The giant eagle fell to the ground, still twitching slightly. The outermost feathers of its spread wings were as long as an arm, and its sharp hooked talons gleamed with a cold, iron-like light. No one knew how many lives they had taken, but unfortunately, today it had encountered a venomous snake.
Wumu was a venomous snake, but Song Xu rarely saw him use venom. Generally speaking, he would coil his snake tail around prey, use constricting force to kill the opponent, and then swallow it.
The giant eagle soon stopped moving. Song Xu squatted beside it and pulled at its wing feathers to examine them. From the noisy flock of birds in the tree, several slightly larger golden-feathered birds flew down. This “slightly larger” meant only about one circle bigger than a palm; to Song Xu, they were still very small.
After landing, these birds turned into beastmen, lightly touching down on the ground about three meters away, looking at them with some fear.
Song Xu snapped and tossed away the giant eagle wing in her hand, focusing her gaze on those adorable bird beastmen.
When Song Xu was in her own beastman form, her height was very ordinary, but these bird beastmen, after transforming into human form, were only about one meter tall—some rather petite little people.
They wore small skirts made of golden feathers, and there were also one or two clusters of golden feathers among the gaps in their hair, glinting in the sunlight.
Their clothes were too pretty. In the beastman world, whether one’s clothes looked good or not was something one was born with. Thinking about it this way, if kingfishers and peacocks also had beastmen, then their clothes would definitely be very gorgeous, right?
“Where do you come from?”
“What are you doing here?”
“Is he a half-beastman?”
“Why did you help us kill this enemy?”
“You helped us, thank you.”
“We’re also very afraid of snakes, so please don’t come too close to us.”
The small birds with clear voices spoke one sentence each, their voices rising and falling, chirping noisily.
Song Xu had spent so long facing a mute snake, accustomed to him not being able to keep up with her speaking rhythm, and only now did she finally meet a truly evenly matched opponent.
She immediately put on a serious expression and said, “We come from the Eastern Lands of Great Tang, heading to the Western Heaven to obtain scriptures, just passing through your treasured land.”
“This snake-snake is my partner, Wumu. Although he looks a bit fierce, he is very friendly and also doesn’t like to eat birds. You can rest assured!”
“I have a grudge with this eagle, and I happened to see you being attacked, so I drew my blade when I saw injustice. No need to thank me!”
Having to accurately express the meaning of another world’s language using the language of the beastman world was really a bit difficult, but Song Xu did it.
She successfully talked a group of bird beastmen into a daze. They whispered to each other, and some even showed expressions of shame at their own lack of knowledge.
“You must be from a big tribe, right?” One slightly braver little bird beastman quietly moved a bit closer and asked in a soft voice.
“That’s right, we’re auxiliary members of a big tribe!” Song Xu said without the slightest guilt.
With one little bird setting the example, the other little birds also gradually gathered around. Of course, they only surrounded Song Xu alone. They curiously asked this fun-to-talk-to squirrel beastman, “Why did you leave the tribe? Outside is very dangerous.”
Song Xu said, “We came out to travel, just to go out and play. Staying in one place for too long, we came out to look at the world and broaden our horizons.”
“Wow!” The little birds let out admiring chirps.
In this beastman world, beastmen were scattered everywhere, living in suitable regions. Only the hunting teams of big tribes would go to somewhat distant places to hunt. Most beastmen would never leave their own habitat in their entire lives, staying within the same nearby area from birth to death.
Like these golden-feathered birds—they were born on this tree, foraged in the surrounding forest, and had never gone far away. Therefore, they rarely saw other beastmen pass by.
Wumu was the same. He was born in the Fierce Beast Tribe, lived in the tribe before adulthood, and after adulthood lived in a stone cave in that forest. If he had not met Song Xu, he might have spent his entire life in that forest without ever leaving.
Song Xu’s chatterbox mode kicked in. Squatting on the spot, she chatted with the little birds. “There are so many birds on this tree, are they all your clansmen?”
The smallest bird beastman hopped about, bouncing up and down, and spread his arms like opening wings as he answered, “No, our clansmen number several dozen, and they all live in those nests in the very middle. The other nests on the tree are all birds that we raise.”
So this, too, was a small gathering place. The outer ones were just ordinary golden-feathered birds.
Song Xu carefully looked at the nests on the tree and found that this was indeed the case. In the center of the big tree were more than a dozen nests with a slightly larger area—those were the beastmen’s dwellings. Earlier, when Wumu climbed the tree to hunt the eagle, he had rushed too fast and knocked off a corner of several nests. Some small branches were hanging, about to fall but not yet falling, and some little birds were busily repairing them.
Song Xu asked curiously, “Why do you raise these birds?”
“For nothing in particular. We’ve always lived like this. Our clan and their clan live together. Although they aren’t beastmen, we protect them, and they also protect us!” The little bird beastmen spoke in a matter-of-fact tone.
When they talked, they had many small movements, just like little birds hopping on branches and flapping their wings—adorable.
Song Xu’s voice mixed together with the voices of a group of little birds who spoke with chirping sounds. At first, Big Snake waited off to the side, but after waiting for quite a while, there was still no sign of that conversation ending. Snake-snake tapped the dead giant eagle with the tip of his tail, waited a bit longer, and over there it seemed to be getting even more lively.
Because they were afraid of Big Snake, the little bird beastmen all crowded around Song Xu. Occasionally, one would feel curious about Wumu, but they would only look from far away. After two glances, they would scare themselves and hide behind their companions.
Snake-snake began swaying his tail faster. He hissed twice. But the sound was too small and got drowned out by the noise over there. Song Xu didn’t hear it.
When the snake made the dangerous sound that signaled an attack, it finally startled the group of birds and the squirrel. The bird beastmen were frightened and suddenly turned into little birds and flew up, flapping all over Song Xu’s head.
Song Xu: “Almost done, almost done, I’ll just chat for ten more minutes, okay!”
She had just asked about the grudges and entanglements between this giant eagle and these bird beastmen, and she hadn’t even finished hearing it yet.
According to the little birds, this eagle had appeared two years ago, seeming to have come from a very distant place. It had already eaten several of their clansmen and many ordinary golden-feathered birds. In their beast forms, they were small in size; in beastman form, they couldn’t fly. No matter which form, they had no way to deal with that giant eagle. Every time, they could only resist with all their strength.
Now that the giant eagle was dead, everyone was very happy. That was why they had excitedly all gathered around Song Xu to talk with her. If the one who killed the giant eagle, Wumu, were not the big snake they were very afraid of, they probably would have wanted to invite them to stay up in the tree for a while.
Song Xu was chatting happily, and time passed quickly. A big snake swam over. Song Xu, who had kept a bit of attention on that side, hurriedly said, “Wait a little longer, right away!”
The big snake came closer and closer, approaching the squatting Song Xu from behind, crawling up along her back. He placed his raised head on top of her head and opened his gaping maw.
In an instant, the little birds scattered and fled.
Song Xu: “…Alright, alright, no more chatting, let’s go.”
She muttered, “If you were over there, you’d definitely be the kind of man who’s very impatient about accompanying his girlfriend to go shopping at the mall. But since you’re a cute snake-snake, I can only forgive you.”
She waved to those little birds: “Goodbye, we’re leaving! Work hard at living!”
That tree full of bird nests was like an isolated island in a green forest. They gradually left the island, sailing through the green sea.
Snake-snake swam in front. Suddenly, he twisted his head back and ha-ed at Song Xu. That petty little sound just sounded very angry.
Song Xu was a bit confused by his ha. After coming back to her senses, she immediately ran over, straddled the snake’s tail in one move, put her hands on her hips, and asked, “What are you ha-ing for!”
The big snake twisted his head back and ha-ed angrily again. Song Xu immediately opened her mouth and imitated his hissing sound, ha-ing louder and longer than him. Although it sounded more like a cat hissing, he still felt her anger.
For some reason, the big snake who was angry dryly closed his gaping maw.
Song Xu pressed her advantage and ha-ed at him two more times, ha-ing until the big snake’s head shrank back. Only then was she satisfied.
The big snake flicked his tongue, feeling that he couldn’t win an argument against her. He twisted his head and started sliding forward to leave. Song Xu wasn’t paying attention and fell off him. She lay on the ground and suddenly shouted once, and didn’t get up, just lying there and angrily shouting, “I’m not going! I’m just lying here, I’m not getting up! Ah!”
Song Xu lay there for a while, saw a few tender leaves above her head glowing translucently in the sunlight, picked them, and stuffed them into her mouth.
Rustle rustle, the big snake came back again. He slithered to Song Xu’s side, his snake head right in front of her eyes. Song Xu raised her hand and pushed him away. The big snake circled around her once, trying to use his head to push her up. Song Xu deliberately slid downward, just lying there and not getting up, even crossing one leg over the other.
It looked exactly like how she used to act like a little rascal in front of her biological father back then, her style not diminished at all.
Snake-snake had no choice. He lay down beside her, the two of them lying together. But he wasn’t lying as peacefully as Song Xu. Every so often, he would try to see if he could push her up. Seeing that Song Xu seemed determined to lie here and spend the night, Snake-snake stood up and slithered away again.
Seeing him disappear into the bushes and disappear, Song Xu hesitated about whether to follow him. She lay there pondering for a long time about what exactly Wumu was angry about. As she thought, her own anger also passed. Just as she was about to pat her butt and get up, Wumu left first.
She sat there on the spot, and suddenly heard the rustling sound of bushes moving. Instantly, she lay back down again.
The big snake came back with several flowers stuck in his mouth. He loosened his mouth, letting the flowers fall onto Song Xu’s body, then rested his snake head on Song Xu’s belly and swayed it.
That silly snake-snake actually knew to bring food to seek reconciliation. Song Xu did a sit-up and hugged the snake’s head. “Alright, I’m not angry anymore. Let’s go!”
But the snake’s head pressed down on her and refused to get up.
Song Xu dragged him but couldn’t pull him up. “Ah, now it’s your turn to throw a tantrum and refuse to get up?”
No way around it—looks like they were going to sleep here for the night.
This randomly chosen sleeping spot was not very comfortable. Song Xu didn’t sleep well. In her hazy state, something kept making fine sounds beside her, along with the sound of rubbing against the ground. Song Xu groggily woke up. Snake-snake rolled over to her side, revealing a face covered with snake scales.
Song Xu: “!”
“What’s going on, what are you doing again?” Startled awake, Song Xu leaned down to look at Wumu’s situation.
Wumu suddenly reached out and grabbed her shoulder. That hand was practically the same as the giant eagle’s claw, clamping onto her shoulder so hard it hurt badly.
His chest rose and fell. He said with difficulty, “Talk, happy. Stay here, no.”
Song Xu understood why he had ha-ed at her during the day.
“No, no, no, I won’t stay here. I still want to travel with you. I’m happiest when I’m with you.”
