Yang Guo lived up to his status as a rising top male celebrity. Though his place wasn’t as prime as Ink Orchid Mansion, it was still one of the most luxurious commercial districts in Pine City.
Jiang Xiaoyu silently crouched by the door of Yang Guo’s villa. It was dark, which played to his strengths—he was like a perfect dark chocolate ball blending seamlessly into the night.
The villa in front of him wasn’t large; it was a townhouse. He circled around it once, then leaped from a tree in front into the yard. He landed without a sound, tucking his tail like a little thief as he began searching for a way into the house.
He slipped in through a small window, carefully avoiding the lit areas and hiding meticulously in the shadows of the furniture.
A voice rang out: “Is it done?”
Yang Guo seemed to have just finished showering. Dressed in a silk bathrobe, he lounged on the living room sofa, talking on the phone.
“What the hell…” He sounded impatient, sitting up and biting his lip. “Got it. I’ll figure out how to deal with Ye Lian myself.”
“What do you want me to do about it?” His tone was annoyed. “You’re just my manager—know your place. Do you really think you’re someone to me now that Jiang Fei’s gone?”
Hearing this, Jiang Xiaoyu’s ears perked up, and he focused intently on the man.
Yang Guo sensed something off and paused with the phone in hand. “I’m hanging up.” He stood and looked around, relaxing his furrowed brow only when he found nothing. Muttering to himself, “Am I overthinking it? Feels like something’s watching me.” Then, slippers slapping, he headed into the elevator.
Jiang Xiaoyu stayed perfectly still, watching the elevator light go up. After a few minutes, a chill hit him from the side. He huddled tighter, shrinking firmly into the corner’s shadow, his pupils narrowing to slits.
Yang Guo returned to the living room holding a golf club, though it was unclear from where. He used the club to lift curtains and check around. After a thorough search with no findings, he pursed his lips. “Fine, guess it really was just me.” He tossed the club on the ground, turned with a yawn, and said, “Time to go play with the little cutie in the basement.”
Even after the figure vanished, Jiang Xiaoyu didn’t dare peek out. He cautiously shifted his view, observing through a gap in his cover. The house was silent, letting him hear faint sounds—light footsteps returning to the living room.
It was Yang Guo again, his expression gloomy now, sending a shiver through Jiang Xiaoyu. The guy’s vigilance was excessively high; just a sense of being watched had him this paranoid. Hard to imagine an ordinary person having such sharp instincts.
This time, he rummaged through the house again, locked all the doors and windows, then vanished completely from the living room.
Jiang Xiaoyu waited a bit longer, then stealthily darted to another shadow, listening intently before scanning the room layout. He quietly pushed open a small escape window, then followed Yang Guo’s direction.
The house wasn’t large but had three floors above ground, with an elevator linking to the basement and top floor. Jiang Xiaoyu didn’t dare use the elevator; he found the passage and headed to the basement.
Unlike the Ye Residence’s fully equipped, expansive underground space, this one seemed just for storage—cardboard boxes everywhere, opened and unopened, perfect for hiding.
He padded along cat-footed in the corners. Passing one spot, he caught a faint whiff of blood. Before he could pinpoint it, a miserable cat yowl rang out.
Jiang Xiaoyu’s heart jolted, and he bolted toward the sound.
It was Zhang Pangpang, his four limbs tied to a workbench. Yang Guo held a small cat nail clipper, snipping off a segment of toe bone from Zhang Pangpang’s claw tip.
The orange cat trembled all over, snarling from his mouth, “You dead freak, you’re done for.” As the baby of the family and an atavistic cat-form human, he’d been spoiled rotten since kittenhood—where had he ever endured this? Intense pain shot from his claw tip through his limbs and body; cold sweat beaded on his cat fur, nearly forcing him back to human form.
The ragdoll cat nearby paced frantically, its blue eyes brimming with tears. As Yang Guo moved to clip again, it mustered courage and yowled, lunging at him. But its claws had long been trimmed, making its scratches on the man’s face utterly feeble.
Yang Guo angrily grabbed it by the scruff and slapped it hard. “You little beast, I’ve been too nice to you, huh!?”
Zhang Pangpang strained against his restraints, yowling furiously, “Let it go! Touch it and I’ll make sure you rot in jail for life!”
Unfortunately, Yang Guo couldn’t understand. Amid their pitiful meows, he let out twisted, satisfied laughter. “Yowl louder, make it pretty so I can record it as music material.”
He slammed the ragdoll cat’s head a few times, blood trickling from its mouth, its blue eyes gradually losing luster. Yang Guo snorted coldly, “If it weren’t for those idiots fawning over you, I’d have done you in long ago. Killing you wouldn’t be hard.” An idea struck him, and he narrowed his eyes. “Arranging an ‘accident’ for some publicity isn’t bad… Say you fell from a height, and I stick by you, seeking treatment tirelessly.”
He laughed gleefully at the thought, grabbing one of the ragdoll cat’s paws and hoisting it high to smash it down. Just as Zhang Pangpang’s rage nearly forced a shift, the intrusion alarm blared at the door.
Yang Guo dropped the ragdoll cat and bolted upstairs. Zhang Pangpang yanked at his ropes, calling to it, “Tangyuan, you okay?”
After triggering the alarm on the first floor, Jiang Xiaoyu raced back to the basement, meowing lowly, “Keep it down, he’s still up top.”
Zhang Pangpang stared at the pitch-black furball like a heavenly savior descending, meowing tearfully, “Little Yu! You finally came!”
Jiang Xiaoyu had no time for the faith in those words. He shifted back to human form, snipped the ropes, scooped up both cats, hunched over, and ran out.
Zhang Pangpang’s claws throbbed in agony, yet he eyed Jiang Xiaoyu’s smooth chin, meowing, “You brat, how are you so pale? This ain’t Fat Lord taking advantage—it’s you stripping buck naked in front of Fat Lord… Of course, Fat Lord is a stand-up guy. Now that I’ve seen it, I won’t dodge responsibility. Fat Lord…”
Jiang Xiaoyu was speechless, snapping down at him, “Shut up.”
The young man’s hair was ink-black, his chest so white it nearly glowed. Zhang Pangpang felt dazzled, his claws forgetting the pain as he whined, “So fierce… Not a good wife cat…”
Jiang Xiaoyu ignored him, setting him down by a vent shaft. “Can you climb up?”
The walls weren’t smooth, with plenty of protrusions. Zhang Pangpang glanced and replied, “Yeah.” Gritting through the claw pain, he climbed quickly. Jiang Xiaoyu stroked the ragdoll cat in his arms. “Little guy, you holding up?”
The ragdoll cat’s body was limp without strength, dried blood at its mouth. Jiang Xiaoyu swallowed his fury, shifted back to cat form, and said, “I’ll carry it up; you catch.”
The vent shaft was tall. Hauling a cat heavier than himself, Jiang Xiaoyu climbed with excruciating difficulty, teeth clenched, claws scraping up one by one, limbs shaking from overexertion.
Progress was agonizingly slow.
Jiang Xiaoyu felt his heart pounding out of his throat, breaths coming quick and ragged. Sweat soaked his fur, dripping down his cheeks. His jaw ached from the prolonged carry, but he didn’t dare slacken.
Finally at the top, Jiang Xiaoyu was too exhausted to even swish his tail. He carefully set the ragdoll cat down, then collapsed beside it, panting heavily, limbs twitching with spasms from the strain.
Zhang Pangpang checked the ragdoll cat’s head. Jiang Xiaoyu gasped, “Where’re your clothes? Get it to the hospital quick.”
The orange cat had no heart for antics now. He took over, grabbing the scruff loosely and mumbling, “C’mon, shortcut that way.” He turned to go but heard no movement behind, looking back puzzled. “?”
Jiang Xiaoyu steadied his breathing, gaze calm. “You go ahead. I need to go back for something.”
Zhang Pangpang panicked, dropping the ragdoll cat. “No way! That psycho’s super vigilant—you’ll be done if he catches you!” His claws sweated anxiously, but Jiang Xiaoyu was resolute. “Don’t worry. I’ll be fine and get evidence too.”
Seeing the orange cat unmoved, Zhang Pangpang gritted his teeth. “If you’re not out in an hour, I’ll call the police.” Without waiting, he snatched up the ragdoll cat and bolted.
Jiang Xiaoyu exhaled, peeked down the vent—silent—then slipped back to the basement.
Yang Guo had returned once, panicking at the missing cats. He called Zhao Peng. “Those two beasts are gone!”
Zhao Peng doted on Yang Guo, even tolerating his twisted hobbies. “Told you to just kill ’em. Why keep ’em so long?”
Yang Guo snapped irritably, “Idiot! That’s not the point! The ropes were cleanly cut—like with clippers! How’d two cats do that!”
Zhao Peng caught the anomaly. “Some reporter sneak in?”
Yang Guo’s face darkened. “Knew I felt eyes on me upstairs.”
“What now?”
“I’ve locked down the security system. No passcode, nothing opens. Let’s see how it gets out.”
The other side seemed to say something more, but Yang Guo had no mood to keep listening. He hung up the phone, scanned the workbench, pinched that blood-stained cat toe bone, and let out a cold sneer: “You’d better not get caught by me.”
He turned and headed back downstairs. A faint rustling sound came from a cardboard box in the corner. Jiang Xiaoyu silently poked his head out. He cautiously observed his surroundings and confirmed that Yang Guo had walked far away before lightly and quietly jumping out of the box.
The bloody scent still lingered. He sniffed around nonstop, thanks to the fifty million olfactory receptors from his cat body. At a corner, he discovered a box sealed with tape. He scratched open the tape with his claws, stretched out his body, pounced to the box mouth, and reached inside with his paw, hooking out a blood-stained shirt.
The bloodstains had turned brown, turning the shirt’s originally soft fabric stiff and dry. The bloody smell was even stronger up close, and his acute sense of smell was especially torturous for the cat right now. Jiang Xiaoyu held his breath and pulled out the shirt. Just as he prepared to turn and leave, footsteps sounded from behind.
In that instant, goosebumps erupted all over his body as if he’d been electrocuted. He fiercely jumped into a paper box and slammed the lid shut, holding his breath and listening intently to the sounds outside.
Yang Guo held a sharp knife in his hand and returned to the basement with a gloomy expression. “Where are you hiding?” he muttered under his breath. He kicked aside a obstructing cardboard box, then tilted his head as he eyed the large and small boxes before him. “…Could it be in one of the boxes?”
With a creepy chuckle, he gripped the knife and stabbed into a box big enough to fit a person. No scream came as expected. He pursed his lips in dissatisfaction, pulled out the knife, and stabbed a few more times. After stabbing several large boxes without finding anyone, he frowned and turned his gaze to the smaller boxes. “Are the little beasts hiding in these?”
Jiang Xiaoyu’s heart pounded in his chest as he heard the footsteps drawing closer.
Yang Guo twirled the knife tip in a flourish and suddenly noticed the box where he’d stored the shirt.
“…I remember, that box—I sealed it shut?”
At this moment, Jiang Xiaoyu’s heart drummed like thunder, his heartbeat drowning out Yang Guo’s eerie and twisted whisper. He forcefully suppressed his inner panic and calmly pondered his escape route for breaking out later.
If he were just a lone cat, he wouldn’t need to worry about a way out. But he had to take the evidence with him. If he missed this chance, he might never get another opportunity to approach this room.
He gripped the shirt tightly under his claws and focused his mind intensely, listening to the movements outside the box.
He heard the knife tip scrape across the side of the box. Right after, a sound pierced his eardrums.
