Aeldara's voice rang out, ice-cold and piercing.
The warm, romantic atmosphere in the garden was instantly shattered by her words.
"You two... even have a child?!"
The accusation exploded like a thunderclap from the heavens, shattering the silent night.
Lin Qingyue, still holding Little Cyrene who was engrossed in her cake, froze completely.
Her brain shut down. The gears of her thoughts jammed, ground to a halt by the utterly absurd accusation, leaving only the buzzing static of a short circuit.
A... a child?
Who? Me? With Ilanier?
Wait... hold on... has this plot train completely derailed? No, this is a full-blown leap into another dimension!
Oh, right, this is another dimension... Never mind...
But having a child? How can two women have a child? Even if Earth's technology had advanced that far, it couldn't possibly produce a four- or five-year-old overnight!
Could it be... the Elven Race's life sciences have already reached that level?!
A barrage of absurd questions ricocheted through Lin Qingyue's mind, causing her arms, still holding Cyrene, to stiffen like stone.
Across from her, Ilanier's expression was equally priceless.
The lazy, seductive smile vanished from her lips, replaced first by astonishment, then by a sense of utter absurdity that left her unsure whether to laugh or cry.
She never imagined that her most loyal and composed Captain of the Knights would utter a statement capable of shaking the entire Royal Palace.
She opened her mouth to explain, but the words caught in her throat. She had no idea where to even begin.
The scene descended into a dead silence so bizarre it was almost surreal.
The only one unaffected was Little Cyrene, nestled in Lin Qingyue's arms.
Oblivious to the complex storm brewing in the adult world, she only noticed that the embrace holding her had suddenly become uncomfortably rigid.
The little one squirmed unhappily.
Then, she raised the half-eaten cake in her hand, struggling to offer it to Lin Qingyue's lips.
"Eat."
Her clear, childish voice uttered the second word she had learned.
That single word was the final straw, precisely crushing Aeldara's teetering worldview.
Look!
She's already learned to share food!
If this isn't mother-daughter affection, what is?!
On Aeldara's usually frosty face, the dam of her emotions finally broke.
A chaotic storm of shock, heartbreak, confusion, and the righteous fury of someone who had just watched their peerless, centuries-nurtured cabbage get ravaged by a pink-haired pig twisted Aeldara's features into a chaotic mask.
Her crimson eyes were locked onto Lin Qingyue.
The gaze was no longer one of scrutiny but of raw accusation and disappointment.
It was the look one gave a peerless scoundrel who, despite already having a child, still wore an innocent expression of "Who am I? Where am I?"
"Your Majesty..."
Aeldara's voice trembled.
She forced her gaze away, turning to Ilanier with eyes filled with the pained question: How could you be so foolish?
She wanted to demand answers, to offer counsel.
But when had it ever been her place, a mere subject, to interfere in the Queen's private affairs?
But...
But...
Aeldara's heart clenched violently, a sharp, stabbing pain making it almost impossible to breathe.
The Queen, who had raised her like an older sister, even a mother...
The monarch she had sworn to protect with her life...
Had been... taken... by an otherworldly visitor in such an ambiguous way?
And they even had a child!
The little girl had pink hair, just like that otherworldly woman.
But those pointed ears were unmistakably a trait of the Elven Race!
The evidence was irrefutable
Ultimately, this battle-hardened Captain of the Knights, who wouldn't even flinch before an Undead Army, succumbed to the immense mental shock and did something completely out of character.
She whirled around abruptly.
"Urgent military matters in the Northern Territory! I... I must attend to them immediately!"
She stammered out the words almost incoherently, then strode away on her long legs, her movements stiff and awkward, practically fleeing the garden in a desperate rush.
Her retreating figure—resolute, hasty, and even stumbling slightly—had lost all its usual heroic grace and composure.
Watching Aeldara flee in disarray, Lin Qingyue was utterly dumbfounded.
Wait, why is she running?
Urgent military matters? That sounds like an excuse! Why did she look at me like I'd murdered her mother?
And what did she mean by that last comment? What's this about "already having a child"?
Completely bewildered, Lin Qingyue looked down at the pink-haired little girl still nibbling on cake in her arms, then back up at Ilanier, who wore an equally exasperated and amused expression.
She finally couldn't hold it in any longer and asked the question she'd been bottling up.
"Ilanier, she... what did she mean by that just now?"
"Pfft..."
Ilanier finally lost her composure, a soft chuckle escaping her lips, which only deepened Lin Qingyue's confusion.
Instead of explaining, she leaned forward with keen interest, her wine-red eyes twinkling with mischief as she studied Lin Qingyue and Little Cyrene in her arms.
"She saw a child with pink hair."
"With a pair of pointed elven ears."
"Being held by a human who also has pink hair."
"And standing right beside them... was the Elf Queen."
Ilanier leaned in closer, lowering her voice as if sharing a secret between close friends.
"Qingyue, what do you think she concluded?"
"Huh?!"
Lin Qingyue's voice shot up an octave, startling Little Cyrene so much that the girl stopped nibbling her cake and stared up at her curiously.
"She thought this child is... ours? Are you kidding me?!"
Lin Qingyue felt as if her entire worldview was being shattered by a sledgehammer.
"Having a baby can't be that fast! Besides, how can two women even have a baby?!"
She thought Aeldara's logic was ridiculous beyond belief.
However, Ilanier's next words made her realize it wasn't Aeldara who was being absurd—it was this world.
"Well, for us elves..."
Ilanier watched Lin Qingyue's ghost-seeing expression, a suspicious blush creeping up her fair cheeks as her gaze unconsciously drifted away.
"...it's possible, you know."
"And..."
She paused, her voice dropping even lower, laced with a strange magnetism as she spoke almost directly into Lin Qingyue's ear.
"...it really is that fast."
Lin Qingyue: "???"
She felt her brain had completely shut down, unable to process the Elf Queen's words.
What did she mean, "it's possible"?
What did she mean, "it really is that fast"?
This wasn't science anymore; this was metaphysics! Theology
Gazing at Lin Qingyue's face, which screamed, "Are you fucking kidding me?" Ilanier took a deep breath. She, too, seemed to find the topic difficult to broach.
Aeldara had already fled in a meltdown; Ilanier couldn't let this long-awaited "partner" she'd finally found break down as well.
"Qingyue, sit down first."
Ilanier gently pulled her back to the white jade table.
"This... is a long story."
Her voice carried a hint of solemnity.
"It involves the deepest... reproductive secret of the Elven Race."
Lin Qingyue sat down stiffly. Little Cyrene, nestled in her arms, had already devoured one cake and was now launching an assault on a second.
She pricked up her ears, bracing herself to hear an elven tale that would surely shatter the worldview she had built over two lifetimes and several decades.
"Because of our long lifespans and innate closeness to nature, we elves have rather faint physical desires," Ilanier's voice echoed in the tranquil garden, tinged with the gravity of revealing a racial secret. "We tend to favor spiritual love."
Lin Qingyue, holding the baby, listened in stunned silence.
Faint desires? Then what about all those romantic scandals from your youth? Did you just pose for some magical portraits?
Hiss... I think I finally understand why that human king went on a rampage.
It's probably less about his ancestor having a fling with the queen of a neighboring kingdom, and more about the fact that his ancestor was just a life-sized cardboard cutout in the whole affair, wasn't he?
She silently roasted Ilanier in her mind but didn't dare say it aloud, afraid of interrupting the ongoing "science lesson."
"Because of this, our method of reproduction is different from most other races. We rarely... ah, rarely conceive life in the way you humans do."
As Ilanier spoke, her fair cheeks flushed a deeper shade of red.
Lin Qingyue blinked, signaling her understanding.
Even a centuries-old veteran of love needs to maintain a little modesty now and then.
"Then how do you..." Lin Qingyue asked curiously.
"The Mother Tree of Life."
Ilanier's gaze shifted toward the branch of the ancient tree in the depths of the garden, which emanated a soft, gentle glow. Her eyes filled with reverence and tenderness.
"When an elven couple falls deeply in love and decides to have a child of their own, they come together before the Mother Tree of Life to pray."
"Then, the couple each offers a drop of their own blood, which fuses into the heart of the Mother Tree."
"The Mother Tree of Life uses these two drops of blood as a foundation, combines them with the soul traits of the couple, and gestates a brand-new life in an extremely short period of time."
Ilanier paused, glancing at Cyrene, who was now single-mindedly demolishing her second small cake.
Then she added a crucial piece of information that nearly made Lin Qingyue's eyes pop out of their sockets.
"Moreover, a child gestated by the Mother Tree is born already looking like a four- or five-year-old human."
BOOM!
Lin Qingyue felt something explode inside her mind.
She stared blankly down at the pink-haired, pointy-eared, four- or five-year-old girl in her arms, currently gnawing on a cake.
Then she looked up at the silver-haired, crimson-eyed Elf Queen across from her, who wore an expression that screamed, This is just how things are done here.
A complete, yet utterly absurd, chain of logic slammed into place in her mind.
Last night, she and Ilanier—two "deeply in love" adults—had shared a bed in the Queen's Bedchamber (a special map), triggering a hidden condition.
The location was the Queen's Bedchamber, the place in the entire Royal Palace with the most concentrated life energy, which even contained a branch of the Ancient Tree of Life.
Then, tonight, she had summoned Mem.
After absorbing the energy from the Ancient Tree of Life's branch, Mem had transformed from a pink pixie into a four- or five-year-old girl.
This little girl had pink hair just like hers (inherited Gene A).
She also had the Elven Race's signature pointed ears (inherited Gene B).
All the elements formed a perfect, closed loop.
From Aeldara's perspective, the entire process was flawless, seamless!
She and Ilanier, in the Queen's Bedchamber, had used the power of the Ancient Tree of Life to create a child belonging to both of them in a single night!
Holy crap! So I just did a one-click, painless childbirth, huh?!
What is this, an otherworldly childbirth DLC? I never paid for this! System, don't you dare make decisions for me!