100x Rebate Sharing System: Retired Incubus Wants to Marry & Have Kids

Chapter 697: Chapter 696- The Distracting Mother

He looked at Helena. At the baby in her arms. The infant was not feeding. Not crying. Not sleeping. The child was sitting. In Helena’s arms, supported by her forearm, the tiny body was upright. The head, which should have been too heavy for an infant’s neck, was held steady. The eyes, dark and deep, were looking at Viktor.

Not at his face. At him. The whole of him. The child was studying.

Viktor waved. His hand, the one not held captive by Mira’s son, moved. The fingers spread. The universal ’hello’ gesture.

The baby blinked. Once. Slow. The acknowledgment of a being that had just processed a visual input and categorized it.

Bella appeared at his side. The cat-kin, still naked from the earlier session, had wrapped a towel around his waist. Her small hands tied the knot. The ’let-me-help-you’ gesture that was part habit, part devotion. She stepped back. Gave him the towel for the baby.

He took the towel. Wrapped it around his waist. Then reached for Helena’s baby.

His hands found the infant. Lifted.

"Why is this thing so light?" he said. The words came out before he could filter them. The baby weighed almost nothing. The small body, warm and soft, was lighter than a sword. Lighter than a scroll. Lighter than anything he had picked up in years.

Helena’s eyebrow rose. The violet-and-gold eyes carried the nanny’s disapproval.

"Young Master," she said. The title was pointed. Corrective. The ’you-will-not-call-your-son-a-thing’ tone that she had used when he was five and had called a book stupid. "You shouldn’t be calling it a thing."

"It?" Viktor said. His eyebrow rose. "You just called him ’it.’"

Helena’s mouth opened. Closed. The correction had backfired.

Viktor held the baby. Both hands. The infant, light as air, warm as sunlight, was cradled against his chest. The small head rested in the crook of his elbow. The tiny body, no longer than his forearm, fit against his bicep.

Mira moved. She stepped forward. Extended her son. The baby, still gripping his finger, was transferred to his other arm. Two infants. One in each. The combined weight was still nothing. The combined responsibility was everything.

His arms tightened. Slightly. The muscles, the same muscles that had wielded swords and crushed skulls and held women in positions that defied gravity, contracted. The panic hit. Not the battlefield kind. Not the combat kind. A new kind. The ’if-I-squeeze-too-hard-I-will-break-them’ panic that made his heart rate spike and his breathing stop.

Both babies settled. Against his biceps. The small heads turned. Found the muscle. Found the warmth. Found the heartbeat beneath. The infants closed their eyes simultaneously. The tiny bodies relaxed. The mouth of Mira’s son found his skin and suckled. Not for milk. For comfort. The instinct. The ’this-is-my-father-and-I-am-safe’ instinct that no amount of demonic power or system enhancement could replicate.

"What the hell," Viktor whispered. His voice was thick. The amusement was gone. The teasing was gone. The cocky, perverted, ’I-will-fuck-everything’ persona was gone. What was left was a man holding two infants and feeling their heartbeats against his arms.

Tiny. Fast. The heart rate of an infant. One hundred and twenty beats per minute. He could feel each one. Through his skin. Through his muscle. Through his bones.

The heartbeats against his chest.

His own heartbeat slowed. Matched. Not the rate. But the presence. The ’I-am-here-and-you-are-here-and-we-are-alive’ synchronization that existed between parent and child.

He sat. On the couch nearby. The leather creaked. The babies didn’t stir. Both infants, eyes closed, mouths working against his skin, were settled. Asleep. Peaceful.

Viktor looked at them.

The room was quiet. The six women, standing around him, watched. Mira, Helena, Elara on one side. Bella, Kaida, Vivian on the other. All of them looking at the same thing. The man who had fucked them all into submission, who had destroyed armies, who had claimed heavenly demons and saintesses and demon sovereigns, was sitting on a couch holding two babies and looking at them like they were the only things in the world that mattered.

Kaida’s hand went to her belly. The movement was involuntary. Her fingers spread over the pregnant swell. The child within stirred. A kick. Small. Against her palm.

Bella’s hand went to her belly too. The cat-kin, the former assassin, touched the curve of her own pregnancy. Her silver eyes, watching Viktor with the babies, softened.

Vivian’s hands were already on her belly. The elf, the quiet one, held her child within and watched the father of her child hold his other children and felt something she couldn’t name.

"He looks cute," Bella whispered. The words came out unbidden. The honest, unfiltered observation of a woman in love.

"He looks terrified," Kaida corrected. But her voice was soft. The mercenary’s edge was gone. Replaced by the maternal warmth that pregnancy had awakened.

"He looks like a father," Vivian said. The elf’s words were quiet. Final. The most accurate description any of them could have given.

Viktor didn’t hear them. His eyes were on the babies. On the small faces. On the closed eyes. On the tiny mouths.

His mind drifted.

Back. Far. Past this world. Past the system. Past the magic and the fucking and the power. Back to the other life. The first life. The life where he had been someone else. Someone who had fought. Someone who had trained. Someone who had given everything for other people. For a world that didn’t care. For people who didn’t remember.

He had died. In that life. Fighting. Protecting. Doing the right thing. And the world had moved on. No one remembered. No one cared. The death was worthless. A statistic. A line in a report that was filed and forgotten.

But here.

In this world. In this life. In this body.

He had something.

The heartbeats against his chest. The women around him. The children in his arms. The territory he had built. The family he had created. Not through duty. Not through sacrifice. Not through the ’I-will-give-my-life-for-strangers’ heroism that had killed him before.

Through desire. Through claiming. Through the raw, selfish, ’I-will-take-what-I-want-and-protect-it-with-everything-I-have’ drive that the system had given him and that he had embraced.

’I need to become stronger,’ he thought. The thought was not new. It was the constant. The background process that ran beneath every interaction, every fuck, every meal, every moment of peace. ’Stronger than the army. Stronger than the barbarians. Stronger than the Demon King. Stronger than whatever is coming.’

’So that no one can touch them.’

His arms tightened around the babies. Slightly. Not enough to disturb. Enough to feel. The heartbeats answered. Faster. The infants stirred but didn’t wake.

’No one.’

He looked up. At Mira. At Helena. At the women around him.

"But what are their names?" he asked. The question came out anxious. The ’I-should-have-asked-this-hours-ago’ anxiety of a father who had been so busy fucking and fighting that he had forgotten to name his children.

Mira moved. Behind the couch. Her body pressed against the back. Her breasts, still leaking milk through the gown, pushed against the leather. Her lips found his ear. Her breath was warm.

"The fuck," Viktor stumbled. His body flinched. The babies stirred. He steadied. "I’m trying to say his name, lady."