Chapter 52 The Big Cat is Generous (Including Bonus Chapter) A heartwarming slice-of-life scene...
Mingjian went back to his room.
Xiao Bumian was still fast asleep, but compared to the paleness he had just lost from blood loss, his complexion seemed a little rosier, and his breathing was much more steady.
Mingjian jumped onto the bed and carefully pressed his ear against his chest again to listen. Although his heartbeat was still not very strong, it had become much more regular.
Only then did he truly relax, find a comfortable spot, curl up beside Xiao Bumian's warm embrace, his tail tip swaying unconsciously as he lay down and fell asleep peacefully.
Forget it, there's no use thinking about it now. Sleeping is the most important thing. I'll deal with the rest of my worries after I wake up.
After an unknown amount of time, Mingjian groggily woke up, feeling a gentle touch brushing against his fur. He opened his sleepy cat eyes and met Xiao Bumian's smiling, peach-blossom eyes.
The boy was already awake. He was lying on his side, one hand supporting his cheek, the other hand gently stroking Mingjian's hair. A pleasant smile played on his lips. "You were sleeping so soundly."
Mingjian: "..."
In other words, he might not be used to being a cat yet, and waking up to see Xiao Bumian's huge face was quite frightening.
Mingjian instinctively tried to twist his body to get away from the cat's clutches, but Xiao Bumian's technique was just too good. The pressure from his fingertips was just right, and the rhythm of combing his fur was neither too fast nor too slow. The comfort it brought made the cat's bones feel like they were melting.
Mingjian's initial struggle vanished instantly, and he even involuntarily let out a satisfied snoring.
He silently despised himself for a second.
What a useless cat! Is that all the ambition you have?
Ming let out a meow.
It is now the dead of winter, and snow is falling outside. Beautiful hexagonal frost lands on the windowsill, and goose-feather-like snowflakes flutter down.
There was no heater in the room, and it had a chilly feel to it. Fortunately, Xiao Bumian's body was warm enough, radiating a reassuring warmth.
Mingjian nestled comfortably in his arms, her snoring growing louder and louder.
Xiao Bumian chuckled softly upon hearing the voice.
Ye Tanzhou said that Mingjian kissed him because he liked him, and he also liked Mingjian, so they could be considered to like each other.
Sometimes he would hear the operas sung by the troupes that Xiao Yun had hired from outside, which mentioned that people who liked each other would get married.
So, are he and Mingjian going to get married too?
Xiao Bumian was somewhat puzzled.
He disliked anything too troublesome. Xiao Bumian remembered how troublesome it was when Mingjian and Rong Yunzhi got married in the merman ruins. Mingjian had been busy for a long, long time, but he could never find Mingjian, which made him very unhappy.
However... if the person he was to marry was Mingjian, and the process was for his and Mingjian's sake... Xiao Bumian thought that perhaps he could reluctantly endure those troubles.
He smiled and casually stroked the cat's fur, his mind already starting to vaguely conjure up images of a wedding, though he still had no idea what exactly was going to happen.
Mingjian had no idea what Xiao Bumian was thinking.
He felt that the young Xiao Bumian was so much better than the later, unpredictable, and sickly girl who threatened to kill him at the drop of a hat. This Xiao Bumian would gently stroke his fur, and his embrace was warm and cozy.
only……
Mingjian recalled Gu Weishen's words.
Soulfire should be something that only demons possess. Gu Weishen said he wanted to extract the soulfire from Xiao Bumian's body, which means that Xiao Bumian had never been a demon, because... he was originally a demon.
But Xiao Bumian could clearly cultivate spiritual power.
It was a night long ago, and his master was carrying him on his back along the path back to the mountain.
The night sky was ablaze with stars, and his master's gentle voice told him fantastical tales. Among them was a story about a being called a half-demon, existing not only as pure demons and cultivators, but also as a child born from the union of a cultivator or human and a demon.
But the master sighed and said with pity that such children are extremely rare and difficult for heaven and earth to tolerate. The vast majority die in the womb, and of the very few who survive, almost none live to adulthood.
Xiao Ming, perched on his master's broad back, asked in a soft, sleepy voice, "Master... Master, is it possible that not a single half-demon could survive?"
The master paused almost imperceptibly, sighed, and smiled with a slight curve to his lips, saying, "Master, I've only ever seen one."
Xiao Ming was so curious that his sleepiness was almost gone. He opened his eyes wide and asked, "Is he very scary? With a blue face and fangs? Three heads and six arms?" He imagined the most terrifying monster he could think of.
The master was amused by his childish guess and laughed out loud. He seemed not to have expected him to ask such a question. After a long while, he said, "No, that half-demon looks just as cute as the little one."
"Oh," Xiao Ming responded, seemingly understanding, then tilted his head and asked, "Is he very pitiful?"
The master was clearly taken aback for a moment before chuckling and asking, "Why would you think that, little one?"
Xiao Ming thought for a moment, then tried hard to organize his thoughts, his little brows furrowed as he said, "Didn't Master say that all demons are bad? He's a child born of a human and a demon, so other kids definitely won't want to play with him."
He gently pressed his little face against his master's warm back, his voice becoming very soft, "So pitiful, just like you, little one."
The master fell silent, saying nothing more, but carried him on his back, walking steadily step by step up the moonlit mountain steps, his back appearing exceptionally silent in the night.
Mingjian now realizes that what his master was referring to back then was Xiao Bumian.
Therefore, Xiao Bumian is a half-demon. His mother is the woman Gu Weishen calls "Yunniang," Xiao Yun.
And... what about his father?
In Xiao Bumian's childhood memories, he overheard the maids outside whispering that Xiao Yun had gone missing for a period of time the year before she married Gu Weishen, and when she returned, she was already six months pregnant.
And with what he had heard last night, everything suddenly became clear.
His master, as a disciple of the Word Spirit Sect, possessed the ability to deduce destiny. It must have been he who deduced that the half-demon fetus in Xiao Yun's womb possessed extraordinary power that could help the Gu family rise to a higher level, which persuaded Gu Weishen, who already craved power and immortality, to keep the child.
Those in the mortal realm with the aptitude for cultivation are extremely rare, one in ten thousand, and only one in a hundred years can truly embark on the path to immortality. However, Xiao Bumian's blood can turn this impossibility into possibility, greatly increasing the probability of the Gu family's disciples awakening their spiritual roots.
This is why, in just over a decade, more than a dozen members of the Gu family have embarked on the path to immortality, leading to a rapid expansion of the family's power.
Xiao Bumian was like a carefully nurtured Gu worm, imprisoned in a small space, his limbs bound by cold chains. He didn't need to do anything; his very existence became an inexhaustible "resource" for the Gu family.
In the end, they even planned to completely strip him of his cultivation foundation and the soul fire necessary for the survival of the demon race.
No wonder Xiao Bumian has this kind of personality, no wonder his injuries are so difficult to heal.
Therefore, on the night of the full moon when the yin energy is at its peak, his strength will indeed be greatly reduced without the suppression of the soul fire. And the fact that he holds an umbrella under the clear sky is not just for show. It's just that as a half-demon who has lost his soul fire, his body temperature is always lower than that of an ordinary person. After excessive consumption of internal energy, his body simply cannot withstand the direct sunlight. Instead, he will feel unbearably burned all over.
All the details that I couldn't understand before connected at this moment and became incredibly clear.
He asked Xiao Bumian why his arms were always cold when he held him.
Xiao Bumian simply replied that it was innate.
At that time, he thought Xiao Bumian was just brushing him off again, and he even felt like biting him because of the other party's matter-of-fact tone.
But now he understood that Xiao Bumian hadn't lied to him. He was truly born this way, because from birth he was destined to lose his soul fire, like a container whose core had been prematurely emptied.
His master knew all of this.
His master may even have been one of the driving forces behind all of this.
Mingjian suddenly felt as if something was tightly gripping his chest, making it difficult to breathe. A sour feeling spread from his heart and rushed to his throat, choking him so much that he could barely speak.
Is it because of Master?
...Or perhaps it's because of Xiao Bumian.
Perhaps he truly considered Xiao Bumian a friend and didn't want him to have such a hard life or to suffer.
Xiao Bumian wasn't born a good person; it's because no one ever taught him what kindness or love is.
He doesn't understand what liking is because the first clear emotion he perceived after birth was perhaps the hatred and disgust from his mother, Xiao Yun.
He shouldn't have been born, but because of Gu Weishen's selfish desires, and the schemes of that Venerable One and his master, he was born.
But after he was born, aside from being imprisoned in a small courtyard, all he truly possessed was the long passage of time.
Perhaps at the beginning, Xiao Bumian also tried to be a good person.
He would release the oriole that Xiao Yun had made into a puppet for him, he would warm the kitten in his arms on cold nights, he would obediently call out "Mother" when Xiao Yun occasionally woke up and brought some tenderness, and he would pretend to be asleep when he heard servants outside the window cursing him in low voices as "monster" and "bastard," as if he could not hear those harsh voices.
"Can cats get unhappy too?" Xiao Bumian seemed a little puzzled. He stretched out his fingertip and gently poked the white cat that had buried its whole face in his chest.
Seeing that there was no response, Ming clung to Xiao Bumian even tighter with her limbs, rubbing her fluffy head against his chest, as if this could isolate her from everything outside and convey a silent comfort.
Xiao Bumian paused, seemingly not expecting Mingjian to do this. He was stunned for a moment, then smiled with his eyes crinkling.
But he thought he still didn't like that Mingjian was in the form of a cat.
If Mingjian weren't a cat right now, he could lower his head and kiss Mingjian. That way, Mingjian wouldn't be sad, because every time Mingjian kissed him, Xiao Bumian's mind would go blank, his hands would go limp, and his legs would go limp.
Mingjian liked it very much too. If he kissed Mingjian, Mingjian wouldn't be sad.
Ye Tanzhou is absolutely right; this is not how you raise a cat.
He no longer wanted Mingjian to be his cat.
—
Time slips away quietly amidst fragments of memory.
That's strange.
This time, the memory fragments were much longer, unlike the last time during my childhood, when I left in less than two days.
Mingjian stayed with the young Xiao Bumian for a whole month.
He was actually somewhat resistant to it.
He didn't want to witness Xiao Bumian's soul fire and bone essence being extracted; just imagining it filled him with inexplicable fear.
He couldn't explain the source of this fear. Was it the fear of seeing his master's familiar yet unfamiliar face again, or simply the inability to see Xiao Bumian suffer such pain?
As Xiao Bumian grew up, his temperament became unpredictable. He always seemed lazy and fearless. He was a clean freak; even if Mingjian had only gone out for a stroll and gotten a little dusty, he would still grab her and throw several dust-removing spells at her until she was spotless.
However, the young man Xiao Bumian in front of him did not have such unfathomable cultivation. He did not even know any offensive spells. The only thing he was good at was the spells that Xiao Yun had taught him sporadically when he was occasionally lucid, which were used to make small puppets.
Sometimes, when the weather was a little warmer, he would hold Mingjian in his arms, sit in a corner where he could get some sun, lean against the wall listlessly, close his eyes, and feel that little bit of insignificant warmth. His pale skin was almost transparent in the sunlight.
But in winter, sunny and warm weather is rare. More often than not, the sky is gray and the snow falls heavily, turning the courtyard into a desolate white.
At this time, Mingjian would leap out of the window and leave a string of plum blossom-like cat paw prints on the windowsill covered with fresh snow.
Perhaps it was because the young Xiao Bumian's face still retained a touch of childishness, and the softness in his features hadn't completely faded, but Mingjian felt that he was much gentler now. Although one could occasionally see a hint of his future self in his calm eyes and slightly pursed lips, overall, his aggression had been reduced to almost nothing.
Mingjian's wariness towards him naturally decreased.
Well, actually, it seems that he never really had any real sense of wariness towards Xiao Bumian.
But this younger version of Xiao Bumian is indeed gentle.
He would worry that Mingjian was cold, so without saying a word, he would pull the cat back from trying to sneak away to play in the snow, forcefully stuff it into his warm clothes, and warm it with his body heat.
He was afraid that Mingjian would be bored, so even if he wasn't interested in these games, he would patiently wave the colorful feather cat toy in front of Mingjian's eyes.
But perhaps it's true, as the system says, that a yandere temperament is innate, unrelated to age or circumstances. Xiao Bumian seems to be inherently disliked by living beings.
Aside from Mingjian, the "fake cat," all the other stray cats in the mansion, and even the occasional bold bird that flew over the courtyard wall, would instantly bristle or fly away in fright as soon as they saw Xiao Bumian, as if they had seen some extremely terrifying natural enemy, as if they would lose their lives if they were a step slower.
Mingjian had originally thought that since he was now a cat, he might be able to use his status as a fellow cat to get closer to the real cats, teach them a lesson, and tell them that Xiao Bumian was actually quite good and that they shouldn't dislike him.
However, reality slapped him in the face.
Even though he was dressed as a cat, there was still an insurmountable communication barrier between him and those real cats! He meowed for a long time, but they either hissed at him warily or ignored him completely, not understanding what he was meowing at all!
It almost made Mingjian furious; he could only stare helplessly at those cat tails.
Xiao Bumian's eyes crinkled with a smile. Although he couldn't understand what Mingjian was saying, he could clearly sense Mingjian's unusually rich emotions.
Sometimes it's the joy of catching a snowflake, sometimes the frustration of failed communication, sometimes the melancholy of watching birds fly by in the distance... This feeling is magical, as if there is an invisible thread connecting them.
At first, he didn't understand what these emotions specifically represented, but gradually, by observing Mingjian's reactions, he could also sense that the warm, comforting feeling that made him want to smile was probably happiness. The puffed-up feeling, even the urge to scratch something, was probably anger.
Xiao Bumian thought for a moment and confirmed that he was happy when he kissed Mingjian, even happier than happy, his heart was bubbling with joy. But when he saw Mingjian and Rong Yunzhi getting married, he felt a suffocating feeling in his heart, which was simply unhappiness.
“Hmm,” Xiao Bumian looked at Mingjian’s two short legs, still fluttering against the birds that dared not approach him. He tilted his head and asked, “You like them? If you like them, I’ll catch some for you.”
Upon hearing this, Mingjian was so frightened that she quickly meowed twice.
Just take a look!
In the end, he could only reluctantly retract his claws, sullenly nestled back into Xiao Bumian's arms, and gaze longingly at the birds.
It wasn't that he particularly liked those birds; he simply disliked their defiant attitude. They would land casually in Xiao Bumian's yard, chirping away, but the moment they saw Xiao Bumian, even just through the window, they would flutter their wings and flee in panic as if they had seen a ghost.
Mingjian was furious.
Xiao Bumian hasn't done anything yet, neither catching nor scaring them, but these birds have already started to prey on people, which is really annoying.
Seemingly sensing his bad mood, Xiao Bumian sighed helplessly, carefully wiped the paws that he had wet from scratching the snow, revealing the pink paw pads underneath, before taking the sulking cat back into her arms to warm it.
Seeing that his attempt to bite the bird had been abruptly interrupted, Ming angrily took Xiao Bumian's fingertip, which was being used to wipe his claws, into his mouth.
Before I could bite down, my sharp teeth gently sank into the soft flesh, then released.
Never mind, the big cat is magnanimous now.
He decided not to stoop to Xiao Bumian's level.
Clearly see what you're thinking.
Xiao Bumian didn't really care; he just thought Mingjian was cute. Anyway, he wasn't liked by cats and dogs. He was a half-demon, and there weren't many living creatures that would actively approach him. At least in his memory, only the raccoon dog he used to keep would occasionally get close to him.
But I'm more afraid of what's more.
As the next full moon night drew closer, Mingjian's mood became increasingly anxious and restless.
He began to think about how to break the memory fragments.
He began frantically calling out to the system in his consciousness, wanting it to immediately pull him out of this fragment of memory; he didn't want to see it anymore.
His initial purpose in entering the memory fragments was to find the root cause of Xiao Bumian's demonic possession, wasn't it? Now he has found it, seeing it clearly, even beyond his expectations. He doesn't want to witness the tragedy to come.
He wanted to leave.
He was afraid that if he continued watching, he would be unable to control his pity for Xiao Bumian, would feel sad for him, and might even waver in his original intention of just living a good life and staying away from trouble.
Unfortunately, it was no use. The system seemed to have vanished completely, offering no response whatsoever.
Sometimes, after being a cat for too long, immersed in the rare gentleness of the young Xiao Bumian, Mingjian would still have moments of disorientation, wondering if he was a cat demon, and if his previous memories were just an absurd dream. The days of being held in Xiao Bumian's arms and having his fur stroked were the real ones.
Fortunately, such absurd ideas are always interrupted by reality in time.
For example, when he still couldn't communicate with the real stray cats in the yard.
Mingjian looked at the stray cat in front of him with a mouse in its mouth: "..."
The wildcat looked at Mingjian, then with a "thud," tossed the dead rat onto the snow in front of him, pushing it forward slightly. Its eyes seemed to hold a hint of goodwill and expectation, as if to say: Here, buddy, I just caught this, it's fresh, I'll share half with you.
Seeing that the cat was completely frozen, he was determined not to eat that monstrosity!
He hurriedly ran back to Xiao Bumian's courtyard, wagging his tail in shock. At that moment, he thought it was actually quite good that the creatures didn't like Xiao Bumian; at least the wild cat didn't dare to come in, only daring to wander around outside the courtyard with a dead mouse in its mouth.
Xiao Bumian couldn't leave; the chains only allowed him free movement within the room. Those world-destroying techniques he would later comprehend were, for now, sealed away, rendering him completely powerless. Xiao Bumian vaguely felt that this might be related to the rules of this dream.
He tried to deviate from his memory, but soon everything would return to normal.
Before, Xiao Bumian had doubted that this was just a dream, but now he was certain it wasn't. It was a long-buried, real memory from his past. Everything was repeating itself methodically, unchangeable.
The only variable here is Mingjian.
Mingjian was originally sent by those people to kill him, a fact Xiao Bumian had known for a long time. So, is Mingjian appearing in his memories now to... kill him here?
It's clear that it's just a useless little cat now, unable to do anything.
Xiao Bumian, on the contrary, felt a surge of intense curiosity. He had never heard of any method that allowed someone to so realistically delve into another person's past memories. How exactly did the person behind Mingjian manage to do it?
Why did they go to such lengths to send his consciousness back here?
Or rather, what do they want?
Is it to reaffirm his pain, to find more of his weaknesses, or is it really to find an opportunity to kill him completely in this unchangeable past?
If he really wanted to kill him, why didn't Mingjian do it? He just kept eating and drinking for free and taking advantage of him every day.
Xiao Bumian smiled, he actually found it quite interesting.
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Author's note: Happy Qixi Festival, everyone! [dove emoji]
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