Chapter 97: Little White did it!

“小–Bai!”

By the time they reached the hotel entrance and watched as Jiang Lingwei and Jiang Cheng went in first to check in, Jiang Yao hurriedly declared she needed to walk the dog. Grabbing Xiao Bai, she slipped away to a secluded spot and glared at him fiercely.

“Ah? Ah?!”

Xiao Bai still had no idea what mistake he’d made, stubbornly trying to surrender to save himself:

“What did I do? I didn’t do anything!”

The little furball panicked, raising his two paws and shouting,

“I surrender, woof! Don’t torture me, woof!”

“You.”

Jiang Yao gave a devilish grin. Without transforming, she simply conjured a crystal dagger from her usual magic, holding it under Xiao Bai’s whiskers as she said,

“Think carefully about what you’ve done.”

“Ying!”

Letting out a tiny shriek, Xiao Bai immediately begged for mercy:

“Magical Girl, Crystal, Heroine… Boss! Boss, don’t do this, let’s talk things over, don’t touch my whiskers, my whiskers are innocent.”

“Too bad.”

Magical Girl Crystal said as a matter of course,

“It’d be better to threaten you by the neck, but since you’re a furball, it’s hard to find your neck.”

“Wuwuwu, are you still a Magical Girl? I protest, I want to find [Opal]!”

“Protest denied.”

The Magical Girl gave an even more wicked smile: “You want to find Opal? Did you forget, she’s mine too. Take a guess, will she help you or me?”

“Ah?”

Xiao Bai had clearly forgotten about this. He quickly said,

“What do you mean, find Opal, there’s no such thing! I’ve always been closest to you from the start, how could I forget you just because there’s a new Magical Girl? We’re the best and thickest friends.”

“Not looking for her?”

“Why would I look for her? What happens between us thick friends doesn’t need another Magical Girl to interfere.”

Faced with a whisker-threatening crisis, as if channeling the wisdom of his ancestors, Xiao Bai suddenly realized where he’d gone wrong and hurriedly cried out,

“R-right! I get it now, isn’t it just about playing matchmaker for Old Jiang and your mom? I might be a bit extra here, but I can still help out!”

The crystal dagger edged closer to his whiskers as Jiang Yao asked,

“How?”

With his beloved whiskers in her hand, Xiao Bai grew desperate.

(Still calling herself a Magical Girl? Isn’t she just a bandit? QAQ)

He quickly said,

“I have my ways! Look, in your mom’s eyes I’m just a little white dog, right? Doesn’t that make it easy for me to get close to her and create some opportunities? The key thing is, to your mom, everything I say just sounds like ‘woof woof’, so I can send messages openly!”

“When your dad makes a move, things will fall into place!”

She didn’t move the dagger away, because Jiang Yao was still thinking.

Whether or not Mom was actually Aurora aside, realistically, Xiao Bai’s trick probably wouldn’t have much effect.

Mainly, she just felt Mom was being stubborn. Otherwise, she wouldn’t even allow Dad to stay with her. To put it crudely, Dad’s just a proper gentleman—if he ever lost his composure, Mom might have already…

(So embarrassing, I can’t think about this anymore.)

As a girl growing up in the internet age, Jiang Yao understood this kind of thing, but it seemed she’d inherited Mom’s shyness. Just thinking about it made her blush.

“What’s… wrong?”

Seeing the girl’s inexplicable blush, Xiao Bai, not understanding why, carefully raised his paws and asked.

“Ahem.”

Jiang Yao let the dagger dissipate into sparkling lights, coughed lightly, curled her lips, and patted Xiao Bai’s head with a smile:

“Haha, look at you! Scared silly, weren’t you? I’m a proper Magical Girl—how could I have such dark and heavy thoughts? All my thoughts are bright and cheerful~”

“Doesn’t look like it…”

“Hm?”

“…Doesn’t look like someone with dangerous ideas! How could the wise Tangula…(snip)…the Second be wrong? Surely you have a heart of gold, a beautiful soul, a kind and lovely Magical Girl who would never harm a fairy’s whiskers. Right…”

“Hmph.”

Seeing Xiao Bai so quick-witted, Jiang Yao snorted lightly and suddenly asked,

“By the way, when did you start calling my dad ‘Old Jiang’? You two get along that well?”

“Ah, we do! Don’t humans always say that dads are closest to the dog at home?”

Xiao Bai blurted out.

Jiang Yao was shocked: “Ah?”

Realizing what he’d said, Xiao Bai panicked: “You set me up?!”

Hearing this, the girl resolutely bonked him on the head, bringing him back to his senses.

As a fairy with max resilience, he bounced back from being squashed in just one second.

However, the mental blow lingered, and he kept muttering,

“Am I really going to become a dog just because I act like one all the time? No, I’m a fairy! Oh no! Please, no!”

“Oh, what’s the big deal? You’re a fairy—can you really be shaken by something this small?”

Pinching his soft body to comfort him, Jiang Yao picked up Xiao Bai and started heading back.

“By the way, I haven’t asked you yet—why did you suddenly decide to come with us? Don’t tell me it’s just for fun.”

“No choice.”

When it came to this, Xiao Bai deflated a little as he said,

“There’s no more clues in Mudong City.”

“It’s just a small town—what could you expect?”

Knowing he was talking about his ancestors, Jiang Lingwei stroked the fairy’s droopy head and said,

“You said yourself it might be many years before it comes up. You can’t rush this kind of thing.”

“I know…”

Xiao Bai fished a card out of his fur and said,

“This is what I got from magical tarot divination.”

“Before, it was the tarot that guided me to you, but after you left, the divination changed. The new hint says I should look for a place related to the sea, and you just happen to be heading to the coast.”

“Let me see…”

Jiang Yao peeked. The tarot card’s pattern wasn’t from human society’s traditional tarot decks—

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It simply depicted a sea shrouded in rising mist, and beneath the surface, something seemed to glow faintly.

“Is that it?”

Jiang Yao was doubtful. She’d played with tarot cards before—usually, there were deeper meanings behind the illustrations, each representing something else.

“Yours just has the sea, so it’s the sea? I’m not questioning your divination…”

(Though, honestly, I do doubt it. Xiao Bai, is your divination magic even reliable?) She complained inwardly, then said,

“It’s just, don’t you have a book for deeper interpretations or something? Or maybe think about what it could represent? Tarot cards usually mean more than what’s on the surface.”

“Ha?!”

Xiao Bai seemed thunderstruck: “Why didn’t I think of that…”

The girl was helpless: “I knew it. Anyway, don’t overthink it, Xiao Bai. Just look around for now, and if nothing turns up, treat it like a vacation.”

As they talked, the two of them made it back inside the hotel.

By now, Jiang Lingwei had finished checking in.

Compared to Jiang Cheng, who was lacking in common sense in some areas and hadn’t tried many new things, she adapted much more quickly. Now, she could skillfully use all sorts of electronic apps.

As soon as Jiang Yao entered the room, she saw her mom and Jiang Cheng chatting and laughing about something.

“…Then, that guy just… eh?”

Noticing her daughter had returned—and was watching her—Jiang Lingwei inconspicuously shuffled her feet a little farther away, put on a serious expression, and said:

“Mm, Yao Yao, you’re back. Just in time, let me tell you: you’ll stay with me, and your dad will room with Xiao Bai.”

“Alright…”

Saying this, Jiang Yao quietly gave Xiao Bai a gentle squeeze.

Xiao Bai, catching on instantly, put on an act, jumping from her arms to the floor and clinging tightly to Jiang Yao’s leg, biting the hem of her pants as if he couldn’t bear to be apart from her. “But, Mom, look—Xiao Bai wants to stay with me.”

“Well.”

Jiang Lingwei glanced at Xiao Bai, thinking to herself how he really was getting more and more like a dog.

Just a few days ago, she saw him wolfing down some beef dog food for fun. What started as a joke, could it have actually caused a problem?

Not knowing what Xiao Bai was up to, Jiang Lingwei decided to go along with him and her daughter:

“It’s not a big deal.”

“Then the two of you can stay together, and your dad can have a room to himself.”

Jiang Cheng at her side understood their intentions in a second and immediately started sighing dramatically, throwing out lines like, “Ah, a lonely old man.” “Even the dog’s abandoning me,” and so on.

“What’s that got to do with you.”

Jiang Lingwei was amused by his act and gave him a playful smack: “You’re a grown man, just sleep by yourself.”

“Mom.”

Just then, Jiang Yao hurried up and said,

“There are only two rooms anyway. I’ll stay with Xiao Bai, you stay with Dad, problem solved!”

“Huh?”

She’d never considered this arrangement before. Jiang Lingwei froze for a second and was about to say something—

“I don’t mind.” Jiang Cheng was quick to make his ‘opinion’ known.

“…Huh?”

Sensing something was off, Jiang Lingwei put her hands on her hips, shifted her gaze from Jiang Cheng to her daughter, then lingered pointedly on Xiao Bai. Seeing that the little furball’s whiskers were trembling in fright, she finally said,

“Well now, you two, using your little schemes against me?”

“No, no.”

“Wouldn’t dare.”

Father and daughter both waved their hands in unison:

“It was all Xiao Bai’s idea.”

“What? You’re the humans! Woof!” The betrayed Xiao Bai barked helplessly.

“Forget it.”

Jiang Lingwei waved her hand.

“We’ll go with what you said. It’s just a place to sleep—doesn’t matter where.”

She held up two room cards:

“Chengzi, Yao Yao.”

“At your service!” The two of them saluted.

“Take the cards, drop your luggage.”

“As you command!”

Watching her husband and daughter clown around in perfect sync, Jiang Lingwei couldn’t help but break into a smile and just went along with them.