By the time Qi Yu had shaken off that bee, he had already run clear out of the bedroom.
“That scared me half to death.” Anthropomorphically, he brushed his branches and leaves over his nonexistent heart, then suspiciously looked around in every direction. Only after confirming the bee was gone did he let out a long sigh of relief.
“Maybe you should take a look at what you look like right now.” 007 had watched the whole thing, and staring at the bizarre, almost-human-shaped little rose before him, had held back laughter for ages before finally managing not to burst out.
“Hm? What do you mean ” Wait, wasn’t he a flower? Then what he looked like now was…
007 tactfully conjured a screen of water, and before Qi Yu there suddenly appeared a standing rose.
The rose had only a single bloom open; the rest were still buds. There was one thickest branch on each side, and below, the roots split from one into two, while scattered small twigs adorned the little rose. From a distance, it did resemble a human figure not exactly ugly, either.
But Qi Yu, being the looks-obsessed person he was, didn’t see it that way.
“!”
How could the little rose, without its flowerpot, be this ugly? No no no, this isn’t me, it’s just an illusion. Once I open my eyes, I’ll still be that dashing, universally adored handsome little rose.
007: Do you have some kind of misunderstanding about what “handsome” means?
He used a branch to cover his line of sight, and after a long while, quietly cracked his eyes open a slit, peering through the gaps between his leaves at the water screen.
Still that bizarre, human-shaped little rose.
!
Startled into a jolt, Qi Yu swept a hand across the water screen, retracting it, trying to pretend it didn’t exist.
That’s right, all of that was just a dream. He was still a thoroughly handsome little rose!
The handsome little rose decided that, while Gu Yuheng was away, he should take the opportunity to familiarize himself with the layout of the place, just in case of emergencies.
Dragging his two splayed branches, Qi Yu went from bedroom to living room, upstairs to downstairs, kitchen to garden, touring every corner of the villa, inside and out.
With all this back and forth, it had gotten quite late.
“007, we’re all monsters here, so why are the ones in novels so powerful, while I’m this pathetic? Is there some amazing cultivation technique that would let me cast a spell and come and go without a trace?” Qi Yu dragged his exhausted body back toward the bedroom, bouncing along step by step.
Walking in his true form was simply exhausting.
Krrrk, krrrk. In his mind, a strange crunching sound came through, and only after quite a while did 007’s reply arrive: [Didn’t I give you the manual last time? Why do you think you’ve been out of soil for so long without any problems?]
007 quietly stashed the potato chip bag in the system space and answered with a perfectly straight face.
[Cultivate seriously. Once you’ve cultivated to human form, you can start doing missions, that way we’ll have an energy source, and coming and going without a trace will be the simplest thing in the world! Once you’ve accumulated enough, I can send you home.]
If you want a horse to run, of course you have to feed it!
007’s words hit Qi Yu right where it counted. Though he looked calm on the surface, going home was something he’d been thinking about all along.
The little rose shuffled slowly back to the bedroom, shut the door with a bang, curled his branch tips into a circle, like a human making a fist in a gesture of encouragement and cheered himself on.
He walked over to the flowerpot. He’d yanked his roots out too hastily earlier, and the soil had scattered everywhere.
The moment he approached the flowerpot and was bending down to push the bits of soil back in bit by bit, a black shadow suddenly darted out from behind the pot and landed on Little Rose’s root, its stinger driving straight into the tender bark of the stem.
“Holy crap, holy crap! Why haven’t you left yet?” Qi Yu froze. It was the rose stem sawfly that had been chasing him earlier. Before he could shake it off, Qi Yu felt a sharp, stinging pain across his root and stem.
For a moment, the pain left him speechless.
The sawfly departed, thoroughly satisfied.
This was pure misery for Qi Yu. His root throbbed unbearably, and with Gu Yuheng off-work time fast approaching, he had no choice but to grit through the pain and clean up the whole mess.
“Whew~ I’m exhausted.” Qi Yu wiped away nonexistent sweat and clapped the dirt from his hands. He had finally finished dealing with all the scattered soil.
Just then, a leisurely car horn sounded from outside.
Gu Yuheng was back.
Qi Yu clambered up into the flowerpot, limping. The spot where the sawfly had stung him still burned fiercely. Forcing down the pain, he buried himself in the soil.
Between the petals, droplets of water began to seep out, one after another.
***
Downstairs, Gu Yuheng paused mid-step as he entered the door, and as if sensing something, turned his gaze toward the bedroom window.