"You aren't allowed to have children as a King?" Alex asked King Jin with a quizzing look on his face. This was one of the weirder things he had heard in recent times for certain.
In most other places, including his own, Kings, and Emperors would be heavily suggested, almost forced to reproduce so that they could have heirs.
And yet, to hear that such a thing was not what happened in the Kingdoms of the Eastern Continent was certainly weird.
The king shook his head in response to his question. "The moment any of the 6 of us wish to have offspring, we must put aside our crowns," he said. "That is the vow we made to His Majesty."
"But why?" Alex asked. "Did he give any reason?"
"No, not really," the King said. "We have a few speculations, but there is no concrete answer."
"What do you think the reason is?" Alex asked.
The king looked at Alex, and then at the two retainers he had by his side. Seeing them all, he wondered if it was a good idea to reveal the information. In the end, as long it didn't harm His Majesty, then he didn't see how it could be bad to share.
"Well, it most likely has to do with the previous kings who were thinking of rebelling against His Majesty," the King said. "It is said that one gets greedier when they have children. They no longer just have themselves to think about, but their offspring too. As a result, they start daring to defy and do things for themselves."
"His Majesty might believe that to be the reason why the previous kings tried to rebel against him," the King said. "As a result, he no longer allows the Kings who sit on the throne to have someone to change them."
"I… see," Alex said.
"Well, it could also be that he doesn't want the Kings to get distracted. That might be the case," the king said. "Either way, it's all speculative. I'm sure His Majesty had compelling reasons to stop us from having children."
"Do you want to have children?" Alex asked.
"Hm… that's not something I can answer right away," the King said. "I still wish to be a King for a long time, so I haven't really thought about it. Hehe, maybe I'll get a family once I too go to the Immortal lands."
The king's hearty laugh made everyone feel cheerful again.
While others moved on the front of the topic, Alex continued wondering why the Emperor would ever not want the Kings to have children. Was he really worried about another rebellion?
But that shouldn't be the case. As Alex could see, the two strong individuals next to the King were definitely not under him entirely. If he wasn't wrong, they were from the Head Legion and directly reported to the Emperor.
'Weird,' he thought and stopped wondering about it after a while. The carriage passed through multiple bridges and past a few gardens before arriving at a massive gate that lead to the King's palace.
The palace was fancy, just as fancy as Alex's own palace.
It was a large palace, nestled within lush emerald gardens that still managed to show off its awe-inspiring grandeur. Alex walked through the intricately carved wooden doors that held a golden figure of an Azure Dragon on them.
The insides of the building were made with white marble, and the walls were adorned with jade figures with green silk tapestries hung from the wall.
He could already smell some sweet aroma that permeated the air inside.
Alex looked around at everything he could see, most of which was green in color.
"Is there a reason why your kingdom is called the Emerald Kingdom?" Alex asked. "The information I received said that it was something that was made so you didn't have any connection to it in the name."
"Yeah, that's about it," the King said. "Also because of the Hundred Blossom Valley with all the greenery. The Emperor just chose the colors that matched some important features of the land."
"Oh, so the other kingdoms match their colors too?" Alex asked.
"Yes," the king said. "You'll see it in due time."
Alex was then taken to a hall where he sat and conversed in detail with the King about various things. The King was extremely friendly, as someone would have to be in front of an Alchemist as terrifyingly talented as Alex.
He tried to mix in a few hints of him wanting some pills from Alex, which Alex gave up in the end and promised to give a few pills to aid with cultivation.
After a few more hours of conversation, Alex retreated to the room that he would be staying in for the foreseeable future.
After a brief search of the room, he called out Pearl and Whisker. "Are we there?" Pearl asked, looking around the room.
"Yes, we're at the Emerald Kingdom," Alex told Pearl.
"And are we going to go to the Beast Paradise next?" Pearl asked. That was the plan they had made since it was quite close.
"We'll have to see. As long as I can make an excuse to go there, I will," Alex said. "Given how close it is to the Azure Dragon's secret realm, it might be a little harder than we are envisioning thought."
"No, I'm sure we'll succeed. We'll have to believe in ourselves," Alex said. "But that comes later. I have to spend the next upcoming month preparing to go into the Endless Shadow Abyss."
"Prepare well," a voice spoke from his mind. Godslayer had been listening to his conversation as well. He had woken up a long time ago and was now slowly helping Alex where the could.
There wasn't much for him to do, so he lay low for now, asking Alex to feed him a bit of the Death aura whenever he could. However, lately, he had started getting a little more active after hearing about something from Alex that had caught his attention.
"We should take it all away," he said. "We can't let any stay in there. I want it all."
"We will see how it works," Alex said. "I'm not even sure if the reports are correct or not."
"Doesn't matter," Godslayer said. "We'll try our best. The Endless Shadow Abyss's darkness aura must all be taken away."
Alex sighed. He had read in one of the books that the reason why Endless Shadow Abyss was called such was that it used Darkness aura to create the world.
Alex wasn't sure how strong the object that created the world was, but he was damn sure he would find it and have Godslayer consume it.
With both Darkness and Death aura being consumed at once, Godslayer would improve his strength to a level that hopefully rivaled when Alex first met him.
Afterward, Alex went back to cultivating with the rest of them, waiting for tomorrow to come so that he could go roam the city.
However, come morning, the King arrived outside his door with good news to deliver to him.
Thanks to the news of his arrival in Greenheart City, the elders at the Cloud Iron sect had hurried and sent over Talia, who had arrived in the city last night.
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