Chapter 78
The plane arrived shortly afterward.
Just before the plane was about to land, Pei Huai gently woke Li Miao and patted her hat, reminding her boyfriend to tuck in his ears first.
Li Miao had just woken up from a nap and was still groggy, with a red mark on her face from the drawstring of her hoodie collar.
Pei Huai rubbed the red mark, then touched Li Miao's head. After checking her ears and putting them back in, he didn't immediately take off the hoodie.
If Li Miao is not fully awake yet, and she lets out her cat ears halfway through her walk and is noticed by passersby, that would be too troublesome.
"Okay, then I won't take off my hat," Li Miao said in a hoarse voice, looking completely half asleep.
"With Miaomiao like this, she'd probably be completely unaware of what happened if I sold her now." Pei Huai's dark eyes flashed with a helpless yet indulgent smile.
"If anyone's going to be sold, it'll be me selling you. You've been following me to Lingmao Mountain, which is deep in the mountains." Li Miao snorted lightly. It should be Pei Huai who's afraid; at most, he's just returning to his lair.
"Don't worry, your brother is still in my cousin's hands," Pei Huai joked.
"Hey, it's clearly your cousin in my brother's hands. My brother and I are big monsters."
"Awoo~" Li Miao opened her lips and imitated an animal's cry, "A great monster that can eat you up."
"I don't know why I was sucking on her so much yesterday that she was meowing." Pei Huai said as he led Li Miao to retrieve the checked luggage.
Li Miao walked behind the boy, and Pei Huai's simple words made Li Miao blush.
He only obediently lay there and let Pei Huai suck his belly because Pei Huai was playing games with him.
"If you say that again, I won't let you suck in your tummy next time," Li Miao snorted.
Pei Huai's Adam's apple bobbed slightly, and he immediately dared not speak any more recklessly, succumbing to the coercion and enticement of Master Meow Meow.
After leaving the airport, the two took a taxi directly to Lingmao Mountain and the village.
Pei Huai originally wanted to take a taxi directly to the village, but the round trip was quite far, and there were hardly any passengers on the return trip. Going there would not earn much money and would be a waste of time.
The driver initially intended to politely decline, but upon hearing that Pei Huai could add more money, he thought for a moment and agreed. He then placed the suitcase in the trunk of the car, and the two headed towards the village.
The road to the village is long and paved, so transportation is relatively convenient. But once you get close to the village, the paved road turns into a flat dirt road. Driving is fine if it's not raining, but if it rains and the car wheels are covered in mud, even fewer drivers will be willing to take your fare.
After getting off the bus and pulling his suitcase into the village, Pei Huai found that the environment was better than he had imagined. It wasn't a particularly poor village; every household had built a single-story house, and there was a small shop selling groceries at the village entrance, though it wasn't very big and couldn't be considered a small supermarket.
Moreover, Pei Huai wasn't the only outsider in the village.
During the midday rush alone, Pei Huai saw several private cars drive into the village, seemingly belonging to tourists.
"If they come to the village to play, we have places to fish, farmhouses, and places to sell firewood chickens. Their businesses are all doing well. Now that it's the National Day holiday, there are more tourists coming to the village every day than usual."
“If you come back with me for the Chinese New Year, you probably won’t see any tourists from other places,” Li Miao patiently explained to her boyfriend.
Pei Huai nodded.
"My grandma and I live at the foot of the mountain closest to Lingmao Mountain, but we still have to walk further in," Li Miao whispered to Pei Huai, pointing to the restroom.
"Because it makes it easier for you to hunt in the mountains?" Pei Huai asked.
“Right, you’re pretty smart, you guessed it right away. Besides, there are fewer villagers living inside, so when we occasionally turn back into cats, it won’t attract too much attention,” Li Miao continued.
Pei Huai chuckled: "I'm just guessing. I deduced the reason based on the actual situation."
Li Miao: "That's still just a guess."
Pei Huai raised his hand and vigorously ruffled Li Miao's head. "Smart humans don't argue with kittens."
Li Miao chuckled to herself, "You foolish humans, you can't possibly win an argument with a kitten."
Pei Huai's eyes flashed with a helpless smile. This little cat Li Miao should be spanked more often tonight for her fluffy, chubby little bottom. Look how wild she's become.
Along the way home with Li Miao, villagers kept greeting her, after all, in their eyes, Li Miao was a high-achieving student who had been admitted to university.
Li Miao smiled sweetly and greeted her uncles, aunts, grandparents, and other relatives.
I also ran into a group of children playing together, and they were calling out to Miaomiao "brother".
Li Miao took out the candies and chocolates she had bought in advance from her pocket and happily distributed them to everyone, asking them to say hello to Brother Pei Huai.
The group of kids who received the candy greeted Pei Huai in loud voices.
Pei Huai subconsciously wanted to offer them something, but when he checked his pockets, all he found was chewing gum and a box of mint chewing gum to freshen breath.
"This is all I have left, do you want it?" Pei Huai asked, holding out his hand.
This is candy, and no child would refuse it; they all happily said they wanted it.
Pei Huai breathed a sigh of relief, having managed to give what could be considered a small gift.
After the children dispersed, Pei Huai followed Li Miao further in and asked her why she hadn't told him beforehand that there were many children in the village and it would be best to bring some candy with him.
“Because I brought them, I brought so many, and I gave them all to them.” Li Miao blinked her eyelashes lightly, speaking very naturally.
Pei Huai is his boyfriend, and they're family, so it's fine if one of them carries the things.
"Oh, I see. I misunderstood Miaomiao." Pei Huai opened his arms and hugged Li Miao. "I'm sorry."
"Don't worry, don't worry, it's nothing." Li Miao didn't take it to heart at all, and even patted Pei Huai's back to comfort her boyfriend.
"Mm." Pei Huai nodded and released Li Miao.
On the way to Li Miao's house, Pei Huai also discovered something else: cats often appeared in the village.
In some courtyards, there is more than one cat. Some households keep three or four cats, while others keep only one.
Pei Huai suspected that the cat was playing inside the house and not in the yard since he didn't see it in the yard.
"So many people in your village love cats so much?" Pei Huai asked, looking at the roadside where several cats were gathered together, lying on the ground lazily basking in the sun, a warm and pleasant scene.
When Li Miao saw them, she called out the names of the cats one by one, squatted down and petted this one and that one.
The cats are very well-behaved, with warm and proactive personalities; not one of them was aggressive towards Li Miao.
However, Pei Huai guessed that Li Miao might be a cat by nature, and if he were replaced by another mountain lion, he might get caught.
Although the effects of the "curse" that the cat disliked him were gradually weakening, Pei Huai didn't dare to squat down and pet the cat recklessly, in case it still had an effect and scared the cat. So he just stood aside and watched.
He gently petted every single cat before stopping, patting his clothes to remove the cat hair clinging to him.
After saying goodbye to the cat, Li Miao continued to lead Pei Huai forward.
Under the warm midday sun, Li Miao explained why there were so many cats in the village: a long time ago, the village was called Lingmao Village, a name that came with Lingmao Mountain.
Legend has it that long ago, the village had fertile land and produced a lot of grain, but rats often caused trouble in groups, their numbers almost becoming an infestation. The villagers were also worried about the plague, so they caught wild cats from the mountains to help catch the rats.
Gradually, the villagers began to raise cats, and this custom continued to be passed down, becoming more and more fantastical. It was said that there was a spirit cat in the mountains who controlled the whole world and could bless the village with good weather and abundant harvests.
The names Lingmao Mountain and Lingmao Village were decided at some unknown time.
The name Lingmao Village was too eerie and supernatural, so it was changed to a more ordinary-sounding village name during the construction of the new society.
Lingmao Mountain will retain its original name.
The villagers live in harmony with the cats, and when the news spread online, many tourists wanted to visit this "cat village." As a result, the village gradually opened up agritainment businesses and other shops, and its overall economy is much stronger than that of other villages in the same city.
Children in every household grow up listening to stories told by the elders, and learn from a very young age to get along well with the cats in the village, so the villagers respect the cats very much.
"I see, so there's a story behind it." Pei Huai said, expressing his newfound knowledge. "But speaking of which, do the villagers know that you... are spirit cats?"
"And I heard from your brother that there's a special medicine that can relieve fever, and there's your experience too. The Spirit Cat isn't just from your Li family, is it?" Pei Huai said softly.
"Of course not only that, there are several families living next to us who are civets, but they are all older."
“There are very few young spirit cats in the new generation that can manifest human form.”
"If one lives on Lingmao Mountain absorbing the essence of the sun and moon, or frequently consumes rare and precious herbs, it might be easier to manifest a human form," Li Miao explained roughly.
"Anyway, it's all very complicated. I don't even know if I turned from a cat into a human or if I was born from a civet cat. My brother and I lived in the Civet Mountain when we were kittens, and only later did we live with our grandmother."
“I see, that does sound a bit complicated,” Pei Huai said. “Then what about those cats we encountered when we first entered the village…”
“Those are all real cats, the kind that haven’t developed intelligence,” Li Miao said.
"That's good. Otherwise, if I were to pet them tomorrow and they turned into humans older than me, it would be quite impolite."
"Haha, don't worry about that. You can pet any cat that roams outside."
"That puts my mind at ease." Pei Huai nodded.
Li Miao's lips were getting dry and chapped from talking, and she wanted to drink water. Fortunately, they had arrived at her grandmother's house.
"We're finally here! It's been such a long walk!" Li Miao stretched and called out her grandmother's name while still outside the courtyard.
"Grandma, Grandma, Miaomiao is back to see you!" Li Miao excitedly pushed open the door, and Pei Huai followed the boy into the courtyard.
Pei Huai quietly surveyed everything in the courtyard: there was a well, an old tree, stone benches and chairs under the tree, and firewood piled up in the yard.
Is it that you don't have gas for cooking, or you still cook with firewood?
Pei Huai's gaze shifted, and he indeed saw the makeshift stove set up directly in a corner of the yard.
There was no hint of disgust in his eyes; on the contrary, he was very curious about all of this, which he had never seen before.
He saw online that some people said that food cooked over a wood fire is delicious and flavorful, and he felt lucky to be able to try it today.
"Ah, Miaomiao, you and Pei Huai have finally arrived. Welcome, welcome." Grandma Li's voice came from the inner room before she even arrived.
A kind old woman with gray hair walked out. Judging from her superior bone structure and facial features, Grandma Li must have been a great beauty when she was young and in human form.
"Hello, Grandma Li, I'm Pei Huai. I've been visiting your home these past few days, sorry to bother you," Pei Huai greeted with a smile.
Yu Bao glanced at Pei Huai out of the corner of her eye; he was smiling so brightly.
This is completely different from the aloof and arrogant persona I saw when he first entered the school.
"Hello, little one, welcome to my home. As for calling, it's no trouble at all. The food is ready, please put your suitcase down and come in to eat," Grandma Li greeted him warmly.
Li Miao pulled Pei Huai inside and told him not to be polite.
After putting away their suitcases, Pei Huai and Li Miao washed their hands at the tap in the yard before sitting down to eat.
The food was clearly fresh from the pot, still steaming hot. Sitting at the table, Pei Huai's nostrils were filled with the aroma of the food.
"Wow, Grandma, all the dishes you made look so delicious." Li Miao didn't know where to start cooking.
The menu includes steamed mandarin fish, freshly killed braised chicken, dried silverfish, stir-fried lettuce with sliced pork, stir-fried river shrimp, braised pork trotters with green beans, stir-fried green vegetables, and a yellow croaker and tofu soup.
Pei Huai couldn't help but smile slightly when he saw the dishes.
No wonder there are two cats; they made three fish dishes and one shrimp dish.
The thought of the pure white, heterochromatic-eyed lion cat he had seen long ago cooking for him by the stove with a spatula made Pei Huai's heart flutter with cuteness.
"If Miaomiao likes it, eat more. If you don't know what to eat, then have a small yellow croaker first." Grandma Li put a small yellow croaker into Li Miao's bowl, and then asked Pei Huai what he wanted to eat, and she put some food on his plate.
“Everything is delicious and plentiful, so let’s start with a piece of free-range chicken. Grandma, you can have some too. I’ll just pick up the food myself,” Pei Huai said with a smile.
"Alright, little one, eat more. Grandma makes a lot of food, so don't be shy." Grandma Li ladled herself a bowl of fish soup and drank it first.
“Okay,” Pei Huai said. He really didn’t stand on ceremony and ate as usual. Because his grandmother’s cooking was delicious, Pei Huai ate even more than usual.
And before she knew it, Li Miao had eaten until her little belly was round and full.
There were some dishes that couldn't be finished, so they could be saved for dinner. Therefore, when cleaning up the dishes, we would only clean up the rice bowls and chopsticks. This time, Pei Huai was really embarrassed to let his grandmother run around again, so he offered to wash the dishes and chopsticks.
"Why don't you sit and play with Miaomiao for a while? You're a guest that Miaomiao brought back, so there's no reason for a guest to wash dishes. Don't let my white hair fool you, I'm still in good health."
Grandma Li said in a serious tone, "My hair isn't all white, it's just that my hair is gray. Actually, I'm not that old."
Pei Huai almost couldn't hold back and burst out laughing in front of Grandma Li.
"Alright, you all rest, Miaomiao, go wash the dishes." With lightning speed, Li Miao snatched the dishes and chopsticks that were supposed to be cleaned up and took them to wash.
For a time, only Pei Huai and his grandmother were in the room.
In the courtyard, several chickens clucked and wandered around, occasionally lowering their heads to pick up insects to eat.
Grandma Li first asked about Pei Huai's studies and family. After exchanging a few pleasantries, she then thanked him for helping Li Miao with her online tutoring for the past three months.
"If it weren't for you, my teacher, Miaomiao would have cried," Grandma Li said.
"It was just a coincidence. Li Xuan and my cousin are very good friends, and that's how they contacted me," Pei Huai said modestly.
Grandma Li: "You've put in a lot of effort, otherwise our little silly cat Miaomiao would have had a very hard time with the exam."
"Grandma, you're not allowed to secretly call me a silly little cat!"
As soon as Li Miao returned from the kitchen and entered the house, he heard his grandmother pointing out his shortcomings. The little cat was furious and about to bristle!
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