Chapter 46

Chapter 46

Although Liao Zhiqiu showed no sign of exposing him, Bai Fuling still climbed down from the experimental platform and ducked under the table to hide—after all, there were more NPCs outside besides Liao Zhiqiu, and the others' attitudes might not be so friendly. Better safe than sorry.

And indeed, the game developed just as Bai Fuling had predicted.

The sound of footsteps echoed as another NPC, a man, approached.

"Young Master Qiu," the NPC said, "what brings you here?"

"I'm here to celebrate my cat's birthday," Liao Zhiqiu replied. "But the kitten didn't like the food. Why?"

"I must remind you, Young Master Qiu, you are not to take the specially prepared food without permission, nor must you feed it outside!" The NPC didn't answer the question, instead speaking in a stern tone first. "The master has emphasized this many times."

"I want to celebrate my cat's birthday," Liao Zhiqiu repeated. "Cats like the wind, rain, clouds, grass, and lakes outside. So I want to celebrate in the prettiest spot."

"No, Young Master Qiu, you can't do that outside. If you want to feed the cat, you can come here. We have a designated laboratory and observers."

"I want to celebrate my cat's birthday. Celebrating where there's wind, rain, clouds, grass, and lakes—that's the cat's birthday wish." Liao Zhiqiu's attitude was firm.

The NPC fell silent.

After a long pause, he said, "In that case, I'm afraid the master will still need you to cool off for the day."

Huddled underneath, Bai Fuling listened quietly to the dialogue, mentally processing the information from this part of the conversation.

It seemed that the people here were aware of Liao Zhiqiu's cognitive impairment but made no attempt to correct it.

They didn't object to Liao Zhiqiu taking organs to feed the cat; their issue was with him doing it outdoors—especially on this day each year, [the cat's birthday].

They didn't want these matters exposed to the public, so was that why they needed to lock up Liao Zhiqiu for openly celebrating outside?

As Bai Fuling pondered this, the NPC in the room suddenly shifted the topic, speaking sternly again, "Wait, Young Master Qiu. You just said, 'the kitten didn't like that food'—does that mean you've already taken the specially prepared food to feed it?"

"..." Liao Zhiqiu didn't answer.

The room fell silent for a moment.

Bai Fuling's heart skipped a beat.

Based on his previous gaming experience, after lengthy dialogue, intense interactions were about to go down.

Either combat or a chase sequence—and in this situation, it seemed more like the latter.

Sure enough, once the NPC realized this, he suddenly remembered Liao Zhiqiu's momentary reaction when entering the room earlier—he had suspected someone was inside! And it was someone Liao Zhiqiu didn't recognize as human, a sneaky intruder.

The NPC frowned, turned around, and began searching the room.

The overlapping sound of footsteps in the background set your nerves on edge.

Bai Fuling was familiar with this kind of stealth section.

Generally, NPCs would search once and not continue, so players only needed to avoid the NPC's line of sight and hide for the entire duration.

Bai Fuling panned his camera. While the NPC in the white protective suit had his back turned, searching the cabinet, he darted out from under the bed!

Originally, he planned to hide in the medicine cabinet the NPC had already searched on the other side, but after glimpsing the large and small glass bottles there, he changed his mind.

Those items must have meaning; presumably, those glass bottles of various sizes were there to make hiding harder for the player. Bumping into them would lead to exposure.

A hide-and-seek game that needed speed, precision, and reactions to sudden turnarounds was definitely a hard mini-game—but who said the player only had this one path?

As the saying goes, all roads lead to Rome. Since hiding over there was too difficult, why not avoid the ground altogether?

Bai Fuling already had a brand-new idea. Since ancient times, CTs never look up; basically, no NPCs look upward, so there was another safe place.

—That was the ceiling!

Compared to the obstacle-avoidance game with glass bottles of various sizes, getting onto the ceiling should be much simpler.

So, while the NPC and Liao Zhiqiu both had their backs turned, Bai Fuling, like an agile spider, made his character climb the wall on all fours.

He had initially worried that the laboratory walls might be too slippery to climb, but fortunately, the game was still on the player's side—or perhaps it simply hadn't programmed the walls that way. In any case, the player actually managed to climb up the wall smoothly!

LED lights were embedded in the ceiling. Bai Fuling carefully avoided the light fixtures to prevent blocking the light and casting a shadow, which would expose him.

He clung to the ceiling upside down like that.

In the room, the NPC on the ground finished searching the cabinet. His next move was to lift the white cloth Bai Fuling had earlier draped over the experimental platform, then bend down to check under the bed.

Bai Fuling, on the ceiling, breathed a sigh of relief: good thing he had slipped away earlier, or he would have been discovered.

Otherwise, he probably would have been forcibly ejected from this new map by the NPC.

Liao Zhiqiu watched as the person in front of him lifted the cloth and searched under the bed, showing no other reaction—because he knew the kitten would always hide well.

After searching around and finding nothing, the male NPC finally relaxed.

He turned to look at Liao Zhiqiu, whose expression remained calm and unperturbed, and returned to the previous topic, asking once more, "Young Master Qiu, who did you take the specially prepared food to feed?"

He smiled. "Since you said the kitten didn't like it, why not bring the kitten here? I can help see what the problem is. Maybe the kitten is sick?"

Liao Zhiqiu nodded. "It is sick."

The kitten had a cognitive impairment; he knew that.

"I will cure it."

Seeing that Liao Zhiqiu had no intention of saying more, the male NPC seemed to realize he wouldn't get any further information and gave up pressing. He simply said:

"Alright, Young Master Qiu—but if you want to raise a cat well, keeping it by your side is the most reassuring, isn't it?"

"The outside is too dangerous, Young Master Qiu." The male researcher smiled. "Please remember to bring the cat you've been feeding back home."

"..." Liao Zhiqiu tilted his head but didn't answer. His expression gave no hint of his inner thoughts.

The man was about to say something more when something suddenly fell from above, knocking him to the ground!

—It was Bai Fuling who fell.

To be honest, Bai Fuling didn't do it on purpose.

He had been clinging to the ceiling like a spider, planning to wait until the NPC finished searching and the scene passed before coming down.

Who knew that after the NPC finished searching, they started chatting below and showed no sign of leaving anytime soon.

Bored from clinging to the ceiling, Bai Fuling listened to the characters' conversation in the background and clicked on the small icons in the upper right corner of his screen to browse.

In the personal status section, Bai Fuling noticed a few lines of text that hadn't appeared before.

---Accumulated ■■ has reached the standard---

---Mutation Mode has been activated. Please select a direction (can be changed)---

→ Cat: You are a cute cat, come be a cat! You're all about elegance and agility.

→ Beagle: You are lively enough, tear it up! You will have endless energy and the strength of an ox.

→ Angel: You are an angel from heaven, forever holy. You should have a pair of wings.

→ Spider: Climbing up and down, walking on walls like it's nothing. Perhaps you can even shoot spider silk.

Each option stems from the player's previous actions, with a wriggling black tentacle icon at the beginning of each line, seemingly selectable.

Oh! So there really is mutation point conversion. Bai Fuling widened his eyes. Good thing I didn't blindly eat the internal organs Liao Zhiqiu offered earlier. Waiting a bit longer until now gave more options to choose from freely.

And you can even change the selection afterward!

Out of curiosity, Bai Fuling nonchalantly clicked the first option.

The moment he selected [Cat], the character on the screen suddenly detached from the ceiling and dropped like a rock!

Bai Fuling: "What the—?!"

At that moment, he realized with a jolt: Crap, wrong choice!!!

He shouldn't have chosen [Cat] here; he should have [chosen] Spider! After all, cats can't hang upside down from the ceiling.

The good news is, he landed on the NPC, so his HP didn't drop much, and he didn't need to take a bite of *Pure Tentacle, Fiery Hot* to replenish his health bar. Plus, he landed right in front of Liao Zhiqiu, a level-one animal lover.

Bai Fuling made his character get up. The NPC on the ground was still lying there.

Hesitating for a moment, Bai Fuling silently opened his backpack, trying to see if he could shove the NPC into it—finding he couldn't, he sighed in relief.

Phew, not a corpse; he didn't kill the NPC! Otherwise, he'd probably be thrown in jail. Unless he also took out the eyewitness, Liao Zhiqiu.

Bai Fuling looked up at Liao Zhiqiu, who stood motionless before him.

Having witnessed the man he was talking to being knocked down, Liao Zhiqiu showed no reaction. Only when he looked at Bai Fuling again did he show a bit more emotion, saying sincerely, "Were you hunting, little cat?"

"Uh, yeah, that's right." Bai Fuling hesitated for just a second before coolly admitting, "Yes, I was hunting."

By saying this, the person on the ground was now his prey! That way, his earlier action wasn't a crime.

How could a little cat commit a crime? Cats are never guilty.

Bai Fuling crouched down and very naturally began looting the items from the unfortunate NPC on the ground.

After searching through, he didn't find anything particularly valuable on the NPC. The only thing of note was probably an ID card.

Alright, he thought. After all, the new map just opened; it's normal not to find treasure so quickly.

The first monster is usually just for dropping the key—which in this case is the ID card he just found.

"You look much better than last time." Liao Zhiqiu looked at Bai Fuling and smiled slightly. "Are you hungry? I'll take you to grab a bite."

"Is there food here?" Bai Fuling played along. He planned to see where the NPC leads for now.

Since a new character panel has already appeared, he's not afraid of eating something he shouldn't and causing mutation. Now everything has measurable stats.

Hearing the affirmative reply, Liao Zhiqiu seemed in a good mood. He walked to Bai Fuling's side: "I know where there are things you like. I'll take you."

Bai Fuling nodded and steered his character forward.

Whether it was an illusion or due to choosing the [Cat] mutation, he felt the little figure on the screen moved with more of a bounce than before—he could actually tell from the pixels! That was surprising.

He chuckled to himself.

Bai Fuling followed Liao Zhiqiu. This place indeed looked like an underground lab.

With numerous branching paths and secured doors, but Bai Fuling had snagged the ID card from the earlier NPC, so he could smoothly open every electronic door.

Whether it was a system setting or Liao Zhiqiu deliberately avoiding them, the two basically didn't encounter any other NPCs along the way.

As they passed by, Bai Fuling actively reached out to grab all clickable documents he saw. You can never have too many clues!

Passing through an electronic door, Liao Zhiqiu stopped.

The room was quite empty, with a medium-sized freezer at the front. To the side, a familiar figure was leaning against the wall, apparently asleep.

...It was Luo Qingyue!

Bai Fuling recognized him at a glance. What's he doing here?

"Oh. He's here too." Liao Zhiqiu looked over. "This is the cat my grandfather raised... No, he's not a qualified cat. He's more often human."

Such a simple sentence was packed with meaning! Bai Fuling widened his eyes slightly.

"He's not hungry anymore." Liao Zhiqiu glanced at Luo Qingyue dozing against the wall, then walked toward the freezer ahead. "But the food hasn't been delivered today."

Oh. Bai Fuling thought silently. He's not hungry because the player fed him earlier.

...He almost ate the player! They really should leash their animals, don't just let vicious dogs and cats roam freely!

But he didn't say it out loud.

The character's idle animation on the screen changed to raising a hand to brush past the hair near the ear, then touching the face—like a little cat washing its face.

"Don't worry. We can wait here." Seeing this, Liao Zhiqiu's attitude became even better. He said, "Someone will come to deliver fresh food today."

Bai Fuling listened. Although Liao Zhiqiu's words sounded a bit strange, combining them with known information, Bai Fuling pieced together some clues.

He looked down, opened his backpack containing all the clue information he had collected along the way, and planned to review it during this waiting period mentioned by Liao Zhiqiu.

Test subject, Kate Injection, values exceeding standards, unstable mental state, animalization... A series of information appeared scattered across each document.

Bai Fuling frowned, using his years of experience playing adventure puzzle games to sort through this, combining it with the earlier newspaper clues.

The Kate Injection was initially developed to enhance physical fitness, allowing bedridden patients with muscle atrophy to recover their health—that's what the newspaper reported.

However, judging from the current information at hand, after injection, a series of problems emerged. Patients exhibited symptoms like excessive excitement, loss of reason, significantly increased hunger with a preference for raw meat, tending towards animalization.

The research side chose to conceal this for further experimentation.

The newspaper only mentioned that the Kate Injection's side effects had a probability of making people irritable.

To treat the animalization condition, they entered a second phase of research, studying how to restore animalized people to normal.

However, this phase basically made no progress... Initially, they experimented on maddened cats, later injecting it into humans.

First, inject normal subjects to induce extreme beastification, then research how to reverse this transformation and return them to normal.

But the side effects at this stage are much more severe, and the human body cannot withstand them. To date, the only survivor who has recovered is Subject 022, but he remains unstable and hasn't fully shaken off the side effects of beastification.

If he doesn't eat in time, he will revert to an irrational, feral state.

Thinking it over, Bai Fuling paused briefly.

Without deep thought, he could guess that Subject 022 most likely referred to Luo Qingyue!

After all, only a few NPCs had appeared, and cross-referencing them lined up.

The clues collected so far were enough for Bai Fuling to figure out most of the story, but some questions remained:

Who was the culprit behind the Crescent Scythe Murder Case? Who was behind the red crayon sketchbook and the paperclip? Was removing the heart meant to feed the "cat"? Why did Liao Zhiqiu develop cognitive impairment, and why was he so fixated on the cat's birthday—whose birthday was it?

Bai Fuling listed these questions one by one in his mind, his gamer's heart eager to explore all mysteries and achieve great accomplishments.

On the screen, Luo Qingyue, leaning against the wall, stirred, a scribbly black cloud appearing above his head. He seemed to be waking up.

Bai Fuling noticed the movement on the screen. He looked at Luo Qingyue and suddenly remembered something: according to the files, if he isn't fed on time, he turns feral.

So, after eating, would he return to normal?

The researchers and Liao Zhiqiu didn't know that the player had already fed him in advance!

In other words, the waking Luo Qingyue was not a "cat" but a human—was the good-tempered, mom-friend librarian coming back?

Bai Fuling really wanted to know whether the other party was aware of these things.

Regardless, he could say when Luo Qingyue opened his eyes: "Hey, you're awake. Just now, you dealt 99% damage to the player and must pay 99,999 in compensation for mental damages!"

Author's Note:

Bai Fuling: First, be a cat; later, experience being a troublemaker, an angel, and Spider-Man!