Chapter 77: Sea Turtle, a Natural-Born Scapegoat

Once he confirmed that Yun Jiao could really hold her breath in the sea for that long, Yun Chenxi was both amazed and greatly relieved.

So, Yun Jiao let herself go even more wild.

She lay on the sea turtle’s back and was carried even farther away.

Yun Chenxi only gave her one instruction: "Don’t go too far, and remember to come back."

That sea turtle seemed intelligent, so even though Yun Chenxi was still a little worried, he let Yun Jiao go.

Yun Jiao was so happy she kicked her little feet up and down on the surface, making the water go SPLASH, SPLASH, SPLASH.

After a bit of testing the waters, she could finally play freely in the sea.

"Let’s go. We’re going to play on the seafloor."

This time, Yun Jiao went somewhere even farther out, a place where basically no one dived.

As soon as she and the great sea turtle reached the bottom, she spotted a huge starfish.

It was much bigger than Yun Jiao’s face.

’This is edible.’

’The selling price isn’t too high.’

’I’ll take it.’

There were also sea urchins, and quite a few of them.

But... she hadn’t brought any tools to carry things.

She didn’t want to touch the sea urchins’ spines, so she could only stare at them longingly and sigh.

’Next time, I have to bring the right tools.’

Over here, she picked up several large conches alone.

Her hands couldn’t hold them all, so she found a fishing line floating in the sea and strung the conches together.

"Great sea turtle, help me carry this."

Having a helper was so convenient. She hung the fishing line directly on the great sea turtle’s rear flipper.

There were already five large conches strung on it.

Suddenly, she saw some jellyfish.

The sea turtle saw them too.

The girl and the turtle both swam towards the jellyfish in perfect sync.

Yun Jiao grabbed one in a single snatch.

The great sea turtle got one in a single bite.

’Delicious!’

The jellyfish’s tentacles brushed against Yun Jiao’s hand.

She paid it no mind. It was a good chance to test if her current body was resistant to poison.

The result proved it: the jellyfish’s venom had no effect on her.

Yun Jiao: Happy

It was impossible to bring these back, so she had no choice but to pop them in her mouth.

The girl and the turtle floated in the sea, happily munching on their little snacks.

She caught a few more, this time to feed to the great sea turtle.

After feeding it, Yun Jiao began to sweet-talk the great sea turtle.

"I’ll give you yummy things to eat, so in the future, you have to bring me yummy things to eat too."

The great sea turtle looked at Yun Jiao with its beady eyes.

’No problem!’

Yun Jiao patted its head. "Good friend, good mount!"

The two of them went wild playing on the seafloor.

Since she didn’t have any tools to carry things, Yun Jiao was selective and caught a few large prawns.

Since she couldn’t carry them, she ate them on the spot. She split a prawn larger than her palm into two.

She tossed the head section to the great sea turtle and popped the tail section into her own mouth.

While chewing, her eyes darted around, looking for any other goodies.

She spotted a large sea eel.

WHOOSH! Yun Jiao zipped over. As she grabbed it, the eel tried to turn its head and bite her.

She gave it a backhanded slap—a big one—and knocked the eel, which was as thick as her arm, into a daze.

Finally, she dragged it by the tail. "Let’s go, back we go!"

She looked so proud and triumphant.

The sea turtle had fishing lines hanging from both its flippers.

On one side were conches and a few scallops; on the other were large crabs and shrimp.

Yun Jiao held a huge starfish in one hand and the sea eel’s tail in the other, all while chewing on a shrimp tail before swallowing it.

She even let out a burp.

’I’m full.’

Surfacing, Yun Jiao turned her head and looked around, spotting Yun Chenxi and Yun Xiaowu not far away.

"Second Brother, Fifth Brother~"

Hearing her voice, the two boys looked over at the same time. They let out a huge sigh of relief when they saw her.

Heavens knew how long they’d been searching!

"Where did you run off to?"

The expression on Yun Jiao’s delicate, pretty little face was utterly innocent.

"I don’t know. I just went wherever the great sea turtle took me."

The sea turtle: born to be the perfect scapegoat.

The great sea turtle: ...

’I’m *so* grateful to you.’

Yun Chenxi and Yun Xiaowu stared at the great sea turtle.

"Why did you take Jiaojiao so far away? What if something had happened? Could you have given us back our Jiaojiao?"

The great sea turtle: ’Can’t understand, can’t understand...’

"Second Brother, look."

Yun Jiao quickly held out the large sea eel and starfish in her hands.

"Such a huge sea eel!"

"Is it dead?"

’Sea eels are vicious. There’s no way Jiaojiao could have caught it and brought it back alive, right?’

Just as he reached out to grab it, the eel suddenly twisted its neck to bite him.

If he hadn’t pulled his hand back quickly, he would have gotten a nasty bite.

Yun Jiao’s eyes flashed fiercely. With a smooth, fluid motion, she delivered another big slap.

There. It was dazed again.

Yun Chenxi: ...

’Case closed. Jiaojiao is more vicious than the eel!’

The starfish was also quite large.

But this thing fetched a low price at the purchasing station. One this big would probably only sell for about fifty cents.

Even a mosquito’s leg is still meat. No one turned their nose up at it.

Yun Jiao let out another satisfied burp.

Yun Xiaowu narrowed his eyes. Knowing his sister’s habit of wanting to taste everything she saw...

He asked directly, "You’ve been eating, haven’t you?"

Yun Jiao covered her mouth. "No."

Her rebuttal was extremely loud.

Yun Chenxi flicked her on the head. "Still saying no? The guiltier you feel, the louder you get."

Yun Jiao: ...

’Nonsense!’

"Why is your mouth so impatient? It would’ve been much tastier if you brought it back and let Grandma marinate it raw!"

Yun Jiao mumbled softly, "I couldn’t help it."

Raw marinated seafood was indeed delicious. Yun Jiao’s mouth started to water.

Even if her stomach wasn’t hungry, her mouth was.

"What’s that behind the great sea turtle?"

Yun Xiaowu noticed something odd. He went behind the great sea turtle, pulled up the fishing line, and gasped.

Yun Chenxi’s eyes widened too.

They thought Yun Jiao had already scored big by finding such a large eel, but they never expected there would be so much more!

There were seven or eight large conches alone, plus five scallops that were also a good size.

Because of their exceptionally delicious flavor, the price for scallops at the purchasing station wasn’t high, but it wasn’t cheap either.

The conches were mostly sold by the piece. The ones Yun Jiao had picked were all slightly larger than a grown man’s palm, each weighing over a pound.

These sold for one yuan and fifty cents each.

"Over on this side are crabs and shrimp."

Yun Xiaowu pulled up the fishing line bit by bit, as if opening a blind box.

The first thing to emerge was a chubby box crab, and it was a good size.

Next was a tiger prawn.

Then came a gazami crab, a prawn, a flower crab...

Because the fishing line had limited length, Yun Jiao had only picked the big ones.

This left Yun Chenxi and Yun Xiaowu both pleasantly surprised and utterly shocked.

"Spill it, just how far did you two go!"

Just looking at this haul, they knew she must have gone a good distance beyond their usual foraging grounds.

Yun Jiao: "I don’t know."

Don’t ask. If you ask, the answer is she doesn’t know.

’Besides, I can’t do math, so how would I know how far I went?’

At such a young age, she was already as shameless as a dead pig that doesn’t fear boiling water.

Yun Chenxi: ’I may have loosened the reins a bit, but I didn’t tell you to go completely wild!’