The Swamp Monster blocked the prison entrance with huge boulders. It began spending more time clearing out the water ghosts in the surrounding area. This enormous creature had never been so vigilant and patient. In the past, it had always acted alone, hunting at will, never needing to think about something like “safety.” But now, it started patrolling the area around the prison, making sure every crack was sealed and every lurking water ghost was eaten.

Because of the water ghost that had wanted to eat the little human it was raising, the brutal predator carried out a massacre just as savage as the one three years ago. The swamp swallowed many water ghosts. Green blood flowed along the swamp into the river near the Tiandong Base, making that human settlement even more uneasy. People all felt that the swamp was shrouded in a gloomy, terrifying aura.

But for Jiang Xiaoya, she only felt that she had been grounded by Mom and could no longer climb out to play with snails. The prison was big enough, but after crawling around for a few days, there was nothing left to explore. There was no television to watch here. Outside was only endless rain. Occasionally, when a little dragonfly flew by, she would happily chase after it for a long, long way.

As if it had seen Jiang Xiaoya’s boredom, the Swamp Monster took Jiang Xiaoya with it for the first time when it went out.

This was her first time going outside! She happily looked left and right: endless reeds stretched across the swamp; beneath the shallow lake water, aquatic plants swayed gently. Aquatic dawn redwoods grew out of the swamp, like a forest standing in the water.

Only, the Swamp Monster clearly hadn’t brought her out to admire the scenery. The huge creature lifted the child who was looking around everywhere and set her down in front of a half-dead crocodile, pointing at it fiercely.

Jiang Xiaoya had already grown teeth and could walk. She was a mature child now.

It was time to learn survival skills. And the Swamp Monster was still very merciful—it had already beaten the crocodile half to death. Jiang Xiaoya should be able to kill it easily.

It bared its teeth. “Huh—heh!”

Kill that crocodile.

Jiang Xiaoya looked awkwardly at the crocodile, her four limbs turning in an embarrassed little circle: me?

She thought she must have misunderstood Mom’s meaning. After all, she was only a few months old. This was practically like asking a pure-hearted college student to win a Nobel Prize. But she stared at the enormous creature for a long time, and the huge creature resolutely pushed her in front of the crocodile.

“Heh—”

Jiang Xiaoya took one step forward and three glances back, until she finally realized that Mom wasn’t joking. She looked at the crocodile, then at Mom, and used a child’s ultimate skill—she scurried back and hugged Mom’s leg tightly.

Then she started yelling, “Mom! Mom—!”

The enormous creature tore her off its body and tossed her beside the crocodile, then disappeared into the reeds without looking back. Jiang Xiaoya couldn’t find Mom anymore. She looked at the crocodile in confusion, then at the endless dawn redwoods and swamp around her. She realized the crocodile seemed to be on its last breath, as if it wouldn’t bite her, so she climbed onto a big rock nearby.

The Swamp Monster pretended to leave, but actually hid in a corner to spy.

Long ago, when the Swamp Monster had just been born, because its flesh smelled especially delicious, because it couldn’t break free from the chains, because it was confined in this prison, its situation had been extremely dangerous. The half-blind monster tore apart the chains and crawled out of the prison, leaving nothing but its own blood along the way. It had to be vicious and terrifying enough in order to survive.

But that was all in the past.

It replicated its former experience and threw Jiang Xiaoya into a fight with a wild beast. A terrifying monster, of course, wouldn’t gently teach a child. It naturally used its own savage and direct methods. It didn’t even understand that a human child at this age had only just learned how to crawl. For one like Jiang Xiaoya to already be able to stand was already very impressive.

The Swamp Monster was muddled and rough. By all logic, a little baby should have wailed loudly, but she seemed tougher than expected. On top of the big rock, a little dog looked left and right. Just when the Swamp Monster thought she was finally going to crawl over and sneak-attack the crocodile, it realized there was no movement from the child.

It moved closer to take a look.

Jiang Xiaoya had already fallen asleep.

“……”

It bared its teeth in fury.

On the way home, it kept making heh-heh sounds the whole way.

The entire swamp trembled from the fury of the enormous creature. Heh-heh echoed as if with reverberation, sounding truly terrifying. The last time, Jiang Xiaoya would still have been frightened by Mom, but as time passed, she realized that Mom was actually very good to her, and she had already begun to be a little fearless, like boiling water couldn’t scald her.

She felt that Mom was probably scolding her. Using her smooth little head, she translated it—probably scolding some useless thing, something like mud that couldn’t be plastered onto a wall, and the like—and instantly felt it was both familiar and warm.

Hehe, Jiang Xiaoya had never been scolded by Mom before!

In order to comfort Mom, she excitedly presented her with the achievement of her own hunting at night: a snail on a leaf.

The Swamp Monster stared quietly at the snail crawling slowly on the ground for a long time.

The Swamp Monster still refused to give up.

The next day, it grabbed Jiang Xiaoya and made her fight an even more vicious crocodile. This time it was a living one, a crocodile that would clack-clack and chase people to bite them. But Jiang Xiaoya hid on a big rock for quite a while. She poked her head out, sneakily pointed at herself and then at the enormous creature behind her.

Jiang Xiaoya: My mom! Super fierce!

The crocodile seemed to understand Jiang Xiaoya’s baby talk and slowly submerged into the lake.

On the third day, the Swamp Monster cruelly threw Jiang Xiaoya in front of a water ghost. It roughly expressed that it absolutely would not come save her, nor would it follow behind to protect her—little, little human, could only save herself!

Facing that water ghost, Jiang Xiaoya really was scared—

She erupted with an unprecedentedly powerful will to survive and lunged toward Mom like lightning. Then, in just a few quick motions, she grabbed the Swamp Monster’s hair and climbed onto the top of its head.

The Swamp Monster instinctively reached out to pull her off, but fearing it would crush the little brat to death, it angrily: “Heh-heh—”

Get down.

But in just that brief moment, Jiang Xiaoya had already scrambled up onto its neck. The Swamp Monster became even fiercer. It looked like it was about to erupt, just like the last time it discovered Jiang Xiaoya crawling out of the prison. Yet the little brat, afraid that the water ghost would gnaw on her feet, even tried to climb her two exposed little feet up onto Mom’s head as well. She was greedy for life and afraid of death, carefully clinging tightly to Mom’s head.

They confronted each other for a long time.

In the end, it smashed the water ghost to pieces and silently, slowly carried Jiang Xiaoya home.

Like an extra-large capybara carrying a mini capybara, slowly swimming across the swamp.

After returning home, the enormous creature squatted by the swamp for a long time.

It finally realized that wanting to turn Jiang Xiaoya into a ferocious little monster was a very difficult thing.

No, this wasn’t right. According to the laws of the swamp, weak creatures had only two paths: either become strong, or be eliminated. It should have followed this iron rule—either train the cub into a qualified predator, or eat her.

Jiang Xiaoya crawled over to pester Mom.

The enormous creature pointed outside and heh-heh’d something, its vertical pupils narrowing into a single line, looking extremely serious.

Miraculously, Jiang Xiaoya actually understood its meaning.

If you’re not strong, you’ll be eaten.

Jiang Xiaoya thought about it. She crawled to Mom’s side and nudged its enormous body with her head.

Although Jiang Xiaoya was only a few months old and not fierce enough yet, she had Mom!

Just like the forest’s big, big deer, protecting the little deer until she grew up.

Being leaned on and wildly rubbed against, the Swamp Monster arched its back. Would it have to protect this cub like this from now on? It had no concept of protection, because it had fought its way through alone since childhood. In the swamp, natural selection reigned—if you were weak, you died.

This ferocious great monster was even more lacking in any awareness of being a mother—because it was male.

And not just that, it was the very young and hot-blooded type, still a very, very long way from having a child, at least another ten or twenty years away from becoming a father. Of course it wouldn’t suddenly erupt with any maternal or paternal instincts.

But Jiang Xiaoya looked at the young creature with bright, sparkling eyes, a tiny little thing squatting beneath its huge shadow.

Forget it.

It discovered that its shadow was very, very big. Big enough to fit ten Jiang Xiaoyas.

───♡───

Tiandong Base, hospital.

Deng Feng finally woke up.

After the apocalypse arrived, aside from the appearance of terrifying water ghosts, there were also some humans who developed special abilities and could release spiritual manifestations. At present, their numbers were still very small, and wherever they went, they were treated with respect. Deng Feng was one of these rare ability users. That was why he had managed to walk out of that swamp alive in the end and receive rescue.

As the only person to come out alive from the Black Forbidden Zone, the information Deng Feng possessed was extremely valuable. Tiandong Base was eager to know exactly what was going on inside that swamp. But after Deng Feng woke up, he proposed a condition in exchange: “I want you to go look for Captain Jiang’s daughter.”

A small baby, lost in the swamp for several months already—most likely she had ended up as food for the water ghosts. But despite being reminded of this many times, Deng Feng remained adamant.

Their squad had come to seek refuge at Tiandong Base because the city they originally lived in, Pingchuan City, had suffered massive attacks from water ghosts. Captain Jiang and Deng Feng had both been soldiers stationed in Pingchuan City’s garrison unit. The two shared a deep bond, and thinking of the sight of Captain Jiang pushing him away at the very end, Deng Feng could not, no matter what, forget Captain Jiang’s kindness.

No matter what anyone said, they had to search once.

Because of Deng Feng’s insistence, before long, an investigation team composed of ability users began to infiltrate that dangerous swamp.

They had two missions: first, to assess the threat, confirm the activity range of the Swamp Monster, and determine whether Tiandong Base needed to evacuate; second, to search for that child—despite the slim hope.

───♡───

Jiang Xiaoya was living very well, and she had even grown taller! Her crawling suit had become much too short, exposing a large section of her little arms, and there were no clothes to change into. The Swamp Monster, of course, would not notice such small details.

The child also had no shoes to wear, like a little wildling. Because she had crawled all over the place before, the knees of her crawling pants had been worn through as well, giving her a very beggar-sect look. However, Jiang Xiaoya was a child who loved cleanliness—she would crawl to the edge of clean lake water by herself to wash her little hands and feet.

After learning to walk, Jiang Xiaoya no longer crawled around everywhere, instead beginning to practice wobbling along on her feet. When taking her out to play, the Swamp Monster liked to put Jiang Xiaoya on a small island in the middle of the swamp, letting her play with little flowers and grass.

Jiang Xiaoya was a highly destructive child. She liked to ravage flowers with ruthless hands and also enjoyed causing destruction. If she wasn’t taken outside, the only thing she could play with was the Swamp Monster’s hair. She would tie one butterfly knot and little bun after another in Mom’s hair. Often, when the Swamp Monster woke up, it would find that she had pulled out quite a lot of its hair!

Every creature that failed to keep a proper eye on things would suffer retribution—even the Swamp Monster. So it learned to take her out for some fresh air.

But just after setting her down and leaving for not very long, Jiang Xiaoya would start making werwer noises and calling for Mom, as if she had suffered some extremely serious injury and was about to die. It would heh-heh and hurry over, only to discover that it was just a small cut on Jiang Xiaoya’s finger from the aquatic plants.

The enormous creature was very displeased and told her that with an injury this minor, if it had arrived three seconds later, it would already have healed!

But Jiang Xiaoya cried werwer even louder: Mom, it hurts so much, it hurts so much I’m going to die!

Of course, it wasn’t every time that Jiang Xiaoya made a fuss over nothing. Once, when the Swamp Monster came back, it discovered that Jiang Xiaoya’s knee had been badly scraped open and was bleeding. That day she howled especially loudly. The Swamp Monster had shed a great deal of blood before, and after becoming accustomed to it, it no longer felt pain. A born warrior possessed terrifying regenerative abilities and naturally would not care about such small injuries.

But on the way home, it still carried Xiaoya on its shoulder, slowly making its way back home.

It remembered something and suddenly, vaguely realized that humans were different from it. Humans were fragile, without rough, hard skin, of very poor durability, easily damaged. That was why they needed things like clothes and shoes for protection.

The Swamp Monster had seen humans wear clothes, so it wanted Jiang Xiaoya to wear them too. Wear ten layers!

Jiang Xiaoya obediently lay prone on top of the Swamp Monster’s head.

In her previous life, Xiaoya had been an orphan. She charged into fires, rushed into torrential rain, and would only wipe the rainwater or ash from her head. Even when she was injured, she would still carry the little girl she had rescued out of danger, then show a reliable smile to her teammates. She had been a little adult since childhood. After all, for a child without a mother, tears were a useless thing.

But this time was different. After turning into a child, Xiaoya discovered that calling “Mom” would get a response.

She could become small and noisy, hiding beneath Mom’s shadow, seaweed seaweed¹ In Chinese, the original is “海带海带”, which does not literally mean seaweed here. Instead, it conveys a clingy, rubbing, nuzzling motion—like soft seaweed drifting and wrapping around something..

Liking to make strange noises was, of course, to attract Mom’s attention.

Mom, Mom, it hurts so much!

Mom, Mom, do you care about me?

Once she got an answer, happy bubbles would pop up over Xiaoya’s head.

werwer!

She was the happiest little dog in the world!

Footnotes

• 1
  In Chinese, the original is “海带海带”, which does not literally mean seaweed here. Instead, it conveys a clingy, rubbing, nuzzling motion—like soft seaweed drifting and wrapping around something.