The Love-Hate and Grudges Between Me and the Mermaid - Chapter 22

Chapter 22

In the vast night, something was reflecting a shimmering glimmer.

It wasn’t the sea surface; it looked more like the reflection off a smooth plastic film.

Bu Yan’s gaze was involuntarily drawn to that spot, and then her mind suddenly went blank.

A fishtail.

The girl was a mermaid.

A beautiful, slender fishtail. Under the girl’s exertion, the massive caudal fin spread out, resting beneath the water’s surface.

Seeing her look over, the girl good-naturedly lifted it out of the water, wagging it before her eyes with considerable pride.

“Is it beautiful?” Bu Yan heard the girl ask again.

“Beauti…ful.” Bu Yan turned her head, averting her gaze.

“For real?” The girl propped her hands on the reef and flipped herself in front of Bu Yan. “It’s not beautiful, is it? If it were beautiful, why would you be so unwilling to look at me?”

“Are all you humans so duplicitous?”

As she spoke, she hooked a finger under Bu Yan’s chin, forcing the other to look at her. “You’re lying to me, aren’t you?”

“No.” The hand on her carried a faint fishy scent; the fingers had only completely become fingers the moment they reached out.

Bu Yan looked away, unable to believe she had actually encountered a mermaid.

In legends, mermaids were creatures of the Otherworld. They did not belong to this world; they were cross-dimensional beings from another distorted, cold world.

Lurking in the deep, dark oceans.

But legends are, after all, legends. From ancient times to the present, no one had ever seen a mermaid, and no one believed in their existence.

According to records, a navigator discovered a mermaid nearly a thousand years ago, and a scientist captured one several hundred years ago, but none had been seen since.

Consequently, these legends and records were treated as jokes for after-dinner small talk or as fictional stories widely circulated throughout the world.

“Don’t you humans all like pretty things?”

The girl grew puzzled again, her expression inexplicably pitiable. She placed her fishtail onto the reef, and a few seconds later, it transformed into human legs.

“You don’t like that? Then do you like this?”

The girl knelt and crawled in front of Bu Yan, lifting her garment to reveal fair, straight human legs, asking with yearning eyes.

But Yan didn’t even look. Feeling that things couldn’t continue like this, she handed over a dress.

It was a long blue dress.

Ian had worn it. She had changed out of it today and told Bu Yan to throw it away, but Bu Yan had put it in her bag and forgotten about it when she went out.

She wondered if the girl would mind.

Thinking this, Bu Yan stiffly explained the garment’s origin.

The girl’s expression was first filled with rage, her eyes harboring hostility. Then, as if discovering something, she pressed her nose to the clothes and sniffed, letting out a soft laugh.

“Of course I don’t mind,” she said, even lifting the dress in high spirits to examine it closely.

“So you like this, you like her,” the girl lowered her head, murmuring to herself.

Bu Yan didn’t hear clearly, but from their prior interaction, the girl seemed to be a mercurial person.

Adhering to the principle of not letting the other person feel awkward, not provoking their anger, and not letting the conversation fall flat, she gave a soft “Mm.”

This time the girl laughed loudly, her silver-bell-like laughter ringing in Bu Yan’s ears, her body trembling slightly.

It was as if she were the ruler of this world; her every move affected everything else. When she laughed, the eyes in the sky and the seawater on the ground laughed with her.

The eyes curved, the moonlight dimmed, and the waves grew larger. Seawater splashed onto Bu Yan’s face, leaving the taste of sea salt in her mouth.

But Yan twitched the corner of her mouth uncomfortably and raised a hand to wipe the water from her face.

The girl noticed Bu Yan’s movement, and her laughter stopped abruptly.

“What is your mate’s name?” she asked suddenly.

She was all smiles, looking at the picture of innocent naivety.

Bu Yan froze for a moment and replied, “Ian.”

“Oh~”

“That’s quite a nice name,” the girl evaluated.

But Yan remained silent. The girl looked at her with burning eyes, and after a while, asked again: “Aren’t you curious what my name is, Bu Yan?”

How did she know her name?

Before Bu Yan had time to ask, her vision suddenly blurred. Her ears captured the movement outside before her eyes did.

Crying, the sound of sirens, and the voice of the mayor holding a megaphone to maintain order among the crowd.

“Do not panic! Do not be afraid! This is the manifestation of the Alien God!”

In an instant, Bu Yan snapped back to her senses and found herself still standing in the same spot.

The area around her was packed tight, surrounded by a crowd of people.

Every single one of them was in a posture of worship, hands pressed together, looking up toward the sky with profound piety.