"It is not the framing I would have chosen," Lustia said, her voice carrying the detached cadence of someone discussing the weather rather than the transactional nature of human intimacy. "But it is not inaccurate either."
"The system you were given ties its most significant unlocks to the specific, primal act of creating life..."
"I did not design that mechanism, Rex..."
"I inherited a domain and a designation with mechanics that were already carved into the bedrock of reality the same way every god inherits the bones of whatever came before them."
Rex stared at her, his mind churning through the implications. The coldness of it, the sheer, mechanical cruelty of a universe that demanded such a price, made something hot and angry coil in his gut.
