Loving My Mates In The Beast World

Chapter 23: A Shan Without Shasha

(Len's POV)
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"Life can't be anymore harder than this," My initial comment from my childhood had become a daily slogan for me now. I had thought this multiple when I was often bullied by my other siblings.

But now, I'm saying this slogan again and again after being denied by the Shashas here. There are not many Shashas in the first place and after reaching the age of marriage, a Shan's life is meaningless if he's not mated with any Shasha yet.

I and my Brother Jemin have been trying to find one to whom we could dedicate our lives to. But, unfortunately, no one is interested. Their high demands and wishes are too much for us to cope up with in our daily lives.

The Shans now have started to make clothes and cook food which were once the work of Shashas, just to impress them. Nowadays, Shans are also looking after the cubs, to secure a good impression in the Shasha's heart  and not to get abandoned or rejected.

And here, neither I nor Brother Jemin can cook and make clothes. And looking after the cubs? Hahaha!

We had tried once to bribe a cub into our team so that we could impress his mother to make our mate, and guess what? That cub had almost his life in our hands!

From then onwards, cubs had become a nightmare for us. And adding to that incident, no more Shashas in the tribe wanted to take us in. Worst, they won't even give us more than just a glance.

So, now only Brother Jemin and I are the only ones left. We are the companion of each other and stay together. Even though I'm a lion and he's a bear.

Brother Jemin is also the most matured one and also know how to deal with a situation without making it awkward. So our reputation hadn't detoriated to that level where we would be despised or worst, to be driven out of tribe.

Still, it didn't mean we gave up on finding us a mate. Both of us had tried to impress Shashas of other tribes too, when we were out for trading, but their other mates are too much for us to handle.

And we didn't want to destroy the relations among the tribes just because of our desperation to find a mate.

Still, it hurts to see Brother Jemin getting mocked behind his back by none other than the engaged Shans trading with him. And I'm sure they also mock me when I'm not around.

Afterall, a Shan without a Shasha is useless!

Speaking of which, Brother Jemin and I weren't so close from the beginning. I only used to know him as my mother's first born cub who was the only one that survived the winter. All his other bear brothers were dead. He's seven years older than me and we had never crossed our paths before, until that day.

I had run away from my den when I had enough of my other brothers bullying me. My tail was a lot shorter than theirs and so I was often the subject of theirs to get bullied by them.

And it seriously hurt a lot. I had tried to complain to my father about it. But I only got the same reply from him again and again, "Be good. Don't behave like a Shasha. We, Shans need to be strong to withstand everything."

It was just too much for me. And I would often ask for why in the world I had to go through this. Why?

That day, I was still weeping when suddenly I heard a strong voice trying hard to be soft and gentle.

"Hey, cub! What are you doing here?"

For the first time, I thought I was hallucinating as none had ever showed a single bit of care for me. So, even though, I stopped crying, I didn't look up. I just curled myself more into my embrace, when I heard that voice again.