Chapter 116 Killing the Grand Duke Jupiter (Part 4) How can I face anyone, completely naked? ...
The candlelight flickered gently on the desk, casting dappled shadows on the couch through the thin gauze curtains.
Song Qiling's sleepiness vanished instantly, her gaze fixed on the dark "little thing" in her palm, and even her breathing unconsciously slowed down.
She cautiously reached out and gently pinched one of the tentacles.
It feels as soft as silk soaked in warm water, and carries the slight warmth unique to living things; it is supple and elastic.
Curious, she kneaded it a couple of times, rubbing the delicate texture of the surface with her fingertips, and found it wasn't slippery or sticky at all, as she had imagined.
It feels amazing.
With this movement, the "octopus" suddenly stopped.
Its round body shrank almost imperceptibly, and its beady black eyes blinked twice quickly, revealing a hint of bewilderment and panic.
A short while later.
The tentacle that was being pinched trembled slightly, tentatively and little by little climbing up her fingertips, softly resting on her knuckles and gently rubbing against them.
Seemingly afraid of her resistance, he only rubbed against her twice before stopping, his pair of dark, beady eyes fixed on her, shining like glass beads in the candlelight.
Song Qiling was stunned for a moment, then a warm feeling slowly spread to the tips of her ears, and it felt as if hot water was flowing from one end of her heart to the other, and her limbs and bones were soaked in an indescribable comfort.
Regardless of whether this person is a junior brother or not.
This is just too... obedient.
"Ahem—" Clearing his throat, Song Qiling continued, "Can you speak?"
His round, dark eyes stared at her without blinking, as if frozen in time.
...It seems unlikely.
Song Qiling then asked, "Then when I ask you a question, if you answer correctly, you blink once; if you answer incorrectly, you blink twice, okay?"
As soon as he finished speaking, his beady eyes blinked.
Song Qiling couldn't help but smile.
This method works.
She composed herself and went straight to the point: "You're my junior brother, Gu Lianzhou?"
His beady eyes blinked again.
"Was it because you were injured by Chu Yue last night that you lost your human form and turned into this?"
Blink again, and this time the tentacles were a little limp, and the dark eyes drooped a bit.
"Is that really so?" Song Qiling's fingers tightened with anger, but fearing she might hurt him, she quickly loosened her grip. "Chu Yue has really gone mad. Why is he even targeting you for no reason?"
Her gaze returned to the tiny figure in her palm, and she sighed softly, gently stroking the top of the other's head with her fingertips: "Poor thing, can't even speak..."
Before she could finish speaking, the black bean-shaped eyes blinked twice, and the tentacle gently patted the back of her hand, as if in rebuttal.
"What, you still want to speak up for him?" Song Qiling was both amused and annoyed. She picked up the 'octopus' and held it in front of her, patting his round head. "He's done so much to you, who knows how long it will take to recover..."
At this point, she finally remembered something, her brows furrowing slightly, "Junior brother, you're still so young and weak, I'm afraid you can't even beat Kun-ge'er."
Kun-ge'er was the little thief in her house. Taking advantage of his speed, he even stole half a piece of her pastry the other day. She chased him around several times but couldn't catch him.
Now that my junior brother looks so docile and harmless, I'm afraid that rat could ride on his head.
Thinking of this, Song Qiling was overcome with sorrow. She let the tentacles burrow between her fingers, then simply lay back on the bed, staring at the canopy and sighing, "What am I going to do..."
As they spoke, the supple tentacles slowly encircled her wrist, seemingly in protest.
"Alright, you can't even speak properly, save your energy." Song Qiling grabbed a corner of the blanket, covered her junior brother with it, and patted the blanket lightly. "Your most important thing right now is to rest well and wait for your body to recover."
Despite this, she was not sleepy at all. Hugging the slightly bulging blanket, she mumbled, "I guess I won't be able to go to my stall tomorrow. If you have any conscience, get well soon, okay?"
Beneath the soft bedding, a pair of eyes blinked quietly.
Song Qiling lay awake until dawn.
My eyelids felt as heavy as if they were made of lead, but I never dared to close them completely, my gaze always fixed on the dark shadow on the inside of the bed.
As morning light streamed through the window, she sat up and saw that after a night of rest, her junior brother was still a black octopus, his tentacles resting on the blanket, his bright black bean eyes staring at her.
It's not a hallucination.
With mixed feelings, she propped herself up in bed, picked up her junior brother, put him on her shoulder, and got up to make the bed.
As soon as she stood up straight, the little creature on her shoulder used its tentacles to cling tightly to her collar, as if afraid of falling off.
After making the bed, she went to open the window to let in some fresh air. The morning breeze was slightly cool, and the "octopus" on her shoulder shrank back into the crook of her neck.
Song Qiling, who was ticklish, couldn't help but laugh and said, "What are you doing? I've never seen you so afraid of the cold before?"
On second thought, my junior brother is currently naked, so... it makes sense that he's afraid of the cold.
As her thoughts drifted, she shook her head, trying to clear her mind.
What's with all this talk about being naked? My junior brother can't even take care of himself right now, so as his senior brother, I should be more tolerant of him.
She went to the courtyard to fetch a basin of clean water, brought back a soft handkerchief, wiped her face first, and then turned to her junior brother on her shoulder: "Although you have changed your appearance, you should still retain the habits of a human being."
As she spoke, she gently removed the "octopus" and carefully wiped his cheeks with a handkerchief dipped in water.
As I wiped my hands, I suddenly remembered that my junior brother had crawled on the ground all night yesterday, and his feet must not be very clean.
So, perhaps because she was not clear-headed from staying up all night, she simply put her junior brother into the basin and splashed water on him with her fingertips.
Visibly, the junior brother's body stiffened for a moment.
"I don't know if you have the habit of scrubbing yourself in the bath, but I'll give you a simple wash today. If you feel uncomfortable, just tell me..."
She paused for a moment, then added, "Look at me, I have such a bad memory. You've forgotten how to speak."
Fortunately, it was just her and her junior brother in the room. If a stranger had come in, they probably would have thought she was crazy.
After finally cleaning her junior brother, she took a dry cloth and dried him off. Only then did she nod in satisfaction and carry the copper basin outside.
The sun was shining brightly outside, and Gu Lianzhou squinted as it warmed his shoulders. Song Qiling lifted the basin and sprinkled water under the trees in the yard. Then she straightened up, glanced at the empty yard, and felt a sinking feeling in her heart.
My junior brother has returned, but he's no longer human.
It's still too quiet.
After washing up, she returned to her room, placed her junior brother on the table, turned around and went to the wardrobe to find the leftover fabric and needles and thread from the last time she made clothes. She returned to the table, her face solemn as she threaded the needle and began her needlework.
“I don’t know when you will be able to regain your human form. Staying indoors like this all the time is not a good thing.” She took the measurements, picked up the scissors and began to cut the cloth, glancing at her junior brother in front of her from time to time. “I need to make you a cloth bag so that you can hide.”
The fabric was of superior quality, soft and light, but her needlework was really rough. From a distance, it looked like a loose sock, and the two ends of the "sock" were connected by long strips of cloth, making it look even more incongruous.
"Done!" Song Qiling bit off the cotton thread, picked up the cloth bag, shook it, hung it diagonally at her waist, then grabbed her junior brother and gently put him into the bag, patting the pocket. "That way, no one will see."
The tentacles inside the bag gently touched her waist, as if in response.
Song Qiling was initially worried that he would feel unwell, but she soon found that her worries were unnecessary. The cloth bag would occasionally bulge out, and the soft touch through the fabric felt like a warm jade pendant that could move.
However, things remained stable for the next three to five days.
She still got up early to draw talismans as usual, but now there was a dangling cloth bag next to her inkstone. She went to the market to buy things as usual, and when picking out vegetables, she would whisper to the bag, "The bamboo shoots are tender today," or "I'll kill a chicken to make soup for you," and so on, looking like a madwoman.
She continued to study magic as usual, but whenever she flipped through the books, a small head would always peek out from the bag with half a black bean eye, quietly staring at her.
When they were inside, she couldn't bear to keep her junior brother confined.
Whenever he was released from the bag, he would slowly move to the desk, dip his tentacles in the still-wet ink, and write "All is well" and "Senior Brother" crookedly on the back of a scrap of talisman paper.
When Song Qiling first saw it, her eyes lit up: "Why didn't I think of having you write!"
From then on, one person spoke while the other dipped his brush in ink and wrote, which became a unique form of conversation between the two.
However, there are many inconveniences when traveling, and it is difficult to write with ink. Song Qiling had an idea. She found some fine charcoal pencils, carefully cut the paper, and bound them into small booklets the size of a palm, and put them into her cloth bag.
“That way, even when you’re out, you can just write down whatever you want to say,” she explained.
As the days went by, the two became very close, except for certain moments when Song Qiling would be particularly persistent.
When changing clothes or taking a bath, she would gently place her junior brother and his bag outside the screen, or leave him in the next room.
Although it never explained the reason, only saying "Wait a while," the "octopus" seemed to understand something, its beady eyes always quickly glancing elsewhere, never "saying" a word about it, nor writing a single word in the booklet.
-
In the stillness of the night, the dull echo of a midnight clapper resounded from outside the window, one after another, blending into the thick, impenetrable darkness.
The candles inside had long been extinguished, with only a faint light filtering through the window paper, barely outlining the blurry contours of the furniture.
On the bed, the small black figure curled up beside Song Qiling's pillow was wriggling restlessly.
The tentacles curled up and loosened on the bedding, then gripped the soft fabric tightly again, the slight trembling revealing that they seemed to be enduring some kind of silent pain.
Immediately afterwards, dark purple demonic patterns emerged from its smooth surface, flickering like breathing, each flash bringing a more intense distortion of its outline.
Amidst the intense fluctuations of that eerie light, the tiny octopus's body was stretched and reshaped by an invisible force...
Finally, all the struggles subsided, and what replaced the bed was a slender, human body.
Gu Lianzhou raised his hand somewhat blankly, his five fingers curling slightly in the dim light before unfolding again.
He stared blankly at his clearly defined palm, lost in thought.
The next moment, as if remembering something, he suddenly threw off the covers and looked inside. Then he quickly tucked the blankets back in, turned his head abruptly, and looked at his senior brother who was still fast asleep beside him.
Gu Lianzhou was overwhelmed with excitement and could hardly contain himself. His fingertips trembled slightly as he reached out to the shoulder of the person beside him, wanting to immediately share with his senior brother the matter of turning him back into human form.
But just as his fingertips were about to touch him, the feeling of emptiness and lack of protection suddenly seized him, and that impulse was instantly suppressed by a tidal wave of embarrassment.
How could he possibly face anyone looking like this, completely naked?
How should I explain this to my senior?
In his utter confusion, the person beside him suddenly smacked his lips, mumbled something indistinctly, and then, without warning, rolled over and came straight towards him.
In the past, he was the size of an octopus, curled up on the pillow and still feeling cramped. The two of them could live peacefully under the same blanket.
But now that he has returned to the shape of an adult man, the once spacious bed suddenly feels cramped.
As Song Qiling turned over, one of her legs naturally lifted up and landed squarely on his waist.
The warmth of his body seeped through the thin nightgown, and Gu Lianzhou froze instantly, his blood seemingly freezing in that instant, and he dared not move an inch.
What's even more agonizing is that, because of this closeness, his senior brother's shallow and even breaths are gently brushing against his neck and collarbone, bringing a subtle yet distinct itch that seeps straight into his heart.
His Adam's apple bobbed involuntarily, he swallowed hard, lowered his eyes, and looked at his senior brother, who had almost rolled into his arms without realizing it.
A unique scent, a blend of soapberry fragrance and my senior brother's own, lingered around my nose.
It felt like I had a drum inside my chest.
"Bang, bang, bang," one after another, heavy and rapid blows struck the chest.
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