The air in the nexus's high altitude room was still thick with the lingering scent of sex and the low, satisfied humming of satisfied women.
Adam lay sprawled amidst the hides and furs, his powerful muscular frame relaxed, one arm draped possessively around Lyra's waist.
She was curled against his side, her head on his chest, her silver hair fanned out messily across his broad chest muscles.
For a rare moment, there was no frantic sex, no power plays, no scheming; just the quiet aftermath of shared dominance and submission. The consensual appreciation of each other's comfort and beauty.
The hellish sky outside flickered with its perpetual bruised light; occasionally casting long, distorted shadows across their entangled forms.
"It was a frenzy," Lyra murmured, her voice a soft contrast to the usual sharpness.
Her finger traced idle patterns on his skin, "After I was reborn. The memories of the fire, the hatred... it was all a red haze. I slaughtered everything I saw for weeks. Demons, beasts... anything with a soul."
She tilted her head back to look at him, her mercury eyes serious. "It is the same for most. The negative energy that forges us... it demands an outlet. A feast."
Adam lay lazily, but his attention focused on her words.
Lyra was describing the events of her rebirth; something that differed greatly from his.
He recalled the sudden, powerful desire to kill and devour the demons he had encountered when he was first reborn. It was an instinct forged from eons of evolution; something akin to a rite of passage.
The ecstasy of devouring souls not only came from the increase in power, but it also gave a sense of euphoria as the soul nourished a fiends body, while also tasting amazing.
Though, Adam wouldn't know as he had forcibly drowned his rage upon rebirth, instead focusing on the new state of being; a state of feeling that had been so cruelly denied from him in his past life.
He was an outlier in newborn devils reborn from a past life's malice and sin.
A subtle realization hit him: him not going into a frenzy at birth had shifted the plans Gorael had initially set for him ever so subtly, but just enough to get him to his current state.
A domino effect that had lead him to a different destiny…
'To Lyra.' Adam thought while subconsciously squeezing the devil beauty in his embrace.
Lyra shifted into his strong squeeze, enjoying his warmth, before a sudden subtle hunger tightened her features.
Talking about souls had made her crave one.
"You should partake, my king. You expended so much of your… energy~"
Lyra said, her gaze drifted meaningfully over his body, then down to her own, dripping crotch; the immense amounts of seed he had pumped into her and the others.
"The fatigue, the... depletion. Souls are the purest sustenance. They restore vitality and strengthen our essence."
Even without food or substance, a lesser devil or demon could go months and still live strongly. Then, there was also souls which could be a direct replacement for the requirement of physical food.
Adam's interest was piqued at the thought.
He had absorbed the knowledge of soul consumption from his hellish inheritance, but it had been an abstract concept. Now, with Lyra's urging, it became a tangible need.
With a thought, he summoned the soul of the peak-tier berserker demon he had ultimately broken during his dungeon experiments.
It appeared in his palm not as a wisp, but as a dense, pulsating orb of violent crimson light, swirling with raw, untamed power and the echoes of a brutal life the demon had.
Fear.
A blurry, chaotic, and dread filled emotion was being transmitted from the soul in his hand.
Nigh-immortal, the demon begged for life, even in its soul state.
Adam ignored the emotions and brought it to his lips.
There was no chewing, or no swallowing.
As he willed it, the soul dissolved into a stream of intangible energy that flowed into him. The sensation was indescribable.
It was not like eating food; it was like plugging into a cosmic battery, like a demonic jolt of power.
A wave of pure, vibrant power crashed through his system, washing away the faintest hints of fatigue, making his demonic core thump with intensified vigor. A taste of intoxicating sweetness filled his senses, while a feeling of being massaged by delicate hands roamed over his entire body.
His senses sharpened, and the very miasma in the air seemed to crackle with newfound clarity.
"Tasty," He conceded, the understatement laden with dark pleasure.
Lyra smiled, a genuine, wicked curve of her lips.
"It is life itself."
Life.
She fell silent for a moment, nestling closer.
Then, her voice dropped to a whisper, laden with a significance that changed the very atmosphere in the room.
"There is something else that I recalled."
Adam looked down at her, his hellish eyes questioning.
"The first time," She said, her gaze holding his, "When you took me, when you filled me. I felt it the instant your seed surged into my womb and I knew."
She placed a hand on her lower abdomen, uncertainty, protectiveness, and a hint possessiveness gleaming in her eyes.
"I am pregnant."
She saw no surprise in his eyes, only a slow-burning, possessive satisfaction.
Of course he wasn't surprised.
He had claimed her with the explicit intent of marking her, of breeding her. It had been a natural instinct to not pull out.
A devil's womb was not all that mysterious as, simply put, it was a highly efficient, smart organ.
The powerful efficiency of child bearing among fiends was a selected trait that only served to aid the species as a whole.
With their astute understanding of their own bodies, conception was not a guessing game but a confirmed event. At the higher levels, given that the female was strong enough, she could choose to destroy the child embryo in their body.
But, in cases where the male was stronger, with a more potent demonic mana, then trying to get rid of the embryo would bring harm to the pregnant female. Keeping the child would be safer in the end; they could even raise the child as an asset or, like Saphira's mother, give the child away.
Plus, it wasn't the usual 9 month long pregnancy that most mortal races endured. Instead, the pregnancy would be swift, a mere three months, and then the offspring would be born.
Of course, bearing a child of devil was also a great burden that could kill weaker beings and races. Even devil's couldn't have child after child, as there was a grace period in which a female's body would reject all attempts of becoming pregnant; albeit special means of course.
"A heir," Adam stated, his voice low as he pushed those thoughts to the back of his mind.
His hand covered hers on her stomach, feeling and sensing the rapidly growing life within her; his touch claiming the life within her as he had claimed her.
They are his.
The start of something new, of something big. A surge of adrenaline and anticipation rose within as he thought of making a force, a clan, so powerful that beings like Lord Gorael would run with their tails between their legs.
"Our dynasty begins here."
The statement was simple, but it carried the weight of an empire.
Lyra was no longer just his queen; she was a mother of his legacy. The future had just announced its arrival amidst the afterglow of their coupling.
Words of greatness spoken into the warm air, a tangible mist of spent passion and demonic energy still lingering around their entangled forms.
Adam lay beside Lyra, one hand possessively draped over the faint, still-imperceptible swell of her abdomen where his seed had taken root.
His mind, turning from carnal satisfaction to strategic calculation, was already dissecting this new variable: an heir.
The thought of being a father was a concept so strange that it made him question his demonic existence once again.
Did he want to be a father?
Not for the children themselves, but as a way to expand, to have the strongest, most loyal subordinates.
After all, devils at the higher realms were stronger not only in demonic mana and physicality, but also in mind. Trusting such a powerful being would be like turning your back to a blade: dangerous.
Only with his own blood, with which he could brand and nurture, could he have true devil subordinates.
A son that could in turn help propagate and expand his forces, or a daughter that…
'Hmm what type?'
"A child," He mused aloud, his voice a low rumble in the quiet chamber, "In three weeks, we'll be able to discern its nature; it's gender." It was a statement of fact, a point of their unique demonic biology.
For a devil, such knowledge was power, allowing for preparations, for eliminating any doubt from the very earliest moments.
Even though the pregnancy stage only lasted 3 months for female devils, Adam would rather know now than later.
Men were perfect subordinates, while women could be nurtured as highly valuable currency… much like a certain deviless.
Lyra, nestled against him, went very still. Then, with a softness that held an undercurrent of unbendable steel, she spoke.
"No, let us not. Let us wait. Let the child be born, and we shall know then."