8. Shocking

8. Shocking

“What on earth is this?”

My sister lifted me up so fast it was terrifying, so I only managed to see the three characters of the title. As the documents shimmered chaotically under the flickering candlelight, my gaze kept drifting towards them.

A good child is supposed to not peek at other people’s belongings, but I believe heaven will permit me to be a righteous thief today.

I am a big, scary, and bad wolf. I let out a silent “Kuaang!” towards the sky so my sister wouldn’t hear, and I approached the desk, my tail wagging.

Thump-thump-thump.

The long-awaited moment of peeking.

“Hehe….”

I felt a sense of delicious transgression from doing something bad behind my sister’s back. It was an exhilarating feeling of rebellion that made my tail tremble.

I climbed onto my sister’s wooden chair, and after a strenuous climb, I looked down at the desk.

“Arctic Fo- %& Tribe… &*☆ Records…?”

Oops.

I just realized now, but I can’t read all the letters of the wolf tribe yet. That’s why what I keep in my tail is a picture book, not a book filled with letters.

Even excluding my past life, I’m eight years old and can’t read, which isn’t something to be proud of, but to make an excuse, learning to read wasn’t very meaningful in the North. What’s important is survival, not letters. So, I knew the words I used often, but not the ones I didn’t.

It’s not just me. Even the friend living next door probably wouldn’t be able to write half of our tribe’s letters if asked.

Hmph.

But unlike her, I can write my name. I stayed up for several nights studying hard with my sister!

A cool wolf knows how to write its name. I picked up a pencil lying on the desk and magnificently wrote my own name.

“Rang… Seol…… Ah…!”

Unlike my sister’s writing, my three letters were crooked, huge, and tilted, soaring to the sky and falling to the ground. But clearly, the three letters, Rang Seol-ah, were written.

Hoo hoo, my pride soared to the sky.

Oh, right, I can also write my sister’s name. I wrote my sister’s name below my own large name.

“Rang…. Seol…… Yeon? Yeon?”

Using my own writing as a reference, I wrote up to two characters, and now I had to write the last character, but it was quite difficult. I wracked my faint memory, drew lines through the incorrectly written characters, and after several corrections, I finally finished writing my sister’s name!

“Hehe…!”

At this point, my creative urge surged. Next to my large name, I drew a small wolf. It’s small now, but it’s a cool wolf that will grow incredibly large soon.

And next to my sister’s name below it, I drew a large, cool, and dignified wolf. This is naturally a picture symbolizing my sister.

“Wow…!”

After finishing, I realized anew that I had a talent for drawing. I’m so scary, a wolf that is strong, powerful, cool, and even talented in studies and arts!

Excitedly, I decided to draw my entire family. I would write Dad’s and Mom’s names below my sister’s name!

“Rang…… But how do you write Dad’s name?”

Dad’s and Mom’s names were not two characters long like my sister’s and mine. The only thing they had in common was the first surname, indicating they belonged to the same tribe. In simple terms, it was a name that couldn’t be taken for granted.

After a moment of thought, I concluded that I lacked study and decided to improvise.

Swish-swish, swish-swish.

The pencil flowed unhindered across the paper. Curves and straight lines intersected and harmonized, eventually creating a perfect wolf family picture.

“Hehe… Hwaaam.”

How long did I spend drawing? It seemed that waking up at night was too much for my young body, as my eyes began to close. My vigorously wagging tail and perked ears drooped powerlessly, constantly expressing fatigue.

Since I had finished drawing, there was no need to force myself to stay awake. I wrapped my tail around myself and hugged it tightly, feeling the faint scent of my sister on my tail and the warm body temperature of my tail, and fell asleep.

——

“Haa.”

Seol-yeon sighed. Although she was born a strong wolf suin, it was still difficult to adapt to staying up all night.

Moreover, since she had expended considerable energy searching for her sister in the snowfield the previous morning, it was natural for fatigue to accumulate. She also had to finish the task of handing over the dismantled Wyvern meat to the polar bear after the sun rose today, so she couldn’t rest comfortably during the day.

Then, wouldn’t it be better to finish the work she was doing all night and get at least a little sleep? Seol-yeon thought.

“But….”

She couldn’t easily dismiss her sister’s words. No matter how many strange things her sister did, she had never said anything completely bizarre. Perhaps through this incident….

“Umm, no.”

Her father had always told her that the leader should not make optimistic assumptions. A wolf pack leader can only feel at ease after everything is over. Suin are no different.

As Seol-yeon walked down the dark hallway, contemplating whether to continue her research, she reached her room and slowly opened the door.

The crackling, warm stove, the flickering candlelight….

“Wh-“

And her sister, asleep at the desk. Seol-yeon rushed over in surprise.

Did she see it? No, of course she saw it.

She was careless. No matter how soundly her sister slept at night, she should have fully considered the possibility of her waking up. Seol-yeon anxiously looked down at Seol-ah and the desk.

“….”

Perhaps it was all a needless worry.

Seol-yeon sighed as she looked at the papers scribbled all over. Since they were copies, it wasn’t a big problem that her sister had doodled on them. It just… felt a bit disheartening.

Seol-yeon, whose heart sank for a moment, slapped her forehead and sighed several more times. Then, she picked up the paper that was underneath Seol-ah.

“What is written here?”

Seol-yeon slowly read the illegibly written characters. It wasn’t easy to decipher them because they were so crooked, but as the older sister, she managed to read them with her strength.

“Rang… Seol-ah.”

Is the one next to it a drawing of herself? Seol-yeon looked closely at the drawing.

A small wolf drawing. It’s cute because it’s so crumpled. She didn’t seem to have a talent for drawing, but cuteness didn’t matter.

“It will grow soon…?”

Seol-ah seemed to think she would grow as tall as her sister or other family members. Seol-yeon tried to calm her trembling eyes.

Because the average height of an Arctic fox suin is….

Well, yes. That’s not important. Seol-yeon shifted her gaze.

What was written next was probably Seol-yeon’s name.

The reason for the assumption of ‘probably’ is that the word written there was Rang Seol-eon, not Rang Seol-yeon. Several characters around it were written and then crossed out with lines, as if she had tried writing all the confusing characters.

Ryeon, Ryeong, Yeong… and Yeon.

Why did she erase the correct character after writing it?

Seol-yeon chuckled quietly at the absurd sight. As she stroked her sister’s head, who was buried deep in her tail, her sister stirred and mumbled in her sleep.

What was written next were the parents’ names… no, just parents. Fortunately, there was no unfortunate incident of not recognizing their identity.

Rang Dad.

Rang Mom.

Looking at the trace of an attempt to write something to the left of ‘A’, it seemed she originally intended to write her parents’ names. However, the result seemed to be a failure.

And next to them were wolves representing her father and mother. Combining this with the drawings of her sister and herself from earlier, the cute wolf family picture was finally completed.

“Hoo hoo.”

It was a heartwarming picture.

Although the prepared materials were a mess that couldn’t be used, it was a warm picture worth enduring it.

Seol-yeon carefully lifted her sister. Because Seol-ah was buried so deeply in her tail, she couldn’t tell if she was lifting Seol-ah or her tail, but either way, Seol-ah would have been lifted with it, so it didn’t matter.

“Sleep well, Seol-ah.”

“Ae-eung….”

The cute sound of her sister’s sleepy mumbling. Seol-yeon laid her sister on the bed and covered her with a blanket. Seol-ah, sleeping soundly with her tail hugged tightly, was, as she always thought, incredibly adorable.

“I’ll have to show this to Mom and Dad later.”

After that, Seol-yeon tidied up the desk. She set aside the scribbled materials for storage, separated the materials being researched from those that had been completed, and then, after tapping the papers on the desk to align them, Seol-yeon looked back.

The blanket rising and falling. And the crackling stove and the flickering candlelight…

It’s a peaceful scene.

What she must protect. And what she wants to protect.

The candle melted and dripped down towards the plate supporting it.

“Hoo.”

Seol-yeon blew out the candle.

Thinking that she needed to prepare drawing paper and colored pencils for her sister.