Chapter 51: Hatching Your Own Wife!

Xie Shijin was discharged from the hospital on the afternoon of August 21.

When he got home, he started packing his things, going up and down the apartment building to pack everything he could send and courier it to his rented apartment.

The next morning, Xie Shijin opened the door, and the door to apartment 602 next door also opened.

Uncle Lin stood at the door and saw the boy with a schoolbag on his shoulder and a pot of gardenias in his hand, carrying nothing else: "Is Xiao Xie heading to Beijing?"

Xie Shijin nodded: "Mm."

"It's good to go sooner rather than later, and get things sorted out over there." Uncle Lin had heard about what had happened recently and had also visited Xie Shijin in the hospital. He had even helped Xie Shijin with her discharge procedures. "I'm not good with words, so I can't say anything nice. Now that you're in Beijing, you must take good care of yourself, study hard, and make something of yourself. Uncle Lin believes in you."

Xie Shijin turned and went downstairs. The door behind him was still open. Uncle Lin asked, "Aren't you going to close the door?"

"I won't close it," the boy said.

He hadn't had a chance to tell Cheng Shiyun where his rented house was, and Cheng Shiyun might even turn into other little animals and come back to find him.

He left, and Cheng Shiyun couldn't get home without her key.

He also asked Uncle Lin to call him if any small animals returned, no matter what they were.

He will come back for her.

Uncle Lin said, "Okay, I'll keep an eye on things for you. Be careful on the road and stay safe."

Yang Shengnan waited for him downstairs and took the boy to the station.

At 8:20, Xie Shijin boarded the bus, found her seat, and touched the red string around her neck.

At 8:30, the high-speed train departed from Yichuan bound for Beijing.

Xie Shijin found his house on an alumni website. Most of the properties for sale on alumni websites are owned by students and teachers from the university.

The homeowner was an elderly professor from Tsinghua University. Without an agent, the two exchanged contact information, and the homeowner sent him a video of the house. After Xie Shijin was satisfied with the video, he paid a deposit of two thousand yuan to reserve the property.

The house is near a middle school, a little far from the school, about five kilometers away, but there is a subway station and bus stop right outside the community, so transportation is quite convenient.

When Xie Shijin arrived at the location, he sent a message to the landlord, who then came to sign the contract.

After leading the boy upstairs, the landlady's daughter opened the door and said, "This house has been around for over ten years. My parents bought it when I was in high school. No one has lived here for many years, so it may have accumulated some dust, but the furniture and everything else have just been replaced. See if there's anything you need, and I'll buy it and have someone move it over."

The house faces south and has excellent natural light. Sunlight streams into the room through the windows, making it bright and airy. Xie Shijin placed the gardenia on the balcony: "Okay, let me take a look first."

Xie Shijin walked around the room for a while, and after confirming that everything was alright, he signed the contract.

The landlady's daughter told the boy the door code, and as she was leaving, she suddenly asked, "Hey, classmate, do you have any pets?"

"I can't keep pets?" Xie Shijin looked up. "The contract doesn't say that..."

"Sure, you can keep it!" The landlady's daughter smiled, seeing the boy's surprised expression. "We also have pets, a Bichon Frise, twenty years old, it passed away a few days ago from old age. If you're looking for cats or dogs, we have some toys it never played with, it would be a shame to throw them away. If you don't mind, I can bring them over."

"I'll take care of him," Xie Shijin replied, then repeated earnestly, "Thank you."

Landlord's daughter: "You're welcome. I'll bring it to you later."

As the landlord's daughter said, the house had indeed been uninhabited for a long time. The floor was so dusty that you could leave a footprint with every step. The furniture was replaced by the landlord a few days ago when Xie Shijin said he wanted to rent the house.

It took Xie Shijin half a day to clean the house, and then he went downstairs several times to pick up the daily necessities he had bought online.

He wanted to keep himself busy so that he wouldn't think about Cheng Shiyun so much.

He actually owns very little.

The nest was bought for Cheng Shiyun, as were the climbing frame and the small porcelain bowl.

The box of toys that the landlady's daughter sent was also for Cheng Shiyun.

Cheng Shiyun hasn't returned yet.

...

In the evening, Xie Shijin received a message from Yang Shengnan that Ni Jiaqi had woken up.

Ni Jiaqi was seriously injured and hospitalized. His guardian applied to the school to postpone his enrollment for one year.

Ni Jiaqi was very annoyed and complained to Xie Shijin, "I think I'm fine, but my mom is making a mountain out of a molehill."

In the video, he was lying on a hospital bed in a hospital gown, his lips pale. When Ni's mother arrived at the hospital that day and saw him seriously injured and unconscious, she fainted from crying.

Xie Shijin said, "Your parents love you very much."

Ni Jiaqi is the only son of Ni Jiaqi's parents. If something really happens to Ni Jiaqi, they will be heartbroken and will hate Xie Shijin and Cheng Jinghua.

Just like Ni Jiaqi used to hate him.

Ni Jiaqi choked, unable to deny it, and asked again, "Did you tell Uncle Cheng about Cheng Shiyun?"

Xie Shijin shook his head.

Ni Jiaqi took a deep breath and then exhaled: "Uncle Cheng came to see me this afternoon... but I didn't tell him."

I dare not say.

He dared not let Cheng Jinghua experience the blow of losing her daughter again.

He used to resent Cheng Shiyun for not telling him anything, but now he understands her a little.

In life, unexpected accidents are always inevitable.

Once you've had something, you'll fear losing it.

Once you've reunited, you'll fear parting again.

After he woke up, Yang Shengnan told him that, out of humanitarian considerations, Guo Renyi would have a three-month recovery period after the amputation, and the trial could only begin once he had almost fully recovered.

He regretted it; he regretted telling Yang Shengnan that Xie Shijin had gone to kill Guo Renyi.

He should have let Xie Shijin kill him.

Every day that such a person lives is a trampling and harm to Cheng Shiyun, Cheng Jinghua, and Ran Hongyin.

Yang Shengnan also told him that although Xie Shijin's pet snake had disappeared, it had laid an egg for him.

Xie Shijin brought that egg to Beijing with him.

It looked tiny, only the size of a fingertip, yet it remained perfectly intact after traveling such a long distance with him.

Cheng Shiyun really liked her original cat bed, so she kept the old one at home, and Xie Shijin bought an identical one.

He then placed the egg in the cat's bed.

"Is this a snake egg?" Ni Jiaqi examined it carefully, trying to identify it. "Why doesn't it look like one?"

The snake egg is oval at both ends, round at one end and pointed at the other, with a plump middle.

It certainly doesn't look like it.

More like... a bird's egg.

Whether it was a snake egg or a bird egg, it was the only thing Cheng Shiyun left him.

Ni Jiaqi asked suspiciously, "Xie Shijin, you're not afraid I'll compete with you for Cheng Shiyun, so you're teaming up with Officer Yang to fool me, are you?"

"...Is it necessary?"

Xie Shijin spoke indifferently and hung up the video call.

Ni Jiaqi called again: "Why did you hang up on me? Did you hang up just because I said something that made you feel guilty?"

Xie Shijin ignored him, put her phone on the coffee table, and started unpacking the package he had just picked up downstairs.

The breeding box he ordered arrived.

The vet said the snakes would enter their breeding season after their estrus period, so he bought a breeding box that very night. He originally thought the snakes would lay eggs in about a month, as the vet had said, but he didn't expect the breeding box to come in so quickly.

The breeding box was made of wood, and the seller included a heat lamp. Xie Shijin assembled the breeding box according to the instructions, then placed one of his clothes at the bottom of the box before taking the egg out of the cat's nest and gently placing it inside.

"Why put it in the breeding box?" Ni Jiaqi asked, puzzled.

Xie Shijin glanced at him sideways: "If we don't put a breeding box, where will we put it?"

"The refrigerator."

"..."

Ni Jiaqi raised an eyebrow and said matter-of-factly, "Eggs will rot if left outside for a few days in this weather."

Xie Shijin frowned: "The breeding box can adjust the temperature."

But the main function of the breeding box is to incubate poultry eggs. Ni Jiaqi stared at him and suddenly felt that he was acting strangely: "Xie Shijin, you wouldn't... want to incubate it, would you?"

Xie Shijin paused in turning on the heat lamp, then pursed his lips.

Ni Jiaqi realized that he might really be thinking that way, and asked in surprise, "Can it hatch?"

Xie Shijin paused for a moment, then said frankly, "I'm not sure."

It has been four days since Cheng Shiyun disappeared. Last time she turned into a little snake, she returned after three days. Today is the fifth day, and Uncle Lin has not called her.

"So what if it hatches? Cheng Shiyun's child?" Ni Jiaqi chuckled, then suddenly frowned and asked a crucial question, "Is this egg... fertilized?"

Snake eggs, like chicken eggs, duck eggs, and bird eggs, must be fertilized to hatch. If they are not fertilized, no matter how well Xie Shijin adjusts the temperature or how carefully he takes care of them, no baby snake will hatch.

Before Xie Shijin could speak, Ni Jiaqi had already burst into a tirade, shouting, "What did you do to Cheng Shiyun?"

"You fucking..."

"Xie Shijin, are you a pervert?"

"grass!"

Xie Shijin closed his eyes briefly: "...Can you shut up?"

He now understood why Cheng Shiyun had called Ni Jiaqi an idiot.

"I didn't do anything."

Snakes and humans are reproductively isolated.

yes.

Ni Jiaqi cursed himself for being stupid and asked again, "Then why are you incubating it?"

Xie Shijin said, "Give it a try."

Ni Jiaqi: "..."

He twitched the corner of his mouth.

"Try what?"

"Let's see if we can hatch Cheng Shiyun from this unfertilized egg?"

"Shall we try leaving this egg outside for half a month to see if it goes bad?"

He didn't want to mock the other party like that, but Xie Shijin's behavior really did seem a bit abnormal.

"Have you been taking your medication lately?" Ni Jiaqi sincerely suggested, "Why don't you go see a psychiatrist?"

Xie Shijin ignored his sarcasm and opened her phone to check the incubation requirements for different types of eggs. Snake eggs need to be incubated at a temperature between 25 and 30°C and a humidity of 70% to 90%, while bird eggs require a constant temperature of around 37°C and a humidity of 50% to 70%. The two are quite different.

Seeing his serious expression, Ni Jiaqi didn't say anything more sarcastic.

Let it hatch.

It's good to have some hope.

Otherwise, he'll end up like me, regretting every day that he shouldn't have been so soft-hearted as to bring Cheng Shiyun back to Xie Shijin's house.

"Which floor of this apartment do you rent?" Ni Jiaqi asked.

"Twenty-fourth floor." One bedroom and one living room, with an elevator.

Ni Jiaqi squinted and looked behind him: "Is there a bird's nest on the air conditioner unit outside the window?"

Xie Shijin walked over and opened the window: "Yes."

The bird's nest was only the size of a palm, with dry branches mixed with hay and feathers twisted together, squeezed between the air conditioner unit and the wall.

The balcony extending from upstairs can block direct sunlight and torrential rain, and the air conditioner outdoor unit can block strong winds. It's a very clever bird.

There were two eggs in the nest, and one of the chicks had just hatched. Its tender red beak was wide open, and it stretched its neck and chirped, waiting for its mother to feed it.

Ni Jiaqi said, "Why don't you put the eggs in the bird's nest and let it incubate them for you?" He suggested a clever substitution.

Xie Shijin took a photo and identified the mother bird as a Red Crossbill, a Class II protected animal in China.

The eggs in the nest were greenish with small spots, while his eggs were smooth and white, making them very easy to identify. What if the mother bird discovered that the eggs weren't hers and pecked them open?

Ni Jiaqi always comes up with these unreliable and terrible ideas.

In the middle of the night, Xie Shijin came out after taking a shower, put on his hearing aid, and heard a series of pitiful screams outside the window.

He draped a damp towel around his neck and walked into the living room.

The screams came from the bird's nest outside the window.

Another chick hatched, its wet downy feathers sticking to its skin. It had a large head with protruding eyes that took up most of its head, and frankly, it wasn't very pretty.

There was only the mother bird in the nest, no father bird.

Hatching is a bird's instinct, but a mother bird cannot raise so many chicks. The chicks must go through fierce competition to survive. So the first chick to hatch is preparing to push its younger brother or sister out of the nest so that it can enjoy the mother bird's care all to itself.

It arched and arched, with its mother bird watching nearby.

Survival of the fittest is the law of nature; only the strongest can be her offspring, and the mother bird will not interfere.

The nest wasn't big, so after a couple of nudges, another chick was pushed to the edge of the nest.

The moment the fledgling fell out of the nest, Xie Shijin opened the window, reached out, and caught it.

Not cute, but very pitiful.

—Cheng Shiyun will save it.

So without thinking, he reached out his hand.

It was so small, curled up in his palm, its tender red breasts heaving rapidly. He could crush it with just a few strokes of his hand; it was such a fragile life.

Xie Shijin carefully put the baby bird back into the nest, but as soon as she withdrew her hand, it was pushed out again by its older brother or sister.

He tried again, but the result was the same.

what to do?

—Cheng Shiyun will save it.

Xie Shijin closed the window, turned around, and brought the baby bird back.

He found an empty cardboard box that he was about to throw away and put the bird inside.

It kept shaking.

Since baby birds haven't grown feathers yet, they can't keep their bodies warm and are prone to hypothermia and death.

He glanced at the temperature-controlled breeding box again, opened the door, and placed the cardboard box next to the snake eggs.

"Don't make noise."

"Chirp chirp chirp!"

"Shh-"

"Chirp chirp chirp!"

"Your sister is sleeping."

"Chirp chirp chirp!"

Xie Shijin opened a webpage and searched: Why does the bird I picked up keep chirping?

The search results popped up: most likely, you're hungry.

Xie Shijin squeezed its crop. It was empty.

He has never kept birds and doesn't want to.

—Cheng Shiyun will save it.

He turned on his phone screen and searched for how to feed the birds.

Mix cooked egg yolk with warm water in a 7:3 ratio to form a yogurt-like paste. Make sure there are no lumps before feeding it to the chicks.

The boy got up and went into the kitchen.

At midnight, Xie Shijin stood by the stove with his arms crossed, and started boiling eggs.

Boil the eggs, peel out the yolks, add warm water according to the ratio, and slowly mash them into a smooth paste with a spoon. After feeding the bird the last bite, it finally stopped chirping.

Xie Shijin was so busy that her hair was completely dry before she took her medicine and lay down on the bed.

School starts on August 23rd.

The school gate was already completely blocked by eight o'clock in the morning.

After completing the enrollment procedures, Xie Shijin submitted an application to the school to be a day student.

"Applying for off-campus accommodation is possible, but it has to wait until after military training," the teacher in charge of welcoming new students explained. "Military training includes checking students' dormitories, so all new students will have to live on campus."

Xie Shijin asked, "When is the military training?"

"According to past practice, it's usually a week after the start of the semester. You can move to the dormitory after the military training begins, it won't affect anything."

Over the following week, the school held a series of events, including freshman enrollment ceremonies and the first lecture of the semester. It also invited renowned professors from home and abroad to give lectures, offering guidance to the still confused freshmen on topics ranging from professional fields and life choices to growth paths.

The freshmen below the stage were either writing furiously or listening intently, while Xie Shijin turned on the home security camera.

He still keeps that red crossbill.

He left early and returned late this week, making sure to feed the birds well before leaving so he could keep them fed all day. Even the mother bird couldn't find food to feed her chicks every day.

So the bird grew from the size of a finger to the size of an egg in five days, but the egg that Cheng Shiyun laid for him... hasn't hatched yet.

Military training starts tomorrow, and Xie Shijin will be moving to the dormitory for twenty days.

Ni Jiaqi asked on WeChat: [What should I do with the eggs?]

12715: [Take him to the dormitory.]

He contacted the wildlife conservation station and they will come to take the red crossbill away this afternoon.

Ni Jiaqi: [...]

Ni Jiaqi: [Are you crazy?]

Ni Jiaqi: [If you incubate eggs in your dorm room, your roommates will think you're crazy.]

He even suspected that Guo Renyi's blow had damaged Xie Shijin's brain.

He felt that Xie Shijin was now like...

What does it resemble?

Like a widower who went mad overnight after his wife died, but whose child is too young to go with him.

A child can keep both their mother and father in check.

Ni Jiaqi: [Since you don't have time, why don't you send the eggs back? I'll take care of them.]

Xie Shijin's inability to hatch the eggs was definitely a problem with his methods.

If you leave it to him to incubate, he will definitely be able to hatch it.

Ni Jiaqi: [No, what if the package breaks in transit?]

Ni Jiaqi: [I can get out of bed now. I'll come to Beijing to see you tomorrow.]

Ni Jiaqi: [I bought the ticket.]

Ni Jiaqi: [Xie Shijin?]

Ni Jiaqi: [Where is he?]

Xie Shijin gripped his phone tightly, swiping with two fingers to zoom in on the surveillance footage.

The egg... rolled out of the nest he made of clothes.

-----------------------

Author's note: It's about to hatch!