Chapter 7213: The Ultimate Provocation With the help of Ves, the Dark Apostle managed to formulate a dignified means for his people to work on behalf of red humanity. Both of them knew that the Ascended Giants could not exist without the support of the humans that spawned them. The dream of attaining immediate independence and carving out their own territory in the new frontier was an unrealistic fantasy. If they truly declared their independence from red humanity, then they would not only lose its protection, but also turn themselves into the most vulnerable prey in the Red Ocean! The only way to survive at that point was to give up a portion of their independence and pledge their service to a strong civilization. The only other choice that the giants could make besides red humanity was the Red Cabal. It did not take much thinking for Ves and the Dark Apostle to conclude that the Evolution Witch would drop everything and hunt down as many treacherous giants as possible. Their continued existence in the service of the native aliens represented an insult so severe that the strongest backer of the Red Collective had no choice but to make an example out of the traitors! This strategic direction obviously led to certain death. Therefore, it became important to formulate a different strategic direction that would keep the giants aligned with red humanity. From the initial reactions of the humans and the giants in the conference room, the Dark Apostle grew reassured. The giants could understand his decisions and why it became important for the Ascended Giants to take up a mercenary attitude towards their relationship with red humanity. The humans on the other hand knew that this was the best that they could get. It may be weird for the Red Collective to treat one of its most powerful departments as if it was an external contractor, but at least the two would be able to preserve a semblance of a relationship with each other. While the Dark Apostle made a good start by presenting his three guiding principles, his initial framework still had room for improvement. The fact that he was being frank about it made it easier to suggest changes and additions. This was a remarkable departure from when the Oscillating Fist was in charge. He hoarded power so much that the giants became paralyzed when their polemarchos remained absent for a duration of several months. The Fiery Axe possessed the least amount of inhibitions when it came to testing her new leader’s tolerance. Now that the Ascended Giants had entered a period of transition, this was an excellent opportunity to squeeze in her own suggestions! It would be much harder to get her way when the Phase Lord Department had settled into its new direction. "Your guiding principles are largely functional." She told her current polemarchos. "That is understandable. You needed to cover the basics. I just think that we can do better by adding a more aspirational goal on top of that. The Ascended Giants need to do more than secure their short-term survival in a dwarf galaxy dominated by several powerful races and civilizations. You need to set a higher-level ideal that we must strive towards. This will be the motivation that will drive our fellow giants to behave in a more acceptable manner." The Dark Apostle furrowed his brows. "I... do not understand what you are saying. Can you give me an example?" "It is not that complicated, sir." Eliza Mo Ragadan spoke up. "Take the Terrans. They all take pride in their old heritage and have always tried to restore the original Terran Empire as that used to be the time when they were at the top. Even if this goal was no longer realistic anymore, the Terrans never cared for it. They never fractured any further and always remained united by this shared goal." "I am beginning to see what you mean..." "The Rubarthans on the other hand derive their pride from their Star Emperors and their meritocracy." The chief of staff continued. "These are the twin pillars that props up the Rubarthan identity. It would be much harder for the Rubarthans to defend their distinct culture and identity if they lack these institutional totems as it were. Every group needs to look up to something. This can be anything so long as it generates enough pride. Think of gods, national pride, racial pride, government model and even hatred against others." For whatever reason, the Dark Apostle latched on the word ’totem’. He imagined every civilization as a tribe of cavemen that gathered in the center of their tent camp, only to fall on their knees to offer their worship to a carved wooden totem. What the Fiery Axe suggested and Eliza elaborated upon was nothing more than a more sophisticated way to carve totems for the ’tribe’. Now that the Dark Apostle understood the Fiery Axe’s suggestion, he indeed recognized that his initial framework placed too much emphasis on stabilizing the present and not enough on striving towards a better future. The giants needed a source of hope and motivation in order to bring the best out of them. It didn’t need to be anything modest or realistic. They could go big in this aspect. So what could serve as a powerful and compelling enough totem for the Ascended Giants? Attaining godhood was an obvious answer, but the second principle already dealt with it. Besides, the Dark Apostle felt that putting way too much emphasis on divinity was counterproductive. The more the giants obsessed over it, the greater the probability that they would fight back against his moderate regime! "If I may, I can offer you a suggestion." Formation Master Andrea Vos spoke up. "If you are brave enough to take up this challenge, then I suggest you strive to compete against alien phase leaders. The native aliens have produced phase lords much longer than us. This should ordinarily put your giants beneath your alien counterparts, because the latter had much more time to understand their strengths and produce larger and more powerful native gods. As upstarts, it is not impossible to surpass them in a short amount of time. As long as you work hard enough and embrace the changes that the alien phase lords have eschewed, you can potentially become the dominant variant of phase leaders in the Red Ocean." That was quite an ambitious suggestion. It was also a dangerous one. By declaring that the Ascended Giants seek to replace and surpass the alien phase lords in this dwarf galaxy, the former would definitely provoke the latter! The native gods possessed a sense of pride that was not any weaker than that of the giants! The declaration would spark a fierce rivalry that could lead to a lot of brutal confrontations between Ascended Giants and alien phase lords. What was clever about this human suggestion was that this polarizing goal would vastly reduce the chance that the two different groups would reconcile with each other and develop friendly relations based on shared traits. In that sense, this was a proposal that clearly benefited red humanity. The question now was whether it was beneficial for the Ascended Giants to antagonize the only other group of phase lords in this dwarf galaxy. "Thoughts?" The Divine Harpoon spoke first. "It will be easier for red humans to trust our race if we openly seek to replace the competition as opposed to joining it. Accepting this proposal will burn any bridge we have with the Red Cabal, but it will also produce clarity for our fellow giants. Once we adopt this ideal, we will close any chance for the giants to defect to our enemies." That might be good for red humanity, but not necessarily for the Ascended Giants. One of the reasons that red humanity treated the giants with a lighter touch was the threat of driving the latter into defecting to the Red Cabal. By removing this threat, the Ascended Giants would become overly dependent on red humanity. The latter would gain a great amount of leverage and would no longer have to placate the giants so much. However, the Dark Apostle hated the instability that came with keeping this channel open. He wanted to take total control over the Ascended Giants, and he knew that he had no choice but to rely heavily on the support of the Red Collective to maintain high reign past a single 20-year term. "What do you two think?" "I like it." The Fiery Axe grew eager. "We will make powerful enemies if we embrace this goal, but it will light a fire in our hearts and drive us to excel. If we do not have the courage to challenge the original phase lords, then we do not deserve our pride! In fact, we shouldn’t limit ourselves to surpassing alien phase lords. We should strive to surpass the originals, the phase whales who always consider themselves to be the truest descendants of the Elder Gods!" The Grapple King raised a palm. "Slow down, Fiery Axe. I admire your sentiment, but let us not be too hasty. The phase whales are powerful beyond measure. Not even the alien phase lords dare to be too explicit about trying to surpass their original teachers and guides. If we openly challenge the phase whales for dominion, the latter will drop their remaining complacency and target us specifically. We cannot withstand their full might." "Pff! Let them come! We are not alone! We can beat them if we team up with the humans! Besides, if we want to do this right, then we should go big! We should strive to become the only phase leaders of the Red Ocean! By vanquishing and eradicating the alien competition, we will prove with our deeds that we are their successors. Old is not always better." The Farseer nodded with approval. "Just as homo sapiens had once driven homo erectus to extinction, a new species of giants can also do the same with the established species of phase leaders. This will be the ultimate display of strength and success. Many red humans will be willing to worship your leaders as gods for helping to eradicate your alien counterparts." She may sound a little too blatant about it, but the giants did not care. They already fell in love with this aspiration! The Dark Apostle finally issued his verdict. "Very well. Let this be our fourth guiding principle. The Ascended Giants must become the ultimate phase leaders or die trying. We will never cease to compete against alien phase lords and phase whales until we have defeated all of them. We must become the only gods of our kinds in the Red Ocean!" Go big or go home! It was better to be overly ambitious than overly cautious when it came to setting an ideal! Though there were obvious problems with this aspirational goal, the Dark Apostle did not hesitate for too long and readily embraced the suggestion! This was how the giants set their policies. As long as their leader thought it was alright, the giants would readily follow suit. If any of them disagreed, then they were welcome to issue a leadership challenge at the next possible opportunity. Keeping himself open to such challenges would allow the Dark Apostle to get away with behavior that others considered tyrannical. It gave the rank-and-file giants a means to fight back against a policy they objected towards. If they wanted to change how the Ascended Giants operated in the Red Ocean, then they just had to prove their fist was stronger than that of their leader! Until that happened, the giants should comply with the new rules so long as they did not goo too far. "The humans started from a single solar system in the vast and dangerous Milky Way." The Dark Apostle said. "From this humble start, they defeated and humiliated the Seven Apex Races and took over half the galaxy. We can follow their example. So long as we remain patient and take this step by step, we can progressively grow stronger and ultimately become powerful enough to pull the mightiest phase lords and phase whales from their thrones!"