225: the truth

Fortunately, another cry of a child rang out.

Kong Jiamu stood there dazed.

"Why does it seem like there's another child crying..."

The Silver Armored Knight grabbed him by the collar and pulled him close, seemingly to scrutinize him carefully.

No one could be sure.

The armor effectively concealed his gaze.

"Go on, see your child."

He manually turned the Peacock around and gave him a push toward the screen.

The Peacock took two steps in that direction and suddenly stopped in his tracks, his brain finally appearing to come back online.

A feeling of trepidation at the prospect of a homecoming was the first thing to hit him.

After returning to reality from the void, countless pieces of information flooded toward him.

The Emperor's orders and the urgent battle on the front lines had forced him to set everything else aside, take responsibility for tens of millions of soldiers, and focus on the front-line situation.

And after everything had come to a temporary close, there was only one thing left in his mind.

Tu Nan, she was here!

She had caught him.

She was about to give birth.

The concentration of this information was too high, preventing him from thinking clearly until now... He only now truly realized what all of this meant.

Tu Nan, with her pregnant belly and at the critical moment of childbirth, had followed the flagship across countless Star Gates to get here.

The reason he could return was that she had broken into his nearly collapsing spiritual sea and picked him back up, piece by piece.

Kong Jiamu's chest felt heavy, as if he had been struck hard by a blunt object.

"Tu Nan..."

Tears smeared the face of the proud Peacock as he finally continued forward.

Rounding the screen, he saw Tu Nan lying there.

She looked exhausted, her long braid at her side, and strands of loose hair were soaked with sweat, sticking to her face.

"Here, see the child."

James stood to the side, having finished cleaning up the second child. Seeing the Peacock approach, he handed the baby over with a smile.

The Peacock didn't even look.

In his eyes, there was only Tu Nan.

Walking forward devoutly, he knelt by the nursing bed and tidied the hair of his beloved Female Beast.

Tu Nan's green eyes shimmered with soft light, her lips slightly parted, her entire being filled with affection.

How could there be such a wonderful, such a lovely Female Beast in this world?

Kong Jiamu wept as he kissed those poor red lips.

He would kiss her twice and then mumble a few words.

"Ugh... wuwu, Tu Nan, you scared me to death."

"Wuu, why are you so silly?"

"I... I have a child."

Tu Nan had been kissed awake by Kong Jiamu.

After Little Bird was born, she felt as if she had fallen asleep, or perhaps she had fainted with her eyes open?

In any case, for a moment, her entire body was completely spent.

It wasn't until someone kept bothering her with kisses and licks that she was forced to wake up.

Long, curled eyelashes kept sweeping over her eyes from different angles, as did that head of stubbly, kiwi-like hair.

"Peacock...?"

Tu Nan finally managed to get a word out in a gap between kisses.

Kong Jiamu finally stopped kissing. His cheeks flushed red just from that simple two-word nickname, and he let her go, staring blankly with wide eyes.

He appeared incredibly innocent and pure.

Tu Nan looked at the old doctor, James, who was suppressing a laugh to the point of internal injury, and then at the child in his arms, a gratified smile appearing on her face.

"Go see the child, although you two have already met."

She was referring to their chaotic first meeting as father and son within the spiritual sea.

The Peacock turned his head following her gaze, and James brought the child over, gently placing him between the parents.

Little Bird was still a wrinkly little ball, his wet feathers stuck to his skin, making him look rather disheveled.

No one could say why, but with the same mother and born at the same time, Little Fish was as fair and tender as a small Pearl from birth, while he was like an unpolished stone, with a head of sparse, pale green fuzz.

Perhaps as he grew up, the color would gradually darken to a deep ink green like his father's?

Tu Nan thought with a smile.

The little guy opened his eyes under his parents' gaze; his pale blue eyes were exactly the same as the Peacock's.

The Peacock found him incredibly precious and reached out to poke the child's cheek.

With his heart feeling soft and tender, the Peacock still couldn't help but complain with his usual sharp tongue.

"How can this child be so ugly? He doesn't look like you or me."

Little Bird was carefully observing whether his mother's appearance was the same as what he had just seen when he heard such a heart-stabbing comment.

He rolled his eyes in disbelief.

Then he saw a bald head with pursed lips coming toward him.

"Wah—!" He wailed loudly, accompanied by a frantic cry in his heart.

「Mom, help! Help! The ugly thing is coming!」

The Peacock was startled into a fluster. Why did the child suddenly start crying?

"What do I do? Huh? Should I soothe him? Pick... pick him up?"

He thought of how the Silver Armored Knight had picked up the child earlier and was about to step in to help.

James stopped him.

"Give him to his mother. Don't add to the mess; step back." The old doctor paused. "Where's the other one? Bring him over and put him by the mother's side."

Sure enough, as soon as Little Bird was close to Tu Nan, he began to sob and gradually stopped crying.

The Silver Armored Knight, holding Little Fish who had opened his eyes again, also emerged from behind the screen.

The child had been woken up by the alarm of Little Bird's scream in his mind.

Tu Nan was exhausted, but she still politely thanked the other party.

"Thank you for taking me to find a doctor just now."

The other person, however, was frozen in place by her sudden voice, standing there motionless.

Tu Nan was puzzled.

"Your Excellency, what is it?"

A strange sound came from the other person's throat, as if a word was being spat out and then swallowed back down. In the end, he only said,

"His Majesty bestowed the name... Shou."

To keep a vow, to keep her, to keep the sliver of hope he had sought for himself.

"Lord Shou?"

"Shou."

Tu Nan gave a polite smile and didn't continue the strange conversation; she looked at Little Fish.

"Please place him by my side."

The other person's armor shifted very slightly, but perhaps it was just the vibration from lifting a foot?

Little Fish was placed beside her. That knight Your Excellency stepped back a few paces but didn't retreat behind the screen, which made Tu Nan feel very uncomfortable.

The Peacock finally saw this child again. He poked this child's cheek with equal treatment and said to Tu Nan with a smile,

"Isn't it a bit inappropriate for your research project to use my son for experiments? Could there be a Sea Beast in one of her parents' lineages? Is this atavism?"

He looked back at James, somewhat dissatisfied.

James looked innocent and refused to answer such a life-threatening question.

"Um... you two chat." He retreated outside with a forced smile, noticing as he passed the Silver Armored Knight that the other party had no intention of moving.

Fine, he couldn't control these big shots.

On this side, even though Tu Nan was well-prepared for many things, she hadn't expected the Peacock to find such an unreliable explanation on his own.

Did he have no other thoughts at all?

Forget it. No matter what the Peacock thought, she had long since prepared to tell the truth after the Children were born; the child shouldn't be without his own father.

Taking a deep breath, she spoke softly to the Peacock.

"I think it wasn't some experiment, but rather because I am a Cat Beastkin."

The Peacock didn't understand, but he could see that Tu Nan's expression was extremely solemn.

He had no choice but to pull back his hand, which was still secretly poking the child's bottom, and knelt properly to listen seriously to Tu Nan.

"Well, the principle is a bit complex, but in short, this child's father is someone else."

The Peacock tilted his head; he didn't understand at all.

This was beyond his knowledge base, yet he seemed to have heard something strange?

What was it?

"..."

Tu Nan discovered that the Peacock intended to stubbornly pretend he didn't understand.

A person walked directly from behind the screen; it was His Majesty the Emperor, who had entered just as James was leaving.

"Don't understand? I'll tell you."

The Emperor's voice was calm to the point of being cold.

"The father of the other child is Hain."

Seeing the Peacock frozen in place, he told him nonchalantly,

"These Two Children are both my students. Whether you admit it or not is unimportant."

"Alright, don't disturb the rest of my Female Official."

"Withdraw."

Kong Jiamu instinctively refused, "I won't!"

The Emperor sneered.

"This is my bedroom. Get out."

Two Silver Armored Knights stepped forward at the sound.

Kong Jiamu stood up dazed.

"How can it be?"

His voice trembled.

He didn't know if he was asking Tu Nan, the distant Hain, or himself.