Little Chubby Girl's Standards for Herself

A kindergarten in Star City.

After the children finished lunch, a young female teacher, after making sure they were all in bed for their afternoon nap, sat down by the door, put on her headphones, and started watching videos on her phone.

A moment later, a small hand gently patted the female teacher's arm. She looked up and saw that it was Liu Shiling, the "most popular child" in the class.

The female teacher took off her headphones, instinctively grasped Liu Shiling's chubby little hand, and asked in a soft but concerned voice, "What's wrong, Shiling?"

Liu Shiling whispered, "Teacher, I'm thirsty, I'd like a drink of water."

So the female teacher got up and walked to the wall, found the stainless steel water cup with Liu Shiling's name on it among a row of cups, poured her a little less than half a cup of boiling water, blew on it for a while, and then handed it to her. "Drink it in small sips, be careful it's hot."

"Thank you, teacher." Liu Shiling took the water cup, blowing on it to warm it up as she sipped the water.

The female teacher sat back down by the door, but instead of continuing to watch the video, she picked up her phone and scrolled through some text messages.

Liu Shiling moved a small stool next to the female teacher, then sat down with her water cup in hand and asked softly, "Teacher, what video were you watching just now?"

"I'm watching the news," the female teacher replied softly.

"Can I watch it with you?" Liu Shiling asked softly, "I can't sleep."

The female teacher was taken aback; some children were actually interested in news videos?

She thought for a moment, then nodded in agreement. She took out the earphones again, cleaned the earbuds briefly, gave one to Liu Shiling, plugged it into her phone, and continued watching the video she had been watching.

She was watching a video about what happened in Montamira last night. The uploader had edited together various news reports from home and abroad, as well as videos made by netizens, and then used his own words and subtitles to explain it.

The video is currently playing footage of vandalized shops and streets with scattered bloodstains. Then the camera pans to show a Chinese business owner standing in front of his vandalized shop, filming himself and describing his experience from the previous night in Chinese. It was clearly originally a video posted to his own social media account.

The female teacher hesitated. Was it inappropriate to show this kind of video to kindergarten children? Although there were no direct scenes of violence, the images depicted the consequences of a riot.

Liu Shiling had overheard several teachers discussing related news in the corridor that morning. She had no interest in current events or news, and couldn't even distinguish between Myanmar and Montamira, let alone where they were or how far they were from Star City.

But she overheard two phrases that came up during the teachers' discussion: "Eight arms" and "eight eyes."

Liu Shiling immediately thought of the bald uncle's "pet," which she named "Barbie Warrior."

So I was very curious and wanted to know what news the teachers were discussing, and whether the thing they described as having "eight arms and eight eyes" was "Barbie Warrior".

Unfortunately, she can't access QQ now and can't confirm with the bald uncle, and the teachers discussed it briefly before stopping.

Just before her afternoon nap, she happened to see her teacher looking at a news article on her phone. There was a fleeting image of an eight-armed giant, so she leaned over and shamelessly asked to watch it together.

"Teacher, can we start from the beginning?" After watching for a while, Liu Shiling suddenly asked cautiously.

The female teacher was even more surprised. Liu Shiling was actually interested in this news?

She had only watched 6 or 7 minutes of it anyway, so going back to watch it again wouldn't make much difference. Besides, she was now more interested in why Liu Shiling liked watching this kind of news clipping.

The video starts playing from the beginning, beginning with a girl who was in Montamira last night, personally experienced the riots, and saw the vision of the Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Monster. She takes a selfie and describes her experience from last night.

The girl happened to work in graphic design and had also studied drawing. Last night, when she returned to the hotel, she drew the illusion of the Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Monster she had seen.

When Liu Shiling glanced at the screen just now, she saw that picture being displayed.

After the video started playing again, the female teacher's attention was no longer on her phone. She kept glancing at Liu Shiling of her eye, and then she was surprised to find that the child was actually staring intently at the screen with wide eyes, watching the news clip and commentary video very seriously.

"Teacher, can we pause here?" Liu Shiling suddenly looked up at her teacher and asked.

"Huh? Oh, here?" The female teacher subconsciously tapped the screen to pause the video, and then realized it was a sketch of the Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Monster illusion.

Liu Shiling said, "Teacher, could you screenshot this painting and send it to me on QQ? I want to learn how to paint this."

The female teacher looked at the painting again and exclaimed in surprise, "Why would you want to draw this? Don't you... find it frightening?"

Liu Shiling asked in surprise, "Why is it scary? It didn't do anything bad... Teacher, did it do something bad?"

The female teacher was taken aback. She had actually seen some news about Montamira that morning, especially the description of the "Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Monster illusion." After arriving at work, she had discussed it with other teachers. They had different guesses about the reason for the appearance of the "Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Monster," but there was one thing that most media outlets, eyewitnesses, and netizens who participated in the discussion reached a consensus on—the appearance of the "Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Monster illusion" in Montamira objectively prevented a large-scale riot and saved countless people who might have died in the riot.

Seeing that Liu Shiling was still waiting for her answer with her two big, bright eyes, the female teacher had no choice but to tell the truth, "It didn't do anything bad; on the contrary... it did something good and saved many people."

Liu Shiling smiled happily, "So it's a very powerful and very good pet... monster! I want to draw it!"

The female teacher immediately recalled the animals with many wings and eyes that Liu Shiling often drew before, and felt relieved, realizing that the little girl's liking for this kind of picture just happened to match her aesthetic.

"Okay, I'll screenshot it and send it to you." The female teacher took a screenshot of the video and sent it to Liu Shiling's QQ account— Liu Shiling had asked the teacher to add her as a QQ friend a couple of days ago.

However, what puzzled the female teacher was that after Liu Shiling happily said "Thank you, teacher!", she continued to watch the news video about Montamira with her. Even though the girl's drawing of the "Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Monster" no longer appeared, and it was just a compilation of selfies and interview videos of some eyewitnesses, Liu Shiling still watched it with great interest.

The female teacher naturally didn't know that after watching for a short while, Liu Shiling had basically concluded that the people in the video were describing the bald uncle's "Barbie Warrior." She didn't have any evidence or basis for judgment; it was just intuition.

Barbie Warrior did another good deed, and she felt honored.

In the afternoon, Liu Shiling's class happened to be having a drawing class. So after finishing the drawing that the teacher had assigned, she began to redesign her own "Barbie Warrior" drawing based on the "Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Monster" sketch that she had seen on the teacher's phone at noon.

Because her tablet wasn't with her and she couldn't access QQ, and it wasn't easy to borrow a phone from her teacher to look at the drawing, Liu Shiling couldn't compare it with the girl's drawing. She could only try to imitate it from memory.

Unfortunately, although the Little Chubby Girl's drawing skills have improved a lot under Tang Baona's guidance, she is still far from being as good as the girl in the video. Trying to draw such complex and realistic pictures is too beyond her ability. Moreover, her memory of that picture is somewhat different from reality, as it incorporates her own impression of the real "Barbie Warrior" from her dream.

So when she drew it, it not only failed to capture the same imposing and awe-inspiring presence as the young lady's painting, but it was actually inferior to her previous "Barbie Warrior" drawing.

Looking at the "Barbie Warrior" on the drawing paper, which had become even uglier, Liu Shiling sighed helplessly, her little eyebrows furrowing together.

"Haha, is this the drawing from that video at noon? Shiling, you did a great job, it's so cute." The female teacher who walked up to Liu Shiling glanced at her finished drawing and praised her with a smile, looking at the eight-armed, chubby "Barbie Warrior".

Liu Shiling's expression became even more bitter. "Barbie Warrior" should be majestic, not cute!

After returning home with her mother in the afternoon, Liu Shiling immediately asked her mother for her tablet, then went back to her room, logged into QQ, and saved the screenshot of the video that her teacher had sent her.

She took out her sketchbook, frowned at the drawing on the tablet, and stared at it for a long time, but still didn't start drawing.

She thought for a moment, then opened QQ, found Tang Baona's profile picture, clicked on it, and was about to press the voice message button when she remembered that Sister Laoxian had said that she and Sister Piaoliang were going to another place for a while and had things to do, so they wouldn't be able to teach her to draw and sing for the time being.

She scratched her head, then scrolled through her list of less than ten QQ friends and clicked on a cartoon deer wearing a helmet—this was Zhou Lutong 'Da Lu QQ account.

She and "Da Lu" had exchanged letters several times through Xiao Mei. "Da Lu" sent her several paintings, and she sent "Da Lu" several origami pieces. The last time they added each other on QQ, they only exchanged greetings once and haven't spoken since.

Liu Shiling sent the saved screenshot of the video, followed by a voice message asking for help, "Da Lu, Da Lu, I want to learn this painting technique, how do I learn it?"

Liu Shiling didn't wait for a reply, but continued to try to draw "Barbie Warrior" in her own way, because she knew that "Da Lu" was a primary school student and got out of school later than her kindergarten.

After dinner, Liu Shiling finally received a reply from "Da Lu," but it was neither text nor voice; instead, it was a drawing.

That drawing was the "Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Monster" drawn by the girl in the video screenshot she sent before. However, "Da Lu" accurately extracted some features from the drawing, exaggerated those features slightly, simplified other details, thickened the lines, and cartoonized the style of the drawing.

Liu Shiling's eyes lit up as soon as she saw the picture sent by "Da Lu". She didn't need to say anything more; this picture alone had already solved the previous problem.

The young lady's drawing is a sketch, which Liu Shiling hasn't studied. She draws simple colored pencil drawings, so it's difficult for her to imitate this kind of detailed, realistic style.

But when "Da Lu" helped her deconstruct and reassemble it, she immediately found her footing. So, following "Da Lu's " new style, she added some features of the "Barbie Warrior" she had seen in her dream, and quickly drew a relatively satisfactory "Barbie Warrior".

After finishing the drawing, Liu Shiling picked it up and examined it carefully, tilting her head left and right, squinting her eyes, and smiling broadly, quite pleased with herself.

Then she started tearing small pieces of paper. After tearing a large pile of small pieces of paper, she controlled the two Coin, "Chocolate" and "Ice Cream," to jump into the pieces of paper. After a while, it was as if a super mini hurricane was carrying the pieces of paper up and up. Then one hurricane became two, and the upper ends of the two hurricanes were connected together, swaying and converging, condensing, and extending.

Soon, influenced by the two Coin, the scraps of paper formed an eight-armed figure that was over thirty centimeters tall.

She also deliberately blackened some of the paper scraps, intending to control them to form eight eyes on the little figure's head.

Unfortunately, her control precision was still lacking. Among a pile of paper scraps, she couldn't accurately locate the blackened scraps, so the eight-armed little man's eyes were mostly on his stomach, making it look like he had eight holes poked in him.

Although it's not perfect yet, Liu Shiling is already very happy to see the image of this eight-armed little man—at least no one will mistake it for an upright crab or a tree stripped of its leaves by the wind anymore!

She put a lot of effort into drawing "Barbie Warrior" not just because she liked drawing, but because she wanted to build and create a more concrete and complete image of "Barbie Warrior" in her mind!

That way, she can look even more impressive when using "magic" to create the "Barbie Warrior" image!

Although Uncle Baldy had previously instructed that the "magic" of constructing the "Barbie Warrior" image could not be used outdoors or in front of people for the time being, it would be too embarrassing and a disgrace to the "Barbie Warrior" if we didn't prepare and practice beforehand and ended up with a "standing crab" when we needed to use it.

"Barbie Warrior"—that's the name she chose!

Perhaps in the future, "Barbie Warrior" can use her magic to have a real body in this world, to fight against villains, and no longer be regarded as a non-existent illusion or hallucination!

Liu Shiling was overjoyed to have successfully created an eight-armed miniature figure from scraps of paper. She controlled the miniature figure to float in the air, its eight arms waving as if swimming in the air.

"Whoosh, whoosh~, Barbie Warrior is flying~, whoosh, whoosh, Barbie Warrior is super strong, whoosh..."

While controlling the eight-armed paper scraps to fly around the room, Liu Shiling happily hummed a song that came to her mind without her knowing what melody it was based on.

While watching TV in the living room and grooming "Egg Pie," Shiling's Mother vaguely heard her daughter humming in her room. She frowned, picked up Egg Pie, and went to the bedroom door, pressing her ear against it to listen.

After listening for a while, Shiling's Mother thought Liu Shiling seemed to be crying in her room, and was greatly alarmed. She quickly pushed open the door and went in. "Shiling, what's wrong?"

"Ah!" Startled by her mother's sudden entrance, Liu Shiling, who had been humming a tune haphazardly, jumped back instinctively, almost biting her tongue.

The eight-armed paper scraps that she had controlled to fly diagonally above her head also suddenly disintegrated. First, two Coin fell to the ground, and then paper scraps flew everywhere, drifting down around the Little Chubby Girl like snowflakes.

Seeing the scene before her, Shiling's Mother was dumbfounded. She immediately realized that her daughter was probably playing house again, using scraps of paper as snowflakes and imagining herself as the lonely and helpless White-haired Girl in winter.

"Liu Shiling! How many times have I told you not to tear up paper scraps and play with them! You know how hard it is to clean up! Those scraps are everywhere, on the table, in the corners, you can't even sweep them up, you know that!"

So, under her mother's furious gaze, the Little Chubby Girl quickly shrank back and grabbed a broom to sweep the floor—although she would have been much more efficient if she had controlled the "Chocolate" and "Ice Cream" to "collect" them.

"Egg Pie" also obediently ran over and followed Liu Shiling to her side, sweeping the floor with her, and occasionally found scraps of paper floating by from under the bed or in the corner.

However, no matter how Liu Shiling looked at that chubby cat face, she felt it was gloating.

Shiling's Mother, who was watching her daughter sweep the floor with her arms crossed, didn't actually have a stern or angry expression on her face. Instead, the corners of her mouth couldn't help but curl upwards.

For some reason, seeing her daughter make silly mistakes now actually makes her feel happy and relieved.

For a while now, my daughter has been becoming more and more sensible and mature. She no longer wants to watch cartoons every day, no longer asks for delicious food, and no longer misbehaves and causes trouble. Instead, she loves to study, doesn't make a fuss, and is well-behaved and quiet. This makes me feel bad, but I don't know what to do. I can't just tell my daughter, "Don't be so good."

Shiling's Mother suddenly noticed several paintings on the desk in the room. The top one was of a person with eight arms and eight eyes. It looked quite good, both in terms of overall shape, proportions of each part, and coloring. It seemed that her daughter had made progress in her painting again?

This isn't the first time my daughter has drawn this eight-armed, eight-eyed figure; she's drawn it several times before. It's considered one of Liu Shiling's favorite figures to draw, along with an orange cat with multiple pairs of wings and eyes.

She hadn't thought much of it when she saw it before, assuming it was just her daughter's imagination. But now, she suddenly remembered some news she'd seen today—the monster hallucinations described by Myanmar tourists, which also seemed to have eight arms and eight eyes?

Shiling's Mother frowned slightly, but quickly relaxed. This kind of character with many hands and eyes doesn't belong to any one person. The world is so big, there must be many of them. She guessed that her daughter had seen some cartoon character and came up with the idea.

However, looking at the picture on the table, Shiling's Mother still felt something was off; it seemed like she had forgotten something.