Chapter 16: There’s a Monster
Ruan Chen watched with immense curiosity as Vincent thrashed up and down in the water. Although he couldn’t understand a single word, just looking at the merman’s expression was highly entertaining.
Clinging onto Lux’s shoulder with his small hands, he tilted his head up with round, wide eyes and said, “Meow meow meow-wu! (This fish is a total dumbass.)”
The translator wasn’t finished yet, but Lux felt he should encourage the human’s attempts to communicate with him.
He lowered his eyes, smoothed back Ruan Chen’s hair, and let out a low “Mm.”
Ruan Chen got excited. “Meow-ow? (You understood me?)”
He heard the merman give another low murmur in response.
“Meowu? (Really?)” Ruan Chen tilted his head suspiciously. “Meow-ow-ow? Meow meow meow! (You aren’t just giving me some half-assed response to brush me off, are you?)”
This particular string of cries was far too long, and Lux failed to grasp its meaning.
Ruan Chen stared intently at him, and the merman fell into silence.
“Ow-ow-ow! (You son of a meow, you really are just brushing me off!)” Ruan Chen turned his head away in a huff, ignoring him.
And here he thought he could finally communicate with this merman.
He had thought way too highly of the guy.
Species that talked like they were singing could never strike a chord with a tone-deaf human like him.
Ruan Chen’s anger didn’t even last a few seconds before Lux held up a bag of snacks right in front of his eyes.
“Want some?” He tore a small opening. “I saw you liked it a lot yesterday, so I grabbed a few more bags for you.”
Having just gone through intense exercise, Ruan Chen’s stomach voiced its desperate craving.
He immediately clapped a hand over his belly, looking down to glare at his midsection. “Meowu! (You spineless traitor, all you know how to do is eat!)”
Right after his shout, Lux had already torn off a piece of jerky and pressed it against Ruan Chen’s lips.
“Mew-wu.” Ruan Chen curled his tongue and bit it into his mouth.
Delicious.
For the sake of such delicious food, I’ll temporarily forgive this merman for a few minutes. Ruan Chen convinced himself.
“Lux, do you want to come with me to check out the footage?” Vincent asked. He felt that the combat skills this human had displayed were absolutely worth paying attention to.
The battleship was cruising smoothly, and Lux didn’t have anything urgent to attend to, so he nodded. “Lead the way.”
“You got it!” Vincent grinned. “I’m definitely going to let you see the true face of this human of yours.”
Ruan Chen was still digging out jerky from the bag in Lux’s hand with his head down, completely oblivious to what was coming next.
Lux followed Vincent into the monitoring room. The merman soldiers on duty stood and saluted in unison. “Admiral Lux! Is there anything we can help you with?”
Vincent quickly said, “We’re just checking out the training room footage. Carry on with your work, don’t worry about us.”
The merman in charge of the training room vacated the seat for them.
Ruan Chen finished off another bag. Licking his lips, he propped himself up by Lux’s shoulder and scanned the surroundings.
Meeting the fixed, intense stares of several nearby mermen, he let out a tiny “mew-wu” and shrank right back into Lux’s embrace.
“Be good, don’t squirm.” Lux pinched the soft flesh at the back of his neck.
Thanks to this, Ruan Chen successfully scored a third bag of snacks.
The playback of the footage began.
On the light screen, the size difference between the human and the merman was even more pronounced. He looked so tiny, appearing incredibly fragile.
Lux dangerously narrowed his eyes.
Vincent waved his hands frantically. “Don’t get mad yet! Keep watching, it absolutely, positively wasn’t me bullying him!”
After waiting a few seconds, the human in the footage suddenly lunged forward. His slender arms extended and retracted in a flash.
Immediately after, the merman who had just been standing upright in the water was flipped over with a loud splash and slammed onto the floor, his face frozen in utter disbelief.
“Ahem.” Having the scene of him getting utterly destroyed publicly exposed yet again, Vincent rubbed the tip of his nose. “How about it? I didn’t lie to you, right?”
Lux’s golden pupils constricted slightly.
The movement just now had been way too fast; the human’s small arms had been practically an afterimage.
He raised his eyes and said, “Play it again. Slow motion.”
The footage replayed.
Vincent paused the light screen right on the frame where Ruan Chen made his move. “Look at his stance.”
He opened his optical computer, analyzing the principles of force applied to this frame.
The optical computer screen indicated that the exact spot Ruan Chen’s hand had gripped was Vincent’s center of balance.
In a mere fraction of a second, he had accurately judged the most vulnerable spot on the opponent’s entire body. Coupled with exquisite technique, he had effortlessly dismantled Vincent’s defense using less than a finger’s worth of strength, and had even completed a counter-kill without intentionally trying to strike back.
Vincent grew even more excited. “If we can analyze Ruan Ruan’s fighting style, our own close-quarters combat skills can reach a whole new level!”
Lux was a fellow combat enthusiast himself. Vincent knew that if he wanted to keep learning things from Ruan Chen in the future, he had to convince Lux first.
He asked with a face full of anticipation, “What do you think? If you’re worried, you can let Ruan Ruan teach me first.”
“Meow meow meow meow! (Finished it, want more!)” Ruan Chen couldn’t wait any longer for a new snack and anxiously patted Lux’s arm.
Lux opened another bag for him. “Teach you?”
Vincent nodded. “Yeah! I learn really fast! Once I learn it, I can teach the other mermen. That way, Ruan Ruan won’t have to interact with anyone else.”
This plan was comprehensive enough; it wouldn’t make Lux feel like his human was being eyed by outsiders.
“Then why shouldn’t he just teach me directly?” Lux arched an eyebrow.
Vincent: “…”
Oh, right.
But…
“You… you’re willing to learn combat from a human?” Just how proud Lux was by nature was something everyone on Ocean Planet knew.
Back in his military academy days, he had infuriated who knew how many instructors. None of them could ever make him yield, let alone teach him in the field of close-quarters combat—his absolute specialty.
Vincent watched as his pale golden eyelashes lowered. The tiny human in his arms opened his small mouth, slowly nibbling on the meat chunks in his hand, his pink tongue occasionally grazing Lux’s fingers.
The expression on Lux’s face held a level of patience and tenderness Vincent had never seen before.
“Why wouldn’t I be willing?” he spoke softly. “He is my human.”
Before long, Ruan Chen finished eating. He licked away the crumbs from the corner of his mouth. “Meow-ow. (Full.)”
“Then… then that’s even better! Teaching you works just the same.” Vincent rubbed his hands together, wishing he could start the lessons right this instant. “It’s just… well, when he’s teaching you, can I stand off to the side and watch?”
Right as he finished speaking, the human in Lux’s arms let out a yawn, his eyes glistening with moisture. “Mew-wu… (Sleepy…)”
Lux scooped him up. “We’ll talk about it when the time comes. He’s tired, I need to coax him to sleep first.”
Vincent: “?”
Coming out of the monitoring room, Lux carried Ruan Chen back to the quarters and shut the door.
He sat down on the sofa, letting Ruan Chen sit astride his fish tail so they could look at each other face-to-face. “You like using weapons, you aren’t afraid of the Zerg, and you even know exquisite martial arts.”
Lux brushed away the black hair by Ruan Chen’s ear. “Ruan Ruan, just how many little secrets do you have?”
The merman’s tail was very slick, so Ruan Chen had to grip Lux’s clothes tightly just to maintain his balance.
“Meowu? (What are you saying?)” He met the merman’s eyes from mere inches away. They were pure and unique, resembling shifting golden sands, framed by long eyelashes—even longer than those of his beautiful Chinese teacher back in school.
“Meow meow meow meow… (This merman is… actually kind of good-looking.)”
Ruan Chen’s small face quietly flushed red.
Then, he caught his own reflection in the merman’s pupils.
His eyes were wide open, his mouth slightly agape, and his expression looked completely dazed—the exact picture of a little pervert.
Not understanding what was going on, Lux placed a hand against his forehead, frowning as he said, “Why is your face so red? Are you sick?”
“Meow-ow! Meow meow meow meow! (Smelly goldfish, it’s definitely because you’re always seducing me with all this hugging and touching!)” Ruan Chen flew into a shameful rage. Swatting Lux’s hand away, he dived straight into the conch bed, yanking the blanket all the way over his head to completely ignore him.
When Ruan Chen woke up from his afternoon nap and crawled out of the conch bed on his own, the room was empty.
The battleship had already flown far away from Ocean Planet and entered deep space, advancing steadily toward Base X. They would arrive in less than three days.
Ruan Chen was entirely unaware of this. All he knew was that a small nightlight was turned on in the room, and it seemed to have gotten dark outside.
“Meowu. (Hungry again.)” He rubbed his stomach and looked around.
Then, he discovered two open jars of food on the small dining table not far away.
A spoon was stuck inside one of the jars, showing signs of having been stirred.
The merman had probably mixed that powder from last time into it.
Ruan Chen wrinkled his nose in disgust, but he still picked up a jar, scooped out a large spoonful, and stuffed it into his mouth.
The taste was as good as always.
He swallowed it down. As his gaze drifted, he spotted the window open on the room’s wall.
Ruan Chen’s eyes widened.
Outside… it didn’t look like it had simply gotten dark.
He felt like he had just seen a giant rock floating in mid-air?!
With a soft “meowu,” Ruan Chen paddled his legs and quickly swam over to the window, pressing his face flat against the glass to peer outside.
“Mew-wu! (Holy crap!)”
He really hadn’t seen wrong!
Was that outer space out there?
“Meow meow meow meow… (So beautiful…)” Ruan Chen’s dark eyes reflected the scenery outside the window, a look of pure intoxication washing over his face.
Suddenly, a mass of black shape violently shot past the window with a sharp whoosh.
“Meow-ow? (What the hell?)” Ruan Chen froze for a few seconds. He tilted his head, looking in the direction where the black shadow had flown.
In that exact instant, the black mass from a moment ago slammed onto the exterior of the battleship with a loud clang, stopping right in front of the window where Ruan Chen was standing.
Ruan Chen looked up.
A bug monster, looking exactly like the ones inside the “gaming pod,” bared its mouthparts right at him.
Ruan Chen froze solid.
A few seconds later, a blood-curdling screech echoed through the room: “Meow-ow-ow-ow—! (Holy fucking shit, ahhhh!)”
The jar and spoon Ruan Chen had been holding sent flying out of his hands. He spun around, frantically paddling his limbs to get as far away from that window as possible.
“Meow-wu-wu-wu… (The monster escaped from the gaming console!)”
Immediately after, Ruan Chen crashed right into a broad, solid chest.
He looked up and found the golden merman.
“What’s wrong?” Lux had just returned. Hearing his panicked shriek from the doorway, he had rushed back in an instant.
With a pale little face, Ruan Chen looked up to lodge a desperate complaint: “Meow meow-ow-ow, meow-wu-wu… (There’s a bug monster outside the window!)”
He curled himself tightly against Lux, extending a trembling finger to point toward the window.
Lux held him tightly, protecting the back of his head to soothe him while following the line of his arm to look outside.
But there was absolutely nothing on the window.
Ruan Chen knitted his brows. “Meow-ow-ow? (It was clearly just there!)”
He rubbed his eyes, looking back over in disbelief, but it remained entirely empty.
“Vincent,” Lux commanded into his communicator. “Pull up the surveillance footage from the exterior of my quarters.”
“Copy that!”
The sudden appearance of that bug had genuinely scared Ruan Chen half to death.
“Meowu…” He had calmed down slightly by now, but his limbs still felt a little weak.
Lux carried him out of the room. After a moment of thought, he grabbed a portion of the most popular beverage available, filling it into a small baby bottle designed for human use.
Ruan Chen felt the merman tap his shoulder. He lifted his head from the merman’s chest, and the moment he opened his mouth, something soft was stuffed right inside.
Ruan Chen instinctively took a sip.
It was sweet, and very tasty.
“Mew-wu…” Holding it with his small hands, he narrowed his eyes and downed more than half the cup in one long breath.
Once he realized something felt off, he pulled the cup down to look at it.
A baby bottle?!
Ruan Chen’s eyes instantly bulged out.
“Does it taste good? Be good, don’t be scared anymore.” Lux had no idea he had just ignited a bomb.
A few seconds later, having gathered a massive charge of rage, Ruan Chen glared up at him and roared fiercely: “Meow-ow-ow-ow-ow! (I am not a fucking baby! Are you looking down on me?!)”
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