Daily life in love
"We don't even have a single group photo."
Jiang Cheng looked at Yu Miaomiao with earnest expectation in his eyes.
With him staring at her like that, Yu Miaomiao couldn't bring herself to refuse, even if she didn't want to take a picture.
The weather is beautiful today; the sun is shining brightly, and the lake looks like a sapphire.
The two stood by the lake, their clothes fluttering in the wind, and Yu Miaomiao's hair swayed in the breeze before she finally tied it up.
The girl snapped a few photos and said, "Let's change our pose."
What position should we change to?
From childhood to adulthood, Yu Miaomiao has basically only had ID photos taken, and ID photos do not require posing.
She was searching her meager memory for any photography experience, wondering if she should make a peace sign, when she suddenly heard Jiang Cheng call out to her: "Miaomiao."
She turned her head. "What's wrong?"
Jiang Cheng asked, "Have your results from the last competition come out?"
Yu Miaomiao asked in confusion, "When? How come I didn't know?"
"Just this morning."
Jiang Chengyi said seriously, "You are number one."
She raised her eyebrows, her eyes filled with unwavering confidence as she looked at Jiang Chengyi. "I knew it."
Just then, a series of clicks rang out. She turned around and saw the girl put down her camera and give a thumbs up. "OK, this pose is done too."
Yu Miaomiao finally realized what was going on. She squinted at Jiang Chengyi and said, "You lied to me."
Jiang Cheng smiled. "Special circumstances."
After taking the photos, the girl asked for Jiang Chengyi's email address, promising to export the photos and send them to him as soon as she got back.
After doing all this, Jiang Cheng returned to Yu Miaomiao's side and said, "The filming was great, don't you want to see it?"
Yu Miaomiao wasn't interested at all. "What's so interesting about it? I don't like taking pictures."
She didn't understand the purpose of taking photos, as if these experiences were somehow meaningful.
-
In the evening, the tour group's itinerary ended, and the research team switched to hiking. After two days of navigating through the deep mountains, they finally reached the snow leopard's territory.
Xu Zhou, a workaholic, didn't rest for a moment. He directed his subordinates to assemble the equipment and immediately began to examine all the monsters in the snow leopard clan.
Yu Miaomiao and Jiang Chengyi were free, and Xiaobai's mother, seeing that they were bored, suggested taking them out for a walk.
Behind them followed a little white tail. In the month since they last met, the little white tail had grown even bigger, standing up to be almost as tall as a person, its tail swishing back and forth, looking extremely proud.
They stopped to rest on a hillside that was free of snow and covered in lush vegetation.
Jiang Cheng judged: "There must be a rich water source under this grassland."
Salt said, "I don't know. Everyone calls it a gift from God. In winter, we all like to come here to sunbathe."
As she spoke, she lay down, closed her eyes to enjoy the sunlight, and Yu Miaomiao sat down to drink water.
Little White couldn't stop. Its "howling" was annoying, and it kept burrowing into Yu Miaomiao's arms. But after a while, its fur stood on end, and it scurried away.
Salt teased it, "What's wrong? Don't you like Miaomiao the most and say you want to see her every day?"
Xiao Bai whimpered twice, "It...it has an unpleasant smell."
It snuggled into its mother's arms.
Yan said, "Miaomiao, don't worry about it. Children are fickle; they might dislike this today and that tomorrow."
Jiang Cheng asked her, "What did Xiaobai say?"
Yu Miaomiao remembered that Jiang Cheng couldn't understand the words of monsters, so she explained to him, "Xiao Bai said that I have an unpleasant smell."
Jiang Cheng pondered for a moment, "Could it be... my scent?"
Salt said, "No way, I'll try."
She carried Xiaobai towards Jiang Chengyi's direction, and the little snow leopard howled and resisted fiercely, its fur standing on end, just like before.
"It's actually true!"
Yan was surprised: "Miaomiao, it seems that Cheng Yi's scent on you is too strong, which is why Xiaobai reacted."
Yu Miaomiao froze as she drank the water.
She exclaimed in surprise, "But why do you have Cheng Yi's aura on you...?"
Yu Miaomiao quickly stood up. "I'm rested. Let's continue."
Salt, interrupted from his thoughts, stood up as well. "Okay, let's go."
Yu Miaomiao walked slower and slower, falling behind, and secretly sniffed her sleeve.
Yan turned around and saw this scene. She asked, "Miaomiao, what are you doing?"
She lowered her hand. "N-nothing."
After the salt had walked away, she muttered softly, "How come I can't smell it..."
Looking down at the girl's slightly reddened ears, Jiang Chengyi couldn't help but chuckle.
Yu Miaomiao, of course, couldn't smell it.
For the past two days, while hiking and staying in tents, Yu Miaomiao has been transforming into her original form to keep warm, lying in Jiang Cheng's arms and sleeping soundly.
Since the two had been together for a long time, she had unknowingly been permeated with Jiang Chengyi's aura. How could she possibly have noticed under such circumstances?
-
After enjoying the scenery of the snow-capped mountains and canyons, they began to walk back.
Just then, a snow leopard appeared on the mountain road not far away. Its steps were light and quick, and its tail was held high, as if it were holding something.
Salt called out to him, "Hey, Crane, where have you been? You're all dirty."
The agile snow leopard shook off the snow and showed Yan the white wreath hooked at the tip of its tail. "Auntie, I finally collected enough flowers, and I need to give the wreath to A-Yue as soon as possible."
Yan laughed, "You're still so young, and you're already thinking about these things."
"I'm not young anymore!" the crane protested. "Next year I'll be a full one hundred years old!"
Salt waved his hand, "Alright, go ahead."
The snow leopard wagged its tail and walked away.
Jiang Cheng picked up a flower that had fallen from the wreath and examined it.
The flower is very small, only about half the size of a fingernail. From the petals to the stamen, it is pure white without a single blemish. Dozens of petals overlap in a regular pattern, making it very delicate.
He asked, "What kind of flower is this?"
Salt explained, "In our language, this flower is called Viraji, which means undying love, and it only blooms in winter."
"Young people will collect vilaj and weave it into a garland to give to their loved ones as a token of their love."
"Oh, right, it also has a rather useless but very peculiar feature."
She touched the petal, infused it with a little demonic power, and then said, "Let it go."
As soon as Jiang Chengyi released his hand, the flower trembled and floated up, its petals shimmering with a barely perceptible light. After a dozen seconds, the light went out, and it fell back into Jiang Chengyi's palm.
“That’s how it is,” Salt said. “Veragi is very sensitive to demonic power; he floats up when he senses it.”
She told an interesting story: "More than a hundred years ago, the array around the territory underwent major repairs, and too much demonic energy dissipated. For those few days, the mountain was so bright it looked like it was on fire."
Jiang Cheng held the small flower in his palm, lost in thought.
It was noon when we returned, and the clan had prepared a sumptuous lunch for everyone.
Yu Miaomiao was exhausted after several days of traveling. She had spent the whole morning shopping and had little appetite. She ate a few bites and then returned to the temporary accommodation that Yan had prepared for them to rest.
She buried herself in the thick fur and sighed contentedly.
This is the best accommodation I've had in days. I don't need anything else; this quilt alone is enough to keep me warm.
only……
Yu Miaomiao turned over and looked at the empty other side—Jiang Chengyi was not by her side.
The power of habit is truly immense. Even though she had been sleeping alone for over a decade, after only a few days of sleeping with Jiang Chengyi, she felt unaccustomed to being apart from him.
During lunch, Jiang Cheng said that Xu Zhou had something to discuss with him and didn't know when he would be back.
Thinking this, Yu Miaomiao yawned and closed her eyes tightly.
She slept until sunset, and when she opened her eyes again, it was completely dark.
She twitched her ears and heard Xu Zhou's shouts not far away, probably still giving the demons physical examinations there.
Jiang Chengyi did not return.
A sense of disappointment flashed through her mind.
Just then, her phone chimed. She picked it up and saw a message from Jiang Cheng.
Come to the hillside during the day.
She replied: 【What is it?】
I'll let you know when we arrive.
Yu Miaomiao then got dressed and walked towards the hillside.
The hillside was only a few hundred meters from her residence, and she arrived quickly. She spotted the figure standing not far away at a glance.
She was about to call out "Jiang Chengyi" when the other person turned around as if they had heard her beforehand.
He said, "You've come."
Yu Miaomiao said, "Now can you tell me what it is?"
Jiang Cheng took her hand and walked towards the top of the grassy slope, saying, "I'm taking you on a date."
"Dating?"
Yu Miaomiao looked around at the barren hillside covered only with grass and asked in confusion, "Here?"
Jiang Cheng remained silent, walked all the way to the top, and picked up a jar.
"Here."
Yu Miaomiao looked at the jar, which was covered with a black cloth and looked very mysterious.
"What's this?"
Jiang Cheng said, "Open it and take a look."
She lifted the black cloth and saw a jar of bright stars. Without the cloth's restraint, the stars rushed out of the jar.
The stars in the altar seemed endless, scattered in the air, their light twinkling. She looked up and found that the entire hillside was filled with starlight, as if it had become a sea of stars under the night sky.
Yu Miaomiao caught a glimmer of light and realized that it wasn't a star, but Veragi—countless Veragi.
"Isn't it beautiful?"
Under the starlight, Jiang Chengyi's face was bathed in a hazy silver glow, exuding an unusual gentleness.
He said, "After hearing about the characteristics of this flower from Yan, I wanted to give you a surprise."
She clutched the Viraghi flower tightly. "How...how did you do that?"
Yan said that Viraji grows on a very distant mountain, and snow leopards always have to travel over mountains and rivers to collect it. How much effort did Jiang Chengyi spend collecting so many Viraji in one afternoon?
And how did they find so much demonic power?
"Look, the moon is out."
Jiang Cheng gestured for Yu Miaomiao to look up. The dark clouds had dispersed at some point, and the bright full moon cast its clear light, which shone brightly on the place, complementing the starlight of Villaji and making it as beautiful as a dream.
Yu Miaomiao looked up, gazing at the beautiful scenery, blinked hard, and said, "You..."
He only uttered one word before falling silent.
After a long while, she finally said, "It's beautiful, I like it very much."
"Thank you."
Jiang Cheng grabbed her shoulder, unusually serious: "You're not allowed to say thank you."
"This is what I want to do for you."
He hugged Yu Miaomiao, his voice lowering, "I should thank you."
"Thank you for accepting my surprise."
-
They lay in the grass watching the moon and the starry sky.
Jiang Chengyi's phone rang; it was a message from someone who had received the photos they had taken by the lake last time.
The two of them huddled together to watch.
The photos are in a slightly out of order, so the first one is of Yu Miaomiao looking at Jiang Chengyi with her eyebrows raised, her lips curled up, and her expression full of pride.
The expression is so vivid, it doesn't look like a photograph, but rather like a frozen moment from a memory.
The people in the photo look like they're about to come to life—Yu Miaomiao stares at the camera in surprise, while Jiang Cheng smiles where she can't see him.
The next few pictures show Yu Miaomiao looking at Jiang Chengyi with a slightly reproachful expression, while Jiang Chengyi looks completely innocent.
Yu Miaomiao thought she should have been angry at that time, but looking at the expression in the photo, she realized that her anger was not genuine, but rather accompanied by a faint smile.
So that's what my expression looked like back then...?
The corners of her mouth unconsciously turned up.
Then there are the first few photos I took.
It was just an ordinary tourist photo, but she found that she could actually sense subtle emotions beneath her expressionless face.
This one shows impatience, this one shows a bit of confusion, this one shows hesitation about whether or not to make a peace sign...
Looking at herself in the photo, Yu Miaomiao thought, "This... isn't quite what I expected."
"That's the purpose of taking photos."
Jiang Chengyi said, "It has no significance; it's just so that when we look back on it a long time later, we won't forget how we felt at that moment."
Yu Miaomiao finally flipped to the last photo. Looking at the two people in the picture, she asked him:
"And this one?"
In the photo, she is tying her hair up, and a few mischievous strands escape in the wind. She impatiently reaches out to catch them.
She assumed Jiang Chengyi was also tidying up his clothes or doing something else.
But she only realized now that at this moment, Jiang Chengyi had turned his head and was looking down at her.
His focus and purity were so intense, as if Yu Miaomiao before him was his entire world.
This was supposed to be preparation for taking a photo, but for some reason, the girl took the picture.
And so, this moment of tenderness was captured forever in the photograph.
Yu Miaomiao looked up and asked, "How did you feel when this photo was taken?"
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