The two of them talked for over a day, just about random stuff, but at some point, Orpheus actually had to get back to work, and Gravis also wanted to walk around some more. So, the two of them split up again.
Gravis relaxed for the remainder of the year, and when the year was up, he also met back up with Orthar and Yersi. Gravis didn't want to disturb them while they were learning a ton about business and human society.
Orthar's thirst for knowledge had only grown more powerful. The more he learned about the more complex facets of human society, the more intrigued he became. He even asked Gravis for some Immortal Stones so that he could read as many books as possible.
Yersi became a social butterfly, and she spent most of her time just visiting public places and talking with others. There were not only Immortals in this city, but also the progeny and friends of Immortal Kings. Because of that, she made a ton of friends weaker and stronger than her.
Gravis' mother entered the auction for the new shop and promptly won it for around 625,000 Immortal Stones. Of course, she disguised herself before entering the auction. If she appeared as herself, everyone would not even dare to compete with her, and she knew that Gravis wouldn't want a shop that had been claimed with such methods.
Gravis also visited some public places and talked with a lot of people. Sadly, there was not much he could talk about with others. The powerful Immortals and Immortal Kings were not interested in talking to a new Immortal, while the other new Immortals were far below Gravis' level. Their mindsets were just too far apart.
Over 80% of the Immortals in the city had an Avatar created with the Law of Space, which surprised Gravis. This was the easiest and worst Law to create an Avatar with, and Gravis hadn't expected that so many of them would use this Law. Wasn't the highest world supposed to be the most elite place?
After talking some more with Orpheus, Gravis found out that this wasn't the case. Due to the overabundance of easily cultivatable techniques and methods to comprehend Laws, many Immortals had not had that much combat experience. Yes, they still needed to have a powerful Will-Aura to even reach this Realm, but there were many methods to boost a Will-Aura in the highest world.
Surprisingly, the average Battle-Strength of Cultivators in higher worlds was far above the average Battle-Strength for Cultivators in the highest world.
Yet, these numbers were only valid when one looked at the average Battle-Strength. It was entirely different when one talked about the Cultivators with Peak Battle-Strength.
Opposer City was mainly populated by Cultivators that were no longer interested in growing more powerful. There were still some that only lived here for a short amount of time to get some money to continue their Cultivation, like Gravis, but these people were in the minority.
Cultivators mainly stopped cultivating when they saw that their Battle-Strength had become weak. Continuing to cultivate with such a weak Battle-Strength would very likely result in their death. That was why there were so many weaker Immortals in this city.
The truly powerful Immortals couldn't be found in the city. These powerful Cultivators were outside, still tempering themselves or living inside Clans and Sects. The methodical teachings of a powerful Sect, together with the abundant resources from the highest world, created some terrifying monsters.
There were even some Immortals that had the Law of the Dead World as an Avatar, which was insanely impressive. Of course, these Immortals were supremely rare. If an Immortal managed to create such an Avatar, all the Peak Sects would fight for such a talented Cultivator. In total, there were probably less than ten.
Yet, they still existed.
But there was another Law that was even rarer than the Law of the Dead World.
Surprisingly, it was the Law of Freedom.
When Gravis first told Orpheus about the Law of Freedom, Orpheus didn't even know that this Law existed. Gravis was incredibly shocked when he heard that. Orpheus was a powerful Star God, and he didn't even know that this Law existed? This seemingly made no sense.
So, Gravis visited his father again, who was adamantly talking with the Black Magnate. Even after a whole year, the Black Magnate had not left. Gravis simply joined them and asked about the Law of Freedom.
"Oh yeah, the Law of Freedom is tough to understand," the Black Magnate said. "Understanding the Law of Freedom is actually the third hardest step to becoming a Heaven's Magnate. Even a lot of Divine Gods don't know it."
This shocked Gravis even more. There were even Divine Gods that didn't know it?
"Why?" Gravis asked.
"The reason for that is the fourth hardest step," the Black Magnate said, "which is the Law of Suppression. Comprehending Suppression while you are already quite powerful is difficult. The more powerful you become, the less likely it is for you to get suppressed, which logically makes it harder to comprehend suppression."
"So, to learn the Law of Freedom, you first need to know the Law of Suppression, but the more Cultivators know about the power of Suppression, the harder it is to escape from it and comprehend Freedom."
"Huh," Gravis said with some surprise. "What are the hardest steps?"
"They are-"
"No," the Opposer interfered. "If you tell him that now, he will laser-focus on that Law and try to comprehend it."
Gravis frowned while the Black Magnate sighed. "Alright, alright."
The Opposer turned to Gravis. "The last two steps are the very last steps you need to take to become a Heaven's Magnate. Obviously, you are not even close to being ready to take these steps. I can tell you when you become a Divine God. Thinking about these concepts before that Realm is a waste of time."
"But yes," the Opposer continued. "The Law of Freedom is difficult. Generally, Cultivators start with the Law of the Dead World. After that, they include life to create the Law of the Living World. Then come emotions, and lastly, the situational Laws."
"The reason why Cultivators choose this way is because of the difficulty of comprehending these Laws," the Opposer said.
Gravis frowned. "But I saw several beasts in the middle world that knew about Danger, which should be a Situational Law, and Pride, which should be an Emotional Law."
"Comprehending a single Law of a different category is not necessarily more difficult," the Opposer said. "The issue is that you need all of them. You shouldn't have much issue with the Law of Pride, for example, but the Law of Rage won't be as easy for you with your logical mindset. Yet, you need both of them."
"Understanding matter, life, and the elements isn't as complicated in comparison. After all, you can simply look at them since you can see all of them with your own eyes. Instead, you need to experience emotions and situations. You can't simply look at Suppression since you need to be suppressed to truly understand its feeling."
Gravis hummed a bit. "That actually makes sense," he said.
Gravis quickly left after his question was answered since it seemed like that his father and the Black Magnate wanted to get back to talking.
For the next year, Gravis spent most of his time with his family and Orthar as he simply waited for his shop to be ready. Gravis had already finished all his intelligence gathering about other forges and also created a general plan with Yersi and Orthar on how their business should run.
And before they knew it, the shop was finally ready to be opened!
