It didn’t take long for Aqua to feel the shift in her womb. A few days at most. Strange… whereas her first pregnancy (with the Dark Hide’s offspring) had left her feeling confused and uncertain right up until the point where she felt her young one acting up, now she was practiced enough at bearing monster babies to be able to almost immediately tell when exactly she crossed the threshold from fertile young woman to buoyant mother-to-be.

Her suspicions were confirmed when the Heartless, even the most feral and vicious of them, refused to pursue or attack her during her wanderings. This was always a benefit to getting knocked up by them: the capability to wander without harassment within parts of the Realm which would normally have them swarming her. She resolved to use the present time—pregnant enough that the Heartless wouldn’t pursue her, but not so pregnant that moving was difficult—to probe the boundaries of the Realm of Darkness. Perhaps she could find a way back into the world of light in these little-tread pathways?

Despite days spent traversing the far-off depths of the Realm—days which she spent with her belly slowly rounding outward, every morning taking a little more effort for her to rise—Aqua was unable to find a way back. But what she did find was remnants of worlds: fabulous forests of green with the echoed song of long-dead sprites, chewed-up and gnarled wreckage from massive space stations, crumbling castles that once stood sentinel in sunny lands. At each she stood, sadly reflecting in the awareness of how many worlds the Heartless had brought to ruin, and her somberness turned to resolve. She would change the Heartless, one birth at a time.

And she didn’t have long to wait. Her Heartless pregnancies always progressed extremely quickly, but this one seemed… heavier than usual. Weightier. When she was a week into it, Aqua’s belly was already a noteworthy globe, but the sheer weight of it all was surprising. She had to rise shakily, one hand supporting her growing womb, panting mildly from the strain. Even mild activity that would have normally posed no problem to her, pregnant or no, was something she found herself having to pause and rest after. Walking even a brief half-mile over easy terrain would leave her almost totally spent.

Soon enough she had to cease her investigations of the far-off reaches and reflect in the quiet solitude of a dry glade of grey grasses. She found herself napping frequently, her body attempting to conserve energy spent nurturing its new passenger, and once she woke up to feel her offspring tumbling and kicking inside of her.

Gently touching her hands to her stomach, Aqua rubbed them back and forth across her belly, hoping to soothe her child, only to be shocked when it kicked again, the action visible as a small bump on her stomach.

“You little troublemaker,” she grumbled without malice. “What do you have to say for yourself, acting up so?” Her stomach settled tremulously, as though the baby within could hear and understand her. “And why,” she lamented, “are you so heavy?”

Of course, she had her own suspicions. After all, she creatures she’d fucked to make this one were beings of stone. It only stood to reason that it had a body of rock to match. Even though she’d borne bigger, she’d never had to deal with anything heavier.

She tried to rise and barely managed it, and with a sigh of resignation, she sunk back down onto the grassy glade. “Guess I’m stuck like thus,” she muttered, but a smile played about her lips. Maybe it was just the maternal feeling in her, but she didn’t mind that much.

---

Aqua spent almost the entire second week entirely immobile thanks to her growing child’s weight. The baby Gargoyle was more than capable of keeping her locked in place, and she drifted in and out of long hours of slumber, roused only by distant winds stirring the grasses or the increasing activity of her baby in her womb. Her breasts were aching as well, that low, sweet burn that heralded oncoming birth. More than once, she woke to the sensation of small trails of milk dribbling from her nipples to slide down the curve of her belly. On one occasion, her child acted up during a time when her tits were being especially productive, and Aqua chided it with faux sternness: “If you’re so excited for it, then hurry up and come on out already!”

Before long, the day arrived. She woke in the morning, warm and sleepy, and felt the child’s weight shifting lower, felt her body going through the by-now familiar motions of preparing to give birth.

“Okay,” she said, steeling herself. “Okay.”