Gao Yue ran back to the cave and saw Moya sitting on the stone bed inside, his jade-carved face expressionless as he watched her in the dim light.
Her footsteps gradually slowed, and she felt a bit of fear rising in her heart, clearing her throat to steel her courage.
"Ahem, thank you for taking care of me these past two days."
"But, I feel like my staying here is blocking your romantic prospects."
The more she talked, the more her heart pounded; she didn't even know what she was stammering about anymore.
"Romantic prospects means... the opposite sex... females. I'll be hindering you from mating with a female. No normal female would want to see another female living in her male's cave, even if it's just a cub... right?"
"So for both our sakes... why don't I go live with someone else's family now..."
After saying that whole long string of words, Moya didn't say a single word, his expression remained indifferent, his vertical pupils staring at her flatly, giving nothing away.
Gao Yue swallowed.
She didn't dare make another sound.
She quickly packed up her things, and reluctantly took out her folding electronic makeup mirror.
This makeup mirror wasn't the old-fashioned handheld one her mother had bought at a tourist spot—it was one she'd bought for work, with a ring of small lights around it worth several thousand, able to smartly adjust its aperture and offer multiple color tones.
It worked great for lighting when she filmed videos, and the mirror surface was large too.
To demonstrate the mirror, Gao Yue pressed the switch.
The ring of small lights around it instantly lit up.
Gao Yue said, "I'll give you this. Thank you for taking care of me these past few days—selling it should fetch quite a bit of money. Look, you press here to turn the light on, and press again to turn it off."
Seeing that Moya still said nothing.
She grew flustered, and working up her courage, tiptoed over and gently set the mirror down on the stone bed.
But by the time she walked back to her suitcase, she found the makeup mirror had been thrown back at her, landing right inside the suitcase.
She turned around and found that Moya was no longer on the stone bed—the cave was empty, he had already left.
Gao Yue's expression fell.
She felt bad inside too, and didn't want to leave. In all her years, aside from her parents, no one had ever been so good to her.
But reason told her she couldn't stay here long-term.
Once Moya took a mate, she'd be driven out in disgrace, and then these past days' fond memories would truly turn to ash.
Since he didn't want the makeup mirror, then she wouldn't leave it behind.
Gao Yue sighed, packed up her suitcase, and in the end left nothing for Moya, but she didn't take the planet necklace that had been sitting in the corner of the stone bed.
"Hmph hmph?"
Snowball Pig walked over to her side, nudging her leg with its snout, its black bean eyes watching her, whimpering softly in its throat.
Though this female had been quite annoying at first, over the past two days she'd gotten used to being held while sleeping—her body was much warmer than her owner's.
Was she really going to leave?
Snowball Pig raised its head to look at her.
A pang of sourness struck Gao Yue's heart, and she stroked the soft fur on top of its head.
"Goodbye."
She looked around; over the past two days Moya had bought her quite a few things, whether it was soft beast skin or vegetables, all bought specially for her, but she felt too embarrassed to take them—in the end she only took the wooden cup he'd made specially for her yesterday.
Reluctantly, she glanced back at the stack of soft beast skins on the stone bed, then dragged her suitcase by its handle out of the cave to meet up with Grandma Ya and the others.
Once sun-dried, this beast skin would be fine to use, and it carried a warm, sun-baked scent—the one she'd covered herself with yesterday had been so comfortable. What a shame.
……
That day, Gao Yue received a warm welcome from Grandma Ya's family.
Mainly because Grandma Ya was happy—she liked Gao Yue a lot, so her three Beast Husbands followed suit out of affection for her, treating Gao Yue well too.
That noon, two of the Beast Husbands hunted down a large prey animal, lit up the Fire Pit, and cooked meat especially for Gao Yue to eat.
Few Python Clan Beastmen ate a balanced diet of meat and vegetables like Zhihua's Family did; pythons were carnivores, and most of them didn't like eating cooked food—what they usually ate was half-raw meat.
To accommodate Gao Yue, they specially cooked the meat through this time.
The meat's texture couldn't compare to the Fire-Horned Sheep she'd eaten before, and it had a slightly gamey, fishy smell, needing cooking wine, ginger, and other seasonings to mask the odor before it was edible.
But Gao Yue didn't want to disappoint the elders, so she acted like she loved it, and ended up suffering through the meal.
Dinner was just meat.
No vegetables.
Gao Yue really felt too embarrassed to ask the three elders for vegetables.
Then came bath time.
Their wooden house was fairly far from the river, so all four elders bathed downstream in their original forms, even Grandma Ya—it was more convenient that way.
But Gao Yue had no original form, so she couldn't just jump into the river to bathe.
The Beast World was open in some ways but not others—female Beastmen also only bathed in the river in their original forms; if a female were to strip down in her human form to wash up in the water, that would be considered scandalously indecent.
Gao Yue couldn't bathe in the river, and didn't want to trouble the elders, so she claimed she didn't feel like bathing that day.
As for drinking water, she couldn't just make do—she screwed up her courage and asked for boiled water.
When a white-haired elder carried a heavy Stone Pot all the way to the river to fetch water, then boiled it especially for her, Gao Yue could have slapped herself.
She really deserved it!
By this point, she was already starting to regret leaving Moya.
Even if she'd eventually be driven out in disgrace, so what? Who knew when Moya would take a mate—it might drag on for years yet.
She should enjoy the comfort while she could! No idea what she'd been worrying about in advance for.
But she'd already moved in, so she had no choice but to grit her teeth and keep living there.
Grandma Ya's Family lived in a wooden house with many rooms; the room prepared for Gao Yue hadn't been lived in for a long time, and some of the wood had rotted and grown moldy.
Gao Yue knew how dangerous mold could be, and worried about her lungs, so she didn't dare take it lightly—she wanted to clear away all the moldy wood planks.
There was no mold-removal spray here, so she could only scrape off the moldy spots with a knife.
Naturally, the Three Old Men wouldn't let Gao Yue, a Female Cub with a broken arm, do the work, so they took over the task themselves, leaving Gao Yue to just help out on the side.
Actually, the Three Old Men would let Gao Yue help out a bit, but when Grandma Ya also wanted to pitch in, they absolutely refused to let her do a single thing.
Watching this, Gao Yue gained a deeper understanding of couples in the Beast World.
After becoming Mates, a Beast Husband's feelings for his Companion never seemed to fade—if anything, they grew stronger with time, remaining just as deep even once his hair turned white, unwilling to let his Companion lift a finger.
In modern times, many newlyweds were so sweet together they'd practically carry each other everywhere, but as time passed, that would fade—husbands would become hands-off, dumping all the household matters on their wives.
Old men were even worse—many took it for granted to dump all the housework on their old wives, strolling around outside with hands behind their backs, playing cards, playing chess, fishing, while their wives bought groceries, cooked, cleaned, and looked after the children.
And none of this would ever happen in the Beast World.
Gao Yue felt a stir in her heart, and drifted off in thought for a moment.
A fleeting thought crossed her mind—if she could never go back, what kind of Companion would she find here—and in that instant, Moya's figure flashed through her mind.
But the image appeared only for a moment before she forcibly pushed it down.
It was just too unrealistic.
Moya was far too popular; the only reason he'd taken such good care of her before was because he'd mistaken her for a cub, and on top of that, he'd accidentally hurt her, which was why he'd been so attentive.
Setting all that aside, she didn't think he'd ever look at her differently—maybe now that she'd left, he was even relieved.
Better to be realistic about it.
Her mind drifted back to those low-ranking single males in front of the cave earlier, who'd said they wanted to "adopt" her.
Halfway through cleaning, Grandma Ya called out to her from outside the house.
"Little Yue—"
Gao Yue heard her voice and immediately went outside.
Then, once outside, she was stunned—the grass outside the house was covered with things.
The huge Beast Skin Bag of vegetables bought from Zhihua's Family, over a dozen Soft Beast Skins, had all been sent over, along with two live Fire-Horned Sheep, the very ones she'd praised as delicious.
There was also a large bundle of freshly picked Yuyu Flowers, and the ointment given by the Medical Priest.
This ointment worked wonders—the scratches on her body and the stitched wound on her arm had completely scabbed off and healed within just two days, so she'd forgotten to keep applying it. She hadn't expected Moya to remember and send it over specially.
Besides that, there was also a large sack of husked rice.
This rice was a rare commodity, unavailable within the tribe; she'd thought that once she left Moya's Cave she'd never get to eat it again, but she hadn't expected Moya to have bought it for her.
Looking at all these things, a wave of intense bittersweet emotion surged up in Gao Yue's heart.
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