Shou Quan nodded wildly. “Honestly, I see it the same way. I mean, even though his blood might be mixed, he’s clearly falling on our people’s side, doesn’t he? I mean, just look at him and the crown prince!”

The others slowly nodded. Yes, His Majesty’s pursuit of the Son of Heaven hadn’t been a subtle affair. Everyone in the capital city of the dragon realm was aware and even the generals who seldom returned had heard about it one way or another. Clearly, their king was crazy about that person, just like any dragon who had found their other half.

Even General Min Jun showed a thoughtful look when this was brought up. To be honest, he himself had been so focused on battle that he never found someone to love. Still, he was close enough to the soldiers under his command that he had watched many of them fall in love, get married, and even have children. Which of them hadn’t shown the same kind of expression their king had when looking at the crown prince of the Nine Heavens?

He had been there for the celebration in the Nine Heavens earlier this day and even though he had been annoyed at the presence of the demons and half his attention was always on them to make sure that they didn’t try to use the opportunity to covertly attack, it was still his king’s big day so he naturally paid attention to the couple to be wedded as well. And really, there seemed to be no doubt about their feelings for each other. Not to mention …

He looked back at Fu Heng, his brows tightly furrowed. “Did he really … bind his soul to him?” Technically, every race could do so if they intended to do it but only for the dragons, it was a natural matter. Their souls were made up differently, after all, easily separated so they could be attached to another soul. The gods and the demons simply weren’t the same.

Fu Heng inclined his head. “Yes. I’m not aware of exactly when it happened but knowing His Majesty, it should have been before the crown prince left for his trial. If you have any doubt, you should also know what happened after His Highness’s reincarnation was killed in the last battle. I assume that proves it.”

Actually, Min Jun and the other generals weren’t totally clear on this. They didn’t know much about the gods’ trials and the wedding between Qiu Ling and Jing Yi had been on a much smaller scale than the celebration today, with only the people closest to them attending. As a result, the generals had never actually met Jing Yi and only knew that after the last battle, their king suddenly rushed off and couldn’t be found again for a whole week.

After inquiring at the time, the response they received was simply that something had happened with the Son of Heaven but no details were mentioned. Considering that they had just fought a tough battle and needed to deal with their own matters — bidding farewell to those who had been lost, taking care of their families, and making sure that those who had been displaced by the battle could settle down peacefully again — they didn’t insist either and left the matter to their king’s adviser and the gods. And, well, that seemed to have been the right choice as they heard just some days later that everything had been solved.

Fu Heng looked at their uncertain expressions and quickly recounted what had happened after the battle. After thinking for a moment, he also added a few sentences about the situation that had happened even earlier in the Nine Heavens when Zhong Jing Yi tried to kill the original body.

At this time, hearing about their king’s state, Min Jun forgot for a moment what he was angry about originally and slapped the table. “Why weren’t we informed about this?! His Majesty almost died and nobody thought to tell us?!”

Fu Heng looked at him and felt that things were moving in a good direction. As betrayed as Min Jun had felt earlier, the fact was that he was likely the one who admired their king the most. It wouldn’t even be wrong to say that he downright worshiped him. Finding out that something had almost happened to him, his natural instinct was to get angry and find fault with someone, probably feeling somewhat anxious inside.

Fu Heng didn’t show his happiness and instead shook his head. “There wouldn’t have been much you could do. We were all at his side, taking turns to make sure that nothing worse happened, and the previous king and ancestor Xin Lan came up with a way to deal with it. Then, the battle already happened and took care of things naturally.”

Although, admittedly, it had been a close call. If not for their king being lucky somehow and meeting Tian, he also wouldn’t have survived that time. Well, maybe if they quickly grabbed the crown prince of the Nine Heavens and brought him to their king but that would have needed to be tried and could have been quite dangerous. In the state their king had been in, it wasn’t clear whether he could still distinguish between friend and foe, after all.

Min Jun grumbled for a moment longer, thinking that they still should have been told. At the very least, a few of them could have rushed to the capital city and stood guard to protect the king while he was vulnerable … After another moment, he froze, realizing that he had just fallen into his previous way of thinking, ignoring the terrible secret he had found out about today. He didn’t know how to react and simply stared ahead, his mind drifting about.

That person … he still couldn’t forget the day he had seen him on the battlefield and it was indeed hard to ignore the loving gaze he directed at the Son of Heaven. It was hard to get the image of those marred scales out of his mind though. He was torn about which one to believe more.