Ch86.2 - True form

Translated by yuki

Edited by xiaowu  

Lu Qingjiu said, “I’m serious.”

“Sure then,“ Bai Yuehu replied flippantly. After confirming with Lu Qingjiu, puffs of black mist started surrounding his body. Once this black mist disappeared, Bai Yuehu also disappeared. Lu Qingjiu’s eyes fell onto the stool Bai Yuehu had been sitting on and witnessed a black… small snake crawl out from within Bai Yuehu’s clothes.

No, actually it wasn’t a snake, instead it was a small dragon. It was just that due to its shrunken size and it’s black coloured body, one would mistake it for a scaly snake at a quick glance. At this moment, it was as if Lu Qingjiu was magically communicating with his young self. He understood fully why his younger self had been unwilling, even on the threat of death, to touch Bai Yuehu.

Of course, all this remained in his thoughts, without being voiced out. He even took care to act surprised while reaching out a palm to carefully pick up Bai Yuehu, watching as Bai Yuehu coiled up in his palm. 

The dragon form of Bai Yuehu was covered in a layer of beautiful black scales, with a pair of red eyes – which were presently observing Lu Qingjiu nervously. They only relaxed upon seeing no discomfort in Lu Qingjiu’s expressions.

The scales were cool to the touch, making it comfortable for Lu Qingjiu to hold. Lu Qingjiu used his thumb to gently massage Bai Yuehu’s body, for the first time noticing Bai Yuehu’s dragon horns that had shrunk at the same time. After shrinking, Bai Yuehu’s horns were extremely cute, like delicate sea coral. It was slightly rough to the touch; one could feel the bumps and dips on the surface, as well as a scaly feeling.

However, the thing that drew Lu Qingjiu’s attention the most was Bai Yuehu’s pair of fluffy small ears. Why did the dragons, who appeared like haughty creatures, have such fluffy ears? They were similar to kitty ears, soft and cool to the touch, altogether being so cute one could die.

The more he looked at it, the more Lu Qingjiu couldn’t control himself, lowering his head to kiss Bai Yuehu’s ears, watching as Bai Yuehu revealed an embarrassed expression, coiling up even more in the centre of his palm.

His actions earlier had been straightforward, so it was a mystery why the other party was so shy. Lu Qingjiu smiled, “Yuehu, you’re so cute.”

Bai Yuehu humphed, “If I was so cute, then why did you not choose me?”

Lu Qingjiu was dumbstruck, dryly coughing as he said, “This can only be blamed on the fact that the young me had no standards.”

“I forgive you.” 

As the two were chatting, Yin Xun who had finished playing with sand came over and picked up a bottle of cola. Seeing Lu Qingjiu who was sitting on a stool, but no Bai Yuehu, he blankly asked, “Where’s Bai Yuehu? Did he go fishing again?”

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

Lu Qingjiu didn’t get the chance to say anything before Yin Xun spotted what he was holding in his hand and started screaming in terror, “WTF Lu Qingjiu, why do you have a snake in your hand! Quickly throw it away, what if it is poisonous?”

Djl Tefte: ……

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Cr fzqfmafv, Djl Tefte lwwfvljafis oifk eq ogbw Oe Hlcuple’r qjiw, ifjqlcu atgbeut atf jlg ab rmgjamt Tlc Wec’r ojmf. Mjmlcu atlr jaajmx, Tlc Wec ktb kjr ralii ecvfg atf jrrewqalbc atja atlr kjr j rcjxf, rtglfxfv ibevis ktlif vgbqqlcu ab atf ugbecv, “Lfiq wf!!! Ktfgf’r j rcjxf!!!”

Lu Qingjiu immediately rushed over to remove Bai Yuehu from Yin Xun’s face, but he was a little too late, Bai Yuehu’s claws had left a few scratches on Yin Xun’s face. Although Yin Xun didn’t feel any pain, he was still scared half to death…

Bai Yuehu ground his teeth, “Yin Xun, I am going to eat you!”

Yin Xun was shocked to hear Bai Yuehu’s voice, but didn’t realise that the “snake” he had been referring was actually Bai Yuehu, and became even more terrified, “Qingjiu, Qingjiu, why did I just hear Bai Yuehu’s voice? Where is he right now?” 

Lu Qingjiu was so amused by the two’s antics that he couldn’t control himself any longer, laughing to the point of tears. Bai Yuehu glared angrily at Yin Xun. If only he wasn’t within Lu Qingjiu’s hands, he would have directly rushed to Yin Xun and scratched him to pieces.

Yin Xun was shocked silly for a long moment before slowly recovering his wits. After which, he finally realised that the black snake Lu Qingjiu was holding had spoken in Bai Yuehu’s voice. He instantly understood what was going on, and his face turned ash grey, “I… didn’t do it on purpose…”

Bai Yuehu fiercely bared his teeth, but since he had a delicately small body at the moment, it wasn’t very threatening at all.

Lu Qingjiu patted Bai Yuehu’s fluffy ears and gave him another kiss, successfully placating Bai Yuehu’s anger. 

Yin Xun stared at Bai Yuehu, wanting to say that in this form Bai Yuehu was no different from a snake, you couldn’t blame him for mistaking it. However his survival instincts forced him to stay silent, and his good for nothing self even revealed an ingratiating smile saying, “B- Brother Bai, please excuse me for being blind and not recognising you…”

Bai Yuehu glared at Yin Xun, while Yin Xun continued to maintain his stiff smile.

Lu Qingjiu was curious, “You can transform yourself to this small size, but how big would you be if you transformed into your big size?” He remembered that time he rode Bai Yuehu and dived into the ocean. Although Bai Yuehu’s body had also been surrounded by black mist at that time, he could faintly feel that it was a huge body. This was also in addition to that time Bai Yuehu was fighting with the red dragon – it was such a pity due to the distance at that time, Lu Qingjiu was unable to clearly make it out.

“Very big, “ Bai Yuehu answered, “Do you want a look?” 

Lu Qingjiu nodded in excitement. Yin Xun had just now thoroughly offended Bai Yuehu, and with this hanging on his guilty conscience, he decided to shrink back into the chair he was sitting on and pretend that he had no existence.

Bai Yuehu gave it a bit of thought, “However it may be slightly scary, I may frighten you.”

Lu Qingjiu rebutted, “How could you frighten me? Dragons are our Chinese people’s totem, no matter where, they would also be welcome.”

“Really?” 

Lu Qingjiu nodded his head seriously, “Really.”

Bai Yuehu flicked Yin Xun a look and unhappily raised his lower jaw, instructing him to cover his eyes. He didn’t want to let Yin Xun see his true form, lest he would once again crow uncontrollably like a chick that had been picked up by its scruff.

Yin Xun knew he was in the wrong and didn’t dare to argue, obediently pulling up his clothes to cover his head, indicating that he wouldn’t dare sneak a peek.

Bai Yuehu once again turned to Lu Qingjiu asking, “Do you really want to have a look…” 

Lu Qingjiu knew what Bai Yuehu was worried about, and took the initiative to kiss his wet and a little like a puppy’s black nose.

“I’m not afraid at all. Show me, I want to see all of you.”

Hearing his words, Bai Yuehu closed his eyes and made a gentle sound of agreement, before rising up into the air, flying to the airspace above the sea. Black mist started spreading from his body to cover the sky. Subsequently, Lu Qingjiu heard a clear dragon’s call followed shortly by a huge creature appearing from within the black mist, swimming in mid air. Bai Yuehu’s body which was fully covered by black scales reflected a blinding light while making a robust pose, essentially looking like a work of art that could only be seen in frescos.

It was Lu Qingjiu’s first time seeing Bai Yuehu’s transformation up close. His whole person was stunned, the only thing in his sights was this black dragon who was beautiful to the extreme. Bai Yuehu covered a big portion of the sky, but from head to toe every part was so perfect that one could not look away even for an instant. 

Watching the motionless Lu Qingjiu, Bai Yuehu seemed slightly worried. He slowly descended from the skies, putting his huge head on the beach, looking at Lu Qingjiu from afar as he gently called out, “Qingjiu?”

At this, Lu Qingjiu recovered his spirits and exclaimed, “Yuehu, you are so beautiful!”

As he said this, he walked to Bai Yuehu’s side, using a hand to caress Bai Yuehu’s scales, feeling that uniquely cool feeling. After growing to this size, the characteristics of Bai Yuehu’s scales had also been magnified. It was different from other creatures’ scales as Bai Yuehu’s had a more jade-like feel, rock hard and cool. The edges of the scales were also very sharp and could easily slice apart flesh, but this didn’t stop Lu Qingjiu from gently caressing it, and even rubbing it with his face.

Watching Lu Qingjiu’s reactions, Bai Yuehu finally let out a light snort of relief. He then moved his tail, coiling it around Lu Qingjiu and placing him atop his body. Lu Qingjiu happily walked all over Bai Yuehu’s body, but as he lowered his head to observe him more closely, he made a strange discovery. 

“Yuehu, what is this on your body?” He had discovered some green things on Bai Yuehu’s scales. If he were to guess what this was using human logic, it would be some sort of moss-like fern plant.

“Moss,” was Bai Yuehu’s answer.

Lu Qingjiu eyes widened with surprise, “Moss? Why would moss grow here…”

Bai Yuehu responded, “It’s been too long since I revealed my true form.” 

“Is that so…”

Bai Yuehu grunted, but didn’t say anything else. In actuality, the majority of the dragons that came to the human world would always be paired with a guardian. These guardians would normally know the dragons’ identities and naturally could accept the dragons’ true forms. They would also occasionally help the dragons clean the junk off their scales.

The dragons living in the spirit world didn’t have this worry, as they could simply find a magical creature, who would help them do this. A dragon’s body was really long, so it would take an equally really long time to clean, ideally on an annual basis. Without the cleaning, there wouldn’t be any effects apart from not looking that good.

Since Lu Qingjiu’s grandmother had passed away, Shuifu village was always lacking a guardian, so it had been a long time since Bai Yuehu had cleaned his true form. Although Lu Qingjiu had suddenly asked about this, Bai Yuehu was worried that Lu Qingjiu wouldn’t be able to accept this task and so had vaguely skimmed over the explanations. 

“Then, can I help clean you up?” Lu Qingjiu couldn’t stand the thought of such things growing on his dragon’s beautiful body and asked, “Would it be bad for your health once it’s cleaned up?”

Bai Yuehu briefly fell silent, “It won’t, but… won’t you hate it?”

Lu Qingjiu was a little mystified, “Why would I hate it?”

“My body is so big…” 

Lu Qingjiu laughed, “Why would I hate this, I really like it instead. We currently have no tools with us. Let’s go home and get some before we find a space where we can carefully clean up the moss on your body.”

Bai Yuehu let out a sigh as fleeting as the clouds blown away by the wind. Lu Qingjiu didn’t give it too much thought and slid down from Bai Yuehu’s back. The only thing that piqued his interest was that when he was making his way down, he could see Bai Yuehu’s tail was constantly moving from side to side.

This caused an outrageous thought to bloom in Lu Qingjiu’s mind. When doggies were happy they would wag their tails, could it… also be the same for dragons?

Author’s note: 

Bai Yuehu: I am not happy hmph
Lu Qingjiu: Then why is your tail wagging so happily?
Bai Yuehu:╭(╯^╰)╮It’s all your imagination!