Gu Yuena Throws a Tantrum for Chicken Drumsticks: "I'm Still a Baby! I'm Growing!"

Lin Yan did not go straight home.

He stopped at the entrance of a supermarket two streets away from his house.

He pushed open the glass door and walked in.

The supermarket was not large.

There were not many customers at this hour.

The cashier was a girl with a ponytail, leaning over the counter and scrolling through her communicator.

Hearing the door open, she looked up.

Then she froze—her gaze stuck to Lin Yan's face and did not move for a long while.

Lin Yan did not notice.

Or rather, he was already used to such looks.

He took a shopping basket from the entrance and headed straight for the household supplies section.

He picked out a few of the cheapest items—toothbrushes, towels, a roll of toilet paper, and a bag of laundry detergent.

Then he went to the clothing section.

He dug two white T-shirts and a pair of dark trousers out of the discount bin.

They were all the most basic styles.

Their only virtue was that they were cheap.

As he passed the fresh produce section, he picked up two bunches of greens.

Then he stopped in front of the freezer.

He took a small box of the cheapest pork foreleg meat.

As he bent down to grab it, a rustling came from inside his clothes.

Gu Yuena poked her head out from his collar.

Her nose reacted before her brain did.

In the supermarket's corner deli section, warm yellow light shone over the glass display case.

Inside were several rows of freshly roasted chicken drumsticks.

Their skins were golden and crisp, gleaming with oil.

The scent of meat even drifted through the air.

Gu Yuena's eyes instantly went wide.

She stretched out a tiny claw and tugged at Lin Yan's collar.

"Human... I want a big chicken drumstick. Buy me one."

Lin Yan looked down at her.

His face was expressionless.

"Didn't you just eat?"

He reached out and touched Gu Yuena's belly.

It was round and firm.

Like she had stuffed a football into her stomach.

Earlier at the market, the fried chicken drumsticks Ouyang Zixin had bought with that hundred yuan—at least two pounds of them—had all gone into her belly.

How long had it been?

And she still wanted to eat?

Gu Yuena puffed out her cheeks.

Her watery purple eyes glared at him.

She had no grounds to stand on, yet she was still utterly confident.

"I'm not full."

Lin Yan said nothing.

He glanced at the price tag in the deli section.

One large chicken drumstick cost ten yuan.

It was cooked, seasoned, and smelled delicious.

But ten yuan only got you that much.

He looked again at the raw chicken drumsticks in the freezer.

There was an evening special: two pounds for ten yuan, a whole row of them packed full.

Even now, he had not figured out the depths of this stupid dragon's appetite.

But he could tell with his toes that one or two definitely would not be enough.

Ten yuan would vanish without even a splash.

"I don't care, I want them. Waaa... I'm still a little baby dragon, and I'm growing."

Gu Yuena wriggled around in his arms.

Her claws clutched his collar and refused to let go.

Seeing that Lin Yan still had no intention of paying, her eyes darted around.

She suddenly remembered her experience of being a rat.

It seemed she could recreate it again.

Her gaze began to turn dangerous.

Lin Yan looked at her expression that clearly said, "If you won't buy it for me, I'll take it myself."

His brow twitched.

He raised a hand and flicked her forehead.

"Bonk."

Gu Yuena covered her head.

She bared her teeth and glared at him.

Lin Yan ignored her.

He reached into the freezer and took a pack of raw chicken drumsticks weighing two pounds.

Gu Yuena looked at the two rows of deathly pale raw drumsticks.

She instantly quieted down.

But then she looked at the quantity in those two packs and muttered:

"Take another pack. Who are five drumsticks supposed to feed? If the dragons outside found out, they'd think I couldn't afford to eat."

Lin Yan stopped walking.

He lowered his head and looked at the silver-white baby dragon in his arms, so fat that her belly was nearly hanging down to the tops of her feet.

His eyes narrowed slightly.

"There's no refrigerator at home. If you don't finish them, I'll skin you."

Gu Yuena shrank her neck.

Her scales bristled slightly.

But she quickly puffed out her chest again, trying to regain some ground in terms of presence.

"And you're saying we can't afford four pounds of meat in one meal?"

Lin Yan's voice carried no emotional fluctuation.

"You're emergency rations worth only a hundred yuan, and you still want to eat twenty yuan's worth of my meat?"

Gu Yuena's eyes instantly widened into circles.

Her whole body froze as if someone had pressed pause.

What did he mean, emergency rations worth a hundred yuan?

You said on the Soul Guidance Train that I was worth a million!

No, wait, that wasn't the point—

"Pah, pah, pah! Who are you calling emergency rations?!"

Her little claws curled into fists.

She punched him once in the chest.

The blow was as light as a scratch.

But her expression was furious.

She grumbled and complained, her voice carrying an indescribable grievance.

"Take them! Otherwise, I won't purify the mushrooms for you tomorrow."

"Let those damned humans get poisoned after eating them. Then you can go to jail and eat prison food. This dragon won't serve you anymore."

"You won't even let me eat four pounds of meat. Is that any way to raise a dragon?"

The more she spoke, the more worked up she became.

The more she spoke, the more justified she felt.

In the end, she simply turned her head away and flicked her tail, putting on an air of, "If you don't agree, I won't talk to you anymore."

But the corner of her eye kept peeking at Lin Yan.

Lin Yan looked at her like that.

He fell silent for a moment.

Then he reached into the freezer and took another pack of chicken drumsticks.

He put it into the shopping basket.

Then he put back the box of pork foreleg meat he had taken earlier.

Gu Yuena caught that motion from the corner of her eye.

The pride in her heart was suddenly pricked by something.

She felt a little guilty.

In truth, she planned to bring those chicken drumsticks into the Small World.

Such huge drumsticks would become mountains of meat hundreds of meters tall once placed in the Small World.

They would be enough for Di Tian and the others to eat for a long time.

When the time came, she could toss them into the Small World and make up a line: "These are the thighs of Chaos Gods and Demons, trophies this king won while fighting beyond the realm."

Wouldn't that be incredibly impressive?

As Gu Yuena imagined it, the corners of her mouth split into a grin.

She now felt that this kind of life was actually quite nice.

Back in the Star Dou Forest, she lay around like a corpse every day, calling it secluded cultivation.

In truth, she simply lay there without moving.

There was not even anyone to talk to.

She had lain there for who knew how many tens of thousands of years, until her bones nearly went soft.

She had finally managed to take human form.

Only to discover that the Soul Beast race was already on the brink of extinction.

She had no choice but to shoulder the fate of her entire race and become humanity's enemy.

But now, she was only a little baby dragon.

She did not need to think about the great cause of her race.

She did not need to plot any revenge.

All she needed was to protect that Soul Beast habitat within the Small World.

As for the outside world—she could deal with it after she had grown up.

She secretly glanced at Lin Yan.

The boy was carrying the shopping basket toward the checkout counter.

His back was thin.

Yet the line of his shoulders was unexpectedly straight.

Gu Yuena rested her chin on his shoulder.

Her tail swayed gently.

At the counter, the ponytailed girl hurriedly scanned everything.

Even her voice trembled. "The total is eighty-three yuan and fifty cents."

Lin Yan took the crumpled stack of bills from his pocket.

He counted them out one by one.

He had a little over three hundred and eighty yuan. After spending over eighty, he had just over three hundred left.

He carefully folded the change and put it into his pocket.

Then he picked up the shopping bag.

And pushed the door open to leave.