Chapter 259: Picture Book: The Bear and the Girl, Volume 3

Chapter 259:
Picture Book:
The Bear and the Girl, Volume 3

 

THE GIRL’S MOTHER recovered from her sickness and was well again.

The girl had an energetic young sister. She told her little sister about the bear. Then the sister blurted out that she wanted to see the bear too.

The little girl took her sister into the woods to introduce them. They stood in front of the woods, and when the girl called for the bear, it appeared from the trees.

The girl introduced the bear to her little sister. The bear slowly approached the sister, who was very surprised, until she gave the bear a gentle pat. The bear’s fur was so soft and nice!

The sister declared she wanted to ride on the bear’s back. The bear knelt down to let the little sister and the little girl get on. The bear ran through the woods and the meadows, and took the two to places they’d never been.

But their happy days didn’t last for long.

Thanks to the rainbow flower droplet the bear had found, the mother got better. The mother asked for help from a friend to find a job at the town next to them. The girl’s family was going to the neighboring town.

The girl cried as she said goodbye to the bear. The bear gave the girl a gentle pat on the head. The girl cried because she wouldn’t see the bear anymore.

“Thank you, bear. I’m sorry.”

The bear stayed with the girl until she stopped crying.

 

A few days later, the girl and her family got on a carriage to head to the nearby town. The bear watched from afar. The carriage started moving. It kept going and going and going until the bear couldn’t see it anymore.

The girl stopped herself from crying.

“Goodbye, bear…”

The carriage kept going and left the forest the bear lived in far, far behind. They wouldn’t be able to come back to it.

The mother and sister hugged the girl.

“I’m sorry,” the mother apologized.

The bear was important to the little girl, but so were her mother and sister. The little girl held her mother and her sister’s hands.

“You’ll see each other again,” her mother said, and she smiled gently.

Once the girl grew up, she vowed to see the bear again.

 

The carriage slowly moved forward. There were other people on the carriage, not just the girl and her family. The girl was still sad because she wasn’t with the bear anymore.

Then, the carriage stopped suddenly.

“What’s that?”

The people on the carriage were making a commotion.

“Monsters!” someone yelled.

“Mom!”

The mother hugged her two daughters. There was quite the commotion outside the carriage. The carriage wasn’t moving.

“The horses have been attacked!” they heard a shout in front of them.

One of the people on the carriage went outside.

“There are a bunch of monsters approaching!” shouted the person outside. “Everyone, run!”

The people still in the carriage started running away. The little girl’s family tried to run too, but they were pushed over by the people trying to get out ahead of them. Only the girl and her family were left behind in the carriage.

“Mom…”

“It’ll be all right.”

The mother held her daughters in her shaking hands. They could hear the monsters outside. They couldn’t run away. The carriage rocked. The howls from the monsters frightened them and they shuddered.

Right when they were about to lose hope, they stopped hearing the monsters. But they were too scared to look outside.

They were still shaking in the carriage when they heard someone speak from outside. “Are you okay?”

The girl knew that voice. She thought she’d never hear it again. The girl pushed away her mother’s arms and went outside. “Bear!”

Sure enough, she found the bear outside.

“Bear, oh, bear!” she cried and hugged the bear. The mother and little sister also got out of the carriage.

“It’ll be fine. The bear saved us!”

The monsters were collapsed outside the carriage. They didn’t see anyone else around. They didn’t know what had happened. The horses were gone, and the carriage was broken. All they could do now was walk.

That was when the bear crooned loudly—“Cwoom!”

Then, from far away, a black bear and a white bear appeared.

The mother and little sister were surprised, but the little girl was not. She knew that the bear had called them.

“Hop on!” The three bears knelt down and showed the family their backs.

“Mom, the bears are going to take us to the town,” the little girl told her mom. At first, the mother didn’t believe her, but then the little girl got on the bear’s back, and the mom believed.

The family headed to the next town on the bears. When the bears got closer to the town, they let the family down.

“Thank you, bear,” the girl said. But the little sister wouldn’t let go of the white bear. She didn’t want to leave the bear. Of course, the little girl didn’t want to leave, either.

“The bears can’t come into town because they’re too big,” said the mother, shaking her head and giving the little sister a comforting hug. “If only the bears were smaller...”

“We can be!” said the bear, and shrunk! The white bear in the little sister’s arms also shrunk, and so did the black bear next to the mother. They shrunk smaller and smaller until they were just big enough for the little girl to hold in her arms.

Now they could go into the town in the family’s arms. The gatekeepers were surprised, but they let the family go inside with the bears.

And so, the little girl got to stay with the bear.