CHAPTER 465: CHAPTER 465 : XIE JIANYU’S DARK PAST (10)

"Uhhh..."

A deep crease formed between Qiao Wei’s brows as he tossed his head left and right in extreme discomfort.

"Uhhh, don’t..."

"Please, don’t..."

"I don’t want it..."

"Don’t kill my baby..."

The First Demon King, his nemesis, stood before him with eyes squeezed shut. From within both palms, dark demonic energy poured out and seeped into his captive ceaselessly.

Hearing the words coming out of Qiao Wei’s mouth, the demons opened his eyes and twisted his lips into a cruel sneer.

"That’s it, Crown Prince," he whispered in a low, venomous voice. "Let yourself be consumed by your bitter memories, your sadness, and your pain."

A pained groan escaped Qiao Wei. He tried his best to hold onto the reality, but the reality escaped him like sand grains running loose from between his fingers.

It did not take long before he was submerged in the river of memories from his past life again.

His head hung low, his shoulders slumped in deference, he found himself kneeling before the Heavenly Emperor within the confines of the Golden Dragon Palace’s study. The air crackled with a tension born of both reverence and trepidation.

"Abort the child," his Imperial Father’s booming voice echoed through the room.

"I can’t," Xie Jianyu said through gritted teeth. "The child is innocent, it should not have to pay for my and his sins."

"Xie Jianyu!"

A shattering crash, a vase exploding on the floor, was abruptly followed by the whoosh of something arcing through the air.

"Father, don’t!!!"

"Let me go, Jianshen! Release me at once!" the Emperor bellowed in rage.

"Little Yu’s body is weak! Father, we will find a way to take care of that child."

Hearing his elder brother speak did not give Xie Jianyu any sense of peace.

It was because Xie Jianshen’s way to "take care of that child" remained a bowl of abortifacient that he shoved under his younger brother’s nose.

"Little Yu, a few weeks have already passed," the elder omega clicked with his tongue impatiently as he paced back and forth before Xie Jianyu. "Do it as early as possible. Do not prolong the inevitable."

For the first time in countless years, Xie Jianyu could not hold back the dam that had contained his grief. Tears, heavy and hot, spilled freely down his cheeks -- an outpouring of years of stoic anguish, of sacrifices endured and cries unheard.

"Big Brother, please," he begged with all he had. "Please don’t kill my child. Please let it live."

Xie Jianshen glared at his unreasonable younger brother.

"It is a tiger child," he hissed. "A worthless tiger child. Little Yu, childbirth for omegas is risky as it is, not to mention that your body is too weak to endure the pain of childbirth! I will not leave until you finish this bowl!"

Xie Jianyu shook his head fervently.

"I won’t drink," he decided. "I will never drink it."

"Xie Jianyu!!!"

Xie Jianshen had never witnessed such defiance from his usually obedient younger brother, Xie Jianyu. Never before had Xie Jianyu requested anything with such stubborn persistence.

"Big Brother, I beg you," Xie Jianyu choked back the tears. "Let me give birth to the child. I will send the child away to a safe place. You and Father will never have to see or hear from the child. Please, just please let me give birth..."

Xie Jianyu’s pregnancy had left his body severely weakened. After kneeling for three days before the Golden Dragon Palace as punishment, his strength finally gave out, and he collapsed into unconsciousness.

Eventually, Xie Jianshen left and did not return.

When Xie Jianyu awoke, he only had one urgent task in mind -- he needed to find a safe haven for the child once it was born. Raising the child alone was an impossible reality. He needed to find a haven, a family ready to embrace the role of parents, a pair of loving arms to replace his own.

At the very least, he should be able to pay for a good orphanage to take care of his child.

Alas, Zhang Zhiyuan ran Longjing Palace in a manner different from other palace masters.

In return for an open mind regarding partner choices, marriage types, and divorces, he strictly forbade extramarital intimacies. Those who were found engaging in illicit, forbidden relationships, were either put to death or married.

The children were then given to loving, and yet childless couples who desired some offspring.

Following their palace master’s ironclad stance and strict ruling, no couples were willing to accept an unknown child from outside of the tiger clan.

That being said, the only way Xie Jianyu could smuggle his child into the tiger clan was by speaking to Zhang Zhiyuan personally -- or informing Zhang Fengxi, the father of the child, of the existence of said child.

But if he did that, he had to identify himself as the omega in heat who slept with Zhang Fengxi during Winter Solstice.

This was the one thing Xie Jianyu could not do. He could not disappoint his father and his elder brother again.

Weeks bled into months.

While the nausea and fatigue that had plagued Xie Jianyu subsided, his growing belly began to betray his secret.

It became extremely uncomfortable to move around because he had to wear a thick cloak, covering himself from neck to toe, at all times to hide his pregnancy.

Every glance at his reflection in the mirror intensified the pressure to confide in Zhang Fengxi, just as every encounter with his father amplified the need to keep it hidden.

Once Xie Jianyu ran out of options to fix his situation on his own, he knew that he already reached a breaking point.

He could not delay the conversation with Zhang Fengxi any further.

Just as he mustered all the courage he had to talk to Zhang Fengxi about the child, some grim news spread across the Heavenly Empire.

Liu Wenyuan had an accident, resulting in the loss of the baby in his belly.