Chapter 24: 21

Chapter 21

Lost in Translation

Translated by boilpoil
Edited by boilpoil

 

“Where’s my guy?” Bai Yao makes a big stride over the sea otter Mu Mu’er on the ground, and looks around, “where did that big, big human go?”

Mu Mu’er seems to wake back up a little at the question, and snuggles forward, patting Bai Yao’s pants with his paw, looking up at him, wondering why he didn’t see him.

Bai Yao crouches, and shakes Mu Mu’er’s tail, “turn back human, won’t you?”

He finally taught him to turn into human, and he just decides to return to sea otter when he wasn’t looking. It’s tiring.

Mu Mu’er ‘woop’s, and turns around, unhappy, flopping his tail out of Bai Yao’s hand, and pretends he doesn’t understand.

“Do it, like I taught you, or…” Bai Yao starts thinking about what he can put to use threatening him. No meals? He’s full right now, so it’s probably ineffective. Finally, he comes up with something, “… or I’ll watch you shower next time.”

Mu Mu’er looks all unconvinced, and does not look at Bai Yao at all. Really, he might be rolling his eyes at him if he knew how to.

Great. The sea otter finds him unreasonable.

Sentient beastkin maintaining their human forms does require a little bit of concentration, and so it is not too easy to do when still getting used to.

An orca friend of Bai Yao’s once jokingly compared it to girls trying to maintain their waistline by controlling their breathing. They’d often forget and let the waist droop when they start out, but when they’re used to it, they’d be able to do it subconsciously.

It’s slightly more complicated in the beastkins’ case, but the fundamental theory holds. They need practice and concentration, and when mastered, they don’t need to maintain a conscious effort anymore. They won’t even turn back into the original animal forms in their sleep.

However, most strictly speaking, it is actually more comfortable and natural for them to live in their animal forms.

Bai Yao understands that Mu Mu’er might not know why they must maintain a human form at all times. This could be a good opportunity for explanation.

“Sit. Let’s have a talk,” he sits down by the bed and points to the carpet in front of him.

Mu Mu’er slowly wobbles over, and lies down on the carpet, bored and disinterested.

“Turning human – anthropomorphising – is the most important thing we have to do at all times. Do you know why?” Bai Yao speaks gently, squeezing the otter’s paw, “when you’re out in the world, it is a bad idea to turn into a sea otter, because people will laugh at you.”

“Look at me. I’m not human either, but I will also never show my original animal form. We have to hide and pretend we’re human all along.”

Mu Mu’er isn’t listening at all. He’s like a student daydreaming in his lessons, looking about for whatever can pique his interest.

He’s lying on the carpet, and spots something under the bed. His eyes widen a little as he nudges forward. It’s the abalone shell he brought upstairs earlier, that fell and slipped under the bed when he learned to transform then.

Finally. A toy. He extends his paw for it.

The sea otter has only short, stubby paws, so Mu Mu’er is only able to retrieve the abalone shell when he’s halfway inside the crevice. He holds the shell in his paw to play with it.

And somehow he seems to think Bai Yao did not notice his large movements at all.

Bai Yao feels like the teacher in this instance; his throat sour, his charges still chuckling and passing messages along. So he immediately leans forward and confiscates the abalone shell in Mu Mu’er’s paws, and closes his fist on it, raising his brow at the little sea otter.

His toy stolen, Mu Mu’er looks up at Bai Yao, before lowering his gaze in sadness. He has nothing in his paws now. He rubs them together a few times, before putting them on his head to hide his disappointment.

While he’s not exactly in the wrong, Bai Yao still feels like a bad coyote who robbed bones from puppies.

All he can do is pet Mu Mu’er on the head, and tell him, “turn back to a human, mm?”

“I’ll give you the shell back if you do that.”

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Mu Mu’er looks up and down Bai Yao with narrowed eyes, like he’s judging if he would lie. Finally, he comes to a decision, takes a deep breath, and begins to increase in size. A few seconds later, the sea otter turns back into a boy.

Bai Yao smiles, and honours his end of the deal by returning the shell to Mu Mu’er.

He sure looks much less uncomfortable transforming now.

Seeing Mu Mu’er playing with the shell down on the carpet, Bai Yao suddenly thinks of something, and asks, curious, “can you smell what I am from my scent?”

Sentient beastkin and discern species from scent, which humans cannot sense. It’s not just a ‘smell’ per se, but some kind of more complicated signal that can confer information in nature between the beastkins.

Mu Mu’er tilts his head, confused, not even knowing how to respond.

He knows ‘you smell I,’ at least, so he carefully nudges himself forward, and plants his nose on Bai Yao’s clothes to smell.

Bai Yao tenses up while observing the boy’s actions. Mu Mu’er is really, really close to him, almost burying his face in his chest. Bai Yao can see quite clearly from this angle the slightly long eyelashes and some dim freckles he has on his face.

Quite cute.

Close to his hairline, Mu Mu’er has a light scar that is usually blocked by his bangs, so Bai Yao only notices it now. It’s a few centimetres long, and slightly lighter in colour compared to the surrounding skin. It seems to bulge very slightly as well.

This scar seems a bit more prominent than the other numerous scars on his body.

Bai Yao is hesitant to ask about the wound, when Mu Mu’er has already completed his evaluation and backs off, his hair covering the wound up once more.

“Smells nice,” Mu Mu’er nods and answers with a serious face, adding, “orange; lemon; smells nice.”

Bai Yao “…”

I’m not asking you to literally smell…

“I’m a snow leopard, got it?” Bai Yao emphasises the phrase ‘snow leopard,’ “I’m a type of leopard.”

Mu Mu’er doesn’t really get it, but he thinks he hears the word ‘hug,’ and tilts his head. Bai Yao wants hugs? He wouldn’t lose anything giving him a hug, so Mu Mu’er opens his arms wide for a reluctant hug.

“What?” Bai Yao is confused, and his arm remains planted on his knees, unmoving.

Mu Mu’er lets his arms fall back down, disappointed. Didn’t he want a hug?

Bai Yao assumes he doesn’t understand what leopards are, and so he decides to start explaining to him what snow leopards are.

Mu Mu’er loses his interest soon enough, especially after hearing that snow leopards live on mountains. Abalone shells are much more interesting. Oh, the seafood curry rice tonight was really nice. He wanted more. Will he have some more in the future? He still wants more.

The abalone shell in his hand is really colourful. It’s a sort of fluorescent, pearlish colour that tinges blue. Some pretty patterns can be seen when held under the light.

In the oceans, Mu Mu’er always threw the shells away after eating, and hasn’t studied whether they are pretty or not. He never knew abalone shells are so pretty.

“Fluffy snow leopards, that like to eat sea otters,” Bai Yao slowly explains to Mu Mu’er, but he sees that he is not listening. So finally, he snaps, yelling, “snow leopards!”

Mu Mu’er shudders, and his hands shake, almost dropping the abalone shell. He looks up at Bai Yao, frightened, and does not understand what he did wrong, what he did to deserve being yelled at.

Bai Yao spoke so much at length, but has also wasted pretty much all the time he was speaking. His eyes narrow as he licks his canines.

Bai Yao definitely looks unfriendly right now, and remains unmoving for a while, and so Mu Mu’er starts looking around sneakily, then sees the object in his hand, and ‘understands.’ Oh, Bai Yao wants his abalone shell. He quickly hands it over with shifty eyes.

He really, really doesn’t want to give up his shell, but Bai Yao also gave him so much tasty food. He should let him have his beloved toy, too.

Bai Yao is already in regret when a shell is put into his hand.

He’s scared the little sea otter.

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