novelraw Chapter 86: Trees Can Talk
Chapter 86: Trees Can Talk
Beihai arrived at the place where that Pea lived. Seeing the young girl’s sickly appearance, utterly drained of strength, he felt a pang of sympathy.
The girl gave off a fragile aura, the kind that would wilt under the gentlest breeze and leave her collapsing to the ground. Yet even like that, she still tended to the sprouted green pea, as if she and that pea had never given up on each other.
Unable to bear it, Beihai began a healing spell.
At moments like this, a bit of theatricality was unavoidable.
“Your daughter’s illness is cured, but her body is still weak. Feed her well, and she’ll recover in half a month.”
Saying it that way made it sound believable;
otherwise people would always worry.
That said, although the Fairy Tale World was generally a happy place, depictions of poor families did exist, and they occupied a fair amount of space in stories. Many were children, and even more were young girls, plus there was that one An Tusheng.
So if people didn’t see something, of course they could remain unaware. But if they saw Beihai lending a hand, helping out was just a natural, convenient thing to do.
Beihai toyed with the green pea in his hand, curious about the pea’s nature and ambitions.
“All right, that’s handled. You’ve seen your brother’s fate: two lazy ones were swallowed whole, one ended up in the Sewage Ditch, and only the one who mattered managed something significant.“So what will you do now? Bury yourself somewhere, or leave the town and run far away?”
“Hmm, I don’t know. I feel a little envious.”
“What is there to envy? Each pea has its own destiny. If you had magic, you might even get hidden under a bed.”
Beihai thought peas differed from one another. Some fall into window crevices and still grow. Some carry special missions, even sending a princess to the heavens. He wondered whether this pea could communicate like the one in his hand. If it could, maybe he’d keep it. After all, that was a heaven-reaching pea!
But things weren’t finished yet. After returning, Beihai transferred the shop to the frail girl’s family—more precisely, to her mother.
He was leaving anyway, and the property didn’t mean much to him;
it was just sand slipping through his palm, something no one really cared about, not even Beihai himself.
Having done all that, it was time to depart. His adventure party had grown larger over time.
Beihai rode his horse with Ella seated in front of him. He needed to gather the rest of his belongings: a snakeskin sack to put Aladdin's Lamp in, then a dragon, and the Little Fairy—well, maybe not the Little Fairy.
If she got upset and decided to take his facial features while he slept, what would he do?
In the stories she only took the Shopkeeper's Wife’s tongue;
she could take the tongue and later reattach it without anyone noticing. Who knew if she had similar magic?
As for the pea, Beihai decided to plant it at the kingdom border. There it could chat with soldiers and be cared for;
maybe it would even have another story to continue.
The other problem was the pea’s size. Too small—easy to break by accident. Besides, there was Ella, a child, and Aladdin's Lamp, always playing pranks. It could easily pop the pea in its mouth, chew it, spit it out, and repeat the gag over and over.
The Little Fairy was even less reliable—innocent and clueless about everything, even more than Ella.
Now the question was where the old witch was.
After all, she was his destined enemy. He had wandered through nearly half the world and still hadn’t found so much as a trace.
While Beihai lounged in a tree, flipping through the map to decide his next move, a voice came from behind him.
“Head north from here, and you will find that evil old witch.”
Beihai heard the voice and instinctively turned. What the—there was nothing behind him except a tree.
“Grandpa Tree, is that true?” Beihai perked up;
before he could investigate, the information had presented itself. The feeling was oddly delightful.
“Aren’t you surprised?”
“What is there to be surprised about? A Pea and a Sewage Ditch can talk, so why not a tree?”
Beihai said confidently. After witnessing one absurd thing, subsequent absurdities all seemed acceptable.
While he thought that, there was a plop as a mouse fell onto Beihai’s face.
Beihai pinched the little creature’s neck between two fingers and held it up to his face to inspect. It was a flying squirrel;
on both sides of its paws were thin little flaps of skin.
The little flying squirrel folded its paws together devoutly and bowed three times, utterly unafraid.
“They all like you.”
“Them?”
At that moment Beihai realized animals throughout the forest had gathered. Even ants had joined in. Seeing these adorable creatures come together, Beihai glanced at the pot: there was no meat inside, only vegetables, so the animals weren’t being unreasonable for showing up.
If there had been meat in the pot, the animals wouldn’t have dared to get this close. Would they swarm over and proudly proclaim, ‘My second uncle smells delicious’?
Some animals clustered around Ella, unwilling to be outdone. There was even a chinchilla and a guinea pig among the furry visitors.
Despite their numbers, the little furry ones behaved with restraint. They didn’t pile onto her;
they limited themselves to perching on hands and arms.
Ella looked a little troubled. The animals squeezed into every gap. A few squirrels sat on her head;
just as she petted a fawn, a sheep behind her nudged her, and when she turned to touch the lamb, the fawn nudged her in return.
Beihai noticed a turtle among the animals and, intrigued, picked it up and placed it into Ella’s hands.
“Today we eat seafood.”
That suggestion naturally startled Ella. She hastily snatched the turtle back and set it down on the ground.