Chapter 238

Chapter 238: Planning the Future

The “meeting” was over.

Yu Sheng and Little Red Riding Hood sat together on the highest roof of the castle, watching the camp. They watched the tiny kids who were nodding off get scooped up one by one by the older siblings and carried back to their rooms for naps, then watched the “parents” leave the castle yawning as they crossed the barracks. After a long time, Yu Sheng finally looked away and tilted his head back toward the thin rosy clouds in the sky.

Without turning, he asked casually: “They all went back to catch up on sleep. You not sleepy?”

“Too excited to sleep,” Little Red Riding Hood flopped onto the sloped roof: “In a few days I can go take the driving test.”

Yu Sheng thought for a moment, then asked: “What birthday present do you want?”

“A car?”

“Can’t afford it.”

Little Red Riding Hood laughed, then shook her head: “Honestly, I never really thought about it. Who had the mood for that? I’ve been scared for a long time-don’t laugh at me, I’m really scared.”

“Yeah, I know.”

They fell quiet together, enjoying a moment of clear tranquility.

After a while, Little Red Riding Hood broke the silence: “By the way, I thought carefully about what you said regarding the Fairy Tale Organization’s future, how we’ll recruit new members, and how the identity gets passed on. It sounds worth looking forward to.”

“Oh?” Yu Sheng raised an eyebrow: “I thought the words ‘new Little Red Riding Hood’ gave you a shadow in your heart.”

“A little. But because those words have always been a burden, I’m starting to look forward to the ‘change’ to come,” she said with a smile. “Think about it. Until now, in the Fairy Tale Organization, whether it was Little Red Riding Hood or Snow White, every one of us was an orphan dragged into nightmares. From now on, the new Little Red Riding Hood might just be a fresh mysticism graduate hired through normal channels, or a rookie Spirit Realm Detective who sends in a resume.

“There’s no fear of a short life, no piles of pain and loneliness. They’re just looking for a long term, stable job, and we will train them like teachers do. Work normally. Take normal vacations. When they put on the Red Cloak, they are the Organization’s ‘staff’ and ‘apprentices.’ When they take it off, they go home to their families.

“Of course, the first person I train will probably be Xiao Xiao. That kid has real talent, and she’s already had a few first exchanges with the Black Forest. While I’m training her, I can learn how to teach a beginner to handle the Wolf Pack without Anka Aila’s influence. That experience will help with everyone else too…”

She chattered on, a warm, hopeful smile on her face, as if she were picturing how future “Little Red Riding Hoods” would live a steady, ordinary working life. Even if that “work” sounds wild to normal people, for members of the Fairy Tale Organization, it would be an unbelievably smooth life.

She kept smiling, as if she herself were enjoying that future life.

Yu Sheng didn’t interrupt. He listened patiently until her voice grew smaller and smaller, until she started making a light, soft snoring sound under the bright daylight.

A streak of gold flickered at the edge of his vision. Two tufts of golden hair wavered over the eaves like antennae, then a whole sheet of golden hair crawled gloomily up the roof like some shady soft creature. Rapunzel’s head popped over the edge. The hair monster peeked around, then waved happily to Yu Sheng: “Bro, I’m here for Red Hood!”

Yu Sheng pointed at his side: “She’s asleep.”

“I knew it.” Rapunzel wrinkled her nose. A ribbon of golden hair snaked along the roof, carefully wrapped the sleeping Little Red Riding Hood, and began to lift her. “I’ve shared a room with her for years. When I saw her eyes at the end of the meeting, I knew she’d crash within half an hour.”

Yu Sheng stared, stunned, his eyes dragged to that mass of hair creeping over the dark roof: “With hair this long, storybooks make it all poetic and pretty. Why do you look like a goblin crawling out of a cave, creeping around in the dark?”

“What good is pretty? Does it lower enemy attack and defense when we fight demons, or boost movement speed when we sprint down a tower?” Rapunzel gave Yu Sheng a sideways look: “At least I don’t twist it into a strand and fire it off…”

Yu Sheng fell silent.

She spoke again, hesitant this time: “Bro, is our orphanage… really gone?”

“From the site photos Li Lin sent, it’s basically razed,” Yu Sheng sighed. “Only the little kiosk at the Door checkpoint is still standing, and the barrier arm at the Door is down to just the base.”

“Oh, so Sleeping Beauty’s ‘workstation’ is still there,” Rapunzel joked, then grew serious. “So that means we’re going to live here a long time, right?”

“That’s the plan,” Yu Sheng nodded. “You also don’t have anywhere else to go right now. But it depends on what you want. If you choose somewhere else, the Special Affairs Bureau and the council will help. We just handled an Angel Descent level event, after all.”

Rapunzel’s eyes lit up: “Then could we stay here and not move, but have the Special Affairs Bureau send us the resettlement money based on the budget for rebuilding an orphanage?”

Yu Sheng stared at her.

She hurried to add: “And… also send some to your hotel.”

“You really just think of things on the fly,” Yu Sheng said, half laughing, half crying. He waved a hand. “Don’t worry about that. I still have to go to the Special Affairs Bureau in person. There’s a lot to discuss. And if you really settle here, I need to open a dedicated Door from the camp to the outside. We can’t have dozens of you going in and out through my basement.”

“Oh. Sounds like there’s a lot to do.”

Yu Sheng was curious: “What made you ask all this out of the blue?”

“I ran into Snow White and King on my way here. They were talking about what comes next,” Rapunzel said as she hung off the eaves by her hair in a very weird pose, only her head peeking up to chat. “They said if we stay long term, we have to slowly remodel the camp. Build houses ourselves and move out of the temporary units. Then this place will be like a small town. Snow White said we’ll call it Tong O Town, and she wants to build a Titan Altar next to it.”

Yu Sheng was dumbfounded, then he realized the meeting’s effects were showing at last.

The Cursed Children, once they had long lives, finally started planning their futures with hope.

The only problem was that these super middle schoolers, the reserve super middle schoolers, and the super kitty not only had wild imaginations, they also moved fast. Who knew what they would turn this place into.

[This actually sounds super fun.]

The corner of Yu Sheng’s mouth curled up.

“Bro, you smiled. Why?”

“I’m approving it early. I mean the Titan Altar,” he said with a straight face: “Just don’t build it on my vegetable patch.”

“Oh oh!”

Rapunzel left, carrying Little Red Riding Hood.

Yu Sheng watched the huge golden hairball wrap the two of them and creep gloomily down the main path of the camp, then slip into the little house where they stayed. Honestly, when he first met Rapunzel, she wasn’t like this. Back then she even seemed like a quiet girl…

But when he remembered the state Little Match Girl had been in when they first met compared to her normal self, he relaxed at once. They were young people, and they dealt with Fairy Tale for a living. This kind of energy made sense.

Feeling a little sentimental, he drew open a Door and stepped into 66 Wutong Road.

First thing after stepping through, he looked around and listened hard.

It was fine. Nothing was on fire. No giant holes blown in the walls. Irene was upstairs, cursing at her game. The TV in the living room was playing a brainless variety show. Irene’s silly laughter sounded clear and bright.

Yu Sheng sighed in relief and walked inside.

“Benefactor! You’re back!” Foxy’s delighted voice rang from the dining room.

Yu Sheng looked up just in time to see her pounce toward him. Thankfully she didn’t kick in rocket speed. Just a normal pounce.

He preserved most of his ribs.

He caught her and let those many tails clamp around him like hydraulic pliers for quite a while. Then he wrestled a hand free and rubbed the fur behind her ear: “I was held up in the valley, mostly to brief Little Red Riding Hood and the others about the changes in the Fairy Tale Otherworld. Were you anxious?”

“Yes, I was,” Foxy beamed, letting go and tugging him toward the table. “But Irene wasn’t. She said you were busy, then went upstairs to play and to watch TV. I made you breakfast, though!”

Yu Sheng froze: “…Breakfast?”

“Yeah, the one you had last time. Irene said we can call it fox stew.” Foxy sat him in a chair, lifted the lid from a pot, and pushed a bowl in front of him. The bowl held a colorful, layered, bubbling mix of solids and liquids: “It’s so good!”

Yu Sheng’s face went pale the second he saw it. It looked even scarier than last time: “Wait. The stuff in the bowl is moving. There are more colors than last time.”

“Right. This time Irene didn’t mess with it, so it turned out way better,” Foxy grinned wider. “Give me a few more tries and I can get six or seven tenths of Mother’s flavor.”

Yu Sheng went quiet.