Zhan Xi watched the movements of the child in the distance. He was very familiar with what his son was doing. But precisely because he was familiar, he was extremely nervous.
Could his son really handle the Emperor's 3S+ mental power? Even if he could, could his child handle it by himself? The more Zhan Xi thought about it, the more worried he became.
A Zerg rushed past him from behind in a panic, and Zhan Xi, who was caught up in his tense emotions, didn't hesitate to stab it with a dagger.
He frowned and said, “This is so annoying. Can't it be quiet for a while?”
It was affecting his ability to watch his own child.
Wagner, like Zhan Xi, was also affected by the mental power of the Emperor. They couldn't get any closer. They could only stay where they were and watch.
“Uncle Zhan.”
Wagner saw the swarming Zergs and tugged on Zhan Xi's sleeve.
His eyes, still red from crying, blinked up at him. “Teach me how to kill Zergs!”
Zhan Xi hesitated. He looked down at the child, who was barely as tall as his shin, and asked, “Aren't you afraid? Killing Zergs is dangerous.”
Wagner shook his head. “I'm not scared!”
He was his father's child and shouldn't be afraid of Zergs!
Zhan Xi looked back at his son in the distance. He knew that he couldn't get there anytime soon. So why not take revenge on these Zergs that had taken away his child?
“Okay.”
Zhan Xi took out a knife from his waist and handed it to Wagner. When he taught his son, he used pure physical strength. His child had no attacking mental power even if he could activate his mental power.
Therefore, when teaching Ningning to kill Zergs, Zhan Xi didn't need to use mental power, but rather used the most primitive method.
“Wagner, pay attention.”
Zhan Xi randomly picked a passing Zerg and demonstrated to Wagner, “The head and abdomen of the Zerg are their weak points.”
“You must be quick and precise in your attack. If you pierce them but are not sure you can kill them with one strike, then strike them again.”
“Alright, do you see that little Zerg? It's a recently hatched larva. Go and kill it.”
Regardless of the species, the weakest were always the young, and the Zerg were no exception. The newly hatched larvae look very small with wet eyes and a naive gaze.
As Wagner approached, the newborn larva could not distinguish its own kind and mistook him for family.
The larva approached and wanted to nuzzle him.
But the next second, Wagner, with red eyes, stabbed the larva to death.
He had seen many Zergs just now, and he had always remembered the theoretical knowledge about the Zerg.
These Zergs were still a bit naïve just after hatching, but given a little more time, they would awaken their greedy and vicious nature.
Wagner finished killing the larva, and his hands were shaking a little.
Zhan Xi patted his head and led him to kill other Zergs.
As Zhan Xi was leading Wagner, he also closely observed the Emperor and his son in the distance. The two of them had not moved yet.
Time passed little by little.
On the land full of dead Zergs, the imperial Emperor held a sword in one hand and a child in the other, the soft and fluffy little child almost pressing down all his weight on him.
The two foreheads touched, and two mental energies intertwined in the air.
The faint, soothing sprout mental power worked diligently by shaking its little leaves. The owner of the small sprout became paler and paler.
“Uncle Zhan, someone's here.”
Wagner, with his keen eyes, saw the incoming army and pointed towards them. As he pointed, Zhan Xi's expression changed.
Once someone entered, the scene of Ningning healing the emperor would be directly in front of them.
Just as Zhan Xi was about to go and stop them, Ai Wei had already noticed something was amiss.
Ai Wei, who said she wouldn't interfere with Mans, immediately ordered him, “Stop the army and stay here. I will bring Ludwig back.”
When Mans, dressed in military uniform, heard this, he raised an eyebrow slightly, “Your Majesty, the Queen, do you want to participate in command?”
Ai Wei stared straight back at him, “I'm just asking you to stop temporarily.”
The two seemed to be in a silent standoff.
Just as they were both still in stalemate, Huo Lin had already piloted his own small spaceship towards his father's direction. As he left, he also took Mans' attention with him.
“Mans.”
Ai Wei spoke in a deep voice, “Please take your army and temporarily withdraw.”
Under Ai Wei's tough stance, Mans slowly withdrew his gaze and lightly raised his hand to have the army retreat a distance.
“Your Majesty, in half an hour, I will start cleaning up the battlefield.”
“Okay.”
Ai Wei answered and followed Huo Lin.
Zhan Xi watched as Mans and the army left, and the heaviness in his heart was slightly lifted.
As Mans left, at the entrance of the newly opened passage on the Ouyun Star, he faced a black spaceship that appeared to be driving without a license.
He squinted for a few seconds, his lips slightly hooked, “Hello. This is the Empire's General Mans, routine inspection of flying credentials.”
The people inside the spaceship: “?”
The imperial general changed his profession?
Was there something wrong?
While Mans was still outside, Huo Lin had already arrived in front of his father. His small face also showed discomfort, as his father's overpowering mental power was not easy for him to handle.
“Father.”
Huo Lin touched his father and called out to him, looking up: “Ningning seems a little off. Can you put him down? I want to take a look.”
Huo Lin called out several times but to no avail.
Until finally, Ai Wei arrived.
Ai Wei's appearance finally moved Ludwig's gaze, and the mental power that had not been soothed by the little child began to spontaneously converge.
“Ludwig, give Ningning to me.”
The little child, who had been pressing his forehead against Ludwig, had closed his eyes by now.
The little child's head was tilted on Ludwig's neck, and he was soft and leaned in Ludwig's arms.
The person seemed to have passed out, but his tender sprout was still struggling.
The moment Ai Wei reached out to pick up the little child, Ludwig successfully converged his mental power that had not yet been soothed.
His eyes cleared, and he looked at the child in his arms.
The tender sprout stopped trembling, and the child wrinkled his face, groaning uncomfortably.
Ludwig, who had regained his clarity, did not hand the child over to Ai Wei. His Adam's apple rolled down, and his voice was a little hoarse: “Just now, it was Ningning--“
“Your mental power is too strong, Ningning couldn't handle it.”
Ai Wei looked at the whimpering child, and her heart was filled with pity. She knew that without the child, Ludwig would be in great danger.
She was grateful that Ludwig was comforted by the presence of the child, but she also felt sorry for the child's frail body.
Zhan Xi sensed that Ludwig had fully retracted his mental power. He strode over and took his son from Ludwig's arms.
After taking the child, he turned and left, wanting to take the child to a safe place to examine him carefully.
Huo Lin followed closely behind.
Ludwig and Ai Wei stayed in place. Ai Wei whispered to Ludwig, “Mans and his army are nearby. I'm not sure if he noticed what just happened.”
Upon hearing this, Ludwig looked outside. He instructed Ai Wei, “Go check on Ningning. Leave this to me.”
The army entered again, led by Mans himself.
Ludwig and Mans worked together to clear the battlefield. Their goal was to kill the Zerg queens. The number of Zergs queens in the Zerg race was scarce, so they had to kill all the Zerg queens first.
But as they searched, they did not see any Zerg queen.
In the palace where the Zerg queens had lived before, they saw the remains of the Zerg queens on the ground.
Ludwig squatted down to examine it.
“It looks like it was eaten. These are Zerg bite marks, and this slime is what the Zerg leaves behind when they eat.”
“A Zerg queen has been eaten.”
This discovery furrowed Ludwig's brow. In the Zerg world, Zerg queens were rulers of the highest order and their own kind could not eat them.
Ludwig's mind flashed with a guess as to what could have eaten all the Zerg queens.
After five hours of cleaning, all the Zergs on the Ouyun Star were killed, and all the Zerg nests were destroyed. The surviving inhabitants of Ouyun Star knelt directly in front of the Imperial Army.
They choked back tears and expressed their gratitude to the army.
Ludwig's gaze swept over the Ouyun Star, and even though they had killed all the Zergs, the Zerg king, which lacked mental power itself but could induce a human mental power to riot, had long since disappeared without a trace.
He gave a casual order: “The Empire will take charge of Ouyun Star, Mans, leave a military force behind to deal with the aftermath.”
This Ouyun Star might be related to Ningning's background, and Ludwig had no intention of giving it to anyone else.
After leaving it to Mans, Ludwig turned and left.
He hadn't talked to Mans about Ningning's issue from start to finish, and Mans hadn't brought it up on purpose, so Ludwig didn't bring it up either.
Just before leaving, he stopped and asked Mans, “Did you find anything when you came here?”
Mans smiled and said, “No.”
He hadn't seen any magical little child either.
With Mans' answer, Ludwig didn't ask any more questions and continued walking forward.
Meanwhile, on Ai Wei's spaceship, a group of people were gathered around the child on the bed.
Taking advantage of the arrival of Ling Qi on the spaceship, they looked at the child and then at Zhan Xi.
He frowned, didn't say anything, but his eyes were clearly condemning: “How did you take care of the child?”
In addition to Ling Qi, Zhan Rao had arrived ten minutes ago.
Although there was a group of people around, the little prince, Huo Lin, still occupied a good position. He sat next to the little child, holding the child's hand and listening to the adults talk.
Zhan Rao said softly, “It's okay, the overdraft wasn't too severe this time, so we don't need Phoenix Feather Stone.”
Ludwig woke up before he exhausted the little tender sprout. If he had waited a bit longer, they would have had to dig out the Phoenix Feather Stone again.
Under the gaze of the crowd, the exhausted little child rolled over and faced away from people with his chubby butt, seeming not to want to be looked at.
He slept through most of the day.
When he woke up, the little child rubbed his eyes and saw the Emperor's face in a daze.
He was stunned for a moment, then subconsciously reached out his chubby little hand to touch the Emperor's head.
Ludwig lowered his head and let him touch it.
After the child finished touching, he blinked his eyes and said, “It doesn't hurt anymore.”
Ludwig responded softly, “It doesn't hurt anymore.”
The two of them continued to look at each other. As the little child's slow-waking brain slowly turned, he began to furrow his brows as if he remembered something.
Ludwig: “...”
He suddenly had a bad feeling.
He tried to divert the puppy's attention, “Ningning, do you want to get up? Your uncles are all here, and your father is settling them in. I can take you to see them.”
The little child remained silent, just staring at him angrily.
Now that the little child had regained his strength, he remembered that he had been tricked by Uncle Lulu!
Ludwig paused for a moment and continued, “Andrei bought you a new bottle that can hold a lot of milk at once. Do you want to go see it?”
The little child was still angry.
He pulled the blanket over his head and angrily shouted in a small, milky voice through the blanket, “Uncle Lulu is bad! I don't want to talk to Uncle Lulu anymore!”
Ludwig looked at the little lump on the bed in silence, feeling unusually helpless.
How could you comfort a sulking puppy?
***
The author has something to say:
Puppy: I can't be comforted!