Favorite of the Beast-world: I Got Rich Through Farming-Chapter 19: The Bizarre Snake-Bodied Man

"Is something wrong?" An Jin followed Xi’s gaze to the inside of her own arm.

A faint, indistinct red mark was coiled there. It was very light and blurry, but on closer inspection, it looked like a small snake.

She had actually noticed it long ago but hadn’t paid it much mind.

She’d originally thought it was just some kind of birthmark on the original owner’s body, but from the sound of Xi’s words, it seemed it wasn’t that simple.

Xi was so sad he seemed to wilt. He lowered his head and said dejectedly, "It’s a mark a male Beastman leaves on a female. It means they’ve already..."

His voice faltered. Seeing An Jin’s pupils gradually constrict, he couldn’t bear to continue but forced himself to say, "It means they’ve... mated and bonded. That male Beastman will become the female’s mate..."

"Ah Jin..." Seeing the female’s small face turn pale, Xi quickly leaned forward to support her. He suddenly regretted telling her the truth, wishing he could just slap himself.

’If I’d known Ah Jin would be this upset, I’d have been better off not saying anything at all!’

An Jin was indeed deeply distressed, but her reasons were different from Xi’s.

Snake Beasts were all cruel, cold-blooded Wandering Beasts. Xi thought she was upset because she now had a Wandering Beast for a mate.

An Jin’s distress came from the realization that she had gone from being a girl to evolving into a full-fledged "woman" after some kind of "great harmony of life aerobic exercise"??

The key point was that she herself had no idea about the time, place, or even the other person involved in this "great harmony of life exercise"??

’Does this mean that Snake Beast will come looking for me again?’

’What if he finds out I’m an imposter? Snake Beasts are savage and bloodthirsty. Will he kill me in a fit of rage?’

A chill spread through An Jin’s heart. Xi, blaming himself, looked like he wanted to wipe away tears, appearing even more heartbroken than she was.

The certain Merfolk’s tears were already streaming down before hers had a chance.

His tears solidified into pearls, falling drop by large drop into the water and creating ripples.

Xi poked his fingers together guiltily, swimming beside her. The Merfolk’s beautiful, jade-carving-like upper body emerged from the water.

His exquisite, beautiful face was downcast. He gently nuzzled her calf, which was resting by the riverbank, like a kitten seeking comfort.

Xi’s sadness was a bit absurd, but seeing him so dejected, An Jin didn’t resist his intimate little gesture.

He nuzzled her again, then suddenly, as if he’d taken the wrong medicine, his fishtail gave a sharp flick. He quickly looked up in pleasant surprise. "Ah Jin, have you gone into heat?!"

’H-Heat?!’

An Jin’s mouth twitched. Feeling as though she’d been struck by lightning, she tried to understand this new term from a local’s perspective.

It was basically asking if she’d gotten her period.

Combining this with the original owner’s memories, she seemed to be only thirteen or fourteen years old. She wasn’t an adult and hadn’t had her period yet.

An Jin shook her head, slightly embarrassed. "No, why... Is something else wrong?"

Xi’s blue eyes lit up in an instant, the corners of his mouth curling into a joyful smile. He looked so happy he seemed about to dance. "Ah Jin! Actually, there’s another possibility!"

"If you haven’t gone into heat yet, a male Beastman won’t mate with an underage female! They can’t place a mate mark on you, which means the mark on your arm should only be a Quasi-Partner Mark!"

A so-called Quasi-Partner Mark was a contractual agreement a male Beastman in this world made with an underage partner he had chosen for life.

Just like a mate mark, a male Beastman could only form a Quasi-Partner Mark once in his life.

When the female came of age, if she was willing to accept him, the male could smoothly become her mate, and the Quasi-Partner Mark would turn into a formal mate mark.

However, if the female refused to accept him, he would be unable to pursue other females. He would be destined to become a mateless beast, living a lonely life without a partner or offspring, fated to slowly die alone in a corner of the jungle.

An Jin considered this deeply. ’Since I’m the only partner this Snake Beast I’ve never even met will ever have, he definitely won’t give up on me easily...’

To be honest, she didn’t want to get into any romantic entanglements in this world.

After all, this wasn’t the world where she truly belonged. If it were possible, she still wanted to go back.

Besides, this Snake Beast was a Wandering Beast—temperamental, savage, and cruel. Becoming his mate was not a very sound choice.

An Jin wanted to ask if there was a way to remove it, but before she could speak, Xi had already grabbed her arm.

He reached into the river and, from who knows where, pulled out a sharp, needle-like object. He aimed it at the snake pattern on her arm, intending to pierce it.

"Ah Jin, you’re sure you don’t want this Snake Beast, right?!" Although it was a question, anyone could hear the urgency in his tone.

"...Yes."

An Jin followed her heart. Though she felt a twinge of pity, she still nodded.

The moment the sharp object pierced her skin, An Jin’s face went deathly pale. A searing pain, like fire, shot through her arm, hurting so much she almost passed out.

"AHH—"

The girl’s agonized cry echoed through the forest.

At that very moment, several kilometers away in a stone cave, two blood-red pupils suddenly snapped open in the pitch-black darkness. A savage, bloodthirsty light, like a blade of ice, shot toward the distant source of the sound.

"HISS~"

The bewitching, sinister blood-red pupils narrowed, emitting a menacing aura. A bloodthirsty red glint flickered within them, radiating an incredibly dangerous presence.

The sound of a snake’s tail scraping against the ground drifted faintly from the cave, leaving a long, shallow track on the earth.

The beasts in the jungle instantly twitched their ears. Their bodies went rigid, and after casting a fearful glance at the cave, they bolted, vanishing without a trace.

The searing light burned the red figure that had been lurking in the darkness as it emerged.

A naked man slowly slithered out of the cave. His skin was a sickly, deathly pale. His upper body was sculpted, muscular, and fluid, but his lower half was the winding, slithering body of a black-and-red python over ten meters long.

He stopped at the cave’s entrance, silent as the night. Those blade-like, scarlet snake eyes narrowed, his cold gaze sweeping toward the distant source of the sound.

His ink-black hair cascaded like a waterfall over his lean waist, long and straight. The man had his back to the sun, his python body casting a large shadow.

The man’s face and expression were obscured.

Only his tall, slender back exuded a strange, sinister aura.

"Heh... You think you can get rid of me just like that?" His deep, pleasant voice should have been beautiful, but it was laced with a chilling, unsettling laugh.

He caressed his own chest. A spot of red stained the pale skin, marking the place deeper within where his heart lay, branded with the one and only mate mark. "Don’t you think you’re being a little too naive..."