Chapter 203: Cat Transformation!

【Congratulations, you have obtained the trait 【Cat Transformation!】】 【Your body can freely switch between human form and cat form. After transforming into a cat, some of your skills and attributes will be adjusted accordingly.】

"Hmm?"

Yun Mu opened her eyes in a daze, looking at the game prompt and the ceiling above the room.

"So... it wasn't a dream?" she muttered softly as she sat up.

"Princess, your hand..."

In the washroom, Yun Mu paused with her hand holding the toothbrush, looking at the mirror with a rather helpless expression.

"Meow, meow."

Beside her, Brenna retracted her hand sheepishly.

However, her pair of azure eyes were still curiously fixed on the top of Yun Mu's head.

"Sigh."

Seeing her like this, Yun Mu couldn't help but sigh and said, "Didn't I let you touch them plenty of times when I first woke up?"

"Haven't you touched enough?"

"Well..." A slightly awkward smile appeared on Brenna's face, and she said with some embarrassment: "Because it's really rare, a human growing cat ears and all that..."

She paused and added, "I've never met anyone who could reach your level on the Cat Path before."

"Ah, no." After finishing, she suddenly realized something, immediately shook her head, and corrected herself: "To be precise, in all my years, you are the only human I have ever seen who has mastered the Cat Path, Miss Yun."

"No way..." Hearing Brenna say this, a look of surprise immediately appeared on Yun Mu's face.

Back then, both Edward and Brenna were very clear about what would happen after mastering the Cat Path.

She had assumed there would be many people who had mastered this path.

It turned out Brenna was saying she was the only person she had ever seen who had mastered the Cat Path? Hmm... although given Brenna's age, this didn't seem like something worth being surprised about.

But it was still very rare, right!

Although she had no evidence, that was just what Yun Mu thought in her heart.

Or perhaps the Cat Path was just relatively famous, but in reality, very few people actually mastered it? Was it a path that was extremely difficult to master? Twitch, twitch.

While Yun Mu was thinking, the cat ears on top of her head twitched involuntarily.

Stare. Brenna's attention was drawn by Yun Mu's twitching cat ears, and before she knew it, she reached out her Evil hand once again.

"Princess, everyone has arrived."

Just as Brenna was about to grab Yun Mu's cat ears, Ai Yi, a member of the Shadow Guard with a petite figure, suddenly emerged from the shadows and reported to Brenna in a rather flat tone.

"Ahem..."

Retracting her hand as if nothing had happened, Brenna gave a light cough, put on a serious expression, and said, "I know, I'll be down shortly."

"Understood, then this subordinate will take her leave."

Ai Yi's gaze lingered on the top of Yun Mu's head for a moment before she lowered her head, her body turning into Shadow and dissipating in the room.

"Let's pick up the pace too." After Ai Yi left the room, Brenna looked at Yun Mu and said.

"Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle..." Yun Mu didn't reply, just tilted her head back to blow bubbles with the mouthwash, then spat it into the toilet.

"I'll go wait for you downstairs~"

She waved her hand casually at Brenna and walked toward the lobby on the first floor of the inn.

"Has Miss Yun finished washing up already?" Brenna stared blankly at Yun Mu's departing back, a look of surprise appearing in her eyes.

"... So fast!" she thought, a bit slow on the uptake.

"No, it's just because you're too slow." If Yun Mu knew what she was thinking right now, she would likely have answered like that.

About ten minutes after Yun Mu finished washing up.

Brenna followed the stairs down to the lobby on the first floor of the inn.

With just one glance, she saw everyone gathered in the corner of the lobby.

Aside from Yun Mu, there were Bishop Muse and the others who had rushed over from the Winter Cathedral.

Edward, Lita, Officer Leinuode, and that man she hadn't met but recognized at a glance, the president of the Painter Association, Mr. Sixin, were all gathered here.

In addition to them, there was the Second Rank nun Meiyin from the Church, plus the Night Watchman Huoerfu.

Basically, everyone involved with the Scarlet was now in this small inn.

And despite such a conspicuous scene, everyone present—whether it was the inn's staff or the few guests—subconsciously ignored them.

She had seen this method before; if nothing went wrong, it should be the ability of that Fourth Order Master, the Faceless One, Dunn.

In fact, it was precisely because she knew of this ability that Brenna had chosen to meet directly here.

Most people probably wouldn't expect them to hold such an important meeting in a place like this.

Brenna thought to herself as she walked.

And over on Yun Mu's side, about eight minutes ago.

"Are these real cat ears?"

"Can I touch them?"

When Yun Mu sat down between Lita and Meiyin, Lita, who had learned from Edward that Yun Mu had mastered the Cat Path, immediately locked her gaze on the top of her head and asked.

"Eh?"

"Isn't that thing a toy?"

Meiyin, who was beside her, kept her head down and didn't speak, but after hearing Lita's question, she wondered curiously in her heart.

"Of course you can." Upon hearing Lita's question, Yun Mu agreed without much hesitation.

Anyway, she had already let Brenna touch them this morning, so letting Lita touch them for a bit was no big deal.

Come to think of it, she hadn't tested the new trait she had obtained in her dream last night yet.

Being able to switch between cat and human form, it felt a bit like a Druid's trick from a fantasy work.

She was actually quite curious about what that experience was like; she would try it out when she had some free time later.

As for the fact that she had turned into a cat in her dream... honestly, she had almost forgotten the plot of the dream, although it was probably more than just a simple dream.

But she really couldn't recall the details of what happened inside. She only remembered that she seemed to have gradually turned into a cat while playing with other cats, and was then hugged from behind by an existence suspected to be Eve's true form, who even said something about a reward... To be fair, Eve's chest was really big—no, really soft; when she was picked up at the time, her cat paws even patted it twice.

It was very bouncy!

*Ahem*, the gods of this world shouldn't be at the level where they would notice just because someone thought about them in their heart, right?

Yun Mu thought with a guilty conscience while Lita stroked the cat ears on top of her head.

"Hello, this is the meal you ordered."

Just then, a member of the hotel staff walked up to them, carrying two plates of food, and said with an apologetic expression: "Sorry, there are no food carts in the shop, we can only bring them over a little at a time. Could you please wait a moment?"

"..."

Everyone turned their gaze toward Dunn. After noticing that everyone's eyes were on him, the latter raised his head, fixed his gaze on the staff member's eyes, and said in a deep voice: "It's fine, just bring them over in batches."

"Alright, we will bring the rest of the food and drinks over very soon!" The staff member's face lit up with joy, and they said so immediately.

After the staff member left, Dunn faced the questioning gazes of the group and said with a calm expression: "Don't worry, I ordered the food; after all, people have to eat."

"As for the problem in that regard, rest assured, no one will pay attention to us here, including the owner of this hotel. Everyone will only remember that many guests came to eat today, and that is all."

Can the Faceless One's ability be used like this? It seems it's not just as simple as eliminating one's presence... Listening to what Dunn said, Yun Mu analyzed in her heart.

"Sorry everyone, I'm late."

After the hotel staff had finally finished serving all the dishes, Brenna happened to walk down the stairs at this moment.

"No, the timing is just right, Princess."

Bishop Muse chuckled indifferently. He pointed his hand toward the only empty seat present and said: "Let us be ready to start at any time."

"Mm." After a pause, the old man looked toward Lienie.

"Although it might not be necessary, Lienie, could you please set up a Barrier?"

"... Of course, no problem."

Lienie nodded in agreement.

She was seen taking a magic book with a red cover from her waist and flipping through the pages quickly.

"Goddess's Night Veil!"

The magic book emitted a mysterious purple-black light, forming a sphere resembling the night sky, shrouding everyone present.

And after Lienie put the magic book away, the purple-black sphere disappeared from everyone's sight.

However, this was only a conclusion drawn from observation with the naked eye; in fact, in the world of Ether, everyone could still feel the existence of the Barrier.

"Setup complete!"

Lienie sat back down in her chair and explained to everyone, mainly Yun Mu and the others: "The main effect of this Barrier is to prevent eavesdropping, and it also has a certain ability to cause Disturbance to divination."

"I think that unless that Outer God knows we are here and specifically peeks at us, our conversation here is safe."

"His power has not reached that level yet, and the erosion of the world is not deep enough. Even if we say his true name here, I imagine there won't be any problems."

Bishop Muse said softly.

"Hey, hey, I don't think there's any need to test that kind of thing." Sixin, who had originally planned to slack off the whole time, couldn't sit still upon hearing this and stood up to say.

"Of course, I was just making a small joke."

Is this kind of thing something you can joke about? Sixin wanted to retort, but upon thinking of the other party's status and strength, he silently swallowed it back.

"Alright, let's start talking about business."

At this time, Brenna suddenly stood up, clapped her hands forcefully, and attracted everyone's attention.

She looked at Yun Mu, then at Edward, and then at Leinuode, saying: "Although I have already heard about the matter from the Shadow Guard, please, Edward and Mr. Leinuode, share what happened in the few days we were away with the others."

"Alright."

Leinuode seemed to have anticipated this; he said without any hesitation: "On the day the Princess left, nothing special happened in Frostfall City."

"It wasn't until the early hours of the next day that the Guard Hall received a report."

He took a piece of cardboard from his pocket and said while looking at the content on it: "At first, the reporter only claimed that his son had gone missing and wanted to ask the people at the Guard Hall to help him search."

"But in the subsequent investigation, according to the traces left by his son before he went missing, the guards of the Guard Hall finally found the body of the reporter's missing son in the yard of the reporter's house, from the traces of digging that had been covered up."

"Based on the obvious characteristics of the blood being drained from the body, we initially classified it as a victim of the Dried Corpse Murder Case, but immediately after, various pieces of evidence pointed the clues of the murderer toward the reporter..."

After a pause, Leinuode looked at everyone, as if giving them time to digest the information.

"Everyone present should know who the real murderer of the Dried Corpse Murder Case is."

"It was also at this time that I began to intervene in the investigation of the case."

"But the information inside is very complex, and there are many suspicious points. I won't go into too much detail here. In short, we finally brought the reporter into the Guard Hall..."

Leinuode flipped the paper on the cardboard and looked at the content on the next page.

"In the sixth hour after the reporter was brought into the Guard Hall, the guard delivering food to him was attacked. Fortunately, that guard's skills were quite good; he didn't suffer any injuries and even subdued the reporter while being caught in a Touxixi."

"Because the reporter had almost completely lost his sanity at the time and would attack anyone he saw, we had to put him under Imprisonment."

"And in the subsequent 5 hours of questioning, we couldn't get any useful information, until..."

"Until?" Yun Mu tilted her head.

"Until we associated it with the tragic state of the reporter's son's body." Leinuode nodded at Yun Mu and said: "We thought that drinking blood might allow him to regain his sanity, but we were afraid that the person who had their blood drunk would suffer some unknown influence."

"So we didn't use blood plasma from the hospital, but instead selected a group of volunteers from the guards and temporarily drew blood to feed to that reporter."

"And after drinking the fresh blood, the reporter's sanity actually returned to normal."

"This is the Scarlet Curse!" After hearing Leinuode's description, Yun Mu stood up immediately and said without hesitation.

"That's right, this is indeed the Scarlet Curse." Brenna waved her hand, looked at Leinuode, and said: "Continue, the main point is still to come."

"Yes, the main point is still to come." Leinuode nodded and said with a serious expression: "The point is not the Scarlet Curse itself, but rather, what caused this reporter to be infected with the Scarlet Curse!"

PS: Ahhhhhhhhhhh.

I'm dying because there's no episode 21 of Frieren to watch! Ahhhhhhhh.

How could it cut off at a place like this!

Gaia—

(End of chapter)