Chapter 34 part1

Best singing voice
In the vast expanse of stars, which could never be fully explored, there existed some amazing coincidences.
“Ma” and “Pa”, for example, were two syllables that, in the majority of all languages among the many races in the interstellar, meant mother and father once combined with a second part.
This included the interstellar Lingua Franca. As a result, even the few races that did not use these two syllables could still understand the meaning behind the foreign words.
However, as an inhabitant of the 21st century earth, Xie Tao obviously could not understand interstellar Lingua Franca or any of the other languages. But despite this, he still had not encountered any communication barriers in this world.
Both his hearing and his speech were somehow automatically translated. Like a cheat. And Xie Tao was very fortunate to have received this golden finger.
It would be very hard if he could not understand the language. Luckily he did not have to face such a terrible situation.
Cubs instinctively want to be close to their parents. As long as their parents didn’t act harshly or treat them badly, the cubs would always want their parents to pay more attention to them.
This was also the case for the little mermaid cub who saw the youth as his parent. So even after he received Xie Tao’s response, the cub did not release the finger in his grasp.
He wanted to be closer to the youth. But as he had already swum to the edge of the pool, he could only press himself as close as possible to the poolside in order to shorten the distance between them, be it so even just a little.
Seeing this action, Xie Tao suddenly felt a sour and soft feeling in his chest.
Knowing that the cub was trying to get close to him, it naturally warmed his heart.
The sour feeling mixed within was because Xie Tao had noticed from the mermaid’s movements just now that the cub was still subconsciously afraid of leaving the water.
As cubs, mermaids could not turn their tail into legs and they couldn’t leave the water for too long.
However, this “too long” referred to approximately more than half a day. After that the cub would start to feel a little unwell, but as long as they returned to water within 12 hours there would be no problem.
For a cub to be in a life-threatening condition due to dehydration, the cub would have to have been out of the water for at least one day.
On the planet inhabited by the mermaid race, water covered the majority of the surface and many cities were built directly in the water.
Although there were also cities built on land and on the water surface, these cities were designed with the cubs in mind and had various facilities for the cubs. One of these was the small pools you would find every hundred meters that were specifically meant for rehydration of the cubs.
Moreover, there were also canals everywhere in the cities which were used for transportation. There was really no need to worry about finding water.
Therefore mermaid cubs were in general not afraid of being brought to land by their parents. They knew they were safe and at most they were a little nervous when they left the water for the first time. But the nervousness usually disappeared once they saw the land scenery and their curiosity took over.
But because of the trauma he had experienced, the mermaid cub before Xie Tao’s eyes was subconsciously afraid of leaving the water. The pain from the dehydration at that time had left a psychological scar.
It was because he understood this, that Xie Tao’s heart felt both soft and sour at the same time.
One hand was grasping the youth’s finger, the other was holding onto the pool’s edge. The mermaid cub raised his head and gazed up at the youth’s face with his azure eyes, lightly shaking the finger side to side.
When cubs wanted to attract their parents’ attention, they would usually either instinctively make a sound or go and pull on their parents’ clothes or hands. This way of grasping and shaking the finger was the mermaid cub’s way of doing this.
Like the mermaid cub, Xie Tao responded by moving his captured index finger and met the cub’s eyes to show that he was paying attention to him.
“Pa… Ah~ ”
He could still not pronounce it correctly, but the mermaid cub was still very happy. He now knew who his parent was, the youth in front of him now responds to him.
“Try speaking a little slower.” Xie Tao nodded to show that he knew that the cub was calling out to him, and then said in a warm voice, “If you slow down you should be able to say it. But either way I can understand you.”
Xie Tao reached out to stroke the mermaid cub’s head. The cub’s tail swayed lightly under the surface and he made a low monotone sound. On the small delicate face which usually was without expression, a trace of joy could suddenly be seen.
“Pa… Pa.” Two syllables with a very long gap between them were issued. The mermaid cub, who had tried his hardest to make the syllables clearer, blinked and looked up at the black haired youth sitting in front of him.
As he was waiting for his response, the cub suddenly felt the hand on his head gently touch his head again and then heard the youth make a sound that resembled some kind of praise.
Regardless, he had gotten a good response. Looking up at the youth in front of him, the cub then turned his head to glance at his surroundings. Finally, he lifted his other hand and reached out towards the youth.
Doing this took a lot of courage for the mermaid cub, because it was this gesture that cubs made when they wanted to be lifted by their parent.
The mermaid cub was still subconsciously afraid of leaving the water. The fact that he had taken the initiative to do it was based on the dependence and full trust he had towards the youth.
Knowing that the little mermaid was scared to leave the water, Xie Tao had seldom tried to pick the cub up. So, now that the cub had reached out and wanted him to pick him up, Xie Tao was very surprised and could only stare blankly for a second.
“Baby, wait for a moment.” Once he came back to himself, Xie Tao said this in a soft voice and then stood up to go get a towel.
_______________
Translator’s note:
I will publish part two in a few hours.
I decided to divide the chapter into two parts as I was a little after schedule. (I have two exams next week so studying has taken up a lot of time this week. But don’t worry, I think I will be able to publish next week as well despite the exams.)
[1] - Lingua Franca is a language build from pieces of other languages and it acts as a universal language.