novelraw Chapter 168
Chapter 168
Chapter 168: Do you like it like this?（4.2K）
Xia Li washed his face and came out of the bathroom.
Compared to the red ink stains on his face, Wuqi had completely become a ‘calico cat’.
His black and white body was covered with red and blue patches, and even some deep purple where the two inks mixed together.
Xia Li had originally wanted to dye Wuqi with tiger stripes, but he messed up.
Instead of a tiger, he had dyed a monster.
“It looks pretty fierce though.”
Xia Li chopped the kitchen knife in his hand and turned to comfort Wuqi.
Wuqi looked at his reflection in the glass and surprisingly didn’t dislike Xia Li’s handiwork.
Maybe he was ugly in the eyes of humans, but in the eyes of cats, he was definitely invincible. The kind that looks intimidating.
『I used to vomit when I looked in the mirror because I was tired of my own face. Now I feel like this cat face is quite handsome, already one-tenth as handsome as my human body. 』
“Meow!” Wuqi’s excited meow echoed in the kitchen.
“……”
Xia Li thought to himself, it’s dangerous when you have that kind of thought.
Since you already know how to appreciate your own appearance, it’s not just your body that’s becoming beastly, but your mind too, right?
Beastfall?
He turned back and focused on cutting vegetables.
There were still some ‘good treasures’ that Mrs. Fang brought over two days ago in the refrigerator.
Xia Li grabbed a handful of red and green herbs, chopped them up, and mixed them with chili oil and seasonings.
A faint fishy smell filled the air, but if you smelled carefully, you could detect a hint of fragrance.
Lucia stood at the doorway, arms crossed, supervising.
It had only been half an hour since she last saw the Brave Hero, and he had already dyed himself like this.
He said it was dangerous to leave a dragon at home, but in Lucia’s opinion, leaving the Brave Hero at home was also quite dangerous.
Sniffing with her nose, Lucia smelled the fishy odor but only thought it was the smell left by the carp from earlier.
She walked over, took the dishcloth, and rubbed it on Xia Li’s face.
“Xia Li, you’ve become a calico cat!”
“Be gentle, my skin is thin.”
Xia Li busied himself with his hands, extending his neck for Lucia to wipe his face.
“Meow…”
Wuqi gave him a disdainful look and strutted off to the living room to play with Mianhua.
Then Xia Li started cooking again, stir-frying a dish of tomatoes and eggs.
Just then, the light on the rice cooker went off, and Lucia went to serve the rice while Xia Li was in charge of serving the dishes.
Three dishes and a soup were quickly prepared. This configuration of fish and vegetables could be considered a sumptuous meal for their family.
Xia Li served Wuqi a bowl of carp meat.
A man has to keep his word. Wuqi had been staring at him for a long time, his eyes as if he was looking at a fish.
Mianhua meowed, wanting to try a bite, but Wuqi swatted her away with his paw.
『You’re still young and can’t spit out fish bones. When you grow into a big cat, you can let your owner cook it for you every day… Remember to share a bite with me then, hehehe. 』
Wuqi lectured Mianhua, patting her head.
Xia Li ignored the two cats, focusing his attention on the evil dragon across the table.
“Try this herb, it’s a specialty of the Sichuan region.”
He picked up a white root and placed it in Lucia’s bowl.
He had wanted her to try it before, but he never had the chance.
Mrs. Fang understood him, knowing he loved this, and brought him a big bag a few days ago. Xia Li couldn’t finish it all by himself.
“As the old… girlfriend of a Sichuan man, for the sake of future family harmony, I think you need to get acquainted with it.” Xia Li said seriously.
Lucia held her chopsticks and struggled to pick up the suspicious root.
She brought it close to her nose and sniffed. The strong fishy smell made her eyes water.
“It stinks… It’s poisonous!”
“It’s not poisonous, it’s not poisonous,” Xia Li knew the dragon would say that. “It won’t attack people, and it’s also anti-inflammatory when eaten. It’s very beneficial for both human and dragon bodies.”
Lucia looked at him dubiously.
This might be the worst food Lucia had ever eaten on Earth.
It was even more terrifying than cola.
She only took one bite and swallowed it as quickly as possible.
As long as she swallowed fast enough, the stinky taste wouldn’t catch up with her…
“How is it? Is it delicious?” Xia Li waited for the evil dragon’s answer with some anticipation.
“……”
The evil dragon didn’t speak, silently picking up a piece of tofu to eat, trying to cover up the taste in her mouth.
『You actually made a giant dragon from another world eat Houttuynia cordata…』
Wuqi on the side was shocked.
“The tofu in this is delicious.”
Lucia ate the tofu with gusto, deliberately changing the subject so as not to dampen the Brave Hero’s expectations.
Xia Li rolled up his sleeves, wanting to pick up another piece of the herb and put it in the evil dragon’s bowl.
The evil dragon immediately roared, “I can’t eat anymore!”
Xia Li smiled.
“Just say it if you don’t like it, okay?”
Lucia poked the rice with her chopsticks and nodded slightly.
“I know…”
It was only because she didn’t want to disappoint the Brave Hero’s expectations, otherwise, she wouldn’t even swallow it.
“In the future, no matter what you don’t like, you have to say it. You have to learn to refuse.”
“You should do that when you meet other humans outside, and you should do the same with me.” Xia Li said.
Before this, Xia Li had taught Lucia how to accept human kindness, how to distinguish between good and bad people, and how to fight back when encountering bad people.
But there was one thing he hadn’t taught Lucia: how to refuse.
This dragon was too silly and too stupid. At least for Xia Li, Lucia could never say no to him.
Xia Li was fooling around, but sometimes it was important to understand Lucia’s needs.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t be able to determine where the boundaries were between him and Lucia.
“Refuse if you don’t like it. It’s everyone’s right,” Xia Li paused and added, “It’s also your right as a girl.”
“……”
Lucia looked at him blankly.
She seemed to have never thought about this kind of question.
Refuse the Brave Hero?
Where to begin?
Looking at the strange green herbs that Xia Li picked up with his chopsticks and handed over, Lucia thought for a moment and still opened her mouth.
She had no reason to refuse the Brave Hero’s feeding.
“Ah~”
Xia Li retracted his chopsticks.
“Are you a stupid dragon?”
“Huh?”
“I told you to refuse me!”
“Xia Li, is this some strange hobby of yours?” Lucia asked innocently.
Xia Li’s nose was crooked with anger.
He was trying to teach the dragon how to be a human, what was she thinking about him?
“You said I wouldn’t refuse, but I’m only like this to you…” Lucia softened her voice.
Xia Li’s crooked nose returned to the center.
Thinking about it, Lucia treated other humans like a flower on a high mountain, naturally carrying an aloof and distant air.
Looking quietly at the dragon in front of him who would accept anything he did, Xia Li ate the Houttuynia cordata from his chopsticks.
Would accept anything he did?
He hoped that Lucia would choose to accept everything willingly after understanding the meaning of all human behavior.
Instead of agreeing to everything without reservation from the beginning.
He should bully her less in the future.
After eating a couple of bites of fish, he picked up two more pieces of tofu and put them in his bowl. Xia Li served Lucia some soup.
Today’s carp and tofu soup was stewed milky white, the tofu was tender, and the fish was fragrant.
Xia Li used to have no confidence in his cooking skills.
Firstly, he had been deeply poisoned by the food in the other world. Secondly, he used to live alone and never pursued a high quality of life.
Now that Lucia had barged into his life, she made Xia Li start to pay attention to enjoying life.
“Eat more, eat more to gain weight, so you can develop more.”
◈◈◈
He placed a small bowl of soup in front of her, and Lucia blew on it twice before drinking it.
“Xia Li, your cooking skills are already half as good as mine!” Lucia praised generously, finding it delicious.
Xia Li had no objection to her heavily watered-down statement.
“Oh, right.”
Speaking of ‘development’, it reminded Lucia of something else.
“There are many pictures of ‘well-developed’ people in your computer folders.”
“Cough,”
Xia Li almost choked on a piece of tofu.
When Lucia said the words ‘well-developed’, she clearly emphasized them.
He wiped his face, and his cheeks, mixed with tofu crumbs and red ink, looked comical.
Lucia’s expression was serious, and her gaze made Xia Li wary.
Impossible.
He had hidden all the folders.
With Lucia’s limited computer skills, she couldn’t have opened them.
“You still like those fluffy tails, don’t you?” the evil dragon questioned.
Xia Li felt guilty and explained himself.
“In the human world, apart from normal human girls, there are also anthropomorphized animals… Compared to scaled animals, the most common ones are foxes and cats, so this is just survivor bias.”
After they had almost finished their meal, Xia Li dragged the evil dragon to the computer to prove his innocence.
Lucia casually picked up Little Cotton, who was lying at her feet, and held her in her arms.
As she walked, she teased Little Cotton and kept saying.
“Cotton, stay away from the Brave Hero in the future.”
“Meow?”
“You’re in danger.”
Xia Li: “…”
Even if he liked that kind of thing, he wouldn’t do anything to a cat, would he?
Arriving at the computer, Xia Li finally understood what the evil dragon meant by folders.
It turned out to be the ‘Reference Materials’ on the desktop.
If Lucia had opened his browsing history, Xia Li would have had no way to explain himself.
But these things were indeed work-related.
“None of the pictures in here are explicit!” Xia Li pointed to the folder and said.
The evil dragon was stunned: “You have explicit ones??”
“……I don’t.”
Xia Li instantly wilted.
It turned out to be a misunderstanding.
He was the one who jumped to conclusions, thinking that the evil dragon had seen something terrible, but it was just this?
“You know, for my Record of Experiences, I will write settings into the book, and in order to improve the settings, illustrations are essential.”
As he spoke, Xia Li opened his AI image generation software.
“The things in these folders are all reference materials. I use them to let the AI generate images.”
After learning that Lucia had only seen these, Xia Li wasn’t panicked at all and even casually generated an image for her to see.
Lucia glanced at it, she didn’t understand it anyway.
However, when the so-called AI image generation software opened.
The residual image information from the last time was displayed.
“Huh?”
Something white flashed by.
Lucia only took one look, and Xia Li closed it at lightning speed.
“What?”
“Nothing…”
“I saw silver dragon horns.”
“No, no, there’s nothing there.”
Xia Li directly chose to shut down the computer.
No matter how thick his skin was, it was a bit awkward at this moment.
Fortunately, there was still red ink on his face that hadn’t been washed off, otherwise, his emotions would definitely be exposed.
There were hundreds of pictures of silver dragon girls in the software records.
Rather than girls, they should be called ‘women’.
In order to recreate the image of Lucia in her prime from his memory, Xia Li tried it a few times with AI.
And they were all the kind with the age restriction lifted.
Each one was well-proportioned and voluptuous, with a cold and arrogant expression, two parts disgust, three parts shyness, and five parts tenderness.
Of course, these were only for him to secretly look at.
He didn’t expect to be caught red-handed by Lucia herself.
I just couldn’t help but imagine, I just crave my girlfriend, so what!
Xia Li looked up at Lucia standing in front of him.
Compared to when she first arrived on Earth, she had grown a little taller, and there were some curves in her previously barren figure.
But she was still short, small, with a pretty face that revealed innocence and cuteness.
She seemed to have nothing to do with the pictures on the computer, but only Xia Li knew.
She was gradually approaching the image of the Silver Dragon Queen in his memory…
“Is that me?”
Lucia was still frowning, she was sure of the image she had just seen.
“That’s not it.” Xia Li shook his head rapidly.
“Then, is it another silver dragon? You’re peeking at other dragons.”
Lucia’s clear amber eyes showed sadness.
“No, no, no, I remembered wrong, that’s you, I was using the computer to recreate your previous appearance.”
Xia Li felt that the misunderstanding would only grow if this continued.
Even if he just glanced at another female creature, Lucia would get jealous.
If she found out he was secretly generating images of other dragons behind her back, this little jealous girl would probably explode.
As he explained, he opened his phone and showed Lucia two less explicit pictures.
“See, based on the word commands composed of your physical characteristics, I’ve tried my best to get close, but AI technology is limited, so it’s still a bit off…”
‘Buzz’
Just as he was explaining, Lucia had just glanced at it when Xia Li’s phone vibrated.
The caller ID showed ‘Courier’.
Xia Li immediately changed the subject and said, “Oh, the reference books I bought the other day have arrived. Didn’t I say I was planning to open a pet hospital? My parents suggested I try to get a veterinary license first, that’s considered the entry level…”
He pressed the answer button, and a rough voice came from the phone.
“Hello, your delivery has arrived. I see you have door-to-door delivery service for this order. Is anyone home now? I’ll bring it up to you.”
“Yes, yes, bring it up.”
“Okay, confirming the delivery address is Building Three, Unit Two, Shangdong Chaoyang Residential Complex…”
“Hello? Are you there?”
Clang, clang.
Xia Li’s phone fell to the ground.
In front of him, the evil dragon who had been silently thinking suddenly moved.
She stood up, and the silver dragon scales on her face emitted a silvery-white glow.
As if in an illusion, beautiful dragon horns extended from the sides of her forehead, and her thin cherry lips became a little more intense.
Her amber eyes turned almost golden, and a sharpness replaced the original innocence in her almond-shaped eyes.
Sharp, cold, and arrogant, but when she narrowed her eyes slightly, they became seductive.
“Do you like it like this?”
Gone was the sweet, girlish voice, replaced by a mature and cool tone.
Lucia tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
She leaned down and kissed Xia Li’s cheek with her red lips.