Black Shadow | Souei

Bonus: A Happy Family

It had been a few months after Rimuru headed out to instruct Shizu's students. He kept in contact with the kijin who could use [Thought Communication] and regularly received reports. To his great relief, neither Shion nor Kumiko and Souei had poisoned or demolished the town, respectively. However, the three were for sure driving Benimaru up a wall. Benimaru, the General who was placed in charge of the Kijin by Rimuru, felt like he wanted to quit as the official leader of the Kijin. Mainly, as the leader of Souei and Kumiko and as the supervisor of Shion's cooking. The latter could speak for itself, but the former...

The Kijin couple, after their marriage, had been closer than ever. The two were stuck at the hip and even scouted together now. They fought like normal, but immediately after the fighting started, it would end just as suddenly as it started since Souei would begin fretting or Kumiko would burst into tears.

Why? Because Kumiko was pregnant.

Benimaru couldn't believe it when he first heard. Apparently, they had gone and conceived the child within the first few days after their wedding. The rest of the Kijin teased them for days on end after they found out a couple weeks later and claimed that their wishes for baby Kijin were just jokes.

Kumiko stomach was no longer flat as her baby bump was showing now, and the females of the village were overjoyed to see a pregnant Kumiko wandering around with Souei in tow. Souei, being the sort of awkward Kijin father he was, simply couldn't leave her alone at any second out of fear something would happen to put both her and their unborn child in danger. Shion and Shuna, who stuck by Kumiko a lot, indulged themselves in scenes of a wilting Souei and Kumiko scolded him for thinking she was helpless. The blue Kijin couldn't even begin to think about arguing back against his wife since he knew she was perfectly capable of protecting herself, but he could't help it and still worried.

Months continued to pass and Kumiko's small baby bump grew until she was forced to waddle around. Souei banned her from scouting and resorted to sending his doubles out while he stayed with her to ensure that she didn't wander off on her own. The rest of the females were eagerly on standby to help Kumiko with whatever she needed. Since monsters generally had a long lifespan, very few females were pregnant and most weren't even looking actively for a partner or childbirth; they just let feelings come when feelings came. So, essentially, the entire village catered to the pregnant Kumiko.

"I'm fine, Souei," Kumiko sighed as he flitted around her and stuffed pillows around her as she sat on the bed. Her scythe aws resting against the back wall, and much to Kumiko's dismay, had been collecting dust and cobwebs since her pregnancy had made it difficult for her to scout with Souei. "My back is killing me, but placing a pillow under my arm isn't going to do anything."

Sure enough, Souei had formed a throne of pillows for his wife. The white, fluffy mass of cloth almost buried Kumiko as it toppled over. She pushed the pillows off of her and reached both her arms out to Souei.

"Help me up, dear. I want to exercise."

"Kumiko, love. You're pregnant and you can barely even walk. Why in the world do you think you can exercise right now?" Souei immediately regretted his words as Kumiko turned to glare at him.

"So I'm helpless because I'm pregnant? I can waddle just fine. Just watch me." She struggled a bit, shifting side to side as she tried to shuffle her way to the end of the bed. It was to no avail since her stomach was horribly large and made it so difficult for her. As she realized that she was having trouble, the female burst into tears.

"I can't do anything!" She wailed as Souei quickly reached over to help her to the edge of the bed before wrapping her in a hug to calm her down. "I'm so fat now that I can't even get off this bed. What is the point of even walking when I can't even get rid of this fat no matter how much I walk?"