The suddenly quiet hall held nothing but the gazes of the powerful figures watching me.
I was under a lot of pressure.
In front of people like these,
could I still spout nonsense and muddle my way through?
"Ye Xiaoyao, can you tell us the truth now?"
Without thinking, I glanced toward Ye Qingxian.
The girl's hand paused as she calmly sipped her tea.
Junior Sister—why are you looking at her?
What was this, as if she had something to do with the baby too?
I quickly looked away. That had been a purely instinctive reaction. Surely no one could read anything into it.
When I fell silent again, the two elders looked ready to come down themselves and pry the words out of my mouth.
Who made a mistake and then clammed up like a mute?
But—
Heavenly Sword Venerable was still watching me like a hawk from the side.
She gave a light cough and said, "Ye Xiaoyao, just speak your mind. Whoever it is, I'll see that you get justice."
I took a deep breath.
I knew that if I couldn't give them an explanation today, there was no way I'd leave here unscathed.
I'd already anticipated this scene back when I made up my mind to fleece the Female Protagonist. Things still hadn't reached the worst-case scenario, so my plan was simple: no stubborn silence, only the hardest, most shameless nonsense.
"It has nothing to do with anyone in the sect."
"The baby belongs to someone outside the sect."
"They have a special status, so I can't talk about it."
"If you insist on forcing me to say who it is, then I'm willing to cripple my cultivation and leave the sect for good."
They wanted an explanation. Any explanation would do, and this was the last resort I'd thought of long ago.
If I couldn't stay in the sect, I could wander the world alone and quietly build myself up. That was still better than ending up on the Female Protagonist's grudge list.
My cultivation was even simpler.
It was only the lousy Qi Refining Third Layer. They could take it if they wanted. Even if they destroyed my Five Spiritual Roots, I wouldn't be afraid. I could just copy new spiritual roots in the future.
As soon as I said that, pretty much everyone believed me.
Only Ye Qingxian wore an inscrutable look.
The others had never experienced Ye Xiaoyao's mouth firsthand.
She already had, several times. Ye Xiaoyao looked soft and weak, but her words were harder than anyone's. She loved spouting nonsense more than anything.
Especially when it came to the baby. Not a single thing she'd said about it had been true.
The more Ye Xiaoyao insisted the other person was outside the sect, and had a status so special she couldn't reveal it, the more convinced Ye Qingxian became that the baby's other blood relative was someone within the sect—and someone no one would ever guess.
Who could it be?
Many figures appeared in Ye Qingxian's mind.
Every one of those phantom figures was a mighty, towering powerhouse.
She thought of countless possibilities, but never once considered herself.
The hall fell silent again. Everyone was thinking about how to respond—or perhaps waiting to hear what Heavenly Sword Venerable would say.
Even she still hadn't quite recovered.
The invincible Great Devil King in the records was so ruthless that she couldn't reconcile her with the young woman before her, who was determined to protect her child and seemed a little lovesick.
The word "absurd" filled her mind.
What peerless hardcase had dared lay a hand on the future invincible Great Devil King?
And the key thing was—
He'd even gotten the Great Devil King to bear his child willingly, without asking for a title or status.
There was no way anyone could force her.
Whatever the Great Devil King wanted to do, you let her do it.
If she wanted to have a few babies, then let her have them.
How big a deal could it be?
Why make things difficult for her?
As long as she wasn't planning to destroy the world, in Heavenly Sword Venerable's eyes, she could do whatever she wanted.
Having one baby was nothing.
If you made things difficult for Ye Xiaoyao and forced her to get rid of the baby in her belly,
you might as well write I'm forcing you to turn evil and destroy the world across your forehead.
So she swept a hand through the air and said magnanimously, "If you don't want to say, then don't. You can have the child too. That's your own business, and no one else is allowed to interfere."
Elder Fengyun was left speechless.
Though he'd already known how things would turn out, hearing Heavenly Sword Venerable say that still struck him as outrageous favoritism. Her own descendants had become so rebellious, and she still put up with everything. If it were his descendants, he would've forced the truth out of them long ago and beaten that irresponsible scumbag into a pulp.
Heavenly Sword Venerable's words settled the matter once and for all.
From that day on, no one could make things difficult for Ye Xiaoyao over this.
I was a little surprised too.
I'd already prepared myself to be kicked out of the sect.
And the result—nothing happened?
When had Heavenly Sword Peak gotten so easygoing?
Wait, what had Master just said?
Having a baby was my own business, and no one else could interfere?
Huh?
There was really such a good thing?
Didn't that mean I could have as many as I wanted, and no one would call it indecent or step in halfway through?
As the matter came to a close, Heavenly Sword Venerable had no idea that her words would prove prophetic. If she'd known what would happen, she never would've said them so magnanimously, as if it were no more important than deciding what to have for dinner.
She'd thought she could indulge people without limits in all sorts of other matters, but she'd never imagined Ye Xiaoyao would actually do this.
Who really kept having babies one after another without the slightest hesitation or restraint, giving birth nonstop with no breaks in between and no time to recover?
Was she treating herself like a broodmother?
And the worst part was, the Great Devil King herself had decided to do it.
Heavenly Sword Venerable was mainly worried that when she returned to the Time and Space Administration, her colleagues would criticize how she'd handled things in this Level Five World. Even a Great Devil King had basic human rights.
Jian Wushuang never expected that, just after finishing her punishment in the Cold Hell and preparing to make it up to Junior Sister, she'd see a whole crowd of little radish heads of every height trailing after her. She was left so dumbfounded that she turned into a stone statue in the wind.
Only Ye Qingxian left with her brows drawn together.
How could Heavenly Sword Venerable do that?
She truly couldn't understand.
Letting your descendants do whatever they wanted wasn't love.
Letting your descendants drift wherever they pleased, do whatever they wanted—that was no different from being irresponsible.
Her fists slowly clenched.
Junior Sister's usual docility, her stubbornness about having babies, and her unwavering devotion to that scumbag—
All of it left her, a girl who wasn't much older herself, deeply unsettled.
She wanted to respect other people's lives.
But Junior Sister was innocent.
She was still so young, with a wonderful life ahead of her. She'd only been deceived by someone else.
If even Junior Sister's family wouldn't step in and they let her carry on like this, what would she become in the end?
Ye Qingxian took a deep breath and suddenly realized something.
Perhaps the only person left who could pull Ye Xiaoyao back from the brink was her, the Senior Sister from the same sect.
Forget the baby.
She absolutely couldn't stand by and watch Junior Sister get dragged into the abyss by someone else again.
So she stopped Ye Xiaoyao, who was about to head home and go to sleep.
"A girl must never debase herself."
I looked up at the Female Protagonist before me, my expression growing complicated.
"Right, I'm shameless to begin with." I tilted my head, my voice crisp. No matter how alluring the little cherry of a mouth might be, once I stopped holding my tongue, every word I said could get more infuriating than the last. "So you should stop meddling in my business."
It wasn't that I was asking for a beating.
I just didn't want to have anything to do with the Female Protagonist anymore.
Ye Qingxian's knuckles cracked as she clenched her fists.
What should she do?
She really wanted to chase after Ye Xiaoyao and pin her to the ground for a beating.
To see what kind of mush was inside her head—
Would one fist the size of a sandbag be enough to knock some sense into her?
Ye Qingxian had always been a woman of action.
So she acted at once.
Above the distant horizon of Heavenly Sword Peak,
Shuang Yue was tugging at the Senior Sister who usually doted on her most, complaining tearfully about how awful Ye Qingxian had been lately.
The pretty young girl recounted everything so vividly that Yue Wuhua was drawn right into the scene.
"That does sound pretty awful."
Yue Wuhua gave her verdict calmly.
Before you continue