Beauty and the Beasts

Reaching out to feel it, the fabric felt cold and soft to the touch, like silk. The surface was uneven as if there were prints on it. Bai Qingqing rubbed it with two fingers and found that the fabric was quite resilient—she had a feeling this fabric wasn’t silk as it didn’t snag as easily.

“I wonder who left this behind. I’ll bring it back and ask Parker. Perhaps someone from the tribe lost it and an animal brought it here.”

Bai Qingqing carried the stack of cloth and found to her surprise that, although it felt soft to the touch, it had quite a substantial weight—like it was laden with lead.

With great effort, Bai Qingqing finally managed to crawl out of the cave, but she ended up with mud all over her body, and now she also had that weird and damp stench from the hole on her.

It was only then that she got a proper look at the cloth in her hands—it was white like snow and flawless, covered with dense scale-like prints all over, which explained the uneven texture she had felt earlier.

What a strange cloth. She had never seen such fabric in the modern ages. She found it unbelievable that the beastman had such advanced fabric-weaving techniques.

Bai Qingqing didn’t mull over this for too long, simply running back with the cloth.

When she got back to Parker’s wooden house, Bai Qingqing saw that the entire house was decorated with little white flowers—Baby’s breath perhaps—everywhere as if this was a greenhouse.

A leopard was rolling around the floor like a lunatic, oblivious of oneself.

Bai Qingqing, who thought she walked into the wrong house, hurriedly apologized. “Sorry, I walked into the wrong house.”

After retreating several steps though, Bai Qingqing glanced left and right and realized that nope, this was indeed Parker’s house!

Walking in once more, Bai Qingqing saw her canvas bag hanging on the wall, which now had several sprigs stuck into it. She was now certain this was Parker’s house.

With his all fours up in the air, the leopard purred when it caught sight of the inverted Bai Qingqing. His eyes lit up instantly and with a roll, he got up on his feet.

“What are you up to?” Bai Qingqing’s mouth twitched. She shook her sore arms and said, “Look what I found.”

Parker’s eyes swept over that fabric, then towards Bai Qingqing’s face. As if he suddenly discovered something, his vision instantly returned to the fabric. The leopard’s pupils visibly shrunk and he grew quiet as if he was injected with a tranquilizer.

He transformed back into human form and slapped away the fabric in Bai Qingqing’s hands. Grabbing her hands, he asked anxiously, “Where did you get this from?”

Bai Qingqing was startled. Her wrist that was being gripped forcefully felt a sharp pain, making her feel Parker’s intense nervousness.

“By the lake. What’s wrong?” Bai Qingqing asked urgently. Seeing Parker so anxious, it must be something very dangerous. Even though she couldn’t fathom the link between a piece of fabric and danger.

Parker’s brows knitted together tightly as he murmured softly, “How is it possible…”

“What exactly is this?”

Noticing Bai Qingqing was frightened, Parker hurriedly composed himself and answered calmly, “A homeless beast has come to our tribe.”

Bai Qingqing felt her blood turn cold all over as if she had fallen into an ice cellar.

Thank god she wasn’t captured.

“Didn’t you say homeless beasts don’t appear around here?” Bai Qingqing felt like her hands were stained by the fabric she had held, unable to tolerate the smell. “What fabric is this? And what has it got to do with a homeless beast?”

“This is the skin a snake beastman sheds when it comes of age. They use this to please their mates, so they will try to shed as completely as possible.”

Parker then kicked the white snakeskin on the ground and sneered after taking a glance at it. “Seems like this snake beastman’s skin-shedding technique isn’t too bad. What a pity.”

The more Bai Qingqing listened, the more frightened she felt. It was then that she saw that the snakeskin was in a cylindrical form. At the thought of how she had carried that thing back with her own arms, she felt a numbness in her palms.