its origin, then no one really would know.
Unfortunately, none of them bothered to answer him as they always told him to focus on what was near him first.
Now that the subject was brought out again and this time the alliance even had a method of exploring that hidden portion of the universe, Felix had to ask them again.
"You will find out soon and in great detail." Thor said with a wry smile.
"What do you mean?"
This answer baffled Felix as he was put under the assumption that he had to reach the other side of the universe to find out.
Too bad, the tenants didn't bother to clear his doubts when they knew that he was going to find out about it eventually.
In their eyes, it was best that it didn't come from them as the truth was honestly too shocking for anyone to accept...