"Essentially, yes," Elio confirmed. "And we're dangerously close to that limit. We've barely reached a million."
Micah intervened, his brow furrowed in concentration. "But that doesn't make sense. Why would the Creator put such a limit?"
"It wasn't the Creator," Elio explained, his voice heavy with the weight of this revelation. "It was the Goddess, his counterpart. It's a limitation imposed as part of their conflict."
Kriz let out a nervous laugh, his usual humor tinged with fear. "Great, so we're pawns in a divine squabble. What else?"
Brok elbowed him to shut up, but the tension in the room was still palpable, thick enough to cut with a knife.
Ren, always analytical, spoke up. "With the current dynamics of the harems, the big majority of the population being women, and the belief that we should have as many children as possible, about 50,000 children are born each year, correct?"