The starry sea was vast, and the Star Network boundless. Live streams existed in the network like carp crossing the river—how could a little cat get noticed amid them all?
Alpha-13 was a machine sealed away for a century, an ancient relic lonely for tens of thousands of days and months even after syncing its database. It covered everything meticulously, but it couldn’t avoid overlooking this one detail.
But that was fine. The Star Network’s AI favored this extremely polite little cat and, without violating any rules, pushed him to the front of the newcomer stream pool.
This was a natural pool with massive viewer traffic and a huge number of streamers. All new Star Network streamers would be placed here on the rankings for a month, and since viewing was free, plenty of people came to scout fresh faces.
[Morning, everyone. Let’s see what fun newbies we have today.]
[I saw a pretty good one yesterday, heh heh, black stockings and beautiful legs… Forgot to bookmark, lemme go dig it up.]
[Eh? What’s this? Little Cat Stream?]
Li Ao’s stream room name was, naturally, something he’d requested from the AI with his chubby face all bashful.
[Lemme check it out.]
[! Oh my god, what new species is this? So cute, so adorable!]
[How cute? Not even cuter than that little cat from the league—wait, fck me, this is our mighty and domineering Little Cat Bro!!!]
[Aaaah oh my god the real live Little Cat Bro aaaah]
The little cat was originally squatting properly, but after getting tired, he flopped down like a farmer. He could hear the ding-ding-dong-dong sounds of people entering the stream and see the barrage messages flashing on the screens around him. But he was illiterate, so naturally, he couldn’t respond.
[Aaaah Little Cat Highness, did you see my message? Notice me!]
The cat saw it, the cat didn’t recognize it, the cat was itchy, the cat lifted a paw to scratch.
His short hind leg struggled to lift, kicking furiously at the itchy spot—kick kick kick kick kick.
[Cat legs! Cute cat legs! Let me take a bite!]
[I’m gonna tell everyone I know—Little Cat Highness is live streaming on Star Network aaaah]
The league was still on hiatus, and the little cat hadn’t appeared on the monitors for several days. So once this message spread on Star Network, it instantly drew a flood of league viewers pouring in crazily.
[Wait, why did so many high-level accounts suddenly rush in?]
On Star Network, account levels rose with payments and gifts. High-level accounts had bright red borders on their avatars, known as red-border accounts—extremely eye-catching.
[Whoa, even more just came? This stream just went live minutes ago, and it’s almost at five hundred viewers?]
That wasn’t the key point. The key was that among these five hundred accounts, the vast majority were yellow-border and red-border! White-border and gray-border were the most common on Star Network; they mostly stuck to free zones, so they’d never encountered so many mid-to-high-level accounts.
It wasn’t hard to understand. Dawn League matches themselves required a subscription, and not a cheap one—something ordinary folks couldn’t afford. Otherwise, would the Federation be stupid enough to spend a fortune on expensive monitors for a laborious tournament with no revenue?
Just the Dawn League subscription fees alone brought the Federation government trillions in star coins—not to mention all the peripheral income.
[Little Cat Highness, please accept my sincerest love!!!] Viewers wanted to send gifts to the little cat but found he hadn’t enabled gifting. Turns out, when the AI had guided him through the tutorial, it asked if he wanted to turn it on, and he’d rejected it without hesitation.
In the little cat’s view of education, you couldn’t take people’s money for nothing. Grandma said you had to give to receive—we had hands and feet, we could work ourselves.
The little cat was a good cat, the little cat listened to Grandma.
[Eh, we can pay for a private line? Me me!] Viewers who couldn’t gift discovered they could initiate a solo line for just the minimum hundred bucks and immediately sent a request.
But the second he dialed, someone beat him to it.
AI notification: [Little Cat Streamer, your viewer is now online.]
Li Ao paused, then climbed up from the ground. “Hello? Did someone come?”
The moment he spoke, an astral projection appeared before Li Ao.
The first thing he saw was a pair of bare feet, then calves, then he craned his little head up and met a pair of golden eyes.
According to comparison theory, when facing an ordinarily excellent person, you might feel affinity or jealousy. But when facing someone extraordinarily excellent, you’d subconsciously want to avoid the comparison, even feel fear. It was a classic psychological defense mechanism.
So when the viewers recognized who was connecting with the little cat, the noisy barrage instantly went silent. Born in the free Federation, they sneered at monarchy, but in this moment, they instinctively held their breath, trembling in awe.
But the little cat was different. The little cat wasn’t scared—he was bold, and a bit of an unwitting face-connoisseur.
With his fluffy flower collar making his already round head look even bigger…
This person was really good-looking… The little cat’s eyes sparkled as he toddled over—one waddle, two waddles, right to the guy’s feet.
“What’s your name?” His little paw wanted to climb on the foot, but it was just a regular astral projection, so he swiped at empty air.
The little thing spoke ancient Chinese?
Isiris elegantly crossed his legs in his chair, lowering his gaze to the tiny fluffball at his feet, and said coolly, “Who might the one before me be?”
The fluffy cat chest puffed right up. “Li Ao!”
Isiris said, “Then, Li Ao. Remember well—my name is Isiris Regalis.”
Too long, couldn’t remember. The cat’s eyes went watery as he beamed and shortened it automatically: “Xixi.”
Isiris’s sword brows twitched slightly, somewhat surprised by his boldness. “How old are you?”
The little cat stretched out one round paw, then added a toe. “Six years old.”
“Where do you live?” Isiris had no interest in beating around the bush and asked for the address directly. He had the power to be arrogant—even if he learned the little cat’s star system coordinates right now, Imperial warships would reach him before anyone else.
But the little cat had been drilled by the robot too long and remembered the Machine’s warnings. Cautiously, he replied like it was read-receipted: “Li Ao lives in Aiai’ang’ang.”
The cat listened to the Machine. The cat didn’t tell anyone where he lived.
“!!!” The robot monitoring from behind practically wanted to thrash the cat’s butt. Speechless at how brainless this kitten was, yet relieved he was dumb enough to misremember the planet name.
Isiris seemed pleased by the reply, propping his face as he chuckled lightly to the side. “You’re pretty smart.”
A bit of wariness, but not much.
The cat was smart, the cat was proud—he praised the cat, so he was a good person.
Thanks to an unwitting blood bond, the little cat felt natural trust and fondness for the man before him.
He wanted to chat more, but his back started itching again. He wanted to scratch with a paw but couldn’t reach.
Xun saw him like that and wanted to go scratch for him, but the robot cautiously stopped him.
Though the little monster currently looked nothing like a Xenoid… the robot worried someone might spot its abnormality. Not to protect the little monster, of course—when beating a dog, you still had to mind the master. If someone hurt something this stubborn cat had latched onto, he’d really pounce and bite with teeth.
After all, the robot had already been bitten over the dog-raising thing before.
Xun didn’t come to help Li Ao, and he couldn’t reach himself. Itching unbearably, his four legs splayed as he flopped to the ground and frantically rubbed against the floor.
Some time passed, and the barrage gradually revived.
[Your, Your Majesty, this is really Delphi’s emperor, right?]
[Golden hair, golden eyes—no mistake… So handsome. A million times handsomer than photos.]
[My legs are jelly. No wonder Delphi calls their monarch the sun.]
Isiris frowned slightly, and the barrage vanished again. Everyone held their breath, not daring a peep, as the monarch reached toward the little cat. “Come here.”
Li Ao’s eyes were teary from the itch. Hearing the voice, he scrambled up, paws trying to hook onto the man’s calf to climb, but it was just a projection—he swiped empty air again.
Seeing how pitiful he looked, Isiris had a guess. “Activate astral projection.”
The AI, well-acquainted with the monarch, wasted no words and directly charged: [Understood. Deducting one million star coins—astral projection activating in one minute.]
[Fck fck, badass!! Fck! First time in my life seeing someone activate astral projection!]
Astral projection was a virtual reality tech that simulated the body 1:1, enabling remote physical contact.
Not the real body, but the highly realistic sim even had tactile feedback—indistinguishable from actual touch in terms of sensation. Its technical difficulty made the activation fee exorbitant.
With the function enabled, Isiris’s projection materialized. He patted his thigh and said to the cat, “Come here.”
The little cat wised up this time, probing with a paw first to confirm he could touch, then started climbing.
His stubby legs climbed surprisingly fast, huffing and puffing up the man’s thigh before shoving his back against the hand. “Scratch scratch.”
The soft touch under his palm caused Isiris a brief pause. He had a nephew, a frail white lion cub. He simply disliked cubs and rarely interacted with Ryan. He’d only held the other once, and the cub’s fur was coarse and hard, completely different from the kitten’s texture.
That kid Zane had an unreliable personality, but damn if he wasn’t good at siring offspring.
Unaware that this was actually his own cub, the lion dad reached out to stroke the itchy spot along the kitten’s back.
The human hand was warm and large, nothing like Xun’s cool, sticky paws. Having been petted just right, Li Ao started purring.
Isiris’s fingertips threaded through the kitten’s long fur, pausing when they passed over two subtle protrusions. He’d once doubted the cat’s bloodline, but now he understood. Only Regalis’s lineage could produce wings that soared through the skies.
“Little guy, you’re going to grow wings.”
The kitten blinked in confusion. “Huh?”
Slender fingers gently rubbed over the kitten’s shoulder blades. “Where’s your guardian?”
“What’s a guardian?”
Isiris never knew he could have such good patience. “Who’s taking care of you?”
