Epilogue 3: Shrimp’s Story (End)
The night before the wedding.
Luo Bian spread out her ex-girlfriend, who was curled up limply on the vegetation, and held her. She patted her on the back to comfort her.
“Your esteemed ruler, you are getting married tomorrow. I heard that you have not yet found that ‘beautiful’ one.”
Her ex-girlfriend was weak, and she lazily answered in her arms.
Luo Bian sincerely suggested, “In that case, why don’t you just run away from the marriage?”
Her ex-girlfriend: “?”
Luo Bian was eager to try. “Just hide here with me. No shrimp will find you this time.”
Her ex-girlfriend: “…”
The rock cave fell into a silence.
Later, her ex-girlfriend did not speak for a long time, and Luo Bian thought she had fallen asleep.
Just as she was about to fall asleep, she heard the shrimp in her arms say, her voice clear and pleasant, and she made a three-part agreement with her:
“Although we are getting married tomorrow, it doesn’t count as getting back together. If you perform well after the marriage, it might be possible to get back together.”
Luo Bian’s whole being was revitalized.
“If you dare to leave me again… then it will really be impossible.”
After her ex-girlfriend threatened her, she fell into a deep sleep.
…
Luo Bian remembered that she had not slept all night, and she was ecstatic.
She remembered that she had secretly lit a little white flower lamp and had carefully looked at her ex-girlfriend-slash-fiancée in her arms, and she could not get enough of looking at her.
She remembered that she had been thinking all night that after the grand wedding tomorrow, they would become each other’s wives…
Luo Bian also remembered that the evil humans, who were recorded on the historical rock and were passed down in the mouths of the shrimp, had appeared the next morning.
They had, for some reason, found the remote Qingdai Lake and were catching shrimp and crabs in a wooden boat.
The clan was in a panic and was fleeing in a disorderly manner.
And the ruler, at a time like this, had to abide by her duties and calmly command the entire clan to flee in an orderly manner according to a pre-arranged plan, and she herself could only leave last.
By the time the clan had finally been successfully evacuated, the ruler and Luo Bian, who had insisted on staying with her, had been forced to be caught by the humans.
Plop.
They were thrown into a tank and were piled up with other strange dead fish and shrimp.
Lack of oxygen… lack of oxygen.
Luo Bian’s heart was pounding. She extended her long claws, wanting to check on her ex-girlfriend’s condition.
But she saw a human poke his head in and, with a sudden reach, grab her ex-girlfriend.
A mantis shrimp’s body is truly insignificant to a huge human, and there is no room for resistance.
A light squeeze, and she would be dead…
Seeing her ex-girlfriend flapping her shrimp tail and struggling, Luo Bian’s whole body tensed up, and she was anxious and furious.
Her emotions were pounding in her brain, and her heart was also clamoring, and her whole body was numb.
As her strong will surged, she, for no reason, leaped out of the tank and, the moment she landed, transformed into her human form.
She rushed haphazardly toward the human and, with her still-unskilled hand, snatched back her ex-girlfriend, and then, with her ex-girlfriend, she leaped into the water.
“A ghost—”
The human, in his wooden boat, hastily fled.
Plop.
The familiar water temperature instantly enveloped her whole body.
But the pain of lack of oxygen did not disappear, and it even grew more intense.
Luo Bian opened her eyes and found that she was still in her human form.
She was anxious and did not know how to turn back into a shrimp, and she began to choke and cough uncontrollably in the water.
Her ex-girlfriend was circling around her, her long claws clinging to her, as if she were anxiously saying something.
But Luo Bian could no longer understand.
In her suffocation, her lungs ached, and her brain was deprived of oxygen. Without realizing it, she fainted.
…
When Luo Bian woke up, her head was dizzy.
“Gibberish…”
A human had appeared in her line of sight and seemed to be saying something to her, but she could not understand.
She sized up the strange, bizarre, and distorted surroundings, and a bone-deep panic and loneliness arose in her heart.
—In a situation where the methods of movement and breathing were completely different, and the living environment had also undergone a drastic change, how was a shrimp who had just come ashore supposed to adapt?
The unknown is always accompanied by fear. This was simply a new calamity.
Fortunately, the middle-aged female human who had saved Luo Bian was a kind-hearted person. She had thought that Luo Bian’s brain was temporarily damaged after she had drowned, and although she could not speak or listen, and her limbs were uncoordinated, she had not abandoned her.
She had taken her to a doctor in the town without success, and then had taught her to do some picking work and had raised her as a laborer, but she was not harsh.
And so, Luo Bian had begun to stumble and struggle.
At first, her whole being was dizzy. She was dizzy from the air, from the land creatures, from walking, and it was difficult for her to adapt to everything.
Later, after falling a few more times and getting bruised, she was able to walk steadily.
She listened to the big sister speak every day, and after a long time, she was able to listen and speak fluently.
Sometimes, she would suddenly not be able to breathe, and she would be so suffocated that her whole body was on the verge of suffocation. But if she desperately relaxed and cleared her brain, she would, for no reason, be able to breathe automatically.
It was too difficult to come ashore from the water, and the progress of adaptation was too slow.
Luo Bian was growing more and more anxious.
That day, she was finally able to express herself completely. “Big Sister, may I ask how long I have been ashore?”
The big sister said, “Just half a year.”
The way humans count days is the same as shrimp. One day and one night is called one day.
According to their counting method, Luo Bian’s life had been nearly a year and a half when she had come ashore, and now half a year had passed, so it was a total of nearly two years.
Her ex-girlfriend was three months older than her.
And for a hundred years, the longest lifespan of a shrimp recorded in the clan was two years and two months…
—Her ex-girlfriend had long since passed away.
The tip of Luo Bian’s nose suddenly felt sore.
Her breath was broken in the next second, and then she trembled violently.
She suddenly raised a hand and covered her face.
A cry escaped from between her fingers.
The big sister said, “Little sister, why are you crying? If you’re tired, don’t work. You can rest for a day today.”
Luo Bian was so choked that she couldn’t speak, and later, she squatted on the ground, her whole body trembling, and she wailed, and her organs ached.
They had been so close to their wedding back then, but now they were separated by death.
…
Luo Bian had completely adapted to human society and was now able to freely switch between her human and shrimp forms.
The first thing she had done was to ask the big sister for the location of Qingdai Lake.
The big sister’s home was located downstream, some distance from Qingdai Lake.
Luo Bian had said goodbye to the big sister and had searched on her own, and after a few days, she had finally found Qingdai Lake.
A certain shyness near home.
She had taken a deep breath for a moment and had transformed into a mantis shrimp. She had swum all the way to her old home and had found that her home was as prosperous as ever.
She had rushed in without any regard and had come to the group of historical rocks that recorded the past rulers.
Sure enough, she had seen the rock that belonged to her ex-girlfriend—
This was something that would only be erected after a ruler had passed away.
It recorded her great achievements, and especially emphasized that one human fishing accident.
It said that she had calmly and composedly commanded the clan to escape, but she herself had almost died at the hands of the humans with her wife.
“Wife”—
Luo Bian had trembled as she had confirmed it twice, and the word was clearly and unmistakably carved on the historical rock.
…Even though they had not completed their wedding, her ex-girlfriend had still called her that to the clan.
Until she had been arrested by the shrimp soldiers and had been thrown into a familiar prison, Luo Bian had still not been able to come back to her senses from that title.
Later, her tears had flowed with the lake water.
She had curled up in the cage and had recalled how she had been entangled with her ex-girlfriend here all night.
Deep love cannot overcome the different paths of life.
…
Luo Bian had come ashore again.
Her heart was empty, and she did not know what to do.
The passion for carefully decorating her little house and exploring the unknown world seemed to be gone, and Luo Bian was in a daze.
She would sometimes search everywhere, but she did not know what she was looking for.
Sometimes, she would stand in one place for a long time, lost in a daze, until her whole body was soaked with dew.
Sometimes, until she was out of oxygen, she would only then discover that she had, at some point, turned into a shrimp.
Sometimes, she was about to be put in a hot pot, and she still hadn’t come back to her senses.
“Excuse me, can I buy this shrimp?”
A young woman’s voice came from the side.
Luo Bian’s scattered thoughts sharpened, and she naturally felt a certain kinship.
She looked over and saw that the young woman had long, reddish-brown hair, which burned like an unquenchable flame.
…
Luo Bian had a home and also a motivation.
Because, she had heard a legend—
All living things in the world would enter a cycle after death, and would be reborn, and would return to the world.
Commonly known as the next life.
Luo Bian knew that this was very likely to be false, but she was willing to believe it was true.
And so, she would often drive her tricycle to nearby rivers and lakes to look for a familiar figure.
She had taken the initiative to take on the responsibility of purchasing ingredients for the studio, and every day she would go to the largest seafood procurement market in B-City and would carefully search through the mantis shrimp tanks of every single seafood store.
And even, when she was taking her driving test, her mind had been in a daze, and she had suddenly wondered if her ex-girlfriend’s reincarnation would be in the river next to her.
By the time she had come back to her senses, she had already accidentally driven the test car into it.
And, whether it was more due to her hard work or more due to fate—
On an ordinary day, she had taken the new human from the studio and had routinely gone to the seafood store to search the mantis shrimp tanks.
To bring two sweet female mantis shrimp together, she had bought them.
Seeing this, the seafood store owner had taken the opportunity to recommend a new batch of high-quality mantis shrimp.
She had originally just nodded without much hope.
Who knew that when that batch of shrimp was poured into the shrimp tank, Luo Bian’s gaze had suddenly been captivated by a familiar figure—
She had hastily walked to the edge of the tank and, with a precise scoop, a mantis shrimp had come out of the water, splashing and struggling.
“Let me see…”
Luo Bian had uncurled the shrimp and had carefully held its head with her fingertips, and had brought the shrimp close to her nose, wanting to observe closely if it was really her ex-girlfriend.
The shrimp’s light-blue shell had visibly and slowly turned crimson, and it had suddenly lifted its tail high and, with a wet smack and a smack, had whipped Luo Bian on both cheeks with two sounds.
Luo Bian had let out a cry of pain and had clutched her face, her eyes brimming with hot tears.
“This really is my ex-girlfriend!”
After five years.
Luo Bian, who clearly knew that the other was no longer there, but was still blindly searching;
And her ex-girlfriend, who had not been able to find the other for many years, and so had had to take a risk and, in a desperate move, had taken the initiative to be caught by humans and brought ashore.
The two shrimp had finally found each other and could be together for a long time.
…
Later.
“Will you get back together with me?”
That day, after both had transformed into their human forms and had been passionately kissing in bed, Luo Bian had murmured in a low voice.
“Okay.”
Her ex-girlfriend had panted lightly and, for the first time, had relented.
Luo Bian had been stunned, and her heart had been filled with a wild joy.
The next second, she had been in a mess and had been full of regret—
It’s over.
Is she really agreeing with me, or can she only say “okay”?
But she had seen her ex-girlfriend’s eyes shimmering, and she had looked at her with a clear and deep gaze, and at some point, she had learned to say these words:
“I have long since been… your wife.”
(End of Shrimp’s Story)
