Most of the others were filming near the water and taking care of the cubs. Nobody noticed the little incident happening at the back.
Xie Tao, who found himself encircled by a silver tail and firmly held by the other, did not respond for a while. As a result, Xie Tao remained in the other's grasp, floating over the steps.
As the youth in his hold did not move or speak, Ya Yi lowered his eyes a little and continued to quietly hold him in place.
However, thinking of the sudden panic that had appeared in the youth's eyes just now, he lightly tightened his silver tail around the youth's waist to silently show that he was safe.
When Xie Tao finally reacted, he reflexively reached out to grab onto the silver tail around his waist. Feeling the cold surface against his palms, he completely returned to himself and saw the current situation clearly.
"…Put me down." With a low cough, Xie Tao said this with a subtle expression on his face.
He wouldn't go so far as to say that he was embarrassed. When the other had been in his cub form, Xie Tao had touched and hugged him, and once, in order to appease him, he had even planted a kiss in the other's fluffy forehead.
Xie Tao subconsciously felt that there was nothing wrong with the Knox being close to him while in his cub form, and although he was conscious of him while in adult form, the familiarity in his heart weakened this feeling.
After Xie Tao uttered these words, he soon felt solid ground under his feet. The only thing was that… the silver tail was still half encircled around his waist.
Unlike the small fluffy tail while in cub form, this furless silver tail had a cold metallic texture. It almost looked like a tail belonging to a mighty silver dragon, and it seemed very aggressive.
The tail was not wrapped around his waist as firmly as before and was only partially circled around it. It reminded Xie Tao of how the Knox liked to hook his fluffy little tail around his wrist when in cub form and suddenly he could understand and accept the current situation better.
Without much thought, Xie Tao reached out his hand to touch the silver tail half encircled around his waist.
The cold was very distinct. Recently the weather had warmed up and when standing under the sun during the day, it even got quite hot. This heat made it almost unbearable for Xie Tao, and so he could not help but touch a few more times.
Naturally, Xie Tao eventually restrained his hand. After touching the silver tail for a while, he lightly pushed at the tail, indicating that he did not need to hold onto his waist anymore.
This powerful and dangerous silver tail placed around the youth's waist seemed unexpectedly meek. It could even be said to be submissive when touched by the youth, and the owner of this silver tail was the same.
The silver tail had not left the youth's body this whole time, but once pushed by the youth, it quickly obeyed the youth's request. However, the silver tail seemed to droop a little after returning to its normal position.
Xie Tao realized at this moment that one could read the Knox's mood from his tail. Although emotion almost never showed on the other's face, the tail was actually very expressive. Even while in adult form, one could easily identify how the other felt just by looking at it.
When he raised the tip of his tail, it meant that he was happy, the same went for when he lightly brushed it against the back of Xie Tao's hand. Drooping his tail like that, on the other hand, was certainly not a good sign.
Light colored, cold eyes, moved and stopped on his hand. Xie Tao stepped closer and touched the adult Knox's silver hair, just like he would a cub.
"Be good."
As he raised his hand to touch him, Xie Tao's eyes rested on the silver tail behind the Knox. As expected, the tip of the tail turned up slightly.
This Knox was still very good…
Looking at the slightly raised silver tail, Xie Tao gently smiled and thought this, but in the next second, a feeling of having his cheek gently rubbed stunned him in place.
Xie Tao often rubbed his cheek against the fluffy Knox cub's head, but having his cheek rubbed against him while in adult form, was of course an entirely different sensation.
However, before Xie Tao could respond, something caught his eye.
"What's this…?" From where he now stood he noticed something he had never seen before. Just below Ya Yi's neck, close to his collarbone, there was a small black mark resembling a totem and Xie Tao's attention immediately shifted to this.
Only a small part of it could be seen, the rest was blocked by his shirt. But even just from seeing this small part of the black pattern, Xie Tao got a bad feeling in his heart.
"I don't know." Although he sounded very cold and indifferent, Ya Yi had actually answered Xie Tao's question seriously.
He really did not know what the black mark was. Ya Yi only knew that from the time he was born and had exited his egg….. or maybe even from before he that, it had always been there. The mark could not be seen during cub period, it was first in adult form that it was visible.
This bad feeling he had was merely intuition. Xie Tao frowned.
The black pattern seemed rather complicated. Raising his hand, Xie Tao looked up at Ya Yi, then reached out and touched it. He could not see any pain in his face, and so the frown on his own slightly lessened.
What exactly is it? Xie Tao decided to carefully investigate it later, possibly even ask Zarad. However, Xie Tao hoped that his intuition was wrong.
Seeing that the youth's eyebrows were still not fully relaxed, the Knox subconsciously moved his tail behind him and then returned to cub form, swiftly jumping into the youth's arms.
"Meah~"
The fluffy cub stroke against the youth's chest several times, seemingly trying to attract the youth's attention. He then lightly touched the youth's palm with his two small horns.
Feeling the two small horns, Xie Tao at last temporarily put his worries aside and looked over at the group of cubs who were curiously exploring the new place.
Lin Yi, who was in charge of the shooting, soon finished and had gotten a good number of promotion worthy photos. Among them, the mermaid cub was the subject Lin Yi took most photos of.
The reason for this was very simple, the sea coupled with the mermaid was without a doubt a quite perfect match.
The club's official Xingyou account was usually managed by Xia Qi, and it was also up to her to pick out the best photos taken. After carefully sorting through the pictures, she logged into the Yunbao branch's official account and updated their page.
"Exploring the new venue, I hope our babies can play happily like this every day."
This simple sentence was accompanied with carefully selected photographs and just a few minutes after posting, they started receiving likes and comments one after another.
Ever since the series of events triggered by the flying contest, Yunbao branch's official account on Xingyou had gained several followers. Although the number was only 5000 for the time being, it was a huge improvement from when they did not have any followers at all.
Starting from the day of the new venue's completion, the mermaid and Moye cub changed from spending the majority of their time in the indoor pool to the new ocean simulated area.
Although the two cubs could freely move between the two pools, the place where the two cubs mostly spent their time had gone from being indoors to outdoor. As a result, the next day, Xie Tao went to keep the two cubs company under the sun as they happily played in the ocean simulated area.
As it would be a bit inconvenient for him to enter the water, Xie Tao only intended to quietly watch them from the shore. However the mermaid cub, who heard his footsteps, quickly swam and arrived at the shore even before Xie Tao.
He seemed to have been waiting for him to come and had swum up to the shore even faster than usual. As soon as Xie Tao walked over, his trouser leg was immediately grabbed by the mermaid cub.
"Ah~"
The cub issued one sound. His ice blue tail was swaying gently under the surface, his azure eyes looking straight at the youth squatting at the shore.
Xie Tao was a little puzzled, he could sense that the mermaid cub was unusually happy, but didn't really know why. Assuming that it was because of the ocean simulation and thinking that it meant that the mermaid cub liked it a lot, Xie Tao showed a happy expression.
However, the trouser leg in the mermaid cub's grasp was not released.
Vaguely aware that there was something more going on, Xie Tao touched the mermaid cub's short blond hair and asked in a warm voice, "What's wrong?"
After asking, Xie Tao, just like last time, added another sentence. "I won't leave."
Saying this, he watched as the cub at last let go of his pants and then, after a while, Xie Tao witnessed a very unexpected scene.
The little mermaid cupped his hands and lifted up some water. The water held by the young cub then suddenly seemed to be pulled by an invisible force, shaping it to a certain form before solidifying into a beautiful ice crystal.
"Pa~"
Holding up this pretty ice crystal in front of the youth, the mermaid cub moved his tail from side to side.
Xie Tao looked down at the ice crystal presented to him, but was still too stunned to respond.
The shape of this ice crystal… It seemed to be a word in the mermaid race's language.
The word, its meaning…
It was equivalent to the meaning of "Papa".
________________
Translator's note:
So~ now you finally have the whole chapter.
This chapter was amazing right!?
I mean, not only did Xie Tao discovery a black pattern on Ya Yi's skin, but the mermaid cub also seems to have some kind of ice power?!!!!
So exciting. XD
Many thanks to Jessica Lins for the coffee~ ❤️