Since Nile wanted to leave her in suspense about her own pregnancy, Alex tossed him out of the bed ruthlessly and locked him outside of his own room for the rest of the night.
He was obviously getting too touchy-feely there and she not only just woke up after three days but now she was also pregnant?! Albeit only for a few days, and technically it wasn't possible to detect her pregnancy this early as she practically just conceived the child but as hosts, the process was fundamentally different as 001 was forced to explain by Alex.
[As you know, only when two hosts mate can a child be conceived. That is why even if you fell in love with a resident of a mission world and married, both parties would be considered as good as infertile even if the test results classified them as perfectly healthy.
Personally, I was always wondering when you were going to get knocked up. You and your husband never used protection after all.
Anyway, once a host gets pregnant, it's the soul that carries the child since your real physical body is already dead and gone, and the void vessel is simply an artificial body, though it is also possible to have a child in the void world it is simply not recommended if you want first place in the competition as the child would not be able to join you in your mission worlds since they would already have a body of their own. Thus, you would have to accompany the child for some time.
As for the actual date of conceiving, to your soul and not Alex's body, each host comes from their own respective worlds that are all real as opposed to the void world's vast array of mission worlds. This means that each soul has their own concept of time that flows accordingly to their original world. These original worlds go through a different time zones from the artificially created mission worlds as well as the void world. In short, you could have conceived your child some time in the first or second world, we could find out if we want to calculate the how much time passes in your world as opposed to the void world.
As a system I have already calculated that for you. You have spent approximately 20 void hours give or take an hour or two in the void world. One void hour is basically an entire year in your world, so you have been dead for 20 years. During these twenty years, you have been together with your husband as a soul in another's body. Only recently did we find out you were pregnant, however. But that doesn't mean "you" are pregnant anymore. For all we know you have already gotten through the nine-month period just recently and the child inside your soul's womb is ready to be conceived and born anytime in each of the worlds you travel to now and in the future. Then again, you died a virgin in your third world, which is why I can't pinpoint exactly when your child was conceived.
But in short, following your first time with your husband in every world, you will have the same child, though the gender and appearance of the child would not be the same in every world the soul is that of your child no less.
The specs of your child can only be finalized in the void world, the moment your void vessel conceives them. They will be randomized in terms of gender, but the appearance should be based on genetics.
Any other questions?]
Alex tiredly shook her head no, then sighed softly.
Who would have known, she was pregnant. She never had to worry about it before, as her first two worlds were childless for some reason. Just those two worlds alone had already taken up twelve years in her original world so they had plenty of time for the child to be conceived but it didn't.
Maybe it had to do with her luck?
Honestly, she didn't know if it was considered good or bad luck to be with a child. Was it her bad luck that she couldn't get pregnant in the past, or was it her bad luck now that had gotten her pregnant?
Wasn't this just forcefully pushing her to Nile?
Well, not that she'd force feelings into their relationship just because she was carrying his child.
She wasn't a good person, much less a good mother. If she wasn't in love with Nile, a child surely wouldn't change that.
That didn't mean she wouldn't care about her own flesh and blood, though, maybe?
Technically, she really hadn't cared for her own flesh and blood when her parents left her. But in the case of the child between her and him, she wasn't sure of their...species???
'001, what exactly will our child be considered ah? A spector? Human?? How long is their lifespan?'
[Host, the child will be considered a permanent void resident. That is simply a soul with an artificial body. The void world houses them with no cost if their parents do not take them in or are unable to. In the case that the parents are unable to, it is usually due to the competition ending and them not having taken up the next competition, thus running out of points and having their souls obliterated. Of course, usually by then the children would have grown up and started families of their own with other void residents.]
So, basically, as long as Nile kept it in his pants in the void world they wouldn't have to worry about the child too much for now. Alex didn't think he'd have a problem with that as they didn't spend much time in the void world anyway and truthfully had no plans to especially since she at least had a wish in mind to make now, which was to spend forever with him if he could make her experience what love was.
In his case, he probably wanted more than anything for her to win so that their future was possible if he truly loved her.
'So that means that that child from before... The mommy they were looking for was...me? Fuck.'
[Affirmative.] 001 had always wanted to say that word. It sounded so professional!
Well, Alex had to admit that the child brought out some sort of good feelings from her. They didn't seem too much of a hassle to take care of, and even though they looked on the verge of tears in the end those tears weren't shed and they were even easily pleased! Such a pleasant child couldn't possibly be too hard to handle?
Remembering those soft squishy hands and the timid voice of the child in that space, Alex didn't realize the tender smile slowly creeping upon her face.
That was the mesmerizing scene Nile had walked in on when he finally decided that the door could no longer keep him from his wife. It was an easily removed obstacle, but he thought she wanted some time alone to register everything. After all, having a child before love was properly developed, he was actually kind of scared of the possibility of her considering an abortion. But, it was her choice, and even though he was the father and he would be distraught over it, Alex was the one bearing the pain of childbirth when all was said and done.
Faced with such a gentle Alex, Nile felt his heart speeding up and he felt content--so unprecedentedly happy. His wife didn't want to abort their child and from the looks of it she hadn't even considered that possibility at all.
Though, he couldn't help feeling slightly hurt that the first time she smiled in such a way wasn't at him but because of someone else, even if it was their own child he still felt bitter.
Actually, after thinking about it, no matter how hard he tried to convince himself that he was the indirect cause for that expression on her face he only felt more wronged and conflicted.
The only times she ever smiled at him were in the first world where she betrayed him in the end, and then the werewolf world twice--when he cheered her up when she was mulling over something and the third when he died for and with her.
But none of those times was like this one before him. She even made the air around her turn still and the atmosphere was warm and comfortable as if she was in complete harmony and bliss at the mere thought of their child.
Why would she think she was unfeeling? She clearly just hadn't met the one to move her heart--and it was at that precise moment that Nile knew who his true rival was.
After all, he wasn't the first person to move her heart at all!! Now it would be harder to get her to love him wouldn't it?! Usually the first man to win the heart had the highest chances of winning!
There was also her fear of being left alone, which Nile alone couldn't guarantee otherwise but he had offered to love her for as long as his soul existed if she really didn't want to sacrifice her wish for him.
He understood her concern, though only somewhat. After all, he was someone who had lived for over a thousand void years. Time was nothing to him for the entirety of his lifetime as a human and as a host. He saw many people die, but never cared for any of them. He let many people come and go, but similarly forgot them before he even finished blinking his eyes.
Nile had simply lived a life of indulgence with no attachments, similar to what Alex had done, but to a more extreme extent.
To him, the present was all that mattered. Whatever happened in the future was for the future, whether they be sad things or happy things. But spending forever with her didn't sound bad at all.
Only when he met her, did he feel a spark of life within himself, as if he was finally alive and not just a robot roaming through the worlds trying to find something to pass the time. She was entertaining and arrogantly so, and rarely did she ever show any weakness.
The times she did, he wanted more than anything to pull her into her arms and make her smile that smiles he loved so much. And the mere thought of losing her terrified him to no end. He felt that, if she no longer existed, he would follow her even to obliteration. What meaning was there to continue living a life without her?
That's why, when she fainted that day three days ago after killing the female lead, he was so shaken up that he immediately picked her up and ran to the nearest medic. Unfortunately the medics only told him that she was sleeping, but he knew it wasn't that simple.
He did consider her evolution into the Queen Mother, but as someone with her mental constitution and specs, this world's mental battles wouldn't even be able to make her so much as flinch. A blink would be all it took for her to control the alien inside her. (A/N: he knows her so well oml)
So, knowing that it wasn't the world that rendered her unconscious, he immediately asked Zero through their soul link to scan her and find out what was wrong.
Zero was noticeably excited at his findings, detailing him about how she was carrying his little nephew or niece! If he wasn't a starship but a person, he would have been sobbing crocodile tears of immense joy while jumping up and down and throwing himself onto his host in a hug.
Actually, when Nile walked into the room to see his beautiful wife smiling so serenely, his eyes also unconsciously watered as his lips turned upwards into a breathtaking and--similar to her own that she was unconscious of--unprecedentedly gentle smile. He had never once thought that he would become a father one day. Even when he was with other hosts, he didn't like the thought of the possibility so he always used contraception.
But with her, he felt from the very beginning that he wanted her. For the rest of his life, and even long after that. There was no need for anything extra blocking him from being directly inside her. The thought of having a child with her also didn't seem so bad if the child would become as great as they were as the parents. In fact, he was looking forward to this day for much longer than he knew.
Of course, now that he knew that his position was lower in Alex's heart than their child, he wished the child could have waited a few more years for him to stabilize his position in her heart (he meant establish, since you can't stabilize something that's not there but imma save him this burn bc he's a cutie)... Now, he wasn't sure how about the kid because they stole his smooth pathway into her heart, leaving him with the thorny and twisted route instead.
With these conflicting feelings, he shut the door softly behind him and slowly walked to the bed, gently descending upon it and going under the covers to envelope his woman in a warm embrace.
Alex had noticed Nile from the moment he unlocked the door but was still unaware of her own expression. She was only thinking about the kid she had a brief exchange with, who would have known that just thinking of the kid would make her feel so giddy?
Yet, when she turned to look at the man by the door and saw that he was on the verge of tears along with that silly yet gentle smile pasted on his handsome face she was instantly dumbfounded.
Her smile instantly disappeared though she didn't realize it come and go in the first place.
The reason she was so surprised was because he had never been so...calm before? Nile was always sneaky, shameless, arrogant, sexy, and occasionally sold meng. But he had never cried in front of her before or even looked as close as he did now, whether it be of happiness or sorrow.
But, Alex thought inwardly as he slid under the covers and hugged her with his hot and hard body, That expression was the best he's ever had since I first met him. I like it.