I Will Teach You How to Hunt Gods

Chapter 735 - 28: Mother and Father

She sipped her tea at leisure, as casual as if she were sitting in her own living room.

But then again, to her, this place did indeed count as "her own home."

"But for you..."

Deng’s gaze fell on Yun You, carrying a kind of confession she had never shown before.

"Those other identities don’t matter. The most important one is only this——"

She tilted her head slightly, the corner of her lips hooking into a complex curve, laced with mockery and curiosity, and a trace of indescribable seriousness.

"I’m your mom."

"..."

Yun You was stunned.

The words were a bit too explosive; she couldn’t digest them for a while.

But thinking it over carefully, there didn’t really seem to be anything wrong with it.

In those time‑spanning visions before, she had seen the process of creating Calamity Demons; she’d watched Deng in the Cosmic Library manufacturing them one by one, then tossing them into the real world like shooting stars to wreak havoc.

Deng was the creator of the Calamity Gods, and she, Yun You, as a Calamity God, calling Deng "mother" did seem to make sense...

"Look at you, idiot, you’ve got it wrong."

Deng seemed to have read Yun You’s thoughts again and continued, "I’m not talking about ’mother’ in the sociological sense, I mean it in the biological sense."

"You are a Calamity Demon, but Calamity Demons are also a kind of human. You’re not some stone that popped out of a crack; how could you not have a mother?"

She extended a finger and tapped at Yun You through the air.

"Half the genetic material in your body comes from me, understand?"

Yun You stood where she was, feeling as if the "ground" beneath her feet made of knowledge was turning unreal. Her head was buzzing.

Mother.

The word was both familiar and somewhat strange to her.

Actually, a long time ago... probably right after she became a Death God, she’d faintly realized she wasn’t the child of the Yun Jiang couple from Jiu Xiang; they were just ordinary people and could never have given birth to a daughter with red eyes.

But so what?

To Yun You, even without any blood relation, she had always regarded that couple as her real parents, because they had given her everything, including their lives.

So whether she was biologically theirs, Yun You truly didn’t care.

As for Deng...

Deng had helped her, that was true, but through those images of the past, Yun You had also realized a fact—that Deng had never helped her out of a parent’s love for their child, but from something more utilitarian.

To Deng, she was a special "creation," her most successful work; Deng only lent a hand to make this work even more perfect.

Deng had long since discarded most of her human emotions; that simply wasn’t her personality anymore.

So Yun You found it hard to see her as her mother.

"It’s normal if you can’t accept it. I never planned to have you ’recognize your ancestors’ or anything."

Deng once more anticipated Yun You’s thoughts. She shrugged and said carelessly, "But you and I are indeed blood relatives. That’s a fact you can’t argue away."

"I gave you life. Even though I never took care of you a single day, never fulfilled any maternal duty, neither you nor I can deny all of this."

"So I never expected you to call me Mom someday. If you like, you can keep calling me Deng, or Ophelia, whatever. It doesn’t matter."

"..."

Yun You lowered her head and silently sighed in her heart.

Deng’s attitude was very clear, and very cold; she truly couldn’t feel a trace of parental warmth from this "mother."

Ophelia Moon, the Stargazer, felt more like a distant, powerful symbol, a stranger connected to the beginning of her life by cold technical ties.

An indescribable sense of loss, mingled with what she knew of this woman’s complicated past, weighed heavily on her chest, making Yun You inexplicably a little sad.

Then that inexplicable emotion drove her, as if under some strange compulsion, to blurt out a question she herself felt was somewhat absurd... yet, logically speaking, almost perfectly natural.

"Then... what about the other half of the genetic material in me?"

Yun You’s voice carried a faint, hard‑to‑detect dryness. Her gaze locked tightly on Deng as she asked softly, "Who is my father? Is it the Saint?"

She still remembered how, when she was young, the Stargazer always had a particular focus on the Saint, even a not‑so‑obvious admiration.

If creating a Calamity God required another powerful source of genetic material that could match her own, then that Saint who once stirred Deng’s heart, yet was ultimately buried by her own hand, seemed like the most reasonable candidate.

"..."

The air seemed to solidify for a moment.

In the library, the walls made of countless bookshelves seemed to tremble ever so slightly.

The lazy nonchalance vanished from Deng’s face.

She turned her head a little, a few strands of silvery‑gray short hair falling to cover half her face.

Silence.

A rare silence, carrying a heavy texture, settled between the two of them, jarring against the vastness of the library itself.

Yun You could even feel that the invisible currents of energy around them seemed to grow viscous and oppressive because of that silence.

A moment later, Deng slowly turned back. Her face was expressionless, and in those deep, star‑sea eyes, almost no ripple could be seen.

Yet Yun You keenly caught a fleeting, extremely complex emotion flash deep within them—so fast it might have been an illusion.

"No."

Deng’s voice suddenly rang out, terrifyingly calm.

She shook her head and murmured, "The Saint is past tense. His genetic Sequence is strong, but from a rational perspective, it still has some flaws, making it unfit as the cornerstone of the most perfect work."

"Your real father... is..."

Deng’s tone was flat and rippleless, as if stating a fact that had nothing to do with her.

"The Monarch."

"Or, you can also call him—Yun Tiankui."

Tian Kui?

Yun Tiankui?

The Monarch?

Yun You felt as if struck by lightning; her mind went blank.

This name... this surname... Yun!

She was called Yun You, and the Monarch’s name turned out to be Yun Tiankui! There was no way this was a coincidence.

Perhaps this name had been given to her personally by Deng. Half the blood flowing in her veins actually came from that Monarch, heavy as a mountain, who had become a butcher for the sake of his ideals?

The sheer absurdity made her head spin.

Besides, she clearly remembered that the relationship between the Monarch and the Stargazer had never been good. Back when they weren’t Death Gods yet but still researchers, the two of them had quarreled every day because of differing views.

The Monarch was conservative, while the Stargazer was radical; they held each other’s positions in contempt. Without the Saint mediating between them, Yun You truly suspected those two might have actually started throwing punches in the lab.

Later, the Monarch came to see the Stargazer as the greatest threat and heretic, and the Stargazer, to avoid conflict, directly exiled herself from the real world.

Yun You even recalled a fleeting scene in the Illusion Realm—some dark corner where the newly arrived Stargazer in the Alternate Space was gritting her teeth as she jabbed a needle into a crude cloth doll that looked like the Monarch.

How could such nearly mortal enemies possibly provide the genetic template for Deng’s Calamity Demon project?

Yun You felt this was downright absurd.

"..."

Deng didn’t answer immediately. She turned her head slightly to avoid Yun You’s gaze, her eyes a bit unfocused, fingers unconsciously twisting a lock of silvery‑gray hair. She stayed silent for a few seconds before slowly speaking; her voice was lower and faster than before, with a forced stiffness to it.

"I... just thought his genes were perfect enough, the only ’optimal solution’ that met the technical requirements."

"Powerful material affinity, a stable Soul structure, extreme tolerance for energy impact... these traits are crucial for forging the perfect vessel. Other than him, no one else could reach that standard. That’s all."

She paused, as if to add weight to her words, then suddenly whipped her head around to look at Yun You again. Her eyes carried a kind of almost stubborn emphasis, and her voice unconsciously rose a few degrees.

"I never liked him, never liked that stubborn, cold, self‑righteous bastard. Not one bit."

"No..."