The GORGEOUS Mermaid Who Lands in the Eighties: Nine Brothers and Endless Pampering! - Chapter 23

Shen Yunlian gave her son another little smack. “If you want to sing, sing it yourself! Jiaojiao’s voice is still tiny; if you hurt it, you’ll have me to answer to.”
Wang Mei threw her hands on her hips. “You lot are acting like big bosses now! Songs? Forget songs, get digging!”
The boys instantly spread out and started scraping away at the sand.
Wang Mei handed Yun Jiao a lightweight little bucket and a small wooden spade.
The spade was one they’d specially custom-made for her at home.
“Jiaojiao, why don’t you go play over there, yeah?”
“Can I go in the sea?” She stared at the water, practically vibrating with excitement.
“Jiaojiao already knows how to swim, she’s brilliant.”
“No, you can’t, sweetheart.”
It was clear both adults weren’t going to let her risk it.
“Little ones can’t play in the sea. One big wave and you’ll be swept off. It’s too scary.”
Yun Jiao turned her head—she definitely didn’t like being told that.
She squatted down, poking the sand with her little spade, looking thoroughly miffed. She was so small, puffed up like a perfectly round, grumpy pufferfish.
Wang Mei couldn’t resist and gently ruffled her soft, adorable little head.
“Jiaojiao, you’re so good, and so incredibly cute.”
Yun Jiao: …………
She jabbed the sand even harder.
Crunch…
She poked something.
Her small fingers dug it out: a pretty blue pebble.
Nice one.
She tossed it into the bucket, then moved and kept poking.
This time, she dug out a sand cockle.
Chomp, into her mouth it went.
“Jiaojiao, what are you stuffing in your mouth now?!”
Yun Jiao was chewing happily when Yun Xiaowu sprinted over and dug the cockle right out of her mouth.
“Honestly, you’re so greedy! You try to eat everything.”
Yun Jiao kept her lips pressed tight and just stared at him.
Yun Xiaowu said, “Dummy, you need to at least pry the shell open! Plus, there’s loads of sand in these cockles. Doesn’t that grind your teeth?”
Yun Jiao nodded. “Doesn’t taste good. Not as nice as the scallops from the sea.”
“Right, if we can’t go in the sea, Big Brother will take you to find sea urchins. You can eat those raw, or we can take them home for Grandma to steam with eggs.”
Jiaojiao’s eyes instantly sparkled.
However, sea urchins were tricky to find. They searched for ages around the rocks near the water’s edge. No sea urchin, but they did pick up a small white octopus (a ‘hairy octopus’) and a green crab that weighed around 150 grams.
“Sea urchins, sea urchins, where are you?”
Jiaojiao heard a weird noise.
She looked out at the sea. Her blue-black eyes could see incredibly far, with crystal-clear vision.
Because of this, she spotted a giant sea turtle swimming right towards them.
“Come quick, little sister, I think I see a sea urchin over there.”
Yun Xiaowu held her hand and walked towards the rocky stretch opposite.
“Well, look at that.”
A dark, spiky sea urchin was stuck in a rock crevice. Yun Xiaowu didn’t dare try to grab it; getting stabbed by those spikes would really hurt.
He used the tongs to clip the sea urchin out.
“Jiaojiao, you play over there, I’ll open this sea urchin for you.”
“But don’t run into the sea, understand?”
Yun Jiao said “Okay” and pointed at the whelks clinging to the rock face.
“Fifth Brother, spicy whelks.”
Yun Xiaowu pulled the scissors out of his bucket and immediately started snip-snip-snip-ping the sea urchin’s spikes.
When she spoke, he looked in the direction Yun Jiao was pointing.
“Hey, you’re right! And quite a haul too.”
A dense cluster of them was stuck to the rocks, and some were a decent size.
Spicy whelks are small brown snails with tough-looking shells, named because they naturally have a slightly spicy flavour when eaten.
He’d been so focused on the sea urchin he hadn’t noticed them. “That bit’s a bit steep, Jiaojiao, don’t go over there. I’ll go once I’ve finished this sea urchin.”
He clipped off the sharp spikes, then cut open the shell, revealing the fresh sea urchin roe inside.
“Here, you can eat this.”
Yun Jiao took the sea urchin, and Yun Xiaowu suddenly pulled a small wooden ladle out of his jacket pocket.
Yun Jiao: …………
Fifth Brother was seriously prepared.
She sat on a clean little rock and started scooping up the sea urchin with the ladle.
Yun Xiaowu, scrambling like a monkey, shot back up to the rock covered in spicy whelks, chucking the bigger ones into his bucket with a clink-clatter.
Yun Jiao looked at him, then went back to eating the sea urchin, then looked at the giant sea turtle peeking out from behind a nearby rock, looking completely sneaky and suspicious.
Yun Jiao waved her hand. “Come here.”
The giant sea turtle fixed Yun Jiao with its small, beady eyes for a few seconds, then slowly, slowly lumbered over to her.
Its head and tail, when combined, looked longer than she was. Barnacles were growing on its shell, which was bigger than the family’s foot basin.
“Do you want me to help you get these barnacles off?”
A sea turtle’s shell is extremely hard and is its best shield.
Barnacles growing on the shell won’t immediately put them in danger, but if they get too numerous, the sea turtle is like a ship weighed down in the water, and it can also damage the shell.
In fact, it’s not just sea turtles; many ocean creatures, even massive whales, are pestered by barnacles.
The sea turtle seemed to understand Yun Jiao’s words and actually nodded.
Yun Jiao didn’t have the right tool to scrape the barnacles off the shell, so she hunted through her brother’s bucket.
She pulled out a spade.
It was a bit big for her; it was the one Yun Xiaowu used for digging sand.
Holding the spade, she aimed it at the barnacles on the shell and started prying them off with great effort.
“I’ll clean the barnacles off for you, but you have to catch me some fish, okay?”
Yun Jiao started setting the terms for the sea turtle herself. “I want yummy ones.”
The sea turtle just lay there quietly.
When Yun Xiaowu finished gathering the whelks and came back, he saw it.
“BLOODY H***!!!”
Yun Jiao peered out from behind the giant sea turtle’s fluffy little head, her big eyes looking at him.
Yun Xiaowu ran over. “Wait, where did this giant sea turtle come from?!”
Yun Jiao, in her childish voice, said, “From the sea.”
Yun Xiaowu wanted to say something, but he swallowed his words when he met his little sister’s bright, clear eyes.
He wanted to say that she had also been delivered by a sea turtle.
However, the family had told him to stop mentioning it. They were raising Yun Jiao as their own child, and constantly bringing it up might make her think they were reminding her that she was found/adopted.
“Jiaojiao, what are you doing?”
Yun Jiao held up the spade. “Scraping barnacles.”
Yun Xiaowu rolled up his sleeves. “My turn.”
The two of them scraped the barnacles clean off the sea turtle’s shell. Yun Xiaowu patted the giant sea turtle’s shell.
“There you go. I wonder if you’re the same sea turtle from all those years ago.”
To a human, all sea turtles look pretty much alike aside from their species, so it was genuinely hard to tell.
The sea turtle rubbed its head against Yun Jiao’s hand, then moved to the water’s edge and entered the sea, following the incoming tide.
Yun Xiaowu stood by the water for a while. “If only we knew where sea turtles lay their eggs.”
You couldn’t eat the sea turtle, but you could definitely eat sea turtle eggs.
And they were meant to be super nutritious, too.
Yun Jiao cocked her head, resting her little hand on her chin, deep in thought.
“Shall we go?”
Yun Jiao shook her head, refusing. “I have to wait.”
The giant sea turtle had promised to bring her something.
She held Yun Xiaowu’s hand and suddenly saw a small mound of sand puffed up nearby on the beach.
She walked over and poked it with her finger.
It was a cat’s eye snail.
(End of Chapter)