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PTGWD Chapter 79: Romance

The egg excitedly bumped its head against Fang Xingzhou's belly.

Both the large monster and the egg stared intently at Fang Xingzhou, eagerly anticipating a look of ecstatic joy on his face.

Three seconds of silence.

Fang Xingzhou’s face remained pale, his heart and temples throbbing as he counted Lu Jianchuan’s tentacles. His chest felt tight and painful.

“Eight are missing,” he said hoarsely, stepping closer and grasping the nearest tentacle, which was missing a chunk. “Does it hurt?”

Lu Jianchuan blinked his dozens of eyes, momentarily stunned. He then looked down at his tentacles, counting them over and over, finally realizing that only ten remained. The other eight were nowhere to be found—perhaps the egg, after devouring the Nightmare Serpent, still lacked the strength to be born and had resorted to consuming part of its parent.

Fang Xingzhou raised his cold hand and touched Lu Jianchuan’s oddly shaped head, indeed feeling a sticky liquid.

“Part of your brain is missing, and there’s brain fluid dripping,” Fang Xingzhou’s expression grew even grimmer. “Half of your vocal cord is gone, and many teeth in your mouthparts are broken.”

His heart bled along with the missing chunk of brain. Lu Jianchuan, however, felt nothing and said in surprise, “Part of my brain is missing?”

A tentacle reached around to the back of his head, but instead of feeling human skull, it touched brain fluid directly. The vocal cord was torn in half, leaving only a trembling remnant hanging in the air—no wonder his voice sounded so strange.

Lu Jianchuan quickly reverted to his true form for a moment, an eye jumping into the air to get a look at his current state.

Indeed, a fifth of his massive brain was missing, bearing familiar bite marks.

He extended a tentacle to compare the bite marks with the broken teeth in his mouthparts—they matched perfectly.

Lu Jianchuan: “…”

No wonder his teeth were chipped. The Nightmare Serpent’s bones weren’t that hard; even chewing through the entire skeleton shouldn’t have caused his teeth to break.

…It seemed that during his unconsciousness, the egg had taken control of his body and enjoyed a hearty meal.

But it wasn’t a big deal! Lu Jianchuan transformed back into his human form, still missing the back of his head, but beaming with joy. He rubbed his brain-fluid-streaked cheek against Fang Xingzhou’s cold face and said, “It doesn’t hurt, Zhou Zhou. I easily devoured the serpent, took a nap, and then gave birth to the egg. The missing parts will grow back after another nap. Don’t worry.”

Fang Xingzhou’s eyes were bloodshot, his nose tingling as he tightly hugged the half-skull, pressing his forehead against Lu Jianchuan’s.

“Never again,” he murmured. “You scared me to death, Deer.”

Lu Jianchuan coiled a tentacle around Fang Xingzhou’s waist and kissed his lips, comforting his shaken lover.

The two began to kiss passionately, using their tongues to confirm each other’s existence.

The egg, having eaten part of its parent, took the opportunity to jump into Fang Xingzhou’s pocket, hiding itself out of guilt, afraid of being scolded by its father.

When Li Xuan and Yan Xin rushed to the office, they were greeted by a scene straight out of hell.

The floor was stained with red and green blood. The massive serpent had been reduced to a skeleton, and terrifying tentacles coiled around a slender man, kissing him with a brain-fluid-dripping human head.

Their hearts nearly stopped. They instinctively took a few steps back, taking deep breaths to calm themselves.

Soon, Yan Xin noticed the round egg peeking out of Fang Xingzhou’s pocket.

He was momentarily stunned, then nearly cheered in excitement upon realizing what it was, only to be quickly silenced by Li Xuan: “Shh.”

The two exchanged a glance and, without disturbing the family who had just survived a harrowing ordeal, quietly took the elevator back to the lobby to inform their colleagues and gather the prepared items.

Lu Jianchuan and Fang Xingzhou kissed for a long time.

Until the sound of firecrackers behind them startled them both.

They quickly separated, Fang Xingzhou instinctively shielding Lu Jianchuan as he turned to look behind them.

A dozen special agents, led by the director, stood joyfully at the door. The two on the far left and right held electronic firecrackers, crackling loudly. Five others carried black boxes of various sizes, containing what seemed to be living creatures, thumping against the boxes.

The two tall agents in the middle held up a large red banner that read:

“Congratulations to Mr. Lu and Mr. Fang on the birth of their precious egg! Father and egg are safe and sound!”

Li Xuan: “Congratulations!”

Everyone clapped enthusiastically.

Lu Jianchuan and Fang Xingzhou were stunned for a moment.

Lu Jianchuan felt a bit embarrassed. He straightened the overturned potted plants in the ruined office and said with his half-vocal cord, “Thank you, everyone.”

Yan Xin said excitedly, “I successfully completed the task of providing nutritional supplements during the pregnancy! Mr. Lu, please enjoy your postpartum meals!”

With that, he patted the five black boxes behind him.

“These are five B-level special items we carefully selected. They’re nutritious and should taste good too. After last night’s battle, I think you’re in dire need of replenishing your energy.”

At the mention of food, the tentacles immediately began to gurgle, digestive fluids quickly pooling at the edges of the incomplete mouthparts, and the eyes all gleamed with hunger.

Fang Xingzhou hugged the tentacles and said, “Thank you. Everyone stayed up all night. Go rest early. I’ll take care of him.”

But the light in Yan Xin’s eyes outshone Lu Jianchuan’s dozens of eyes combined.

“No, I’m wide awake now,” he said, staring intently at Fang Xingzhou’s pocket. “Could you two let us see the adorable little jellyfish? I’ve been waiting for this moment for so long. I’ve been so excited these past few days that I couldn’t sleep!”

Lu Jianchuan reached out with a tentacle to grab the egg: “Of course, no problem, I…”

He stopped mid-sentence.

They had been so engrossed in their kiss that they hadn’t noticed the egg, born after so much hardship, had gone missing.

The newly minted fathers froze, then frantically searched everywhere. After a while, the egg rolled out of Fang Xingzhou’s pocket on its own, landing in his palm.

Fang Xingzhou sighed in relief, his heart pounding as he carefully held the egg, rubbing the shell with his fingers. Only now did he calm down enough to properly examine the thing that had tormented them for nearly two years.

Lu Jianchuan also leaned over, looking at their child with him.

…It looked like an ordinary egg.

Much larger than a typical chicken egg, the shell was pristine white, flawless, with a faint gray shadow visible inside, moving energetically.

An indescribably wonderful feeling washed over him.

Fang Xingzhou stared at the egg for a long time, as if he could feel its heartbeat and breath through the shell.

No matter how he looked at it—the oviparous creature before him was not of the same species as humans. Yet Fang Xingzhou could inexplicably sense, even directly feel, that this egg carried half of his blood.

His breathing unconsciously softened. He took a slow breath and gently kissed the eggshell.

The little one inside quickly moved to the kissed spot, letting out another sharp cry.

A smile appeared in Fang Xingzhou’s eyes. Lu Jianchuan also showed a rare maternal tenderness, tapping the eggshell with a tentacle before handing it to Yan Xin.

Yan Xin’s hands trembled with excitement as he held the egg up to his eyes. The other colleagues quickly gathered around, a dozen pairs of eyes fixed unblinkingly on the egg.

“So round.”

“Yeah, and the shell is so white. It looks so well-behaved!”

“It feels a bit chubby. It must be developing well.”

“It ate 0009. Does that mean it can control dreams now? Will it visit our dreams tonight?”

“We’re about to have a second A+, right? I wonder if I’ll be assigned to take care of the little jellyfish… By the way, is it a sir or a madam?”

They chattered in hushed tones, as if afraid of startling the embryo inside.

Li Xuan took out a camera and snapped a birth photo of the egg, then carefully measured its size, weight, and magnetic field level, recording the data in the archives before contentedly patting it.

The eggshell let out another soft scream.

The special agents laughed warmly. Yan Xin returned the egg to Lu Jianchuan, his eyes red, and said, “You two rest now. We have some cleanup to do and won’t disturb you further. Contact us if you need anything.”

A nursery had been prepared next to the office, but Lu Jianchuan wanted to go home. So the Institute escorted them, along with the “postpartum meals,” back to Xiangxing Street, reminding them to bring the egg back for a checkup when it was a month old.

By the time they arrived home, the sky was fully lit.

The remnants of the sunrise still lingered in the east, heart-shaped white clouds drifting across the blue sky. A cool morning breeze blew, signaling that today would be a beautiful, sunny day.

As soon as they entered, Fang Xingzhou instinctively looked at the roses by the door.

After a year and a half, the roses were still in full bloom. Overnight, many new buds had appeared, swaying happily in the morning breeze, full of vitality. Only a few of the larger flowers were slightly duller in color than usual.

He kissed the topmost bud, cleared the living room for Lu Jianchuan to eat his “postpartum meals,” and went to the bathroom to draw a hot bath.

In just five minutes, when he returned to the living room, the five black boxes were already empty.

Lu Jianchuan’s brain had returned to normal, no longer leaking fluid, but only two new tentacles had grown back.

He looked exhausted, propping himself up on the sofa, his many eyes fixed on the newly laid egg.

Fang Xingzhou felt another pang of heartache. “Come take a bath and then rest properly.”

Lu Jianchuan nodded but didn’t move. Instead, he leaned closer to the egg, examining it over and over, finally saying in disbelief, “Wife, I really laid an egg.”

Fang Xingzhou smiled: “Yes, you laid an egg. That’s incredible.”

Lu Jianchuan tapped the eggshell with his brain matter, then curiously extended a tentacle to give it a spin.

The egg spun smoothly and quickly.

Fang Xingzhou watched for a while, but when Lu Jianchuan seemed about to spin it again, he finally couldn’t take it anymore. He picked up the dizzy egg and placed it in an incubator he had prepared earlier, turning on the light and carefully setting it on a soft pad.

“Stop playing with it,” Fang Xingzhou said. “Go take a bath.”

Lu Jianchuan reluctantly climbed down from the sofa and slithered to the bathroom, sinking into the bathtub with a long sigh. He buried himself in the water, all his eyes gathering at the top of his brain matter, happily watching Fang Xingzhou.

Fang Xingzhou gently scrubbed him clean.

Lu Jianchuan was still in disbelief. “I really gave birth to it.”

Fang Xingzhou: “Yes, after nineteen months and eleven days. If it hadn’t come out soon, I think my mental state would have been in serious danger.”

As he spoke, he parted Lu Jianchuan’s tentacles and scrubbed the area where the sac had once hung, still feeling a lingering fear.

The area was now just a flat patch of skin.

Lu Jianchuan scratched his belly, feeling strangely unaccustomed to its emptiness.

“Now when I hold you to sleep, there won’t be a big belly in the way,” Lu Jianchuan said happily. “Once the last few tentacles grow back tomorrow, I can return to my full human form. Our family will be complete, all human.”

Fang Xingzhou laughed as he scrubbed, his tense shoulders finally relaxing. For the first time in nineteen months, he felt truly at ease, as if a heavy stone had been lifted from his own belly.

He said lightly, “An oviparous human. That sounds like the subject of a scientific paper.”

Lu Jianchuan, dripping wet, rubbed his chin against Fang Xingzhou: “Even though it’s oviparous, the child will definitely look like you.”

“I can’t imagine a baby that looks like me curled up inside an egg,” Fang Xingzhou said. “How will it hatch? Will it come out as a baby or a little jellyfish?”

Lu Jianchuan was stumped, pondering for a few seconds: “I don’t know either…”

The new fathers thought for a while.

As Fang Xingzhou scrubbed the second tentacle, Lu Jianchuan suddenly had an idea: “Maybe while it was in my belly, it was developing its divine side. Now that it’s been born, it needs its human father’s care.”

Fang Xingzhou thought that made sense.

He meticulously cleaned the mouthparts, then leaned down to plant a kiss.

“You’ve worked hard, Mama,” he said. “I’ll take care of both of you from now on.”

Lu Jianchuan happily blew bubbles in the water, thinking about how his and his lover’s blood would forever flow in their child. Even if the world came to an end one day, and he and Fang Xingzhou had turned to dust in their coffins, their child, as a symbol of fate, would continue to carry their love forward, becoming the deity of a new world…

How romantic.

He stretched out his tentacles, letting his lover patiently clean his ugly body, slowly recalling every detail of the pregnancy. Even the chaotic setbacks now seemed sweet.

He wanted to insert his hectocotylus into his lover’s body, merging them into one again.

But obviously, Fang Xingzhou wouldn’t allow him to be willful at this time.

After the bath, Fang Xingzhou dried every corner of Lu Jianchuan and turned on the warm air to evaporate any remaining moisture.

When Lu Jianchuan tried to leave the bathroom, Fang Xingzhou stopped him again, wrapping each tentacle in thick, clean towels and draping a brown blanket over his brain matter.

Lu Jianchuan had turned into a giant plush toy.

He looked at Fang Xingzhou in confusion, who said seriously, “You just gave birth. You can’t catch a cold.”

Lu Jianchuan completely trusted his wife’s professional knowledge. Although he didn’t feel cold at all, he nodded as if he understood and began to crawl toward the bedroom.

The towels, unlike suckers, couldn’t grip the floor firmly. He slipped a bit, his tentacles dancing on ice, taking a while to reach the second floor.

Upon entering the bedroom, he found Fang Xingzhou had stacked five quilts on the bed and placed ten stainless steel basins filled with water on the floor.

It was only early autumn, but the heater was already on. A red and blue therapy lamp had been installed on the wall at some point, and the egg had been moved to the bedside, reflecting a faint glow under the incubator’s light.

Lu Jianchuan: “?”

He crawled onto the bed in confusion, looking at the terrifying reflection in the water basins, and asked, “Is this water for washing my tentacles? But I’ve already taken a bath.”

Fang Xingzhou said, “You’ve lost a lot of blood and might experience symptoms of excessive blood loss. This is electrolyte water for you to drink. If you feel thirsty when you wake up, drink it to speed up your metabolism.”

Lu Jianchuan: “Oh… oh. What about these quilts…?”

Fang Xingzhou touched a tentacle.

Lu Jianchuan’s body temperature, already low, had dropped even further after giving birth. His tentacles felt cold to the touch.

He said, “Each tentacle needs to be covered to help restore your body temperature. Since the birth wounds have already healed, there’s no need to worry about postpartum fever.”

Lu Jianchuan didn’t understand.

But his wife was always right.

He obediently shook out the quilts, covering himself layer by layer until only half of his brain matter, crowded with eyes, was exposed.

Fang Xingzhou tucked him in and kissed the gaps between his eyes.

“Rest well,” he said. “If you feel unwell, call me anytime. I won’t go anywhere.”

Lu Jianchuan’s grooves formed a smile.

“Okay.”

Fang Xingzhou sat by the bed, counting each eye until they all closed.

Lu Jianchuan was indeed extremely exhausted. In the familiar environment, he quickly fell into a deep sleep, his stomach digesting the “postpartum meals” he had just consumed. The missing tentacles slowly began to regrow.

Soon, both the large and small monsters were quiet.

Fang Xingzhou watched for a long time.

That wonderful feeling washed over him again. He quietly stood up, walked to the bedside, and stared motionlessly at the eggshell.

It was as if invisible threads connected him to them. Though they were of different species, their blood and bones were intertwined, bound together in a way that could never be separated.

Fang Xingzhou’s Adam’s apple bobbed slightly as he gently brushed the eggshell.

—The egg immediately followed his hand.

He crouched by the bedside, facing the egg, silently asking what it needed.

The egg seemed to dislike the incubator, knocking against it twice with its head before nuzzling into Fang Xingzhou’s palm.

Fang Xingzhou silently mouthed, “Want to come with me?”

The egg swayed back and forth, as if nodding.

Fang Xingzhou opened the wardrobe, picked out a silk nightgown, tied it around his waist, and then tied the egg to his abdomen.

“How about this?” he asked again.

The egg excitedly bumped its head against Fang Xingzhou’s belly, expressing satisfaction.

Fang Xingzhou couldn’t help but smile. He turned off the incubator’s light, not wanting to disturb his lover’s rest, and quietly left the room. He headed to the kitchen to start stewing chicken soup.

Comment

    1. Raaaeyy says:

      SOOOOO CUTTTTEEE😭❤🌹

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