Chapter 22: Husband

The stupid fish endured silently. Of course, he knew the wounds on his body had festered. Every flick of his tail fin was piercingly painful.

Jiang Yang felt both angry and anxious, but seeing the stupid fish lowering his head and bearing it silently, even her great anger dissipated.

She climbed back onto the rock, not bothering to wring out the water from her wet clothes. She patted the empty space beside her and said to the stupid fish: “Come up.”

Chi Mei’s eyelashes trembled, water droplets clinging to their tips fell. He slowly swam over, supporting himself with his arms on the rock, using a bit of strength, and his fish tail left the pool.

His upper body leaned against the rock wall, tail fin limply spread out on the rock. This position fully exposed the wound. After leaving the water surface, the festering parts of the wound became more clearly visible. Jiang Yang bent down, carefully examining it, frowning imperceptibly: “The wound is already inflamed. If not treated, it will get infected. Where did your previous healing ability go? This wound is far less severe than that gunshot you took before. How did it become inflamed and festering?”

Chi Mei’s tail fin trembled weakly between his fins. He bit his lip and said guiltily: “This is already after recovery. It was much more serious when I was first injured.”

Jiang Yang was half skeptical: “How did you get injured?”

Chi Mei’s wet hair tips dripped water. He lowered his head, not daring to look directly at Jiang Yang: “It was a few days ago. I was hungry and went out to catch fish to eat. I was led into a pile of reefs by a cunning octopus. I couldn’t stop in time and crashed into the reef, which scraped off my scales… Actually, A-Yang, you don’t need to worry. My wound has already healed a lot. It will be fine in a few more days.”

Jiang Yang suddenly fell silent. It had already recovered for several days to become like this, so how serious must it have been at the time? No, the scratch on his back clearly hadn’t healed at all from yesterday to today. Jiang Yang frowned deeply. Her intuition told her there was a problem here, but she couldn’t figure it out for the moment.

Looking at the hideous wound in front of her, fresh red blood continued to ooze out, deeply paining her eyes.

“I’ll go out to find herbs for you.” Jiang Yang stood up abruptly: “From now on, your wound can’t touch water anymore, otherwise the infection will spread faster.”

Food and drink were plentiful on the island, but medicines were extremely scarce. They could only rely on natural herbs, and whether they could be found was still a question. While it was still early, she had to hurry to find some.

“A-Yang.” Chi Mei grabbed her waistband.

Jiang Yang’s heavy expression suddenly changed. She grabbed the other end of the waistband: “What are you doing?!”

The waistband around her waist was only tied in a simple knot. Fortunately, she was quick enough to grab the waistband, otherwise her clothes would have loosened by now.

The stupid fish knew he had made a mistake. He withdrew his hand sheepishly and looked up at her. His black, moist, and bright eyes were filled with twinkling starlight: “A-Yang, I’m a fish. I’ll die of thirst if I’m not in water.”

Jiang Yang rubbed her forehead and sighed: “I said don’t let your wound touch water, not that your whole body can’t touch water.”

She took off her completely soaked and heavy outer coat and placed it in the stupid fish’s hands: “Here, if you feel like you lack water, use it to wet your scales and wipe them, but be sure to avoid the wound, understand?”

The stupid fish held her clothes in his arms. His brain seemed to think of something, and he suddenly nodded with a blushing face: “I understand. A-Yang, when will you be back?”

“Before dark, I suppose. If I find medicine, I’ll hurry back as soon as possible.” As she spoke, Jiang Yang had already climbed out of the tree hole. She shook off the sand on her body, and suddenly, as if remembering something, bent down and stuck half her body back into the hole.

Unexpectedly, she saw this stupid fish burying his face in her clothes, his eyes narrowed comfortably into slits, looking exactly like a contented little fox.

A small stone rolled from Jiang Yang’s side, fell onto the rock wall, rolled a bit, and then rolled into the pool with a “plop” sound.

The stupid fish looked up.

Their eyes met.

“……”

“……”

Jiang Yang was stunned. The stupid fish was also stunned.

“A-A-Yang?” The stupid fish’s face turned as red as stir-fried boiling shrimp. His hands shook like a sieve, his expression tense and stiff, his speech even more stuttering: “…A-Yang, you, you came back so suddenly? When did you come back?”

Jiang Yang looked at the nervous stupid fish, then at her clothes that had been sniffed, and paused: “Just now.”

Chi Mei’s eyes trembled, as if having survived a calamity.

“What do you want to eat tonight? I’ll bring it back for you.” Jiang Yang pressed her lips together, a faint smile between her brows.

“Are you asking me?” Chi Mei’s eyes widened, as if a firework had suddenly bloomed. Under the rippling water, Chi Mei held her clothes tightly in his arms, his face red and heart pounding as he said: “Anything is fine, everything is good, as long as you come back early.”

“Alright.” Jiang Yang smiled silently and entered the dense forest.

She didn’t intend to search aimlessly like a headless fly. She wasn’t familiar with the island’s environment, and searching randomly without any clues would take who knows how long to find anything. Fortunately, there was someone on this island who knew the situation better than she did.

Finding a medicinal herb was difficult, but finding a house was quite easy.

Soon, Jiang Yang found Chun Jian’s dwelling. His home was on a flat piece of land near the beach, a simple but wind and rain-proof wooden hut. In front of the hut was a fence enclosing some unknown wild vegetables. Two little brats were running wild in front of the door, their giggling and laughing voices reaching Jiang Yang’s ears.

Because of the tropical location, the sun was fierce and the UV rays strong. The two little brats’ skin had been tanned to a wheat color, but fortunately, they had inherited their father’s merman genes and had decent features. However, on this remote island far from human habitation, skin color didn’t matter anyway.

Jiang Yang slowly approached.

Seeing Jiang Yang, the two little brats immediately stopped their roughhousing and ran fearfully into the house, shouting as they ran: “Father, that bad woman has come to bully us again!”

Chun Jian anxiously rushed out of the house, shielding the two little brats behind him, looking warily at Jiang Yang: “What do you want?”

Jiang Yang was a bit speechless. Who was it that first put a dagger to her throat? Just because she resisted, she became the bad person? If she were really a bad person, killing these three would be as simple as killing chickens.

However, considering that she needed a favor this time, she had to lower her attitude.

“Don’t be afraid, I don’t have any other intentions. I just want to ask if you know of any medicinal herbs on the island that can treat wounds?” She stood two or three steps away from Chun Jian’s fence, no longer resisting, maintaining a safe distance to make Chun Jian less nervous.

“Medicinal herbs?” Chun Jian looked her up and down and said: “Wait a moment.”

With that, he took the two children back into the house, even very cautiously locking the door from the inside. After about the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, the door bolt moved, and Chun Jian came out of the house. Standing at the door, he threw a package of already dried herbs at her: “Grind this into powder and apply it to the wound.”

Jiang Yang thanked him repeatedly and prepared to leave with the herbs.

Seeing that she had no intention of lingering, Chun Jian finally let down his guard and asked: “Where are you injured?”

Jiang Yang answered: “I’m not injured. It’s Chi Mei who’s hurt. His wound is infected, so I came out to find herbs.”

Chun Jian frowned coldly: “Infected?”

Suddenly, he laughed lightly: “Then you’d better take good care of him. Merman wounds can be very painful.”

Jiang Yang nodded slightly: “Thank you.”

She found the medicine earlier than she had imagined. Not daring to delay a moment regarding the stupid fish’s injury, she hurried back.

Watching Jiang Yang’s retreating figure, Chun Jian’s thin lips burst into a contemptuous sneer: “To actually give her the merman pearl, what a fool! Merman King, you just wait and see, watch how your precious son follows in my footsteps, watch him slowly be tortured to death by this woman.”

Jiang Yang randomly found two dry stones baked by the sun on the beach and hurriedly ran back to the tree hole, placing the herbs on the stones to crush and grind them.

“A-Yang, where did you find the medicine?” Chi Mei leaned beside her, his chin lightly resting on her shoulder as he asked.

“Chun Jian.”

“Chun Jian?” Chi Mei’s heart tightened, his expression somewhat displeased.

“What’s wrong?” Jiang Yang asked.

Chi Mei lowered his head, his thin lips slightly pursed: “Why did you go to him?”

Jiang Yang continued grinding the herbs while saying: “Don’t worry. Although that man Chun Jian’s behavior is a bit abnormal, I recognize this herb. It’s indeed a medicinal herb that can treat wounds. He didn’t tamper with it.”

Chun Jian was half a stranger to Jiang Yang, but considering he had grudges with the stupid fish’s mother, she had to be a bit more cautious. On the way back, she carefully identified the herbs to confirm there was no problem before daring to use them.

Chi Mei’s delicate chin rubbed dissatisfiedly on her shoulder, his wet hair strands intertwining with Jiang Yang’s long hair: “I’m not worried about that.”

“Then what are you worried about?” Jiang Yang asked.

“He…” Chi Mei bit his lip, reluctantly saying: “He’s a man abandoned by his wife-master, living as a widower.”

In their merman tribe, there was no tradition of husbands not being able to remarry after their wife-masters died. Someone like Chun Jian, who was alone raising children and had been exiled to a remote island with few human traces, must be very hungry after not seeing a woman for many years.

Jiang Yang was not only young and strong but also beautiful in appearance and gentle in personality, a thousand times better than that whatever San Niang who abandoned him.

If they stayed together as a lonely man and woman, what if Chun Jian developed other thoughts about A-Yang, wanting to find a new mother for his two children and tried to seduce A-Yang?

Chi Mei narrowed his eyes, gritting his teeth, as if he had already seen Chun Jian with his clothes half-open, eyes filled with autumn waves.

Jiang Yang’s shoulders shook uncontrollably. She pinched his handsome face that was like thin snow and laughed: “You stupid fish, can’t you stop thinking about those messy things?”

Chi Mei’s eyes were filled with water. He let Jiang Yang pinch his face out of shape and said in a low, muffled voice: “This isn’t messy. Didn’t you say you don’t like staying in the water? He’s turned into a human now and can stay on land with you.”

Even after so long, Chi Mei still remembered that casually uttered ‘she doesn’t like staying in the water’ from Jiang Yang.

Jiang Yang released her pinching hands and sighed helplessly: “I’m not interested in husbands.”