Beneath the boundless surface of the ocean lurked a gargantuan entity; its shadow could be clearly seen passing swiftly under the water. The blue whale, nearly thirty meters long and weighing hundreds of thousands of catties, is—like the mermaid race—one of the oldest creatures on this planet.
One whale falls, ten thousand things rise.
They have accompanied this planet through millions of years. In life, they enjoy the ocean’s bounty; in death, they selflessly sacrifice themselves back to the sea.
A sudden ripple disturbed the sea level as the sea breeze blew gently. Without warning, the blue whale breached the water, leaping high into the air. For an instant, it seemed to connect heaven and earth; its song echoed to the clouds before it plunged back into the depths. A wave tens of meters high surged up, shattering the calm of the surface.
Deng Xi was swept up by the churning waves, tumbling again and again. His wet golden hair was plastered to his face, and he scrambled to pull it away, his head spinning as he dizzily flicked his tail.
Within the rapid currents, a silver tail swam against the flow toward him, taking Deng Xi’s hand and leading him forward. Following the strength of the silver tail, Deng Xi flicked his tail fin; he gradually learned to master the surging waves. His fragile tail was no longer just at the mercy of the current; instead, he willfully rode atop the waves before swiftly diving through.
Deng Xi grabbed onto the blue whale, which was now swimming slowly ahead after its mischief. He pulled a long face and scolded it in the mermaid language, “How childish!”
Si Jisheng placed Deng Xi’s large seashell on the whale’s back. He and Deng Xi sat together on the blue whale, their long fish tails dangling into the ocean.
Deng Xi turned to look at Si Jisheng. “You wouldn’t know, but they love playing pranks, especially Big Whale.” He patted the whale’s back. “He’s the worst of them. Every time, he deliberately knocks me over with waves and leaves me behind to escape alone.”
The blue whale gave a low cry, sounding as if it were piteously pleading its innocence. Deng Xi huffed, “Admitting your mistake? Too late.”
Si Jisheng brushed his palm over the barnacles on the whale’s body. In the interstellar era, creatures like whales were nearly extinct, let alone an ancient blue whale of such massive size. It was hard to imagine that such a complete marine biological system still existed on this backward fringe planet.
He suddenly lifted his eyes and looked quietly at Deng Xi. The blue mermaid, riding atop the whale, flicked his tail fin rhythmically. The shimmering sunlight penetrated the clouds and cast a golden rim around his hair; his eyes crinkled as he chatted and laughed with the ancient natural creature in a foreign tongue.
The wind was light, the waves were flat. The world seemed to fall into tranquility in this instant.
“Little mute?”
Si Jisheng suddenly snapped back to reality. A palm-sized face had suddenly appeared enlarged before his eyes. Deng Xi blinked his crystal-clear blue eyes, looking expectant and flattering. “I want to borrow your claws for a bit.”
The little mermaid held up two fingers, measuring a tiny distance with his fingertips. “Just for a moment.”
Barnacles on a blue whale are actually very hard to clean. More often than not, the reason whales rampantly churn the waves in the ocean is to use the sea’s power to wash them off; they even rub their bodies forcefully against reefs to scrape them away. For a human body, they cannot be picked off by hand.
Usually, Deng Xi used sharp shells as tools. For a whale as massive as Big Whale, he might have to labor for over a dozen days or even a month. But the silver tail’s fingertips were sharper than any shell tool; they would surely be very effective!
Deng Xi solemnly took Si Jisheng’s hand, lifting the silver tail’s index finger to pick at a barnacle on the whale’s back. Si Jisheng slightly flexed his fingertip, and the barnacle instantly fell off.
Deng Xi’s eyes widened with worship, his brows curving. He asked carefully, “Little mute, could I borrow a little more of your time?”
He had originally only intended for the little mute to help share a small portion of the work, but now! He wanted the silver tail to handle all of it. Deng Xi felt a bit of self-loathing for his greed.
Deng Xi’s thoughts were written all over his face; Si Jisheng saw through them at a glance. But the blue whale was truly too gargantuan. Even for him, cleaning every spot meticulously would take the entire day.
And he only had three days. Si Jisheng bit his lip slightly and shook his head, intending to pull his hand back, but Deng Xi grabbed it firmly. “I’ll teach you how to sing, okay?”
His silver eyes constricted instantly. Si Jisheng thought for a long time before finally nodding in agreement.
Deng Xi leaned over, spreading his arms wide to hug the blue whale. Even though he looked as tiny as a small fish or shrimp lying on top of it, he said cheerfully, “Let’s go, Big Whale! We’re here to give you a scrub-down!”
The blue whale found a safe sea area to anchor. Deng Xi leaped into the sea and swam in front of it; the whale used its head to gently nudge him. Two “fish” played happily, while the Marshal was left to do the hard labor.
Si Jisheng’s fingertips tensed slightly, and the Jiao-man’s sharp claws suddenly unsheathed, reflecting a cold, chilling light. Si Jisheng had used these claws to kill many Zergs, but he never expected that one day he would willingly give a bath to a whale.
For the blue whale, barnacles were like a skin disease; having them pulled off was merely like having an itch scratched—it didn’t hurt at all.
Si Jisheng worked until the middle of the night before finally cleaning the gargantuan creature. Meanwhile, Deng Xi had slept on the whale’s back for the entire day—falling dizzily asleep while basking in the sunlight and waking dizzily while bathed in moonlight, stretching lazily.
With the barnacles removed, Big Whale shook its body, kicking up a massive wave. In the next instant, it joyfully spouted a high pillar of water from the top of its head.
Just as Deng Xi finished his stretch, he was suddenly propelled toward the sky by the water pillar. He was dazed for a moment before realizing he had “ascended,” snapping awake in terror: “Little mute!!!”
Si Jisheng struck the seawater heavily with his tail fin, breaching the surface to steadily catch the rapidly falling Deng Xi. In the next moment, they fell onto the whale’s back together.
Having had its itch scratched again, Big Whale moved its thick tail.
Falling onto the soft flesh and remaining unharmed, Deng Xi stared blankly at the silver eyes inches away from his own. He blinked and stammered, “Actually… I wouldn’t have been hurt even if I fell. Big Whale often plays this trick on me.”
Si Jisheng looked at the blue mermaid in his arms. After a moment of daze, he suddenly rolled over to lie on the whale’s back and closed his eyes. He obviously knew that.
Deng Xi took a deep breath, turned his face to look at the silver tail beside him, and curled his lips. “But I… instinctively called your name.”
Si Jisheng’s fingertips tensed instantly. He opened his eyes to look at Deng Xi; the Jiao-man’s naturally cold body temperature seemed to begin heating up in this second.
Deng Xi rolled over to lie prone on the whale’s back, reaching out his hand to catch the small fish and shrimp on the whale—those carried in the water pillar just now. He grabbed a small fish within reach, even though there were larger ones further away.
Deng Xi placed it generously by the silver tail’s hand, his soft cheek pressed against his own white arm. “Little mute, I want to break our deal.”
Si Jisheng propped himself up slightly, looked at the small fish in his hand, and cast a heavy gaze toward Deng Xi.
His long, curly golden hair was scattered over his back, arms, and face. He said seriously, “I don’t want those hundred fish anymore.” His wet eyelids curved slightly, and a smile blossomed in his exquisite features, revealing a small dimple at the corner of his mouth. “Little mute, let’s look for a new nest together.”
“Find one that you like, and I like too.”
The silver tail fell into a long silence. He would eventually leave for matters of importance, and the blue mermaid could not leave the ocean. After a long while, Si Jisheng nodded slightly.
Deng Xi cheered: “Then what kind of nest shall we find? I like ones that glow; we could find a bioluminescent jellyfish…”
Si Jisheng lowered his head and began processing the fish that had been shoved at him.
Deng Xi continued as he ate the fish meat passed to him, “As long as you can call Big Whale, then in the future, even if I’m not in the nest and you go out alone, you’ll be very safe. As long as Big Whale isn’t sleeping in, he’ll surely come when he hears it.”
Deng Xi was a man of action. He asked, “Little mute, were you born unable to speak?”
Si Jisheng shook his head.
Deng Xi: “Was it because of an injury?”
Si Jisheng shook his head again.
Deng Xi tilted his head. “Then why?”
Si Jisheng’s thin lips were pressed tight; he offered no explanation.
Since he wasn’t born mute and his vocal cords were fine, Deng Xi was puzzled for a while. He asked tentatively, “Is it that you don’t want to speak?”
Si Jisheng nodded.
Deng Xi breathed a sigh of relief. “That’s fine. If you don’t want to speak, then don’t. But you should be able to sing, right?”
Si Jisheng knit his brows in confusion. If one cannot speak, does it not follow that one cannot sing?
Deng Xi felt his logic held no flaws. In his mermaid tribe, the very first words an infant mermaid uttered upon hatching weren’t “mermaid language” at all, but song. A song that the ocean would answer. Singing, for a mermaid, was as simple as eating or drinking.
Finally, Deng Xi detected something amiss in Si Jisheng’s silence. “Little mute… could it be that you don’t know how to sing?”
Si Jisheng nodded. Deng Xi was incredulous. Just where did the little mute hatch from? How did he not inherit any of the mermaid heritage? Wandering for so many years without even knowing how to sing—how piteous.
Deng Xi thought it over with distress, then his eyes lit up. “Little mute, let’s close our eyes first and wait.”
The blue whale swam slowly forward through the ocean. They were like a solitary boat on the sea—tiny, yet not cold. Points of starlight decorated the night sky. As the sea breeze blew past, a low, shallow hum suddenly began.
It held no language. It was chaotic and boundless, acting entirely on whim, yet it was as graceful as the moonlight scattered over the surface—clear and pure. When the sea breeze left, the song also stopped abruptly.
Deng Xi wanted to explain his innate ability clearly to the silver tail who understood nothing. “Our song is like the wind; it blows when it wants to and stops where it likes. When it begins and when it ends—it’s all based on the heart. Over-preparing would only ruin our gift.”
Facing Deng Xi’s encouragement, the Marshal, who had never sung before, truly felt powerless. Just as Si Jisheng was about to shake his head in refusal, Deng Xi suddenly took his hand.
“Little mute, do not hesitate, do not fear, and do not shrink back. This is an ability we were born with. You only need to follow the ocean to find it again.”
Si Jisheng looked into Deng Xi’s steady eyes. The blue was clear, like the color of the sea, and the sea was most capable of embracing all.
The sea breeze began to blow gently again. A meaningless, low hum began along with the wind, gradually drifting further away.
Si Jisheng’s psychological barrier lay in those names. When detached from the familiar Interstellar language—without uttering a single specific word—a low hum based on whim happened to reduce the “cost” he faced.
Because he hadn’t spoken normally in a long time, his voice was exceptionally raspy. The melody he hummed was also exceptionally noisy and unpleasant, like a grown man learning to babble, or a monster growling.
Si Jisheng was not a man of blind confidence; he had self-awareness. To be able to produce a sound and take the first step was enough.
“It sounds very beautiful.”
Si Jisheng froze, slowly opening his eyes. Deng Xi’s eyes were crinkled with a smile as he repeated:
“It sounds very beautiful. I like it very much.”