Hey, I've seen this little sister before. The moment Shun saw her, this sentence inexplicably appeared in his mind.
And unlike Jia Baoyu, he had genuinely seen this little sister before…
Sirin, the future Herrscher of the Void. She was also one of the core targets of his Consciousness Mapping. He hadn't expected that it would be her family who picked him up.
Wasn't this also a coincidence of fate? Of course, perhaps it was because he had arrived here relying on the Herrscher of the Void core fragment, so his landing point was very close to Sirin.
But no matter what, being picked up by Sirin's family while lying in the snow was still something quite surprising.
His thoughts were pulled back to reality. After Shun and Sirin played a ten-second staring contest, Sirin seemed to remember something and said:
"You… are you okay? My name is Sirin. This is my house. My mom and I found you collapsed in the snow, so we brought you back. What's your name?"
After speaking, Sirin looked at Shun expectantly, hoping the good-looking boy they had dug out of the snow would give some answer.
But after waiting for quite a while, she still didn't hear a single word from Shun. This was naturally not because Shun was pretending to be aloof.
Shun also really wanted to answer Sirin, but after Sirin said so much, he had only understood the sentence "I am Sirin." Everything else was incomprehensible.
Thanks for the invite. May I ask how a Russian language beginner can understand Russian in a short time and communicate quickly with Russians?
At this moment, let alone Katyusha—even if a PPSh was put to his head, Shun would only say "I don't understand, simida."
He couldn't just say to Sirin, "My dear tovarisch, right?" Nor could he sing "The Unbreakable Union" or "Katyusha" to show off in front of this Russian girl, right?
So at this time, since he couldn't understand anything, he might as well "just smile."
Speaking of which, it was really strange that he and Seele could communicate normally back then. One could only say that Cocolia's orphanage didn't lack educational resources.
But perhaps because Sirin was still quite carefree at this time, a flash of inspiration struck her. Using her extraordinary wisdom, she reached a conclusion.
"C-could it be that you can't speak?" She pointed at Shun with a shocked expression. After saying this and seeing that Shun still showed no reaction, she became even more certain of this conclusion in her heart.
What a pitiful child. He actually can't speak. Sirin thought this and wanted to give Shun a loving hug.
The current her could not be compared to the one in Babylon Tower who had suffered endless torment and lost everything.
The current Sirin was truly at her most innocent and kindest moment—a genuine little angel Sirin.
Sirin thought it and did it. Without thinking twice, she went in for a bear hug, which left Shun completely stunned.
Wait, why did this child suddenly hug him? At this moment, Shun didn't realize that he currently looked even smaller than Sirin—he was basically a Conan.
At this time, a gust of cold wind blew in, making it hard for Shun to keep his eyes open. The temperature inside the house also dropped rapidly. But after a while, the wind stopped, and the temperature inside began to rise again.
Winter in Siberia was just this cold. Shun and Sirin simultaneously looked toward the direction the cold wind had come from. It was a purple-haired woman who had opened the door from outside and entered the house.
Looking at the other party's face, which was seventy to eighty percent similar to Sirin's, Shun guessed that this was probably Sirin's mother.
The woman walked closer and saw the two still hugging. Even though she had entered the house, she still didn't take off the heavy coat she was wearing.
The purple-haired woman opened her mouth, wanting to say something, but Sirin interrupted first: "Mom, he can't speak. What should we do?"
"Can't speak?" The purple-haired woman was very surprised. If he couldn't speak, that would be somewhat troublesome—whether for future communication or how to handle this child.
However… she looked at Shun's clearly Asian face and thought for a moment.
Maybe he wasn't unable to speak, but just couldn't understand? Although it was strange for someone appearing in the depths of Siberia not to understand Russian, it was a bit arbitrary to conclude that he couldn't speak after just this short while.
But she herself hadn't received advanced education and only knew Russian. Still, for some reasons, she understood a bit of German.
"Sirin, are you sure he can't speak?"
"Yeah, I said a lot to him earlier and he didn't react at all." Sirin nodded blankly.
She was amused by her silly daughter. Just because there was no response, she concluded the other party was mute? Though he probably really couldn't understand Russian.
Thinking of this, she no longer hesitated and asked Shun in the limited foreign language she knew:
"Can you speak German?"
Hearing the familiar language, Shun felt a surge of joy. After all, because of Ana, he had self-studied German, so it naturally wasn't unfamiliar to him now.
He hadn't expected Sirin's mother to know German. Although her proficiency didn't sound very high, it was still enough for communication.
Thinking of this, Shun quickly nodded and said, "I know some."
Sirin was shocked when she heard Shun speak, her mouth opening in surprise. So he could talk after all.
Seeing that Sirin's mother could communicate with him was undoubtedly good news. However, the next second, Shun could no longer smile.
"I'm sorry to tell you some bad news. Your legs have been frozen in the snow for too long and can't be saved, so…"
"Oh, I understand. Sorry for the trouble." So it was bad news after all, but there was nothing that could be done. Shun only looked small on the outside; he wasn't actually a child.
"It's good that you understand. I've contacted the doctor in the village. He'll come to the house soon to saw off your legs. But the conditions might not be very good, so the process may…" She didn't continue. For a child who looked less than ten years old, this was undoubtedly an extremely cruel thing.
However, Shun's calm and mature reaction surprised her greatly. Upon hearing that his legs needed to be sawed off, he didn't cry or make a fuss—he simply nodded and accepted it.
After a while, there was a knock at the door. Sirin went forward to open it. It was a middle-aged man holding a saw that still had some wood shavings on it.
Sirin recognized him. He was the only doctor in the village. Was he here to treat little Shun?
During the earlier time, Shun and Sirin's mother had talked about other things while avoiding that topic. Shun's name had naturally been told to Sirin as well.
Seeing that Shun looked a little smaller than her, Sirin took it upon herself to decide to call him Little Shun.
"Doctor uncle, are you here to treat Little Shun's illness?"
The middle-aged man patted Sirin's head kindly and said, "Your mom said a child's legs were frostbitten and asked me to help saw them off. I originally thought it was little Sirin. Now that it's not, that's really good…"
"Eh?" Hearing the middle-aged man's words, Sirin was somewhat shocked. Saw off the legs? With that? But…
"Alright, little Sirin. Shouldn't you be glad it's not you or your mother who needs their legs sawed off? Look, aren't there plenty of people in the village missing arms or legs?"
Although Sirin didn't quite understand, …was it really okay to say such things? Was Little Shun going to lose both legs just because he had been frozen in the snow for so long?
This world… is so cruel…