1 An unexpected beginning.

Through unfamiliar darkness came blinding light.

An orifice opened right in front of me as rhythmic contractions embraced my body. Two hands grabbed the underside of my arms and being unable to resist, I started getting pulled out of the comfortable warmth of the place where I was resting.

A slumber. A slumber long enough to make me feel like I had already been dead. Yet here I am.

The small light source gradually became larger and larger until my entire field of view was filled with nothing but light.

"Honey! You did it!" Cries of a man resounded in the background making my head throb.

"Congratulations."

"Haaah… finally…" An exasperated sigh.

My eyes took a bit of time to adjust but as soon as they did, I was greeted with a reflection of a red infant cradled in the arms of a man. There were people donning blue drabs surrounding me. On the other side, there was a man grabbing a woman's hand with great fervour.

The woman in question looked completely fine excluding the little beads of sweat glistening off her supple skin. The man on the other hand looked... rough to say the least.

His red hair and grand appearance were completely contrasted by the tears and snot running down his face. The woman's green hair matched the serenity that she was displaying with her composed outlook.

One of the blue rag covered females used some sort of tool to chop off the pipe extending from my belly and the other tied it up neatly and put some sort of clip on it. It didn't hurt nearly as much as I thought it would after seeing the instrument. And even if it did, in this state, I was powerless to retaliate.

Then the man held me up the wrong side around and tapped my ass. The room went silent and everyone looked at me with anticipation. What an odd bunch of fellows.

Now that I think about it, I did feel like I was choking a bit.

I applied a little pressure on my vocal cords and coughed a bit.

"Khhk Khhk." Yep, the air was now entering my lungs just fine.

Yet, the man didn't cease the act of tapping my ass.

'What does he even want me to do?!'

He continued incessantly and with more aggression with every progressive tap. One tap, two taps, three taps… the air got colder and everyone started looking more worried.

'Ughhh! This is getting annoying.'

"Can you stop?" I squeaked out of my little vocal cords.

.

.

.

"WHAT THE FUCK?! THE BABY JUST TALKED! FUCK!"

"Eh?" My legs suddenly got released as the man experienced shock and I started falling towards the ground. Blasphemy! How could this nincompoop let such a defenceless and delicate being fall?!

I needed to protect myself. I drew my hands closer to my chest, to no avail. They flailed around helplessly. The only other option was using my mana!

BUT I DIDN'T HAVE THAT!

'Am I going to die again? Already?!'

I prepared myself for the worst.

But before I reached the ground, a mana cushion forced me to float in the air. Heh, how? I looked around the silent room. The source was- ah! The female in bed.

The mana slowly pulled me towards her and I got buried between her arms and her plentiful… umm… chest.

My heart was racing, and I sweated an unholy amount but I felt warm.

After giving myself a moment and exerting my brain the reality of the situation dawned on me.

Even though it was different from my era, what I went through was nothing but the human phenomenon of childbirth. I did claim that it was a human phenomenon, but the woman who underwent it was definitely a demon by race. I could feel her energy. Demons don't give birth, so this scenario didn't make a lot of sense...

Coincidentally, the male with red hair was human.

The two other females were demons and the male who was holding me upside down is human.

What the hell is up with this intermingling of races?! Since when did humans and demons just coexist? Nothing made sense about this situation.

'Did I miss a page of common sense?'

"What are you talking about doctor? How could a baby talk?" The woman said while forcing a finger between my palm. I grabbed onto it instinctively.

"But-" The 'doctor' in question tried to protest.

"Moreover… you almost dropped my kid. Don't you know how much pain I had to go through to give birth to him?" I took a look at her visage.

No, lady, you look just fine. The man beside you, on the other hand, looks as if he went through hell.

The 'doctor' now has his eyes down low under this stifling atmosphere.

"Well, it's fine since I wouldn't let him fall even if you threw him on purpose… but what you said does interest me. He might turn out to be a prodigy..." She looked down at me expectantly. "So why don't you say something Mao-kun?" Her words seemed unthreatening enough but her face... Her face!!!

All of my neurons fired up at once and I transferred into my maximum thinking state.

Humans and demons coexisting, and a demon giving birth to a child from presumably a human. This was all unprecedented. This is definitely not the era I come from. There are too many variables and too much danger. I cannot compute properly!

I must lay as low as possible. Judging from the 'doctor's reaction, speaking is something a 'baby' should be incapable of. Even though I was able to speak the day I was born in my previous life. So what do I do to not arouse any suspicion? What do I do? What do I do?

"Mao-kunnn." The slowly warping face of the woman instilled an impending sense of doom in my heart.

And then it all clicked.

Previous life, age six, I came to learn from a book that human kids have a tendency of making a peculiar sound for no particular reason. A sound that resembled the high pitched whine of a dog right after an aggressive bark.

I put all my faith in that little sound and opened my mouth.

"Uwein."

The room went silent again and the eyes that were imparting fear were now glittering with an emotion that can only be described as joy. The man next to the woman has streaks of tears running down his face again.

"Seee doc?!" The woman shouted. "There's no way our cute little Mao-kun would speak! I mean listen to him… he even cries in a German accent!" The woman held me up and pointed me towards the doctor.

"Uwein." I muttered again. AHH! SO EMBARRASSING!

'I want to cover my face and hole up somewhere. Don't look at me!'

"I see..." The doctor said unconvinced and started wrapping his stuff up.

"Well, can you just move on to the other procedures now?" The woman took charge again. Boy, am I proud of this demon! Such a strong one.

"Yes, sure."

What followed next is a bunch of modes, I got wrapped up, caressed, and showered with affection, fed the liquid called colostrum, almost suffocated in the process. And only after all that, did I get put into a bed.

After that, a bunch of guests came and greeted my lazing self.

Many dressed up in uniform. Some dressed in noble clothing. All played around with me and discussed my future with my parents as if I didn't have any say in it. They looked as if they wanted to build connections with me before I was even capable of picking and choosing. They blatantly tried sucking up to me. Many a time with gifts.

It appeared as though my new family had some prestige.

But that didn't get to them, as they were clearly capable of handling themselves. They put off any attempts with a smile on their face saying that I should be the one to decide.

By the time the majority of them left, the room was filled with bouquets.

"Is this our little Mao-kun?" The last one to arrive was a demon man.

"Yep… isn't he cute?" My father bragged.

"Sure is… but he's not as cute as our Yuu-chan." The man replied with an equal amount of pride. He and my father must be close to have this sort of conversation.

"You shouldn't be saying that after seeing someone's newly born child!" A woman complained. She slowly crept into my field of vision, carrying another kid... probably the 'Yuu-chan' the man just mentioned.

A female demon kid, around my age. Skin as pure as snow, majestic blonde hair, and eyes shining like the deepest blues of the ocean. But what struck me was the mana composition. I would never mistake for anyone else's.

I put on a stern expression as the composition was one that belonged to the person that killed me in my previous life…