DA chapter 19

 

After sleeping comfortably through the night, Lin Jia ordered a hotel breakfast after getting up early.

The expensive hotel breakfast was not just toast. It included a ham platter with ham, cheese, brie, and manchego; caviar with a poached egg made from sturgeon roe, smoked salmon, spinach, and hollandaise sauce.

There was also lobster bisque, thin noodles, and truffle bread. The truffle bread came with three condiments: butter, jam, and honey.

Lastly, there were two glasses of champagne.

The cat wanted to say something but weighed its words before speaking. “How much money do you have left in your account?”

Lin Jia sat down to eat. He didn’t answer the cat’s question but pushed some of the food in front of him toward the cat. He tossed a silver fork over and said flatly, “Use this to eat. Don’t let things leak out of your mouth.”

The cat froze, so incredulous that its voice became hoarse. “There’s… a portion for me too?”

Lin Jia neither confirmed nor denied it, focusing on eating.

No one could take advantage of him, and he valued profit, but that didn’t make him stingy. Preparing an extra breakfast for the cat was just a trivial matter.

After eating, Lin Jia changed into freshly ironed clothes. The cat fur that had gotten on his clothes had already been carefully removed by the hotel staff.

The cat chewed the shrimp meat in its mouth, slurped a bite of thin noodles, looked at the tidied-up Lin Jia, and secretly commented: He does look fairly decent.

Suddenly, a wet wipe smacked onto its face. The cat hurriedly grabbed it with its paw. The wipe blocked its vision, making Lin Jia’s voice by its ear sound clearer.

“Clean yourself up.”

The cat wiped its mouth and saw that Lin Jia was about to leave.

It quickly followed, springing onto Lin Jia’s shoulder with one jump.

Seeing Lin Jia frown slightly, the cat hurried to assure him: “I wiped them clean. Hands and feet are clean too.”

Only then did Lin Jia relax his brows, open the door, and walk out.

Not many people in the Underwater Wold were willing to stay in such a high-end hotel. Most people were barely getting by. Therefore, the entire hotel was extremely quiet. So quiet that even the sound of footsteps sinking into the soft carpet seemed loud.

After Lin Jia renewing his stay for two more nights, the cat asked, “Where are you going?”

The cat truly could not understand why Lin Jia was leaving the hotel. After finally leaving Fish Belly, instead of settling down in the hotel, he wanted to run around.

The cat asked, “Aren’t you afraid of getting dragged back to Fish Belly?”

Annoyed by the cat’s questions, Lin Jia finally threw it a cold glance.

After the stream of people passing by them had gone, the cat suddenly reacted and said excitedly, “Are you going to help me find my real body?”

The cat found it hard to believe, and was also a little touched.

At such an high price, the hotel’s services were very comprehensive. As long as he paid, most of Lin Jia’s needs could be met. Lin Jia didn’t need to do anything personally. Instead of sleeping or continuing to soak in the bath, he left the hotel. Other than helping it find its body, the cat could not think of any other reason.

“You’re overthinking it.” Lin Jia did not indulge the cat, coldly spitting out the words. “Looking for business opportunities.”

Lin Jia instantly extinguished the cat’s enthusiasm, and it asked dejectedly, “Business opportunities? Do you want to do business in the Underwater Wold?”

Risking life and limb to enter Fish Belly to obtain fish spirit, and then exchanging it for currency—Lin Jia did not agree with this method of earning money. The fairly good-quality, complete fish spirit that Buzzcut mentioned had only been exchanged for one hundred and twenty thousand, and the effort and return were far from proportional.

Lin Jia would not allow his labor to be valued so cheaply, nor would he become management’s worker.

Seeing Lin Jia’s determination, the cat tried to think of possibilities. “Impossible. All industries in the Underwater Wold are monopolized by management. They definitely won’t give you operating rights. If you secretly start a business, management will shut it down as soon as they find out.”

Then, the cat remembered something else: “Even if you secretly start a business, you’ll still need supplies and goods, right? That’s impossible, too. As for where the Underwater Wold’s supplies come from, I bet even management doesn’t know.”

Lin Jia did not care about the cat’s persuasion. He only asked, “Where is the place with the most people?”

The cat really could not keep up with Lin Jia’s train of thought. “What are you going to do now?”

Lin Jia said lightly, “Not all business needs cost and materials.”

The cat looked at Lin Jia suspiciously.

Lin Jia stopped walking. “Think.”

The cat racked its brain and finally thought of the place with the most people in Underwater Wold. It was far from the hotel, so Lin Jia naturally didn’t walk — he hailed a taxi.

Taking a taxi in the Underwater Wold was unnecessary and drew the attention of passersby. The engine roared to life, stirring up dust that settled heavily on their faces.

After paying and getting out, Lin Jia looked up.

The building in front of him was not tall. Between the second and fifth floors, a huge display screen was mounted on the wall, with numbers rolling across it.

Besides Lin Jia, others stopped here and looked up at the screen. After a quick look, however, they walked toward the side door.

People from all directions entered through that door.

Because there were so many people, the cat did not want its abnormality to be noticed. It pressed close to Lin Jia’s ear and whispered, “Those numbers aren’t anything else. They are the clouds in the sky.”

As it spoke, the cat pointed upward. Lin Jia slightly raised his head to look. Fish-shaped clouds drifted slowly by. At first, they appeared layered over the horizon. But on closer inspection, each cloud was distinct, representing independent entities.

Some hung high, some sank lower, and some seemed to have dropped enough to touch the tops of tall buildings.

“You’re so smart; you probably already guessed.” The cat said. “The clouds are Fish Belly. When clouds sink over a certain area, nearby people may be dragged into Fish Belly. If the cloud doesn’t pull in enough people, it will pull in others at random. It’s not only people in the Underwater Wold who get dragged in; people in the real world get dragged in too. The updates on the screen show the cloud descent details.”

Lin Jia caught the blind spot. “How does management know where the clouds will descend?”

Before this, the cat said that management was made up of unfortunate people who came from the real world.

Having racked its brains in the car, the cat could finally speak smoothly with Lin Jia. “They say it’s technological analysis, but who knows? That’s not important. What’s important is that the accuracy rate is quite high; otherwise, there wouldn’t be so many people coming here to check information.”

Before Lin Jia could respond, the cat looked at the constantly opening and closing main door and continued, “There’s too much cloud information on this screen. There’s more detailed cloud information inside, and many people are there, fitting your requirements.”

Just as Lin Jia was about to step inside, the cat added, “Oh, right! Because the clouds are called ‘Fish Belly,’ and entering ‘Fish Belly’ gives you a chance to get a fish spirit. People in the Underwater Wold call this place the ‘Bounty Hall.’”

Lin Jia entered the Bounty Hall.

As the cat had said, the building was full of display screens. The light from the screens mixed into one mass and condensed above the densely packed crowd’s heads.

At first glance, the color of everyone’s faces matched the color of the screens’ light.

Lin Jia entered and was also swallowed by the electronic fluorescent light.

Unlike the giant screen outside, the screens inside were connected piece by piece.

Like a store selling televisions, they all played the same image at the same frequency. This time was no exception. All of these screens displayed the same information as the giant screen. Someone had to reach out and touch one of the screens. Clicking a cloud number made that screen display the information separately. If the screen sensed no new touch within thirty seconds, it returned to the cloud summary display.

There were many people inside the building, and no matter how many screens there were, there were more people than screens. However, not everyone stood before a screen checking cloud information. Instead, several people surrounded one screen together to view information.

The dark mass of people and their noisy voices provided perfect cover.

The cat said to Lin Jia, “Did I tell you before that most people in the Underwater Wold form groups?”

Lin Jia answered, “Mm.”

The cat continued, “More people means more strength. People who know each other don’t need to worry about the final fish spirit distribution when entering Fish Belly. They’re one group, so whoever gets the fish spirit is fine. But if several groups enter the same Fish Belly and don’t negotiate clearly beforehand, then it gets troublesome.”

The cat looked at Lin Jia worriedly behind the crowd. “Going into Fish Belly alone usually doesn’t end well. In the Underwater Wold, there are no independent people, only independent corpses. Luckily, the group you met this time was Buzzcut’s group—they looked pretty stupid.”

Lin Jia gave the cat a meaningful glance. How shameless—the stupidest cat dared to call others stupid.

“If you meet one of those vicious groups, it’s hard to say how it will end.” The cat was busy explaining and didn’t notice the meaning behind Lin Jia’s glance. It suggested, “Why don’t you join a group too? Someone like you is quite sought after.”

The cat said, “But you still need to choose carefully. Some groups are chaotic, and not every group distributes things fairly. In some groups, some people eat the meat while others can’t even get the soup. It’s also common for people to prey on their own members. If you join one, make sure it’s a group with positive energy.”

Naturally, Lin Jia already had plans in mind. He did not intend to use the fish spirit to increase his account balance, but business could not be done immediately. Even costless businesses needed early-stage operations. Before the business could get going, Lin Jia had to enter Fish Belly; at the latest, he had to do so within two days. The balance on his card was about to turn into a fiscal deficit.[mfn]A fiscal deficit refers to the shortfall in a government’s revenue compared to its spending during a certain period.[/mfn]

Though the cat was stupid, these words did make sense.

Fish Belly itself was full of dangers. If he had to expend energy dealing with others’ schemes, that would also be part of the cost of obtaining the fish spirit. As a wealthy man on the rich list, Lin Jia knew a few self-defense moves, but he wasn’t especially good at fighting. He was able to knock down Buzzcut in one move because he caught him off guard, plus Buzzcut was already injured.

If he encountered professional fighters, it would take considerable effort to win. He wouldn’t allow himself to be at a disadvantage by fighting alone. Even without the cat’s persuasion, he would naturally choose a camp as a stepping stone.

Lin Jia asked, “Any recommendations?”

The cat replied, “Let me think.”

The topic of groups had come up suddenly, and the cat had not thought about it earlier.

Lin Jia let the cat think. About ten minutes later, the cat said, “I remember the biggest group in the Underwater Wold is called ‘Broken Cloud.’ It was formed by a group of troublemaking newcomers, and it has great influence in the Underwater Wold. Broken Cloud—shattering clouds. Just from the name, this group should be good.”

The cat looked at the crowd shifting before them and urged Lin Jia to join Broken Cloud.

Lin Jia: “How do I join?”

The cat replied, “There must be people from Broken Cloud here. Just find someone and ask.”

Lin Jia’s face stayed cold. “How do I ask?”

“Ask in front of other groups: Do you know if there are people from Broken Cloud here? Can you point the way?”

There would not be any open or hidden fighting between groups. Just like business rivals in the commercial world, they wanted to crush all competitors. Only an idiot would help introduce talent to the opposing side.

Only a cat would say something this stupid.

Joining a group was necessary but not urgent. Lin Jia was still focused on finding business opportunities.

Finally remembering Lin Jia’s purpose for coming here, the cat asked, “What exactly is the business opportunity you want to find?”

The cat had a hard time connecting business opportunities with crowds.

To avoid the cat’s endless questions, Lin Jia was just about to speak when he heard a sound: “Chu.”

The next second, the building that had seemed bathed in light suddenly grew dim. The overwhelming display screens suddenly went dark for an unknown reason. The electronic fluorescent glow abruptly disappeared, and the white incandescent ceiling lights finally revealed their true color.

“What’s going on?” someone in the crowd asked, staring at the extinguished screens.

“Probably a system problem.” Another person answered, “Wait, it’ll be fine in a while.”

The same problem had happened before, so the people inside the building did not take it seriously. But ten minutes passed, then half an hour, and the screens still did not recover.

Gradually, people began to grow impatient. They did not have that much time to waste.

Someone found management on the first floor and asked when the screens would recover.

Management said, “Circuit failure. We don’t know exactly when it will be fixed.”

“Don’t know?” The person asking was stunned. “Aren’t you going to repair it? What if it can’t recover for the whole day? Who knows which cloud will suddenly drop? If someone gets dragged into Fish Belly while walking properly on the road, will you take responsibility?”

Being dragged into Fish Belly unprepared meant death.

“We’re definitely going to repair it.” Management was dissatisfied with the questioner’s attitude. “Management worked hard to analyze the clouds and set up the information hall for you to check. What more responsibility do you want us to take? Besides, we didn’t want the circuit to fail either. It happened suddenly. Understand? Don’t treat management’s efforts as something natural.”

“Then can’t you hurry them?”

“I said, management is already repairing the circuit.”

Management looked at the crowd. “Either wait or leave. But, since you’re afraid of being dragged into Fish Belly, stay here quietly so you won’t be dragged in while walking on the street, and then blame management for not caring whether you live or die.”

The crowd was silenced by these words, leaving them no choice but to wait quietly.

They truly needed the cloud information that management was releasing.

The Bounty Hall had no sofas, so some people sat on the floor to wait.

But after another long stretch of time, the screens were still dead silent. Someone became impatient, stood up, and asked, “When will this be fixed? Can you give a clear answer?”

“It’s already being repaired.” Management gave the same answer.

“It’s been almost an hour.” Someone said, “Doesn’t management have a backup circuit? Just find a generator and connect the power.”

One stone stirred up a thousand waves. The previously quiet Bounty Hall immediately erupted with different voices, and the noise grew louder and louder.

Management’s expression changed, and he shouted, “Keep your voices down! There’s a meeting upstairs! As soon as the circuit is fixed, everything will be back to normal! Why are you all so anxious?!”

The crowd refused to let it go, insisting that management build a new circuit.

Angrily, management slammed the table and stood up abruptly. “If you keep making noise, I’ll call the inspectors.”

The weight of the word “inspectors” hung in the air, and the noisy Bounty Hall instantly quieted down.

The cat leaned close to Lin Jia’s ear and lowered its voice even more, saying, “Because inspectors can fire guns under special circumstances, but the inspector team decides what counts as special circumstances anyway.”

The cat had already told Lin Jia this before. Lin Jia did not plan to stay any longer; he was tired of standing.

Just as he was about to leave, he heard the management say respectfully behind him, “Director Zhang, Director Cheng, Director Sheng…”

After several forms of address combining surnames and titles came a clear, “Deputy Chen.”

Lin Jia paused, stopped, and turned back.

Management had just said there was a meeting upstairs. It seemed the participants were these directors. They had finished the meeting and were coming downstairs.

“What’s going on?” Among the several directors, one glanced at the people sitting on the floor.

Management hurried over to explain. “Deputy Chen, there’s a circuit failure. Someone is already repairing it.”

This exchange allowed Lin Jia to accurately identify Deputy Chen.

He was a man around twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old. He was the tallest and youngest among the directors. Perhaps because the meeting had ended badly, he looked displeased, which made him seem aloof.

He responded and turned to leave.

Management hurried after him, reminding him in a low voice, “Because of the circuit failure, cloud descent information is delayed. Why not rest in the lounge first and leave after the cloud updates recover?”

“No need.” He threw down one sentence: “Restore it quickly.”

Then, he walked straight out of the Bounty Hall.

Management could only watch him leave before turning to ask the other directors if they wanted to stay. They stared at Deputy Chen’s back as he departed and shook their heads helplessly. “Little Chen…”

Another director shook his head. “Young and full of spirit.”

They chose to stay.

Lin Jia left the Bounty Hall, hailed a cab, and went back to the hotel.

After returning to the hotel and closing the door, he directly asked, “Was it him?”

When Deputy Chen appeared, Lin Jia clearly felt the cat freeze on his shoulder.

The cat jumped from his shoulder onto the soft, large bed and pressed one corner into a dent.

It crouched there and said uncertainly, “I don’t know, but it feels familiar.”

After running around all morning, Lin Jia took a bottle of mineral water from the fridge and twisted off the cap. The connection between the bottle cap and the tamper ring snapped, making a tearing sound.

Lin Jia tilted his head back to drink, looking at the cat through the bottle.

The bottle distorted the cat’s shape.

Although the cat had not recalled Deputy Chen’s exact name, he was still someone the cat remembered. Lin Jia hadn’t initially intended to help the cat, but Deputy Chen had already appeared, and the cat felt a sense of familiarity…

Lending a hand was not impossible.

However, familiarity did not mean that Deputy Chen was the cat itself. The source of the familiarity had to be distinguished—whether it was the cat itself or someone familiar to the cat.

Lin Jia asked, “Now that the person has appeared before your eyes, can you remember anything else?”

The cat shook its head. “Can’t think of anything else.”

From the moment the cat saw Deputy Chen, it had tried hard to recall something, but its brain remained empty of any memories related to Deputy Chen.

Lin Jia had never expected much from the cat, so he wasn’t disappointed. He screwed the cap back onto the bottle. “We’ll confirm again tomorrow morning.”

The cat looked up. “Ah, confirm where?”

Lin Jia: “Bounty Hall.”

The cat: “He might not be there.”

Lin Jia: “He will be.”

The cat’s eyes lit up. “Really? How do you know?”

Lin Jia put the water bottle back in the fridge to continue chilling. Lin Jia used the room phone to call room service and asked the hotel to send lunch.

After lunch, he took a nap. After waking up, he went to the hotel gym for two hours.

After exercising, he came back, took a bath, drank the wine, washed up, and went to sleep.

He did not answer the cat’s question.

Early the next morning, while still half-asleep, Lin Jia saw a huge cat face.

The cat said, “You finally woke up. It’s five o’clock; dawn is almost here.”

Lin Jia: “…”

Expressinless, he pushed the cat’s face away and turned over to continue sleeping.

When he opened his eyes again, the cat’s face appeared once more. “Six o’clock.”

He threw the cat off the bed, got up, and went to wash up in the bathroom.

The cat urged, “Ah, it’s six-thirty already.”

The cat looked worried. “Seven o’clock.”

The cat looked miserable. “You still want breakfast?”

Lin Jia only left with the cat after dawdling until past eight. They took a taxi to the Bounty Hall, arriving at only 8:30. By this time, there were already many people in the office. The display screens that had failed yesterday due to circuit problems had finally recovered, and everyone hurried to check the cloud descent information.

The cat looked around for Deputy Chen’s figure.

Near 9:00, Lin Jia held the cat and stood at the entrance that connected to the other floors.

Lin Jia: “Unless it’s an emergency meeting, meetings generally start at nine at the earliest.”

The cat did not understand.

Lin Jia said, “Obviously, yesterday’s meeting ended badly. If the meeting didn’t reach a conclusion, there would definitely be a second one.”

No one understood meetings better than Lin Jia, who had to attend them every day. Meetings started at the earliest at nine for two reasons: first, because work time mostly started at nine, and second, because if a meeting was too early, participants would not be mentally sharp, which would be useless for the meeting.

A meeting that ended badly had even more meaning.

Generally, meetings ended badly because the participants could not agree on the content. At the second meeting, each side would bring their own people to support them and achieve their purpose.

Lin Jia lay in wait at the necessary path through the Bounty Hall, letting the cat confirm Deputy Chen, as well as the people Deputy Chen brought today, to see whether the cat felt any familiarity toward the others.

If the cat felt familiar with all of them, then Deputy Chen was most likely just one of the people familiar to the cat’s original self.

However, if the cat felt familiar only with Deputy Chen, then Deputy Chen should be the cat itself.

The cat waited nervously. At around 9:00, as Lin Jia had expected, Deputy Chen arrived with his group.

He brought three people.

The cat still felt a strong sense of familiarity toward Deputy Chen. Lin Jia’s gaze moved to the three people accompanying him:

One woman and two men.

Lin Jia examined them one by one.

The woman was a little over five feet seven inches tall, had short hair, and wore management’s unified dark blue uniform, giving off an air of competence.

Lin Jia asked the cat, “Feel anything?”

The cat shook its head. “No.”

Lin Jia emphasized, “Did you look carefully?”

The cat: “Really, no feeling.”

Lin Jia’s gaze moved to one of the two men. He also wore a dark blue uniform and carried several cups of coffee, handing them out to the others.

Lin Jia asked, “Feel anything?”

The cat: “No.”

His gaze moved to the last of the three men. Unlike the others, his uniform was pure black with the word “Inspector” on his arm.

Lin Jia stared at him and asked the cat, “What about him? Do you feel anything?”

Just as the cat was about to answer, the man in the black uniform noticed the gaze from the shadows. He raised his head and locked eyes with Lin Jia.

 

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