Cat 186: An Identical Black Cat

Chapter 186: An Identical Black Cat

Yan Jiyun could only choose between options A and B, but he didn’t have to consider the first one at all—the system hadn’t even given him a chance to pick it.

[Please make your choice within 5 seconds.]

Yan Jiyun chose B.

[You have made the correct choice. You will be transferred to the main account’s copy in 3 seconds. Please prepare to enter the top-tier instance “Sweet Christmas”!]

What the hell is “Sweet Christmas”—what kind of family celebrates Christmas with people dying?

What’s there to prepare for, mental preparation? Closing his eyes, maybe blinking—that’s about all he could get ready.

He really was at a loss for words.

The system never cared how the players felt. In fact, the more rattled the players were, the closer it got to the essence of the game, and the closer it came to the scenes most viewers loved watching: the unknown, the terrifying, deadly traps around every corner.

Yan Jiyun didn’t close his eyes. Suddenly, he asked the system: “What is the current status of the main account’s player?”

It was only after regaining his composure that he realized something—this time, the notification wasn’t coming through the main-pet link to hint at Qi Feng’s state, but was relating to the safety of the main account’s player himself. Did this mean Qi Feng could be sending a cry for help to his friends? Had things really gotten that dangerous?

He still remembered the little card Qi Yunchu had previously passed to Qi Feng bearing Su Qiuming’s plea for help. But this time, Qi Feng hadn’t sent a card like the other had. Could it be that players pulled into the game who were in mortal danger would not get an out-of-game help opportunity like the first batch of instance entrants?

Just what kind of danger was Qi Feng in? No wonder his pet notification system no longer showed any updates. The threat level must have been this high.

Regardless, he and Qi Feng were now inseparable. He had to save him.

If Qi Feng didn’t survive, neither would he.

As for the current instance, let the system do whatever it wanted. He’d just go along with it.

[3—2—1. Player will now be transported from “Devotion to My Pet” to the “Sweet Christmas” instance!]

Suddenly, everything in front of Yan Jiyun went pitch black.

At the same time, his livestream went black as well.

“Wannabe Human” Livestream Room:

“Fuck, what’s going on—why is the screen black!? Did the cat cub go into rest mode? There’s some terrifying shadow on the screen, but looking closer—damn, it’s just my own reflection.”

“Ahhhh? Is this a massive network issue or something? Why can’t I watch the cat cub’s stream?”

“Me too. Did the game disconnect?”

“No, I can see his teammates are still streaming live. The instance is running just fine—it’s just the cat cub with issues.”

“[Cry-laugh] Is cat cub facing some sudden event again? I’m not even shocked anymore—just wanna find out what the hell happened!”

“Let’s all wait a moment.”

Just then, a system message popped up in the stream room.

[The player is transitioning between instances. Reconnection to the stream will take 120 seconds. Please be patient.]

“What? Never seen this before. I have to post this on the forum for everyone to see.”

“What’s with cat cub’s constitution? Why does he attract every weird event? Why did he transfer instances without any warning this time?”

“No idea. Wish we could see the cat cub’s profile—such a shame we can’t.”

“Anxious, seriously anxious. Thought this would be like any other instance, but something unexpected happened. What is it, anyway!?”

As audiences camped patiently for the stream to resume, Yan Jiyun was already being transferred from instance A to instance B.

This time, it wasn’t a bug; the entire process went smoothly.

After what he’d experienced in the last instance, Yan Jiyun had become calm enough to switch game settings with barely a flicker of emotion. Scene changes? He wasn’t afraid of that at all.

From a few notifications Qi Feng had sent, it was clear that “Sweet Christmas” was no simple mystery copy. Mutated monsters would appear in this one. He’d entered in cat form—hopefully, he wouldn’t land right in the center of danger.

His entrance differed from Qi Feng’s. They had been drawn in passively; he, on the other hand, had chosen to enter. The circumstances he faced should be different as well.

Qi Feng might not rescue Su Qiuming after entering, but he himself was going into the game for Qi Feng alone.

So—his first priority upon entering was to find Qi Feng and save him. The only problem was that he didn’t know what deadly threat Qi Feng was facing, nor how much longer he could hold out.

He hoped Qi Feng would hang on until he arrived. Qi Feng had to endure.

At last, Yan Jiyun’s body steadied, and he opened his eyes.

At the same time, his livestream restarted. A flood of comments poured in, so thick that nobody could make out which message belonged to whom—each new post buried the last.

[Player’s livestream has resumed.]

[Welcome to the “Sweet Christmas” instance.]

[Because you joined mid-game, you are exempt from the main mission. Your only goal is to survive to the end of this instance. Enjoy the game~]

Yan Jiyun immediately checked the time left in this instance.

[Time to instance end: 20 hours, 5 minutes, and 20 seconds.]

A top-tier instance lasted this long?

Although this was an unplanned entry, where life and death was a real concern, gathering information was as important as saving lives.

He was now standing at the entrance of a mall. On both sides of the door, Christmas trees were planted; on the right stood a giant Santa Claus doll whose once-kind smile had twisted into something sinister and eerie.

Festive decorations filled the inside and out of the mall, but the floor was littered with severed limbs and dismembered bodies; the stench of blood was overpowering. Yan Jiyun stuck out his tongue, nearly gagging.

“Wannabe Human” Livestream Room:

“Holy shit, I see the instance info—top, top-tier instance! What did cat cub do this time—how on earth did he end up in a top-tier? System bugging out again?”

“Sweet Christmas? Damn, I remember you even need to pay extra to watch this one. Lemme check if they took my money.”

“No deduction—I guess cat cub entered too late. And look, only 20 hours left on the instance clock.”

“Any experts know why cat cub’s here? Shit, this garbage game just made me even more curious! Never done it like this before—just 20 hours left, can cat cub even finish?”

“Oh no, this instance is brutally hard! Cat cub’s barely played ten instances—can he survive?”

“Aaaaah, damn system—are you trying to kill my cat cub on purpose? I don’t allow him to enter something so dangerous! There’s no way out!”

Yan Jiyun next checked the player list.

[Online players: 30/500]

Only thirty left out of five hundred!

The full five hundred likely included people who had been pulled into the game by others; each original survivor could bring in ten new players, but not everyone succeeded in that. Judging by the numbers now, tossed together with the forcibly drawn-in, a total of five hundred at peak had entered this instance!

Other than the peak tournament, this was the largest player population Yan Jiyun had ever seen in a copy. Now, only thirty of five hundred remained.

His pet system menu still glowed; his tool bar, too, remained open. After taking stock of the situation, he didn’t hesitate to use all the goodwill items he’d collected.

[You have used: Tuna x2, goodwill with your owner increased by 2 points.]

[You have used: Sardines x2, goodwill with your owner increased by 2 points.]

[You have used: Beef Patty x2, goodwill with your owner increased by 2 points.]

From a goodwill score of 20, he’d just jumped 6 more points.

Yan Jiyun couldn’t tell if anything in the pet menu had changed significantly. If only he could locate Qi Feng’s position.

His pet menu did, in fact, have a “locate master” function, but he still didn’t have enough goodwill points to unlock it.

Tsk. How on earth was he supposed to grind goodwill now?

He had always been reluctant to expose his identity to Qi Feng, but now, truly at death’s door, he found he didn’t care as much.

He didn’t understand this instance at all, had no useful information whatsoever—how was he supposed to find Qi Feng?

There were footsteps of people running inside the mall. Yan Jiyun slipped through a bloodstained wind curtain to enter.

Inside, the number of audible footsteps exceeded thirty; it felt like fifty or sixty at least.

Why so many? Was there only one giant mall in this copy? Did every player stay within the mall?

If so, then wouldn’t Qi Feng be somewhere in here as well?

Suddenly, Yan Jiyun had a clear direction.

The first floor of the enormous mall was filled with all sorts of luxury skincare brands, each shop running Christmas promotions, decorated with discount banners. After the monster attack, the place was in shambles—bottles shattered and creams smeared everywhere.

Yan Jiyun leapt over the debris and spilled lotions, heading straight upstairs.

There may have been nobody around, but the elevators were still running.

He took the escalator up easily to the second floor.

Compared with the atmosphere-driven horror of “Devotion to My Pet,” this was true nightmare; a living hell.

Blood covered the floor and blackened stains ran all along the walls, the stench unbearable.

Near the top of the escalator, in a men’s clothing store, Yan Jiyun saw a pile of men whose guts had been torn open, blood and organs leaking everywhere. Seeing it head-on for the first time, his stomach lurched; he really did need that mental preparation.

Fuck! This was revolting!

It was more than a test of endurance—it attacked his mental health. If every instance were like this, even survivors would eventually lose their minds.

No wonder Qi Feng always sought him out after an instance; cats truly were healing for the soul.

He counted himself lucky he’d never entered one of these brutal, kill-or-be-killed instances before.

A guttural, almost crazed voice suddenly shouted, “Where are you! Come out!”

Speak of being driven mad by an instance—Yan Jiyun ran right into it. He rounded the corner toward the sound—a sportswear store’s entrance—where a man stood with a blood-smeared baseball bat, face stubbled, right eye bandaged. He looked as jumpy as a startled bird, darting his one good eye at every sound.

Just then, the mall’s speakers burst out with the familiar song “Jingle Bells.” Sung in a nursery style, it was more unnerving than hearing the wind howl through Liu Jinghao’s funeral parlor in the dead of night—downright chilling.

Yan Jiyun didn’t recognize the mentally broken player. Not knowing the situation, he wasn’t about to approach him carelessly. Besides, as a cat, he couldn’t very well run up and ask what was going on.

What kind of events drove a player qualified for a top-tier copy to such a state? Maybe he wasn’t one of the original entrants, but was part of the batch drawn in with Qi Feng.

Was Qi Feng like this too by now?

After seeing the player, Yan Jiyun noticed a new data bar had appeared on his system interface.

[Current sanity corruption: 99]

As a gaming enthusiast, Yan Jiyun was no stranger to such numbers—he’d just thought they only existed in games. But here they were, embedded in “Destiny’s” instance.

The sanity corruption meter, derived from Western horror, now formed part of the game’s mechanics. Considering the system’s style, it probably didn’t function the way he expected—otherwise, why would this copy allow outside support, only for every “rescuer” to get trapped too?

Yan Jiyun kept running toward the most crowded area. On the way, he encountered a woman tearing out her own hair in a frenzy. Blood oozed from her scalp as she screamed continually.

“Don’t come any closer, don’t come! I am me! You can never beat me!”

Another one gone mad?

Nearly ten minutes had passed since Yan Jiyun entered.

Since mental corruption was present, did that mean there was something inside the copy capable of polluting everyone’s minds?

What could it be?

“Wannabe Human” Livestream Room:

“Cat cub’s been in there nearly ten minutes, right?”

“Just about.”

“You think that thing is about to appear?”

“What thing? Is it scary?”

“Terrifying! Absolutely terrifying!”

“Aaaaah, I’m scared. Will cat cub even stand a chance?”

“Help, I don’t want to watch that gross thing defeat cat cub.”

“Don’t worry, his corruption level is still low. He isn’t scared at all.”

“But I really want to see what it is… Think cat cub will freak out or jump in fright?”

Yan Jiyun studied the mall’s layout. He’d come in through tower C—judging by the plan, there should be towers A, B, and, at a stretch, D as well.

Moving toward the sound, he felt it draw nearer and nearer, though no sign of people appeared.

In the children’s wear section, he suddenly caught sight of a familiar figure.

Wasn’t that Qi Yunchu—the one who’d also gotten the card? Yan Jiyun was pretty sure it was him; his features were distinctive.

Qi Yunchu turned from the children’s section toward the elevators and emergency staircase, and Yan Jiyun followed discreetly.

As Yan Jiyun tailed him, he heard more chaotic footsteps behind. Qi Yunchu, running ahead, kept his composure, while whomever was behind him was panting in panic. Qi Yunchu ran fast—if it weren’t for the footsteps, Yan wouldn’t have believed he was using any special item, though who was to say he couldn’t be? Still, in Qi Yunchu’s eyes, Qi Feng was already exceptionally capable, and he’d entered first—yet now, even Qi Feng was close to cracking while Qi Yunchu outran everyone. Was it that Qi Feng was slipping, or had Qi Yunchu been hiding his true ability?

Just then, a black shape shot past Yan Jiyun’s eyes.

Yes, “shot past” was precisely the right phrase—a dark shape streaked by. Was there a mirror up ahead?

He took a few steps forward; in the central area, sure enough, the store interiors had mirrors, but not the corridors. The only reflective surface in the hall was near the fire equipment station, and he was just a cat, not a person.

Had he seen wrong, or had a cat identical to him just flashed past?

Was there really another cat in this game that looked just like him?

Yan Jiyun stood in place, thinking for three seconds, then bolted in the direction the black cat had run.

Good. Little Black—now you have my attention. I do not permit another black cat identical to me to exist in this copy.

“Wannabe Human” Livestream Room:

“Fuck, don’t chase it, cat cub—come back! That’s a trap!”