Neighbors Who Worship a Legendary Pokémon Statue

Mu Yun lived in an old residential complex that had been around for quite some time.

Though it was small, poorly landscaped, and occasionally had stray Pokémon passing through, it still had all the basic facilities it needed.

For example, there was a small square that should have been used for exercise but was instead packed with card tables and chessboards.

"Xiao Yun, out for a stroll?"

"Is this the Starter Pokémon you received? What a spirited little guy!"

"Wow, Brother Yun's bug is huge!"

As he walked around, some elderly residents and neighborhood children chatted familiarly with Mu Yun.

Because he was an orphan, the neighbors had always taken good care of him.

When he was in elementary school, people would often say they had cooked too much for dinner and invite him over for a meal.

Compared to the cold, distant relationships between neighbors in the high-rises of his previous life, these low, aging residential buildings were instead filled with peaceful, warm everyday life.

"Wooah!!"

Perhaps because it was the first time it had seen so many people since hatching, Weedle was incredibly excited. It poked its little head up from Mu Yun's arms and looked around everywhere.

It was also completely at ease with the elderly people and children ruffling its head, not dodging at all.

It was obviously the kind of outgoing child who would never be afraid of crowds in the future.

After briefly letting Weedle experience the outside world, Mu Yun carried it home.

"Xiao Yun?"

Just then, a plump woman in her early thirties wearing a white-collar work outfit approached from the side with a bag of vegetables in hand.

"Aunt Wang, just got off work?"

Mu Yun greeted the gentle-looking woman familiarly.

Wang Dan was Mu Yun's neighbor, a strong woman who had been widowed early and raised her daughter alone.

Even so, she remained kind-hearted. During his elementary and middle school years, he had eaten half of his dinners at Wang Dan's home.

To show his gratitude, Mu Yun had tutored her daughter every night before he entered high school.

Unfortunately, Wang Dan's daughter, Chi Duoduo, truly was not cut out for studying. Even though Mu Yun had done his utmost, she still had not gotten into Songjiang No. 1 High School.

She could only attend the more distant Songjiang No. 2 High School, where students had to board.

With Chi Duoduo gone, and with Mu Yun frequently staying at Song Fu's house after starting high school, he visited Wang Dan's home less often.

"Pork ribs were on sale today, so I bought a little too much. I was just wondering what to do with them. Why don't you come sit at Aunt Wang's place and have dinner?"

"Duoduo is on break too. Help Aunt Wang keep an eye on her tonight, so she doesn't spend the whole vacation thinking about playing and fail to get into college next year."

Wang Dan invited him with a gentle smile.

Mu Yun had long grown used to invitations like this over the years.

It was just that when Chi Duoduo had not been around before, Wang Dan had found it inconvenient to invite Mu Yun over by herself. She would only occasionally send him cooked meat dishes, saying she had made too much and could not finish it.

After all, a vigorous young single man constantly going to the home of a widow living alone could easily damage their reputations if people talked.

She did not care, but Mu Yun was still young and had a long future ahead of him. She had to think more carefully for his sake.

"Sure. I haven't seen Duoduo in a long time either. But no need for dinner—I just finished eating. I only came downstairs to help him digest his food."

As he spoke, Mu Yun bounced Weedle lightly in his arms.

Weedle cooperatively let out a little "Owo."

On the way home, Mu Yun held Weedle in one arm and casually took the bag from Wang Dan's hand with the other.

Wang Dan did not refuse. She only smiled and said that with Duoduo rarely home, she had not bought so many groceries in a long time. She had carried them all the way back, and her shoulders were already a little sore.

Mu Yun glanced at her impressive assets and felt that the soreness in her shoulders probably should not be blamed on buying too many vegetables.

While chatting, the two of them and the Pokémon soon arrived at Wang Dan's home.

Since they were neighbors, the layouts of their homes were not too different.

The only difference was probably that the home of a mother and daughter felt more lived-in than the residence of a single man like him.

There was a warm carpet, fluffy toys, warm-toned furniture, and so on.

But aside from those things, what caught Mu Yun's attention most was the statue enshrined at the very center of the living room, standing within a red wooden shrine.

It was an earthy brown statue whose exact material could not be identified.

It stood around thirty centimeters tall, with two horns on its head, four hooves planted on the ground, and a stern, resolute expression.

That was right. It was not some Daoist deity or Buddhist bodhisattva, but a Pokémon.

An unknown Pokémon that did not exist in textbooks and could not be found online.

Yet Mu Yun, who retained memories of his previous life, had recognized it the first time he saw it. This Pokémon statue was one of the legendary Swords of Justice—

The Rock Sword of "Justice"—Terrakion!

Legend had it that he fought humanity to protect Pokémon that had lost their homes due to human wars.

Just from that description, it was clear that he was a Pokémon hostile toward humans.

Why did Wang Dan's family worship a statue of such a Pokémon?

Mu Yun did not know.

When he was little, he had asked about the statue out of curiosity.

But Wang Dan did not know either.

According to her, it had been passed down through her husband's family—Chi Duoduo's late father's family—ever since the time of his great-great-grandfather.

No one knew what it was for, so they had simply kept it.

Wang Dan merely treated it as a relic left behind by her husband. Whenever she missed him, she would occasionally place an Oran Berry before it, as though offering comfort to her late husband's spirit in heaven.

"Duoduo, look who's here!"

The moment she entered, Wang Dan called toward the inner room.

Since only the two of them lived there, Wang Dan had specifically partitioned off a private space of a few square meters for Chi Duoduo in their already small home.

She herself had turned the living room into a bedroom, leaving everything visible the instant one entered.

Perhaps because Chi Duoduo had been away from home for so long and Wang Dan had been living alone, several thin, breathable purple garments had been casually spread across the bed.

They appeared to be summer pajamas she had changed out of that morning.

Wang Dan had clearly noticed the impropriety as well. She hooked a strand of hair with her finger, and her gentle cheeks immediately flushed slightly.

Fortunately, Chi Duoduo appeared in time and broke the awkwardness.

She had a cute face and a petite figure, standing under one meter sixty, yet she possessed assets that most people could never hope to match, practically rivaling her mother Wang Dan.

But what drew the most attention were the brown birthmarks smudged across both sides of her forehead.

The birthmarks were not large, only about the size of soybeans, symmetrically positioned above the outer corners of her eyebrows. Against her fair, smooth, full forehead, they looked especially distinct.

They were not ugly. If anything, they made her look distinctive, like a pair of tiny deer antlers.

"Brother Yun!!"

After that excited shout, the small figure in a short top and shorts shot out of the room and pounced straight at Mu Yun.

Apparently accustomed to this scene, Mu Yun calmly placed the still-unresponsive Weedle on the shoe cabinet beside him and caught her.

The petite body pressed into his arms, soft curves squeezing against his chest as a faint, pleasant fragrance washed over him.

As a laundry expert, Mu Yun immediately recognized the scent as Lunatone-brand lavender detergent.

"Honestly, you're already so grown up, yet you still act like a child. You have no sense of propriety—you want a hug the moment you meet him!"

Seeing her daughter in Mu Yun's arms, Wang Dan, whose embarrassment had eased, shook her head with a hint of jealousy.

Her daughter did not even ask for a hug after coming home. What a waste of all those years raising her.

Then again, other people's daughters were quiet and refined, while her own girl had been more energetic than boys since childhood.

Mu Yun, on the other hand, had always been quiet, mature, and steady even as a child. Whenever he took Duoduo around, it was practically like a father raising a child.

Duoduo had grown up without a father. Perhaps being raised alongside Mu Yun had made her dependent on him too...

"I won't! Bleh, bleh, bleh~~~"

Chi Duoduo pressed her little head against Mu Yun's shoulder and rubbed against him affectionately like a cute fawn, completely ignoring her mother's scolding.

"Dongo~~"

After Chi Duoduo came out, a timid figure poked half its body out from the room, seemingly searching for its owner.

I'll post pictures of everyone except the Pokémon in the comments section.

If you want to see them, you can click on the relevant character's first appearance paragraph.

If you want AI-generated ones, you can post them in the comments too. We can look at them together if there are pictures~~

That's all.

I just realized that a lot of pictures cannot be posted in the comments. Let's see if this works instead.