Little Alpaca – Chapter 2

Volume 1: Little Alpaca

My Sweetheart Grass Mud Horse.

Yi Qiu¹ felt for the first time that her body was exceptionally light, as if her limbs and bones didn’t exist, devoid of any sense of gravity.

After something ‘dinged’ three times by her ear, a distinctly mechanical girlish voice suddenly appeared, pulling Yi Qiu’s thoughts back from a state of total chaos.

Host, binding, changing the worldline?

As a veteran bookworm², Yi Qiu had read countless novels. When something as outrageous as transmigrating into a book happened to her, she was surprisingly not panicked by it. She simply calmed down quickly and slowly opened her eyes.

Sight was the first sense to recover in her body after hearing.

Very clearly, this was not her home.

【Congratulations to the Host for activating the System. Upon achieving the final objective, you may bring a generous reward back to the real world.】

To her left was a lavishly styled wooden bed. Black gauze hung down on both sides of the bed, which was empty.

【We will provide the Host with rewards and penalties for various attributes based on the plot’s development and degree of change. The levels of these values will directly affect the Host’s survival experience in this place.】

To her right, she could see the general furnishings of the place. The room was mostly filled with various antique-style furniture. The overall style was ornate, yet the color palette was dark and somber. It seemed the master of this place liked this kind of gloomy atmosphere.

【Friendly Reminder: This world is fraught with peril. The Host must build a camp at every step³ to achieve the final objective. Should the mission fail, the Host’s existence will be obliterated, and you will not be escorted back to reality.】

While observing her surroundings, Yi Qiu listened to the mechanical girlish voice chattering endlessly in her mind, and for a moment, she felt a major headache coming on.

“Alright, alright, I know I’ve transmigrated into a book. Just let me calm down a bit first.” She didn’t say this out loud, but she knew that “System” could hear her.

That System said it would kill her if she failed the mission. That sentence alone was enough to give her a headache. She didn’t want to listen to so much nonsense right now; she just wanted to figure out her own identity and situation.

After a brief observation, sensation slowly returned to Yi Qiu’s body.

She moved her neck and discovered she was lying prone on the floor.

There was a soft blanket on the floor, its plush surface gentle and smooth, exceedingly comfortable.

Wait, why would someone choose to lie on the floor instead of sleeping on the bed?

Yi Qiu looked down in astonishment. Her hands and feet were furry… ah no, those weren’t hands or feet, they were little sheep hooves with only two toes!

She was prone on the floor, her four limbs curled, her butt sticking up, with a small, round, and short tail on it.

“What am I?” Yi Qiu subconsciously tried to stand up, but as the bell on the red string around her neck rang, she found her hind legs were weak, and she could only walk on all fours.

Having been a human for 28 years, to suddenly become a four-legged animal one day—she practically ran to the large water basin used for “feeding” with a mournful expression.

The moment she saw her reflection clearly in the water, Yi Qiu’s mind collapsed—this thing, she had seen it online before.

Transmigrating into a book was one thing, but to transmigrate into a rotten-tailed⁴ old-school angsty novel of all things.

An angsty novel was one thing, but it turned out she didn’t become the female lead, a female supporting character, or even a villain. There were a whole bunch of female characters in the story with roles of varying importance; becoming any one of them would have been fine. Why, of all things, did she have to become an alpaca…

According to the novel’s description, this was a sweetheart Grass Mud Horse⁵ kept by the female villain’s side as a spiritual pet⁶!

But to call it a sweetheart… it wasn’t much of a sweetheart, since the female villain was born cold-blooded and ruthless, after all.

As everyone knows, there were no alpacas in the country in ancient times. This alpaca was brought over from an overseas merchant ship.

They say that which is rare is precious. It was precisely because of its rarity that this docile-looking little fellow was brought back to the Demon Realm by the Demon Sovereign’s underlings and presented to the Demon Sovereign—that is, the main villain of 《Thin, Withered Branch》, the Qinyuan bird⁷ You Yan⁸.

When the Demon Sovereign You Yan first obtained this little fellow, she was quite pleased. She raised it day after day with good food and drink, and to extend its lifespan, she would even channel spiritual energy into its body, attempting to help it open its spiritual intelligence⁹ and transform into a yao¹⁰ body.

But the little alpaca was just the most ordinary, dumb alpaca. No matter how the Demon Sovereign helped it, it could never become a yaojing¹¹.

In the end, the Demon Sovereign gave up. On a day she was in a bad mood, she casually slaughtered and ate it, and even shared the delicacy with the male lead.

After finishing, she even gave a review—”Tastes pretty good.”

Yi Qiu wanted to cry, she really wanted to cry, but the moment she opened her mouth, all she heard were the sounds of ‘Mmm, err, mmm.’

Those were the sounds of an alpaca.

Good grief, she couldn’t even speak human words.

The System, which had been quiet for a long time, seemed to sense the Host’s emotional fluctuations and immediately popped up.

【If the Host has anything they do not understand, you may ask at any time. I will say everything I know without reservation.】

It wasn’t just that she didn’t understand! She simply suspected she was living in a dream!

“Are you seriously kidding me? Who transmigrates into a Grass Mud Horse? Can I apply to change my identity?”

【Apologies, the identity has been bound and cannot be changed.】

“At least give me a human form! What the f#ck¹² am I supposed to rely on to change the worldline as a Grass Mud Horse?” Yi Qiu asked through gritted teeth. “By spitting on the villain?”

【Host’s request successfully received. This talent skill has been activated for the Host.】

Yi Qiu: ???

Amidst her confusion, two lines of text appeared in her mind.

Talent Skill: Spit Saliva.
Damage Assessment: The longer the charge, the higher the damage.

Yi Qiu broke down and shrank into a corner, bonking her little sheep head against the wall—very lightly, of course. She was afraid of pain.

No, she had to have a talk with this System. She couldn’t just eat this mute’s loss¹³!

“If I have to stay like this, then I’m dead either way! If you don’t give me a proper explanation today, I’m going on strike… I’ll find a chance to escape, I… I’d rather die by ramming my head right here than be slaughtered and eaten by the main villain later!”

The System fell silent for a moment before sending her two strings of data.

【Current Attributes】
Intelligence: 60
Strength: 30
Spiritual Root¹⁴: 10
Agility: 10
Health: 100
Stamina: 100
You Yan’s Favorability: 50

【Attributes Required for Human Form】
Intelligence ≥ 150
Strength ≥ 50
Spiritual Root ≥ 200
Agility ≥ 50
Health ≥ 20
Stamina ≥ 0
You Yan’s Favorability ≥ 1000

“So you’re saying… as long as I complete various missions and obtain attribute rewards, I can get a human form?”

【That’s right!】

Yi Qiu sat up against the wall, hugging her hooves.

The small and thin Grass Mud Horse wore an expression of having no attachment left for life¹⁵ and sighed three times in a row in the empty, deserted room.

She stared at her current attributes for a long time and cursed quietly in her heart: “What the hell, like my intelligence level needs you to assess it…“

The System seemed to want to say something more but was directly muted by Yi Qiu.

Yi Qiu stiffly hugged her furry self, shrinking alone in the corner, lost in thought for a long time.

When she came back to her senses, the only change was that she realized she was hungry. Her stomach was rumbling nonstop.

Yi Qiu felt she had to eat something first, but the exquisite food basin on the floor only contained grass.

She knew she should eat the grass obediently like a normal alpaca. She should even be grateful that she was an alpaca whose staple food was grass, unlike chickens or birds that had to eat insects.

But no matter how she tried to console herself, no matter how her stomach rumbled, she felt a sense of repulsion facing that basin of grass, unable to bring herself to take a bite.

After a brief struggle, the little alpaca walked out of her room with a rather unpracticed gait, moving with great care.

Just as she took her first step out, she saw a person flash past. Hovering over this person’s head were the four green characters for “Demon Slave Fourteen.”

“There’s really no need to display their names above their heads…”

As her thought fell, the name above the person’s head gradually faded away.

Seeing the Demon Slave walk further and further away, Yi Qiu couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief.

She walked through this unfamiliar demon clan palace with her neck shrunk down and her eyes lowered, the bell around her neck ringing crisply. None of the passing demon clan members stopped her in the slightest.

It seemed the pet personally raised by the Demon Sovereign could move about here without any obstruction.

After confirming this point, Yi Qiu’s posture as she walked grew bolder. For a moment, she held her head high and puffed out her chest, striding with a gait that recognized no kin¹⁶ as she began her overt quest for food.

As she searched, she suddenly caught a whiff of a sweet fragrance like sugar and honey. Unable to control her four skinny little legs for a moment, she licked her lips and trotted happily towards the source of the scent.

The source of the fragrance was the coldest and most deserted of all the sleeping halls.

Spiritual energy could be faintly felt flowing and intersecting all around, weaving into an invisible and formless barrier¹⁷. Within the barrier, there seemed to be powerful fluctuations of spiritual energy. The demon clan members along the way all turned a blind eye to it, with no one daring to approach in the slightest.

Yi Qiu subconsciously felt this was not a good place. Her survival instinct told her that a weak little alpaca shouldn’t trespass into a place that was obviously quite dangerous.

Just as she was about to switch paths to find food, a large, gold-rimmed glowing border appeared above the sleeping hall shrouded by the barrier. There was even a giant exclamation mark at the very top. Gaudy, extremely gaudy.

This was practically telling her outright—there’s an important plot clue here!

“Let’s make a deal. Next time, please spare me this kind of five-mao special effect¹⁸. It’s just as immersion-breaking as displaying names above people’s heads.”

As soon as Yi Qiu finished her roast, the gaudy gold border and exclamation mark vanished without a trace.

She took a deep breath and boldly walked towards the barrier.

The expected pain did not come. She actually passed through the barrier completely unscathed, as if she had casually walked through a gentle breeze.

She could clearly feel a warm current existing inside her body. It must have been that warm current that protected her as she trespassed here.

Carrying her heart and hanging her gallbladder¹⁹, Yi Qiu followed the fragrance forward, tracing it all the way to a side hall on the left.

She saw that inside the dim hall, where the surrounding wooden windows were shut tight and only half a wooden door was open, stood a graceful woman.

Jujube-red hair was draped over her shoulders. Over a deep blue long robe, she was shrouded in a thin layer of black gauze. A water-colored long whip with a dark, scale-like pattern was coiled around her slender waist.

The woman’s slender fingers slowly toyed with the air. Pale green, ethereal light seemed to be playthings at her fingertips, and every subtle movement outlined her captivating figure. And that chilling spiritual light, like smoke and mist, carried an ineffable beauty amidst its strangeness.

After a moment, all the spiritual light converged at her fair fingertips, and Yi Qiu’s breath hitched for an instant.

The moment the woman turned around, she saw a pair of dark golden pupils.

She came back to her senses in just an instant.

Red hair, golden eyes, and wielding a long whip—the woman before her was none other than the entire novel’s greatest villain, the owner of this little alpaca—the Demon Sovereign You Yan.

Yi Qiu subconsciously swallowed, her gaze shifting to the Demon Sovereign’s fingertips. She saw her holding a small, cyan porcelain bottle. A line of small white text was thoughtfully displayed on the bottle.

—A Demon Seed refined with forbidden arts. Can cause a person to demonify, lose their sense of self, and never again enter reincarnation.

Isn’t this the thing that killed the male lead’s adoptive parents and caused the misunderstanding between the female lead and the male lead?

What kind of crime is it to stumble upon the villain refining poison?

Yi Qiu couldn’t help but shiver, frozen in place like a still frame.

In the next second, You Yan slowly walked forward and crouched down in front of the little alpaca. Her slender, charming eyes, shaped like willow leaves, curved up slightly as she reached out with a faint smile that was not quite a smile to rub its furry head.

Yi Qiu subconsciously closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she saw You Yan take a single Demon Seed from the small porcelain bottle and dangle it playfully by her mouth for a few circles.

“Little fellow, want a bite?” You Yan’s voice was deep and slightly hoarse, seeming to possess a bewitching power, like a strong winter wine that made one’s head feel dizzy upon hearing it.

And atop that Demon Seed was an exceedingly sweet fragrance, the very scent that had lured Yi Qiu to this place.

She knew she ought to be like a normal alpaca, unable to refuse the temptation of “food,” so as not to arouse suspicion.

But this temptation is a bit too deadly, isn’t it…

“Unmute!” While pretending to be very interested in the Demon Seed, Yi Qiu anxiously asked in her mind, “I just want to ask one thing right now. This stuff—if I really eat it, will it cost me my sheep life?”

【You will, oh. It’s certain death, you know.】

Please, can you… not sentence me to death in that cutesy tone…

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