Chapter 64: Extra — The Mochi Family (2)
The bird trafficker was dragged away by security. After hitting a wall at Si Jingce’s place, he probably wouldn’t be able to enter this building again.
Hearing the door close, Yanyan poked his head out from the room. “He’s gone?”
“Mm.” Si Jingce walked over and hugged him. “He offered four hundred yuan to take you away.”
Yanyan’s value couldn’t be measured in money.
Si Jingce held him even tighter, as if afraid someone might rush in the next second and snatch the bird away…
“Four hundred yuan?”
Yanyan said in surprise, “Wow, am I still that expensive? Beige penguin pearl finches shouldn’t cost that much.”
Nowadays, you could buy a tame and cute little pearl finch for under two hundred yuan.
If it wasn’t hand-raised, the price would be even lower.
He cautiously glanced at Si Jingce and came up with a terrible idea: “How about you sell me to him, take the money, and then I’ll find a chance to run back?”
Si Jingce: ……
He rubbed Yanyan’s head hard, immediately extinguishing this immature thought. “We don’t lack four hundred yuan.”
The balance in Yanyan’s bank account alone could buy back an entire nest of birds.
Yanyan snuggled into his arms, clearly realizing the same thing. “Then can I use money to buy back my parents and my brothers?”
Si Jingce nodded.
But while the idea sounded good, those birds had likely formed deep bonds with their current owners. Their owners might not be willing to sell them.
He gave Yanyan a heads-up, and Yanyan nodded. “I know. We’ll ask the birds what they think.”
Pearl finches are flock breeders—keeping them alone could lead to depression or abnormal behavior. If the whole family could reunite, it would be wonderful.
But after being apart for so long, his family might have formed new flocks. And now that Yanyan was a stronger human, intervening might not necessarily help—it could even harm them.
“It’s okay!” Yanyan smiled. “Having brother is already enough for me.”
They decided to gather all the birds from Yanyan’s original nest for a reunion—and even let Gui Yaying and Si De meet the “in-law birds” (…?).
Si Jingce flipped through the contact list the former owner had sent and unexpectedly saw a familiar number.
When Yanyan first came home, Si Jingce had once heard his thoughts and gone to see a psychiatrist. The doctor’s surname was Shi.
Dr. Shi hadn’t found anything wrong at the time but suggested follow-ups… which Si Jingce had long since forgotten.
Seeing him staring at the number, Yanyan asked, “Brother, do you know him?”
After so long, Si Jingce simply told the story as a joke. “When you first came home, I went to a psychiatrist. This was the doctor.”
He frowned, recalling something. “He also told me he had a friend under a lot of stress, always suspicious—thinking his partner was a pelican.”
Yanyan: ……
A pelican that could turn human… there was only one.
…
What a small world.
Some time ago, Gui Yaying had casually mentioned that a business partner’s son had gone to raise a pelican. Only now did Si Jingce realize—it was the same person Dr. Shi had talked about.
Yanyan was right—there was only one such pelican.
Originally, Si Jingce planned to use a follow-up visit as an excuse to meet Dr. Shi, but now that there was a connection, things became much easier.
That pelican’s partner was surnamed Shang—Shang Wanshuo. Although the Shang and Si families had some business ties, the two weren’t particularly close.
This time, Yanyan turned into a bird and was carried in a transparent bird carrier as they went to Shang Wanshuo’s house.
The moment they entered the villa, the little pearl bird widened his eyes in amazement.
Such a big yard… just like the Si family’s.
Walking further in, under a tree sat a pelican nest. A white big-beaked bird rested there with its eyes closed.
“Chirp!”
Yanyan clung to the air hole of the carrier, greeting the pelican.
Shi Yu opened his eyes and glanced at him. Before Yanyan could get excited, a tall man walked toward them.
Everything went dark as the man bent down, peering closely into the carrier. He extended a finger to tease him. “So you’re the pearl finch who teamed up with Yu Yu for that ‘fishing enforcement’ stunt?”
Back then, to catch Doctor Chen, they had acted secretly. Shi Yu hadn’t told his partner.
Yanyan’s gaze unconsciously followed the man’s finger, his little head bobbing.
Then he realized the tone carried a hint of interrogation. His whole body stiffened. He slowly turned around, shrank into the corner, and curled into a ball in guilt.
Si Jingce covered the carrier with his hand and greeted him, “Mr. Shang.”
Since the man’s partner was also originally a bird, Si Jingce introduced without hesitation, “This is my boyfriend, Yanyan.”
Yanyan, still facing away, fluttered his wings as a greeting.
Shang Wanshuo received them in the sitting room. Si Jingce let Yanyan out of the carrier for some air. The pelican—Shi Yu—sat beside his partner, quietly shelling sunflower seeds and feeding Yanyan.
By the time Dr. Shi arrived, Yanyan’s stomach was already stuffed full of peeled seeds from Yu Yu.
“Sorry, sorry, just got off work—I’m late.”
Dr. Shi came in somewhat disheveled, carrying two bird cages. He set them on the table and smiled when he saw Si Jingce.
“Mr. Si, how have you been lately?”
In this situation, Si Jingce obviously wasn’t about to tell him “my condition still isn’t cured,” so he brushed it off lightly. “No more auditory hallucinations. Maybe I was just under too much stress back then.”
Doctor Shi, who didn’t know the truth, put on an “I told you so” expression. “Everyone’s under pressure these days. Just rest more and you’ll be fine.”
He continued, “Are your routines still irregular? Skipping meals and all that?”
Si Jingce: “Not anymore.”
If he stayed up too late the night before, the next morning he would definitely be woken up by Yanyan’s constant nagging about eating—or he’d feel a fluffy little creature land on his face, pecking him with its tiny sharp beak.
His chaotic lifestyle had been forcibly corrected by Yanyan.
Shang Wanshuo raised an eyebrow from the side. “You’ve gone back to being some kind of relationship guru for others again?”
“You think everyone’s like you? I’m working properly,” Doctor Shi rolled his eyes.
Then he seemed to remember something funny. Turning to Si Jingce, he asked, “Can I tell him?”
Si Jingce: “…Go ahead.”
Doctor Shi immediately covered his mouth and started whispering with Shang Wanshuo.
Shang Wanshuo’s expression gradually turned strange. In the end, he glanced at Si Jingce and let out a heavy “Hah.” “What a scheming way to chase someone.”
The boomerang came right back and hit Si Jingce.
Doctor Shi slammed the table laughing. Yanyan, who had been quietly eating sunflower seeds and had no idea what was going on, got startled and bounced a few times.
He looked at Si Jingce, then at the others, and mistakenly thought Si Jingce was being bullied. He immediately rushed to Doctor Shi’s hand and shouted fiercely, looking up, “Chirp!”
“Oh ho.” Doctor Shi’s attention was instantly drawn away. He leaned in curiously to examine him. “Why does your call sound different from your brothers’?”
Pearl finches have different calls?
Everyone turned their attention to the two cages Doctor Shi had brought. Smiling, he said, “Go on, meet your brothers. Let’s see if you still recognize each other.”
The little pearl bird hopped forward. Doctor Shi pulled off the black cloth. The two pearl finches inside, who had been sleeping, were startled awake and immediately started yelling—
“Chirp-chirp-chirp-chirp!”
Yanyan’s pupils shook: ?
That call… really was different.
“These two are called Zhima and Tangyuan,” Doctor Shi introduced. “They love talking. Always chattering away—I have no idea what they’re saying all day.”
Yanyan stood to the side, quietly listening as his bird brothers finished scolding Doctor Shi…
When they were taken away, none of them had molted yet—just grey, round little fluffballs. Now they were all handsome adult males.
After carefully identifying them and confirming they were indeed his brothers, Yanyan gathered his courage and called out, “Big brother, second brother, long time no see.”
Unexpectedly, Tangyuan frowned and coldly replied, “Who’s your big brother?”
Yanyan’s heart skipped a beat.
Wait… did he recognize the wrong birds?
But their scents were similar—he shouldn’t be mistaken.
Before Yanyan could say anything, Tangyuan protested indignantly, “My shell cracked thirty-five seconds earlier than his. I’m obviously the big brother!”
Zhima didn’t care at all. “I was the first to poke a hole in my egg.”
Tangyuan: “But I was halfway out before you even stuck your head out!”
Zhima: “Oh? But I fully hatched before you.”
“I’m the big brother! I’m the big brother!” Tangyuan screeched.
Yanyan, at a loss, tried to mediate. “Big brother, second brother, don’t fight…”
Hearing himself called second brother, Tangyuan screamed even louder.
Doctor Shi, completely misunderstanding the situation, was touched. “Looks like they still recognize each other. Truly a family of birds.”
Yanyan felt like his ears were about to explode.
After being separated for so long, their first reunion immediately turned into a fight. The little bird on the table panicked, trying to break it up. “Stop arguing, don’t fight anymore!”
The flames of war turned toward Yanyan. Tangyuan stared straight at him. “Fourth chick, you tell us—who’s your big brother?”
Yanyan: QAQ.
He couldn’t offend either of them. Silently, he burrowed into Si Jingce’s palm, leaving only a short tail feather sticking out.
Doctor Shi: “Oh, he’s shy.”
Unable to get an answer from Yanyan, Tangyuan grew furious. He quietly moved closer to Zhima’s cage, stretched out, and gave him a fierce peck.
“Hey!” Doctor Shi quickly lifted Zhima’s cage. “You two are fighting again when I’m not looking!”
From his tone, this clearly wasn’t the first time.
“At first I wanted to keep them in the same cage,” Doctor Shi said helplessly, “but they kept pecking each other every day, feathers flying everywhere—it scared me to death. In the end, I had no choice but to separate them.”
Shang Wanshuo commented, “Raising two identical birds—interesting hobby.”
Doctor Shi puffed up his chest. “Mind your own business. I like it.”
Then he explained to Si Jingce, “My old man has nothing better to do, so he likes raising birds. Zhima and Tangyuan are actually his.”
As he spoke, he pulled up a video of his father’s birds.
The moment it played, it was full of noisy chirping—parrots, finches, pearl finches—every color variety, and two of each.
Shang Wanshuo fell silent for a moment. “…Your father must be a master at matching games.”
“They’re all male-female pairs,” Si Jingce noticed something off. “Then why did you buy two male pearl finches?”
Male pearl finches kept together tend to fight. Experienced bird keepers usually avoid this.
“Damn!” At this, Doctor Shi couldn’t help but curse. “Ask that bird seller!”
“He told me Tangyuan was female! Scammed me out of sixteen hundred yuan!”
Yanyan looked at Tangyuan in shock.
Second brother… you got mistaken for a female and were almost paired with big brother…?
