Seven dazzling light spheres streaked across the sky, arousing curiosity throughout the dark universe. One of the dark cosmic entities couldn't help looking up, but was immediately given a hard smack on the back of the head by the companion standing next to it.
"Why did you hit me?" Baltan asked, raising his claws while rubbing his head with a wronged expression.
"What are you looking at? If you have a death wish, keep watching! Get your butt home right away!" the companion urged anxiously.
Hearing this, Baltan quickly pulled back his gaze and nodded nervously to show he understood.
The once bustling street instantly plunged into chaos.
"We're closed! We're closed! Hurry up! Move it!" Vendors hurriedly drove away customers, quickly packed up the goods on their stalls, and hid themselves away with a practiced efficiency that could not possibly have been more routine.
In the blink of an eye, the previously lively street was completely deserted. They were merely peddling specialty products from their respective planets to make ends meet; nobody wanted to risk their neck. The only exception was the dark emperor Alien Empera, whose subordinates operated the black market.
—
At the auction venue, the price of the Ultra infant soared all the way up, remaining persistently high. Alien Baltan on the stage was all smiles, the glowing organs on his face flashing with increasing frequency, clearly extremely satisfied with the outcome.
Seven Specium Rays descended from the sky, instantly overturning the vast majority of the aliens at the venue.
"Ultra warriors!" Facing the utter chaos, the aliens looked on in terror at the uninvited guests who had turned the venue upside down. Some of the more cowardly aliens fled the scene amidst the confusion.
"Ultra Cannon." Arno seized the moment to fire a blast downward. With a thunderous boom, another ten percent of the aliens below were killed or injured. Arno immediately flew toward the hosting stage, shoving the muzzle of his cannon right into Alien Baltan's face at point-blank range.
Zoffy and the other Ultramen punched out one alien at a time, quickly bringing the situation under control.
"Spare my life, hero!" Alien Baltan cried out in terror, staring straight down the barrel pressed against his head.
"Too late!" Arno smiled faintly, sending Alien Baltan straight to his ancestors. Looking with a pang of heartache at the tiny Ultraman curled up inside the glass dome, Arno raised his cannon and smashed the glass dome to pieces with a loud *bang*, lifting the infant Ultra out into his arms.
Seeing Arno's rough handling out of the corner of his eye, Ace was so startled he immediately punched another alien into oblivion.
Seeing that Zoffy and the others had the situation under control, Arno carried the Ultra infant back to the Land of Light.
—
Science Patrol Headquarters (Silver Cross Army Headquarters)
"Sister Marie, how is the infant doing?" Arno asked anxiously, looking at the little Ultraman inside the medical capsule.
"Vital signs are normal, he's just lacking energy. This infant carries the coordinates of the Land of Light and was transformed into a light sphere to be sent here, so something must have gone wrong along the way." Looking at the normal readings on the light screen, Mother of Ultra breathed a sigh of relief, especially since new-born Ultras in the Land of Light were so rare.
"Arno, guess what I found?" Seeing that there were no other Ultras around, Mother of Ultra couldn't resist gossiping with Arno.
"What did you find?" Arno was somewhat speechless; she was already a captain in the Silver Cross Army, yet she still loved gossiping so much.
"The resonance of this infant's core is ninety-nine point nine percent similar to Seven's," Mother of Ultra said, pointing at the little Ultraman in the medical capsule.
"What! That little brat is Seven's son?!" Ace blurted out before he could stop himself. Father of Ultra, Zoffy, Zoffy (Note: Zoffy is mentioned twice in the source, let's keep it flowing), Ultraman, and Jack turned to glare at Ace in silent condemnation.
"Uh! Why are you guys here? Hahaha." For a moment, Mother of Ultra felt so awkward she wanted to find a crack in the floor to crawl into.
"We've never seen Seven show interest in any female Ultra, have we?" Zoffy scratched his head. He had mentored Seven for thousands of years—how could he not know whether Seven liked anyone?
"Could it be he made a baby with an Earthling on Earth?" Ace's imagination ran wild.
"They're not even the same species, how could they have a baby?" Arno stepped forward and slapped the back of Ace's head. Ace rubbed the back of his head with a wronged expression.
"Then where did this Ultra infant come from?" Ace asked with a grievance.
"You're asking me? How the hell should I know?" Arno rolled his eyes at Ace.
"Could Seven have manufactured a kid all by himself on Earth?" Ace dropped another statement so shocking it nearly startled the other Ultras to death.
"Did you fail your physiology class? How is an Ultra supposed to give birth to a child all by himself?!" Arno snapped back.
"Forget it, discussing this now is useless anyway. Since he's Seven's kid, we'll talk about it when Seven gets back," Ultraman said, immediately stepping in to smooth things over when he saw the two Ultras were about to start bickering again.
"Mn!" Father of Ultra nodded in agreement.
"One last question: who's going to raise him?" Ace asked timidly.
The gazes of all the Ultras landed on Arno. If anyone present had the most experience raising children, it was none of the others—it was definitely Arno. Send him to the House of Ultras? That clearly wouldn't be appropriate, considering he was Seven's son. Seven, still on Earth, had no idea that his plan to protect his son by sending him back to the Land of Light without acknowledging him had been completely hijacked by another Ultra.
"Why are you all looking at me?" Arno asked, looking in confusion at the Ultras who were eyeing him so inexplicably.
"Arno, you're already raising one. You wouldn't mind raising another, would you?" Zoffy looked at Arno. Zoffy figured that Taro alone was already a handful; he was definitely not raising another one!
"Why does it have to be me raising him?" Arno protested, feeling rather unconvinced.
"I'll have Hikari give you a raise." Father of Ultra, who had remained silent all this time, spoke up quietly.
"Fine." For the sake of a pay raise, Arno bowed down to capital. "Since you're Seven's son, I'll call you Zero—Ultraman Zero." Arno looked tenderly toward the medical capsule.
With the infant's name settled and the question of who would raise him decided, the child's situation was temporarily resolved.
Ultraman led the others to deal with the aliens who had infiltrated the Land of Light, and the various Ultramen returned to their respective posts to continue going about their busy work—except for Ace, who was off stirring up trouble everywhere.
—
"Uncle, are you alright?" The moment he got home, Arno was rushed by Tregear, whose hands grabbed him from top to bottom, front, back, left, and right, checking him all over. His uncle was truly too bold; clearly, he wasn't even an adult yet! He'd heard the guys from the Garrison say that his uncle had single-handedly barged into the dark aliens' stronghold—it had nearly scared him to death.
"Alright, alright, stop worrying. Didn't I come back in one piece?" Seeing the serious look in Tregear's eyes, Arno simply gave up resisting and let Tregear inspect him to his heart's content.
"Uncle, it's not that I'm nagging, but you're only a few thousand years older than me. Can't you stay put and keep out of trouble for once?" Tregear said with a helpless sigh. His uncle looked great, and his heart was in the right place, but he was just too good at stirring up trouble.
"I know, I know!" Arno quickly promised, terrified that Tregear would subject him to another round of "loving" lectures. "Oh, right, I picked up a little brother for you."
"A little brother?" Tregear didn't process it for a moment.
"The Ultra infant I rescued from the dark alien stronghold," Arno explained to Tregear.
"Then when can I go see my little brother?" Tregear asked excitedly. The family was finally going to have a new member! Now that his uncle had a job, coming home from school to an empty house left him feeling too lonely. It wasn't that his uncle hadn't bought him pets before, but after he nearly loved one to death, his uncle had explicitly forbidden him from keeping pets ever again.
"In a few days, once the infant's condition improves, I'll take you," Arno promised.
"Yay!" Receiving a definitive answer from Arno, Tregear spun around in circles with excitement.
"Alright, how much of your holiday homework have you finished? Let me check." Arno sat down on the sofa and tapped the coffee table.
Tregear froze instantly as if hit by a pause button, the excited expression on his face stiffening. Seeing this, Arno didn't need any further explanation. "Right now! Go do your homework immediately!"
—
"Uncle, is this the little brother you were talking about? He's so tiny." Tregear leaned against the glass of the medical capsule, looking at little Zero inside with a hint of disdain.
"You were just this small once too." Arno gently patted Tregear's head.
Little Zero seemed to sense a trustworthy presence nearby; his eye lamps gradually lit up. "Ya! Ya! Yi!" Little Zero stretched out his tiny hands, demanding to be held.
Arno lifted little Zero out of the medical capsule. Looking at the person before him, little Zero wrapped his tiny arms around Arno's neck and babbled on endlessly with happy cries of "ya ya".
"Looks like this little guy is quite the sucker for good looks!" Tregear chuckled as he poked little Zero's butt.
"Ya!" Angry, little Zero slapped away the hand making trouble on his bottom, then turned back to bury his arms around Arno's neck to babble and complain.
"Little Zero has recovered his health and can be discharged now." Afnu, Mother of Ultra's assistant, handed the medical bill for little Zero to Arno. "Oh, right, little Zero is still very young, so you'll need to buy some more specialized energy fluid."
"Got it." Arno nodded with a look of existential despair. Money really vanished in the blink of an eye!
—
"Tregear, Uncle Arno!" Taro came trotting over with pattering steps.
"What are you doing here? Didn't Uncle Zoffy say you were supposed to be tutoring at Ms. Aina's house for the holiday?" Tregear was extremely shocked to see Taro here.
"Ms. Aina said I could have the day off today," Taro said excitedly. "Whose infant is this?"
Because Taro had failed his final exams, Father of Ultra had hired a private tutor to give him remedial lessons after the break started, which was why he was so out of the loop.
"He's my little brother! His name is Zero, Ultraman Zero." Tregear pulled Taro over to Arno, who was holding little Zero, and excitedly introduced the baby to Taro.
Looking at Tregear and Taro pressed close together, Arno inexplicably felt a surge of irritation, feeling very much like a farmer whose prized crop had just been ruined by a pig.
"Hello there, little Zero, I'm big brother Taro." Taro impulsively reached out and poked little Zero's cheek. Little Zero glanced at Taro's silly-looking face, decided that his big beautiful uncle looked much better, and buried his face into the crook of Arno's neck, completely ignoring Taro.
"Taro, little Zero is your nephew and Tregear's little brother," Arno said, looking speechlessly at Taro for voluntarily lowering his own generation.
"If he's Tregear's little brother, why can't he be my little brother too?" Taro scratched his Ultra Horns in confusion, unable to wrap his head around it.
"Little Zero is your brother Seven's son," Arno explained to Taro.
Taro wore a look of utter shock. Just what on earth had happened during the time he was stuck taking remedial lessons? By the time he snapped out of it, he realized the other two Ultras had already walked some distance away, and hurriedly shouted, "Tregear, wait for me!"
"Hurry up!" Hearing Taro's voice, Tregear turned his head and shouted back.
After returning home, Arno left little Zero in the care of Tregear and Taro while he went to the storage room to look for something.
"What is Uncle Arno looking for?" Taro asked, listening to the clattering noises coming from the storage room.
"How should I know?" Tregear shot Taro a disdainful look.
A moment later, Arno emerged carrying a ball.
"What is this?" Tregear looked curiously at the ball in Arno's arms.
"Oh! These are things you used when you were little. Let's see if they're still usable. I'm going upstairs to tidy up a room for little Zero, you two keep a good eye on him." Arno answered, hugging the ball.
"Yes!"