Chapter 180: Lucy Lang, July 15th!

Chapter 180: Lucy Lang, July 15th!

Star Date 71524 in the All-Tori Sector.

I stared up at the tiny television mounted in the corner of the hospital room, just thinking about the stupid sci-fi movie playing on the screen to pass the time.

My attention dropped back down to the bed, where I was currently holding the latest daughter to grace my exceptionally lucky life. The tiny little girl was wrapped snugly inside a soft pink baby blanket, sleeping quietly against my chest.

Her exhausted mother lay resting directly by my side in the hospital bed, completely dead to the world after hours of intense labor.

Mercy Mu sat in the vinyl chair right next to my bedside, keeping me company in this incredibly late hour long after the other wives had packed up and gone home to rest.

Only Hinata remained behind from our security detail, guarding the space next to the heavy door while sitting cross-legged in a deep state of martial meditation.

Mercy leaned forward, her blue eyes scanning the gentle way I adjusted the blanket. "Master, you seem to have gotten significantly better with newborns. I do have to admit, you have plenty of practical experience under your belt now."

I looked over at the smiling Mercy, a soft chuckle escaping my throat. "Honestly, I do not fully understand why I have this deep, overwhelming urge to give every single woman I love children, but it is just my basic instinct. It feels a bit strange when I think about it logically, right?"

Mercy reached across the sheets and rubbed my leg gently, her thumb tracing a soothing circle over the fabric. "It is entirely natural for the truly strong to want to reproduce, and you always select highly capable mothers to join your circle. This ensures your bloodline and legacy will continue to thrive even after you and the rest of us are eventually forgotten in the sands of time. So just live for us, and enjoy every single day we have together."

I reached out with my free hand, touching her cheek with the back of my fingers to feel her warmth while looking deep into her caring eyes. I only offered a silent nod in response because she was absolutely right. I just found myself wishing I could spend an entire eternity with the women I love.

I shifted my weight carefully, placing little Lucy down into her plastic hospital bassinet and pulling the blankets up to cover her tiny shoulders. Once she was settled, I leaned back against the pillows of the main bed and reached down to hold Linda's hand while she slept, feeling her pulse steady against my palm. My mind drifted back over the sheer chaos of the past two weeks, a slow smile stretching across my face as I tracked the timeline.

After Ana and I had made that happy little mistake on the mattress of her new apartment, the two of us parted ways to let the crew reset the staging.

The very next filming day, Kate, Kim, and Hana all showed up on set simultaneously to watch us continue our remaining scenes inside the luxury high-rise. Ana's exceptionally bright, glowing mood made Kate incredibly irritated for some unknown reason, her jaw clenching every time Ana giggled.

Kim and Hana, on the other hand, thoroughly loved watching me work my charm on camera. They kept giggling from behind the monitors, even during the sequence where I was holding Ana tightly in the kitchen for the intimate post-coital dinner scene.

On Wednesday, when Kate was scheduled at a completely different location across town, Ana got incredibly sneaky with her timing. During the afternoon break while the crew was distracted with catering, she caught me in the dressing room, locked the heavy deadbolt from the inside, and forced me into a rapid quickie against the door. Yeah, who was I kidding, I wanted to mark her insides again and confirm our feelings.

If I hadn't already gotten her pregnant during our first encounter on Monday, there was absolutely zero chance I didn't finish the job this time around. The moment we finished adjusting our clothing, she flashed me a wicked grin and casually mentioned she was actively ovulating.

On the corporate side of my life, Mike Hue had called to inform me that the Central Government was currently validating the complete retreat or total destruction of the rival Hidden Temples. They needed to clear the board before our official paperwork could be pushed through the bureaucracy.

In the meantime, our allies made complete duplicate copies of both the Mount Splitting and the Snowflake martial arts techniques to systematically distribute among our loyal members. Only the highly altered, incomplete older training manuals were sent over to the corrupt bureaucrats at Central to file away in their records for legal reasons. Yes, the greedy Li Clan had been actively stealing martial knowledge from the martial arts world for hundreds of years.

Mei and Lan Chow had also been meeting up constantly in secret, moving either as close friends or as lethal partners for covert reconnaissance missions. I never forced Mei to disclose every single detail of her movements because I trusted her instincts implicitly. But whenever a situation turned critical, she always made sure to report the developments directly to me or Lucy.

In hindsight, had I truly known what those two women were actually plotting behind my back, I would have face-palmed into oblivion. Well, I will inevitably find out the full scope of their mischief the moment I board my flight to the UK of America.

Later in the week, my two scheduled days of intense love scenes with Kate turned out to be incredibly steamy, literally, highlighted by a prolonged shower sequence. Unfortunately for the future fans of the franchise, the entire thing was filmed through frosted glass shower doors. The viewers would only see her head and mine moving through the steam, while the rest of her gorgeous body remained entirely hidden behind the foggy glass pane.

Kate almost lost her composure and had full sex with me right there under the running water, but her deep-rooted fear of being discovered by the stagehands stopped her at the last second. Kate is an exceptionally shy woman at her core, and that specific reservation is the sole reason the two of us haven't crossed the final line of intimacy yet.

On the bright side, Kate did quietly inform me over lunch that she had officially started taking the birth control pill. Before I left the country for UK of America, she wanted the two of us to finally make our relationship completely official under the sheets. As far as an actual marriage ceremony was concerned, she wanted to wait until the movie was officially released in theaters.

Jean was already pushing for us to make the event much more memorable by tying the knot right when the entertainment awards come out in January. Yes, I already know it will be Jean's creative doing that earns me a flurry of playful bites on my shoulders in the future, sigh.

The spectacular, pitiful end of Ning the Dragon had successfully woken up the four remaining noble houses operating directly under the Tang umbrella block. The Song family was thoroughly ecstatic with the sudden deaths of the abusive father and son duo. However, my utterly ruthless execution methods forced the remaining aristocratic families to quickly hide their more annoying behaviors, terrified that I might turn my sights toward them next.

Helen had been treated with a massive amount of newfound respect across the city since the execution, all thanks to my public declaration of backing her interest. This, however, turned out to be a massive operational miscalculation on my personal part. Uncle Anthony and Helen end up completely betraying my trust later down the line. I just hope for the absolute love of all that is right in the world, my future-life self manages to avoid the harem route with her.

My second full year at Star University is scheduled to kick off on August 14th. My extensive trip to America is going to start right at the beginning of August, and the movie's primary filming schedule wraps up exactly one week before I leave the country.

So in the span of just seven days, I will have to film the dramatic conclusion of the movie. The final scene is written in a way that leaves the third film wide open for me to star as the lead. Yeah, I actually want to film it, and do you want to know why?

Because both Kate and Ana begged me to do it, deploying a really, really intense level of pleading that I couldn't possibly resist. So I will slide back into the costume for their sake. And the coolest thing about the new script is that my character will officially become a full Vampire in that installment. To save Ken from dying at the climax of the second movie, both Luna and Lilith simultaneously share their blood to transform him. That was exactly how the writers turned the third movie into a full Vampire harem film. It seems the screenwriters got heavily inspired by my real-life action hero stunts and had their creative juices pumping to rewrite the lore.

And at the time, I had yet to find out that my and Ana's future child would actually secure a decent amount of screen time in that new third movie, sigh.

Yeah, the writers are eventually going to look at the infant and say that the baby can totally pass for Ken and Lilith's biological child. And that specific moment is exactly when my lovely Kate will start her irritable, jealous munching of her lover's shoulder. Well, she is incredibly cute when she gets jealous, so I still consider it an absolute win...

I had slowly dozed off in the hospital chair while lost in my thoughts of the chaotic week, only to be gently roused by the feeling of a warm hand squeezing mine and moist lips kissing my cheek.

When I opened my eyes, a pair of sharp grey eyes bored straight into my face with an intense mixture of care and absolute joy. Although, the resting expression on the rest of her face would easily tell anyone else that she would rather I get up and leave the room immediately.

Linda squinted her eyes at me, her voice dropping to a quiet whisper. "Good morning, daddy. Your brand-new daughter is waiting for you to perform your duties again."

I grinned up at her, instantly reading the message in her eyes telling me to change Lucy's diaper. It seems Linda had just finished feeding her a fresh bottle of milk, and the fluid had gone right through her tiny system. Yeah, without fail, I always seem to inherit the first nasty couple of diapers from every single one of my newborn children.

Let's not even bother describing the sheer state of the waste that had been steadily building up inside a baby's body for months, just ewe.

Okay, I completely lied. It was bright green, incredibly stinky, and not very solid at all. Learn to hold your breath out there, future harem daddies.

Well, this is exactly how I spent the entire duration of my July 15th. My little girl came screaming out into the world exactly one minute after midnight. We all initially thought her birthday would fall squarely on July 14th, but Lucy Lang clearly had other plans for her mommy's schedule.

After dealing with George and his demanding wife for two solid days, the pair finally packed up their bags and left my home, sigh. Yeah, it is exceptionally hard for me to truly relax inside my own house whenever I have formal guests staying over. I guess I am just an inherently strange guy like that. With so many permanent women already occupying my mansion, you would think a couple of extra people wouldn't bother me at all, but I guess I am just wired differently.

After a long, grueling day of filming on set, I drove over to enjoy a quiet dinner with Uncle Tang, Kim Tang, his wife, and Helen. Tonight happened to be Helen's birthday, but she had aggressively refused a massive party because it was her twenty-first. Her single, solitary request from her father was to invite me over for a quiet, intimate meal as a family. I couldn't exactly refuse a request like that, right?

While we were waiting for the kitchen staff to finish getting the dinner ready, Uncle Anthony and Kim sat on one side of the lounge, while Helen and I took up the space on the opposite sofa. She was clinging tightly to my left arm like she always does, a big sister's trademark grin plastered across her face.

Helen leaned in closer, bringing up the exact topic that was currently sitting on her academic agenda with me. "Rick, you already know that in our advanced business course, the final two years of the degree have to be completed while working inside a real, functioning business environment, right?"

"Yes," I replied, shifting my arm slightly to look at her. "And if I remember correctly, last year you completed your internship working in one of the Song family businesses, right?"

Helen patted my bicep, confirming the detail with a nod. "I did, but I really did not learn anything useful at all while I was there. The managers stuck me in a back room doing incredibly boring grunt work and sorting files. For my final year before graduation, I want some genuine, high-level experience that actually matches what they offered me on paper."

I looked down at her in mild curiosity as she paused. "Well, it is a strict academic rule that I am legally barred from doing my internship for any Tang-owned corporations. Because of that restriction, I wanted to come and work directly for you. I know you do not officially possess your master business license yet, but you do own a massive collection of hidden companies, even counting the ones tied to the Fire Birds. Hey... Rick, why exactly are you looking at me with that weird face right now?"

My smile grew exceptionally big because I could already perfectly imagine Helen working inside one of my front companies, constantly causing me endless operational trouble with her incredibly needy, attention-seeking nature.

But as I thought about it, I realized I did have one specific company completely isolated from the Fire Birds syndicate.

"Don't pout, Helen. I actually have a great place for you to work in," I said, leaning back against the sofa cushions. "Tell me, do you like running brothels?"

Absolute silence descended upon the room, thick enough to hear crickets chirping outside the windows. My uncle, my aunt, and Helen all looked completely frozen in place the exact moment I brought up one of the underground companies I managed within the Fire Birds syndicate.

I could practically see the gears turning in Helen's head as she vividly pictured herself dressed up as a shady street pimp, collecting dirty cash from vulnerable women. Realizing the horror of her imagination, I immediately stopped playing with her.

"Dear Helen, that was obviously just a joke," I chuckled, waving my hand dismissively to break the ice. "In reality, I have my Harem-Chat Company operating smoothly under the Long family umbrella, and Mrs. Yang is running the entire infrastructure for me. I know for a fact she would absolutely love to have you assisting her with operations. You two are actually remarkably alike in your work ethics."

The moment she remembered I owned that specific enterprise, Helen's heavy pout vanished, and a brilliant smile bloomed across her face, thoroughly relieved to hear it was a recognized, highly respected consumer business. She instantly leaned forward, asking a flurry of questions like an excited teenager.

"Rick, will you really let me work directly alongside Gretta Yang? Do you honestly think she will be willing to cooperate with a woman from the Tang bloodline?"

I smiled down at my doting cousin, offering her a reassuring nod to calm her racing thoughts. "Gretta absolutely will because she is an incredibly kind and highly intelligent woman who never discriminates based on family rivalries. I personally chose her to head the enterprise because I deeply respect her specific type of personality. Even if she isn't technically the single most ruthless corporate CEO operating in the business world, I trust her instincts implicitly. And at the end of the day, total loyalty is the single most important thing to me."

Helen squinted her brown eyes at me, a sharp glint of determination replacing her excitement as she detailed her next steps. "Then I am going to fill out the official university paperwork first thing tomorrow morning and hand-deliver the application to her in person. And of course, I am absolutely going to list my lovely Rick as my primary character contact, ufufu."

I reached deep into my pocket, pulling out the gifts I had carefully prepared for her birthday before sliding them across the table alongside a brand-new smartphone.

"Happy birthday, Helen, from me and my entire household. And this smartphone is my personal gift to you."

With a face full of pure happiness, she carefully unwrapped the small jewelry box to reveal a gorgeous golden locket, its surface meticulously engraved with the image of a coiling golden eastern dragon. Anthony caught sight of the intricate craftsmanship from across the table, offering a knowing nod of approval as he recognized my personal artistic touch on the metal.

Helen gently clicked the locket open, pausing as she stared at the miniature picture copy of my biological mother's portrait resting inside. The resemblance was uncanny; she and Helen looked virtually identical, save for the distinct color of their eyes. Helen possessed deep brown eyes, while the woman immortalized inside the gold frame stared back with a striking shade of blue.

Beneath the portrait, a tiny, elegant inscription read: Head Helen Tang, may you forgive this Hidden Dragon.

Helen was completely overjoyed by the breathtaking gift, but as her fingers traced the edges, her gaze lingered heavily on the coiling dragon, the portrait, and the cryptic choice of words. She clearly lacked the context to fully comprehend its hidden, deep hidden meaning.

She lifted her chin, locking her eyes straight into mine for a long, heavy moment before speaking with absolute softness. "Rick... no matter what secrets you have buried or what you have done in your past, I love you completely. Please don't let your heart grow heavy over my personal feelings. You truly love me too, right?"

I met her gaze with total seriousness, my voice unyielding. "I will never, ever intentionally allow any harm to come to you, Helen."

Satisfied with the answer, she pulled me into a warm embrace to comfort my lingering thoughts, before pulling back to hold up the sleek smartphone, examining the clean casing. "Other than this incredibly cute white-tiger graphic printed on the back of the chassis, what makes this phone so special?"

I took the device from her hand, tapping the glass screen to unlock the operating system before pointing directly to a highly secure app that she didn't possess public access to yet."Now that my corporate enemies have finished wasting their time stealing the first obsolete version of Harem-Chat, I am actively upgrading our entire network user base," I explained, scrolling through the interface. "As long as a woman doesn't legally belong to a formal harem account, she can be registered as an official Harem-Friend. This special clearance will grant you full access to utilize Valentine's assistance."

I demonstrated the functionality by loading the specific profile I had pre-configured inside my private network, showing her name, Helen Tang, listed with a clear Harem-Friend membership tied directly to my main group of twelve wives. Then I finalized the login sequence.

My uncle and aunt both leaned over the table, watching with intense curiosity as I explained the platform's social dynamics. "Now, the infrastructure features three distinct types of communication channels to chat in. As a registered Friend, you only possess permission to view and post on the main Public Page of the Harems. You are strictly locked out of the private secure channel the wives utilize for their personal group chat. But as you can clearly see right here on the live feed..."

The screen illuminated with a rapid succession of automated notifications and text updates.

[New user, Helen Tang Harem-Friend, has successfully joined the group!]

[Velvet-Fan: Welcome to the group and Happy Birthday, Helen.]

[Sister Sharif: Currently working an active shift right now, but happy birthday.]

[Dr Trophy Wife: Another blonde added to the roster, yeah!]

[Older Twin: Welcome and Happy Birthday, sister Helen.]

[Younger Twin: Make sure to kiss Ricky tightly for me!]

[Kate Kong: Just walked through the front door from the studio, phew! Happy Birthday, sister Helen.]

[Phoenix: Welcome to the group and Happy Birthday, Helen.]

[Rick's Turtle: Welcome and Happy Birthday, Helen.]

[Maid Mu: Sending warm greetings, Miss Tang.]

[Maid Han: Same here from my side, how is your summer treating you?]

[Maid Xia: This officially marks my third birthday greeting to you today, sister Tang.]

[Cheerleader: I am honestly so sad that I won't have you sitting in my classroom this year, Helen. :( ]

[Precious: Am I actually doing this typing thing correctly? Greetings? Hello, Sensei?]

[???????: User has been permanently banned from communications.]

[???????: User has been permanently banned from communications.]

[Helen Tang: Thank you so much for the warm welcome, everyone! I promise to send Rick straight back home the second we finish dinner, and thank you all for graciously giving him to me for tonight, I truly appreciate it. Talk to everyone later!]

As she watched the endless stream of handles scroll past, Helen's expression turned remarkably complicated. She slowly lifted her head, casting a highly skeptical look toward her father. Anthony merely shrugged his shoulders, leaning back in his seat with a completely casual expression.

"If I had told you beforehand that Rick's personal harem was actually on the smaller end of the spectrum, would you have believed me?" Anthony remarked with a dry chuckle. "Your cousin simply possesses that rare, magnetic trait that truly powerful women are constantly searching for in a partner. Ordinarily jealous women simply lack the mental fortitude to hang around with those monstrously talented ladies."

I cleared my throat roughly, feeling the sudden warmth climbing up my neck. Historically speaking, over half of the previous Yellow Emperors maintained upwards of fifty separate baby chambers inside each of their respective lifetimes, meaning my current circle was indeed sitting on the remarkably low end of the spectrum. The legendary Black Dragon iteration had close to one hundred and fifty active concubines running around his palace—fuck that absolute noise.

"Cough... what uncle is trying to say is that I simply tend to help out stranded maidens a lot when they are in trouble," I mumbled, desperately trying to steer the conversation away from my personal life. "And I happen to possess a soft heart that makes it hard for me to turn them away when they need shelter. Um... I am pretty sure this is my only real character flaw, right?"

Helen's lips curled up into a slow, knowing smile at my stuttered explanation. I could see the sudden, dangerous light of a scheming plot flashing deep within her eyes as she tilted her head.

"So, if I am understanding this correctly, Rick Tang's absolute greatest weakness is his complete inability to say the word NO?" she mused, her voice dripping with amusement. "Wow... my twenty-first birthday has turned out significantly better than I originally anticipated, ufufu."

Kim reached across the small side table, her fingers pointing directly toward a thick, towering stack of printed resumes and dossiers to remind Anthony of their primary agenda for the evening.

Head Tang nodded, picking up the heavy stack of official family applicants and dropping the bundle straight into my lap, the sheer weight of the paper rustling loudly.

"Rick, within the coming year, I am officially planning to step down from my position as Head of the family to hand the reins over to Helen, right after she secures her final university degree," Anthony explained, his features turning completely serious as he laid out the situation. "I am fully aware that your personal intelligence network is absolutely incredible, so I am charging you with the task of personally selecting Helen's future husband from among these specific men. I refuse to allow Helen to be bartered off to some aristocratic scum, which is exactly the tragic fate that has been plagued across the other four noble houses for the last two consecutive generations. Do this critical task for me, and for the sake of Helen's future."

Ah, fuck me running. Hearing his explanation, my stomach instantly dropped as I realized the nightmare of the request. Accepting this role meant I would essentially have to act as the supreme director for a major side branch of the clan. Shit, I am still actively trying to finish my own University degrees.

"Uncle, why are you rushing this transition so soon?" I protested, looking down at the massive stack of papers in my hands. "I was under the distinct impression that you were going to wait to step down until after I had officially graduated?"

Anthony extended his hand, pointing his finger directly toward his daughter. "She will be exactly twenty-two years old by then, which marks the absolute perfect age to take control of the family line. To be completely blunt with you, Rick, I am thoroughly exhausted with the daily grind of this job. You know just as well as I do that I was never originally raised or trained to hold this supreme position anyway... by all rights of succession, it should have belonged to your mother in the first place. Currently, the Tang family's commercial businesses are not running nearly as efficiently as the Long or the Lang operations, and our economic standing is barely equal to the Feng family due to our poor natural resources. So use your resources to find a stellar candidate that Helen will actually be able to secure a true victory with from among those men."

I stared down at the heavy, oppressive stack of paperwork resting in my hands, feeling an intense wave of anxiety washing over my chest. Damn, this situation absolutely sucks. Arranged political marriages are completely against my personal philosophies.

Just as I was actively calculating the exact physical trajectory required to bolt out of the front door and escape the house entirely, Helen's soft voice sliced through the tension, instantly pulling me out of my internal crisis. "Rick, please relax," she murmured softly, her fingers gently squeezing my arm to ground me. "I trust your judgment implicitly. Just focus on finding someone I can genuinely trust, and hopefully, someone I can eventually learn to love. Just do your best to screen out the arrogant jerks."

Anthony, sensing my hesitation and striking the iron while I was thoroughly distracted by his daughter's pleading, immediately drove the final nail into the coffin.

"You find her a proper, respectable husband by the deadline, and the exact second the contract is signed, I will immediately sign over total ownership of the entire Big Burger franchise straight to your name," Anthony declared, a wicked, triumphant smirk playing across his face. "However, if you fail this mission by the time summer officially comes to an end, I will personally ensure that every single Big Burger location is closed down permanently..."

I froze, my jaw dropping in absolute horror as I stared at my uncle. The man was operating exactly like an evil, calculating System that left me. He had just weaponized the single, solitary guilty pleasure I kept in my entire stressful life to completely blackmail me.

"Fuck! Not my Big Burger!" I yelled, throwing my hands up in complete, defeated surrender. "Fine! I accept this stupid matchmaking mission!"

Anthony Tang leaned back into his chair, a look of pure smug satisfaction radiating from his face. He had just successfully tricked an immortal, world-class Golden Dragon using nothing more than a Deluxe Burger.