Yier rolled his eyes with absolutely no regard for his image.
“Just wait.”
So now he knew how to talk to him?
Who was the one they’d had to painstakingly pry even his name out of before?
He was going to make this merman wait a little longer!
“Go back for now. Until you apply for a new lightbrain, you’ll have to stay in the laboratory.”
A lightbrain could monitor a male’s pollution level. Once Fuyuan was bound to one, he could go find Yunyang as long as Yier approved.
But for now, that wasn’t possible.
Fuyuan obediently returned to the laboratory and entered the pool.
Yier glanced at him, then closed the laboratory’s metal door again and left with the other staff members.
Outside the research institute, Chu Zhiwei said goodbye to Yunyang.
“Yunyang, if you have time to visit Central Star, remember to come find me.”
The work here was finished, and it was time for her to return to Central Star and rest for a few days.
She had just come back from the Third Legion’s base when she was asked to lend a hand. For the past two months, she had been working nonstop.
This time, she was going to take a very long, very well-deserved break!
“Don’t worry, Sister Zhiwei. I’ll definitely come bother you when I get there.”
Yunyang waved goodbye as she watched Chu Zhiwei board the starship.
The starship took off soon afterward, and Yunyang boarded another one with her male consorts.
The research institute had sent someone to receive them when they arrived, so naturally, someone from the institute escorted them back as well.
After returning to the villa, Yunyang sat down in a single-seat armchair with her legs crossed.
Her five male consorts stood in a row before her, all looking down at her nervously.
Was their female lord going to punish them?
Xuan Yu couldn’t help wondering whether he ought to hand her the whip.
Yunyang beckoned. “Fu Shiyi, come here.”
The named consort immediately stepped forward and crouched down before her so that Yunyang could look down at him.
Yunyang reached out and lifted Fu Shiyi’s face with hardly any force at all.
She admired him for a while.
She really could never get tired of looking at her own male consorts’ handsome faces.
As Yunyang admired Fu Shiyi’s appearance, the five men grew even more anxious.
Why wasn’t their female lord saying anything?
Xuan Yu’s knees began to itch, and he felt an urge to kneel.
He had learned this entirely from his father.
Whenever he was at home and his mother showed even the slightest sign of anger, his father would immediately kneel down and offer her the whip, admitting his mistakes faster than anyone else.
His father always said that as long as you admitted your mistake quickly enough, your female lord wouldn’t stop favoring you.
And the facts had proven him right. So after becoming one of Yunyang’s male consorts, Xuan Yu had faithfully carried on his father’s philosophy.
Still, he really couldn’t figure out what mood his female lord was in. He had no idea whether he ought to kneel right now.
Maybe he should just kneel.
Xuan Yu was already preparing to take out the whip when Yunyang lowered the leg she had crossed, leaned toward Fu Shiyi, and planted a kiss at the corner of his lips as a reward.
Fu Shiyi was somewhat surprised, and when Yunyang leaned closer, he turned his head slightly—
The kiss had originally been meant for his cheek.
But that wasn’t important.
The hand Yunyang had been using to hold Fu Shiyi’s chin moved upward and sank into his short, dark-gold hair. She vigorously ruffled it as though she were soothing a dog.
“You were very well-behaved today. This is your reward.”
She had thought the five men would stop her from giving Fuyuan her lightbrain number.
Of course, even if they had tried to stop her, she wouldn’t have listened.
But they hadn’t, and she was very pleased about that. So she was willing to humor them a little—
How could a kiss not count as soothing them?
The fleeting kiss ended, and a smile appeared in the reddish-gold eyes behind Fu Shiyi’s glasses.
Fu Shiyi allowed Yunyang to mess up his hair. When she withdrew her hand, however, he carefully took it in both of his and gently kissed the back of it.
“Female lord, nothing matters more to me than your feelings.”
“Whether you take more male consorts is your choice. I have no right to interfere.”
“I only hope… that no matter how many consorts you have, you won’t forget me.”
Normally, Fu Shiyi was the most thoughtful and steady of the five. His way of doing things also made him seem like a dependable elder.
This was the first time Yunyang had seen vulnerability on his face.
He looked like a pet afraid of being abandoned by its owner.
Yunyang turned to look at the other four consorts.
By now, they had gathered around as well, each of them crouching before her like Fu Shiyi and gazing up at her with devout expressions.
“Female lord, I won’t stop you from taking new consorts either. But could you please not forget me?”
“Female lord, please don’t forget me either, all right?”
“It doesn’t matter whom you favor most, female lord. Just show me a little affection from time to time too, all right?”
Their expressions were much like Fu Shiyi’s, each one tinged with anxiety.
It had taken Yunyang until now to finally realize just how important a female’s affection was to the males of the interstellar age.
Under the Federation’s marriage system, in which one woman could have multiple husbands, if a female forgot about one of her males, he might never have another chance to receive her affection for the rest of his life.
He might even end up like Yun Shaoqi—divorced, his pollution level eventually rising until he lost control completely and turned into a mindless beast.
After all, very few females were willing to help purify a male who had been divorced.
A male’s emotions and very life were in a female’s hands. Even the decision of whether to raise offspring in a breeding pod could only be made unilaterally by the female.
So of course, they were afraid of being forgotten and abandoned.
Yunyang let out a soft laugh.
“Don’t worry. Even if five or ten more newcomers join us, I still won’t forget any of you.”
She wasn’t the type to discard the old for the new, nor was she interested in favoring only one person.
Otherwise, wouldn’t she just be tying herself to a single tree all over again?
She wasn’t going to dismiss her entire harem for the sake of one person.
She wanted to have her arms full of handsome men!
She wanted to be surrounded by beautiful men of all different types!
Of course, with more consorts, each one would have fewer opportunities to spend time alone with her, and there would inevitably be some sense of loss.
But that wasn’t something she needed to worry about.
Regardless of whether her words were true, the five consorts believed them wholeheartedly.
Yunyang rewarded each of them with a kiss.
“By the way, get ready. We’re going to S28 for a vacation in a couple of days.”
The day before, she had received a message saying that the travel ticket she had won in the lottery was valid for only two months.
Even if it expired, she could still use the privileges of an S-rank female to take her consorts on a trip. But this was the first time she had ever won anything.
Even though Pei Wenye had drawn it for her, she couldn’t just let the prize expire.
Otherwise, how could she live up to Pei Wenye’s good luck?
Xuan Yu’s eyes lit up.
The prize Yunyang had won was a seven-day vacation. If Fuyuan didn’t get a new lightbrain before then, they could delay seeing their new love rival for a while longer.
How could that not be good news?
The other consorts were thinking more or less the same thing as Xuan Yu.
“Female lord, I’ll go prepare your clothes right away!”
“I’ll make a travel itinerary for S28!”
“I’ll prepare some delicious food for you!”
“…”
The five consorts divided up the tasks among themselves and quickly got to work.
Yunyang watched them bustle around for a while before opening the StarNet and searching for information about S28.
As for Fuyuan…
She wasn’t going to give up her vacation just to wait for him.
Whether he could add her to his lightbrain and catch up with them before she departed would depend on Fuyuan himself.
