Lightning Is the Only Way

"Until next time!"

Clank! Clank! Clank!

Metallic footsteps could be heard as a tiger, literally armored to the teeth, walked away with the remainder of his ore mountain.

No fur could be seen on the tiger anymore as everything was hidden behind an imposing set of armor.

Beside Gravis was a two-by-two-by-two-meter cube of metal.

This tiger had been a rich customer!

"That's so much!" Stella said with surprise as she arrived beside Gravis, looking at the metal.

Gravis nodded. "Yep."

"Just with one customer, you already earned over 500 million Immortal Stones!" Stella exclaimed with wonder.

This ability to make money was simply too terrifying!

"Not really," Gravis said. "After all, I won't sell this cube of metal."

"You won't?" Stella asked with surprise. "Why?"

"Protection and advertisement," Gravis answered.

Stella became confused.

Gravis gestured to the cube. "I will use up all of this for equipment for all four of us," Gravis said.

"What? So much!?" Stella shouted in shock.

Gravis nodded. "Of course. After all, I want you all to be as powerful as possible in the case that something unforeseen happens. Additionally, when you wear your equipment while talking to customers, they will be even more impressed. A first impression is important, after all."

Stella couldn't really argue against that, but she still felt like this was too much to accept.

That was so much money!

However, Gravis ignored her protests as he directly started to forge equipment for Stella. 

After a lot of back and forth, Stella accepted her new armor, which looked far too imposing for her taste. She liked modest appearances more.

'Well, Gravis is already my man, so I might as well follow his example for a bit,' Stella thought. 

The armor looked cold, bloodthirsty, and imposing, but in her eyes, it only shone with the calm light of Gravis' love.

This was something that Gravis had created for her.

Stella put the armor on, and it fit her perfectly. Her movement also wasn't impaired. Even more, she had seen how Gravis had used some of his scales to create an inner armor and some gasses to create a layer between the outer and inner armor.

If an attack wasn't powerful enough, the gasses would simply remain inside the armor, but if an incredibly powerful attack hit the armor, the explosion of the gasses would reduce the damage of the attack significantly.

Of course, the armor wouldn't be able to resist another attack with such power since the layer of gasses would have already escaped, but that was already more than enough.

In short, this set of armor would boost the passive defense of a fighter by a lot and even had a one-time use of blocking a very powerful attack.

This armor was a literal lifesaver!

Even more, with all of Gravis' Core Battle Laws, the passive defense of the armor was almost as powerful as armor that had been created with the level five Law of Hard Complex Materials.

On top of that, Gravis gave her five full sets!

Gravis also created several weapons for Stella.

Stella was now also armored to the teeth, just like the tiger.

As Gravis looked at Stella, he couldn't contain his smirk.

The kind Stella was nowhere to be seen.

Now, Gravis could only see a bloodthirsty war goddess. 

This was his war goddess!

While Stella continued to look at her equipment with wonder, Gravis forged equipment for Siral.

Siral almost couldn't believe it!

He was just a servant to his master, but his master even gave him this costly set of equipment!?

"10,000 more years, Siral," Gravis said. "In 10,000 years, I will remove the effects of the Life Ring. Until then, you will help me with the Gravitas. However, I'm also not opposed if you decide to work for me after the effect of the Life Ring has worn off."

"This servant is unworthy, Master!" Siral said as he fell to his knees.

Gravis only smirked.

"Could you bring Liam over here, dear?" Gravis said to Stella.

Stella was taken out of her reverie, and she felt warmth flowing through her heart.

Gravis was even willing to give Liam such a valuable present!

"Yes!" Stella said with excitement and cute happiness in her voice.

While Stella was getting Liam, Gravis was quickly creating his own armor and weapons. 

Finally, he had enough metal to create several sets of armor and weapons for himself!

Stella returned after a few minutes with a stunned Liam.

When Liam had seen Stella, he almost couldn't recognize her.

Stella had left looking like herself but had returned a couple of minutes later, looking like a war goddess! 

Yet, Liam's shock only increased when he saw the armored Black Demon and the armored Siral in front of him.

The three of them looked at Liam.

"It's your turn now!" Gravis said with a smirk behind his helmet.

Liam quickly recovered as he looked coldly at Gravis.

"I've not fallen so low that I need to rely on your goodwill," he said.

"You are my employee, and I want my employees to reflect my skills as a forger," Gravis said directly. "If you don't want it, see it as borrowing it until the Gravitas eventually closes."

"You can look at it as your work uniform," Gravis said.

"Lastly, it also keeps your identities secret."

Liam snorted. "Fine!"

Stella saw that Gravis simply used this reason to convince Liam to accept the gift and felt happy that she chose such a thoughtful man for herself.

Just like Gravis always thought in disbelief how Stella could be so perfect, Stella also often thought in disbelief how Gravis could be so perfect.

In a weird sense, both of them felt a bit unworthy of the other.

However, they truly loved each other with all their heart.

Gravis quickly created several sets for Liam, who begrudgingly accepted them.

After that, all the ore had been used up.

Gravis had created over twenty sets of armor and a ton of weapons for everyone.

In just a couple of minutes, the impression that the Gravitas would give a new customer went through an earth-shattering change.

If a new human customer arrived before this incident, they would simply believe that this was some exclusive shop.

However, now, they would think that this was some kind of elite, powerful, underground organization.

After all, being able to equip all of their employees with such impressive equipment showed how powerful and wealthy such an organization had to be.

After getting familiar with their new "uniforms", everyone returned to their posts and waited for new customers.

Right now, the customers were rare, but all of this would change with time.

CRRRRRRR!

Gravis looked towards the tunnel from the beast side with a hidden smile.

'The next customer has come!'

It was a turtle with a metal affinity, and Gravis gave it the same demonstration as he gave the tiger.

After a couple of minutes, the turtle left, nearly looking the same as before.

It didn't need much armor. Something for its legs and head was enough.

However, the biggest change was hidden.

Parts of its shell had been modified to hold explosive spears. 

There was also a thick armor at its belly.

At first glance, one would only see a turtle wearing a helmet and boots, but the most significant changes would only truly show themselves in a fight.

A day later, the next customer arrived, and they also left happily.

A month passed, and Gravis had served over 15 customers by now.

The customers all had different levels of power, ranging from the early Immortal Realm to the very peak of the Immortal King Realm.

There was even one Immortal Emperor that had arrived, but Gravis had to send them away.

Creating equipment at the same level as the Immortal Emperor wouldn't be that effective, and Gravis preferred the quality of his reputation more than the quantity. 

Sadly, Gravis didn't have the power to create suitable equipment for the Immortal Emperor.

All the metal that Gravis had gathered was already transported to the human side of the Gravitas, where parts of it were displayed in some cases. The bulk of the metal was kept in Stella's Spirit Space.

Another two months passed, and by now, around one beast customer arrived per day.

Gravis now had a ton of different kinds of ore in the Gravitas, and he felt like it was time to get some human customers.

Gravis fished out a token Exar had given him.

"I think I have enough ore to make a worthwhile trade. Do you want to send individual customers, or do you want to purchase the ore wholesale for your two organizations?" Gravis asked.

"What do you have?" Exar asked neutrally.

Gravis told Exar about all the ore he had on hand now.

"Beasts sure are wealthy," Exar said. "I will send someone to purchase all of it at 70% of the market price."

"That's fine," Gravis said.

After all, Underworld also had to make a profit.

Like this, Gravis had exchanged some hours of his time for hundreds of millions of Immortal Stones.

This truly was a terrifying ability to make money!

Sure enough, creating a business was the way to become rich!