Thank you, BlueMoon, for the ko-fi~
Staring at the freshly hatched Eggy, the children gathered around the backpack were all stunned.
Even Rong Rong had no idea that Feng Yuan’s backpack had Eggy inside!
He opened his mouth in surprise and asked blankly, “Yuan Yuan, does… Uncle know?”
Feng Yuan hummed and shook his head.
If Grandpa didn’t agree to him bringing Eggy out, the other adults probably wouldn’t either.
So, he hadn’t told anyone.
However, to keep the adults from worrying, he had left a note on Eggy’s crib.
On the note were a few crookedly written words:
“I took Eggy out!”
Translated, it meant, “I brought Eggy out with me!”
“Rong Rong, don’t worry. I left a note for Dad,” Feng Yuan said, noticing the concern written all over Rong Rong’s face. He reached out and patted Rong Rong’s shoulder.
Eggy, still sitting in the backpack, stretched out a tiny hand and grabbed Rong Rong’s.
Afraid that Eggy might fall, Rong Rong picked him up and placed him on the carpet.
There were two carpets spread out in the small yard where they were playing.
Sitting on the carpet, Eggy beamed happily at Rong Rong.
The other children looked at Eggy and couldn’t help but admit defeat.
“Yuan Yuan, you’re amazing,” Cheng Cheng said sincerely. “I wouldn’t dare sneak my little sister out. You’re really brave!”
Feng Yuan puffed out his chest, not the least bit humble.
“That’s right! Yuan Yuan is the bravest!”
Cheng Cheng hadn’t been able to attend Eggy’s one-month celebration, so this was his first time seeing Eggy.
Despite being so young, Eggy’s face was exceptionally handsome.
With the dragon clan’s naturally good looks and the Yu family’s excellent genes, Eggy was destined to be a little heartthrob, no matter whom he took after.
Cheng Cheng studied him seriously for a moment before speaking.
“Your little brother is really cute,” Cheng Cheng said. “Just as cute as my little sister!”
Although Eggy was already very good-looking, Cheng Cheng viewed his own sister through rose-colored glasses.
Under the influence of his strong bias, Cheng Cheng reluctantly conceded that Eggy’s looks were on par with his sister’s.
“Eggy, let me hold you,” Cheng Cheng said, bending down to pick him up.
He loved holding his little sister at home. Seeing Eggy so small made him eager to do the same.
Eggy, who had been grinning at Rong Rong, seemed to be in a good mood.
But as Cheng Cheng’s hand reached for him, Eggy looked up, and the smile instantly vanished from his chubby little face.
Frowning, he stared at Cheng Cheng’s outstretched hand, his expression clearly saying, “Don’t touch me.”
“Hey, Eggy, you don’t want me to hold you?” Cheng Cheng’s hand froze mid-air, and he looked bewildered.
Feng Yuan glanced at Eggy, then at Cheng Cheng, and stepped in to explain.
“Eggy is shy around strangers, Cheng Cheng. Maybe you shouldn’t hold him.”
Cheng Cheng sighed regretfully. “Okay.”
Although Eggy had been a little black egg, he wasn’t the least bit dark after hatching.
While not as fair-skinned as Feng Yuan or Rong Rong, he was still exceptionally good-looking.
Whenever the adults took him out, passersby would often turn their heads to get a second look.
The handsome little Eggy sat obediently beside Rong Rong, neither crawling around nor causing a fuss.
Seeing how well-behaved he was, Feng Yuan leaned over and kissed him.
After showering Eggy with affection, Feng Yuan and the other children turned their attention to the porcelain Rui Rui had brought.
“This looks familiar.”
Feng Yuan stared at the porcelain piece, scratching his little cheek as he fell into deep thought.
He couldn’t shake the feeling that this porcelain creature looked strangely familiar.
Yet, for the life of him, he couldn’t recall exactly what kind of beast it was.
“Cheng Cheng, Yuan Yuan, Le Le, these are for you.”
Rui Rui was a meticulous child. He had brought stacks of yellow paper and incense sticks from his backpack.
His collection of ritual items was even more complete than his older brother’s.
None of these were shared with Rong Rong.
Rong Rong already excelled in his studies. His homework was always adorned with little red flowers.
The struggles of academic underachievers like them were foreign to Rong Rong.
So, this time, they didn’t include Rong Rong in their worship ritual.
Rong Rong simply watched from the sidelines, keeping an eye on them while also making sure Eggy stayed safe.
“Rui Rui, do we have to kowtow, too?”
Xu Jiale, arms full of supplies, voiced the question.
Rui Rui pondered for a moment. “Probably, yes.”
Feng Yuan felt conflicted. Gazing at the porcelain figure, he didn’t believe it represented any deity.
Apart from his grandparents, he had never kowtowed to anyone before.
Last year at the temple, he hadn’t even managed to kowtow before the Buddha statue.
“We have to kowtow! During New Year’s, when my dad burned paper offerings, he made me kowtow, too.”
“If we’re burning paper, we definitely have to kowtow.”
Cheng Cheng, who had kowtowed to ancestors with his father during the New Year, offered his opinion.
Feng Yuan wasn’t opposed to kowtowing itself.
With all the little ones in agreement, they moved to an open space and began their preparations.
First, they carefully placed the porcelain creature on a low table.
Then, they knelt in front of the table.
Just as Feng Yuan was wondering how to light the paper, Rui Rui produced a lighter.
Not only did he have a lighter. He knew how to use it, too.
Click.
As the flame sprang to life, Cheng Cheng swiftly lit a piece of yellow paper.
The children knelt together, each lighting their own sheets of yellow paper.
For these little ones, playing with fire was an incredibly fun game.
The more paper they burned, the more entertained they became.
To keep the flames going, Cheng Cheng even tossed his snot-filled tissue into the fire.
Feng Yuan gathered fallen leaves from the courtyard and added them to the blaze.
They took turns throwing things into the fire, giggling with delight.
Nearby, Eggy watched happily, clapping his little hands.
After a few claps, still sucking on his pacifier, he suddenly crawled over at lightning speed!
Rong Rong hurried after him, trying to pick him up again.
But Eggy had already reached his brother.
Once there, Eggy realized he had nothing to throw into the fire.
He stared at the flames for a few seconds.
Then, his tiny hand grabbed the porcelain creature from the low table.
Crash!
A sharp sound echoed as the porcelain beast shattered into pieces in the fire.
Successfully having thrown something into the flames, Eggy happily clapped his hands again.
Meanwhile, the cheerful laughter from Feng Yuan, Cheng Cheng, and the others instantly died.
The children stared at the fragments in the fire, their little faces gradually filling with panic.
But no one was more panicked than Rui Rui.
He collapsed onto the ground, bursting into tears.
“We’re doomed! My brother is going to hit me!”
Normally, Rui Rui and his brother got along wonderfully.
But when they fought, Rui Rui genuinely got beaten.
When his brother hit him, even his parents wouldn’t interfere!
The thought of going home to a beating made Rui Rui cry even louder.
He had originally planned to return the little porcelain creature after they finished worshipping.
Feng Yuan looked at the scattered fragments on the floor and Rui Rui’s sorrowful expression, realizing that Eggy had caused trouble.
“Rui Rui, I’m sorry.”
Feng Yuan apologized promptly.
He used water from another table to extinguish the fire.
After putting out the flames, Feng Yuan gathered the broken pieces.
The fragments lay scattered across the floor, looking impossible to reassemble.
Feng Yuan felt deeply troubled.
“What should we do now?”
He murmured, “Can we buy the same one at the mall?”
Rui Rui sniffled and said he didn’t know.
Feng Yuan wasn’t one to sit idly by. Seeing that the porcelain shards were beyond repair, he quickly stood up.
“Rui Rui, let’s go buy a new one!”
Feng Yuan was determined to act immediately.
He placed Eggy back into his backpack, this time hanging it across his chest.
He left the zipper open, making the backpack resemble a sling bag.
Eggy sat quietly inside, obediently letting his older brother carry him away.
Before leaving, Eggy turned to glance at the floor.
He still didn’t realize he had done anything wrong.
Earlier, his brother and the other children had been throwing things into the fire.
Eggy was just imitating his brother.
Feng Yuan understood perfectly well that he had set a bad example for his younger sibling.
So, he didn’t blame Eggy at all.
The little ones relocated. They had all driven their small cars to get here.
Soon.
Several small cars arrived at the largest mall.
Focused solely on buying a new porcelain beast as quickly as possible, none of them bothered to pick up the broken pieces.
Left abandoned on the ground, the shattered porcelain suddenly twitched around its eye area after they departed.
A transparent mist slowly rose from the fragments, eventually coalescing into the form of a beast.
This creature had the body of a jackal and the head of a dragon, its eyes wide open and filled with fury.
“How dare they.”
The jackal-bodied, dragon-headed beast glared toward the entrance, its voice dripping with rage.
These children were utterly despicable!
Their failure to properly honor him had already infuriated him.
But then they had gone even further, shattering the porcelain vessel that housed his spirit.
This was a debt he would surely settle!
The entirely transparent beast drifted like a wisp of smoke, heading in the direction the children had gone.
The little ones, already inside the mall, remained completely unaware.
The downtown mall had eight floors in total.
The children wandered together. None of them were first-time visitors.
Rui Rui even had a membership card for this mall.
Cheng Cheng had also brought money. His grandfather had given it to him.
His grandfather, unbeknownst to his parents, had stuffed his backpack full of cash.
This time, he had only brought a large handful.
The mall had shopping assistants.
Aside from Feng Yuan, all the children were quite well-off.
Although Feng Yuan’s family assets were the most valuable among them, unfortunately, his liquid funds were the lowest.
Even Eggy had received more New Year’s money than him.
Feng Yuan had initially intended to compensate Rui Rui out of his own pocket.
But now, with Rui Rui holding his card, there was no need for Feng Yuan to spend anything.
Rui Rui was well aware of Feng Yuan’s financial situation.
“Yuan Yuan, I have more money than I can spend. Just use mine today.”
Having lost his brother’s treasured porcelain beast, Rui Rui had moved past his initial panic, soothed by a large ice cream from the mall.
Now, he was even generously offering to treat everyone.
Not to be outdone, Cheng Cheng pulled out a few bills to show Feng Yuan after Rui Rui made his offer.
“Yuan Yuan, spend mine. Go ahead and spend it!”
His grandpa said that once he finished spending all the money in his backpack, he’d send him another backpack full!
Feng Yuan looked at these extravagant kids. Though he envied them, he didn’t feel the slightest urge to compare himself.
His pocket money might be small, but if he spent it carefully, it was enough!
“You guys spend your own money. I have some, too.”
Cheng Cheng pulled out hundred-yuan bills one after another, while Feng Yuan’s money was all in one-yuan and even fifty-cent coins.
Before finding the matching porcelain beast, they first bought a pile of snacks.
Ice cream, fried skewers, stinky tofu, candied hawthorns, egg waffles…
After buying these snacks, they shared bites. Everyone was thoroughly satisfied.
Rong Rong, raised with meticulous care by his dad, wasn’t quite used to eating these treats.
Eggy was drooling nonstop from the temptation.
With the discipline of a little nanny, Feng Yuan didn’t feed him a single bite of the snacks.
When he sneaked Eggy out, Feng Yuan also took along his bottle and water cup.
So for the past half-day, Eggy’s stomach hadn’t gone hungry at all.
The kids wandered around the mall for a while. The shopping assistant they’d found showed them a bunch of porcelain pieces.
None of the porcelain pieces was the same as the one they’d seen earlier.
The only one that looked somewhat similar was priced at 1.2 million.
Rui Rui’s shopping card didn’t have that much money.
Cheng Cheng’s backpack of cash wasn’t enough either.
Xu Jiale was counting on his fingers, trying to figure out how many digits 1.2 million had.
The kids couldn’t scrape together the money.
Munching on their snacks, they sighed in disappointment.
Rui Rui had already prepared himself for a beating: “Forget it. Let’s stop looking.”
“Anyway, my brother won’t beat me to death.”
Sitting on the small sofa in the lounge, Rui Rui tried to comfort himself.
As he comforted himself, he even brought Feng Yuan into it.
“Yuan Yuan has been beaten so many times, and his butt is still fine.”
“If my brother just hits me once, it should be okay, too.”
Rui Rui’s self-comforting made Feng Yuan a little indignant.
“Rui Rui, I haven’t been beaten in a long time!”
Feng Yuan tried to shake off the nickname “little internet sensation of getting spanked”.
Tilting his chin up, he said with a hint of pride to the other kids, “My dad isn’t home, so no one’s hitting me now.”
When his dad came back a while ago to pick up Qin Xun, he did manage to spank him twice in a hurry.
But now that his dad wasn’t home, he wasn’t scared at all!
Just as Feng Yuan was happily thinking about his dad’s absence, Feng Qi, who had returned to drop off Qin Xun for school, had unfortunately already arrived at the airport.
As soon as Feng Qi got off the plane, he received a call from Yu Yi.
Upon learning that Feng Yuan had sneaked Eggy out, his eager longing to see his son instantly soured.
He still desperately wanted to see his son.
Only this time, when he did, he’d have to raise his hand.
Feng Qi was rushing to his son’s location.
Meanwhile, the shopping assistant in the mall continued to introduce the 1.2-million-yuan porcelain.
“This is modeled after the mythical beast Yazi.”
“It has great collectible value.”
“If you’re interested, you can take a collector’s brochure back to give to your parents.”
The assistant enthusiastically explained the porcelain.
When Feng Yuan heard the name Yazi, it finally clicked.
“No wonder it looked so familiar,” Feng Yuan interjected. “Rui Rui, yours is Yazi, too.”
Feng Yuan knew Yazi’s formal name—Uncle Yazi.
Feng Yuan didn’t know this uncle’s name because of any good reputation.
He knew it because he had heard plenty of bad things about Uncle Yazi.
Those rumors said Uncle Yazi was extremely narrow-minded.
His heart was smaller than a needle’s eye.
If anyone offended him, he would seek revenge at any cost.
Feng Yuan himself had no real impression of Yazi.
But Bai Ze had told him that when he was little, Yazi had come to hold him once.
While being held by Yazi, Feng Yuan had waved his tiny fist and hit Yazi in the face.
Almost instantly, Yazi, while still holding him with one hand, clenched his other fist and lightly punched him back.
Yazi held back, out of respect for Bai Ze and Feng Qi.
But Feng Yuan was just a baby back then.
When Yazi’s fist landed on his small body, the well-fed Feng Yuan, whether from the hit or the scare, immediately vomited up his milk with a loud “wah!”
Because of this incident, Bai Ze often later told Feng Yuan about how terrible Yazi was.
Bai Ze even forbade him from playing with Yazi.
After all, Yazi didn’t hesitate to hit even a child like Feng Yuan.
With others, he showed even less mercy.
Qiong Qi had once crossed paths with him, too.
Qiong Qi accidentally stepped on and killed a prey that Yazi had his eyes on. In return, Yazi chased Qiong Qi down, insisting on stepping on him twice.
Qiong Qi had a fiery temper himself.
At first, Qiong Qi fought back.
But as they brawled, Yazi kept a mental tally while fighting!
How many punches Qiong Qi landed, how many punches he landed back…
He was keeping score of it all!
Hearing Yazi counting, Qiong Qi rolled his eyes and ran off.
In short, such incidents were all too common with Yazi.
His pettiness was widely acknowledged throughout the World of Mountains and Seas.
Thinking of the legends about Uncle Yazi, Feng Yuan patted his chubby little chest with relief.
“Good thing we didn’t run into the real Uncle Yazi.”
Feng Yuan really didn’t want to meet an uncle who would even fight a child.
Moonlit: Yuan Yuan, unfortunately, Uncle Yazi is tracking down your tracks.
Sam Williams On TYMIMA Chapter 152