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Chapter 296 Antonia
296 Antonia
Eventually, Dante could not continue to pace around and cause everyone to glance at him from the corner of their eyes.
That was because a beaming Portia and Aileen came out of the room, their faces full of satisfaction. Dante's head whipped up, and when he saw their expressions, his thumping heart seemed to calm down greatly.
He briskly walked over to them. "How was it?"
"It was fine, Dante. Relax. You can go in and be with Bea for now." Portia replied with an amused chuckle.
Meanwhile, Aileen gently patted her son on the shoulder and gave him a look that he was familiar with, which meant that he had to calm himself. Almost out of reflex, Dante took a deep breath and sorted out his emotions before realizing how his mom had Pavloved him from a young age to be in control of himself.
He never really realized that before, but he had little space to think about it now as he walked right into the room.
Technology in this age had made childbirth not only painless, but the risk of anything happening to the child or mother was so low that any accident occurring was an anomaly. Moreover, all of the machines and tools were handcrafted by Dante using his Nanite Resonance, so they stood at the peak of the universe.
Dante was not worried about Beatrice's health, though he hoped that their child being a darling of the universe wouldn't complicate things. What he was worried about was how he would present himself to his child and whether there were any complications.
As he walked in, the android midwives gave him space and led him to the bed where a slightly tired Beatrice held a baby in her arms, draped in swaddling cloth. As usual, when he entered, her eyes fell on him, and Beatrice released the most dazzling smile Dante had ever seen.
"Dante... come and look at her. She's so perfect." Beatrice beckoned him over.
Dante almost floated over to the bed and sat beside Beatrice, gazing at the lovely little darling within. What surprised Dante was that the girl was born with a full head of purple hair, like her mother and grandmother.
It seemed that genetics were hard to erase, because even her bright little eyes that were full of intelligence were purple as well. Even her features were similar to Beatrice in the sense of the softness and femininity Beatrice possessed, but her skin color was the same as Dante's, and her demeanor seemed somewhat similar too.
However, what shocked Dante was the power he sensed from the child. Dante had mastered multiple power systems so he could sense some of them from the infant, which left him frazzled.
Immediately, he called Levi out.
"I'll leave you two to the post-natal recovery. I'm sure everyone outside can't wait to hear about her name and what happens next." Dante said as he waved to Beatrice and walked out of the room.
Seeing this, Portia and Aileen walked back into the room after giving Dante pointed looks of amusement. Augeus and David stood up and came to either side of Dante, patting his shoulder.
"Dad... there is this burning feeling within me right now. The will to protect my family at all cost, to challenge the world to carve out a safe space for them and to provide for them everything they want." Dante spoke his heart to his two dads.
"Never forget that feeling, son. You will carry it for the rest of your life; make sure to act on it when you can."
"This is part of the journey of fatherhood, Dante. You can only overcome, never succumb."
Both Augeus and David smiled knowingly as they advised Dante earnestly.
Dante sighed and sat down with the two men, listening to their advice and their shared stories of some of the difficulties they faced and how they resolved it. Most of them were martial, financial, and macro-issues that could affect the entire family.
Soon, Portia and Aileen came out once more, stating that Beatrice and Antonia were resting. Dante could come tomorrow to check on her, so he left to another guest room and spent the night tossing and turning, thinking of his adorable daughter and how much he would pamper her in the future.
When morning came, he excitedly rushed upstairs but paused and felt it was too early. As such, he used quantum entanglement to leave the estate and return to the home universe.
He floated before the massive Zero Gate of the Centralis Universe in silent ponderance. His fleet had started building a massive space station around the entire Zero Gate, walling it off and preventing other species from accessing it, just like in the Eternal Universe.
It was a massive project that required more resources than one could imagine. Luckily, the universe was vast, and Dante had conquered many sectors so far, some even yet to be inhabited.
Ever since he learned about Chaos Will, his quantum clone had implemented the policy of rapid gestation. The rewards for migrating to new planets and giving birth across all the species had been greatly increased, especially for races with poor fertility.
Those with high fertility were not given much because high fertility usually came with the flaw of low-quality genetics/existence. An example would be the insect race, with the highest fertility but each individual insect was worth about one millionth of a single human.
Rather than waste time filling the black with low quality, Dante used technology and even magic to enhance the fertility of significant races, causing them to enter a flourishing golden age. Currently, most of these races forgot that Dante was a tyrant who had taken over their freedom and praised him to the high heavens.
Imagine being kidnapped, but you are taken to a luxury mansion with butlers and maids to serve you, food of every type you liked imported for you, any games you wanted available for you, and even the power to create your own animes/manga to watch/read with top beauties paid handsomely to come and play with your young master as and when you wished.
The only caveat was that you couldn't leave completely.
Who wouldn't enjoy such a life?