Chapter 250 - [Bonus] Birds and the Bees feat. Mii & Bob (1/2)
”Hey Mii,” the young doctor asked after they got out of the inner dimension. Buddha was talking with Hua Tuo and the young doctor was told to entertain himself.
”Yes?” the assistant called out cautiously. For some reason, there was a sinking feeling in her gut when Zero called out to her. The strawcherry fairy was busy communicating with Lily and Zoe who were now part of the mindscape gang.
”What is the difference between being a male and a female?”
The strawcherry assistant dropped what she was doing and paused. Was this really happening?
Zero waited patiently but when he heard no response from Mii, he began to worry. ”Mii?”
The assistant sighed. She did not sign up for this. If anyone had to give Zero the talk, that would be his parents. But Zero only had children, grandchildren and creations to ask. Why didn't Solo leave behind a creation guide about the different things he created and how they worked? Now there was going to be that awkward conversation about the birds and the bees that Zero might not even understand because he lacked the necessary parts to identify as male or female.
”Zero, why don't you, Bob and I talk about this in the mindscape tonight,” Mii suggested and Zero agreed.
Thankfully, for the rest of the day, Hua Tuo and Buddha decided to give Zero a break from his training as they discussed the best methods to help Zero develop the eight extraordinary meridians that he naturally lacked.
Zero spent his time reading up about anatomy about males and females on the reading device that afternoon but only became more confused by the knowledge. Male and females exist for the sake of repopulating so that Solo didn't have to continuously do it. It's a rather smart idea created by his past self. However, he didn't understand why he couldn't let all living creatures simply reproduce themselves like worms who were both male and female.
Zero thought back about his early days. Does that mean Namekuji was a hermaphrodite? Was that why it could house so many tiny ones in his body? Were those Namekuji's babies?
What about Buddha? Zero scratched his head over that. Buddha was technically human so he should be seeing either a branch or a flower at the human crotch area. That was basic anatomy after all. What did a glowing light there mean? Was Buddha neither male nor female? Then again, typical signs of deep voice, more muscular structure and absence of developed chest point towards males.
Zero paused. If he thought about it, Mitchnew didn't have developed chests like Coux or Qin Yun. Amaraline might not have a developed chest but she certainly didn't have a muscular structure or deep voice. Perhaps she was an undeveloped female. Mitchnew was muscular like Zenobia but without the chest. Her voice was also low and raspy so Zero wondered if he'd gotten the dark elf's gender wrong now.
”Sekkin referred to Mitchnew as his wife so Mitchnew must technically be a female. Why is it that signs are pointing towards her identifying as a male?” Zero sighed.
”As expected, the only way to tell a person's gender is by studying their crotch areas. I still think branches and flowers are the easiest way to confirm genders. What would that make Buddha then? The books didn't mention anything about the absence of branches and flowers. No mention about light sources at the nether regions either...”
Dejected, Zero decided to do some self-studying.
”Shifu! I'm going out for a walk!”
Hua Tuo waved at Zero and told him to be back by dinner, Zero dashed off and the two Sage Gods resumed their discussion while the young doctor decided to locate the nearest animal in the vicinity.
Not too far from Trigression Falls, Zero caught a small yellow bird. The bird had a high-pitched voice that pointed to females and looked pretty. Zero guessed that it must be a female since females are typically better looking than males with their slender builds and curvy silhouettes.
”Time for the reveal,” Zero told himself and flipped the bird onto its back hoping to catch sight of a small branch or flower.
Instead, he saw none. Shocked by the revelation that Zero might be the same as birds, he consulted Mii once more.
”Mii! Tell me, am I really a bird? Is my body modelled after birds? Why can't I fly? This is so unfair!”
The strawcherry fairy groaned. It looks like the matter can no longer be put off. She called for the dragon who was napping in the egg and told him to handle Zero. She had a lot to do and used that as an excuse to run away from teaching Zero about the more embarrassing things.
Bob didn't know what he was in for when he appeared before Zero. The young doctor was holding a bird in his hand with his pants down to his ankles.
”Zero! What are you doing?”
The teenager was nearly in tears. ”Bob! I'm actually a bird but I can't fly... am I a broken bird?”
That made the dragon speechless. How was Zero a bird? Who told Zero that he was a bird? Also, why was Zero not wearing his pants? What if someone saw that? Even in a forest with nobody, decency was still a must. Bob knew that he didn't care much about decency when he was in his dragon form because like all animals, they felt comfortable in their own skin. However, humans were vile creatures. If one did not wear clothes in the presence of other humans, one would feel a sense of vulnerability to eyes feasting on their naked skin. The prickling feeling of lust directed to his naked human form felt disgusting and from that incident onwards, Bob always made sure to wear clothes as a human.
”Zero, wear your pants properly and we will talk,” the dragon instructed and also ordered Zero to let go of the poor bird who might have been traumatised.
Zero sniffed and pulled up his pants quickly much to the Eternal Dragon's relief. For some reason, he had an inkling Mii sent him over because she didn't know how to deal with a growing teen in their puberty stages. Zero was not exactly a teenager going through puberty but he was finding out a lot of things that made him act like one. Recovering parts of his memory and syncing the memories of four divine entities through their fragments can be daunting. He didn't blame the boy at all for not understanding what gender was despite being a doctor.
”Ok, let's talk now. What's bothering you? Please start from the beginning, I've been quite left out of the loop ever since I saw a funny contract. Just so you know, I did sign it and have yet to check out the new system function that automatically appears in the mindscape.”
Zero sniffed and told Bob how he had to go to his inner dimension to find out whatever was hindering his progress with Buddha.
”And then I saw that Buddha had this glowing light at his crotch area. I'm so confused now because I thought that Buddha was a man. After researching about genders I'm even more confused because I cannot confirm if Mitchnew is a male or a female. She doesn't have a well-developed chest, has a deep sounding voice and is muscular.”
Bob coughed awkwardly and looked around nervously. If Mitchnew heard this coming from her angel, she would be so hurt to hear it even if Zero made that statement with pure intentions.
”Ok, I will explain this only once so you must listen carefully to it. also, you must promise me to never make such statements again. Judging anyone by their gender can often hurt them. If Mitchnew heard this, she would be very hurt by your words even if it is true. Most people cannot help being the gender that they are and some of them are just souls trapped in the wrong bodies.”
Zero nodded and listened to Bob explain the concept of genders seriously. There were three kinds of genders as opposed to the two that Zero thought there were.
”Genders exist for reproduction. In most cases, genders cannot be changed. However, there are some creatures who can change their genders. These are very rare and often only ever happens in hermaphrodites. Humans have attempted to change their genders before and there is reason to believe that they were successful. The previous earth allowed the mating between two people of the same gender and have been able to procreate life.”
”That's fascinating. Did that mean they were able to create life by themselves like hermaphrodites?”
Bob hummed. Not much of that was documented. His knowledge didn't extend that far either and if there was someone who might know about it, that person would be either Merlin or Steve Jobs.
”Sorry Zero, I don't know much about genders in humans or the experiments they did to it. I only know the natural process of how it is created and what it does. You'd have to ask Merlin or Steve Jobs about the experiments humans tried. It's not pleasant is all I can tell you. They attempted alchemy, cloning and all sorts of horrible things that took a lot of lives.”
The young doctor nodded and decided that he would stay away from that topic for now. Bob then explained how life was created and what the branch did to the flower. Zero was amazed by it and then became confused.
”Wait, if babies were born from inside the stomach, then how will you be born? You come from an egg.”
Bob grinned. ”Good question. Like I said, that's the more common method. Sadly, it isn't very convenient for some of the other animals and magical beasts so we find other methods of procreating life. the egg is like a portal womb where the baby grows. So the branch will still fertilise the flower and then the female will lay an egg in somewhere she thinks is safe. Sometimes the mother takes care until the egg hatches but sometimes she doesn't.”
Zero made an angry noise. ”Why can't the mother take care of the eggs? They're helpless to wind and rain and hungry animals!”
Bob smiled. ”Birds lay eggs because they're body is way too small to house several baby birds inside them. The same is with fishes. However, while the birds can sit on four of five eggs for a month, fishes lay thousands of eggs at one time. The mother cannot possibly care for so many children can she?”
Zero shook his head. ”I suppose not? But what if they get eaten by other bigger fishes before they are hatched?”
”That,” Bob told Zero. ”Is the life cycle. The mother fish lays thousands of eggs because she knows not many of them will be born. Some will get eaten before they are born and others will get eaten while they are small and weak after they are born. However, for the strong babies, they will grow up to become mothers and fathers to give birth to even stronger babies hoping that more of them will survive.”
Then the dragon added that all living creatures do the same to provide better for their young hoping that they will become stronger than them to continue the species. The species that didn't survive the growing harsh competition will eventually become extinct.
”That's sad. But it still does not explain why humans cannot be hermaphrodites. If what you explained earlier about some humans being unhappy with their gender or fall in love for others of the same gender, wouldn't the problem be resolved if everyone had both genders for procreation?”
Bob smirked. ”Can you imagine humans populating the world at their will? It takes many years for humans to find a compatible mate and when they do, they can bear children once every year. What do you think will happen if they skip the searching process and start repopulating the world every year after they mature?”
”There will be many humans?” Zero tried.
”Correction,” Bob pointed out. ”There will be many small humans with not enough big humans wise enough to care for all of them. Have you seen Seth? Do you know how many adults are needed to take care of one baby? If Karris was on her own, she would have a difficult time and both mother and child might not make it.”
Zero thought about it. Bob had a point. He explained what extinction was and Zero thought about it. If there were humans who could procreate at will, the world would be overpopulated with humans and there would not be enough resources to sustain everyone. Humans have taken to farming simply because it was easier to feed the population. The mountains and forests were cut down to make cities and towns so the food that took many years to grow were no longer sufficient. If there were more mini-humans than big humans, they would only become extra burdens to the ecosystem and it wouldn't be long for the planet to be destroyed by humans.
”I understand now. However, I don't get the part that you say some humans tend to find the same gender to mate with. Why is that a thing? Isn't that wrong? A flower needs a branch to fertilise it. Two branches and two flowers won't' fertilise each other. Besides, if children were like fruits, the fruits developed by two flowers or two branches would mess up the concept of yin and yang completely. It's going against the cycle.”
Bob sighed. He knew Zero was going to point it out. The term homosexual is not going to be easy to explain. However, the best way to do so without Zero questioning it was to call it a 'bug' in Solo's creation.
”Not everything the Great One created was perfect. Because humans were given intelligence, sometimes the genetics created had flaws in them. You've seen the flaws too right? In Steve's term, it was called a 'bug'. The error in those created humans made them attracted to the same gender. We call it homosexuality but the purpose of the fruitless mating is because the genetic line should not be passed down with that combination after that human's generation. The evolution has reached a dead end and it's a method that preserves the continuation of the human species for the stronger offsprings.”
Zero nodded. Now it made sense. Still, one question remained. ”What about those you said were souls with labelled genders but had been attached to the wrong physical body? Was Enma careless in assigning the body? Was there a shortage of bodies?”
Bob sighed. Leave it to Zero to question what transgender meant. Unlike homosexuality, the dragon couldn't really smoke his way out of it.
”I believe you'd have to consult King Yama pertaining to this. I do not have an answer for dragons do not experience this problem. In fact, humans are the only species who encountered such an issue. It might be due to their level of intelligence.”
Zero nodded and Bob took his chance to run away. He was going to chew Mii out for throwing him to the merciless doctor. Zero didn't give him a break and asked everything under the sun from babies to the strange thing called love and the procreation process. Bob couldn't lie to Zero but he couldn't give him a too detailed answer either. He simply glazed over details and gave Zero a top-down view of the process in the most medical way he could explain it.
”Good job,” the strawcherry fairy praised when Bob returned to their mindscape. Zoe was also there and Lily was bright red after hearing the lecture. None of the mindscape girls wanted to give Zero the talk and Bob groaned. he'd fallen right into the trap of being the only male present.
”You could have thrown Zero a book or something,” he complained.
”Zero researched it up before he talked to you. He still had questions to ask. I see that you're very good at handling Zero. While I'm busy coordinating the background work, I'm putting you in charge of Zero's education and emotional well-being,” Mii said.
Zoe volunteered to be Zero's unofficial guardian and emotional support while Lily decided to simply be his friend and go-to assistant whenever he needed someone to talk to.
”He is calling King Yama now to clarify the reason for transgenders,” Bob told them and Mii laughed. She could already imagine Enma's reaction to it.
”I'm curious to know how he will answer Zero. You gave him quite the logical and medical explanation like a true professional. You do realise that Zero wouldn't understand any of the concepts for lust because of it, right?”
Bob rolled his eyes. ”So what if Zero understood it? He's got nothing down there to explore with. If Lilith didn't want to expose Zero to any of that, I will not do the honours of touching the pandora's box. also, he's too young to be thinking about such things!”