Chapter 265: Ulysses’s Thoughts: An Wouldn’t Accept Bathing Outdoors, So Ulysses Plans to Build an Indoor Hot Spring

[Lucas tasted male Zerg pheromones in the water, that familiar mellow scent of wine. At last, he was certain of Felix's sex.]

[I have a furious curse on the tip of my tongue, and I don't know whether I should say it.]

[Fine, I'll admit it. I'm a tiny bit devastated (bawling).]

[You tasted it in the water, huh? Drink this entire pool of hot spring water dry! Don't waste any of it! (angry)]

[How dare you insinuate that the Major General would waste any? The text has never said that the Major General let a single drop of pheromones escape! As a high-ranking female Zerg, surely he has at least that much ability.]

[No, I'm genuinely devastated. An-shen, change Felix's sex back. I think him being a female Zerg was perfectly good. Female-female romance was perfectly good too. At least then my eyes wouldn't be turning this red. I'm about to turn into a red-eyed Tianjia!]

[Exactly! Who was it that had a problem with female-female romance before? Come out here! Female Zerg Felix was so great, so much more approachable.]

[It's not about whether Felix was approachable as a female Zerg. It's that when Felix was a female Zerg, you thought you had a chance too, right? You thought that because you were also a female Zerg, you might be able to win Felix's heart. Now that Felix is a male Zerg, you know perfectly well he's out of your league. If you ask me, either way, you're just having a nice dream.]

[No, I genuinely thought Female Zerg Felix was great. I'd already gotten attached to this little female-female couple, so him suddenly becoming a male Zerg is taking some getting used to. Fine, I'm also a little jealous that Lucas gets to eat so well. He can have something good, but why does he have to get the absolute best? (crying) I'm green with envy.]

[Lord Aira's guesses were almost completely right. So doesn't that mean Felix really is a prince of the former Imperial Family, and Major General Lucas has become an imperial consort??? Is that okay? He's a Major General of the Federation. Isn't that a problem?]

[What Imperial Family is there anymore? (eye roll) The Empire fell ages ago. What kind of diehard relic would still call them the Imperial Family or call anyone a prince? Even on Hidden Star, they don't use titles like that anymore. The Phoenix Bird Family still exists, but the Imperial Family doesn't. You can tell from Felix joining the Federal military that even the ancient families on Hidden Star are seeking change and aren't clinging to their former glory anymore.]

[True. If they're still thinking about restoring the monarchy now, they'd be making themselves enemies of Marshal Ulysses. Think about Ulysses, still in his prime and destined to remain at his peak for an extremely long time, then think about your own family. Anyone with a functioning brain knows what choice to make.]

The Tianjia found this deeply regrettable. They were still very much hoping the Zergs would start fighting among themselves.

That way, they could gleefully stir up trouble from the sidelines, fan the flames, and see whether there were any opportunities they could exploit along the way.

But thinking about it, that made sense. The remnants of the former Zerg Empire really weren't much of a threat. They had only that tiny planet to rely on, and their strength was nowhere near enough to matter. They had survived this long mostly because of their proximity to the chaotic Dark Star Region.

Right now, Ulysses had only been in power for a year and simply hadn't had time to deal with them. Otherwise, he could clean them up in minutes.

As expected, a villainous final boss and Great Demon King like Ulysses still had to be dealt with by the Tianjia.

The Tianjia felt a great sense of mission about this.

Granted, they weren't exactly the righteous faction either. In fact, females had always ruled their civilization, they delighted in outward expansion, and their methods were brutal. Unlike the Zergs, who had occasionally enjoyed comparatively peaceful eras under male Zerg rulers, the Tianjia's reputation throughout the universe was actually even worse than the Zergs'.

But opposing the Zergs had always been their mission!

They had been doing it for tens of thousands of years. What Tianjia didn't go head-to-head with the Zergs?

And the Zergs' actual ruler, Ulysses, was naturally the individual they needed to study and target most closely.

[Those Zergs on Hidden Star are useless. Looks like we Tianjia will have to do it ourselves! One day, we'll steal both Ulysses's former Male Lord and his current male Zerg!]

Zergs: ???

For some reason, it suddenly felt like the Tianjia opposed them solely because they wanted to steal both of the Marshal's Male Lords.

How utterly unambitious.

But the moment they thought about those two lords, the Zergs immediately clenched their teeth in fury.

Bring it on!

Was An-shen someone the Tianjia were allowed to covet? Tianjia, die, die, die!

If the Tianjia stole An-shen away, what novels would they read? The Tianjia had to die!

And was that lord someone they were allowed to covet either? That was the lord who had invented group Psychic Soothing and who was still diligently working in the Military Region Prison, practically single-handedly providing Psychic Soothing for every military female in an Extremely Dangerous mental state. His importance to the Federation went without saying, and countless military females owed him an enormous debt of gratitude.

Sure enough, perhaps the Tianjia should simply be exterminated!

The Tianjia and the Zergs started tearing into each other on StarNet yet again.

The other races in the universe had long since stopped finding it strange.

They were only fighting on StarNet. They hadn't started an actual war offline. That was already pretty good.

Even if the Zergs and Tianjia actually established diplomatic relations one day, they would probably still spend every day fighting to the death online over one thing or another.

But was it really possible for these two mortal-enemy races to establish diplomatic relations?

Sure enough, science fiction novels and the unprecedented Psychic Soothing exchange and cooperation between the Zergs and Tianjia had given everyone the wrong impression.

One particular race: [To be fair, the Zergs and Tianjia are only arguing. They haven't even gone to war. They can follow the same novels and talk to each other on StarNet, and they even have officially organized Psychic Soothing exchange programs. This is basically their honeymoon period already.]

Honeymoon period?

Zergs & Tianjia: Blegh €€€€

......

Felix, male Zerg, Silver Fortress, Hidden Star.

As the clues connected one after another, Ulysses finally remembered that young "female Zerg" from Hidden Star who had secretly run away to the Federation to enlist more than ten years ago.

Then there was General Enzo's report from several months ago about a male Zerg field-grade officer appearing in the Seventh Military Region.

During the previous male Zerg Archon's administration, male Zergs had been encouraged to pursue the vastness of the stars, which had inspired a number of ambitious male Zergs to enlist in the military.

After so many years, it wasn't particularly strange for one or two of them to have risen to field-grade officer positions. Xi'an had also been promoted to Major not long ago, so Ulysses had simply assumed this was another "Xi'an" and hadn't paid much attention at the time.

Now, comparing everything against the novel and connecting all the clues, Ulysses finally understood the entire sequence of events.

The young lord from the Phoenix Bird Family on Hidden Star, who had run away to join the Federal military more than ten years ago as a "female Zerg," had turned into a male Zerg overnight.

Even someone as experienced and knowledgeable as Ulysses needed several minutes to organize his thoughts after such a transformation.

First, the god was still writing male-female romance after all. Those netizens who had rushed to his official account to @ him and ask how An-shen had suddenly started writing female-female romance could finally settle down.

Second, the genes of Hidden Star's Phoenix Bird Family truly were unique. They could actually allow their descendants to freely choose their sex upon adulthood according to the Zerg they loved.

This also explained why, during the former Empire, the Imperial Family had produced several male Zerg Emperors.

A male Zerg birth rate far exceeding the Zerg race's normal sex ratio had brought certain advantages. The Phoenix Bird Family had found it much easier than other imperial dynasties to win the people's support. The public was naturally more affectionate and friendly toward male Zerg emperors and more willing to overlook their mistakes.

Certain acts of incompetence that would have earned a female Zerg emperor extensive condemnation in the history books had actually received relatively favorable evaluations simply because the ruler was a male Zerg. This had also planted the seeds of many future disasters.

The status of male Zergs within the country had likewise soared to its absolute peak under one male Zerg ruler after another. Female Zergs, oppressed to the point where they could no longer survive, had been forced to find their own way out.

And so, the Empire became the Federation.

Such genes, which defied the Zerg race's natural sex ratio and were completely detached from the needs of the general population, might not have been suitable for an Imperial Family. But if they could be applied to ordinary citizens, they would be extremely useful.

Thinking about the Zergs' birth rate and sex ratio, Ulysses's gaze settled on Felix's name.

But he immediately realized that after all these years of inheritance, the Phoenix Bird Family still had very few members. There had even been several generations with only a single heir, nearly causing their own bloodline to die out.

A genetic trait that allowed differentiation only after encountering one's destined Zerg was inherently incapable of spreading on a large scale.

Because of this "destined Zerg" characteristic, members of the Phoenix Bird Family almost universally had only one mate, either a Female Lord or a Male Lord. Even those who differentiated into male Zergs rarely married multiple female Zergs. Aside from an exceptionally affectionate few who might marry two or three, their number of spouses was pitifully small compared with other male Zergs.

High-ranking Zergs already had difficulty reproducing. Two Zergs could work at it for half their lives without producing a single descendant.

Genes like these were destined never to spread throughout the population.

Ulysses regretted that this genetic trait could not be applied to the entire Zerg population.

Then he reined in his thoughts and returned his attention to the text, looking for useful notes.

When he saw Major General Lucas consuming male Zerg pheromones in the water, Ulysses's brows drew together slightly. He disapproved of such an absurd act on Lucas's part.

The male's face, radiant as moonlight, flashed through his mind, and Ulysses paused again.

Doing something like that in the military really was inappropriate. Even if the hot spring was nominally private, it still wasn't truly a private domain. Such behavior was far too outrageous and wanton. Lucas had clearly been completely bewitched by the male Zerg.

But if it happened in one's own home, or in the god's room, then there would be no problem.

Ulysses wondered whether he should add a bathing pool and hot spring to the god's sky garden.

But he quickly remembered that the male was about to be released from prison. Even if he added one now, there probably wouldn't be time for it to see any use.

Given An's personality, he probably wouldn't accept bathing outdoors anyway.

Ulysses could only regretfully abandon the idea and plan to install an indoor hot spring at the Marshal's residence later.