A light rain fell over Holy Cas Imperial Star, the sky overcast, the time passing and the temperature gradually dropping.
The weather seemed dim throughout Holy Cas, much like the mood of the empire.
Home at last.
Little Chu Zao lay at the window for a long while.
Even as the warship landed, he kept the Angel Spring Source stone in his pocket, still thinking of his teacher at the medical center.
His little wings fluttered behind him as he watched the rain, then he reached out to Amos: “Baba, Baba, let’s go see Teacher Hel.”
Amos scooped his little cub up, signaling for the others to arrange the next tasks, and carried Little Chu Zao toward the medical center.
Within the royal court.
A certain ward in the medical center.
Hel snapped his eyes open from pain.
He looked at the ceiling, his expression unchanged, but cold sweat slowly soaked his back.
Thanks to Morlo’s many efforts, and because of Morlo’s presence, he had managed to hang on a bit longer through the pain.
Though Morlo kept finding new ways of easing it, the relief lasted shorter each time.
The agony of having wings cut off seemed buried deep in the bone; just a moment’s distraction, and it seeped into every part of him, like ink spreading in clear water.
Hel glanced sideways at Morlo, asleep at his bedside.
His gaze grew gentle, and he let out a long breath.
Morlo’s face was pale, clearly worn out from sleeplessness and constant work, overdrawn in mental power and catching only the rare rest.
And now that he was finally asleep, Hel didn’t want to wake him.
Yet Hel’s mental power only barely fluctuated and Morlo instantly sensed it, lifting his head to look at Hel.
“Hurts again?”
Morlo propped himself up, moving closer, his lips chapped.
“I’m fine, you sleep a little longer.”
Hel paused, handing over a cup at his side.
“Hel,” Morlo didn’t drink, the usually gentle face now a little dark, “your pain tolerance has improved a lot in recent years.”
Hel was momentarily speechless.
Finally, he resigned himself, sitting up by the bed, watching Morlo prepare medication at the distant counter.
Morlo came back, administering the shot to Hel’s skin, pushing in the liquid, then exhaled.
“All right, any pain left?”
“It’s fine, it works well.”
Hel clenched a fist, telling Morlo.
“Zao Zao and the others should be back soon, right?”
“Should be? Said they found an Angel Spring Source stone, but I just woke up and haven’t checked, I’ll—”
Morlo replied automatically.
But his hand was suddenly grabbed.
Morlo’s voice halted. He looked down at Hel.
“If it doesn’t work,” Hel looked at Morlo, pushing up the gold-rimmed glasses he’d just put on, appearing gentle and calm, “don’t rush, okay?”
Hel had long prepared himself mentally—even after seeing the cub’s memories—Angel Spring Source stone sounded like a solution, but loss of wings for a Crown Clan was irreversible. If it truly failed, he hoped his own condition wouldn’t affect others—neither Morlo, nor Little Chu Zao.
Just as he always taught that little cub—as elders, they’d missed parts of the cub’s growth and left him with overly negative beliefs; now it needed correcting, step by step.
And most importantly—if you try your best and it still doesn’t succeed, the blame doesn’t lie with you.
Hel actually felt relieved—when Amos brought Little Chu Zao back, his own time hadn’t run out, and he’d noticed this little Dwight’s condition just in time.
Not a disgrace to the title of imperial tutor.
As for Morlo—
Hel hadn’t dared say more, till now.
Morlo drooped his head, hand gripping the spent syringe, most of his face shadowed.
Hel wanted to say something else.
But Morlo suddenly leaned in, the de-needled tube now pressed to Hel’s throat, eyes lifting from beneath short hair, a look of stubbornness and obsession.
“Shut up.”
The gentle Morlo had almost never spoken in this tone.
Now he seemed incensed, nose pressed to Hel’s, dictating, “If you die, Hel, just remember I, will, die, with, you.”
Hel was startled, eyes widening.
Just then, the ward door swung open.
“Teacher, teacher! Zao Zao’s back—huh?”
The cub’s voice cut off abruptly.
Amos, carrying the cub in, saw the scene—Hel leaning against the pillow, Morlo gripping his collar, faces so close their gazes collided, a tension about to explode.
Amos paused, did not hesitate, and clapped a hand over Zao Zao’s eyes, taking a step back to close the door.
Morlo: …
Hel: …
Of course, Little Chu Zao had already seen it. Now, with Amos covering his eyes, Zao Zao’s long curled lashes swept Amos’s palm, and in his soft, earnest voice:
“Baba, was Teacher Hel doing something shameful?”
Hel: …
Amos: “Mm.”
Hel: …!!!
“Your Majesty, don’t answer nonsense!!!!”
As for Morlo?
The moment he realized the cub came in and their eyes met, he buried his face behind his hands—and soon hid behind the curtain.
Moments later, Amos sat holding the cub by the bedside.
Little Chu Zao took out the Angel Spring Source stone, glancing at the shadow behind the curtain.
Then at Teacher Hel.
“Teacher, is Grandpa Morlo all right?”
Still not quite over Morlo’s threatening words, Hel turned slowly to the cub, replied, then looked again at Morlo.
“He’s fine—Morlo—”
Morlo from behind the curtain.
“I’m all right, don’t worry about me, Zao Zao.”
I really haven’t passed.
Zao Zao didn’t fully get it.
He tilted his head, whispering to Amos.
“Baba, is that what romance is like?”
The cub kept his voice down, but every Crown Clan in the room could hear.
Amos pondered.
But before he could respond—
Hel quickly interrupted.
“All right, Zao Zao, so you found it?”
Let’s not talk about that. Having His Majesty Amos, of all the unattached people, answer—who knew what “wise” opinions might come out.
The gentle white Angel Spring Source stone glowed softly in Zao Zao’s hand.
He could vaguely sense its message—’Whatever injury, come to me!’
A true healing specialist!
On the way here, Zao Zao had already “spoken” with it.
Now, the cub placed the Angel Spring Source stone in Hel’s hand.
Watching it expectantly.
To the Angel Spring Source stone, it existed for the sake of angels—now the angel clan was gone but for this last one, the last ever crowned with the blessings of all angels, the final clan chief.
Little Chu Zao’s requests—granted! All granted!
As the last-tasks Angel Spring Source stone examined Hel’s situation, it paused.
Its consciousness seemed to fall silent.
Its power was unlike the Crown Clan’s, but its intent could be sensed by those of strong, acute mental force.
The cub hesitated.
“How is it?”
‘Ju-… just a small problem!’
The Angel Spring Source stone finally lit up, pouring all its power out, light enveloping Hel—
Repair, repair, repair—
The power flowed endlessly.
The brilliance cast not only over Hel, but also brightened the little golden crown on Chu Zao’s head.
Until the Angel Spring Source stone dimmed.
Little Chu Zao picked it up again—flickering, longing to rest, needing a stable place away from the pollution, having learned on this trip how draining it could be.
It quieted entirely, no longer glowing or responsive.
“There’s a newly built pool base in the court beside Dwight Palace, currently unused,” Amos said.
He instructed Little Chu Zao to place the Angel Spring Source stone there later.
But that was not the main point now.
Everyone’s eyes turned to Hel.
“Hel.”
Morlo emerged, looking at him.
“How do you feel?”
At least, on the outside, they saw no clear difference.
“I—I don’t know—”
Hel looked at his hand, frowning.
“The painkillers are still working, and my wings should be in their usual state, but it seems…”
Gone?
Morlo fell silent for a moment.
Then forced a smile: “It’s fine—it’s all right—”
He was prepared for this outcome.
He—
Hel paused, wanting to say more.
But Amos and Little Chu Zao both stared at Hel’s back.
“Uncle Morlo.”
Amos, carrying the cub, even let a rare smile cross his face.
“Maybe you can check Teacher Hel’s wound.”
Morlo automatically looked at Hel’s back and was stunned, then suddenly reached out and began pulling at Hel’s clothes.
Hel: …
“Wait, wait, can somebody tell me why?”
Why the sudden urge to strip him?
Hel, a bit flustered, eventually cooperated as Morlo helped him gently remove the loose patient gown.
The two hideous scars had disappeared.
In their place—was a pair of tiny wings, just about the size of an adult’s hand.
Comically small and oddly out of place on Hel’s back, so tiny as to be easily missed, combined with all his pain and strong painkillers, he himself hadn’t noticed.
Not until Hel used a mirror to look down did this centuries-old, millennia-aged man fall into deep silence.
“This—this tiny???”
Little Chu Zao shuffled over, spreading his own wings for comparison.
“Teacher, your wings are way smaller than Zao Zao’s.”
Hel: …
Hel instantly withdrew his wings.
“But Teacher—”
The cub leaned out, looking at Hel.
“You finally have wings again. It won’t hurt anymore.”
The once-questioning Hel paused, looked at Little Chu Zao, and at last placed his hand on the cub’s hair, showing a gentle smile—utterly unlike the wild man he’d been when they first met.
“Mm.”
Morlo finally snapped back, grabbing the call button.
“Medical staff assemble for further examination.”
Hel had wings again, but there was much more to do.
And—
The cub yawned, glanced at the Angel Spring Source stone.
He whispered to Amos,
“Baba, let’s go put the Angel Spring Source stone down?”
After all this running about, the little one was worn out, and still yearning to help great-grandfather patch his crown, he needed to rest and recover his power.
Amos carried him up to leave.
Morlo saw them to the door, pausing at the threshold to smile warmly—no other emotion showing, but, with his back to Hel, a single tear slipped down.
Chu Zao waved to Morlo.
As Morlo returned, he stooped down and finally dared embrace his lover tightly.
Soon, their voices could be heard.
“Does it hurt?”
“No, but like I said, the painkillers are still in effect.”
“Right, I forgot.”
“But it’s all so strange—does it mean wings can regenerate?”
Hel’s voice still sounded dazed.
From utter despair to rescue in a moment—it all happened too fast for his feelings to keep up.
“Yes—”
Not just for him, Morlo felt the same.
But Morlo only looked at Hel, exhaled a long breath, and with a smile,
“Hey, can you show me your wings again?”
“…Isn’t it enough to know I have them? Why see them again?”
“They’re so small, so cute! I’ve never seen such tiny wings. Let me study them.”
“No.”
Hel: “I said no—Morlo! I haven’t even dealt with you for earlier!”
Zao Zao loved seeing this.
The cub lay on Amos’s shoulder, eagerly peeking their way.
Until everything was cut off.
Only then did he prop himself up, cradling the Angel Spring Source stone, now fast asleep to recover power.
“Thank you.”
The Angel Spring Source stone seemed to flicker but soon dimmed again.
Not long after, it was safely placed near the prepared pool, and as it nestled in its niche, it seemed to sense that this was a good place to recover, shining a little brighter, a drop of water slowly forming in it.
In the next few months.
Holy Cas grew ever busier.
Other nations and star systems responded in kind.
Some beefed up their teams, while friendly planets, or those awed by the power of the Crown Clan, fell in step with Holy Cas, gradually probing the pollution within.
Holy Cas also rolled out new plans.
Rotations and defense reinforcement for the barrier defense line.
And intensified the suppression of the beast tide.
So as to learn what lay beyond the barrier—so when it broke, they wouldn’t be left totally clueless.
During these months, the little cub kept growing. As his crown power recovered bit by bit, he went with Amos to the barrier edge to help Ebinino consolidate and stabilize his fast-dissipating corona.
Bad news: Ebinino remained on the far side of the barrier, his body in terrible shape, constantly in a heavily polluted zone. Different from Crown Clan healed by Chu Zao, his crown kept crumbling, left only with scraps, a patch of fog perpetually fading.
Good news: The loss was now slower than Chu Zao’s efforts to reinforce it.
The mist over Ebinino’s head clearly gained some substance.
The cub had just returned from the barrier’s edge.
Today was the day to head to military school.
With the appearance of higher-level beasts, Crown Clan parents had heightened training standards for their cubs.
They wanted him able to protect himself at all times.
So the little cub had gotten much busier these months.
At school, he arrived just as students clustered at the gates.
He greeted them as usual.
But this time, there was a stranger right at the front.
—Ling Ye.
The Ling Family’s young master, finally attending class.
He stood at the gate, watching Chu Zao approach.
This was his first day; he pursed his lips quietly, eyes trained on the fluff of wings behind the cub—soft and downy.
During this period, he finally came out of his dark spell and summoned the courage to return.
He’d heard that the students they’d tried to recruit or sponsor were unsociable and wanted to persuade them himself.
Barely at the gate, before he could find them, he ran into Chu Zao.
Gazing at those fluffy wings, Ling Ye—a born fluff fanatic—couldn’t look away.
Now that imperial policy had shifted, with future plans scrapped, his only duty was loyalty to the young highness.
Ling Ye told himself so.
Just then, he saw Teng Kelin and several others hurrying out from inside.
Ling Ye stepped up, about to speak.
But Teng Kelin brushed right past him.
As if he hadn’t even noticed.
That same guy who’d sworn in messages that he was strong and would grow stronger yet, until even the little highness was won over by his strength—now breezed by, leading the group.
Ling Ye: ?
“Teng Kelin.”
Ling Ye called instinctively.
Teng Kelin glanced over, blinked, “Ah, Brother Ling—”
Then said hello and hurried off with his teammates.
Sort of like: oh, hi, do we know each other? We don’t.
Ling Ye plainly heard him, excitedly calling to Chu Zao, “Your Highness—”
“I ranked first in this assessment again—do I have at shot at your future army group?”
The world had changed too fast—Teng Kelin’s messages were still on Ling Ye’s comm device.
Ling Ye: …
Had something happened while he wasn’t watching???
Another with this same feeling was Shenghua, holed up on a little planet.
She peered at the sprawled-out Xi with suspicion and couldn’t help but say,
“What on earth did you do? Holy Cas’s crackdown is so intense, you’ve scattered what was a perfectly solid foundation.”
Though secretly, she’d managed to smuggle useful things out during the chaos.
But—if you pinned the blame on a boss and showed nothing but concern, the boss wouldn’t investigate, and might even reward you.
Shenghua made mental notes—what to ask for next?
Xi glanced her way with dead-fish eyes.
“Ran into an annoying one. Soul Clan. I hate Soul Clan—they shouldn’t exist at all—”
Shenghua vaguely knew he’d come from a lab and harbored deep malice toward the world.
Still, when he said that, she couldn’t resist, “They didn’t do anything to you. Shouldn’t you blame those who’ve wronged you?”
Xi looked at her again.
“How do you know whether I blame them?”
He was a lunatic, an aberration—he knew it and despised everything in the world.
But, as Shenghua started to say more—
Xi lifted a brow.
“Are you really sincere?”
Shenghua: …
“It was just basic logic—of course I’m sincere, extremely sincere—”
Extremely sincere about wanting their stuff.
Xi stared at her a while, then looked away.
“Oh.”
*
Holy Cas.
Dwight Palace.
The new wave of rotation plans was out.
Amos and Frey had just entered the palace gardens.
It was lively inside.
Little Chu Zao was craning his head as Butler Mori measured his height, grousing about whether they’d saved any of the potato crop for seed.
Meilun and Kaman knelt by the new Angel Spring, betting if the spring water was sweet.
A cool touch hit his face.
Frey looked up at the cloudy sky.
“It’s snowing.”
“Your Majesty.”
Meilun and Kaman stood, staring at the sky too.
“Yes, it’s snowing—the snow has come so early this year.”
“We can watch the snow with Zao Zao.”
Meilun instinctively looked back at the little cub.
Kaman remarked coolly by his side: “Yeah, yeah, how many times have you said it, I’m sick of it. So moving—Zao Zao said watch the snow together forever. What a sight, crying his eyes out, always wanting to watch snow together—”
“Kaman!”
Meilun splashed Angel Spring water at Kaman.
“Who was crying now?”
The two scrambled out of each other’s way.
The little cub watched for a moment then looked away, trotting over to Amos.
“Baba, Baba, look how much Zao Zao’s grown!”
The cub reached out to show, then stretched his arms toward Amos.
“Baba, hug.”
“Okay, Baba hugs.”
Amos picked him up.
Frey called out: “Don’t break the trees fighting!”
He set off their way but stopped as his comm buzzed.
He checked it again.
“Feeney is lost again? I knew it—thank goodness Anya went along—”
Amos watched it all:—surprisingly lively.
The cub chimed in from his arms.
“Baba, Baba—Zao Zao learned that song at school.”
He meant the one sung during the barrier resonance.
Amos looked down to listen to the cub’s scrambled rendition.
After he finished, Zao Zao looked up at Amos—
“They all said Zao Zao was really talented!”
Zao Zao was supposed to sing at the barrier next.
Really well…?
Amos: …Really?
After all, one couldn’t expect even the most imposing Holy Casians to give a just critique—especially not faced with Feeney’s huge beard.
The cub kept looking at Amos—waiting for his judgment.
Amos paused, and still couldn’t get a word out.
He could only rub the cub’s head.
Cold, powerful Amos—leader of clan and empire—watched all the cheering and noise in the gently falling snow: …well, maybe it really was a bit too lively.
Little one.
You sing well, that’s worth praise, but next time don’t sing to Baba.
Try a different angle—sometimes a ‘sour fruit’ is tastier when fed to someone else, don’t you think?