Ding Ling Dong couldn't help but be amused. She pinched Li Yao's shoulder hard and said, "Look at how scared you are. You are sweating, as if somebody is forcing you to have a baby, and there will be two lively naughty kids running around you tomorrow!"
She sat down next to Li Yao, too. Crossing her legs, she held her cheeks with her hands and continued, "Don't underestimate me. Your wife's career is on the rise, too. If everything goes well, there will be no other candidate for the next Supreme Speaker of the Federation. In the next five to ten years, I will be even busier than you. I might not even have the time to train myself in martial arts, much less take care of children!"
She paused for a moment and bit her lips softly. Her eyes were mixed with the artificial moonlight, as if a few cute and detestable children were jumping deep inside her eyes. There was no telling what she thought of, but she couldn't help but chuckle. "I'm probably not a qualified mother right now. I have such a bad temper, and I don't have much patience. If the naughty kids are really naughty and infuriating, chances are that I'll slap their pink, soft buttocks brutally if they don't listen to me. Tsk, tsk, tsk. It's scary just thinking about it. Let's not do it for now, shall we?"
Li Yao couldn't help but chuckle. "So, you are not ready to have a baby, either?"
"Of course!"
Ding Ling Dong glared at him. "A few days ago, I didn't even know which corner of the universe you were hiding in. Why would I think about such an uncanny thing?"
Li Yao hesitated. "Are you really … going to be the Speaker of the Federation?"
Fate could be quite absurd sometimes. To this moment, he still remembered the scene when he met Ding Ling Dong for the first time on Distant Expanse, the eternal flagship of the Union Army.
At that time, he could never have foreseen that the brawny, careless woman would one day become the Supreme Speaker of the Xing Yao Federation, nor could he have foreseen that he would become, well, not 'Mrs. Speaker', but 'the Speaker's spouse'.
"Of course."
Ding Ling Dong snorted softly, and her eyes became extremely resolute. "I may not be the most suitable candidate, but since such a mission has fallen on my shoulders by accident, I will definitely not run away! A hundred years ago, when Lu Zui handed the Patriots Partnership to me, I swore that I would be the 'Sword Grabber' of the Xing Yao Federation. I would protect the Federation and slash apart all the darkness and obstacles that have been troubling the Federation. This is my belief. Nobody can stop it, and no force can change it!
Li Yao sighed and said, "But as a result, you will not be able to focus on your martial arts for quite a few years. The path of training is like sailing against the current. If you do not move forward, you will fall behind. You were a pure battle-type Cultivator in the beginning, and now that you have improved to the peak of the Yuanying Stage and are close to the 'half step into the Divinity Transformation Stage', it should have been a critical moment for you to break into a higher level. Will the delay in the past few years cause any problems for your future progress?"
Ding Ling Dong grinned, not caring at all. "When I reach a higher level, I will still have to fight for the Federation. Right now, I am merely choosing a different approach. Does it really matter?
"Besides, so many Core Formation Stage Cultivators, Yuanying Stage Cultivators, and even Divinity Transformation Stage Cultivators have sacrificed a lot for the Federation on the battlefield. Some of them have even sacrificed their precious lives. Compared with them, I am only sacrificing a little bit of my time. What's the big deal?
"You should know your wife's personality better than anyone else. She has made her way to where she is today with nothing but 'bravery'. If such a responsibility is placed in front of me and I flinch at the critical moment, I'm afraid that it will become a mental devil that haunts my soul. Then, the possibility of me breaking into a higher level will be cut off. I may even be mentally deranged and regret it for the rest of my life!
"All in all, rest assured. Your wife is a genius in martial arts. Her aptitude is even better than yours. What's the big deal even if I have to wait another five to ten years? I will certainly be the first … 'pure' battle-type Cultivator in the Xing Yao Federation to advance into the Divinity Transformation Stage!"
Ding Lingdang waved her fists and said with lofty sentiments.
However, the word 'pure' had excluded Li Yao, a hybrid-type Cultivator, from the list. It was obvious that she did not want to compete with the monster in terms of speed of advancement.
"As for children …"
Ding Ling Dong considered carefully for a long time and looked at Li Yao for a while. Finally, she made up her mind and said, "It's still too early to talk about such things right now. It won't be too late to consider them in ten to twenty years. What do you think?"
"Okay."
Li Yao nodded his head quickly.
With the development of medical technology and the strength of the flesh and soul of the cultivators themselves, the concept of growth and lifespan of the cultivators was getting longer and longer. Generally speaking, cultivators in their twenties or thirties were "still wet behind the ears". It was very rare for them to have children at such an early age.
Cultivators were burdened with more responsibilities and often had to spend more time training. It was inevitable that they would encounter a lot of dangers, too. Generally speaking, the golden age of training was around thirty to fifty years old. Everybody would be working hard to break into a higher level. As the saying went, 'career'. Generally speaking, one would not enter the stable period until they were seventy or eighty years old.
Therefore, while there were Cultivators who had children in their thirties or fifties, for those who had reached the Core Formation Stage, the Jin Dan Stage, or even the Yuanying Stage, it was not surprising that they would consider their offspring and their family when they were a hundred years old.
Besides, Li Yao and Ding Ling Dong were only a little more than a hundred years old in name. In fact, both of them had spent most of their time in the state of hibernation. By the standards of the Yuanying Stage, both of them were shockingly young.
There were infinite possibilities in the future. Both of them still had space to explore, emperors to beat, extraterrestrial devils to fight, Pangu to annihilate, and so on. As for the naughty children … they would take their time to consider!
"As a matter of fact …"
Li Yao pondered for a long time and sighed in distress. "Sometimes, I really don't know whether it is a good thing or a bad thing to bring a descendant to this universe recklessly.
"This universe is too vast, cold, and dark. Even though we have secured the victory of the Imperium's counterattack today, what we have crushed is nothing more than a troop of the Imperium's remnants.
"The Imperium of True Human Beings, the Alliance of the Holy Covenant, the Pangu civilization, the extraterrestrial devils, and all kinds of bizarre, unpredictable alien species … Faced with so many formidable enemies, can the Xing Yao Federation really fight to the end in the armor of light?
"Although I've always believed so, when faced with the boundless starry sky, I can't help but feel slightly worried sometimes. If I really have a descendant, can I protect him forever, prevent him from being invaded by any darkness and live in a perfect new world?"
Ding Ling Dong blinked her eyes quickly because of the question. In the end, she pouted and opened her hands. "You're overthinking. Don't think that you can shoulder all the responsibilities just because you are 'Vulture Li Yao, dominator of three Sectors'. Who needs your 'eternal protection'? Chances are that it will be your descendants, the naughty children who used to give you headaches, who will protect you one day?"
Li Yao was slightly dazed. Scratching his chin, he said, "Is that so?"
"Yes!"
Ding Ling Dong nodded her head hard. Looking at the bright moon far away, she smiled like a flower and said confidently, "Each generation will be stronger than the last. Isn't this the way the world is supposed to be?"
…
At this moment, at the edge of the vast, boundless Tian Yuan Realm …
In the middle of the chaotic stone belt, a carrier, which seemed to have been abandoned for decades and was riddled with holes and rust and could fall apart into a pile of debris at any moment, was drifting slowly with the current.
Ever since the Xing Yao Federation discovered the seven Sectors, thousands of starships had been traveling among the seven Sectors every minute. Because of the upgrades or the storms of the star children, too many starships had been damaged and abandoned. They could be seen everywhere and were as inconspicuous as space dust.
However, if somebody accidentally discovered the abandoned carrier and barged into it at the risk of being minced by the swirls of stones, they would discover that there was an advanced fully-automatic laboratory, or rather … a breeding room, at the core of the carrier that did not match its appearance at all. Zi! Zi!
Zi! Zi! Zi! Zi!
There was nobody inside the abandoned carrier, but the defense rune arrays at the core were as powerful as those of warships.
Feeble interference waves were released between the crystal processors and the tubes of spiritual energy. Artificial arms were flying up and down agilely.
Two breeding cabins had been prepared, which were filled with liquids that were as warm as amniotic fluid. The two life seeds that had been perfectly combined had been prepared, too. What came next was the most critical step. Or rather, the most dangerous jump was not a jump between space and time, but a jump between different life forms.
Inside the mainframe crystal processor of the breeding room, astronomical information streams turned into two unique ripples that were dancing merrily, as if they were warming up for the last time.
"Excellent," Xiao Ming said. "Everything is ready. We can finally go and find Mom and Dad!"
"Be patient," Xiao Wen said. "Although the breeding cabins can accelerate our growth, haven't we calculated that we have to grow into the age of a seven-year-old before our brains can accommodate more than 30% of our computational ability, and our fleshly bodies can only allow us to do some relatively complicated movements. It will take a long time."
"I know," Xiao Ming said. "The outside world is very dangerous, and our life form is so different from the others. We have to be capable of protecting ourselves before we can go and find Dad.
"Then, let's hurry up and adjust our growth rate. I can't wait to find Mom and Dad and ask them what we are exactly. Can we be called 'human beings'?"
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