Xiang Yu cheered up when he thought of that. He had originally been really happy at home. It wasn’t until his trial had ended that he got into conflict with his parents. After running away and getting married to Yan Xia, he had never seen them again. He didn’t know how they were doing either.

Thinking of his parents, he felt a bit depressed. He hurriedly shook his head and then nodded at Jinde. “Mn! Don’t worry about it. I won’t move a single inch. Nobody will be able to do anything to him!”

Jinde nodded as well and smiled. “I know. Well, we’re off then.” He turned to his husband, took his hand, and then, the two of them indeed left.

Xiang Yu stayed in the courtyard alone with the shell, his mood still in a mess. He watched as the figures of Jinde and Leng Jin Yu vanished in the sky and then turned to the shell. “Now, we’re alone. You don’t have to worry though. I can protect you. I might not look like it but I’m pretty strong.”

He naturally didn’t get a response but Xiang Yu was still content. Anyway, this child would still need more than eight months to come out of its shell. Of course, he couldn’t get a response yet. He was just happy that he was allowed around and even given important tasks like protecting this child. This showed that Jinde cared a lot about him, right? In fact …

He cocked his head, giving the shell a puzzled look. “Qiu Ling, Jin Ling, and you all share the Ling character in your name. But did you realize they also named you ‘Xiang’? So does that mean I’m also part of the family since we share a name as well?” He wasn’t too sure of this but if it was the case … “Then that would make us siblings!”

His eyes lit up when he thought about this. “I never had a sibling before. Growing up, it was only me. There also weren’t other children my age around. It’s no wonder if you consider that gods take two thousand years to grow up. Still, it was pretty lonely.”

He pursed his lips when he thought back and his thoughts finally couldn’t help but drift to his trial again. “When I went on my trial, it was a bit better. Being human … that means you will always have people your age around as long as the place is big enough. Even though there still weren’t that many children, there were still some. It’s a pity we didn’t get along that well.”

He also wasn’t sure what this was about. He didn’t think he had been weird. And yet, he hadn’t really been able to fit in with everyone else. Sure, they got along when spending time with each other but the others had never sought him out to spend time together on their own initiative. He’d either need to follow them or he’d be left behind.

The first person who had really shown him an interest had been Yan Xia. Maybe that was also why he had fallen for him so quickly. It had also helped that after becoming a couple, people started to pay more attention to him. Obviously, this had been Yan Xia’s influence and he had done some things here and there to help him out. It had really seemed nice at that time.

Xiang Yu took a deep breath and then sighed before reaching up and poking the shell. “In the future, you have to be careful when you go on a trial. Lots of bad things can happen there.” He poked the shell again but then blinked his eyes. “Wait.”

His brows furrowed and he finally reached up to touch the Mark of Wisdom. After a moment, his expression smoothed out again and he smiled at the shell. “Well, seems like you don’t need to have a trial. Even though Leng Jin Yu is an ascended deity and they are part of the god race, they are still kind of human. So you’ll be … half dragon and half human. Lucky you!”

He sighed again and turned to glance at the door leading into the palace. “I’d also rather have been a dragon. Being a trueborn god is no good. Growing up is slow and the trials aren’t great either. Being a dragon has to be much better.”

He pondered for a bit and his brows furrowed again. “I guess it’s going to be difficult for you as well. Who knows if you’ll turn out to be more dragon or more human? Humans haven’t been cursed but I think the curse on the dragons is actually pretty good. At least they’re faithful lovers.”

Looking at the shell, Xiang Yu wondered if there was any use in thinking about this. Even though dragons grew up faster and a half-blood might grow up even faster than them, they hadn’t even been born yet. What use was there thinking about the child’s love life? If he wanted to worry about somebody’s love life, he should think of his own.

Xiang Yu pursed his lips again, his thoughts wandering to Xin Lan. That stupid dragon still hadn’t come back as if he didn’t care about whether Tian had really helped Jinde or how Jinde was doing now. He also didn’t seem to care about this child. He was … really, really heartless. His heartlessness was to the point where he couldn’t help but wonder why he had fallen in love with him in the first place. Clearly, Xin Lan wasn’t worth it.

Xiang Yu rubbed the top of the shell to calm himself down but the stuffy feeling in his chest didn’t want to lift. “It’s better not to fall in love at all, no matter how you turn out. Love is just not worth it. Relationships like that of your parents that can even span several lives are really rare.” He himself definitely wouldn’t get it.