Inheriting a Lost Bloodline, My First Task is to have heirs?!

It looked like my reassurance worked since the worry in his face lessened a lot. For some reason, he suddenly looked irritated and looked out the window towards the direction where his sons were in. He then looked at me, "If those sons of mine do not want the children, I'll take care of them. I don't know what method you want to use but make sure to squeeze them dry for my grandchildren's food. I don't care if they pass out like last time. Serves them right if they ended up as heartless idiots like their mothers."

I teased him a little to get his mind off of his negative thoughts, "Father-in-law, don't get too worked up on things you aren't sure about yet. You don't even know if they want the children or not. Talk to them first but don't say anything about my babies. Even if they mention it, don't confirm nor deny their existence. As for me, I will hide somewhere to try and delay the confrontation between the six of us."

He looked at me with a seriousness that I never saw from him from the short conversations we had. He then said with a heavy voice, "The confrontation between all of you can wait. Since you have shared with me your secret, I think I also have to share one of mine to be fair. This also gives you a perspective as to why we do the things we do here in Zanahavre. We may look like we are all living well but that's just a facade."

I looked at him and replied, "Thank you for trusting me with your secrets. I am listening and honestly, I feel kind of thrilled to hear what you have to say. Why do I feel like things are bound to be even more interesting or maybe darker?"

Peony started with explaining why out of all the races, their family set up was different. I have noticed this fact from the start but I don't want to meddle on how they do things here. I simply thought that they did things for survival. What I found peculiar is that Peony was able to give birth to five sons despite the almost non-existent fertility of this world.

He must have noticed the questions that I had in my head but opted not to ask about. He started explaining that here in Zanahavre, the sanctuary has always been led by a king whose responsibility is to marry a wife and bear a child from each of the five powerful fairy families. This is indeed different with the normal family set up for all other races where it was matriarchal, a woman leads the household then she marries multiple men. As for having children, it is all up to luck and fate.

He continued by saying that the fairies after decades of research on both allowed and forbidden spells, found a loophole in the curse that affected the fertility of this world. He said that every century, a new king is chosen out of all the unmarried males in the population. The men who were chosen by the leaders to join this ritual were treated as property by the royal family. Their families have no say as to what their lives would be after the ritual, even if they go insane or die.

Being king gives you a powerful position but also one that gives the man a hopeless fate. Being chosen was treated more as a misfortune rather than a blessing for those who have undergone the ritual.

The chosen king is the man that survived the forbidden magic seal that will be placed on his body with the least severe backlash. This magic seal forcefully boosts a man's fertility using the fertility harvested from other males in the sanctuary. As to how they could harvest it from others and if it has severe side effects to the ones whom it was harvested from, he did not go through the specifics.

The fertility that were harvested from several people were then saved up inside a magic tool. To enhance the effects, they also harvest all the fertility that was absorbed by the previous fairy king who underwent the same ritual .before he became king a century ago.

The magic tool then converts the fertility harvested from others to something akin to a buff spell which when casted to an individual, acts like an ability transfer. It was considered forbidden magic because it was harvested from live specimen, forced into another specimen, has severe side effects to the receiver and instead of it having temporary effects, it has a semi-permanent one. It will be only removed if it was harvested back by the magic tool.

Once an unmarried man who has came of age received the seal, it immediately activates and uses one's life force to prepare the body for the ability transfer. It causes excruciating pain until the seal settles in and it even gives an after effect of getting a curse that makes one's body perpetually weak. The pain doesn't end there though, since the fertility is not the receiver's natural ability and was forced into the body via an external source through the ritual, the receiver's body has a very high risk of rejecting it thus the pain continues until the ability was taken back or the receiver dies.

Some survived the torture that the seal brought to their bodies and gained higher fertility indices. If one is tested and was found to have the highest benefits from the ritual, one becomes king. The others will then be tasked to birth children of commoners. Some who survived the ritual ost ended up losing their minds in the process due to the constant pain and torture. Since it was a waste of resources to let go of these subjects, these insane men were still used by the sanctuary as birthing tools. It is just that, they can be used by anyone who chooses to do so.

If one doesn't want to end up as a birthing tool, they only have two choices: first, to be king or second, to at least not lose their sanity so they won't be degraded into a mere birthing tool. At least with higher fertility indices, they will have a chance to marry into a good family and hopefully, will be treated well by them.

Peony also went into the specifics of how fairies are born. From the books I read back on earth, I think they were born through mana or even flowers I think. As for his explanation, it was a more complicated process than I thought.

Birthing to a fairy child requires a certain amount of body strength and health. As for his situation, the aftereffects of the ritual, the curse made his body perpetually weak. His high fertility still forces his body to get pregnant but ones it happens, the next hurdle is keeping the child alive. He reminisced on how each pregnancy he has was a life or death situation. Each time it happened, he wanted to die and just end it all, but even that is a luxury that he is not allowed to choose for himself.

A male fairy has to keep the life orb containing the baby fairy inside their bodies and nurture it for two months or a total of 56 days in this world before releasing it from their bodies and placing it to their garden of life for external nurturing. In this light, the fairy child is born through normal sexual production, nurtured by mana and the nutrients of the father's body and then they are placed in flowers in the garden of life until they are ready to see the world.

Peony's face was cold, his eyes blank as tears continually flow from his eyes while telling his circumstances and that of the rest of his race. His voice was devoid of any emotion as if the story he was telling me about was not his own, as if the suffering was not his to bare. Based on his story, it turns out that he was forced to undergo the ritual even if his maternal and paternal family did not want to give him to the leaders. He was taken by force and marked with the seal without his parents' permission. Since it has already happened, he was then forced to survive the whole ordeal and be the king no matter what the cost because in Peony's own words, "I would never accept the life of a birthing tool who lost his sanity and will be used as a public property of the whole race".

Even after he became king, every single day of his life was full of many other things that he was forced into. He was forced to marry women that he did not like at all for a total of five times. Since it was his duty, he had to give birth to a child for each wife even if each pregnancy caused him to be in the constant brink of death. Even when the children grew up, he was forced to follow the demands of his wives' family to rear and educate the children based on their own family's way. This caused his sons to grow up not being close with their father and even up to now, Peony is still awkward whenever he speaks with his own children.

******** ******** ********

To you dear reader that made sure to read this chapter today, Happy First Day of March! As a way to thank you, just like how I did in the previous months, here's the code that will give you 10 FPs. I hope you continue to enjoy my novel as well as the novels of all the other great authors from this platform!

It will only work for the first 10 unique users so be quick! <3

<ABDHY4WEAEKECZLUB>