Since the objective had been decided, the next step was to formulate an appropriate plan.
In fact, according to Alaric's calculations, controlling Alaya was not as difficult as one might imagine.
Especially considering that, although the Type-Moon world possesses countless parallel worlds, the one Alaric had arrived in was the original Type-Moon world.
In other words, even the original Alaya had not yet fully come into existence, so where would infinite parallel worlds come from?
And this also meant that Alaric's plan would not suffer any interference, if he were in some parallel world, this would be impossible, because by that point the true Alaya would already have transcended the axis of time.
Alaric's plan was divided into two steps: first, force the gods of Earth to truly exit the stage; then, after Alaya is born, take control of her.
It sounded simple, just like putting an elephant into a refrigerator only takes three steps, but in reality, every single step was something no ordinary person could accomplish.
Take, for example, forcing the gods to withdraw from the stage of the world.
Although Alaric himself was powerful enough, he still fell short when it came to confronting chief gods. After all, such embodiments of rules had virtually no weaknesses.
The only reason Alaric had previously been able to challenge an entire pantheon alone was by relying on Hecate's power.
In other words, if Alaric wanted to wipe out the gods of the world, he would have to strengthen Hecate.
Strengthening Hecate and allowing her to take control of the world's leylines was something Alaric had been doing all along.
However, ending the Age of Gods by defeating the deities was merely treating the symptoms, not the root cause.
Just as the existence of magic is based on mana, the reason the gods could act freely across the land was due to the True Ether in the atmosphere.
True Ether was the oxygen of the gods.
Without it, the gods would either have to rely on the power of faith to sustain their consumption, or watch as their divine power stagnated, only entering and never leaving, until they inevitably declined and perished.
But as long as True Ether existed, even if Alaric killed one god, two gods, or even slaughtered an entire pantheon, more gods would continue to rise.
As long as the concept existed, gods would exist, this was something even Alaric could not prevent.
In other words, if he wanted to end the rule of the gods, Alaric had to cut off the True Ether on Earth and eliminate the faith of the gods.
Only by doing so could he truly and permanently liberate all humanity from their belief in divinity and allow Alaya to truly descend.
But how could he control Alaya?
That, too, was not something an ordinary person could achieve.
However, if Alaric wanted to accomplish this, he could learn from the gods.
The reason the gods were able to suppress the birth of Alaya was precisely because humanity believed in them.
Under the gods, humans could not attain free will, and thus Alaya could not be born.
So if Alaric wished to control Alaya after her birth, he could take a page from the gods' methods.
Of course, that did not mean making himself the sole god on Earth, because gods and humans were fundamentally different.
Gods were embodiments of rules, extensions of Gaia.
In other words, if divine power were used to rule the world, it would represent Gaia's power suppressing humanity's power, and Alaya would still remain asleep.
But was there another method, one that could control humanity while bypassing this issue?
Alaric had even considered signing slave contracts with every human in the world, but that was nothing more than a fantasy.
Even things like slave contracts or self-geas scrolls were not something that could be mass-produced like cabbages; even binding someone required a sufficient amount of power.
Such things could not be produced in bulk and could only be made personally.
But with the world's vast population, creating that many contracts would be an enormous undertaking for Alaric.
Moreover, new humans were being born every second. This meant the task could never truly end.
Even if soul materialization granted Alaric infinite mana, the speed at which he created contracts might not even match the rate of newborn births.
Therefore, controlling every human through magic in order to control Alaya was nothing more than nonsense.
So was there any other method?
The answer was yes, use human power to rule humanity.
This identity was that of a "King."
Divine authority and royal authority might both appear as forms of rule to humans, but on the level of mystical concepts, they were entirely different.
The power of a king also belonged to humanity.
Using a king's power to rule humans, from Alaya's perspective, was simply keeping the benefit within the same pot, it likewise represented the rise of humanity.
Thus, Alaric came up with such a plan.
If all humans in the world were to submit to a single king, then as the aggregation of their thoughts, their collective unconscious would also have to submit to that king.
Having settled on the plan, Alaric prepared to begin its execution.
As for how to cut off True Ether, Alaric already had a draft in mind.
However, to accomplish all of this, the most urgent matter was to transform Hecate from the "Magic Network Goddess of Egypt and Greece" into the Magic Network Goddess of the entire world.
Naturally, Alaric's plan could not be revealed to outsiders.
After learning many hidden secrets from the Heliopolis pantheon, Alaric finally left the Egyptian divine domain and returned to Greece.
Nitocris did not return with him. Perhaps stimulated by her rival in love, Hecate, she claimed that she was still too weak and would remain in Egypt to train under the gods of Heliopolis.
Originally, Nitocris had planned to become a goddess so that she could stand shoulder to shoulder with Hecate.
Of course, she did not become a goddess, or rather, she had already met the conditions to do so, but Ra, the ruler of the Heliopolis pantheon, refused to allow her ascension.
According to him, as a human, Nitocris could already live forever.
Becoming a goddess would only mean being buried alongside these old relics like them, which was hardly worth it.
However, Ra did agree to another matter: with their assistance, Nitocris would be able to advance further in Egyptian runic magecraft.
Although the gods did not truly understand magic, they had a thorough grasp of the rules they themselves governed.
Through the medium of divine runes, perhaps Nitocris could take Egyptian magecraft even further, becoming an unprecedented figure in this field throughout all history.
Of course, even separated by divine domains, Nitocris would not be lonely.
Because the power of Hecate, the Goddess of the Magic Network, connected both realms, through her, Alaric could still come to Nitocris's side at any time.
Thus, Alaric returned alone, leaving Nitocris by herself within her "Pyramid of Nitocris."
However, Alaric did not return entirely alone.
Accompanying him was a black cat.
Though it appeared to be just a cat, in truth it was a god, or rather, a deity who had abandoned divine power and descended to a half-human, half-divine state, what could be called the form of a "Saint."