The snake is growing bigger.

" Ten days later...."

The festival of autumn harvest is taking place in this area and people from all over the region start coming at the temple with their offerings to worship the local deity.

It's a period of renewal and celebration for everyone down the mountains and forests.

Once the temple opens its gates to the visitors, the place will become crowded and less quiet.

This festival lasts for seven days and today is the first day of celebration.The monks dressed in their white blue attires and running from a corner of the settlement to another one are making the place to look more bustling than ever.They send someone to lock the doors to the lotus pond garden so that no visitor can get inside, after all this is the green snake's territory and they were aware of its magnificent presence because their elders once played with a smaller version of it. Surprisingly for them, the snake considerably took in proportions lately and it became big enough to scare a regular human.

"What kind of snake is this?", they were asking themselves, "It growns much larger than it should grow a normal one!", "Maybe is a python!".

No one finding a plausible answer and because the snake never agressed or killed any human being, they decide to ignore it and seal that area of the temple.

Inside the sealed garden the green snake and the girl are living their lives in tranquility but lately became the snake is growing bigger and is eating more day by day, the small animals (rabbits, birds, lizards, rats) are on extinction and the only edible things left are the fruits, roots and the lotus pods, that of course won't last for the entire year or forever. Ruo-er is greatly preoccupied by this matter but the snake assures her that they can leave this place if the situation becomes more drastic than it is and in the worst case, Ruo-er can go anywhere in the world because she has no frightening appearance and the people won't banish her. "Don't panic! The world is big, there must be a place for everyone!", she says to Ruo-er. "As long as you believe in it, good things will happen to you sooner or later!"

Still, the girl isn't worrying for herself, she's worrying for her new green friend who treated her very well all these days that they have lived together and it was her only consolation and moral support when she found herself all alone in the world.

"Greeny, I'm only worrying that the others will mistreat you when they meet you.", says Ruo-er. "You've become a gigantic green snake and your size keeps getting bigger and bigger. When they'll see you like this, the people outside will think that you're a bloody monster and they will not know that you are actually a kind creature that never harmed humans before."

"I can't do anything about my size right now! I will become more voluminous than this in time. It's called growth! Aren't you humans the same, you keep growing?",questions the snake.

The day passes and nothing extraordinary happens, besides the fact that the temple is full of voices and prayers from the crowds that are coming and leaving frequently and so the lotus pond garden's tranquility is disturbed by this uproar. When the night comes, the quietness is finally returning back to the lotus pond but this only lasts for twelve hours because once the sun glitters on the serene sky again, it also brings inside the countless people eager to worship the deities and thank them for this year's harvest.

The second day is the same, nothing out of ordinary. Ruo-er sneaks through the crowd to enjoy the festival as well and in the evening, when the people are fewer, she steals from the crowd's offerings to bring back to the lotus pond garden.

This lasts for five days, until the people realize that the offerings to the deities are completely gone. "How can they all be gone?", they ask themselves. "Did the monks ate them over night?" but that would be impossible because it was simply to much.The monks were also surprised by this event but they didn't say a word about the closed area of the temple to the people because they didn't believe is harmful to them, after all only fruits, vegetables, and other ailments were lost. The visitors were assured that the situation is under control and that the offerings were moved by them to a safe place, so that other people can place theirs in front of the deity too.

Somehow, before the last day of the celebration, a suspicions guy who attended the previous events wants to ambush and catch the creature that steals the offerings, so he waits in the hall where the gifts are placed all night. At some point, he falls asleep but he suddenly wakes up when Ruo-er leaves with the offerings.

He jumps on his feet and runs after the the one who just left. Ruo-er is already far away but he keeps following her foot prints until he reaches the garden. She isn't aware that someone is trailing her. He enters the forbidden area of the temple and a green and gigantic reptile assaults him and frightens him so much that he pees into his pants and faints right there on the spot.

When the sun is rising the next day and wakes him up, he instantly runs out of that place and tries to find someone to tell what happened that night. The gates of the temple are already widely open for the last wave of visitors and the people are crowding inside, when a mad man throws himself into the crowd screaming that there's a green monster in the east side of the temple. This temple is situated on the lowest peak of a chain of mountains and the entire area has several main gardens and a few smaller gardens. Our lotus pond garden was one of the small gardens situated somewhere in the far away east side of the settlement. Even though the monks are trying to calm down the man, they can not, that's why they are forced to politely throw him outside so that the festival can end successfully.

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