“Today is Mianmian’s birthday,” Yu Ying reminded Sui Lin tactfully.
Sui Lin, annoyed, stood up and chose a seat closer to Yu Ying so she could smell her mother’s scent.
Yu Ying lit the candles, placed a crystal queen’s crown on Yu Mianmian, and used a Polaroid camera to take photos of Mianmian from various angles.
Sui Lin stared at the beautiful cake, her nostrils filled with the aroma of the cake and her mother’s scent. Under the round table covered by a floral tablecloth, Sui Lin’s snake tail rubbed against Yu Ying’s calf, her hand holding a fork, enjoying the thrill of a “taboo affair.”
She liked to see humans blush in fear of being discovered, so she hid the emotions in her eyes. But there was no crack in Yu Ying’s expression; on the contrary, she was calm and composed, already accustomed to the rubbing of a certain snake.
The ancient castle plunged into darkness. In the silent space, one could hear the heartbeats of monsters. Yu Ying looked at Yu Mianmian and Sui Lin. Yu Mianmian’s light blue hair emitted a faint fluorescence, her pupils staring at her like deep-sea whirlpools.
Sui Lin’s silver-white hair hung down, her red eyes and lips looking particularly eerie in the darkness, her thick snake tail wrapped around Yu Ying’s ankle.
“Make a wish.”
Yu Mianmian put her hands together and made a wish to the cake. She hoped her mother would appear before her. She blew out the candles and met Yu Ying’s gentle, water-like eyes.
The castle was brightly lit again.
Yu Ying divided a piece from the center of the cake for Yu Mianmian and cut another piece for Sui Lin.
A certain jealous and competitive snake, staring at the cake on Mianmian’s plate, quietly swiped a small piece with her tail.
That makes it fair.
Yu Mianmian: “……”
Yu Mianmian had lost her tentacles, weakening part of her senses, but her body was still covered in a neural network. Her fingertips were stained with cream, and she instantly sensed the sweet scent of it.
“Sister Yu Ying, you take the first bite.” Yu Mianmian extended her finger to Yu Ying’s lips.
Yu Ying leaned toward Mianmian’s fingertip, her lips touching the cream, and she bit down on the fingertip.
The human’s warm, moist mouth enveloped her finger. Yu Mianmian instantly flushed and pulled her finger away; the intense warmth of the human seemed to be melting her. She sat back in her seat nervously, her face red, not daring to meet Yu Ying’s eyes.
Sui Lin had no appetite; she wasn’t interested in such sweet, cloying food. She preferred tearing into bloody animals, like rabbits.
She took two bites, put down her knife and fork, and stared gloomily at the cake on Yu Ying’s plate. On the chocolate cake was a strawberry that Yu Ying had bitten into.
Her snake tail tapped the floor impatiently. Sui Lin was waiting for Yu Ying to put down her knife and fork. One second, two seconds, three seconds—her insidious gaze remained fixed on that strawberry.
Yu Ying, feeling uncomfortable under Sui Lin’s stare, put down her cutlery and wiped her red lips with a silk handkerchief. Graceful and composed, she got up and headed upstairs with Yu Mianmian.
Sui Lin blocked the camera with her snake tail and picked up the strawberry that tempted her so. Under the light, one side of the strawberry was covered in creamy white frosting, while the other had been bitten by the human. The scent of her mother lured her into committing an error.
The strawberry entered her mouth, and her snake tongue licked away the liquid her mother had left behind. With the liquid mixed with the sweet and sour taste of the strawberry, Sui Lin squinted in satisfaction.
Sui Lin’s snake tail slowly slithered to move the camera away. The audience noticed that the strawberry Yu Ying had bitten was gone.
【Teacher Sui Lin is silently staring at her wife, eating the strawberry her wife ate. What kind of insidious snake-person persona is this?!】
【It’s too good to be true! The tablecloth was shaking the whole time they were eating cake; I don’t dare imagine how intense it was under the dining table!】
【Let’s be bolder; I dare to imagine! Let me join them!】
An artificial intelligence in the living room made a strange noise. Sui Lin didn’t understand why humans wasted time and money researching such things.
The robot couldn’t withstand her strength and crumbled into a pile of useless scrap metal. The system installed inside glitched for a moment, and it said in a very robotic tone, “Happy birthday, Teacher Yu Ying.”
“Yu…”
Sui Lin’s snake tail struck the robot’s internal components, and the machine went completely dead.
She had intended to return to her nest to sleep, but stopped upon receiving the information emitted by the robot. She had stolen several pieces of human clothing; it was time to give a gift for the human’s birthday.
Sui Lin twisted her snake tail out of the castle. It was pitch black outside. She could see prey hiding in the grass: a snow-white, fluffy rabbit.
She grabbed the rabbit by its hind legs, and just as her sharp teeth were about to bite into the back of its neck, she suddenly remembered this was a gift for Yu Ying.
Humans can’t hunt for themselves.
What a nuisance.
Sui Lin complained about humans eight hundred times in her heart while preparing the gift for Yu Ying. She tied the rabbit’s legs with straw rope, held it in her hand, and stood outside the castle, looking up at Yu Ying’s room.
A certain snake still loved crawling in the shadows. Sui Lin leaned her arms against the wall, her snake tail brushing against the castle bricks as she crawled to Yu Ying’s window. She hung the rabbit on the window and bit her own finger to write a letter on the glass with her blood.
What should I write? Mother hadn’t taught her how to bless others, but she had taught her how to write letters to provoke others.
Stupid human.
Hello! (She crossed it out; Mother said letters should use two spaces). Sui Lin drew two boxes to represent two spaces. Are you dying to die recently?
Wish you a quick death.
The most beautiful snake in the world.
April 11, 2025
Sui Lin looked at the handwritten letter on the glass with satisfaction. As expected, she hadn’t forgotten what Mother taught her. Surely the human would love the birthday gift she gave.
Yu Ying heard abnormal noise outside the window and looked through a gap in the wooden boards at the glass. There was a tuft of snow-white fur on the glass, stained with dried blood.
She pried the nails out of the wooden boards with a hammer and saw the writing on the glass in its entirety. The font was twisted like ghost runes, blood dripped down the glass, and a tied-up rabbit hung by the edge of the window.
Yu Ying, accustomed to such things, finished reading the snake’s letter. She leaned toward the window, her eyes fixed on the rabbit to confirm if it was still alive.
The rabbit rolled its red eyes and suddenly stared at Yu Ying. Yu Ying gasped, clutching her chest as her heart pounded violently. She opened the window and took the rabbit down.
She tore the straw rope off the rabbit, found a metal cage, lined it with grass and cotton, and fed it lettuce.
Yu Ying closed the cage and touched the blood on the glass with her fingertip. The congealed blood slowly disappeared; the letter she had just seen written in blood was merely an illusion.
Then where did this rabbit come from? Who is playing a prank on me?
Yu Ying re-nailed the boards, drew the curtains, turned on every light in the room, and curled up in her quilt. Her posture in sleep was completely devoid of a sense of security.
The small snake rested her head on the cotton, rubbed against Yu Ying’s fingertip, and fell asleep beside her mother, finding a sense of security. She stuck out a small bit of her tongue.
The game world existed in another dimension. The octopus tentacle monster was trapped in a cramped, airtight space filled with the salty, fishy stench of the ocean and the smell of rust. Black seawater filled the entire space, and He lurked in the darkness.
He suddenly opened His eyes, and eight tentacles crawled up the inner walls of the space. The cramped area could not accommodate His body, so He curled up against the iron plate directly in front.
The moment the tentacle suction cups touched the iron plate, countless red lines appeared on it. These red lines were the only light He had in the dark space.
Hanging below the red lines were photos—photos He had secretly taken while observing Yu Ying. His sticky tentacles stroked the person in the photos through the plastic seal. “Mother.”
If a weak light shone into the cramped, airtight box, one would see that all three walls were covered in His calculations, the characters wriggling.
“Today is the 2649th day since you left, and I have finally found you.” His voice trembled. “But why are you unwilling to meet me?”
“Is it because your child is too ugly?” His tentacles clumsily stroked His ugly octopus head. “It doesn’t matter; my shell will be finished soon. I hope you will like it.”
“You want me to forget I found you.” He gazed at Yu Ying’s photo with obsession. “Mother, you have forgotten, too. You taught me how to parasitize, and how to avoid being parasitized by my own kind.”
“Now I can finally avoid your attacks.” His hectocotylus was pressed tightly against the photo. Just looking at His mother’s photo was enough to send Him into an intracranial orgasm. The hectocotylus pressed against Mother’s photo.
He lay down, staring blankly into the void, imagining the scene of meeting His mother for the first time.
“Mother, we will meet very soon.” His tentacles successfully extended outside the airtight iron box.
He sincerely begged His mother, hoping she would satisfy His wish.
I hope that by then you will recognize your child and embrace me tightly. I hope that by then you will be willing to return to the game space with me. I hope that by then there are no other strange entities by your side.
Mother, His mother can only be His.
His powerful, omnipotent mother would surely recognize Him.
He began to look forward to the day He would finally meet her.