"You're very impressive, Gravis," Jake said from the side with a distant look. It was like he fell into melancholy and was thinking about someone dear to him that he had lost.
"What do you mean?" Gravis asked.
Jake sighed. "Many people try to create a loving and close family while still cultivating. Yet, as you know, not everyone can keep up. For mortals, a century is their entire life, while for us, it's basically nothing. When Cultivators create families, they always have to decide between cultivation or their family."
"One Law Comprehension session can take multiple centuries, and even Spirit Forming Cultivators would see their entire life end during that time. To us, not seeing our family for a hundred years is not a big deal, but to someone far weaker, it may even be their entire life."
"We feel like we take a lot of time for our loved ones, but our loved ones feel abandoned since we haven't visited them in over a decade. Families break apart and get estranged. The children will feel like their father had never been part of their life, while for their father, it only felt like a coffee break."
"When someone that still chases after power creates a family, it nearly always ends in tragedy, but not you," Jake said. "You managed to have a loving daughter while still chasing power. You can take your breaks to comprehend Laws and return while nothing has changed."
Instead of appreciating the sentiment, Yersi felt sad. She knew exactly why Jake envied Gravis.
How powerful was Jake? How long had Jake lived? How long would one Law Comprehension session of his take?
To put this into perspective, Jake planned to dedicate himself to a 10,000 year long Law Comprehension session as soon as he had worked enough. This would be five times as long as Yersi had already been alive.
This was like a 20-year-old meeting their love for the first time. Then, that love would leave for 100 years until they would return. How long would that feel? Their love would have been gone for far longer than the person had been alive for.
Because of this, Jake made the decision to extend his shift for another 10,000 years. Only when they had been together for 10,000 years could he feel comfortable enough to leave for 10,000 years.
Yersi was keeping Jake away from his cultivation, and she felt guilty for that.
Jake wanted to become more powerful, but he had to put his goal on hold because of Yersi.
Additionally, what about after that? Yersi was probably not powerful enough to survive her first tribulation, which meant that she would die in about 48,000 years. If Jake wanted to continue cultivating while still keeping in contact with Yersi, he would probably cultivate for around 20,000 of the 48,000 years. This meant that Yersi would only see him for around 50% of her life.
What about completely abandoning cultivation until Yersi was gone? Then, Jake would have lost an entire 25% of his longevity. After 50,000 years of peace, would he even find the strength to risk his life again?
Jake loved Yersi, but this love also hurt him. He wanted to become more powerful, but he couldn't accept leaving her for this long. Yet, cultivating in shorter bursts wouldn't be nearly as effective as concentrating fully on the Law. It would be a waste of time and money.
Yersi decided to tell her father about Jake's worries. Yersi and Jake had talked a lot about this topic. Jake always said it was not such a big deal, but Yersi knew that he was only saying this to reassure her. Yersi knew precisely how important cultivation was to Jake.
In the past, Jake had had a family already, but it had ended in tragedy. Back then, he had vowed to never create a new family again until he achieved true power. This had continued for over 100,000 years.
Then, he met Yersi, and he immediately felt like she was the one. He also felt like he must not let this opportunity slip away from him, or he would never get this opportunity again.
Jake and Yersi leaned against each other. Jake spoke slowly and quietly with some humor in-between to disguise his pain, while Yersi had some tears in her eyes from time to time. She knew that Jake was only hiding his actual pain and regret.
Gravis listened to all their worries and looked to the side. Yet, he didn't look to the side with an expression of pain.
He had an expression of pure rage in his eyes.
"Highest Heaven," Gravis said with gritted teeth.
Yersi and Jake were surprised by Gravis' rage. "What do you mean?" Yersi asked.
"This is the highest Heaven's doing," Gravis said as he looked back at them. "You said you wanted to stop cultivating. You were fine with being an Immortal. Yet, what would that mean for me? It would mean that there was a chance that you would already be dead when I return. I don't know how long I will stay in the higher worlds, but it might be several times my normal longevity."
"I know this, but I still decided to go through with this. Yet, while doing so, I will lose you. I accepted that since this was your own life, and I want you to be happy. However, when you die, there would be one less person to use against me in the future."
"Then, just a short time after you decided to stop cultivating, you just so happen to meet a perfectly compatible life partner that swore to never have a family again. Yet, after over 100,000 years and seeing billions upon billions of beings, this one person just immediately fell in love with you and broke their oath."
"Staying with you means pain, but that person still decides to stay with you. Giving you pain might not motivate you to continue cultivating but giving pain to the most loved person in your life will."
"Heaven is doing this so that you will decide to continue cultivating because as long as you become stronger, your longevity will increase, and the more your longevity increases, the happier you two will become together."
"And it can use you against me in the future."
Jake looked with awkward confusion at Gravis while Yersi also wasn't sure what she should think about Gravis' words. She knew that Gravis had beef with the highest Heaven, but this sounded more like a conspiracy. Did Gravis see the highest Heaven's hand behind every minor setback?
BANG!
Gravis punched the ground, destroying a lot of it. "And the worst thing is that I can't even be angry at it!" he nearly shouted.
"What am I supposed to be angry about!? Am I supposed to be angry that the highest Heaven brought your one true love to you!? Am I supposed to be angry about that!? I can't!" Gravis said with aggression.
"It gave you an incredibly sweet reward, free of charge, but then it said that you will get an even sweeter reward if you do something for it. Yet, in the end, it's not forcing anything on you! If you want, you can keep that sweet reward without doing anything. I can't get mad at something like that."
"Yet, I am furious!" Gravis shouted.
Yersi felt worried for her father while Jake narrowed his eyes and stepped in front of Yersi.
"Calm down, Gravis," he said with a deep voice. "And just to be clear, are you insinuating that I am manipulating Yersi?" he asked with aggression.
"Of course not!" Gravis shouted back. "You are a victim just like her. You can't do anything about this. I know that you love her with all your heart. That's exactly the thing that makes me so angry! Absolutely nothing bad has happened. Not even the highest Heaven has done anything bad."
"Yet, it still feels like I'm being suppressed!"
"Gravis," Jake said with furrowed brows. "You are paranoid. Not everything bad that happens is the fault of Heaven. I know that you have quite a shaky past with Heaven, but that doesn't mean that everything bad that happens to you happens because of Heaven."
"This is simply how the world is," Jake said. "Sometimes, we simply decide to be together with someone we love, even if we already know that the love might end in tragedy."
"Why? Because we love them, and our time together outweighs the pain of the tragedy," Jake said.
Gravis took a deep breath to calm down. He knew exactly how crazy he sounded right now. No one would believe someone if they said that the overpowering ruler of the world involved themselves into their life this much. This showed an extraordinary delusion of perceived grandness about oneself.
"Forget what I said," Gravis said. "I have handled the situation incorrectly and made it about myself. This is your life, not mine. Not everything revolves around me."
Jake's eyes sparkled with a hidden gleam of shock, but he didn't let it show. Then, Jake nodded. "I know it's painful, but as long as you understand, everything is fine."
Yersi felt torn and wasn't certain what she should feel right now. She felt like Gravis didn't mean what he said, but she also knew that Gravis never lied. Because of that, the things that he had just said must be true, right?
"Let me just calm down and finish my comprehension about Core," Gravis said with a superficial, warm tone. "We can talk all we want after that, okay?" he said as he stroked Yersi's hair.
Yersi's body shook when she felt Gravis' touch, and some tears streamed down her face. She looked at Gravis and nodded. "Okay."
Then, Gravis teleported away.
Silence.
While Gravis was flying, he felt his lightning, and it was absolutely furious.
Jake had seen it because of his superior power.
And Yersi had felt it due to her close connection with her father.
Gravis had lied.