Chapter 29
Rain dragons—a kind of dinosaur that becomes especially active during the rainy season. They are huge in body, immensely strong, and possess enormous wings, making them highly skilled at flying through rain. That is why they are called rain dragons.
Rain dragons are not native animals of Leia Continent. Most of the time, they live on the Lava Mountains next to Leia Continent and normally never leave home. But when it rains, young rain dragons often fly out together to explore. They hunt while playing, though there are also many rain dragons that only play and do not hunt. People who like rain dragons call this behavior rain dragon tourism.
Their travel routes are usually not very far, so the neighboring Leia Continent naturally became the tourist destination they visited most often. That is where the saying came from that rain dragons may appear on Leia Continent on rainy days.
Even so, the audience was still very worried.
Rain dragons are carnivores. Although there has never been any record of a rain dragon treating Snarans as prey and eating them, that in no way affects how dangerous rain dragons are regarded in the minds of Snarans. The main reason is that the moment rain dragons are mentioned, countless people think of the most famous rain-dragon killing incident—a daring adventurer once tried to tame a rain dragon in front of a camera, only for the rain dragon to snap his neck cleanly in the very next moment…
That incident turned rain dragons into a psychological shadow for countless Snarans, to the point that people did not even dare visit the tourist areas near the Lava Mountains anymore.
Although many biologists who study rain dragons said that the adventurer’s behavior had looked like provocation in the rain dragon’s eyes, that never lessened people’s fear of them.
Before absolute power, fear does not need much reason.
In short, the appearance of rain dragons was a potential threat to every guest on Leia Continent—especially since among them, there was one particularly fragile-looking little sweetheart.
This left the audience worried out of their minds.
What they did not know, however, was that Yomi had absolutely no idea rain dragons even existed.
A great deal of information is accumulated naturally over the course of growing up, but Yomi had only transmigrated not long ago, and his understanding of this world was still shallow. He had looked up Leia Continent in advance, yes—but he had only searched for native animals of Leia Continent. As for rain dragons… they were only occasional visitors who came over to play. They had slipped through the gaps in Yomi’s search.
There was absolutely no need to worry about beasts attacking their “new home” at night. Yomi slept very soundly this time. But he still did not wake up naturally. Once dawn came, he was roused by the faint sound of water outside.
Still sleepy, Yomi climbed up and opened the door, only to see a pair of claws cupped around the capsule room in front of the entrance. The next moment, the claws moved away, and a pair of golden eyes appeared from above, looking at him upside down.
If one were not mentally prepared, that really could scare someone.
“Louis?”
Louis had already been awake for some time. He moved away from the capsule and sat down opposite it, then took a cloth and began wiping the face of the still-bewildered Yomi. “It rained outside.”
Those sounds really did resemble heavy rain, and from the sound of it, the downpour was quite fierce.
Yomi’s thoughts very quickly shifted from Why is my bed down here? to Thank goodness we moved.
Yes—thank goodness they had moved. This shelter, though underground, had been built extremely well and was clearly intended for long-term use. It contained a complete drainage system. Water would be diverted elsewhere, so even when it rained, the shelter would not flood. No amount of wind or rain would stop people from taking refuge inside, or else it could not possibly have remained intact for so many years.
The stone cave, on the other hand, might not flood, but under a heavy downpour the environment would become extremely damp. Once the temperature dropped at night, living there would certainly be uncomfortable and would increase the chances of getting sick.
Immersed in his relief, Yomi momentarily forgot that while it was raining, people could not go outside either.
Delighted that the two of them had managed to move in here before the storm, he began chattering happily. “We’re so lucky. It’s like getting handed a pillow the moment you get sleepy… What do you think?”
Louis thought so too. To him, the Yomi before him was like a piece of candy. Even if he did nothing at all, just looking at him felt sweet.
After a simple wash-up, Yomi began dividing the wild fruit. He split the fruit they had stored yesterday into four portions, two of which were meant for today’s two meals. Under the current conditions, Yomi felt that eating two meals a day was enough. The remaining two portions he kept for tomorrow, just in case. If they were lucky, perhaps tomorrow they might be able to go outside again.
The happiness brought by the new home still lingered on Yomi’s face. While eating wild fruit, he kept muttering and chatting with Anxius. In such a closed space, if no one spoke at all, the atmosphere would become stifling. Even the audience watching the livestream hoped the people inside would talk more.
Anxius had always been a man of few words, so Yomi naturally took on the role of the little chatterbox.
The green fruit was plump and juicy. With one bite, juice instantly sprayed across half his face, even onto the tip of his nose. He giggled and said the fruit was slippery and really fun.
Anxius went over to wipe his mouth and face, then gave him all the green fruit that had been divided to his own share.
After finishing his fruit, Yomi glanced over and suddenly realized that the amount of fruit by Anxius’s side had not decreased at all… What was going on? Weren’t you hungry?
After another period of careful observation, Yomi realized that Anxius truly was eating nothing at all! Yomi deliberately picked out a bigger red fruit—the one he thought tasted most like dragon fruit and was the best of them all. He cut the peel open with his little knife and held it out to him with both hands, his eyes saying: Come on, eat it. This tastes amazing. You’ll know once you try it.
Anxius took it, then peeled it cleanly with his claws and lowered his head to feed it to him.
Yomi: “……”
Do my eyes really speak so badly?
“This is for you,” Yomi said directly. “Hurry up and eat.” Afraid he might be embarrassed, he even took his knife and cut off a bit from the fruit in Anxius’s claws, stuffed it into his own mouth first, and used that to signal that Anxius should eat too.
At last, Anxius took a bite. It was a very small bite, and then he continued feeding him.
“……”
Amid bite after bite of being fed, Yomi finally understood the key point.
Anxius was definitely not not hungry.
Yomi was this small and had not even hunted, yet the moment he woke up, he was already hungry. Anxius was so huge, and yesterday he had bustled about doing all sorts of things—how could he possibly not be hungry?
Anxius was saving food.
No one knew how long the rain would last. Under circumstances where movement was restricted, stored food was extremely precious.
After that, no matter how Yomi tried to persuade him, Anxius simply ignored it, as if he had absolutely no interest in those fruits.
Outside, the rain seemed to be getting heavier and heavier.
Yomi began staring at the fruit in a daze. Thinking he was bored, Anxius took out a deck of cards and the foam box they had used the night before, laying them one by one in front of Yomi.
“Cards.” The monster’s eyes were full of anticipation.
Yomi, still thinking about how to persuade him to “eat,” suddenly had an idea the moment he saw the cards!
“Okay, this time let’s play something exciting,” the little one said in a completely unexciting tone. “The winner has to eat the wager on the spot.”
No one could guarantee they would definitely win a card game, but losing was still something one could control.
Anxius had no objection.
The room was quiet. The solar lamp was dimmer than yesterday, but still bright enough to see the cards.
They took turns, one card from him and one from me, back and forth. Before long, an absorbed Yomi had played every card in his hand…
The corners of his mouth had just begun to lift when, in the very next second, his tiny body hunched in shame.
Oh no. He had been playing too happily and completely forgotten that the whole point was to lose.
Embarrassed, Yomi ate the few fruits he had won. When the second round began, he frowned and began playing very seriously—but completely at random.
And yet he won again…
Yomi had never expected himself to be this good at cards. Especially once he realized that Anxius was also playing with the goal of losing, he became even more afraid to continue. When gathering up the cards, he was utterly dejected, and even the fruit in his mouth no longer had any flavor.
Yomi began seriously considering the feasibility of stuffing wild fruit into Anxius’s mouth while he slept…
Before long, Yomi’s heavy-hearted mood attracted Anxius’s attention.
That tiny back leaned crookedly against the wall, looking pitiful enough to stir anyone’s heart.
Had he gotten tired of the wild fruit? To be honest, Anxius also felt that eating too much of it was uncomfortable.
Anxius rose to his feet, walked up the stone stairs outside, and looked out through the little window in the iron door. It was still raining.
When it rained, most animals did not come out, so hunting outside was comparatively difficult… But going to the nearby river to catch fish should still be possible.
On rainy days, the water lacked oxygen, and many fish liked coming up toward the surface to breathe.
Anxius made his decision immediately: he would go catch fish. Returning to the tunnel, he found a large bag to hold them, and when Yomi cast him a puzzled look, he explained, “I’m going to the river to catch fish. Wait here.”
[Catch fish? It is easier to catch fish in the rain, but isn’t it also dangerous… They’ve already spotted rain dragons on Andri’s side!]
[It should be okay. Louis’s true form isn’t any smaller than a rain dragon, and he even has an extra pair of horns compared to them. If they really fight, who knows who would suffer more!]
[As long as Yomi doesn’t leave the shelter, he’ll be safe. I’m more worried right now that that robot Arlo might get taken as a toy by the rain dragons… rain dragons love playing with unusual things!]
[Arlo has already found a tree hollow and gone back to sleep. He isn’t planning to go out today, so don’t worry, everyone]
Seeing that Anxius wanted to go out, Yomi felt uneasy. After all, the rain outside was so heavy… But he had no grounds to stop him. Since Anxius refused to eat, whether it was to save food or because he hated fruit, going out to catch fish would solve the problem.
Yomi knew his own abilities were limited. In times like these, the only thing he could do was try his best to help. He ran inside, rummaging all over for an umbrella. Before he found one, he was scooped up from behind by a pair of claws.
Anxius lifted him up in front of himself and pointed at his own scales. “No need for an umbrella.”
Yomi wriggled his way out of his claws and immediately tried to give him his own knife to use.
Anxius only glanced at it and said nothing, merely extending his claws toward him.
Those claws were more formidable than the blades carried by normal-sized Snarans.
Yomi silently took back his little knife.
He walked Anxius out. Along that short stretch of path, his little mouth chattered nonstop, over and over again repeating the same phrases: “Be careful,” “Be careful in the river too,” “It’s okay if you can’t catch fish, we still have food,” “Come back early”…
Once the door above opened and shut again, Yomi was the only one left in the underground shelter.
Following the way Anxius had taught him, he locked the door from the inside. When Anxius returned, if he knocked on the iron door above, Yomi would be able to hear it.
Once the two of them separated, the livestream screen was split neatly into two halves, each showing a completely different perspective.
On the left was Louis moving through the heavy rain. The storm seemed to have no effect on him at all; the rhythm of the monster’s steps was no different from usual.
On the right, dimly lit, was the little figure pacing back and forth inside the underground shelter.
Yomi was checking all around the shelter. Since it was raining outside, he was afraid something inside might suddenly go wrong or malfunction, and only felt at ease after inspecting everything carefully.
During the inspection, Yomi even tied his knife around his waist with a strip of cloth. After Anxius left, he was clearly on high alert.
No joke—he firmly believed that, with such a sharp knife in his possession, if any beast really wanted to eat him, then upon seeing the knife it would have to think twice, and then think twice again!
After one full round of inspection, the tunnel proved safe. When Anxius opened the door to leave, only a little water had seeped in. The water marks were all confined to the area near the entrance and did not affect daily life.
Yomi knew that catching fish was not simple, and that Anxius would not be back in a short time. Once his indoor patrol was finished, he went back into the little capsule room for a nap, saving his strength that way.
Once the other returned, he would still have to scrape the fish clean! Imagining Anxius coming back exhausted from the heavy rain, Yomi had already claimed all the follow-up fish-processing work for himself in his mind!
Rainy weather was perfect for sleeping. Yomi slept in a hazy muddle, with no idea how long he had been out. Somewhere outside, thunder seemed to roll—and then, all around him, things actually started to shake!
Yomi woke up instantly. Before his muddled brain could process anything, the rumbling was still continuing, even growing more intense. Everything around him shook violently, and the earth itself seemed about to sink…
An earthquake?!
How could there be an earthquake…?
Yomi’s face turned deathly pale.
The instinct to survive made him immediately pull the blanket tightly over himself and clutch the grass dog and bedding in the capsule, not daring to move at all.
The capsule room was earthquake-proof and bulletproof, built of extremely sturdy materials. After all, it had originally been specially designed for children to take refuge in—so that if anything happened to the shelter itself, at the very least these capsule rooms would still protect the children.
Yomi knew that in a moment like this he absolutely could not run around. He had to stay in the capsule.
The booming sounds came and went in bursts. After waiting a little longer, the disturbance weakened, and the shaking was not as violent as before.
There were still some aftershocks, though, and feeling them, Yomi was certain that he really had encountered an earthquake!
His mind buzzed in confusion, and he still could not believe it.
Why had this happened… He should never have let Anxius go out. What if he were under a tree somewhere or in some other unsafe place? There would be nowhere for him to hide!
His phone was outside. Once the shaking was lighter, Yomi quickly cracked the door open a slit and looked outside. Though everything had been shaken out of place and knocked into a mess, thankfully nothing had collapsed!
He felt much more reassured. A moment later, he carefully held onto the wall and went outside to find his phone.
It was a little after three in the afternoon. He had slept for less than an hour.
Yomi knew that the cameras were filming him, which meant the production team was aware of his situation. Hugging his phone, he decided to first look outside and then make a decision.
Hopefully Anxius had flown somewhere else to hide before the “earthquake” began.
Stumbling, the little figure ran to the door. Copying the way Anxius had done it, he used all his strength to push open the small iron window in the door, stood on tiptoe, and craned to look outside.
Beyond that tiny round opening was an unexpectedly vast scene being presented to him—torrential rain, moving white clouds, and blue sky…
?
Yomi instantly went stupid with shock.
He only ever had that kind of view when he was aboard an aircraft.
What was going on? How had it gotten into the sky? Had he perhaps died in the earthquake and his soul now arrived in heaven?
No! Yomi shook his head hard, because far off in the storm-dark sky, where lightning flashed, a gigantic black shadow was rapidly flying toward him—
By now, the livestream comments had already piled up thick and fast.
[Someone save Teacher Mimi, how did he get into the sky?!]
[It’s a rain dragon. The rain dragon carried off Mimi together with the whole shelter. I’m genuinely speechless!]
[I imagined all kinds of scenarios where Yomi might get into danger, but never this one…]
[Why is it somehow tragic and hilarious at the same time]
[This is dangerous. Have the program team’s aircraft gone over yet? Hurry and save him!]
If Yomi had been able to watch the stream, he would have known why he was suddenly in the sky—because not long before, the flood of rainwater had washed away the soil above the shelter, exposing the hook at the top very clearly.
Two rain dragons traveling “for fun” through the storm had stopped here. Discovering that hook, they apparently took it for a toy. When they realized they could not just pick it up in one go, they started tugging at it together… Rain dragons possess immense strength, and at that moment, the two of them were pulling against something shaped like a great container—the shelter itself.
At the time, the comment feed had looked like this—
[Mimi is not a toy, Big Rain Dragon, please let Mimi go!]
[…Holy crap, they really pulled it out! Their strength is terrifying! They could uproot trees barehanded!]
[My mom, who’s watching the stream with me, is about to faint from fear!]
[Oh no! Louis got his home stolen. Literally stolen!]
[Even if the aircraft head over now, it’s already too late… I’m so anxious I’m spinning in circles!]
[Waaahhh, Louis is rushing over! Hurry, hurry, hurry!]
……
Clinging to the little window, Yomi watched Anxius chasing after him with all his strength, and faintly understood his own situation… There had been no earthquake at all. Something had simply grabbed him and his new home in one nestful and carried it away.
Amid the terror, there was even something a little absurdly funny.
His eyes were wet, and his heart was full of fear, confusion, and helplessness… Looking around frantically, Yomi suddenly heard roaring from above—like the cry of a beast, only far louder than any normal beast, like thunder, enough to make his eardrums ache.
The situation was urgent. Yomi knew he had to get back to Anxius somehow—but how? If he rashly opened the door, he might fall straight out…
Apparently Anxius could see him through the tiny window hole. The monster pursuing him through the rain suddenly threw back his head and let out a long howl!
His voice was hoarse, furious, and urgent.
Yomi could not hear clearly, but roughly made out the word capsule.
Separated by the heavy door, Yomi somehow miraculously understood what he meant. With tears in his eyes, he flashed an okay gesture at the little window, then turned and ran unsteadily inside. Using all his strength, he pushed the capsule room toward the door. Panting, he stood on tiptoe to look out again and kept signaling okay.
Anxius, everything’s ready. Let’s not panic.
The monster had already gotten much closer, and madness was beginning to spread through his pupils.
Yomi felt that he was saying things like “open the door” and “stay inside the capsule.”
He knew Anxius must have some plan. The instant he unlocked and pulled open the door, he dashed into the capsule!
Yomi squeezed his eyes shut. He could feel that the capsule was stable and had not been sucked out by the wind… A pair of claws reached in and firmly clamped onto the capsule.
The little capsule room was gently rolled out by the monster, then seized tightly in his arms.
Another earth-shaking roar sounded. Yomi opened his eyes, and now he and the capsule were flying through the air—not flying, actually, but being carried by Anxius in the sky.
And directly in front of them, two dinosaurs were hauling along the shelter, which looked like a giant pipe in the air… The dinosaurs had enormous wings, and they were roaring angrily at Anxius in dissatisfaction.
Yomi was so frightened he was nearly dazed.
How could there be dinosaurs? And flying dinosaurs, at that…
Now that he was hugging the capsule, Anxius no longer had a weak point. Baring his fangs, he let out a threatening growl and then, with no more hesitation, launched forward in a savage rush, biting, punching, and kicking the two rain dragons without restraint!
The rain dragons were still dragging the shelter and had absolutely no room to fight back. Beaten until they were dumbfounded, they were aggrieved and furious too: You brat, you stole the good thing we found and then you hit us too—just you wait!
