Chapter 409 - 408: Extra 4: About Stay-at-Home Dads Teaching Cubs to Walk, Part 4

Chapter 409: Chapter 408: Extra 4: About Stay-at-Home Dads Teaching Cubs to Walk, Part 4

Fofu’s tendency to cry lessened after he learned to talk. Whenever he cried, he sounded like a chirping bird. Perhaps he realized how unpleasant it sounded, because he would cry for a short while before silently clamping his mouth shut. Then he’d wipe away his tears with his tiny hands, hiccupping quietly as he held back the rest of his sobs.

Besides being a crybaby, Fofu also seemed to have inherited Mu Tangfeng’s narcissistic streak. Mu Tangfeng was always looking in the mirror, and since young cubs tend to imitate adult behavior, Fofu grew to love mirrors too. He would hop from side to side, observing his little wings and feathers.

While looking in the mirror, the little guy would make funny faces at his reflection—widening his big, round eyes and even rolling them. He had probably picked this up from Mu Tangfeng, who used to make faces to cheer him up when he was younger. For some reason, the habit had stuck.

However, Fofu wasn’t very good at rolling his eyes. When he tried, he would instinctively tilt his head back—the higher his eyelids went, the farther back his head would go. He often leaned back too far, stumbling and tumbling right off the vanity. Flapping his wings in a panic, he would then somehow manage to fall headfirst into one of the many vases around Mu Tangfeng’s room, only to poke out his fluffy little head a moment later, looking completely dazed.

One could say the mirrors in Mu Tangfeng’s room played an indispensable role in Fofu learning to fly.

Once he grew out of his crying phase, Fofu was actually a very well-behaved child. Unlike Mu Tangfeng, he wasn’t a picky eater. Just like Wu Wu, he was happy to eat anything, which made him very easy to raise.

Whenever he felt his father had wronged him, he would fly over to Shi Lan. The tiny bird would nestle against his mother’s neck, hiding his head in her hair and sobbing quietly. He wouldn’t tattle; he would just cry.

Perhaps it was like the saying, "The crying child gets the milk." Shi Lan always felt a pang of heartache for Fofu. Even though he had cried a lot when he was younger, it was never a fussy, disruptive sort of crying. Besides, he was just so preciously cute. In any case, as a mother, her heart simply ached whenever her child cried.

Every time the little one came to his mother in tears, it was because his father had scolded him. Shi Lan would immediately scoop up her child and go find Mu Tangfeng.

The moment he saw her with the little bird in her arms, Mu Tangfeng felt his scalp prickle with dread and his stomach churn with guilt.

He had just been assuming his son was hiding in one of the vases and had spent a long time checking them all. He never thought the boy would run off to his wife.

For once, Mu Tangfeng asked without a shred of his usual confidence, "Wife, what’s wrong?"

Shi Lan wiped her son’s tears and gave him a weary look. "You didn’t hit our little one, did you?"

"What? Absolutely not! I’m not a violent dad."

Mu Tangfeng might get angry when his son made trouble, but he would only ever give him a talking-to. He could never bring himself to lay a hand on his own child.

"Then why is Fofu crying? Did you scold him?"

Hearing this, the little bird in her arms curled into a ball, wrapping his wings around himself. He then shuffled forward and buried his head in Shi Lan’s sleeve.

Seeing the little one’s reaction, Shi Lan felt something wasn’t right.

Sure enough, in the next moment, Mu Tangfeng began to voice his own grievance. "He has the nerve to blame me? He’s the one who broke my vase! And breaking it wasn’t enough—he started playing on the broken pieces! I was just worried he’d get hurt, so I said a few things, and I can’t believe he ran to you to complain..."

Shi Lan paused, feeling a little embarrassed. "*Ahem.* Our little one didn’t tattle. I just saw him crying and assumed you were picking on him."

"Hah. When it comes to picking on people, who can beat him? I’m the real victim here."

The more Mu Tangfeng spoke, the more aggrieved he sounded. Ever since this cub came along, his beloved vase collection had been steadily shrinking. He’d even hidden away his most prized cuddlebee, terrified the little menace would destroy it. As for everything else... well, if the kid wanted to cause trouble, so be it. He was his son, after all.

Seeing his pout, Shi Lan went over and hugged him. She looked at his tightly pressed, unhappy lips and placated him with several kisses, unable to resist giving the little peak of his upper lip a gentle suck.

Mu Tangfeng’s cheeks flushed crimson. He glanced at the cub still hiding in Shi Lan’s sleeve, and the last of his anger evaporated.

’Well, I guess it all evens out,’ he thought. ’The little brat managed to summon my wife here. That’s a skill in itself.’

Feeling smugly delighted, Mu Tangfeng took the opportunity to deepen the kiss, tangling his tongue with his wife’s for another long, intimate moment.

5. Daddy Jiang Xia

Jiang Xia had actually always been quite worried about his body. For all these years, Lanlan had yet to bear his child, and he couldn’t help but suspect he was the problem. For example, during their nightly relations, he was always the one on the bottom.

To remedy this, Jiang Xia put in a great deal of effort.

He exercised diligently, watched videos to study technique, and worked on increasing his body’s sensitivity.

Unfortunately, all this effort would fall to pieces the moment he was with his wife. He even secretly visited a discreet male health clinic to get checked out and only breathed a sigh of relief after confirming that there were no issues with his fertility.

Jiang Xia’s Fertility Value wasn’t actually low; it was over forty. He could only conclude that his fated connection with his child had not yet arrived, or that he simply wasn’t lasting long enough at night. Because of this, he even started timing himself, forcing himself to hold out until he hit his target time before he would let himself relax.

Around that time, Shi Lan found herself wondering how Jiang Xia had suddenly gotten so much more... capable. As the one on top, her hips were feeling extra sore. Fortunately, Jiang Xia, knowing his own "weakness," felt for his wife. He would always give her a thorough massage afterward to help her loosen up, only then curling up obediently in her arms to sleep.

In any case, thanks to all his hard work, Jiang Xia finally welcomed his son, Wu Wu.

The night Wu Wu was born, Jiang Xia announced it everywhere—on his social media and in every family group chat, even including the one with his divorced older brother, Wen Te.

He wasn’t particularly savvy when it came to social graces; he was just so overjoyed that he had to share the news with everyone.

Thus, for the first time ever, Wen Te did not reply to his little brother’s message.

Jiang Xia didn’t care in the slightest. He was purely showing off. Mr. and Mrs. Jiang were grinning from ear to ear and immediately said they wanted to come see their precious grandson. But it was already late, and Jiang Xia wasn’t ready to share his new little cub with his parents just yet, so he insisted they postpone for a day.

Wu Wu had a chubby, round face and yellowish-gold eyes. His skin was fair and rosy, the picture of health—unlike Jiang Xia’s own pale complexion. In short, the newly-minted father Jiang Xia found his son more adorable every time he looked at him.

Compared to Fofu, who had cried incessantly after birth, Wu Wu seemed far more well-behaved. Jiang Xia couldn’t help but parade his quiet little son in front of Mu Tangfeng to show him off.

His son did have a few less-than-ideal traits, though. For one, he was lazy. For another, he wanted to taste everything in sight.

Jiang Xia lost several pounds from the stress of teaching his son to walk. He couldn’t even bring himself to smile at Mu Tangfeng anymore. Fofu was already walking, but his own silly son was still crawling around.

As a little Pallas’s cat cub, Wu Wu was covered in soft, fluffy fur. Because he was so young, his beast form was tiny, and he usually looked just like a chubby little white kitten.

Wu Wu didn’t like moving much and showed no interest in learning to walk. Jiang Xia would guide him, lifting one of his paws, but after a while, the little cub would just let out a big yawn. His eyes would narrow sleepily, and his whiskers would twitch.

Unable to resist, Jiang Xia lowered his head, gently gripped the scruff of the little cub’s neck in his mouth, and dangled him in the air. This only made Wu Wu fall into an even deeper sleep.

Left with no choice, Jiang Xia had to wake him up. "Son, no sleeping."

Wu Wu sat on the floor, his two hind paws tucked under his bottom and his two front paws resting lazily before him. He blinked sleepily at his father, but his eyes drifted shut again, and he began to let out soft purrs. He was fast asleep.

Jiang Xia stared at his son, his heart filled with exasperation for this promising child who refused to try. "If you don’t get up and practice walking right now, you can forget about dinner!" he roared.

Hearing this, Wu Wu’s eyes snapped open. He let out a low, disgruntled whine, his ears twitching, and began to imitate the paw-lifting motion his father had shown him earlier.

Jiang Xia had finally found his weakness.

Thankfully, all the cubs were intelligent. Wu Wu was the slowest to learn due to his laziness, but with the enticement of food from Jiang Xia, he eventually learned to walk.

From then on, Jiang Xia found it impossible to teach his child anything without resorting to food-based bribery.

On top of that, Wu Wu loved to chew on things indiscriminately. The tables, the cleaning bots, the trash cans, the bowls, and even the glass bottles of growth liquid had all been subjected to his licking and biting.

Jiang Xia spent a great deal of effort trying to teach his child not to put random things in his mouth. Whenever Shi Lan came home, the first thing she would do was check Wu Wu’s mouth for foreign objects.

This proved to be an even more difficult challenge. It wasn’t until Wu Wu was six or seven and had a better understanding of the world that he finally outgrew the habit of popping anything interesting into his mouth.

In short, Jiang Xia now fully appreciated what Yan Huoshui had meant back then when he said raising kids was no easy task.

As for the myriad other trials and tribulations, well, only a parent would ever truly know.

Thankfully, the various Beast Husbands would also secretly use the hardships of parenting as an excuse to seek comfort from their wife. And as a result, their married life had actually become even more loving and sweet, and they cherished the time they had together all the more.