Baby System: I'm the Beast World's Only Hope!-Chapter 150: Episode : Time To Move.

Syris had never had the thought of confronting his father before.

But after mating and staying with Roxy for a long time, her bad behavior was rubbing off on him, and all he wanted to do was get into his father’s face, recklessly punch him, and curse at his face.

Like Roxy would call him, he wanted to be a bad boy again.

Vipersan, the Serpent Lord, stood opposite Zarek and Syris. He had expected to look down. He had expected to see the Runt, the scrawny, pale, shivering disappointment that he had kicked out of the swamp years ago.

Instead, Vipersan had to crane his neck up. Syris filled the sun above him on the grass.

The snake prince was no longer the malnourished boy who lived on scraps. Months of nutrient-rich food and the potent bond with Roxy had triggered a biological metamorphosis.

Syris was broad-shouldered now, his chest thick with muscle beneath his linen tunic. He stood taller, not taller than Zarek, but his frame was elongated and powerful.

His skin wasn’t grey and sickly; it was a luminous, alabaster white, humming with vitality. And his eyes... those neon green eyes didn’t look at the floor. They burned with a cold intensity that made the tension in the air thicken.

Even his brothers had felt his change.

Syris wasn’t smiling.

"You..." Vipersan rasped, his forked tongue flicking out to taste the air. "You have... shed."

"My mate fed me well," Syris corrected. "Why are you here, Father? Did you come to finish what you started? Did you come to kill the Runt?"

Vipersan could not help but remember the feisty female his other sons told him about when they returned to the tribe.

Syris’s hand twitched. A subtle green mist began to curl around his fingers, a neurotoxin potent enough to drop a mammoth in seconds. Roxy never realized he could do this before.

Beside him, Zarek folded his arms, ready to incinerate anyone who moved wrong.

Vipersan looked at the poison mist. He looked at Zarek. Then he looked back at Syris’s face, seeing the cold, hard lines of a killer.

To everyone’s shock, the Serpent Lord raised his hands in surrender.

"No," Vipersan said quickly, shaking his massive, scaled head. "No fight. We are not here for blood."

Syris narrowed his eyes. "You bring this amount of people and say you didn’t come to fight?"

Syris was no fool to believe his father’s words.

"They guard me through the journey," Vipersan insisted. "But we do not seek war with the Iron-Wood."

He took a hesitant step forward, his demeanor shifting from arrogance to something Syris had never seen: humble. Or at least, a performance of humility.

"I... apologize," Vipersan said. The words sounded foreign on his tongue. "For the past. For how I exiled you, we were wrong."

Syris didn’t blink. "What do you mean by that?"

"I was wrong," Vipersan admitted. A look of genuine awe crossed his face. "We heard the news. You did it, Syris. You bred with this female Vessel. You produced a living heir that restored our true bloodline, a good omen for our tribe. My strongest sons could not, but you... The Runt... you possess the True Blood."

"I am not a Runt," Syris hissed, the sound sharp and deadly. "And she is not a vessel. She is my Queen."

"Of course," Vipersan nodded rapidly, not wanting to anger his son. "We... we brought offerings."

He snapped his fingers. Malus hurried forward, placing a chest on the grassy floor. Inside were rare swamp treasures: Black Pearls, antidotes, and soft leather.

They all used this to survive in the swamps.

"For the child," Vipersan said, his eyes darting toward the interior of the cabin. "For my granddaughter. May I see her? May I hold the future of our line?"

The request hung in the cold air. Syris looked at the gifts. He looked at his father’s eager, greedy eyes. He knew that look. Vipersan didn’t want to hold a baby; he wanted to inspect a possible future for his tribe.

A cold, calm rage settled over Syris. He was never going to let him do it! Never ever!

"No," Syris said softly.

Vipersan blinked. "But... I am her grandfather."

"You are nothing but a stranger to me!" Syris spat in anger. "You exiled me. You banished me to the wilderness to freeze. The man standing before you is Syris of the Iron-Wood. I have no clan but this one."

He stepped forward, forcing Vipersan to retreat back.

"Get out of my territory. If I see a single snake scale near my home again, I will burn them."

"You cannot deny your blood!" Vipersan argued. "She belongs to the Swamp!"

"She belongs to the Pack!" Syris roared, his neon eyes flaring as the toxin mist killed the grass around him. "LEAVE!"

Zarek stepped forward, "You heard the snake, move!" He snarled to emphasize his anger.

Vipersan stared at his son and saw his raw power, the rejection in his gaze, and slumped, realizing this bridge could never be crossed.

"Fine," Vipersan whispered. "We will go."

He signaled his sons to retrieve the chest. But before Vipersan turned, he reached into his tunic.

"Wait," the Serpent Lord said.

He held up a small object. A simple leather cord holding a pendant made of a single, iridescent green scale encased in amber.

"The Scale of the First Ancestor," Vipersan said. "This will help in her growth. But do not punish the child for my sins. Let her have the protection of her lineage."

He held it out, his hand trembling slightly. Syris stared at the amulet.

He narrowed his eyes, his pupils constricting into needle-thin slits. His tongue flicked out, tasting the molecules in the air surrounding the object. He scented for dormant poisons, for traps.

He smelled nothing but amber and preservation salts. He sensed the faint, harmless hum of his own ancestors’ biology trapped within the fossil.

It was clean. 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

Syris looked at Vipersan’s face. He saw regret there. It didn’t wash away the abuse, but it was... something.

Syris reached out. His long, pale fingers snatched the amulet from Vipersan’s hand without touching his skin.

"I take this," Syris said coldly. "Not as a gift. But as a payment for the years you stole from me."

Vipersan nodded slowly. "Fair."

He looked at the closed door one last time, longing for the granddaughter he would never know, then turned away. "Let’s go."

The snakes slithered into the darkness.

Syris stood there for a long moment, clutching the amulet. The shadow that had loomed over him since birth, the need for his father’s approval, was gone.

He turned and walked back inside. Zarek slammed the heavy door shut behind them and locked it.

"Syris!"

Roxy didn’t wait. She handed Tanith to Ren and threw herself off the sofa, stumbling slightly on her weak legs, but she launched herself at Syris.

He caught her instinctively, dropping the amulet to wrap his arms around her waist, burying his face in her hair.

"Are you okay?" Roxy asked frantically, cupping his face. "Did they hurt you?"

Syris leaned into her touch, closing his eyes. How could they hurt him? Well, he knows that before, that would have been possible, but with the amount of strength that she had given him, they could never.

"No," he whispered. "They were small. They were so... small."

"You acted like a male for once," Zarek said approvingly from the door, clapping a heavy hand on Syris’s shoulder. "Deserving of Roxy, Brother."

Brother....

Syris cringed at the thought. He couldn’t help but be wary of the dragon; he had started becoming too friendly with Roxy’s mate, and Syris didn’t understand why.

Had he truly accepted them all as family?

Zarek stared lazily back at him, not caring about whatever thought that swarmed in the basilisk head.

Roxy kissed him hard on the lips. "I’m so proud of you, you big-headed snake!"

She pulled back, wiping a smudge of dirt from his cheek. She looked around the room. It was chaotic, crowded, and bursting at the seams with life and victory.

Roxy grinned. A wild, excited energy surged through her.

She looked at her mates.

"Okay," Roxy announced, clapping her hands together. "It is finally time for us to move!"