* * *

After only a short run, Lowell was already gasping for breath.

He had tried exercising for the past few days, but his stamina didn’t seem to improve at all.

‘This body really is all beauty and no utility.’

Fortunately, Felix stopped in his tracks at Lowell’s call and waited.

‘He’s all bark but surprisingly obedient.’

Lowell had always thought Felix was a villain with potential for improvement. Now, he was starting to think, ‘He’s not evil by nature—he’s just been twisted by his circumstances.’

“Don’t tell me you’re planning to go along with that ridiculous suggestion. Or perhaps that was your intention from the start?” Felix asked, his back still turned to Lowell.

‘He can’t seem to say cruel things to my face. His prickly behavior feels more like a defense mechanism, as though he’s scared of being abandoned after expecting too much.’

Deciding to treat Felix like a wild animal, Lowell cautiously approached, maintaining a safe distance.

“I have no intention of letting a single prophecy dictate my fate either.”

“…Well, that’s a relief.”

Felix’s response came after a brief pause.

His gaze dropped slightly, and to Lowell, he looked strangely like a dejected child.

Lowell, who couldn’t ignore lonely people, found himself wanting to see Felix smile.

“Still, wouldn’t it be alright to meet a few times? Just to get to know each other better?”

A gentle breeze passed between them.

Felix’s eyes widened, as though he had just heard something utterly bizarre.

“What did you just say?”

“Even without the divine will, we could become good friends, don’t you think?”

“Friends?”

“Yes. From what I see, Your Grace seems like a kind and considerate person.”

Lowell’s voice was so warm and sincere that it felt almost improper to doubt his intentions.

Felix’s ears slowly turned red at the sweet words he had never heard in his life.

“Rejected. If you’re looking for someone to spend the night with, you’d better find someone else, Lord Lowell.”

But the words Felix managed to utter weren’t what Lowell had hoped to hear.

Felix turned and started walking again, as if to indicate the conversation was over.

His ears, however, remained red.

‘For someone who keeps saying no, he sure bothered to learn my name, didn’t he?’

Lowell chuckled softly to himself.

He resolved to approach Felix more cautiously and delicately, ensuring that Felix would have no room to embrace his villainous tendencies and would instead find happiness.

Of course, life rarely goes as planned.

---

“You’re pregnant.”

“…What?”

“The blessing of the god Kael has been bestowed.”

The priest delivering his routine checkup had no idea what he had just dropped on Lowell.

While the priest was simply doing his job, the news hit Lowell like a bolt from the blue.

‘You temple folks should’ve told me earlier if this is what “divine blessing” meant!’

Lowell felt a wave of dizziness.

The mere thought of Felix, who already had little faith in humanity, made him feel even more hopeless.

‘So much for cautious and delicate.’

Now, all Lowell could see was a destructive, chaotic path forward.

It had all started with Lowell’s attempt to improve his frail body through exercise.

In his previous world, he had tried various forms of exercise, including kendo.

Swinging a wooden sword had seemed like an easy warm-up.

Though the knights training nearby looked concerned, Lowell had confidently picked up the sword. And then…

“Ah!”

He hadn’t even managed ten swings before the wooden sword fell from his hands.

Worse, his arm swelled up, as though it had been sprained.

“Young Master Lowell!”

“See, this is why we told you it was dangerous!”

The knights, who had been waiting for an excuse, rushed over and bombarded him with nagging.

They didn’t even bother to hide their disdain for their weak and clueless young master.

But Lowell didn’t care about their reactions.

He was too busy staring at his wrist in shock.

‘How does anyone live with a body like this?’

He thought his expectations had been low, but his body had managed to perform even worse.

“I’ll call for a priest.”

One of the knights sighed heavily and suggested it. Still in shock, Lowell nodded absentmindedly. Unfortunately, the surprises didn’t end there.

The priest, after examining Lowell’s wrist, declared it a minor muscle strain that could be easily healed with magic.

“I’ll begin treatment now.”

Light emanated from the priest’s hand, and Lowell, seeing magic for the first time, watched with fascination.

What came next, however, was unexpected.

“Hm… I’ve healed your wrist, but something seems off. May I examine you further?”

For a moment, Lowell feared that the priest had discovered he wasn’t the “real” Lowell.

Suppressing his anxiety, he agreed, deciding that he would face whatever consequences came his way.

But what the priest said next was something he hadn’t prepared for.

‘Pregnant?’

At first, Lowell questioned whether the priest had made a mistake.

Then he muttered absurd possibilities, like maybe he had just gained some weight from overeating lunch.

The priest, watching Lowell’s bewildered reaction, shook his head firmly.

“There’s no mistake. If Lord Lowell isn’t pregnant, I’ll resign from the priesthood.”

The priest sealed his diagnosis with unwavering conviction.

“Could you… keep this a secret?” Lowell asked cautiously.

The priest hesitated for a moment but then nodded.

“The temple must be informed, but since it’s still early, we can delay making it public.”

Only then did Lowell let out a sigh of relief.

At least this bought him some time to think.

“I’ll return in ten days for a follow-up.”

After the priest left, Lowell, still reeling from the news, called for Tanya and repeatedly urged her to keep quiet.

“Of course, Young Master. You can count on me!”

Although uneasy, Lowell decided to prioritize the more urgent matter first.

“Can you bring me some water? Preferably cold.”

“Yes!”

Wanting to think things through alone, Lowell sent Tanya out of the room.

‘I knew this was a world where men could get pregnant, but I didn’t think it would actually happen to me.’

The first step was to accept reality.

‘It’s probably best to get rid of it as soon as possible.’

But the means to terminate the pregnancy were far out of reach.

In the Halo Empire, where pregnancy was considered sacred, there was no legal way to end it.

Unless it resulted in a natural miscarriage, Lowell would have to carry the child to term.

‘There is the illegal route—getting the pills to terminate it.’

But those pills were practically poison, fatal even to a healthy person.

‘They’re an extreme option used in palace conspiracies or when nobles are threatened with children. It’s the kind of thing you’d only give to someone you wouldn’t care about killing.’

Lowell had no intention of worsening his already battered body.

‘Am I really stuck with this? No way out?’

The surreal situation left Lowell in a daze.

Honestly, it would be stranger if the knowledge of being pregnant suddenly filled him with paternal love.

Right now, this unexpected pregnancy was nothing more than an unwelcome guest.

For now, he decided to move forward with the assumption that he’d have to give birth to the child.

‘If I do have it, I’ll have to take responsibility.’

The question was how to share that responsibility.

One option was to use the pregnancy as an excuse to flee to a warm country.

But in that case, the child would grow up as a fatherless illegitimate.

‘On the other hand, it’s not like I can make him the father. Someone who could become the Demon King at any moment—that’d be a nightmare for the child. Felix would probably suspect I was sent by someone to set him up if I told him I was pregnant.’

Lowell’s reasoning wasn’t unfounded.

Given the situation, it seemed more plausible that someone already pregnant had deliberately approached Felix, rather than a child being conceived during a shared moment from their previous encounter.

Lost in thought, Lowell suddenly stood up.

‘Sitting here worrying isn’t going to get me anywhere.’

Hesitating didn’t suit Lowell’s temperament.

No matter what Felix thought, the responsibility was on both of them. It was best to face it together through conversation.

‘If that doesn’t work, I’ll raise the child on my own.’

Somehow, Lowell now had the task of stopping Felix’s descent into becoming the Demon King, giving birth to the child, raising it, and ensuring his own survival.

* * *