"Big kitty... don't let them... come closer..."
Nuannuan felt as though her eyelids weighed a thousand pounds.
Forcing the train to stop had drained almost all her energy.
She could sense that many people had gotten off the train.
They wore green clothes and held long, black things.
Were they bad people?
Nuannuan didn't know.
But she instinctively felt afraid.
The snow leopard sensed the fear and weakness of the cub on its back.
Facing the approaching humans, it bared its sharp teeth and let out a rolling, thunderous growl.
"Roar-!"
The sound was full of warning and menace, making the soldiers at the front instinctively stop and raise their guns.
"Nobody move!"
Su Mingfeng pushed his way from the back of the group to the front and sharply ordered his men to stop.
He stared fixedly ahead.
Now that he was closer, he could see more clearly.
That child really was just a little girl of four or five.
Her little face had turned purple from the cold, and her lips had no color at all.
Her ragged red padded jacket was less a piece of clothing than a heap of tattered strips, utterly incapable of keeping out such bitter cold.
Her exposed little hands were covered in bluish-purple chilblains, some already split open, with blood and grime mixed together.
Most shocking of all was the scabbed wound on her forehead, stretching across nearly half her brow bone.
Su Mingfeng felt as though a dull knife were slicing at his heart, stroke after stroke.
Pain.
Indescribable pain.
Whoever this child was, she should never have had to suffer like this.
"Little one, don't be afraid."
Su Mingfeng tried to make his voice sound gentler as he took off his military overcoat and stepped forward.
"We're not bad people. We're uncles from the People's Liberation Army. Are you cold? Come here to Uncle. I have a coat for you."
His voice carried far through the wind and snow.
Nuannuan's consciousness was already growing hazy.
Uncles from the People's Liberation Army?
Mommy seemed to have mentioned those words before.
Mommy had said that the uncles from the People's Liberation Army were good people who protected everyone.
Her gaze passed over the snow leopard's huge head and settled on the face of the man in uniform at the front.
That face was handsome and stern, but why... why was there such sadness in his eyes?
Nuannuan didn't know.
But she could sense that this person meant her no harm.
There was something very familiar and comforting about him.
Just like... just like the feeling from the medal Mommy had left behind.
Uncle?
A hazy form of address surfaced from the depths of her memory.
Mommy had said she had an uncle who was a high-ranking official in the capital.
Mommy had said that if she ever got lost, she should go find her uncle in green clothes.
Was it him?
Nuannuan's mind was a muddled mess.
She wanted to ask, but she didn't even have the strength to open her mouth.
All she could do was desperately use the last shred of her consciousness to give the snow leopard an order in her mind.
"Don't... don't... bite him..."
The growling in the snow leopard's throat gradually subsided, but it remained on guard, its icy blue eyes fixed on Su Mingfeng.
Su Mingfeng took a few more steps forward, coming within ten meters of the snow leopard.
At that distance, he was well within striking range of an apex predator.
The soldiers behind him had their hearts in their throats, their fingers tight on their triggers, ready for anything.
"Child, what's your name? Why are you here?"
Su Mingfeng's voice trembled a little.
The more he looked at this child, the more familiar she seemed.
Those big eyes, those tightly pressed lips looked so much like... so much like his younger sister Su Mingyue as a little girl.
A wild, unbelievable thought grew madly in his heart.
Nuannuan struggled to open her mouth and answer his question.
"I... my name..."
She managed only those few words before she could no longer make a sound.
She was too weak.
Her body's energy had been drained to its absolute limit.
She saw that the man was still walking toward her.
She saw the soldiers behind him raise their guns.
No.
She couldn't let them hurt Big Kitty.
Big Kitty was a good kitty. It had saved her.
"Don't... don't... bully it..."
Using the last of her strength, Nuannuan struggled upright on the snow leopard's back and spread her thin arms, shielding it like a mother hen protecting her chicks.
That gesture, that look, held an unquestionable stubbornness and protectiveness.
Su Mingfeng stopped dead.
At that moment, his mind stopped working entirely.
Because that gesture and that look matched a scene deep in his memory perfectly.
It had been twenty years ago. Five-year-old Su Mingyue had spread her arms just like that to protect a kitten being bullied by the neighbor's children, standing in front of it and telling him in her childish voice, "Big Brother, don't bully my kitty!"
Exactly the same.
A chord deep in his bloodline was struck hard.
An immense, uncontrollable emotion erupted like a volcano, instantly sweeping away all his reason and composure.
"Nuannuan..."
Unconsciously, in a dreamlike voice trembling beyond control, he spoke the name he had buried in his heart for five years.
"Are you... Nuannuan?"
His voice was very soft, yet it exploded like thunder in Nuannuan's mind.
He knew her name!
He really was her uncle!
She'd found him...
She'd finally found him!
Overwhelming joy and pent-up hurt engulfed her in an instant.
"Uncle..."
With every last bit of strength, she gave a faint cry, her voice thick with tears.
Then her vision went black, her body went limp, and she fell straight backward off the snow leopard's back.
"Nuannuan!"
Su Mingfeng let out a heart-rending roar and charged forward, heedless of everything.