FMLB Chapter 96

Chapter 96- Rose Bookmark

 

“The Lull You to Sleep” livestream room was the second most popular room on the trending list yesterday, with the first being the official Star Wars livestream.

 

There are three reasons for such high popularity. The first is the strong recommendation on the homepage of the StarNet live platform, which is the best recommendation spot on the platform and has a great exposure rate. The second is the popularity brought by being parachuted into the hot search in the first place. The third reason is the eleven Brilliant Star Cloud rewards. 

 

The notifications for Brilliant Star Cloud rewards appear on the homepage, and many users will see the notifications on the homepage and click in to see what’s going on.

 

The “Lull You to Sleep” livestream room has eleven Brilliant Star Cloud rewards, making it unique on the entire live platform. Someone started a technical post to discuss this phenomenon, believing that while traditional hot-topic livestreams can stimulate everyone’s most primitive violent tendencies and make people feel excited to enter the arena and fight others.

 

But watching the “Lull You to Sleep” livestream makes people want to spend a fortune to make the host smile.

 

The author of the post expressed his feelings like this: “Even someone as stingy and poor as me, when I know that Brilliant Star Clouds can bring a moment of stop to his gaze like a song, I want to spend all the money in my hands on him.”

 

“Although I can only give him colorful fireworks, but when I look at him from afar across the screen, and see the brilliance of the fireworks flashing in his eyes, a sense of inexplicable honor arises in my heart—It turns out that even he, who is so beautiful that he doesn’t belong to this world, can have a hint of my fireworks scent.”

 

“So, if I were a super wealthy person, I would want to use Brilliant Star Clouds to monopolize this livestream room, letting the whole world know that he, like a moth, is surrounded by my dirty money!”

 

The second-ranked streamer on the trending list was the rising star of the Virtual Mecha Arena, Xue Yuexiao, a young cheetah with strong operational awareness. He broke into the five-star difficulty arena in just two months.

 

There are only three thousand players in the entire interstellar who can enter the five-star difficulty arena. From the moment he entered the five-star difficulty arena, Xue Yuexiao challenged a player every day.

 

At the beginning, his level was very low, and he could only challenge the player ranked last. With each victory, his ability to challenge higher-ranked players grew.

 

Last night was the first time he challenged a player within the top hundred. Xue Yuexiao was surrounded by many halos. Whether as the chief of the Federal Military Academy or as the heir of the Xue family, countless eyes were focused on him.

 

He was the pride of heaven, having never experienced defeat since entering the arena. Some hoped he would continue to win, while others wanted to see him fall. But so far, Xue Yuexiao had never failed. 

 

After defeating the opponent ranked 99th on the honor list, he turned off his livestream and his light brain. He was lying somewhat bored in the mecha training room.

 

“Yuexiao, do you want to go to the gravity training room with us?” a team member asked.

 

Xue Yuexiao pushed his curly brown hair back and, with eyes unobstructed by curls, looked extremely sharp. 

 

“No.”

 

“Yeah, Yuexiao, you’re already so strong, you don’t need training.”

 

Amber eyes stared at the ceiling, slowly rotating twice before slowly coming out of the daze.

 

Xue Yuexiao propped his arm behind his head and lazily turned on his light brain. The first thing he saw on the trending list was a livestream room that was pressing down on him.

 

Lull You to Sleep.

 

The name of this livestream room had appeared frequently in front of him these past few days. Xue Yuexiao originally wouldn’t open this kind of livestream with a cold theme, but maybe because he was particularly bored now, or maybe because he didn’t like others pressing on him, Xue Yuexiao entered this room with a casual attitude to pass the time.

 

The livestream had just started, and the barrage of comments covered the screen tightly, all of them devoid of substance and uniformly praising “beautiful” and “ahhhhh.”

 

Is this a vase? 

 

Besides praising beauty, can’t they say anything else?

 

Xue Yuexiao impatiently blocked the barrage and then saw the smiling young man on the screen.

 

For a moment, Xue Yuexiao’s amber-like brown eyes showed surprise. He was dumbfounded for a full three seconds. 

 

After three seconds, he sent his first comment in life: “…beautiful.”

 

The barrage continued to blow rainbows, and He Ruge looked at the infants sitting in rows in front of him, speaking with the gentle tone characteristic of talking to children, “Good evening, everyone, welcome to my livestream room. Today, I will share a fairy tale story with you all—” 

 

He Ruge paused, his gaze falling on the hedgehog Huahua, and he whispered, “Called ‘Beauty and the Beast.'”

 

“Once upon a time, there was a merchant preparing to go on a short trip. Before leaving, he asked his three daughters what gifts they wanted. The eldest daughter said she wanted pearls, the second daughter said she wanted gems, and the youngest daughter wanted a rose…” 

 

Sensitive to the word “rose,” Huahua nervously looked at He Ruge with his small eyes, but soon he became immersed in the story, his facial expression changing with the ups and downs of the plot.

 

When He Ruge talked about the Beast being killed, tears appeared in Huahua’s eyes. When the Beast was resurrected by Belle’s kiss, Huahua struggled to hold back his tears.

 

After finishing the story, He Ruge temporarily ended the livestream, walking to Huahua. 

 

“Huahua, can teacher talk to you alone?”

 

The little hedgehog hesitated for a moment before nodding, and they walked to an empty corridor together. 

 

“Huahua, do you like flowers like Belle?” He Ruge specifically mentioned the protagonist of the fairy tale story to relax Huahua.

 

His black eyes, soaked in tears, were soft and moist. Huahua hesitatedly looked at He Ruge for a long time before nodding his small head.

 

“Then, when Huahua gives the teacher roses, does he also like the teacher?” He Ruge continued softly.

 

The small head nodded shyly.

 

“Teacher also likes beautiful flowers very much, but teacher thinks that if you like a flower, it’s best not to pick it. If that flower happens to be the Beast’s rose, angering the Beast might bring you danger, and that would be troublesome.” 

 

He Ruge changed his wording. He realized that Huahua liked the fairy tale “Beauty and the Beast,” and using the protagonist of the story as an example wouldn’t trigger Huahua’s rebellious mentality.

 

The little hedgehog remained silent for a long, long time.

 

Huahua also remained silent for a long time.

 

He cautiously lifted his gaze to the petite Teacher Xiao He in front of him, even more beautiful than the flowers, which made Chi Huahua couldn’t help but think of their garden.

 

Chi Huahua is a little hedgehog from the Sixteen Stars. His name is Chi Huahua, and his twin brother is Chi Lu. The day they were born was a spring full of flowers and greenery, with flowers blooming in the garden as if they were giving their all.

 

Chi Huahua’s family had a beautiful garden. In spring, pink flowers clustered on the branches, forming pink clouds in the treetops. In summer, the shade of the trees was dense, and he, his brother, and their parents would sit in the shade, with dappled sunlight filtering through the leaves onto the grass, on his father’s legs, his mother’s face, and even in his eyes. 

 

In autumn, the fruit trees in the garden would bear sweet fruit, and sometimes when he stood under the fruit tree, ripe fruits would suddenly fall onto the spines on his back. In winter, the garden put on a white coat, and he and his brother would run around in the snow, leaving a long trail of footprints.

 

Later, the Zerg attacked, and the huge Zerg landed in his garden, killing his parents. His parents’ blood stained the beautiful garden red.

 

Dad used to joke with him that when he needed to urinate, he could run to the fruit tree, so he could supplement the nutrition of the fruit tree grandpa and make it bear bigger and sweeter fruit.

 

So, with the fruit tree full of his parents’ blood, would it bear even bigger and sweeter fruit the following year?

 

Young Chi Huahua and Chi Lu stood in the only energy shield in the house. He asked Chi Lu in a daze. Chi Lu covered his mouth, and the two little hedgehogs shrank into the narrow energy shield that could block their breath. 

 

They wanted to huddle together, trembling, but their spines would hurt each other, so the two little hedgehogs could only hold each other’s hands.

 

Similarly cold trembling hands.

 

Perhaps because they couldn’t speak when they were hidden in the energy shield, the lively Chi Huahua was unwilling to speak afterwards.

 

Then they finally waited for rescue, but they would never wait for their parents again. In order to protect them, their parents ran to the garden to attract the attention of the Zerg. So the garden and their parents were destroyed by the Zerg, and the fruit tree was broken in half, and there would be no fruit next year.

 

When the eastern hemisphere was about to be completely overrun, Chi Huahua and Chi Lu were sent to the distant western hemisphere. The only thing Chi Huahua had related to the destroyed homeland in the eastern hemisphere was a flower that had once stuck to his back.

 

Perhaps it was stuck to him when he was rolling in the flowers that day. He held the flower tightly in his little paw, afraid that the flower would fall, but no matter how tightly he held it, the flower eventually disappeared—

 

It withered away.

 

Decaying in his palm, nothing was left.

 

Chi Lu told him to put the flower on the roadside soil. Teacher Xiao He said to put rose petals in the flowerpot, which would better protect the flowers.

 

Why did everyone ask him to put the flower down? 

 

Once he did, it would be gone. Everything would be gone, the garden, his parents. They all withered away.

 

The little hedgehog lowered his head and cried silently. When the tears fell to the ground and spread into a puddle, Chi Huahua realized that for some reason, tears were running down his face again.

 

A gentle hand wiped away the tears on his face. 

 

“Chi Huahua, I’m sorry. I’m sorry I can’t give you a hug.” A paper book appeared in front of him, with a flattened rose pressed between the pages.

 

This rose was the largest and most beautiful among the roses Chi Huahua gave to Teacher Xiao He today.

 

“Today, Chi Huahua gave me many roses, but I put those roses in the soil of the flowerpot, which was very disrespectful to you. These roses were picked by Chi Huahua with great effort. How could I put them on the ground?” 

 

Teacher Xiao He said softly, “But there was one rose that I couldn’t bear to put down at the time because it was too beautiful, so I made it into a bookmark.”

 

“The beauty of a flower is fleeting; it will wither soon. But after being made into a bookmark, it can be preserved for a longer time.” 

 

The young man’s voice was as warm as the spring sun, “If Chi Huahua wants to pick flowers next time, just tell Teacher, and we’ll make it into a bookmark, okay?”

 

The rose sandwiched between the pages was very beautiful, just like the flower he took from the garden with his spines, which was as beautiful as it was.

 

After the flower withered, Chi Huahua had been looking for equally beautiful flowers. He wanted to carry those flowers with him, just like leaving the withered people and things by his side. But he never found them.

 

Looking at the rose bookmark in front of him, the little hedgehog, who had been silent all along, suddenly spoke, “…It’s okay.” 

 

He made a weak, mosquito-like sound, “I found it.”

 

He found it.

 

When he heard the voice of this person yesterday, it was as if he heard the sound of everything coming back to life, as if there were little insects reaching out their tentacles and quietly touching the dew on the petals, and as if the fruit tree was quietly bearing its fruit, the juice passing through the veins of the leaves, turning into sweet juice in the fruit flesh.

 

When the face of this person appeared on the screen, it was as if he saw the garden blooming with flowers in spring, with colorful flowers in full bloom, swaying gently in the breeze, which was the most beautiful scenery in his memory, the scenery he thought he would never see again.

 

Chi Huahua looked up at the young man in front of him, at the most beautiful, undefeated flower that appeared in his life.