Chapter 451: Angels Can Also Be Friends
Perhaps most people, upon hearing the Grand Priest say something like that, would only grasp one layer of meaning.
After all, with a guilty conscience, they would most likely see the angels—including the Grand Priest himself—as potential enemies.
But Uchiha Dali didn't feel that way at all.
He'd always had a favorable impression of angels.
Even though the Grand Priest had warned him at the start.
Now, from the Grand Priest's tone and choice of words, he understood two possible meanings.
The first was what anyone could understand: if the Grand Zeno ever ordered the angels to deal with him, then the always-neutral angel race would have no choice but to carry out the Grand Zeno's command.
Of course, that kind of situation was almost impossible.
The reason was simple.
Uchiha Dali knew the story of Dragon Ball.
He knew the Grand Zeno didn't allow angels to fight or take part in conflicts.
If they broke that rule, even angels would be erased. One had already been erased in the past for violating it.
Not even the Grand Priest could plead for mercy.
Since it was a rule the Grand Zeno himself had established, he had no reason to break it with his own hands.
If he truly needed the angels' power, why would he have made such a rule in the first place?
Nothing is absolute, of course—just that the probability was extremely low.
That was why Uchiha Dali leaned more toward the second meaning hidden in the Grand Priest's words.
If the angels ever chose to abandon their neutrality, they could become Uchiha Dali's friends. They didn't necessarily have to be his enemies.
So after understanding all of that, Uchiha Dali looked noticeably more relaxed.
He replied, "Grand Priest, I won't do anything outrageous. You can trust me on that."
"At least, not right now."
"But I'm curious—since you've seen what's about to happen to me, what will you choose to do?"
"Will you report it to the Grand Zeno?"
Uchiha Dali asked, testing him.
Hearing this, the Grand Priest only clasped his hands behind his back and looked down at him from above.
After a moment, he emphasized, "The angel race is neutral."
"Absolutely neutral."
That was already an answer.
In other words, he wouldn't tell the Grand Zeno about Uchiha Dali's ambitions.
However, if the Grand Zeno noticed something on his own and ordered the angels to act against Uchiha Dali, that would be a different matter entirely.
Receiving the Grand Priest's answer directly eased Uchiha Dali's heart even more.
As long as the Grand Priest didn't report him, he would practically be safe from danger.
"If there's nothing else, I'll continue meditating, Grand Priest."
Uchiha Dali sat cross-legged again.
Right now, everything else was secondary. Improving his divinity was what truly mattered.
He had gone from having only one or two points of divinity to accumulating more than two thousand.
During that time, he had clearly felt the overwhelming difference that divinity created.
Divinity didn't directly increase combat power.
But it affected something much deeper—the strength of the soul, or more precisely, the divine soul.
Divinity strengthened the divine soul.
The stronger the divine soul, the greater the heights one could reach.
And only then, when facing opponents of the same level or stronger, would one still have the power to fight.
To put it simply, once a god reached the level above a God of Destruction, battles between gods were no longer about fists and brute strength.
What they competed with was the strength of their divinity and divine soul.
These two factors were the core of high-level divine battles.
As he accumulated more divinity, Uchiha Dali naturally came to understand this through the changes it created in his body.
So right now, he urgently needed to continue raising his divinity.
Otherwise—put bluntly, not to belittle himself—his current divinity wasn't even on Beerus's level. If they were to fight, Beerus, with divinity bolstering his divine soul, would be stronger on that front.
They might end up evenly matched.
Uchiha Dali would be stronger in energy, while Beerus's divine soul would surpass his. The two would cancel each other out, leaving him with no advantage at all.
Seeing Uchiha Dali enter meditation again, the Grand Priest glanced meaningfully at his thousand-plus clones.
He understood the technique to some extent, but he wasn't adept with it himself.
More than a thousand clones identical to the original, each possessing the same overwhelming strength.
Just that alone was enough to terrify almost any opponent.
"In a place where time flows so much more slowly than the outside world, he can still reach this level of divine comprehension… truly rare."
"It seems this dimension is finally on the verge of a great upheaval…"
The Grand Priest thought silently, then vanished in a flicker.
...
Elsewhere, after another hour of training, Beerus had already achieved complete mastery of Perfected Ultra Instinct.
His attacks had become even more ferocious.
Whis, who had been calm and composed at first, now had a slightly more serious expression.
Occasionally, he even had to use his other hand to block Beerus's strikes.
"Lord Beerus, it seems your Ultra Instinct has reached full completion."
Whis praised him while defending.
Beerus could feel his own improvement as well.
Each punch hit harder than the last, his speed steadily rising, and all kinds of abilities—dodge, reaction speed, everything—refreshing in rapid succession.
Every single second brought new changes, pushing him toward greater and greater strength.
And yet, Beerus still wore a stern, grim look, not smiling in the slightest.
Seeing that expression, Whis had already guessed most of it.
As Beerus's strength increased, so did his divinity, allowing him to grasp divine abilities he hadn't understood or fully mastered before.
Once this process began, it only accelerated. And ultimately, the result would be exactly what he suspected.
Even without being told, Beerus would come to understand the situation regarding Uchiha Dali.
"Whis."
Beerus suddenly stopped attacking. He floated in the air with his hands behind his back, his tail swaying lightly.
"Are you taking a break, Lord Beerus?"
Whis also stopped and looked at him curiously.
"Tell me the truth, Whis. If I were to fight Uchiha Dali with everything I have, who would have the better chance of winning?"
Beerus asked.
Whis's gaze flickered. "That's… a difficult question, Lord Beerus…"
"Is that really the truth?"
"Well, the truth is that right now, there's still a slight gap between you and Uchiha Dali."
"Of course, if—"
Before Whis could finish, Beerus became furious and launched at him again. "If that's the case, then help me raise my power! Whis!"
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