‘I’m afraid he’s crying, and I wouldn’t even know it.’

1: I’ve seen comments from people who don’t understand why the old merman chose to commit suicide, and I can’t help but share my own thoughts here.

This Empire is like a building about to collapse, with only the merman struggling to hold it up. And the little bird is like a comfort in the merman’s long years. Perhaps when the merman first met the little bird, he didn’t think the bird would occupy such an important place in his heart. He was just releasing his suppressed kindness onto the little bird. But as time passed, the little bird was no longer just a bird. He became the epitome of the people the merman had once loved in the old era, the only subject of the merman, as the emperor of that bygone age, in the new era.

In front of the little bird, the merman didn’t have to worry about conspiracies or expend much mental energy. He could freely vent his meager kindness on the little bird. Until they met, the merman’s feelings for the little bird were still compassion, pity, and respect, but not love. The moment he saw the little bird’s body on the news, his first emotion wasn’t regret born from love, but shock at the little bird’s moth-to-flame-like love for him, and regret for his own indifference, regret that in the end, he never gave the little bird a hug.

He could have, but he thought there would be time later. Unfortunately, fate had other plans. So the merman chose to die with him. He wasn’t hopeless for romantic love, but as an Emperor, dying together with his last subject, dying together with his great nation.

Going back, why did the merman choose suicide instead of seizing power? Because the merman was already spent. With the debauched ruler of the new era in front, the nobles were the biggest obstacle to the merman regaining power. A younger merman might have managed, but this old merman now couldn’t. He no longer had the energy to deal with the nobles. The merman understood that without him, this Empire, rotten to its core, would inevitably fall into the abyss of destruction. But as a long-lived species, he didn’t want to watch it rot before his eyes. So, the merman detonated the bomb, granting this great Empire one final dignity.

When did the merman truly fall in love with the little bird? After the rebirth.

The little bird the merman fell in love with was the one who remained fervent even in darkness. His feelings for the little bird had always started from kindness and pity. It’s just that in the past life, they met too late, leaving no time for this feeling to transform. In this life, they met early, early enough that everything was just beginning, early enough that this pity had ample time to grow and transform into love.

The above is just my humble opinion.

—-

2: So it was the nuclear button, no wonder Kaide wanted it so badly

3: Oh god, in the past life at the train station, he didn’t discover his tears

4: Fuck, I’m also messily wiping my tears, damn it

5: Following the story of the old merman and the little bird all the way here, I can’t help but write a few more words!!

Seeing it now, I feel both the old merman and the little bird carry a kind of identity dissonance (not in a bad way), both for themselves and for the readers.

Not many details about Izu Paraiso’s government are revealed, but judging from the milk truck and the omega policies, although he was kind, he differed from the traditional concept of a “benevolent ruler.” Or perhaps, it’s me, the reader, projecting a generic “good emperor” image common in web novels, and failing to find that template in Yu Chen.

Izu Paraiso seems to come from a brutal Qin or mighty Han dynasty, yet possesses a narrative completely different from Eastern emperors. Emperors are usually walking achievement records. Even as protagonists in romance novels, they must be emphasized as loving the people like children, benevolent and effective, or despite extreme actions, well-intentioned and ultimately successful. However, Izu Paraiso is not only an emperor in a romance novel but also an interstellar fish with European roots. It comes from absurdity and chaos, heading towards the unknown and madness.

In this story, the merman’s lineage might not just be a beautiful setting, but also a brutal, malevolent background, as if from the Age of Exploration—this is a country ruled by a monster. Because of this, events that seem similar to human reality lead to bizarre outcomes in this world, producing unexpected END. Perhaps this is the charm of OCs: allowing us to let our imaginations run wild in a small world, hypothesizing stories that could never happen in human society.

Izu Paraiso thus escapes the evaluation system bound by achievements within this bubble, allowing us to see him step down from the throne, to see another flesh-and-blood Yu Chen. He can pour his emotions into one person, can grow flowers and raise birds, can weaken, can still be beautiful and noble after failure. As a reader, I think I no longer need him to grow according to my stereotypes. The current him is clearly more brilliant.

“Thank you for your contributions to the nation.”

An emperor recorded in history as a failure, he seems to want to be absent from everyone’s lives. Yet, the words he wrote in the letters to the veterans, he had already spoken them in person to that disabled veteran in his past life.

Perhaps the swordfish physically snatched the medals from the veterans, but the ones who failed the veterans were not just a vicious noble, but the declining nation, the society that no longer recognized their value. Failed along with the veterans was also the last monarch trying to salvage the situation, Izu Paraiso.

The old Stump Bird spent 20 years accepting not only his broken body and aging face, but also his homeland and ideals he could never pursue again. Before losing his right leg, he probably could never be a high-ranking general in the empire. Then he became a tramp, turned outlaw, until even the rebel army didn’t recognize him as their leader—he was also a failure in the identity of “general.” Both the Stump Bird and Mr. D became legacies left by their homeland.

Before coming to their meeting, Bai Ling had likely already foreseen his body’s irreversible death, wanting to fulfill a wish like on a whim: meet Mr. D, so that when he died, he could convince himself: this world once warmed me.

But when he saw that beautiful, elegant figure, a still-warm, glorious past burned before his eyes. He never imagined he would plunge headlong into this deep, dark night, discovering the ruins of his homeland within.

The nearer he got to home, the more nervous he became, afraid to ask the newcomer.

In an instant, the veteran suffocated to death, and a sharp eagle broke free from its shell. A fearless soldier got scared, he fled before the battle, he began to fear death.

What kind of terrifying despair is this?

The world played a cruel joke on him as his life was counting down, pushing a magnificent blueprint in front of him and saying: This could have been yours.

Twenty years, he might have long ago not been so in such dire straits, might have had a legitimate chance to restore the country, might have inherited the will he believed in and rebuilt a better homeland. All possibilities only unfolded before him at the end of his life.

In the morning, hear the Way

; in the evening, die content!

This beautiful relic came for him. Bai Ling’s soul was recognized by his homeland, picked up from the mud by a pair of noble hands, washed clean of dust, revealing the general’s originally shining breastplate.

Birth, aging, sickness, death; unattainable desires; separation from loved ones; encountering those one hates. The Five Aggregates converged, burning like fire.

How could he receive the imperial seal again with a coarse robe and a stump leg, a cold soul and a broken body?

Under Bai Ling’s self-mockery and inferiority was absolute pride and confidence. He was always a seedling planted by his homeland, a soldier belonging to the Izu Paraiso era. Even with one foot through the gates of hell, as long as there was a glimmer of hope, he would struggle back to seize this chance to be re-commissioned. Since that perfect, sharp Bai Ling had died twenty years ago, now he was but a solitary spirit, determined to gnash all his teeth to take a bite, to eat this last meal owed to him by the Empire for so many years.

He was an old hawk fed a piece of fresh veal, a wild rose watered a little, spreading his wings and planning to set out anew with Mr. D.

But even the most tenacious wild rose will die when it is uprooted, crushed, and trampled by external forces.

The brief and tragic struggle, as if a ray of light had returned, was Bai Ling’s destined tragedy in the tide of the times.

It is difficult for a person to seek death simply because of suffering. Bai Ling broke through the power grid in madness. Did he not know how to protect himself? Is it because he was blinded by love and wants to bow in this way? No.

He was too old, too broken. His love and salvation came too late. After this hope was shattered, he had no strength left to struggle further.

What is more cruel than rushing to meet death without hesitation?

It is seeing the dawn, before dying.

It is the inevitability built up by choice after choice.

Perhaps the mistake happened two hundred years ago, when the merman’s ancestors settled this planet, when the A/B/O system was established, when Octopus Kaide usurped power, when Izu Paraiso weakened, during the silence after countless chess games, during that promise at six the next evening.

In the end, no one sat opposite Yu Chen’s chessboard, and he himself lost everything.

In the end, Bai Ling never knew that the man he met once experienced the same grief and regret, chose destruction alongside him.

That dawn was merely the last wisp of the past, seen by you as you struggled to climb out of the concrete jungle.

He opened his eyes, he flew into the sky, he grasped the flower branch reaching for him.

Everything begins anew.

—

6: Damn, the old fish is really crazy… The ordinary people on the Capital Planet are also in a miserable situation

7: Of course his citizens die with him.

8: Saying it’s a love brain destroying the world, I think we can look at it from another angle completely

The merman Izu Paraiso was very good to his people, but his love was a rose blooming under possessiveness. This thorny love came at a cost. The little bird was actually his light, the only successor he acknowledged in the future. When his successor left him, and his death involved a knife named indifference wielded by the merman, he’d inevitably want to die.

Izu Paraiso’s suicide would bring his subjects along. After all, they were his subjects, his belongings, items in his territory, clearly stamped with the seal of possessiveness. He could ignore these subjects, could watch the empire rot in his hands, but couldn’t bear the change of dynasty after he was gone. That would be a betrayal by his subjects.

Naturally, when he committed suicide, he would also bring his belongings to rot together in his hands.

9:

“Gather ye rosebuds while ye may; old Time is still a-flying.”

The Little Bird has regained the memories of a past life, remembering everything. The contrast between then and now is jarring: the misery of the past versus the devotion of the present; being despised then, yet protected now. If the past life was a tumbleweed in the desert, this life is a rose in the hands of the Merman. Like that rose, the Little Bird was once neglected but is now cherished with the utmost care.

The past experiences of the Merman and the Little Bird were truly tragic, yet unalterable. People recoiled from the bloody handprint of a kind drunkard, while only the Little Bird lingered by its side. That man died only a hundred meters from his door; perhaps someone saw him, but no one helped. In that past world, there was only apathy. Survival—mere survival—demanded indifference. With the Secret Police monitoring civilians so strictly that even the Broadcaster was “arrested,” those men don’t deserve to be called police; they’re nothing but lackeys.

It is heartbreaking that the Little Bird was betrayed. No one knew he was the most wanted fugitive. When he was finally captured, those scoundrels couldn’t even believe it was him. His mental collapse was likely caused by them. Had he not been taken, he could have confessed to Mr. D, and they might have found mutual comfort in a quiet, steady life.

That past era resembles the French Revolution—a time of bloodshed, turmoil, and civilian death. The Great Octopus rejoiced at the Little Bird’s forced suicide, unknowingly sowing the seeds for the Merman to bury the entire planet in retribution. To quote Martin Niemöller: “First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out…” No one was innocent. An avalanche is never the fault of just the last snowflake. The infighting between revolutionaries, the apathy of the residents, and the decadence of the nobility—that was the reality.

What did the Little Bird do wrong? He only wanted a country like the one before; he just wanted a home, but it was forever out of reach. Burdened by self-loathing, he saw the Merman as a perfect, unreachable star. Even when he finally received that starlight’s grace, it was easily shattered.

The Merman is actually “cold on the outside, warm on the inside.” He considers the Little Bird’s needs, bringing him a pot of fresh flowers just because the Bird mentioned a faint smell in the house—a gift chosen with such care. The Little Bird once served his country, earning the highest medal for a recruit—an honor only three people had achieved in a century. Had it not been for the Swordfish, he would have been a national treasure. Instead, a corrupt aristocracy destroyed him and the nation alike.

What was the Little Bird thinking in his final moments? He likely missed the Merman’s smile. His greatest regret was probably never confessing his identity to Mr. D. In his heart, that pot of flowers was the most precious gift because it came from him. At six o’clock, the Little Bird used his ashes to kiss Mr. D’s eyes. In his humble adoration, those last thirty minutes were spent in that final kiss.

Mr. D shed his coldness to become the Merman of today. Having lost his love to his own indifference, he left that coldness behind in the past life. A Merman only produces pearls during moments of extreme emotional upheaval; for him, it was learning the Little Bird died while trying to keep their promise. How he must have hated his own apathy then, enough to destroy a broken, indifferent world. It’s like the “Trolley Problem”—the Merman chose what he thought was the “right” answer at the time.

Love can bridge mountains and seas, yet the gap between life and death is harder to mend. Perhaps that is why the Merman stopped his medication; the coldness of the past has been replaced by the tender protection of the present. Nothing stays the same, yet their hearts remain intertwined. “To win one’s heart is my only desire, to never part until our hair turns white.”

Reply: You said it, the ashes fell on the old merman’s eyelids, but the old merman didn’t know at the time. How regretful he must have been when he found out wuwuwuwu

10: Thirty years ago in the first chapter, the Merman had only just learned of the Little Bird’s death, yet his grief alone triggered a pheromone tide that swept across the entire planet. Thirty years later, with a body further decayed and feeling even more powerless against the political tides—and with feelings for the Little Bird that have only grown deeper—the Merman’s heart must be in utter despair knowing the Little Bird died on the way to see him. He must feel a more acute realization of his own impotence and the impossibility of turning back time. There are surely innocent people on the Capital Planet, but there are far more corrupt aristocrats. To take the majority of the nation’s parasites with him in death might be the only way to give a dying empire a chance at rebirth. At the very least, this is the final service a last monarch can perform for his country.

11: Dear Big Codfish:

I am seriously waiting for the Little Bird to cry.

If not, I’m stewing you.

Sincerely,

Your loving reader.

12: I desperately want to see the scene where the Bird cries upon realizing Mr. D and the Old Merman are the same person.

13: I want to see an “IF” timeline where the Stump Bird successfully kept the appointment. If things went as planned, his messy, dirty feathers would become sleek and glossy again under the Merman’s care.

14: The struggle that comes after seeing hope is what hurts the most.