"Were you serious when you said the children wouldn't be a problem?"
Hearing Vivianne's question, Puss's playful smile and mischievous gaze vanished. He fell silent, staring at her.
She looked back at him firmly, waiting for his answer. But the longer he stayed silent, the greater the disappointment that grew in her heart.
At last, he finally spoke.
"Vivianne, I'm not even sixteen yet. I've seen so little of the world, and there's still so much I want to discover and explore. My lifespan isn't as long as yours — and in fact, I intend to change that on my future adventures. That's why… I can't stay with you," he said firmly.
But his words truly saddened her.
She didn't blame him or grow angry — on the contrary, she hadn't even known he was that young, and she understood that it wouldn't be fair to make him stay.
Placing her delicate hands on his chest, she pushed lightly, preparing to get up, say goodbye, and end the day on a sad note.
But when she tried to do so, she was stunned to find she couldn't move — two strong arms had wrapped around her waist, not letting her go.
"Where are you going? I haven't finished talking yet." Puss's amused voice sounded, making her look at him in surprise — he was smiling broadly.
"You… what are you doing, let me go…" She struggled lightly in his arms, even flapping her wings to escape. But it was useless.
"Vivianne, I'm a greedy and shameless cat. It's true that I can't stay, but I still want you — I want the responsibility of being the father of your children."
He declared firmly, leaving her stunned, but before she could speak, he continued:
"You won't be my only woman, and I can't always be with you and the children. After all, there's still so much I want to see. But if you're willing to let me be part of your life and theirs, then at the very least, you'll never lack financial support — they'll be the richest fairy children in the world."
"When they're in trouble, I won't hesitate a single second to come running back."
"And when I'm here, I'll treat them as if they were my own and try to be the best father I can be."
Puss spoke with conviction, looking straight into her beautiful wide blue eyes.
After calming her racing heart, she gave him an amused smile.
"You're applying for the job of absent father?" she teased, tapping his chest with a playful smile. Her cheer returned, and the sadness in her heart began to fade.
Puss chuckled and kissed her cheek affectionately.
"Well, technically, that's not wrong — but let's call it a 'semi-absent father,'" he joked, gently rubbing her back.
"Don't you think you're rushing things, accepting the job of fathering my children so easily?" she asked with an amused smile.
"I thought that was the job you were offering." He raised an eyebrow at her, the corner of his lips curling up.
"Well, it was… but seriously, Puss, would you really accept being the father of eleven children who aren't yours, even if it's as a semi-absent father?" she asked, her heart conflicted.
They hadn't known each other for very long, and though they'd spent the last two weeks together — and started their lesson plans over the past two days — it was still too little time.
So it was hard for her to take his words seriously when he claimed he was willing to take responsibility for her children.
Puss grew serious and nodded at her.
"I won't lie to you, Vivianne. I really am willing to accept that responsibility — for no reason other than you. Yes, I like your cheerful, lively children, and I don't mind adopting them, especially since I'm very wealthy. But I wouldn't have made that decision if it weren't for you. I really, really like you."
He confessed earnestly. They might not have spent much time together, but when he liked someone, he liked them. Even in his past life, it was rare for him to take more than a week to start a relationship with a girl he was interested in — and who was interested in him.
Although all his past-life relationships had ended in failure, he'd always been this impulsive.
Still, even for him, getting involved with a single mother of eleven children was a bold step.
'I am Puss in Boots — I laugh in the face of common sense!' he thought, determined and amused.
He was far too rich to regret something as simple as choosing to adopt children. It wasn't as if it would ruin his life.
Even if he saw things pragmatically, he had no intention of being irresponsible toward the kids either.
Vivianne stared at him, speechless and a little moved.
She loved her children and prioritized their happiness, but that didn't mean she didn't want a life of her own — or to be happy too. On the contrary, she had always wanted to fall in love and get married, but she'd set those dreams aside because of her racial duty and her maternal love.
"Well… we can try, right?" she said timidly, resting her head on his chest.
"Of course we can. Don't worry — everything will be fine, I promise." With gentle affection, he ran his fingers through her soft, silky blonde hair.
And so, on that wooden bench outside the small house, under the starlight and the cold night breeze, a strange — yet somehow comforting — scene unfolded.
An orange cat and a little fairy held each other tenderly, finding warmth in one another's embrace.
…
The days passed with the summer breeze, soon turning into weeks, and from weeks, into months.
Puss's life had been quite colorful in recent months. Far Far Away was a lively city, full of interesting fairy tale creatures.
His relationship with the three ladies was also improving each day, and his bond with them was growing deeper and deeper.
Vivianne, for example, had already completely accepted him as her man. Under the daily routine of playing with the children, putting them to bed, and telling them stories, they had all become more and more attached to him.
The youngest ones even started calling him "Papa Cat," something Puss had to admit touched a few strings in his feline heart.
As for his dragon girl, Aurora, she was even more attached to him than Vivianne's children, and their relationship had progressed a lot.
Lastly came Fiona.
Their relationship had progressed the slowest — not because of a lack of feelings, but because Fiona always carried a sense of inferiority due to the curse she was condemned with.
And that only got worse when Puss refused to kiss her and revealed that he intended to find a way for her to keep and access her ogre form at will after the kiss.
When he told her that, Fiona actually cried and got angry, running away from him. It took several days for him to calm her down and for their relationship to blossom again.
Puss wanted her to show her ogre form to him, so he could help her deal better with that inferiority and fear she felt. But she never gave him the chance, always hiding in her room, and even begged him to promise not to invade her room at night — which really left him feeling powerless.
Other than that, their relationship progressed well after he managed to convince her that everything would be fine, and that he would perform the ritual in a way that guaranteed she would never have to take that form unless she wished to. But if one day she needed to, she could — which would give her a way to better protect herself.
Since everything he did was out of concern for her, her heart softened in the end, and her affection for Puss grew greatly when she realized how much he truly cared for her — to the point that he didn't mind if she became an ogre, as long as it meant her safety.
But ironically, the more she saw that he cared for her as a person, not for the appearance she took, the more her love for him grew — and she absolutely didn't want him to see her in what she believed was her monstrous, hideous form. She didn't want the man she loved to see her as ugly.
And that was how the promise she begged Puss to make — not to invade her room at night — was born.
Aside from these small bumps along the way, the last nine months in Far Far Away had been very enjoyable for Puss, and he had grown very close to the three women he cared about.
But because of the "kiss problem," he hadn't gone beyond gentle affection and cuddling with any of them. Well… except for Vivianne — but even with her, he stopped at kisses and caresses, all out of respect for Aurora and Fiona, who, because of their situations, he couldn't kiss yet.
So, he hadn't crossed the line with any of the three.
Someone might think: "You don't need kisses to do adult things."
Not being able to kiss — not just on the lips, but anywhere on the body — made things complicated. Even showing affection with his lips was risky, for fear it might become a true love's kiss. It drained much of the emotion from sex, and Puss preferred to wait — to give the girls a full and memorable first experience.
Yes, Puss wasn't sure, but he imagined that a true love's kiss might not be limited to the lips. After all, it was true love's kiss, not true love's kiss on the mouth. And in a magical world, one must be careful with such small nuances.
Outside of his colorful love life, the orange cat had also been deeply focused on artifact crafting and magical ritual creation over the past months — and the difficulty was far greater than he had initially imagined.
Even with his super memory and quick learning trait as a mutant cat, he still found himself facing some difficulties in his studies. Only that day — nine months later, three months more than he had originally calculated — could he truly say that he had mastered everything Vivianne could teach him on the subject.
And the little fairy would definitely hit him if she knew he had intended to master her knowledge in just six months. In fact, even the nine months he took were enough to nearly make her faint and doubt life itself in the face of Puss's insane talent.
At that moment, in the royal palace of the kingdom, Puss stood before a workbench, putting the final touches on the design he had been painstakingly working on for the past few days.
As he drew the final line, he held his breath.
It was the sketch of the ritual he had created to allow Fiona and Aurora to transform at will — and now, it was finally complete.
But strangely, there wasn't much happiness in Puss's eyes.
In the quiet room of the castle, his helpless murmur could be clearly heard.
"Finding the central material for this ritual is going to be a big problem…"