“Tides are coming. Will the demonic beasts all run to the edge of the pole and outside?”
“Only the ones with low levels will do that.”
Walking on the snowy plains, Meili always felt that the plains now were even more empty than before. Because she couldn’t keep up physically, they couldn’t leave the lighthouse too far. After walking out a distance, they had to turn back.
Muli told her that a bit farther ahead, there was a river of ice that would never freeze. Even in the coldest times, that river still flowed gently.
“Standing on a nearby iceberg to look, it’s a blue water vein, and beside it are iceberg cliffs like broken precipices.” Muli had noticed that Meili liked such scenery. Although she didn’t say it, whenever she saw these rare sights, her eyes would widen, and she would look carefully, unwilling to even blink.
Just as expected, Meili became interested in what he said. “Really? I really want to go see it if there’s a chance!”
Muli: “Go see it. We go today.”
Meili hesitated again. “It’s too far. We won’t make it back by night.”
Muli let out a soft laugh, his tone confident and proud, “If we can’t make it back, then we sleep there. With me here, nothing will be a problem.”
So Meili really prepared things and followed Muli to see that polar ice river that would never freeze.
The scenery of the first stretch of road was similar. Later, she began to see sights she had never seen before. Groups of icebergs formed an iceberg cluster. The small ones were only two people tall; the large ones, when coming close and looking up, she couldn’t see the top even with her head raised.
These snow-white and rock-hard icebergs of all sizes were piled up along the way without any pattern. Every iceberg was steep and jagged, looking impossible to climb.
Passing one iceberg, Meili saw on the iceberg wall a frozen demonic beast skeleton. Many bone spikes jutted chaotically from the iceberg, like a tree trunk growing out of the mountain.
“Muli, look, that iceberg has a demonic beast skeleton frozen on it.” Meili tugged Muli and shared it with him.
Muli: “This place used to be water before, and now it’s frozen. That demonic beast may have died in the sea, then was pushed up by waves, and when it gathered into an iceberg, it froze inside.”
Actually, many of these icebergs had various animal skeletons frozen inside them, and some even had fish.
Seeing that cluster of bone spikes wasn’t too high from the ground, Muli pulled down the thick fur blanket draped over him, pulled out the two bone spikes hanging at his waist, and suddenly accelerated, jumping two meters high. The bone spike in his hand pierced into the iceberg wall.
Using the bone spike to swing his body upward, he jumped higher and stabbed the other spike into the ice wall. Stepping on the bone spikes, he easily reached the middle of the frost-covered wall in just a few steps.
Meili hugged his thick fur blanket and chased after him to the iceberg wall, touching the white wall once and instantly pulling back her hand from the cold. She only looked up at him to see what he was doing.
Muli shook the demonic beast skeleton frozen in the wall and shouted down, “Get back.”
Meili stepped away and watched him raise his hand and snap. Just like that, he broke the hardened bones frozen in the iceberg. They fell piece by piece to the ground, making continuous crackling sounds and raising a cloud of snow.
He broke down the entire cluster of beast bones, looked at the height above, and then just jumped down from there like that, not forgetting to retrieve his bone spikes mid-fall.
The newly made cloak fluttered behind him. He landed on the ground, cushioning the impact easily in a crouched stance.
Meili got shocked by him. She looked at that frightening height, then at him, then at the height again, then at him.
Muli crouched and fiddled with that pile of bones, speaking casually, “I can jump higher too.”
Once again, Meili sincerely exclaimed, “You’re really amazing!”
After sighing, she asked him again, “What are you doing?”
Every time she praised him, Muli was easy to talk to. He answered everything she asked, his tone soft and mushy, “I’m making something for you to play with.”
“For me to play with?”
Meili didn’t understand why, watching him wedge a few curved bones together. Very quickly, he assembled them into a shallow dish-shaped pan.
Once it was done, Muli excitedly placed her into the pan. While she was still utterly confused, he gave the big pan a strong push forward—
This area had once been water, now covered by a thick layer of ice, with only a thin layer of snow on top, making it quite slippery. The bone-made pan, pushed by force, slid rapidly across the ice.
Meili: “Aaaaaahhhh—”
Muli: “Hahahahaha—”
It was way too thrilling. When the big pan under her finally slowed and stopped, Meili let out a breath, still shaken. Muli had pushed too suddenly; she hadn’t been prepared at all, and her heart was pounding like crazy.
Muli chased after her and asked, “Fun, right?”
This couldn’t quite be called fun, but Meili had never played anything like this. Thinking about it now, in the midst of the fright there was a strange kind of excitement.
She was still hesitating, not sure whether to nod or not, when Muli already pressed down on the big pan and sent her flying across the ice again.
This time was even more thrilling than before. She spun forward in circles across the ice, her head dizzy. She didn’t sit steadily and leaned forward, falling headfirst, both she and the flying pan tumbling.
If she weren’t holding the thick fur blanket, her forehead might have gotten a huge bump.
Seeing her fall, Muli was startled too, hurrying over to pull her out of the snow.
“Why did you fall?” He couldn’t understand no matter what.
Because she didn’t have his balance, of course.
Meili shook the snow off her head. Seeing Muli’s excited appearance, she felt that maybe, compared to her, he was the one who wanted to play this more.
She stood up and said, “I’m not playing this anymore. You come, I’ll push you.”
Muli thought her slender arms could never push him, but he still sat obediently in the big pan, filling it completely.
Meili stood behind him, using all her strength to push.
When Meili flew out earlier, she was like a light falling leaf. Now Muli was like a heavy, solid stone—unable to glide, only able to inch forward if she pushed.
Facing forward, Muli quietly experienced the snail-like speed.
Meili: “Huff—huff—”
Hearing her panting behind him, Muli turned to look: after so long, they had only moved a bit more than two meters.
“Let’s sit together.” Muli offered a suggestion, and he carried it out immediately. He placed Meili in front of him, stretched out both legs to the sides, and began sliding.
They did slide out, but the speed was still slow, and not very convenient. What was worse—after being tormented like this for a while, the bone pan couldn’t handle the weight of the two of them combined, and shattered right on the spot.
Sitting on a pile of bone fragments, Muli stood up with some regret. He hadn’t played enough.
A moment later, Muli thought up a new way to play. He took the thick blanket Meili was holding and laid it on the ice. With a few slaps of his big hands on the blanket, he said, “You sit on this. I’ll drag you forward.”
Meili squatted onto it obediently, like a well-behaved red fox.
Muli grabbed two corners of the thick blanket with one hand and, without even a word of warning, suddenly bolted forward.
Meili leaned back and directly flipped over, rolling out. Muli, dragging the blanket, rushed out far ahead. She sat there in a daze, still unable to react.
Meili: “???” That’s it?
Noticing the weight in his hands grow lighter, Muli ran back while swinging the blanket. He still hadn’t given up on this game, and very seriously suggested to Meili, “You can lie down, then grab the long fur on the blanket. That way you won’t fall easily.”
Meili also felt that made sense. This time, it would definitely work.
She lay down, held onto the long fur securely, and signaled to Muli, “Okay!”
Hearing the signal, Muli shot forward like an arrow.
At first, it was actually quite good. Meili only saw the rushing, retreating icebergs. But Muli seemed to get more and more excited while running, far too fast. She couldn’t quite hold onto the fur, and then, suddenly feeling her hands empty, she naturally slipped off, lying peacefully onto the snow.
Muli, who accidentally left her behind again, rushed far ahead dragging the empty blanket.
Then he turned around to find the Meili he had lost.
Muli ran back and saw Meili sitting with her back to him, her shoulders trembling. His heart jumped—was she hurt and crying?
Too scary.
His steps grew heavier as he walked to her side. “You…”
But Meili lifted her head, her whole face full of smiles. When she saw him, she even burst into laughter: “Hahahahaha!” It was the first time Muli had seen her laugh so happily. She usually smiled too, a smile that made people think she was nice—but not one that made people think she was truly happy.
She was like a red fox, without other foxes’ slyness, and more melancholic than other foxes.
Muli squatted beside her and laughed together with her.
After a long moment, Meili stopped laughing. She looked at the long fur in her hand, loosened her grip and let go, and slowly tried to get up. Her expression suddenly twisted in pain, and she whispered, “It hurts… hiss—”
Muli tossed the thick fur blanket over his shoulder and, skillfully, lifted her into his arms. “Then we won’t play anymore.”
Meili leaned against his chest, rubbing her head and waist. “Let’s play again next time.”
Muli pretended as if he didn’t want to play at all, agreeing, “Alright, next time then.”
When he was very young, his grandfather seemed to have played a similar game with him. Such memories were equally short-lived, and afterwards, there were no more.
He could survive here alone, but could not gain much joy.
Meili saw the ice river Muli had spoken of.
Even more beautiful than she had imagined—because it was so deep, it had turned into a dreamy emerald blue. Against the contrast of the white shores, it was shockingly vivid, like a piece of solidified blue crystal.
They walked slowly along the riverbank, along the clearest and most defined boundary line.
The towering icebergs on the opposite side were like a gigantic snow beast lying in wait, unmoving as it watched this land of ice and snow.
Everything seemed too clean.
Meili wanted to look at the ice river a little longer, but her body couldn’t withstand the cold anymore. Even wrapped in a blanket, she was still shivering.
Muli dug a hole in a nearby small iceberg. These icebergs might have existed for tens of millions of years, incomparably hard, yet under Muli’s claws, solid ice chunks clattered down.
He dug the hole quickly. Muli held Meili and went inside, blocking the entrance with crushed ice and snow, leaving only a small slit.
Meili returned to the state she had been in when first entering the polar region—hiding inside Muli’s clothes, relying on the warmth of the white fur to fight the cold.
Once she warmed up, she moved a little. Muli released one hand that was holding her and placed it under his head, looking upward.
The snow cave was not dark. On the contrary, the crushed ice layers refracted brilliant light like shattered diamonds. The semi-transparent ice itself seemed like a frozen, hazy fog, wrapping them in the middle.
