After My Overprotective Brother Slept for a Thousand Years - Chapter 3

Chapter 3

More than two thousand years ago, back when I was still an egg, my brother picked me up.

The male phoenix of the Phoenix Clan was named Gu Ling. His seniority was respectable, and his cultivation was among the very best.

The only problem was that his brain did not work all that well.

On Gu Ling’s first day as a full-time egg incubator, his childhood friend Taotie came over to watch the excitement.

As a descendant of an ancient vicious beast, Taotie had the body of a goat and the face of a human, with eyes under his armpits. He was gluttonous by nature, devouring all things yet never feeling satisfied. It was said he had even eaten his own name.

“Lao Ling, say that again. Say again what kind of egg this is?”

A pair of vertical pupils split open beneath Taotie’s armpit, and his voice rose sharply, even twisting at the end. “A phoenix egg??”

Gu Ling calmly wiped the drool off the shell. “My egg.”

“…”

The Luan Bird was also more or less related to Gu Ling, and she arrived a day later than Taotie.

Her five-colored luan tail trailed along the ground, leaving radiance wherever it passed. As for her name, it was said only her mate could know it.

“Ling.”

The Luan Bird deliberated for a long time before speaking. “In the Phoenix Clan, the feng is male and the huang is female, but from the markings on this egg, I can’t tell whether it is a feng or a huang.”

“She’s my little sister.”

“Little sister?” The Luan Bird froze. “How do you know it’s female?”

Gu Ling thought for a moment, then answered, “The telepathy between siblings.”

“…”

Generally speaking, a phoenix needed forty-nine days to hatch, nourished by the spiritual essence of heaven and earth. When it broke its shell, there would be a strange fragrance and a faint glow.

And yet, on the twenty-fourth day, the eggshell Gu Ling was incubating cracked.

I broke out of the shell.

I was covered head to toe in egg fluid, with sparse down all over me, a dull, ashy gray.

The Luan Bird sucked in a cold breath. The spirit fruit beside Taotie’s mouth dropped to the ground.

But Gu Ling smiled.

He gently lifted me out of the shattered shell and carefully pressed me against his heart.

The Luan Bird could not help taking half a step forward. “Ling, the timing of her hatching is a little…”

“Premature,” Gu Ling said without even lifting his head. “My little sister spent so long freezing outside, so of course she was born early. I’ll raise her well from now on, and she’ll make up for it.”

“But the color of her feathers is also…”

“Malnutrition. Once she eats more spirit fruit, her feathers will brighten up.”

The Luan Bird fell silent.

She stepped back twice and shook her head at Taotie with a sigh.

Taotie snorted. “Just you wait. If that little cub really grows phoenix tail feathers later, I’ll chew the horns off my own head!”

Also generally speaking, three days after breaking their shells, phoenix hatchlings could flap their wings and fly at low altitude. After seven days, they could speak, their cries clear and melodious.

But by the thirtieth day, I was still flopping around in the nest, my wings beating furiously while my body remained completely still.

I could not speak, nor could I cry out elegantly. All I could do was chirp-

“Chirp chirp!”

“Is my little sister hungry?”

“Chirp chirp chirp!”

“Or do you want a hug?”

“Chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp chirp!”

Gu Ling frowned and pondered for ages before finally announcing with a solemn expression, “I understand. She’s acting spoiled with me.”

Taotie rolled his eyes under his armpit, but the Luan Bird smiled faintly.

And after I swallowed one lingzhi mushroom and spirit fruit after another, I finally began to change.

On an ordinary afternoon, the fog inside my mind suddenly cleared.

As if my intelligence had awakened, I truly gained my own consciousness.

I lifted my head and, for the first time, clearly saw Gu Ling’s true form.

He was a golden-red male phoenix from head to tail, his tail feathers trailing thirty feet behind him. The tip of each plume was adorned with flecks of light like flowing fire.

“…Brother.”

My voice was tiny and indistinct.

But Gu Ling froze completely.

“Brother.”

The second time was clearer.

His golden-red wings began to tremble.

“What… what did you call me?” He lowered himself deeply, his chest nearly touching the ground. “Good girl, say it again.”

“Brother!”

I flapped my wings and called out a third time, then never stopped after that.

“Brother! Brother! Brother! Brother!”

At the time, Gu Ling was crying an absolute mess, yet he was still laughing.

Beside us, Taotie watched the scene and no longer rolled his eyes.

From then on, Taotie and the Luan Bird came to see me more and more often, and they no longer came empty-handed.

“She’s gotten fat.”

Taotie tilted his head and studied me before reaching a conclusion. “She’s so fat she’s become a ball.”

“She’s not fat. She’s just fluffy, so she looks puffier,” Gu Ling corrected.

“…Fine.”

As Taotie spoke, he pushed a spirit stone in front of me. “Eat.”

I looked at the spirit stone, then at Taotie, and did not move.

Gu Ling smiled faintly. “My little sister only eats what I give her.”

“Bullshit! What does she know? At this age, any cub thinks whoever feeds it is its mother.”

Taotie did not believe him and pushed it again. “Eat up, little thing. This was saved straight from Taotie’s mouth. Taotie, who swallows anything he sees! Do you know how rare that is?”

I simply turned my head away. “Chirp.”

Taotie: “…”

He was an ancient ferocious beast, and yet he had just been looked down on by a pheasant chick not even the size of his palm?

Taotie huffed off in a sulk, and before long, the Luan Bird arrived too.

She crouched beside the nest and plucked a single luminous feather from her luan tail.

The tiny feather shimmered with a pale blue glow under the sunlight. It was beautiful.

I looked at my brother. The Luan Bird looked at him too, her expression especially gentle. “Ling, may I?”

Gu Ling nodded. “Thank you.”

Only then did I reach out with my claws to grab it. Unfortunately, my claws were too short. I couldn’t reach, and even tumbled head over heels. “Chirp!”

The Luan Bird burst out laughing. She curved her neck and held it right in front of me. “All right, here you go, little one. May it bless you with safe, healthy growth.”

But just then, a blinding streak of golden light swept in from the west.

The wind shrieked. The spiritual pressure was savage, and the heat wave forced every blade of grass and tree within a hundred zhang to bow low.

Gu Ling immediately shielded me beneath him.

When the golden light faded, a three-legged bird was revealed.

His entire body was red-gold, his eyes like two balls of burning flame, and his third leg was sharp and slender.

Xie Jin.

He stood on a boulder and looked down from above.

“Hey, male phoenix. I heard you picked up an egg and even hatched it yourself.”

Xie Jin held his neck high, his posture lazy and arrogant. “So I came all the way from Jinwu Valley, flew eighteen thousand li, crossed ninety-nine peaks…”

He paused, narrowed his eyes, and searched for ages before finally spotting me, a puffed-up gray furball, under Gu Ling-

“And after all that, this is what you let me see?”

Gu Ling’s wings went taut.

Xie Jin glanced at me, laughed once, glanced at me again, and laughed again.

In the end, he simply couldn’t stop laughing. “Gu Ling! I may not have many eyes, but at least I have two. Look at what you hatched. Gray feathers, short legs, round belly, trips twice every three steps. And you’re calling this a phoenix?”

His tone was downright delighted. “This is a pheasant!”

Gu Ling’s expression darkened. His phoenix wings completely blocked me from view. “You are not welcome here. Please leave.”

“What’s the rush?” Xie Jin shook out his wings too. “I’m only telling the truth. Who knew there’d be something this fresh under the sun? Even a pheasant can pass itself off as a phoenix now.”

“Get lost!”

Gu Ling’s voice changed completely. Every plume of his golden-red phoenix tail bristled, and frigid spiritual pressure surged from him. “I’ll say this one last time: she is my younger sister. Say one more word out of line, and I’ll rip off all three of your claws.”

“Oh no, I’m so scared.”

Before Xie Jin left, he threw out one final line. “Gu Ling, you can fool yourself, but you can’t fool the Heavenly Dao, and you definitely can’t fool those bloodline-obsessed old fossils in your Phoenix Clan! Be careful you don’t end up hurting both yourself and others. By the time feelings get involved, it’ll be too late to cry!”

After that, Xie Jin came by every few days just to pick a fight.

His insults evolved quickly too. Every time he came, he had something new to say.

“Male phoenix, has your sister learned to fly today? Or has she already evolved into rolling instead?”

“Whoa, she’s so fat she can’t even see her own claws anymore. Are you raising a little sister or a pig?”

“I just got back from the South Sea and passed by to take a look. Mm, still a pheasant. A gray, round, flightless pheasant. I’ve confirmed it for you. No need to thank me.”

Gu Ling fought him more than once because of this, but every time Xie Jin got beaten off, he came back again.

All he did was show up to mock us. He never actually harmed me, so in the end, even Gu Ling couldn’t be bothered with him.

As for me, I gradually went from being afraid of him at first to simply finding him noisy.

One time, Xie Jin arrived especially early. The sky wasn’t even fully bright yet, and he had already landed on the boulder to wait.

I poked my head out of the nest entrance, blinked in the morning light, and met his lowered gaze.

“Hey, ugly. Is your brother still asleep?”

“Chirp.”

He froze, probably not expecting me to respond.

“Are you talking to me?”

“Chirp chirp.”

Xie Jin’s expression turned subtle.

“…I don’t chat with pheasants. It’s beneath my dignity.”

After saying that, he flew away, a streak of golden light slicing through the morning mist and shooting straight west.

But the next day, at the exact same hour, he came again.

After watching this, the Luan Bird fell silent for a moment, then said to Taotie beside her, “That Three-legged Golden Crow crosses mountains and valleys just to curse at a chicken. In a way, he’s even more… mm, than Ling.”

Taotie’s expression was somewhat complicated too. “That boy’s mating season should be coming soon as well. It’s just a little… mm.”

Just then, Gu Ling’s voice came from inside the nest, calling me back to eat spiritual fruit.

I immediately waddled back in a hurry.

As I passed by Xie Jin’s feet, I accidentally tripped, rolled half a circle with a little rumble, and flopped onto the ground.

Xie Jin lowered his head and looked at me. Our four eyes met.

Then his third foot kicked me in the butt, and I rolled neatly into the nest.

At that, Gu Ling came charging out.