【01】
“I think Li Duidui definitely likes you.”
Li Peipei, while eating grilled chicken wings, said to me, "Last time when you were downstairs talking and chatting with your old classmate, I saw him standing at the entrance of the stairwell with his arms crossed, staring at that old classmate with an unfriendly expression for a long time."
I dipped the brush into soy sauce and painted it on the skewers while grilling them. I glanced at her and said, “Your sense of romance has never been right. I don’t believe you.”
Although Li Peipei is Li Duidui’s sister, because she’s a bit lacking in the brains department, I’ve never trusted her instincts.
Even though… they’re both vampires.
"I also think Li Duidui likes you." The mermaid Meimei, sprawled out by the fish pond, grabbed a grilled fish and started eating.
I stared at her with disdain. "Meimei, do mermaids also eat fish?"
"Sharks also eat fish, why don’t you question that?”
What she said made so much sense that I couldn't think of anything else to say for a moment. I could only retort with, "Eat less, look how fat you've become. Even sharks don't have hips as wide as yours."
"Don't try to change the subject." Undeterred, she lazily swayed her fishtail. "Last time I saw Li Duidui waiting for you at the bus stop. When it was drizzling, he even gave you his big black umbrella. What kind of person is our landlord? Would he be nice to just anyone?"
"Yeah, it'd be nice if he didn't stab you in the back, let alone be nice to you? Or give you an umbrella?" Li Peipei bit off a piece of meat, chewing as she echoed Meimei's words, "If he doesn't have feelings for you, could it be that he's changed his nature? That probability is probably even smaller than the sky falling."
"He gave me the umbrella because I didn't have one, and he left immediately after giving it to me." I explained, "You guys are overthinking it. You two are the biggest gossip mongers in the whole building."
"I... I also think the land... Landlord likes you."
A timid voice came from the side. I turned my head and saw the werewolf, Xiao Lang, squatting in the corner with a grilled corn in his hand.
After saying just one sentence, his entire face had already turned red with shyness. Seeing me look at him, he became even more embarrassed, lowered his head, hugged the corn, and muttered like a mosquito, "Didn't you two... meet because of me?"
Yes, I met Li Duidui because of Xiao Lang.
On that full moon night… although in a city like Chongqing, there are rarely times when you can see the moon on a full moon night, that doesn't stop Xiao Lang, as a werewolf, from transforming into a wolf.
Nor does it stop him, in his wolf form, from snatching my only rations.
For the first twenty-three years of my life, I lived smoothly, plainly, going to school, falling in love, experiencing heartbreak, graduating, and then starting to do what I loved, drawing comics.
Unfortunately, I might not be a very interesting person, so the editor's evaluation of me was, "Your drawing skills are good, but the content is too boring." That period was almost the lowest point of my life.
Heartbreak, unemployment, not being understood by my parents, no friends to encourage me, my dream was like a daydream, reality was a mess, and the future was bleak.
I used my last remaining money to buy rations for the last week. I thought that after getting through this week, when the lease was up, after eating these rations, I would go back and accept my parents' arrangements, and honestly become someone who 'does real work'.
But I never expected that, in such circumstances, my last rations would be snatched away…
And snatched away by a werewolf.
I didn't hesitate when I chased after him, with only one thought in my mind: I absolutely can't let my food fall into someone else's hands!
Even if I only had one week left to pursue my dream, I would persevere until the very last minute!
The rations, I absolutely couldn't lose them!
The terrain of the mountain city is quite strange. The "person" who snatched my rations was running on the flat ground below, and I was running on the flat ground one level higher. Seeing that he was about to turn a corner and run to a place I couldn't reach, I gritted my teeth, closed my eyes, and risked my life, leaping down from above.
When I hugged the "person" who snatched my things, I realized that something seemed wrong.
This "person"...
Had such broad shoulders, so much fur...
I jumped down from above, hanging on his neck, the pulling causing a tearing pain in my arm muscles, but he didn't even move a step.
I smelled a wild beast scent on him. I felt him slowly turn his head to stare at me hanging on his back. His dark green eyes were sinister and terrifying, and the fangs at the corners of his lips were exaggerated and striking…
A demon… a monster?
Before he could speak, I slapped him across the face with a loud “smack,” forcing his turned head to snap back.
"Ah! Help!" I scrambled to get off him, then ran to the side, picking up stones from the ground to throw at him as I ran. I screamed, "Help! There's a monster!"
The “monster” whimpered pitifully and, surprisingly, didn’t chase after me.
But I was only thinking about escaping, running ten meters in panic, when I suddenly felt someone grab me by the back of my collar, lifting me up like a chicken.
The person in front of me had blond hair, wore gold-rimmed glasses, and was dressed in a suit and tie. He held me in one hand and had the other in his pocket, with an impatient and disgusted expression on his face. "Hey, you scared my pet."
I stared blankly at the person in front of me, then turned my head to look at the monster over there.
Pet?
That nearly two-meter-tall monster with broad shoulders, a narrow waist, covered in fur, and erect ears was his pet? I couldn't understand the situation, and what I couldn't understand even more was that when the monster saw this man, the look behind his furry face suddenly changed.
He grabbed a handful of the chocolates from my plastic bag and stuffed them into his mouth without even tearing off the wrappers.
"Tsk." The man holding me clicked his tongue. The hand in his pocket finally came out, and I saw a golden chain shoot out from his fingertips like an arrow, wrapping around the monster's mouth like a snake, pulling his head back, thus interrupting his chocolate-eating action.
"Ugh!" The monster wanted to speak, but his mouth was bound by the chain, and he couldn't say anything.
The man exerted more force in his hand, pulling the monster over fiercely. He fell like a mountain with a "thud" at the man's feet. "How many times have I told you? You werewolves shouldn't eat chocolate casually. It'll kill you."
I watched this somewhat fantastical scene with wide eyes, feeling like my brain couldn't keep up for a moment.
But setting aside everything else, I only had one question at this moment: "Isn't it dogs that die from eating chocolate? Wolves too? Werewolves too?"
The blond-haired glasses man turned his head to look at me, narrowing his eyes. "As a human, you have a lot of courage."
As soon as he said this, the mountain-like werewolf on the ground, as if throwing a tantrum like a child, struggled to get up and pushed the blond man, the force of which sent the blond man straight towards the nearby steps.
The blond man was holding me, so I also fell towards the nearby steps. I closed my eyes tightly, thinking that with such great force, my head would hit the stone steps and my brains would be splattered everywhere!
But the expected pain didn't come.
I only felt someone's hand caress the back of my head before I fell to the ground, then turn me around while holding me.
I landed on someone and crashed into someone’s… lips.
I opened my eyes and met the blond man's gaze.
I felt that my mouth was cut, and blood was flowing out, staining his originally light-colored lips red. It was this touch of red that made even his eyes look brighter and sharper.
I didn't quite understand his gaze. I only raised my head slightly, realizing that we had fallen onto the steps in a very ambiguous position, me on top, him below.
One of his hands was pressing against the back of my head, the other… unfortunately, was awkwardly bracing against my chest.
"Ah!"
I let out a yelp, scrambled to my feet, stumbled back two steps, and stood there clutching my chest. I stared at him in shock, then at the nearby “monster,” and then back at him.
He then sat up from the steps, stuck the tip of his tongue out, and slowly, very slowly and oddly, licked the blood off his lips. He went still, and for a while, he just sat there with his head down for a while. For some reason, I saw him taking a few deep breaths. Then he looked up, his gaze passing directly over me, staring at the werewolf behind me. "I went out for a meeting, and you caused a mess for me."
The werewolf trembled all over. "I... I... I really can't control myself after I turn into this! I really want to eat chocolate!"
Me: "..."
I'm sorry, I'm so poor, but I was greedy, so I bought a few more chocolates. I'm really sorry that I made you crave them!
At this point, I seriously suspected I’d run into a fake werewolf…
"Go back and stay in confinement."
The blond spoke, stood up, and with a turn of his hand, the iron chain that had fallen on the ground automatically wound itself into his palm. The chain had already slipped from his mouth to his neck when the werewolf was struggling, but the blond didn't untie it. He took two steps while holding him like that. As the werewolf passed by me, the blond man suddenly paused.
"Hmm?" He turned his head back on the steps and glanced at the werewolf.
The werewolf looked at him eagerly. "What's wrong?"
"Carry her away."
"Carry her?"
"Carry me?" I was stunned.
"She saw your true form. Carry her away."
I turned to look at the werewolf. He scratched his head, full of scary long fur, looking like a menace. “Sorry about this.”
Then, he swung his palm, and my world plunged into darkness.
When I woke up, I was living in this eight-story old residential building. I learned that the blond was named Li Duidui. He was a vampire, the kind of powerful vampire who could go out during the day. He was also the owner of this building, and this building was only rented to these legendary demons and monsters…
Except for me.
When Xiao Lang isn't a werewolf, he is a thin and weak boy, very shy, even cowardly. He glanced at me and continued, "That day, the day you met, Landlord locked me in confinement after catching me back."
"Of course, he locked me in my room. There's a big mirror in my room. After Landlord locked me in the iron cage, he stood in front of the mirror in a daze for a while." Xiao Lang lowered his head and said quietly, "He even touched his mouth..."
I suddenly remembered that chaotic touch that day, which couldn't even be considered a kiss. Li Duidui, as a vampire, wouldn't… still care about that, would he?
While I was still pondering this matter, I suddenly heard the door on the roof being pushed open with a "bang."
Li Duidui, who always has a cold expression, stood there. "How many times have I told you?" He squinted his eyes, looking annoyed. "No barbecuing on the roof."