Chapter Twenty-Seven
-Xiao Lan-
Shaohan and I went to Hokkaido on a long-term mission. When we came back, the new first-year students had already been enrolled for a while.
"Honestly, why do I feel like we've missed a lot of the main storyline?" Shaohan said. "How come time is flying by? This long-term mission is taking way too long! It's a good thing we're both capable that it's taken this long even with just the two of us handling it. If it were given to Maki Panda, what would happen?"
"Not bad. It's quite impressive that we managed to eliminate two cunning, gang-related level-one cursed spirits in just a few months." I patted her shoulder symbolically. "Besides, this is what they mean by 'with great power comes great responsibility.' Moreover, with him here, the main storyline should be on our side."
As I spoke, I gestured with my lip toward the monkey doll sitting on my shoulder.
Yes, you guessed it, the monkey doll sitting on my shoulder is indeed Xia Youjie.
On December 31st, on our way to the mall to shop, Shaohan, Deng Xiqi, and I happened to encounter Xia Youjie's spirit wandering in a small alley. Because Shaohan told us about the shocking conspiracy she had just learned, we decided to resurrect Xia Youjie.
Finally arriving at Xia Youjie's body, they were shocked to discover that it had already been stolen. Because a soul cannot be resurrected after a week in the outside world, and because Xia Youjie stubbornly refused to accept being in a normal human body... With the week countdown fast approaching, Shaohan ultimately offered up her beloved monkey doll...
This is the whole story of why Xia Youjie ended up inside the monkey doll. If you want to know the specifics of what happened, please go back to chapters one through five.
"But this is really not right. Do the math. It's late June or early July now, and we started our business trip at the end of April. We've been on business trips for almost two months, nearly three months!"
"Oh, three months! Three months!" Shaohan began to imitate the British accent she had recently been watching. "You know what, darling, these past three months, I have no idea how my lovely little darlings in the dorm have managed without me."
You might hear Angela say that, but don't mistake her "cute little baby" for something actually cute. Angela's pet aesthetic is quite unique; her "cute little baby" isn't a cuddly kitten or a loyal puppy, but rather a spider with webs hanging all over the room.
...And that wasn't even a small spider, it was a huge one. Can you imagine? That spider was as big as my thumbnail!
“At least we didn’t have to go on business trips as long as You Tai, right? Don’t forget, You Tai is still pitifully wandering around alone abroad.” I shuddered and immediately banished the image of Shao Han’s pet spider from my mind. “Besides, didn’t we leave Xiao Hua with Teacher Wu before we left, asking him to take good care of her?”
—Little Flower is the name of that pet spider.
"Do you believe that Gojo Satoru will take good care of Hana, or do you believe that I am the new emperor?" Shaohan rolled her eyes at me. "If I wasn't worried that Hana would get carsick from running around with me, I would have taken Hana away long ago! Let's go, I can't wait to see my little darling!"
As for Xia Youjie, he didn't participate in my conversation with Shaohan at all—I guess he might have developed some kind of psychological trauma from Xiaohua, after all, when Shaohan first got Xiaohua, Xiaohua chased Xia Youjie, a monkey doll, all over the house. After that incident, Xia Youjie also refused to stay in Shaohan's room anymore.
We rushed back to the college, and on the way, Shaohan even "accidentally" ran a few traffic lights.
"Then I'll go see my little baby first!" After quickly counting out a wad of cash for the taxi driver, Shaohan winked at me, waved goodbye, and then turned and rushed towards Teacher Wu's dormitory building without looking back.
"..."
Okay, so what should we do now?
My dear partner abandoned me, leaving me alone to wander through the vast campus. I patted my rumbling stomach and decided to head to the cafeteria for a hearty meal.
It wasn't mealtime, and besides the cook, I was the only other person in the cafeteria. I scribbled on the menu for ages, then handed the messy pencil drawing back to the cook, ignoring her astonished expression. I hummed a tune and happily waited for lunch to start.
It's not that I have a big appetite; I think I just eat a normal amount, far less than Deng Xiqi—she's the real big eater! It's just that the portion size here is too small, not even enough to fill a tooth gap. I don't know how Ji and You Tai, who only eat one portion each time, manage to fill their stomachs.
Xia Youjie's eyes twitched slightly: "Why did you order so much again?"
"Ah, because the portions here are very small." I poured myself a bowl of miso soup to fill my stomach. "Would you like some?"
Xia Youjie shook his head, indicating his refusal.
After filling my stomach, I hummed a song and happily waited for dinner to start. Just as I was propping my head up in my seat, thinking about how much delicious food I would get to eat, suddenly everything went black, and a pair of large hands quickly covered my mouth. The next second, I found myself in a completely unfamiliar space.
I recognized those hands immediately—it was Teacher Wu. But Teacher Wu wasn't in the dormitory at this hour, nor was he teaching first-year students, nor was he on a mission. Why would he come and kidnap me if he had nothing better to do?
"Teacher Wu?" I lowered my voice. "What are you doing here? Shaohan just came to your dorm looking for you."
"And where is this?" I tilted my head. "I was just waiting for my meal in the cafeteria..."
As for Xia Youjie, who had been sitting on my shoulder the whole time, his body stiffened completely the moment Teacher Wu appeared, and he began to pretend to be a perfectly normal monkey doll.
"Xiao Lan—" Teacher Wu deliberately dragged out the last syllable, holding a transparent plastic box in her hand. Inside lay Xiao Hua, whose fate was unknown and who had been turned into a spider pancake. "Please save your teacher!"
I:"……"
Me: "...Wow!"
I forced a gasp from my throat, and all the words I wanted to say finally condensed into one sentence: "You... does Shaohan know about this?"
Xia Youjie slightly curled the corners of his mouth, seemingly lamenting that the thing that had been chasing him all over the house had been turned into an inanimate object by his best friend. However, he quickly regained the stiffness that a doll should have, with only the constantly trembling fur revealing that he had not been able to hide his smile.
Teacher Wu's six eyes were really cheating. I was afraid he would notice something, so I picked up the monkey doll and stuffed it into my pocket.
"So, Xiao Lan," Teacher Wu suddenly brought the plastic box closer to me, her six eyes shining brightly behind her black eye patch, "only you can save Teacher now! If she finds out that I killed Xiao Hua, who knows what kind of weird talismans she'll put on Teacher!"
"No, can you explain how Xiaohua died?" I said with a pained expression, squatting down to look at the horrific scene inside the plastic box. "Did you step on it when you let it out to run around?"
“It’s worse than that,” Teacher Wu said. “It crawled out of the box while I was sleeping and then climbed onto my bed. When I turned over in my sleep…”
"..." I repeated with difficulty, "You mean, Xiaohua somehow jumped out of the plastic box and somehow climbed onto your bed, trying to get herself killed? Listen to me, Teacher Wu, you must never keep pets again—the peerless and number one Teacher Wu can even turn a spider into a pancake, who would believe that if word got out?"
"That's why I came here to ask you for help." Teacher Wu patted me with a grin. "Let's go and buy an identical spider together to return to Shaohan!"
I'm starving! Who wants to go with Teacher Wu to buy this horrible creature for Shaohan? Besides, this has nothing to do with me! I tried to argue: "I just ordered food at the cafeteria... and I haven't even eaten yet..."
"Be a little firmer." Xia Youjie nudged me discreetly from his pocket, offering advice—I guess he didn't want to go with Teacher Wu either, since he'd have to pretend to be an ordinary doll for as long as Teacher Wu and I were out together.
"I'll treat you to a meal," Teacher Wu said with a wave of her hand. "I heard a new Sichuan restaurant just opened in the mall next door..."
I:"!"
With Sichuan food available, who would want to eat the small portions in the cafeteria? I blinked my starry eyes, raised my hand instantly, and declared righteously, "Let's go, Teacher Wu! Sichuan food doesn't matter, the main thing is that I like helping others, I like helping to buy these amazing eight-legged creatures!"
Teacher Wu: "..."
Xia Youjie: "..."
Teacher Wu suddenly revealed a mysterious smile.
"If we're talking about buying small pets—though spiders probably don't count as pets—then of course we should go to the flower, bird, insect, and fish market!" I started scrolling through my phone's navigation. "The nearest flower, bird, insect, and fish market to the Spellcasting Academy is..."
"...Wait, you don't have this here?"
“There isn’t such a market as you mentioned.” Gojo Satoru tapped my phone screen with his finger. “However, there is a special market in the world of jutsu that is used for trading. You can get any kind of toad, let alone an ordinary little spider.
Is that amazing?
I instantly became interested. Just as I was about to nod, the monkey plush toy in my pocket suddenly gave me a light kick. Xia Youjie was reminding me that the place was very chaotic, and even with Teacher Wu accompanying me, taking such a "living thing" there was really... risky.
"A two-legged toad?" Reminded by Xia Youjie, I started shaking my head frantically. "We're only buying one spider, understand? Just an ordinary little spider."
"So we'll just go to the regular market instead."
"Then let's go to the reptile house in Shinjuku." Teacher Wu rested her hand on her chin. "They have a pretty complete selection of spider species there. Maybe we can find one that looks exactly like Xiaohua."
...Imagination is beautiful, but reality is harsh.
Teacher Wu and I spent a long time in the reptile house, but we didn't see a single spider that looked exactly like Xiaohua, let alone one the same size. That makes sense, though. Xiaohua was just an ordinary spider that Shaohan and I found by chance while cleaning; we didn't even know if it was poisonous. It wasn't a particularly large species, so how did it end up in a reptile house in Shinjuku that specializes in selling spiders?
"Then..." I blinked, looking around for a spider that looked exactly like Xiaohua, but to no avail. So I started to come up with some bad ideas. "Why don't you buy the biggest spider here and just tell Shaohan that her Xiaohua spider is a multi-faceted creature that changes shape as it grows."
I meant it as a joke, but Teacher Wu took it seriously. He put his hand on his chin and thought for a long time: "Then let's say it's that black spider that we saw when we came in, almost as big as the palm of our hand."
I:"……"
I can already picture the scene when Teacher Wu goes back home, and Shaohan stares in disbelief at the "little cutie" in her plastic box, asking, "No, is this really my little flower?"
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