Chapter 890: line with translation of chapter title

No. 13: What is the road that will not be walked again?

Due to the consistent anti-aging performance of Uma Musume being superior to humans, and because it's difficult to directly judge age from outward maturity, the 'Otherworld Narita White Ren' left quickly.

Rather, as soon as she put on that look of longing that Aomo couldn't bear to look at, the Beast King's urging voice arrived.

Because he himself is very punctual, Aomo finds it hard to say whether he is empathizing with his own awkwardness, resolving the situation in time, or rushing back to slack off.

But regardless of which possibility it is, he must thank the other party for helping him out—although all this is merely because he himself is a bit 'affected'.

A person's temperament gradually changes with accumulated experience, and may even shift suddenly due to the impact of some major events—these are all simple truths, and that monster-enthusiast fan Bai Ren… is actually not a bad change at all.

Rather, going from a cold-noodle slacker to a much more enthusiastic and open-minded monster chef might be a good thing.

Perhaps Miss Chen Guang would feel relieved, though it's not certain.

But as a fan who has watched her running videos and interview reports since his youth, and even written an introduction column, Narita Bai Ren is still that cold-noodle… uh, cold-noodle cool sister that puts him at ease.

Looking back like this, it's simply the fan's one-sided understanding of the idol's image, stubbornly hoping the idol will forever remain that way—an affected attitude.

Precisely because he understands this, Aomo did not rely on the other party's affection—perhaps mixed with reverence for the Beast King—to command her to converse with him in the manner she remembered.

Let the affectation stop at affectation; here I'll interact with a consistently smooth attitude—although he ultimately still couldn't hold back.

But setting aside the OOC feeling as a fan's standpoint, from a friend's position, from an observer's perspective…

Should we record this?

Such a rare tone and speech—and the recording immortal Aomo Lindun, who also considered this speech very rare, sighed in hindsight.

As he left the bar with brisk, uninterrupted steps, he saw the Beast King standing together with Ishamara and Narita Bai Ren, raising his hand at the roadside and summoning the familiar four-dimensional monster.

What the heck, even though he's so much stronger than me, he ends up using a Brutton to hurry along?

Aomo felt a regret as if even the world's richest person would have to squat on a toilet, and he thought the mighty Beast King could break limits, pulling off even more flashy tricks…

But… he also didn't like such flashy things himself.

Just as Aomo was coming to terms with his expectations, the three in the distance all turned their heads together from the visible spatial tremor.

One person still shouted 'Goodbye, Lord Lindun!' with that enthusiasm that made his eyebrows twitch; another waved his hand together with the Faction members beside him, waving their fin-like limbs; while the dark, towering intermediary then spoke:

"By the way, please apologize to those few monsters for me."

"What do you mean?"

"Upon reflection, perhaps my wording was inappropriate, causing them to misunderstand."

"…You didn't make some low-level error like a discontinuous, missing-character expression, did you?"

Aomo pressed the backs of his hands against his waist, not hiding his disgust, almost saying directly, 'You're not going to perform some meaningless nonsense in front of me, are you?'

"…In short, please apologize for me, and tell them: the monsters' disappearance is due to the black curtain, and has nothing to do with me."

"And…"

"And what?!"

Aomo immediately raised his voice, thinking he still had some more showy maneuver, but then heard him chuckle:

"Thank you for chatting with me."

"…Does that even count as chatting?" Aomo retorted unhappily, "Isn't this communication and interrogation?"

"Enough to make me recall the past…" he said, falling silent for a moment, then, as if returning to the initial awkward state of conversation, he asked, "And, is Morrison here?"

"He's hanging out on the old home network; it's not convenient to let him come." Aomo said calmly.

"Indeed, that's exactly how it should be."

"As expected of you, right?" Aomo smiled.

"As expected of me."

The Beast King lightly laughed and nodded, and then from the other end of the vortex came the nagging of a certain horse girl with a rather bad temper: "Your punctual virtue! Guinea-pig guy! Did those two women go missing? Or are you again tangled up in some troublesome matter?!"

"Sounds like you should go uphold your virtue, Beast King." With a face bearing an empathic, helpless smile, Aomo waved at the Beast King.

"I want to take it easier than you for now, so just get lost."

"Hmm." The Beast King said, gesturing for the two to turn with him and step into the vortex, then raised his claw covered in arm armor and shook it.

"Pay more attention to your surroundings; if there's a problem, find the observer."

When the words fell, the three vanished together with the trembling vortex.

And Aomo would turn back, facing the howling wind that swept into the deserted, dilapidated street.

It blew so hard he had to straighten his suit and bangs; when he lifted his head again, he saw two massive heads hanging down.

One dark red, one dark gold.

The falling-flowers monster Buru Baine, the word-chewing monster Gakura (stage one).

Together with the people standing on their respective heads, they all looked down at the lone young man in a suit facing them.

"Everyone, can we chat?" the young man below asked with a smile.

"At this time?" Meanwhile, above, the half-red-haired youth, barely standing on Gakura's forehead with legs spread, scoffed, his left sleeve uniform bearing three red stripes, "Are you joking?"

Aomo remembered, he was called Gui She.

Originally a proverb from the East Flame text 'Unpredictable Fortune and Misfortune', but in Jidong it was translated as 'Either a ghost appears or a snake appears', and thus called 'Oni Ja / Gui She'.

In the 'Monster Eugenics Thought' team, everyone's name is taken from East Flame proverbs, and they are all East Flame people from five thousand years ago——

——Although that is said, Gui She's hairstyle is already so trendy it doesn't fit with the team at all.

"Why be so sharp?" the young man in the suit said, still smiling, "We should have been comrades, just like we were facing the Five Emperors a dozen minutes ago."

"The Five Emperors?" the bespectacled youth in the team behind the red-haired one exclaimed in surprise at the name.

He is called Shi Jia, his name from 'Ten Drives of the Nag Horse', just as its meaning 'effort without cease' suggests, he is much steadier than Gui She, and can be said to be the overt team captain, with two gold stripes on his left shoulder.

And the tall, full-figured woman with short brown hair exclaimed in surprise: "Do you know the monster's name?"

She, named Hao, takes her name from 'One Hill of the Badger', the sole female member; in such a team, the sole female usually is the team's pet, but she is quite marginal, because she is also a slacker monster, with four blue stripes on her shoulder.

But according to the script Aomo knows, after today she will no longer be that.

But for now, is the "script" still useful?

He looked up at these few people, and also at the giant beast beneath them.

The word‑nitpicking monster Gagara—the most silent and expressionless, yet the giant beast formed from the boy who cares most about feelings and harbors the strongest desires—is the team's de facto leader; its name is derived from the character meaning 'sink' in the proverb 'many feathers can sink a boat', and on the left shoulder of its uniform it should bear a large black mark resembling a QR code.

Of course, before this, they still had a former team leader……

But even now, Aomo has not seen any trace of his existence.

Whether it be traces discernible from others' habits or from their words, none exist.

"You're not together, are you? You even walked off with that armored person, didn't you?"

Unbeknownst to them, the young man below has already observed them thoroughly, and he remains fixated on the scene he saw before.

"To clarify the situation, we always need a guide, right?" Aomo shrugged helplessly, looking at these three people and the giant beast beneath them, "He was the one who first communicated with me, wasn't he?"

"Even that one sentence counts as striking up a conversation!" The red‑haired youth Yan Yi bared his teeth, appearing not to care about his appearance.

"But you haven't said a single word to me before."

"Can't you say that?" On the head of Bu'erbai yinde, the blue‑haired, golden‑eyed boy stared sternly at the smiling young man in a suit below, "You're Aomo Lindun, aren't you?"

The clearest proof that this exceeds the 'script' is that Ma Zhongpeng, the boy who ought to be piloting a huge robot alongside his companions, is now with these monster eugenicists, even wearing their uniforms—only the left shoulder lacks the insignia, showing he joined hastily.

"That armored person, when he first approached us, although he called himself the Beast King, when we questioned his real name he said he was Aomo Lindun."

"Just like you."

As those words fell, the originally probing, angry, or curious gazes turned sharp, bearing down on the boy's words.

And this also made Aomo helplessly raise his hands: "Oh dear, he's really left me a mess—let me think. First, he had me apologize to you for your earlier conversation… although I don't know what was said, he believes a misunderstanding occurred."

"No more nonsense—this guy's just stalling for time; let's kill him!"

Naturally, the one to say this at this juncture is the hot‑tempered Gui She, but if we consider the original team as Aomo understands it, these beast‑users who don't care about human life might actually accept his rash decision.

But now, Ma Zhongpeng is still on their team.

"But the Beast King is gone, and the only clue we have is this person."

The boy with exceptionally clear thinking surpasses an antique over a thousand five hundred years old (although those five thousand years were spent sleeping, essentially he's just a teenager).

Although his say may not carry much weight, in this team, whenever someone raises an objection, the nominal leader will speak up——

"Indeed, given the situation, we ought to have spared his life."

"Before you decide, let me first finish delivering the message I was entrusted with," Aomo interjected into their conversation, "Actually, he also asked me to convey this: the monsters disappeared because of the mastermind, and it has nothing to do with him."

"The monsters disappeared… he said, 'Nate‑kun!'?"

In a team whose average age is four thousand years, it is still a fifteen‑year‑old high‑school freshman who holds the forefront of clear thinking, leaving Aomo to wonder whether he should be spending time here laying the groundwork for interpersonal relations.

Perhaps launching an attack in the Heavenly Authority Penalty Judgment form, giving TVBOSS a little cinematic shock, would make the dialogue proceed more smoothly?

But doing that would be just like the Beast King.

Furthermore, if we cannot create an overwhelming disparity through direct crushing, then destroying the city and even getting caught up in loss of life would be inevitable.

This is an unjustified burden, and it was unnecessary.

"Nate? If he is an Ancient Special Knight, then he is indeed a monster, and I am also searching for him and the whereabouts of the second‑generation music monster."

Thus, facing the renewed gazes of everyone, Aomo maintained his usual warm friendliness, clasping his hands at an angle like a businessman and said.

"Like this, I think our goals align; can we now set aside our weapons and try to cooperate?"