DSMC Chapter 7

The one who needed protection, Li Muyang, was carrying Yan Jiyun and ran toward the school cafeteria.

Perhaps because Li Muyang was too small and skinny, carrying the relatively heavy Yan Jiyun made his arms tremble. He hadn’t run far before Yan Jiyun jumped down from his arms. He was happy to enjoy the joy of not walking, but not in the arms of a kid being bullied. He wasn’t crippled, after all.

As soon as the lunch bell rang, elementary school students swarmed toward the cafeteria to eat.

After the commotion all morning, it was finally time for lunch.

Unlike in middle or high school, elementary school cafeterias had teachers supervising the students while they queued for food.

At this time, Li Muyang was also hungry. But having just been frightened by those players, he chose to hide with Yan Jiyun under the windowsill near the cafeteria.

The aroma of food drifted from the cafeteria, and not only was Li Muyang hungry, Yan Jiyun was starving too. A cat’s body was different from a human’s, it’s small, prone to hunger, and not able to eat much at once. Eating too much in one go could burden the body and cause vomiting. He’d always eaten small portions, multiple times a day.

The cafeteria was on the first floor. The boy and the cat crouched in the bushes, the black cat perking up his ears to listen closely to what was going on inside.

At home, if he was hungry, he ate. If he wasn’t, he slept or went out for a walk. He had been ready to enter retirement — who would’ve thought he’d be pulled into such a weird game? He really missed the days with his pooper scooper at home.

The cafeteria was also a hotspot for random events. If Li Muyang went in to eat now, he might get soup or water spilled on him by classmates, which would further reduce his health points.

Just as that thought crossed his mind, the system popped up with a warning showing Li Muyang’s health was dropping again.

[Li Muyang’s HP has dropped to 55%.]

Yan Jiyun: “…” Speak of the devil.

There were no visible injuries on Li Muyang. His HP was probably dropping due to hunger.

Yan Jiyun considered using his identity to beg food from the children, but if he ran into a student like Wang Qiqi again, it would only cause more trouble. Still, he couldn’t generalize, maybe there were still kind-hearted students who’d feed him?

If Li Muyang died, who knew what would happen in the game. Based on his experience, when the main NPC died, the game ended, and that included him.

So Yan Jiyun changed his plan and stopped hiding in the bushes. He jumped onto the cafeteria windowsill and crouched in front of a few little girls near the edge, staring intently at the food on their trays.

Little girls generally liked small animals. One of them said, “Wow, what a cute Mimi.”

Though Yan Jiyun was close, he kept a safe distance.

The girl, with a soft heart, kindly handed him a bun. Yan Jiyun took the bun in his mouth and turned to leave.

The girl who gave him the bun: “…”

Yan Jiyun darted back into the bushes and stuffed the bun into Li Muyang’s hands.

i Muyang understood his intention, lightly patted his head, and said with a slight stutter, “Th-thank you… Sesame.”

Yan Jiyun stared at him, then tapped his hand with a paw to urge him to eat quickly. After one bite, Li Muyang’s HP stopped dropping.

With his HP stabilized, Li Muyang generously gave Yan Jiyun some affection points.

[Player Yan Jiyun gained +25 Favorability with Li Muyang.]

Other players: “……”

Were they just playing the game the wrong way?

Yan Jiyun hadn’t even shown up, and yet he kept gaining favorability from the main character!

Yan Jiyun had gotten used to receiving Li Muyang’s favorability points. His stomach still rumbling, he jumped back to the cafeteria window and used the same trick again — crouching in front of another little girl and staring at the bun on her tray. As expected, she gave it to him, it was even a veggie bun.

The black cat carried the bun off in his mouth, clever and efficient.

Back at Li Muyang’s side, Yan Jiyun began to slowly eat the bun he’d just begged for. He had exercised far more than usual today and had a healthy appetite.

[Livestream Channel]

“It’s eating so well, now I’m hungry too.”

“Poor kitty. It should be eating meat cans, not veggie buns.”

“Hahaha, the other players are completely baffled, watching Li Muyang’s HP drop and suddenly stabilize, with no idea why. Must feel like riding a roller coaster.”

“This game is way more entertaining than a roller coaster.”

“Mimi has finished the bun. Damn, now it’s licking itself! Its little pink tongue is showing! How can it be this cute?!”

Yan Jiyun didn’t particularly want to groom himself, but it was just a cat’s instinct. He couldn’t really control it. When his fur was dirty, he felt the urge to clean it. Otherwise, he felt really uncomfortable. It felt like some kind of impulse. 

He had spent a whole year as a cat. It had become a habit, pure instinct.

He and Li Muyang stayed hidden outside the cafeteria, enjoying a rare moment of rest and even catching some sunlight to soak up calcium.

Meanwhile, the other players continued splitting up and searching for Li Muyang in a carpet-style sweep.

Since a player had broken into the surveillance room that morning, the security captain was now watching it closely, making it impossible for the players to sneak back in. They had no idea where Li Muyang had gone.

There were ten players total. Seven were fighting in that sports equipment room, one is Yan Jiyun, leaving two unaccounted for. It’s likely these two must’ve been in the surveillance room earlier.

Yan Jiyun mentally divided the other nine players into three teams. From what the other players had said, the score calculation for this game instance was tied to their contribution to Li Muyang’s HP. That meant he needed to stay close to Li Muyang at all times.

As the boy and the cat rested, a few elementary students approached. The bushes didn’t fully conceal Li Muyang, and Yan Jiyun could already hear their footsteps and chatter. He tapped Li Muyang’s pant leg, signaling him to crouch lower in the bushes. But unfortunately, Li Muyang’s school uniform gave him away.

One student said, “Li Muyang, P.E. class is about to start. What are you doing here?”

So much for a leisurely break, time really flew. It was his own fault for being too laid-back normally and having no real sense of time!

Yan Jiyun glanced at the time in the corner of his vision, it’s almost 2:30 PM.

Li Muyang looked at Yan Jiyun hiding in the shade of the trees, then turned to his classmate and said, “Class monitor, I’ll go to class right now.”

He followed the class monitor toward the sports field, worried that Yan Jiyun hadn’t kept up, so he kept looking back. Yan Jiyun was walking under the shade of the trees. To reassure him, he poked his head out of the bushes from time to time, and occasionally waved his tail.

A faint smile appeared on Li Muyang’s otherwise expressionless face.

Yan Jiyun thought to himself that the kid’s smile was kind of cute. At that moment, he actually experienced a bit of what it felt like… to raise a child.

[Livestream Channel] 

“Kitty is so good, so good!”

“Damn, damn, damn! This is killing me with cuteness! Wuwuwu, how can I get such an adorable little kitty?”

“How can you be this cute?! Help, I need oxygen!”

“Sucking[mfn]not really “sucking” like “sucking straws” per se, but more like if you put your whole face to your pet’s belly (or back, if you don’t want claws to your face) and start sniffing and “sucking” in the healing power.[/mfn] like crazy!”

“Reward! Reward! Reward!” 

“I really want to play hide and seek with it. Wuwuwu, this is killing me with cuteness!”

While the viewers in the livestream were screaming “meng, meng, meng[mfn]the same as Japanese “moe”[/mfn]!” in their hearts, Yan Jiyun was thinking about what might happen to Li Muyang during P.E. class.

And soon he found out.

The P.E. teacher had organized the students of Class 4-6 to practice basketball, and even set up team matches. Li Muyang’s opponents were all taller and stronger than him.

Yan Jiyun himself was pretty good at basketball, but that’s only when he’s human. Right now, even if he wanted to help, he couldn’t.

Li Muyang’s body was weak from frequent beatings by his mother, and he hadn’t fully recovered from his last illness. His physical condition was poor. He was knocked to the ground by one of the stronger players, and lost another 5 health points from the bumps and falls.

Li Muyang was clearly visible on the playground, making him an easy target for other players.

Before long, the trio who had previously kidnapped Li Muyang returned in a new disguise. Yang Xue found an excuse to get the P.E. teacher to leave, and the hoodie-wearing young man took over the P.E. teacher for this class. He immediately pulled Li Muyang off the court, preventing his health from dropping further.

[Li Muyang’s HP has dropped to 50%.]

Li Muyang’s knee was scraped and bleeding after being knocked over by a classmate, and his health began to plummet. Wang Mian carried him to the school infirmary.

Their goal had been achieved again. The hoodie-wearing youth found an excuse to let the rest of the class play on their own.

Yan Jiyun quietly followed.

Their destination was the school infirmary. Yan Jiyun stopped about five meters away. The doctor in the infirmary was not a good person.

As soon as Wang Mian entered, he saw the doctor. Dr. Chi immediately recognized that Wang Mian wasn’t a school employee, though Wang Mian didn’t realize he’d been found out.

“Doctor, this student hurt his leg. Could you take a look, please?”

Dr. Chi quickly disinfected and treated Li Muyang’s injured knee.

But while Wang Mian had his back turned and was asking Li Muyang if it hurt, Dr. Chi suddenly showed a sinister smile and pressed a chloroform-soaked cloth over Wang Mian’s mouth and nose. Wang Mian struggled briefly before collapsing to the ground.

Li Muyang jumped off the chair to run, but he was also knocked out by the doctor.

Yan Jiyun heard the sound of something heavy being dragged. Li Muyang’s footsteps were gone too.

The school infirmary was quite far from the other academic buildings, but it was very close to the parking lot.

Li Muyang had been taken away by Dr. Chi, who was clearly no good. If no one intervened, Li Muyang was definitely going to die. Seeing Wang Mian and Li Muyang about to be carted away, Yan Jiyun listened carefully for nearby sounds. Yang Xue and the hoodie-wearing youth hadn’t arrived yet. He had to stop Dr. Chi from leaving the school.

He had noticed the first time he visited that Dr. Chi had OCD and a strong cleanliness compulsion.

Yan Jiyun dipped his paw in some mud and pretended to be a reckless cat. He jumped into the infirmary and began stomping and hopping around on the white paper on Dr. Chi’s desk. Then he leapt onto a storage cabinet and began knocking down the glass bottles he could reach with his paw.

The bottles shattered on the ground, releasing a mixture of pungent smells. Dr. Chi, who hadn’t gone far, immediately stopped what he was doing. His face turned stiff.

Who had touched his things?

The thing he hated most was people touching his stuff!

Dr. Chi pushed the red-haired man and Li Muyang back into the room and returned to the office. There, he saw a black cat perched on the cabinet, stretching out its paw toward a bottle of alcohol. The glass bottle wobbled precariously before finally falling and shattering.

Dr. Chi looked at the muddy paw prints on his desk, his face like ice. “Naughty little cat… I’m going to braise your little paws.”

Yan Jiyun crouched on the cabinet, looking down at him with an unblinking gaze, so calm that not a trace of the storm in his heart showed.

A system notification chimed in his ears:

[Player Yan Jiyun has triggered a side mission: Dr. Chi’s Secret.]

[Mission Details: Find out Dr. Chi’s secret within 30 minutes. Reward: 500 points.]

Yan Jiyun: “……”

Dr. Chi’s eyes were full of secrets, and it must be the kind that could never see the daylight. Could he choose to abandon this quest?

[Livestream Channel]

“Am I the only one who thinks the kitty looks super cute knocking over those bottles?”

“You’re not alone.”

“His paws are so adorable!” 

“If my cat broke all my bottles, I think I would beat it to death.” 

“Whatever a cat does is right and always be forgiven.” 

“Hahaha, Dr. Chi is a total mysophobe. There’s no way he’ll forgive our kitty.”

“Finally! My favorite scene! Dr. Chi, please show us your best dissection skills. Hahahah~ I can’t wait!”