Mermaids have an astoundingly large lung capacity. This deep-sea creature, better adapted to the oceanic environment, made Shu Tang feel a bit suffocated when she was kissed just now.
But life needs a bit of excitement once in a while to be interesting.
So, Shu Tang took it rather well.
However, there were still things that didn’t quite satisfy her—
For instance, now, Shu Tang complained to the mirror that the mermaid had chapped her lips.
“I can’t eat spicy hot pot tonight.”
As soon as she finished speaking, the mermaid scooped her up.
The creature stared at her strangely for a while, probably trying to discern if she was reluctant. Once it was sure that Shu Tang was in a good mood, “he” seemed a bit stunned.
Nevertheless, the creature still carefully inspected her lips and, recalling the glaring finger marks on her waist just now, silently set her down and carried her to the pharmacy.
By now, the mermaid had become familiar with most of the shops, so it successfully knocked on the pharmacy’s door.
Shu Tang felt it was a bit of an overreaction, but the mermaid insisted.
So, they bought a box of ointment for swelling and bruises.
When they returned, it was still raining outside.
Amidst the sound of rain,
The creature’s cold, slender fingers spread the ointment over the corners of her mouth. Her lips were pale and slightly pursed, and she felt a tingling itch on them, but it was soon covered by the coolness of the ointment.
Shu Tang tilted her head back, allowing the creature to touch her, staring blankly at the mermaid’s jawline.
She felt like a fragile treasure, being seriously and carefully wiped clean.
After the application was done, Shu Tang muttered a few words, prepared to dive into the blanket, but as she turned around, she was pressed down by the creature’s large hand.
At that moment, Shu Tang hadn’t realized what was wrong, until she felt a chill and her clothes were lifted.
The creature pressed her onto the bed, lifting her top to check the condition of her waist.
Shu Tang paused,
The creature stared at her skin, where the finger marks slowly deepened, looking a bit frightening.
Shu Tang said, “It’s okay, it will be better tomorrow.”
But the monster’s pale lips were tightly pursed, showing a hint of guilt.
Under the monster’s focused and meticulous gaze, she subconsciously wanted to pull down her clothes to cover her exposed skin.
However, the next second, she felt a heavy, cold breath hit the skin exposed to the air.
Her mind buzzed.
Because the tall, terrifying monster bent down and kissed her.
She instinctively shrank back, but the icy kiss had already seared onto her skin. Controlled by the mermaid’s hand, she could not move, only stiffening her back, letting the beast devoutly kiss her.
Fortunately, the monster did not continue, but instead began to earnestly apply ointment to her.
Shu Tang buried herself in the blanket and did not emerge, complaining:
“Oh dear, it was nothing serious, you don’t need to make a mountain out of a molehill.”
This beast’s fingers could tear apart massive ships weighing tens of tons. To the monster, ordinary humans were very frail, especially in “his” eyes, a little cat that could easily die.
Because of the huge disparity in strength, the monster found it hard to control whether he was hurting her or not, so he became very cautious, even carefully feeling her bones to see if he had injured them.
The monster’s lips were tightly pursed, his eyes filled with self-reproach.
—However, Shu Tang started to squirm. She was reluctant to let the mermaid continue checking, especially when he touched her abdomen, and she immediately began to struggle, incessantly complaining and starting to push away the monster’s large hand.
The monster was a bit anxious about his little cat, held her down, and looked up to hiss at her sternly.
Shu Tang, who was struggling, paused and tried to resist, “Put me down, I can do it myself.”
But the mermaid stopped and glanced at her indifferently.
Instantly, the squirming kitten was frightened by that look.
It was even more intimidating than the first time the mermaid had hissed at her.
It was the kind of look from a superior that left no room for rebellion.
Very calm.
But no one would think to argue with “him.”
So, the scolded kitten finally calmed down and obediently lay still.
Thus, the monster successfully secured the kitten, checked that her bones were fine, and then applied the ointment.
Actually, today’s mermaid was unusually silent, and even his occasional glance carried an untouchable majesty.
She lay on the pillow watching the somewhat fierce mermaid today and suddenly felt a sense of unfamiliarity.
The silent mermaid before her suddenly exuded a majestic aura without anger, his taut jawline giving off a stern vibe.
Perhaps influenced by that memory, tonight’s mermaid looked just like the big boss from ten years ago.
The monster already had a daunting presence, and when this mixed with the authority of the big boss, that trait was magnified to some extent.
But as the saying goes, “A ten-pound cat has nine pounds of rebelliousness.”
Shu Tang obediently lay back down and didn’t dare move, but the longer she lay there, the angrier she became.
Weren’t the marks on her waist also pinched by “him”? Why was he scolding her instead? Was there no justice?
She looked at the mermaid’s profile.
Then, as the mermaid finished applying the ointment and was about to stand up, the kitten began her counterattack.
—At the sound of the wind, the mermaid immediately perked up his fins behind his ears and tensed his muscles for a counterstrike, but realizing it was her, he quickly subdued his aggressive stance.
Thus, the kitten successfully toppled this large monster onto the bed.
She pinned down the fierce creature, holding “him” down, not allowing “him” to get up.
The mermaid let her bully him, and they even rolled around on the sheets.
The kitten began to bite wildly, even leaving a bite mark on his nose tip.
“You still dare to glare at me!”
It wasn’t until the “big boss” was utterly disheveled and his cold, dignified superior aura was broken that she felt satisfied.
Probably because he had done something wrong today, this monster held a sense of guilt and self-reproach, thus he did not resist being bullied, letting the kitten scratch and bite as she pleased.
He simply reached out to protect her, to prevent her from rolling under the bed.
Until she began biting his ear fins.
The sharp fins involuntarily flared and sharpened several times, but were forcibly restrained by the mermaid.
The mermaid held back.
Finally, unable to hold back any longer, he held her tightly in his arms.
The kitten immediately protested, “This is outrageous, why is it that only you can bite, and I can’t?”
Without a word, the mermaid flipped her onto the bed and left her on the soft mattress.
When she tried to get up and run, he grabbed one of her legs.
She immediately started kicking him, struggling in place, until she was mercilessly dragged into the arms of this monster.
She screamed for help, “He’s going to eat someone!” and so on, but the moment the mermaid looked up, she dared not move.
Silently, the monster lifted her shirt. Shu Tang instantly felt that something terrible was about to happen, even feeling the sharp teeth of the beast on her skin, which terrified her into silence.
She felt like she was becoming a little sweetheart, about to be gobbled up whole by this fierce beast.
In the end, the mermaid left a clear bite mark on her waist, just as Shu Tang had bitten “his” left fin, he left a symmetrical mark on her right waist.
As Shu Tang’s hair stood on end, thinking the monster was really about to bite down, the monster looked at her submissive demeanor and chuckled.
Then he slowly let her go.
The mermaid murmured lowly towards her, calling her “Tang” in a deep voice.
This time calling her “Tang” was purely a warning.
It still looked a bit fierce.
Probably asking if she was going to cause any more trouble.
Tonight, the dramatically terrified Shu Tang immediately pulled down her clothes and burrowed into the blankets, unsettled.
She dared not provoke the mermaid anymore and behaved quietly from then on, occasionally stealing glances at him.
“He” would occasionally sweep a glance over her, expressionless.
Shu Tang would then dive back into the blankets.
Before going to sleep.
The two of them sat on the bed and watched the weather forecast for a while tonight.
Shu Tang complained, “It’s going to be stormy for the next three days, no going out to play.”
The monster glanced at her, pulled her into his arms, and turned off the TV.
In the drizzling rain, Shu Tang thought about things drowsily, but soon fell asleep due to the comfortable temperature of the air conditioning.
……
The monster closed its eyes, feeling a familiar, sharp neuralgia.
But in fact, Shu Tang had been watching the mermaid take medicine, and this kind of neuralgia had not occurred for a long time.
Thus, the mermaid gradually realized that this pain stemmed from fragments of memory.
It was the pain Zhu Yan experienced ten years ago, and recalling it ten years later still caused a hallucination-like throbbing.
Unlike last time, when only a fragment came to mind, this time the mermaid’s mind was filled with many snippets of life. Like pieces of a puzzle, they were not enough to reconstruct the entire palace of memories, but still allowed glimpses into moments of the past belonging to “Zhu Yan.”
The monster opened its eyes, checked that the bruises on the kitten had faded, and then went to the 24-hour convenience store downstairs to buy snacks for the kitten.
However, a familiar figure soon appeared behind the mermaid.
Chen Sheng had been waiting in the car and chased after the Founder when he came down.
He seemed urgent, speaking a lot.
After all, this secretary had sensitively sensed something.
In the past, if anyone other than the kitten was this noisy, the monster would have lost patience long ago, but perhaps the memories from ten years ago were influencing “him,” so the monster barely tolerated this noise.
But all the way, the mermaid did not listen to a single word.
Chen Sheng said a lot, but the mermaid’s steps did not pause at all.
He walked straight past Chen Sheng, expressionless, and left.
In those constantly emerging memory fragments, the mermaid thought Zhu Yan was a terrible person.
After all, someone treated as a “human-shaped nuclear weapon” could not possibly live well.
The mermaid hated that ghost from the past, yet that ghost still influenced “him.”
Due to a mutation, this fierce beast had changed from the past. More powerful, more terrifying, it did not feel tired even without sleep. Thus, in this monster’s cognition, there was no sense of “fatigue,” making it hard to understand what the kitten meant by “dead tired” in everyday speech.
However, from the scattered fragments belonging to Zhu Yan, the emotion this monster felt most was “weariness.”
Even after realizing it had been contaminated, the big boss just leaned against the wall, thinking: finally, I can rest.
Like someone who has walked too far and is too tired.
The mermaid returned to the hotel, did not wake Shu Tang, but stopped in front of the reflection in the glass window.
In the mirror, the monster’s sharp fins, dark pupils slowly overlapped with the emerging memories, turning into a short-haired man in military attire, indifferent.
The monster frowned in disgust and immediately turned away.
When Shu Tang got up to drink water in the middle of the night, she discovered that the mermaid was not in bed. Groping around in a daze, she did not feel the mermaid’s tail.
Shu Tang thought to herself: Where’s my fish?
She looked up and saw a tall figure sitting on the chair on the terrace.
Dressed in pajamas, Shu Tang got up and looked over from a distance, feeling that the person appeared very unfamiliar.
He had an aura of cold detachment, and a tiredness about him, like a high-ranking person who has been through much, looking at the heavy rain outside with a face that was indifferent and melancholic.
Shu Tang had never seen a mermaid like this.
She stood there watching for a while.
The fish seemed somewhat world-weary.
She walked over, and taking advantage of her small stature, slipped under the mermaid’s arm and snuggled into his embrace. She began to sniff around him, left and right, and even smelled his neck.
As if she was trying to detect the scent of someone else on him.
The mermaid’s gaze finally shifted, focusing on this little ‘cat’. The creature indulgently allowed her to sniff around like a kitten.
Once she confirmed that the scent hadn’t changed, Shu Tang stopped. She was sure that the person before her was still the same fish.
So she settled down, finding a comfortable position in the mermaid’s arms.
Her fuzzy head resting on the mermaid’s arm.
She heard a deep, pleasant laugh coming from his chest.
The mermaid called her “Tang,” and his voice tonight seemed even deeper.
The creature asked her:
— Little cat, are you being affectionate?
The little cat naturally rubbed against him.
She didn’t deny it.
…
The next morning, they both went downstairs to have breakfast in the buffet restaurant, choosing a spot by the floor-to-ceiling windows.
Because they had spent the night in that position, Shu Tang woke up with a sore neck and a jaw that felt dislocated, complaining endlessly about her head almost falling off.
The creature reached out to massage the little cat’s neck.
But as soon as he made this gesture, both of them saw their reflections in the glass—it looked as though he was about to twist her head off.
So they both stopped.
Outside, the rain continuously washed over the ground.
“Little Rose, tell me, what kind of person were you before?”
The mermaid was silent for a while.
She looked at the cup of coffee on the table.
The first time the mermaid tried coffee was when Shu Tang was studying for exams a while ago. Obviously, such a creature didn’t need coffee to stay awake, only Shu Tang did when she felt sleepy in the afternoon.
At that time, Shu Tang handed it over for the mermaid to try.
The mermaid took a sip and thought that Shu Tang was drinking something akin to dishwater.
Cold, bitter.
Probably a reflection of what Zhu Yan used to be like.
The occasional memories that surfaced were all tinged with the gloom of rainy days.
Shu Tang noticed the mermaid’s gaze and looked at the bitter coffee.
Both of them quieted down.
It seemed like the only sound was the rain outside the window.
After a long while.
She reached out and added two spoons of sugar to the coffee.