Meanwhile, far away on Prison Star, Mo Chen also received the package Jiang Qin had sent him.

He hadn’t received any transfer orders recently, so he couldn’t return to the Main Star. He could only wait until his vacation time to go back.

As for having Jiang Qin come to Prison Star, setting aside whether she would even be willing, there was no way he would ever agree to it.

After taking out all sorts of ingredients and the gift from Jiang Qin, he followed the method she had taught him and boiled a pot of water.

Then, he dropped in the hot pot soup base packet, and the aroma instantly filled the air.

Thankfully, his dorm room was well-sealed. Otherwise, the people hoping to mooch a meal would probably be crowding the building entrance below.

Seeing the natural plants, Mo Chen didn’t think much of it.

For ordinary people, these things were difficult to acquire even with money, but for High-level Beastmen like him, it wasn’t that hard.

So, he just assumed that Jiang Qin had found a way to buy them and had set aside a portion for him.

At this thought, Mo Chen felt a warmth spread through his heart.

He turned on his Light Computer and started playing the song Jiang Qin had sung. The steam rising from the hot pot blurred his features.

"If you have the time, spend a winter with me..."

’Soon,’ he thought. ’When the new year comes, I’ll have my annual leave. By then, Qinqin should have already had the cub.’

’I’ll have to tell Si Xu in advance to take his leave early and stand guard for me.’

’Even though childbirth for females in the Interstellar era has become much easier, I’m still a little worried.’

Suddenly, Mo Chen thought of the inmates in the prison. Although they were criminals, many of them were skilled technical professionals.

’It should be pretty easy to find a few childcare specialists among them.’

’Perfect. I haven’t received any training on this subject yet, so I can prepare in advance.’

Because he couldn’t just disregard the bigger picture and get transferred away from Prison Star, he and Jiang Qin hadn’t registered their marriage yet.

Although he felt a little uneasy, afraid something might happen to derail their marriage plans, he didn’t dare to be selfish.

After all, most of the capable High-level Beastmen were currently on the battlefield. He couldn’t leave Prison Star, and the higher-ups wouldn’t let him leave either.

If they were to get married now, he was afraid some people might think he was trying to use his marriage to a High-level female to get away from here, and they might do something desperate.

So, they could only wait a little longer.

The original plan had indeed been to get married after the cruise. At the time, he had thought that being married wouldn’t interfere with his post on Prison Star.

But after Jiang Qin went missing and both the Federation and the Empire discovered traces of the Insect Race, he changed his mind.

Eating the delicious food and listening to the song, his thoughts drifted far, far away...

***

Despite the snowy weather, Jiang Qin still went out.

It was because her company had a group of actors who were diligently practicing Peking Opera every day, and she was their teacher.

In truth, she herself only knew the basics of Peking Opera.

But those basics were enough. The most important thing was that they could perform the Peking Opera scenes in the film.

So, after spending half a month recruiting the actors, she now had to spend at least one or two more months training them.

The training would be considered complete only when they could perform the opera *Farewell My Concubine* flawlessly, knowing it inside and out.

The previous plan to compete for the year-end awards would have to be pushed to next year.

As for this year, they could only compete for the television series awards for now.

...

After a few more snowfalls, the Interstellar Calendar turned to the beginning of December.

At this point, Jiang Qin’s due date was only ten days away.

Lately, she felt that she wasn’t the one with prenatal anxiety—it seemed the males in her house were. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝒆𝔀𝒆𝙗𝓷𝒐𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝓶

Especially in the middle of the night, they would take turns pacing in front of her room for a while.

For example, right now, at one in the morning, she got up to drink some water and use the restroom. When she gently opened her door, her eyes met with Yuan Ling’s on the other side.

"Did you... have another nightmare tonight and couldn’t sleep?"

Yuan Ling blushed and forced himself to look calm. "Yeah, another nightmare. I dreamed that you were giving birth, so I..."

"So you rushed over to my door without even putting on shoes to just... stand here in a daze?"

"Yeah."

Jiang Qin walked up to him with a resigned sigh and gently squeezed his cheeks. "Go back to sleep. There’s someone with me, and if anything really happens, they’ll let you know."

"I know. I just want to stand here for a bit. I’ll go back to my room in a moment."

"Right. And in a little while, it’ll be the next person’s turn to stand guard, is that it?"

The males in the house all seemed a little anxious. Recently, they had started having nightmares that woke them up, one after another.

Things were a little better for whoever was sleeping next to her that night, but that duty was always taken in shifts.

So on the nights they slept alone, they could only come to her door to stand in a daze after waking up. Once they saw someone else had arrived, they’d return to their own rooms.

It was just like they were taking turns standing guard.

Even though she had reassured them and suggested they get some psychological counseling to work through their emotions, they remained tense and anxious.

Even Long Hao often asked her, "Qinqin, do you think I can be a good father?"

"Of course you can. Someone like you would obviously dote on the cub. I’m sure every cub would love that."

"That’s good. Doting is fine. Isn’t that Flood Dra still around? We can let him be the strict one with the cub."

’That way, he could spoil the cub without worrying about them getting spoiled rotten.’

The main thing was, he wasn’t the only one who had this idea.

For example, Yuan Ling said, "I don’t know how to teach a child, but I can make him lots and lots of toys. As for discipline, let’s just leave that to Yun Xie."

Shi Lichuan said, "My grades were never good, so I’m not skilled at teaching kids, but I did really well in my parenting classes. When the cub is born, you can leave the caretaking to me. As for their education... let’s leave that to Yun Xie."

Lan Yuyan said, "I earn money for you and the cub to spend. As long as I’m alive, the cub will never be short on cash. So it doesn’t matter if they’re successful or not. It’s perfectly fine for them to just be a rich kid and live their own life."

Hearing these words, Jiang Qin knew she couldn’t count on him to discipline the child.

He seemed more like the type of dad who would secretly slip his kid a credit card the moment he saw them looking unhappy.

As for Cang Hong, she didn’t even need to ask. If you asked him to say something stern, he’d probably just bare his teeth.

As for Yun Xie, he was so exasperated with this bunch that he could only laugh.

’When they don’t need me, they’re badmouthing me behind my back. But when they do need me, they all act so impressed and convinced by me.’

He couldn’t even be bothered to deal with them.

Jiang Qin felt that this group of parents was already a lost cause. Because of her own childhood, she figured she would also become a doting mother.

So, in this family, they could only count on Yun Xie and the yet-to-arrive Mo Chen to handle the discipline.

’As a Federation Admiral, she believed Mo Chen would definitely be able to stick to his principles as a parent!’

Jiang Qin exchanged a few more words with Yuan Ling, but she was too sleepy to insist on persuading him. Just like usual, she drowsily went back to bed to continue sleeping.

Meanwhile, Lan Yuyan, who had gotten up to pour her a glass of water, lay back down beside her and closed his eyes to rest after she had fallen asleep.

She had thought she would be able to sleep until morning.

But sometime after three in the morning, she drowsily woke up again, feeling a dull, intermittent ache in her stomach.