Chapter 31: Past Remnants and Hidden Guesses

As twilight descended, the forest gradually fell into silence, interspersed occasionally with a few low chirps of cicadas.

Curling wisps of kitchen smoke rose from above the small wooden house, dispersing into the air. Many fresh vegetables had been planted in the courtyard, their mature fruits hanging precariously from the branches, while a hazy firelight filtered through the windows.

Under the warm candlelight inside the wooden house, Lin Mo lay face down on the bed with her back bare, the corners of her forehead damp with sweat.

It wasn’t because of pain, but because of nervousness.

Every time Mo Jin’s fingers brushed against her smooth skin, a tingling shiver would suddenly rise from the depths of her heart. She couldn’t help but want to evade it, yet she also wanted to draw closer. This internal struggle clashed violently in her mind, until she ultimately shrunk back like an ostrich burying itself in its own feathers.

Lin Mo turned her head slightly, stealing a glance at the earnest expression on Mo Jin’s face behind her. Under the warm candlelight, there was a unique kind of tenderness to her.

Mo Jin’s long, curled eyelashes fluttered. Her fingers paused, and she lowered her head to look at Lin Mo. “What’s wrong?”

Being scrutinized by Mo Jin’s inquiring gaze immediately threw Lin Mo’s heart into utter disarray. She tugged at the soft pillow in her hands, pouting her lips. Mo Jin was wonderful in every way, but she was simply too detached. Lin Mo didn’t even know what she could chat about to pique Mo Jin’s interest.

“I made a lot of money today. Is there anything you want? I’ll buy it for you.”

Mo Jin was a very good bear, and Lin Mo wanted to do her best to repay her.

Mo Jin picked up the blanket from the side and wrapped it around Lin Mo, leaving only her small head exposed outside. “There’s nothing I want.”

Lin Mo poked at the pillow she had bunched into a ball. “How can you not want anything? Haven’t you always wanted bamboo?”

Setting down the medicinal potion in her hand, Mo Jin turned to look straight at Lin Mo. Her tone was light, carrying a trace of doting warmth: “I’ve already found it.”

Lin Mo was somewhat surprised. So the little panda had already found her bamboo.

Lin Mo felt a bit sour in her heart. Which bamboo could be lucky enough to have such an adorable little bear? Since the little bear has been looking for her bamboo for so long, they will definitely stay together forever, right? But why isn’t Mo Jin together with her bamboo right now?

Perhaps it was because of the internship that Mo Jin and her bamboo had separated for the time being. Once the internship ended, Mo Jin would go back to be with her bamboo.

She wanted to be friends with Mo Jin. Since Mo Jin had found the bamboo that was so important to her, she ought to be happy for her, rather than feeling this involuntary sense of grievance and awkwardness.

Yet, the moment she thought about Mo Jin being with her bamboo in the future, sour bubbles couldn’t stop bubbling up from the depths of her heart. It was so sour that her lips, which usually maintained a proper, polite smile, pressed into a straight line over and over again.

Forcing the corners of her mouth upward, Lin Mo said with a face full of sincerity, “Congratulations to you.”

The words were spoken against her true feelings, completely drenched in jealousy, and the tail end of her sentence even carried an imperceptible trace of grievance.

Mo Jin frowned, her gaze landing on Lin Mo, who had turned her head away immediately after speaking, leaving her with only the back of her head.

With her head turned away, Lin Mo’s fingers laced together tightly. The more she thought about it, the more uncomfortable she felt. Her eyelashes trembled slightly, and tears began to fall like pearls from a broken string.

She had managed to make herself feel so aggrieved that she cried.

She wanted to be angry, but she didn’t know who she should be angry at. Feeling even worse, she simply ducked her head straight into the blanket, allowing the darkness to swallow her body.

The wooden door closed with a creak. Lin Mo’s watery eyes blinked, and her ears perked up as she listened intently to the movements in the room.

The sound of footsteps stopped right before the bed. Shrinking her body, Lin Mo shuffled toward the foot of the bed, leaving plenty of sleeping space for Mo Jin.

Sitting at the edge of the bed, Mo Jin glanced at Lin Mo, who was buried in the blanket and unwilling to come out. She shifted into her beast form. A fluffy, furry mass pressed down on the bed frame, making it creak loudly. “Come over, I’ll let you pet my paws.”

The small bamboo leaves on top of Lin Mo’s head twitched, and she stealthily inched closer to Mo Jin’s side. Seeing the pink, tender little paw pads, she instantly tossed all her worries away.

Her little fingers hooked around the bear paw, while Mo Jin’s black eyes gazed at Lin Mo with a deep, quiet look.

Because she had been suffocating under the blanket for too long, Lin Mo’s face was flushed red, her eyes watery and clear to the bottom, her cherry lips slightly parted, making her look somewhat dazed and cute.

Lin Mo was always more adorable when she was being obedient.

Mo Jin felt an urge to pat Lin Mo’s head again, but she was afraid she wouldn’t control the strength in her paws well and would pinch Lin Mo painfully. Since she wouldn’t be able to squeeze the bear paws for much longer anyway, she might as well ask all the questions she wanted to ask.

As Lin Mo played with the paws, a wave of drowsiness gradually washed over her. Remembering the dream she had a while back, she asked tentatively, “Mo Jin, where were you born when you were little?”

Mo Jin’s expression froze. Her voice deepened as she spoke slowly, “In a bamboo forest.”

“What about your parents?”

“I’ve never seen my father, nor have I seen my mother. I was placed within the clan to grow up since I was small. I wanted to find my mother, so I left the clan on my own. Because I didn’t know the directions, I gradually lost my way and walked into a valley. Inside, there was a tall bamboo that was brimming with spiritual energy…”

Mo Jin paused here. A trace of warmth surfaced in her eyes, and she lowered her head to look at Lin Mo, only to find that she had already fallen asleep.

Her fingers had naturally gone slack, her sleeping face peaceful, showing absolute trust toward her.

Mo Jin could feel Lin Mo’s reliance on her. For the longest time, she had been a lonely bear, but now everything was different.

Growing up together in the clan, once a little panda reached a certain age and learned basic survival skills, they would be driven out by their mother from their shared living space. Now that she was a mature bear, her obsession with finding her mother was no longer as intense as before; she only wanted to protect her little bamboo.

Lin Mo was like a glimmer of light in the darkness, illuminating her bit by bit, ensuring she was no longer lost or afraid.

Mo Jin lifted Lin Mo from her knees, laid her flat on the bed, and tucked the blanket securely around her. She stepped off the bed, intending to blow out the candle, when her eyes inadvertently caught sight of the three little tortoises in the water basin.

Two of the little tortoises were stacked on top of each other, playing happily, while the other was slowly crawling along the side, attempting a jailbreak from the basin.

The moment its small, mung-bean-like eyes saw Mo Jin, it terrified the creature so much that it instantly retracted into its shell.

The corners of Mo Jin’s lips hooked up slightly. Displaying a rare bit of playfulness, she used her finger to gently poke the tortoise hiding in its shell. The little tortoise tumbled down from the wall of the basin, landing completely upside down on its back.

—It looked very much like an Angonoka tortoise.

Mo Jin blew out the candle, walked back to the bed, and lifted the blanket. The moment she lay down inside the covers, the fast-asleep Lin Mo latched onto her like an octopus, wrapping her legs tightly around Mo Jin’s waist.

Lin Mo’s shallow breaths puffed against her neck, bringing a tickling sensation. Mo Jin’s clenched hands turned pale as she resisted the urge to push Lin Mo away, instead shifting slightly to her side.

Lin .Octopus. Mo pouted her pink lips and hummed a couple of times, seemingly expressing her dissatisfaction, before pressing her face against Mo Jin’s neck and gently rubbing against it twice.

Only when Lin Mo was truly fast asleep did she dare to be this brazen, wrapping herself around Mo Jin after she got into bed.

An unignorable heat arose within Mo Jin’s body, burning until she broke into a thin sweat. At this moment, she didn’t yet realize that Lin Mo’s movements beside her could be described as teasing.

Mo Jin got up from the bed, pushed open the door, and stood outside in the cold wind for a while before returning to the room.

This time Lin Mo didn’t wrap herself around her. Perhaps sensing that Mo Jin’s body was cold, she turned her back to Mo Jin, curling into a ball and wrapping the small blanket tightly around herself.

Feeling somewhat helpless, Mo Jin had finally found a way to keep Lin Mo in check.

After a short while, both of them fell into a sweet dreamland.

In her dream, Lin Mo found herself in a dim alleyway. The surroundings were pitch black, with discarded trash, littered fruit peels, and scraps of paper strewn about in a messy disarray, giving off a faint, eerie, and terrifying feeling.

A set of footsteps approached from afar, drawing closer. It sounded like several people talking.

“Brother Ming, do you think Lin Mo cheated? Otherwise, why did she manage to snatch the top rank in the whole class the moment she transferred here?” a teenage boy with a cracking, raucous voice said loudly.

“A wild girl who popped out of nowhere, who hasn’t even attended proper schooling before and can’t even recognize all the words in the textbook—ranking first is an absolute joke,” another boy mocked.

“I don’t know what the homeroom teacher was thinking either, actually making her the class monitor. Just watch, before class tomorrow, I’ll throw away the homework notebook in her desk drawer. When the time comes, she’ll be the only one unable to hand in her homework, let’s see how she can be class monitor then,” the boy said resentfully.

The one with the cracking voice took over, laughing mischievously: “Hehe, when the time comes, let’s put a caterpillar on her textbook to scare her to death. Last time, my desk mate saw a caterpillar and was so terrified she burst into tears, it cracked me up.”

The other two boys burst into laughter along with him.

The group walked over from a distance, passing by the alleyway. Dressed as students, they carried schoolbags and wore blue-and-white school tracksuits.

Through the moonlight, Lin Mo clearly discerned the faces of the individuals; they were precisely her classmates from primary school.

Walking right in the center was Wang Ming, and the two boys beside him were his sycophants.

Before she transferred to A City’s Eleventh Primary School, Wang Ming had always been the first in the class. His parents were workers at a nearby factory. Due to the factory going bankrupt, the couple had both been laid off, and encountering an economic winter, they had been unable to find work. His father had turned to chronic alcoholism at home, while his mother temporarily set up a small stall near the school, selling snacks to scrape together a living.

Whenever the teacher mentioned Wang Ming’s family, their words always carried a few hints of regret.

But Lin Mo knew that Wang Ming was not as simple and honest as the teacher claimed. This person looked reliable on the surface, but in his bones, he was an insidious, petty person. He had always been at odds with her, forming factions and cliques within the class, always dragging his feet when it was time to hand in homework, and whispering behind her back.

She hadn’t expected there to be such an incident as this. It was only strange because her homework notebook had never been thrown away, nor had she ever received a caterpillar.

“Meow~”

A faint meow suddenly echoed from the alley, sounding eerie and terrifying in the dim darkness.

The boys instantly tightened their grip on their schoolbag straps, standing back-to-back, looking around warily.

“Meow~”

The cat meowed once more, seemingly begging for food.

Wang Ming was the first to discover the black stray cat sitting on top of the trash can. Patting his chest, he said, “Scared the crap out of me, I almost thought I saw a ghost.”

The boy with the cracking voice raised his foot and kicked the trash can fiercely. The already dilapidated trash can was instantly knocked to the ground, and the black stray cat swiftly bolted away.

“Runs pretty fast, otherwise I would’ve kicked it to death,” the boy with the cracking voice wiped his nose, saying viciously.

Wang Ming patted his shoulder. “Forget it, forget it, let’s go.”

After the group left, the figure of a little panda appeared at the end of the alleyway, staring in the direction they had vanished.