Spring has arrived, warming up, with the morning light spreading across the land, and the sky clear for miles, making it the perfect weather for an outing. The Qingshan Forest Park outside Coastal City is teeming with visitors.
Deep within the Forest Park, surrounded by a wire fence, lies the Qingshan Forest Reserve.
A silver-white wolf weaves through it, a grass-green figure crouching on its back. Upon closer inspection, the person is wearing a loose hoodie, with a few strands of soft curls peeking out from beneath the large hood.
"Shi Yin, we're almost at the perimeter, you can drop me off here," Mu Ying patted the wolf's back.
Shi Yin came to a halt, glancing warily around before a light emanated from his body, and a tall, silver-haired youth stood up. He extended his hand and gently tucked the stray hair by Mu Ying's ear behind it.
"Focus on your studies, and by the time I return from this trip, I should be able to control my ear transformation," he reflected. This was the last aspect of his humanoid form that he couldn't control well. After receiving the third beginner's legacy, he should master it completely and then he could go to the human world to study with Mu Ying.
Shi Yin longed for this, as he had heard that a lot of high school students fall in love. Although Mu Ying said she had no such intentions, he couldn't help worrying when he wasn't around. Moreover, once he completed the beginner's legacy, he would be able to use that "ability."
"What are you thinking about that's making you smile so happily?" Mu Ying tiptoed and pinched Shi Yin's ear, feeling rather reluctant to part with the charming Beastman ears.
"No, nothing," Shi Yin shook his head, the ears under the silvery-white fluff tending toward redness. He widened his eyes pitifully and said, "I'm just a wolf that grew up in the mountains and never went to school. I'll definitely rely on Mu Ying for support, becoming a freeloading wolf..."
"?" Mu Ying, wearing an expression of speechless exasperation, thought about her adorable little Werewolf. Ever since she taught him Chinese, he was visibly corrupted. After a moment, she sighed.
"What have you been reading online now? Besides, what's wrong with being a freeloading wolf? When I was little, you took care of me too, so wasn't I a freeloading girl then? We take care of each other, which is a wonderful socialist comradery!"
Furthermore, as someone who had awakened memories of her past life, even though she had met an untimely death before, the total of both lifetimes rounded up made her a forty-year-old. How could she not afford to support an adorable freeloading wolf, ah no, to restart, an adorable little Werewolf, right?
Mu Ying patted Shi Yin's shoulder with confidence, saying, "Don't worry, I can definitely support you!"
Shi Yin nodded obediently, watching Mu Ying backpack in hand, deftly weaving through the woods until she was out of sight. Only then did he revert to his Wolf Form, disappearing into the dense forest with a few leaps.
What is brotherhood? Although little Shi Yin couldn't attend school due to the lack of control over his human form, he was quite good at self-study.
The first thing he did when he got back to the mountains was dig out a phone from his den and climb onto a rock where the signal was strongest. He opened the phone to search for answers.
"The meaning of brotherhood is: glory and loss shared together... unconditional support... shared blessings and faced hardships together."
"One may have many friends in a lifetime, but a true brother is just one."
Shi Yin nodded repeatedly, as if he had an epiphany, filled with confidence, the companion contract was as good as done!
Ah, he started missing Mu Ying just after a short separation; how he yearned to find her quickly after completing his last beginner legacy. Let's get started now!
Shi Yin's gaze firmed, and a ripple of space spread from him, as he vanished in the blink of an eye.
By this time, Mu Ying had skillfully pushed aside the rusted wire fence and crawled through, quickly reaching the forest park's trail.
She was not afraid of being discovered here.
Even though it was still early, and most visitors had only reached the periphery of the Forest Park, her years of past experiences, praised by the elderly, told her that if spotted, people would think she was a diligent young girl for getting up early.
She climbed the stone steps, her thoughts scattering.
Every time at this moment, she would feel as if she had transmigrated from a fantasy novel to a city novel, just like when she first came down the mountain years ago.
She was an abandoned baby left in the mountains, found by Shi Yin, raised on the milk of a wolf pack. Back then, Shi Yin's human form was only a few years older than her, and he spoke a language she couldn't understand.
For a time, she thought she might have been born in the ancient Beast World, perhaps because she lived in such a remote place; there was only Shi Yin, a Beastman.
When she finally mustered her strength and grew to about five or six years old, she ventured out of the valley, where she was discovered by a ranger and sent to the welfare home at the foot of the mountain.
To this day, Mu Ying still remembers how disillusioned she felt when she first saw the familiar Arabic numerals on the ranger's uniform.
It turned out that the Universal Language Shi Yin taught her was not universal at all—everyone was clearly speaking Chinese!
Fortunately, at that time, Shi Yin's original wolf form wasn't that big, and because Mu Ying had fed him well, he had become a little chubby, so with his ears drooping down, he looked just like a fat little dog.
Following the scent, he found the welfare home and disguised himself as a stray dog wandering around the facility.
According to her observations, this world was extremely similar to her previous life's yet somewhat different.
The Language, societal development conditions were the same as her previous life's, but many of the historical legends and literary and film works were quite different. Considering the existence of Shi Yin, Mu Ying thought this might be a modern world on the surface, but there were still hidden elements of fantasy unknown to humans.
Due to the issue with Language, she was extra cautious, not daring to appear too different from ordinary people.
However, because she had also grown up in an orphanage in her previous life, she took to the life in the welfare home like a fish to water, barely scraping by until now.
Shi Yin began to awaken his bloodline during her high school years and started to receive legacies from the space-time continuum.
Three years passed, and he had already undergone two introductory legacies, gradually mastering humanoid forms. This time was to be the last introductory legacy, and it was said that there would be other magical abilities to come.
Listening to this made Mu Ying enviously sigh; so many years had gone by, and this world, besides Shi Yin, was very scientific. Her only golden finger was the memory of her previous life.
Over the years, she had sporadically published some online literature using some popular elements from online novels of her previous life. Although she hadn't become a big hit, she had made some money, enough for a living.
She planned to start using more settings once she entered university. There was a predominance of realistic literature in this world, so by that time, if she wrote about immortal cultivation, she should be able to earn more. It shouldn't be a problem to buy a farmhouse in the suburbs near the Qingshan Forest.
As for why she didn't move to a larger place, it was because of her deep love for this forest—cough cough—the truth was, having spent so much time in the forest, she felt suffocated and a bit uncomfortable in the big city with its murky air.
Moreover, after researching herself, she found that she did possess a bit of a "special ability"—plants and flowers she tended grew exceptionally well, so a place close to the forest might be more beneficial for her.
She was, in fact, a fan of immortal cultivation...
Scraping by until adulthood, owning a house with a yard in the countryside, planting various flowers and plants, writing for a living, spending the rest of the time cultivating her character (and a bit of immortal cultivation), and having a wolf-eared youth for company—it couldn't get too comfortable.
This was her life goal for this lifetime.
But all of that had just been shattered.