Lightning Is the Only Way

The Empress furrowed her brows in confusion. "You want to reach supreme power without having any offspring?" she asked in confusion.

Gravis nodded. "If I have children, I will love them with all my heart. They would be like another life of mine, and I can't rest and cultivate easily as long as I don't know if they're safe or not. Right now, I don't have the power to protect them from danger."

"Yet, I also don't want my path to end in this world. As soon as I have enough power to protect them, I would be at the peak of the world, which means that I can ascend into the next world. Because of that, I can't have children in this world. I'm sure that I can help you some other way. If you want, I will also just join the Empire as a normal beast," Gravis explained.

The Empress had a very complex look on her face. She wasn't really angry or frustrated about the fact that Gravis just said that he didn't want to do the one thing that his position required of him.

Her face looked more like complex pity.

"Gravis," she said slowly. "Do you know why everyone wants to become my mate?" she asked.

Gravis narrowed his eyes as he heard that question. This question seemingly came out of nowhere. Was the Empress trying to entice him to reconsider?

"Isn't it because of the feeling of power that they might feel after bedding an Emperor and the associated status?" Gravis asked.

The Empress shook her head. "This might motivate some of the Lords, but not so many of them. Additionally, why do you think I give out so many rewards to the Kings for a good mate?"

Gravis also thought about that. "You probably also get something out of this, right?" he asked.

The Empress nodded. "Yes. I am searching for powerful beasts so that I can learn about the Laws of Life," she said.

"Laws of Life?" Gravis asked, taken aback.

receive a lot of insights about the Law of

these words, they would be shocked and appalled. Yet, Gravis understood that beasts really didn't care about their offspring. Mortal animals might care about them, but

a path to power, and an incredibly vast majority would die on that path. Artificially increasing the offspring's power with the parents' help would make it only more challenging for the offspring to become powerful themselves. That's why beasts

might not reproduce as crazily

Children brought light and happiness to their lives, and Gravis wasn't

asked. "You said there is more than

making Gravis nervous. He had expected her to scoff at him or grow enraged by his disrespect. Yet, the Empress

sighed again. "You are really unlucky," she

not mating with you? I'm fine with that. Not getting the reward might seem like a loss, but having children might

want to reach supreme

he heard that. "Wait, what? Are you saying

she sighed again. Right

are all the potential candidates in the previous competition Lords and not Kings

narrowed his eyes. "I don't know,"

the necessary breeding that Lords are required to partake in to

felt his insides shake.

King without having produced a certain amount of offspring," the Empress said, making Gravis' world freeze out of sheer

of a level five Lord. No matter how much they eat or how many Laws they comprehend, the evolution to become

completely stopped, and he couldn't comprehend what was happening right now.

at Gravis with complex pity. "Normally, a level five Lord needs to produce around 1,000

my mates get from me is that their offspring will become Divine Beasts. For some reason, as long as your offspring is a Divine Beast, you don't need to have so

was the Empress saying? He was required to have children in order to reach the Nascent Nourishing Realm? This was a joke,

this was only Gravis' optimism speaking. Deep down, he knew that she wasn't joking,