Chapter 40 – Cat Dad is … What?
‘Not now. There are some unfinished businesses to do here. I need to find that NPC first!’
He raised his head and looked around, searching for a certain NPC.
Then, Xiaomao discovered a wooden signboard, located 10 meters from where he had been resting.
[The Shop is currently closed. Opening time: 9 AM to 5 PM.]
In every dungeon, one or two traveling vendors lurked around in every hidden safe zone. Some might be wandering in a place that could be easily found. But most of the time, these guys chose a nasty place to set up their stores.
There was a reason for their secrecy. After all, their expensive services and items were exceptionally useful in their dungeons, and players called them P2W NPCs.
As long as a player could afford one or two of the NPC’s items, that player could easily hunt any mob in the dungeon!
In this case, the Gnoll Dungeon’s traveling vendor had a store on the top of the suspension bridge tower on the boss’ cliff. The only way to access here was to climb the suspension ropes to the top of the tower.
In his previous life, nobody discovered the shop for years. After this place had been swarmed with players, a parkour maniac climbed the suspension ropes for a YouTube content and discovered the vendor by an accident. Then, his location became well-known in public.
Unfortunately, the shop was closed now. Xiaomao had to come back here later. Moreover, he needed to wake up and take care of his cats. It was already morning in real life!
Xiaomao’s weary tentacle swiped the system screen and pressed the [Log Out] button. He had enough for the day, and he would continue the fight in the afternoon.
However, as Xiaomao closed his eyes and waited for his consciousness to return to his body, he received a strange message.
<Error. Detecting two synchronizable characters in your game account.>
<Please choose the primary character to complete your synchronization.>
“Hmm?”. freewebnovel.(c)om
Xiaomao widened his eyes and stared at the game panel. He closed his eyes, shook his head, and reopened his eyes to recheck it.
He wasn’t dreaming, unfortunately.
…
[Synchronizable Characters]
1. Xiaomao (22%) (Current)
2. Slave One (0%)
…
As Xiaomao had never synced his character and his real body in his previous life, he had never seen this menu before.
‘I heard that rich players have multiple transformations and superpowers. Is this the cause? Is this how those rich bastards got multiple abilities?’
Xiaomao was tempted to try importing Slave One’s abilities into his real body. But after seeing that his primary character’s synchronization rate had already reached over 20%, he changed his mind.
‘I should max the sync rate of my primary character first before I move on. Also, Slave One’s INT is too high. My brain might be fried because of the information overload.’
He played it safe. Since his real body’s evolution path leaned toward the catopus character, he decided to go on with it until the end. After that, he would assimilate other characters’ abilities.
Although Xiaomao had no idea how the synchronization rate increased so fast, he ignored it. Xiaomao suspected that his father might have given him a modified game capsule instead of a commercial one, and he would ask his father to clarify things later.
Ding
<Your character “Xiaomao” has been set to the primary character.>
“I know, munya.”
Ding
<Logging out.>
Xiaomao closed his eyes. He fell asleep and logged out of the game.
…
RRRRRNNNNGGGG
Xiaomao snapped opened his eyes and looked around in a panic. For a moment there, he dreamed about the moment that he was hit by a truck. freewebn(o)vel.com
DING
The system notification sound also haunted him. He felt like he was still playing the game.
<You ha… Catnap…>
<Your… increased by…>
Even the system’s voice echoed in his head. Xiaomao lightly pinched his cheek to stay awake and snap back to his senses.
His heartbeat was so loud that he could hear it by laying his head on the game capsule’s pillow.
“Ugh.”
Xiaomao took his time to open the game capsule hatch. He sat up. But for some reason, his head and the area above his buttock were itchy.
He looked at the clock.
8.30 AM
He actually slept for an extra hour! He was late for school!
Despite the urgency, Xiaomao didn’t feel like going to school today. His sluggish lazy legs moved at a snail’s speed, dragging his body to the bathroom for a morning bath.
While he was at it, he scratched his head.
For some reason, his hair seemed softer than usual. The more he scratched, the more he got addicted to the smooth and silky hair.
‘Wait a minute. I might have sweated a lot while I was playing the game. I should take a bath properly.’
Protecting himself from fungus, germs, and random skin diseases, Xiaomao washed his hair and took his time soaping the entire body.
While he was enjoying the morning shower, the area between his lower back and his buttock grew itchy. Xiaomao scratched it and his fingers found something bumpy.
‘Huh?’
Xiaomao rubbed the thing behind him. So far, it didn’t hurt, but it felt good when he scratched it.
Was a pimple or a cyst always hairy?
And most importantly, it continued to grow longer…
It grew longer?!
By the time Xiaomao had realized it, the hairy thing was already as long as his hand.
Xiaomao frowned. He grabbed a small mirror in front of the washbasin and turned around. He looked at the mirror, which showed the reflection of the mirror behind him.
“…”
He pursed his lips. He understood what it was.
It was a white furry tail!
Xiaomao turned around and looked at his reflection in the washbasin mirror.
His pupils had already turned gold. His skin became so smooth and tender. Meanwhile, the fangs seemed longer and sharper while the surface of his tongue was barbed.
Xiaomao touched the surface of his tongue to feel it.
Indeed, it was a cat’s tongue!
“Holy crap, munya!”
Xiaomao’s pupils expanded like a cat’s eyes. By reflex, his hand grabbed the top of his head and scratched it.
Suddenly, two areas on top of his head sent a pain signal to his brain. It felt like a layer of skin had been peeled off.
But what happened next surprised Xiaomao.
Two white furry cat ears slowly rose from the top of his head. At the same time, his human ears sunk into his skin and vanish, replacing with his silky medium-long black hair.
Xiaomao widened his eyes. His hair was longer, but it was now black and white, similar to Mu-Nyang’s fur and his game character’s fur. Now, he looked like a hooligan or a delinquent, who had dyed a portion of his front hair white.
“Ugh!”
Xiaomao’s tail waved left and right because of his complex emotion, and it accidentally hit the wooden cloth basket behind him. The sharp pain from the tail numbed his spine and his thighs.
The pain was as bad as when someone kicked his nuts. He almost collapsed in the bathroom.
The long white tail stretched and curled because of the pain. Now, the tail was already a meter long.
Had Xiaomao never gotten his cat ears, he would have thought that the tail was a monkey’s tail!
Xiaomao slowly recovered from the random pain all over his body. He sized up his new appearance. Now, he looked like a demi-beastman in Japanese fantasy novels.
He closed his eyes to concentrate, but a clear system screen panel appeared behind his eyelids.
This time, everything was so clear that Xiaomao could read everything.
Ding
<Congratulations. You have transformed for the first time.>
‘Oh, boy.’
Xiaomao had prepared his heart for it when he picked a catopus as his primary character. But he had never expected a rapid transformation after playing the game for a couple of days.
Everything happened too fast!
Still, Xiaomao was optimistic. He coughed and mimicked the hoarse voice of BATMAN.
“I’m CATMAN!”
Xiaomao shook his head, discarding the name.
He was aware that his naming sense needed work, but he didn’t know what kind of superhero alias he should go with in the future.
“No, definitely not Catman. DC will sue me for it. How about… Catopus-Man? Cathulhu-Man? Or… Munya-Man, munya?”
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