After lowering her hand, Ruan Jiaojiao finally spoke, "Xiu Brother, do you still remember the last time Jiaojiao had that nightmare?"
Xiu Xi nodded. Of course he remembered, she had even given him the cold shoulder over it.
Xiu Xi looked at her with a somewhat resentful gaze.
Ruan Jiaojiao realized her mistake and tried to ingratiate herself with a smile, "You can’t bring up old grudges, okay? Last time you accepted Jiaojiao’s apology and even took two candies from her."
"Mmm, Xiu Brother is really nice." Ruan Jiaojiao flattered him and then continued with the matter at hand, "Right, the nightmare I had was related to a snake. I dreamt that snake was coiling around Xiaojiu and even bit him. The nightmare felt so real! I just wanted to ask this Changchong to see if there is such a snake in the hills up front."
"Xiu Brother, you often go into the front hills, have you seen it?"
Xiu Xi shook his head.
His gaze was deep and mysterious.
As the King of All Beasts, animals didn’t dare to come near him wherever he went, even though he was now in human form, his soul was still that of the Wolf King.
"Then... Xiu Brother, could you maybe find an opportunity to sneak me in to take a look sometime? I love this home, I love every person in it, and I don’t want them to die."
These were now her family members, not the original Ruan Jiaojiao’s, but her own as the plump kitty—she had to protect them!
Looking at her, Xiu Xi nodded after a long while. He now had the strength to protect her, and even if they went into the front hills, no one would dare to kidnap her.
"Then it’s settled, come on, let’s make a pinky promise again."
Xiu Xi extended his hand and patiently made a pinky promise with her, allowing Ruan Jiaojiao to finally be at ease. It seemed that they just needed to find a day to go into the front hills, which should be easy enough since the family was busy with home renovations at the moment.
At noon, the Ruanlin Family returned from the village to cook and saw a watermelon added to the kitchen. Without suspicion, they assumed it was another gift from the monkeys. While cooking, she suddenly remembered that she hadn’t looked at the photographs yet.
She returned to the inner room, poured out all the photographs, took a glance, and thought they looked nice. However, as she kept looking, she felt as if something was missing. After thinking carefully, she saw Ruan Jianguo passing by the door with a hoe and called out to him, "Jianguo, are Jiaojiao and Xiaoxi’s joint photo missing from here? Didn’t you bring it back?"
"How could that be, I brought it all back together," Ruan Jianguo said, setting down his hoe and reaching for the photographs. He flipped through them, his brow furrowing as he kept flipping, "How could it be, they were all together."
"Stop flipping; flipping won’t produce a flower. Go look in the car, see if it’s been left behind," she commanded.
Ruan Jianguo nodded and searched in the trike but still couldn’t find it.
He called over Ruan Jiaojiao and Xiu Xi, "Jiaojiao, did you put these photos inside?"
"Mm," Ruan Jiaojiao looked at him, "What’s wrong?"
"One’s missing from here; your joint photo with Xiaoxi isn’t to be found."
"Perhaps you lost it on the way back!" The moment Ruanlin Family saw Ruan Jianguo blaming Ruan Jiaojiao, she immediately pushed the mistake onto someone else.
Mom, I’m not your stepson! I’m your own son!
"The photo’s missing?" Ruan Jiaojiao stood on tiptoes to look, glanced through once, and indeed did not see it, feeling somewhat guilty, "I didn’t pay attention, it was there when I took them."
"It’s alright, it’s not a big deal. Dad will go and print another one tomorrow; there are plenty of negatives anyway," Ruan Jianguo, seeing his little girl feeling guilty, immediately consoled her and then bent down to give her a hug.