After barely surviving the most intense night of his romantic life, Wang Li thought he would at least have a moment of peace in the morning.
He was wrong.
The camp was already buzzing with activity. The senior cultivators, squad leaders, and sect envoys had all gathered in the central war pavilion. The Nether Rift's abyssal tide had retreated slightly, but that only meant something far more dangerous was preparing to emerge.
Wang Li stepped into the command tent, eyes still twitching from exhaustion.
"Ah, Wang Li! You're finally awake!" the camp commander, a stern elder from the Violet Star Sect, greeted him with barely concealed respect. "We were just discussing you."
Wang Li groaned internally. Of course you were.
He was seated at the central seat of honor without so much as a warning. Beside him, several powerful cultivators from allied sects nodded in deference. But as the discussions began, Wang Li felt a sharp glance shoot toward him from across the room.
It was Qin Huoyan, a young patriarch from the Scarlet Blaze Palace. He was strong, arrogant, and dangerously attractive in a bad-boy cultivator sort of way.
Rumors had already circulated that he had once courted Bai Xueyao and had been publicly rejected.
And now, as fate would have it, Bai Xueyao was lounging beside Wang Li, polishing her spear while humming a sweet melody.
Qin Huoyan's eye twitched. His spiritual aura flared faintly.
"Hero Wang," he said loudly, standing up. "Since you are so… intimately acquainted with many of the top female cultivators here, perhaps you can explain why your tent radiated dual-cultivation fluctuations last night strong enough to distort the local spirit veins?"
The entire room fell into silence.
Wang Li choked on his tea.
"E-Excuse me?"
Ling Xi appeared behind him, sipping plum wine with a wicked grin. "It wasn't dual-cultivation. It was a... spiritual bonding ritual. Very advanced technique. You probably wouldn't understand."
Feng Yuling sighed and rubbed her temples. "They really noticed the spirit vein distortion?"
Mu Qingling stabbed her sword into the ground. "Who cares? He's ours."
The crowd gasped.
Yuechan smiled serenely. "As the senior-most member of this… group, I can confirm. Hero Wang Li is… off the market."
Even Lin Ruoyan, who rarely showed emotion, reached out and calmly interlaced her fingers with Wang Li's beneath the table.
"…I need to go lie down," he whispered.
But things only got worse.
A junior disciple from the Sky Veil Sect burst into the tent, panting.
"Sirs! Madams! We have a problem!"
"What is it now?" Qin Huoyan snapped.
The disciple bowed low and stammered, "It's… there's a rumor spreading across the battlefield camps. Apparently… one of Hero Wang Li's fiancées is… pregnant."
Wang Li stood up so fast he flipped the war table.
"WHAT?!"
The cultivators exploded into chatter.
"Pregnant?"
"With whose child?"
"Obviously his!"
"Is that even safe?! He's got dragon blood!"
Yuechan blinked. "Wait. Which one of us is pregnant?"
The girls all turned and looked at each other.
Ling Xi looked smug. "Not me. Yet."
Feng Yuling narrowed her eyes. "I haven't… Wait. No. It's not me."
Mu Qingling frowned. "I haven't missed any cycles."
Lin Ruoyan's gaze turned stormy. "I'd know if I was."
Bai Xueyao raised her hand. "Hold on. What if this is an abyssal sabotage rumor?"
The war council was spiraling out of control.
Qin Huoyan seized the moment. "I demand a spiritual test! If you're carrying an heir, it must be confirmed! This could affect the entire alliance's morale!"
Wang Li turned to Yuechan in a panic. "Senior Sister! Please say something!"
Yuechan took a long sip of tea. Then calmly said—
"…If I am pregnant, he will raise the child with all the love in his heart."
Wang Li felt his soul leave his body.
The discussion was eventually brought under control by one of the ancient elders, who smacked the floor with his staff and roared, "SILENCE! We are at war with the abyss, not each other!"
But the damage was done.
By the end of the day, every sect knew that Wang Li had six lovers, one of whom might be pregnant, and none of them knew who it was.
He became a battlefield legend.
And worst of all, no matter where he went, he couldn't escape the whispers.
"Is that the guy?"
"Yeah, the one who might be a dad."
"Damn, he's got guts. Or something else."
---
That Night…
Back in the fortress tent, Wang Li sat in the hot spring, his head buried in his arms.
"I was supposed to be a mysterious lone dragon roaming the world…" he mumbled. "Now I'm the Abyss Daddy."
Ling Xi floated by on a lotus, giggling. "I think it's adorable."
Bai Xueyao was pacing nearby. "We need to find who started that rumor. I bet it's Qin Huoyan. That jerk is just jealous."
Mu Qingling cracked her knuckles. "Should we test him for pregnancy? That'll shut him up."
Feng Yuling chuckled. "Let him try to handle six women. He'd collapse."
Lin Ruoyan said nothing—but there was a rare smirk on her lips.
Yuechan leaned against Wang Li's shoulder and whispered, "No matter what happens… rumor or not… you're still ours. That won't change."
He looked up at her—and the others—finally letting the tension melt away.
"…You're all crazy."
"We know," they said in perfect unison.