Chapter 6

“Children, come eat!” Yin Dabai called around the food he was dragging back in his mouth.

Hua Xiaoer, Hua Xiaosan and Hua Xiaowu flocked around [him], Yin Xiaoyi and Yin Xiaosi following behind. Yin Xiaoxiao hesitated then crawled over, stretching his body and following after the five young snakes to see what Yin Dabai meant by food.

Yin Xiaoxiao’s face paled and he immediately retreated a few paces. Swallowing, he turned and crawled away.

Just as he was about to disappear into the depths of the cave, Yin Xiaoxiao was forced back out, rolled by Hua Xiaohua’s tail. “Yin Xiaoxiao, quickly go and eat. The last time you and your brothers ate was when you were born. Now, you need to eat more.”

Dear god in heaven ¹ ! Young master, even though this body was now that of a snake’s, my soul was still a human’s! Young master, I wouldn’t mind if I had to eat raw boar, raw cow or raw sheep, but you want me to eat raw rat? Are you trying to kill me?! Young master, I absolutely will not eat rat!

Yes, you heard right. Rest assured that what the five young snakes had surrounded what was indeed a pile of dead rats. Not a pile of something cute like a white pet-shop hamster, but instead the ugly pilfering everyone-yell-”kill it!” kind of rat. So, I would like everyone to understand Yin Xiaoxiao’s mental state! Eat raw rat, tsk tsk. It was indeed very, very normal, exceptionally normal, to feel nauseous over this!

“I’m not eating that! I’m not eating that!” Yin Xiaoxiao once again turned to run away into the deepest parts of the cave. Hua Xiaohua once again grabbed Yin Xiaoxiao by his tail and brought him back. Hua Xiaohua said, somewhat angrily, “Yin Xiaoxiao, don’t mess around! They’re tasty and nutritious! Quickly go and eat!”

“I don’t want to eat rats! I don’t want to eat rats!” Yin Xiaoxiao twisted his body in an attempt to escape from Hua Xiaohua’s clutches.

“Dabai!” Hua Xiaohua turned his head and angrily shouted for Yin Dabai. Yin Dabai immediately came over with a dead rat in his mouth which he deposited in front of Hua Xiaohua. Hua Xiaohua’s head was raised and Yin Dabai immediately took the dead rat and approached Yin Xiaoxiao, who was held, suspended in midair, by Hua Xiaohua.

Yin Xiaoxiao’s gaze tunneled until all he could see was the dead rat, glistening drops of blood falling from its body. Yin Dabai attempted to place the dead rat into his own mouth. Yin Xiaoxiao pulled away, opening his mouth to scream loudly in terror. And then….

He fainted.

Hua Xiaohua, frightened by Yin Xiaoxiao’s suddenly limp body, quickly set him down then rubbed against his face. Okay, it was okay. He’d only fainted.

Yin Dabai: “….Xiaoxiao’s body is really weak. How can he faint so often?”

Hua Xiaohua encircled Yin Xiaoxiao in several of his coils. Yes, as Yin Xiaoxiao’s Pop he had to wonder what could have caused Yin Xiaoxiao to faint…

Hua Xiaohua looked at the rat that Yin Dabai had tossed to the ground.

Yes, Hua Xiaohua. The truth. Have you realized it?

“Hua Xiaowu, come here,” Hua Xiaohua yelled at the pile of young snakes, who were obviously shocked from Yin Xiaoxiao’s scream. Hua Xiaowu crawled over, shaking his head.

“What do you want me to do, Pop?”

“That dead rat, you eat it.”

At those words, Hua Xiaowu very happily dragged the dead rat away in his mouth.

Yin Dabai didn’t say anything. He only stared, confused, at Hua Xiaohua, as though saying, ‘You gave his food to Xiaowu. What about Xiaoxiao?’

Hua Xiaohua ignored Yin Dabai, glanced to the side a few times with a meaningful expression, then crawled away.

Yin Dabai almost lost his temper. Dear Hua Xiaohua, since you’ve had those eggs, you’ve been ignoring me more and more! I must recapture my place ² ! I must!

When Yin Xiaoxiao awoke, he immediately looked for that dead rat. When he looked and didn’t find it, Yin Xiaoxiao felt thoroughly relieved. However….

Yin Xiaoxiao’s face wrinkled. So hungry…

Yin Xiaoxiao coiled himself up, his body forming the shape of that thing on the top of the lazy goat’s head ³ …

This amount of food for a snake was actually quite plentiful. After being born, the young snakes had eaten their own eggshells, then after another brief period of time had eaten again. Now, they wouldn’t have to eat for another five or six days. As they grew, the amount of food they’d need would increase, but the size of their prey would also increase. At that point, eating once would be filling enough for five or six days.

But from birth until now, Yin Xiaoxiao had only eaten his own eggshell. Today, Yin Dabai had gone expressly to find food for Yin Xiaoxiao. It was only incidental that he’d gotten enough food for the other five. While it was unfortunate that Yin Xiaoxiao would rather faint than eat rats, it was to the benefit of the other five lads.

Not long after Yin Xiaoxiao awoke, Hua Xiaohua returned.

Yin Dabai was too far away to see what Hua Xiaohua was dragging behind him.

Was that…a bird’s nest?

Yin Dabai was stupified.

Xiaohua wanted to eat bird eggs? But, if he wanted to eat eggs then there was no reason to drag the nest back. If you want to eat them, just eat them..

Hua Xiaohua dragged over the bird’s nest and glanced over to see Yin Xiaoxiao’s body coiled up and surrounded by a black cloud. Quickly, he crawled over and tossed the bird’s nest in front of Yin Xiaoxiao. “Eat.”

Yin Xiaoxiao looked at the bird’s nest which had suddenly appeared in front of him. Inside, there were four-no, five white shiny plump bird eggs.

Yin Xiaoxiao drooled.

Even raw and encased in a hard shell, these bird eggs were still undoubtedly better than rat. At least, to hear tell from Yin Xiaoxiao.

Thus, Yin Xiaoxiao directly fell upon the nest, cleared it of eggs and spit out the shells.

Yin Xiaoxiao’s full belly rubbed against the ground. Although they had a faint taste of sulphur and the yolk inside was so sticky it was nauseating, the rest was so good. But, just because he was no longer hungry didn’t mean that he had eaten his fill!

Yin Xiaoxiao looked pitifully at Hua Xiaohua.

Hua Xiaohua wrapped his tail around Yin Xiaoxiao in a hug. “We’ll go and get more for you tomorrow. For now, bear with it.”

Yin Xiaoxiao’s mouth scrunched ⁴ and he left.

“Yin Xiaoxiao likes to eat bird eggs?” Yin Dabai was skeptical. “Those aren’t enough. He’d have to eat a lot of them to be full. On their own, they don’t make a meal.”

“You’re really full of nonsense!” Hua Xiaohua’s head rose. “Starting tomorrow morning, I’ll be in charge of getting food for the five young snakes. You’re in charge of looking for Xiaoxiao’s bird eggs!”

Hua Xiaohua left. Yin Dabai looked at Hua Xiaohua’s swaying back in growing confusion.

There weren’t any trees within five li ⁵ of their home, you know?!

Ahem, Dabai, mother wants to tell you that, because it’ll be awfully difficult to satiate Xiaoxiao’s appetite with only bird eggs, everyday you will need to strive hard to find bird eggs. This situation will continue until Xiaoxiao finds new food to eat.

After Hua Xiaowu had eaten the rat given to him by Hua Xiaohua, Hua Xiaowu could no longer move his body. When he saw Yin Xiaoxiao happily slithering over, Hua Xiaowu wanted go over and play with Yin Xiaoxiao. But everytime he tried to move, he had to endure sharp pains. Eventually, Hua Xiaowu gave up.

“Xiaowu, you ate too much!”

“Go to sleep. That wasn’t yours to begin with!”

Hua Xiaoer and Hua Xiaosan twisted and crawled away at the same tempo pace.

And so, stubbornly, the same má huā ⁶ occurred for the second night. As before, Yin Xiaoxiao was in the middle surrounded by Hua Xiaoer, Hua Xiaosan, Yin Xiaoyi and Yin Xiaosi. As for Hua Xiaowu…

He was sleeping off to the side of the “má huā”, unfurled in a straight line and groaning.

Footnotes

<ol>尼玛: internet profanity which originated as a sacred Tibetan word. 振夫纲: refers to the change of matriarchal families to patriarchal families. Historically, it was a part of feudal society. While in this novel, there’s a power difference inherent based on potency of venom rather than gender, from the feel of this and later chapters, I believe that Yin Dabai means more that he wants to stop being bossed around by Hua Xiaohua than anything else. This is referring to the haircut of a sheep from a cartoon The very top of his head looks like vanilla soft service ice cream. 努努嘴: lit. nǔnǔ mouth: refers to t his particular expression : More about it from this article about 1.55 miles or 2.5 km They look like this</ol>