Chapter 31

The scene of Ludwig holding a child came into view, and he saw Zhan Xi making fried buns. He didn’t hurry over, but instead came over after frying the buns on hand.

“Your Majesty, why are you here?” Zhan Xi was surprised to see him coming alone. He put away the small desk he had set up for Jian Ning and invited Ludwig, “Come inside and tell me what’s going on.”

Ludwig’s identity was indeed not suitable for standing outside.

After Zhan Xi finished speaking, he picked up the desk and took a plate of fried buns, and walked together to the backyard. Next to the vegetable garden in the backyard, he put down the desk and prepared to let his own child continue writing here.

The backyard was quiet and deserted.

Ludwig put the child in his arms down and looked up at Zhan Xi, “Why did Ningning lose so much weight during this period?”

When Zhan Xi heard this, he frowned.

He handed the freshly fried buns to Ludwig. “Your Majesty, try our family’s buns. I feel like Ningning has lost weight from eating buns, but I still think our buns taste great.”

As he spoke, Zhan Xi handed the buns over.

Ludwig looked at the golden brown color of the fried buns. Judging by their appearance alone, they were still qualified. He took one and took a bite.

At the first bite, his expression was a bit subtle.

At the second bite, his chewing movements began to hesitate.

In the end, upholding the principle of not wasting food, Ludwig simply stopped tasting the flavor and ate the remaining buns in two big bites.

After eating the buns, Ludwig finally understood the reason for the little chubby child’s weight loss. He frowned and asked Zhan Xi, “Do you really think your buns are delicious?”

Zhan Xi nodded. “When my parents made buns for me before, they tasted like this and I liked them. To be honest, after the buns didn’t sell, I took them for food testing and the results showed that our buns were healthy and had no problems.”

“But for some reason, customers don’t like to eat them at all. I’ve been innovating every day for the past half month, but whether it’s the old flavor or the new flavor, they sell very little.”

As Zhan Xi told the story, Ludwig finally understood that Zhan Xi either had abnormal taste buds or had never eaten anything good since childhood, so he couldn’t distinguish between good and bad taste.

It would be strange if the breakfast shop didn’t go bankrupt with him running it.

Jian Ning sat on a small stool and watched them talk eagerly.

For the normal taste buds of the little child, it was natural to taste that the flavor of the buns was strange. But he couldn’t bear to tell the truth to his father when he saw how hard he worked to make the buns.

The filial child watched his father’s disappointment as the buns didn’t sell, so he could only eat them with tears in his eyes every day.

Ludwig saw Zhan Xi’s effort.

He tried, but it didn’t work.

He didn’t have a deep emotional connection with Zhan Xi, so he had no qualms about hurting him. He told him the truth: “It’s really hard to eat. You should change your profession.”

Zhan Xi: “...”

Zhan Xi didn’t give up: “I improved the taste of the buns, do you want to try them?”

Ludwig: “...”

By the time Ludwig tasted the fifth bun, his face had turned iron blue. His golden eyes locked onto Zhan Xi’s face, reminding him one word at a time: “Change your profession.”

Under the aura of the Imperial Emperor, Zhan Xi’s eyes dimmed.

He looked down at the little child on the small stool and finally compromised: “I’ll go look for a new business tomorrow. I’ve picked up a lot of valuable scrap during the day, and I’ve made a lot of money selling it to the scrap yard. If it really doesn’t work, I’ll just do the scrap business.”

The two of them talked for a while and finally moved into the house. When they moved inside this time, they didn’t bring the little child with them.

Before leaving, Zhan Xi squatted down, opened the child’s homework book, and turned to the page he was supposed to write on: “Baby, you stay here and do your homework obediently. Daddy and Uncle need to talk about something.”

As soon as the two adults left, the little child made a phone call to his older brother. His childish voice sounded happy: “Brother, Dad won’t be selling steamed buns anymore!”

Huo Lin: “?”

Huo Lin, who always ate steamed buns with the little child, breathed a sigh of relief.

They were having a video call, and Huo Lin didn’t want to disturb him while he was doing his homework. The little child was very slow at doing his homework and could easily be distracted by small things.

“Ningning, stand the camera upright and then do your homework properly.”

“But I don’t want to do my homework,” the little child said as he gripped his pen, sitting on a stool. He kept gripping the pen but didn’t write anything in his notebook. His beautiful black eyes blinked, and he spoke with a cute tone: “Brother, talk to me.”

Huo Lin was strict in supervising the little child’s homework.

He looked at the little child who was dragging his feet on the screen and said lightly, “I won’t talk to you until you finish your homework. You can only ask me if you have any problems while doing your homework.”

Under Huo Lin’s supervision through the screen, Ningning, who was holding his pen, finally lowered his head and started to do his homework with a pouty face. He wrote for a while, then looked up at his brother, only to find that Huo Lin was reading a book and didn’t want to play with him at all.

After a while, Huo Lin began to check his homework. “Hold up your notebook and let me take a look.”

The little child, who had scribbled all over his notebook, held it up for Huo Lin to see.

Huo Lin only looked at it for a few seconds before his blood pressure started to rise: “You made mistakes in two and a half out of three lines of characters. The first character you wrote was correct, but how did it become different as you kept writing?”

Now the little child was learning some simple imperial characters, and Huo Lin found it challenging to check his homework without losing his temper.

He had never been a gentle person, born with S-level mental power, which often made him endure mental pain. These pains actually caused his emotions to become extremely uncontrollable.

But in front of Ningning, he had never shown any abnormality.

Even when he felt that his mental power was about to become uncontrollable, he would stay away from the little child to avoid affecting him.

He vaguely guessed that the child seemed to be able to soothe other people’s mental power, but he never allowed him to soothe his own mental power.

The little one was too young, and he didn’t think it’s a good idea to let him use this skill recklessly.

Under Huo Lin’s inspection, Ningning, who was scribbling on his homework, had to rewrite it in a pitiful manner.

He was writing his homework outside, while the conversation of the two adults inside also centered on him.

“That spaceship carrying Ningning that you mentioned, I had someone check it out. Their final destination was the Ouyun Star. After the spaceship had an accident, all the relatives of the personnel on board died for various reasons.”

Upon hearing this, Zhan Xi’s face suddenly turned ugly.

He spoke in a heavy tone, “Ouyun Star has long been taken over by the Zerg. They planned to take Ningning to Ouyun Star, were they trying to--“

He didn’t need to finish his sentence, as Ludwig guessed the same thing: “If the Poison Spider didn’t intervene, this spaceship would have flown into the Zerg’s nest.”

And the fate of the little child, who could not even speak at the time, entering the Zerg’s nest, could be easily imagined.

Ludwig kept the agreement and did not conceal any investigation results.

But all the people and relatives on the spaceship died without a trace, and he could only find out this much for now.

In their conversation, Ludwig revealed his itinerary: “I heard that a male king worm was born in the royal family of the Zerg. To celebrate its birth, the Zerg are revelling and aggressively invading the edge planets of the empire. I will personally lead the expedition and cut off the head of this king worm.”

The Emperor of the Empire was not one to sit back and let others fight in his place. Ludwig had killed countless Zerg, and the three years of peace, as well as the birth of the king worm, had made these aggressive creatures restless.

Mans had already set out on his expedition.

Ludwig’s chosen destination was the planet Ouyun, which had the most Zerg and was likely where the king worm was born.

Zhan Xi didn’t say much when he learned of Ludwig’s plans.

The sky darkened quickly on White Mist Star, and when Ludwig left, the little child in the yard had already turned on the lights and finished his homework.

When he saw Ludwig was leaving, the child clung to his leg.

“Uncle, don’t go!”

The child hadn’t seen Ludwig for almost half a month and missed him very much. He clung to Ludwig’s small leg, and his chubby little butt pressed against his foot.

Ludwig looked down and picked up the child, blocking his path, asking casually, “Do you miss me?”

“Yes!” the child replied.

The child was always honest about his feelings. After being picked up, he hugged Ludwig’s arm.

Ludwig looked at him for a few seconds and said, “Let’s go. We’ll sleep in the palace tonight.”

The child hurried to find his father.

Zhan Xi thought it would be good to let the child eat two meals at the palace after eating buns for so many days. The palace’s food was well-prepared and could fatten up the child. The child had previously become chubby after eating in the palace.

He waved his hand and agreed, “Go ahead, go ahead, eat more when you go.”

The little child nodded solemnly and decided to eat three bowls when he went.

That night, when the little child returned to the palace, he had a supper before going to bed. When Huo Lin held him, his face showed no expression, but his lips were pursed, obviously feeling sorry for him.

When it was time to sleep, the little child had a hard time deciding, but eventually chose to sleep with Ludwig.

When Ludwig came back at night, he lifted him onto his shoulder and sat down. The little one even wanted to sit with him for a while longer. And sleeping between Ludwig and Ai Wei at night made the little child very happy.

Ai Wei was a very caring mother who enjoyed managing family relationships. The pajamas she bought for her family were all matching sets, and even both Ningning and Wagner had them.

Wagner was more independent and had never snuggled on Ludwig’s bed.

On the big bed, the little child, who smelled fresh from the bath, kicked Ludwig with his chubby feet. Ludwig was very heavy, and he had to kick hard to push him away a little.

And every time Ludwig moved a little, he would laugh and giggle nonstop.

The little child played this simple and childish game over and over again, and he was still enjoying it. When he kicked with his chubby feet, he accidentally hit Ludwig’s face, but the latter was not angry.

Not only was he not angry, but Ludwig also grabbed his chubby feet directly, pretending to throw him away.

The little one, who was grabbed by the foot, hurriedly turned to Ai Wei and said, “Auntie! Help Ningning!”

Ai Wei smiled and recorded the video, encouraging the young child to find a way to escape from the emperor’s clutches.

After making a fuss for a while, Ai Wei looked at the time and ordered both the big and small ones to sleep honestly.

The big one was not allowed to deliberately lead the little one to make trouble, and the little one was not allowed to kick their feet secretly after the game was over.

Before going to sleep, Ai Wei lowered her head and gave a kiss on the soft little face of the child, and the child also leaned over to give her a kiss.

After kissing the child, the Emperor raised an eyebrow and looked at his wife, “I want one too.”

Ai Wei: “...”

Cough, they’re all grown-ups, why compare with a child?

They slept soundly that night, and the next day, Huo Lin still came to wake up the lazy child, dressed him, and carried him outside to eat.

The status of the little child in the palace was becoming more and more prominent.

As Huo Lin was putting on a bib for the child, the steamed bun shop that was about to close suddenly received a big order.

The child, who was completely unaware, held the spoon and listened to Ludwig saying that he was going on a long journey.

The child, who had been well-behaved and eating his meal, immediately frowned upon hearing this, and looked at Ludwig with a pout, saying in a small, unhappy voice, “Don’t go! Uncle can’t go!”

Uncle can not go on a long journey!

Ludwig didn’t know why he objected, and even Huo Lin’s persuasion was useless.

At the end of the deadlock, the child refused to eat, climbed onto Huo Lin’s lap, and buried his chubby face in his arms, sadly complaining to Huo Lin, “Uncle is not obedient and does not listen to me.”

A little sprout had already grown while he was sleeping last night.

Since the little sprout had appeared, Uncle could not go out.

***

The author has something to say:

Ningning: The boss of the imperial palace!

 

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