High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 525: Chapter 194: Neptune and Poseidon_1

”So, before we start our conversation, I need to clarify something first,” Su Shijun put down her quill, crossed her hands and placed them under her chin, eyes serious, she asked the wizard in front of her: ”...do you have a Calm Heart Talisman?”

”I do? I have quite a few...” Zheng Qing reached into his grey cloth bag with a puzzled look on his face, pulling out a stack of fresh talisman papers.

He had just finished drawing these not long ago, planning to sell them at the Wandering Bar. They were standard talismans, smoothly executed with obvious results. They could definitely be considered high quality.

”Very good.” Su Shijun nodded in satisfaction. ”This way, I won’t have to waste my time copying incantations again...”

While saying this, she closed the law book beside her and made a hooking gesture with her fingers. Immediately, four or five talisman papers from the stack leaped out and attached themselves onto Zheng Qing, making snapping sounds:

”What’s about to happen next might make you feel a bit uncomfortable... so just to be on the safe side, we should take some extra precautions.”

”What’s going on?” Zheng Qing couldn’t help but protest as he watched the burning talisman papers on his body, ”Is there anything more uncomfortable than having my shadow stolen?”

A rare awkward smile appeared on Su Shijun’s face.

”Didn’t you guys want to know who Neptune’s father is?”

”Who?!” The news drew Zheng Qing’s attention away from the burning papers on his body, his face unable to conceal his anticipation.

Compared to a few talisman papers, the news Su Daxu mentioned was clearly more striking.

This was big news!

It was absolutely the kind of news that could earn a handsome reward from the ”Beta Town Post”—Zheng Qing had no doubt at all that if he put this news up for sale at the Wandering Bar, he could make enough to cover his living expenses for the next four years within a month!

And the expressions on the faces of the guys in his dormitory would be priceless.

At this thought, a silly grin appeared on Zheng Qing’s face.

He could completely imagine himself showing off this news in the dormitory.

Maybe he could even blackmail Xin Fat Man for a few lavish meals with this? No no no, just a few meals, that’s selling him short...

However, before he could finish salivating over his plan, Su Shijun decisively put an end to his daydream.

”Unless there’s been a mistake, you would be Neptune’s father,” she said, looking at Zheng Qing with a serious expression. Her voice was clear and pleasant, but her words made no sense to him.

It’s accurate to say that Zheng Qing understood each word that Su Shijun had just said, but combined together, they made no sense to him.

He was still wearing the silly smile he had when he started fantasizing, only now it was completely frozen on his face—he hadn’t realized the enormity of what Su Daxu had just revealed.

Or perhaps he thought Su Shijun was joking.

”Haha... what a funny joke!” Zheng Qing let out a hearty, awkward laugh, his brain working overtime to try and understand the punchline to Su Daxu’s statement.

Su Shijun stayed silent, her fingers crossed under her chin, her eyebrows slightly furrowed as she looked at him, seemingly wondering why he could still laugh so excessively despite the many Calm Heart Talismans on his body.

Under her gaze, Zheng Qing’s laughter finally began to fade away.

He looked around the empty office, then leaned forward and repeated Su Daxu’s statement with a comical air of caution, ”What you’re saying is... I’m Neptune’s... Neptune’s father?”

Su Shijun nodded in confirmation.

”Nonsense! Blatant lies! Are you kidding me!” Zheng Qing waved his hands, his face turning red and his voice involuntarily escalating, ”I’m still a... a... how could I possibly have a child?!”

”A virgin?” Su Daxu’s eyes twinkled, and it seemed as if a smile began to form on her face, ”I don’t think so.”

Before Zheng Qing could object, she wagged her finger, calmly explaining, ”Perhaps in your understanding, sexual reproduction is the only way for the continuation of species... it cannot be denied, between the transmission of more genetic information and broad rapid reproduction, organisms can’t have the best of both worlds, though sex is indeed an extremely efficient method.”

”But for wizards, sexual reproduction seems dated and inefficient... an adept wizard can have countless ways to leave descendants, even a droplet of blood, a strand of hair, or even a flutter of breath can be used for their progeny...”

The story of romantic and hormonal relationships turned into ’mating’ and ’reproduction’ in Councillor Su’s words. This inevitably created a sense of anticlimax.

Zheng Qing just grunted, silently sinking down into the chair behind him.

From Su Shijun’s tone and demeanor, he was beginning to sense that something was amiss.

This made him feel a heaviness in his chest, a struggle to breathe and for some reason, his legs felt weak, his vision blurred—as if he had just run a couple thousand meter marathon.

Maybe it was excitement, fear, or a combination of both.

Su Shijun paused, her gaze focused on the few smoky talismans on Zheng Qing’s body. After a long moment of silence, she murmured, ”Did the talismans fail? But that’s impossible...”

She was very sure that when she activated the talismans, the incantations had flowed smoothly over them. They were indeed excellent Calm Heart Talismans.

But observing Zheng Qing, who was in no way ’calm’, she couldn’t help but question her earlier confidence.

”I suppose I have no choice but to copy the incantation again,” Su Shijun sighed softly. She opened the law book beside her and recited softly, ”Silence and Think, wake up and transcend!”

She was reciting an incredibly high-level calming incantation, often used on wizards who had fallen into a state of madness. Its power was far more potent than the stack of talismans held in Zheng Qing’s hands.

As his face slowly paled, Zheng Qing seemed to have gradually calmed down.

”Where is Neptune?” He asked with a gloomy face, a crucial question - if he was Neptune’s father, then according to Su Shijun’s previous statement at the meeting, her child should always be with his father.

The key point was that Zheng Qing, as one of the parties involved, didn’t think he had an extra child at any point.

Su Shijun cocked her head, seeming curious about why he would ask such a foolish question.

But she was patient, letting a strand of hair flutter by her ear, pointing at the glass cabinet beside them full of white mist.

A little fox was in deep sleep in the mist.

Zheng Qing’s eye twitched.

He wasn’t a real fool, so when that lock of hair pointed towards Poseidon, many images flashed in his mind instantly.

The pregnant mother fox he took in after a party in a pitch-black alley...

A mother fox that looked like a squirrel, he always thought it was a mistake, but it really did have three tails...

The mother fox who silently slipped away after giving birth to Poseidon...

”So, you’re the...fox that slipped away?” Zheng Qing gaped, almost swallowing back the word ’mother’—he dared not confirm what would happen when an angry powerful wizard lost her temper.

”Not ’slipped away’, but ’left.’” Su Shijun said with a stern face, correcting him: ”As an executive of the Under the Moon Council, I am very busy...During that period, I had to attend evaluations of the Great Wizard Council, and frequently visit the school to prepare for taking over this lab...It was not easy to stay with you people for such a long time.”

”But, when I met you...I was already pregnant, wasn’t I?” Zheng Qing involuntarily glanced at the witch’s abdomen, cautiously reminding her.

”Not at all.” Su Shijun replied with a slight blush but denied firmly: ”I was only prepared to leave behind my lineage at that time... just one seed short.”

Zheng Qing was silent, shaking his head vigorously, trying to eliminate his terrible thoughts from his mind.

”It is, I mean, it is Poseidon, not Neptune, right?” The young student pointed at the little fox in the glass cabinet, stutteringly changing the topic, not caring about how silly his question sounded.

”Greek gods and Roman gods are the same, Poseidon is the Greek name of the sea god, the Latin name is Neptune...I thought you knew this basic knowledge.” Su Daxu seemed a little disappointed while speaking.

”I naturally know this common knowledge!” Zheng Qing’s face began to turn red again: ”But there are so many people in the world with the same names, who would be narcissistic to this extent!”

”In Su Ya’s words, this is not narcissism, this is self-confidence.” Su Shijun corrected him.

”Normal people don’t have this kind of self-confidence...besides, who would use their maid’s words as an explanation.” Zheng Qing grabbed the armrest of the chair, tried to stand up, but his legs were still weak.

So he quickly gave up this plan.

After a moment of silence, he finally raised his head and looked at Su Shijun seriously: ”I need an explanation.”

Su Shijun took a sigh:

”Every wizard needs to purify himself from the inside out when advancing to a great wizard -including spirit, body, bloodline and so on.”

”Poseidon is the witch embryo I’ve given up part of my bloodline for...from an ethical perspective, it indeed is a part of my flesh and blood that fell off my body, it is not wrong to call it my child... but from the Taoist perspective, it’s just one of my incarnations.”

”To describe it with a classic line: Poseidon is me...but I am not Poseidon.”

Upon hearing this, Zheng Qing couldn’t help but take a deep breath- it wasn’t clear whether it was a disappointed sigh, or a sigh of relief from unburdening himself.

”No wonder I always thought this little thing...I mean, Poseidon, was too smart.” Zheng Qing was a bit puzzled after relaxing: ”But...why choose me?”

”My divination magic told me so.”

”You trust magic too much!”

”If a wizard doesn’t believe in magic, should they believe in gods?”

Zheng Qing’s mouth twitched, speechless.

Then he remembered another strange thing.

”If you were that fox...then what about the big eagle that hunted you?” Zheng Qing scratched his hair, feeling a headache coming on: ”I remember that big eagle was very ferocious! To hurt you to such an extent, it shouldn’t have been merciful under my little wizard...”

”Oh, that?” Su Daxu blew a lock of hair in front of her eyes and explained casually: ”I know Thomas very well, he happened to be in Pingyang Gong at that time, so I asked him to perform a play.”

”So, the entire thing, only I was kept in the dark?” Zheng Qing was a bit upset.

”Poseidon didn’t know either.” Su Shijun smiled lightly.