He stared at Cen Yao for a long while, finally confirming that she wasn't joking.
“A live stream inside a dungeon?”
“Are you out of your mind?”
As soon as the words left his mouth, Zhu Lingxi snapped her head up.
She looked at Pei Tinglan, her gaze appearing a bit hostile for the first time.
“Even though Miss Cen's ideas are sometimes quite imaginative, how could you speak to her like that, Young Master Pei?”
Pei Tinglan: “?”
For a moment, he couldn't even tell if Zhu Lingxi was defending Cen Yao or insulting her.
“I—”
Just as he was about to speak, Zhu Lingxi cut him off.
“Miss Cen is still young, and there are many things about dungeons she doesn't understand yet.”
“But she is both clever and capable.”
“What if she actually pulls it off?”
Pei Tinglan: “...”
Cen Yao: “...”
Pei Tinglan looked at Zhu Lingxi.
Then he looked at Cen Yao.
Finally, he couldn't help but mutter, “Do you even hear yourself right now?”
Cen Yao was also somewhat exasperated.
Zhu Lingxi's words sounded like a compliment.
But no matter how she spun it, it just felt a little off.
“Stop.”
Cen Yao raised her wand and gave it a gentle swipe through the air.
“You two stop bickering and listen to my summary first.”
Pei Tinglan crossed his arms and leaned back in his wheelchair.
Zhu Lingxi sat up straight and proper, like an attentive student listening to her teacher's lecture.
Even the surrounding civet cats, perhaps drawn by the tone of Cen Yao's voice, stopped what they were doing.
Dozens of round, bead-like eyes stared at her in unison.
Cen Yao took a deep breath.
“First.”
“During the day today, while Lingxi and I were looking for the main gate, we heard a pot-bellied man making a phone call.”
She looked at Pei Tinglan.
“He mentioned the owner.”
“This means there are normal communication devices in the coffee plantation. At least, phone calls can get through.”
Pei Tinglan narrowed his eyes slightly.
He recalled the employee who had carried him around during the day.
The man indeed had a walkie-talkie hanging from his waist.
There were also phones and surveillance cameras in the plantation's offices.
He had previously only treated them as part of the dungeon's background, never thinking to use communication to seek help from the outside world.
“Second.”
Cen Yao raised two fingers.
“The newspaper I found in the abandoned cabin is a very important clue.”
“On the newspaper, only the report about the abuse and slaughter of cats and dogs in the Coffee Community was legible. The other pages were obscured as if covered in fog.”
She paused.
“What does this mean?”
Zhu Lingxi pursed her lips.
“The Coffee Community has a significant connection to this dungeon.”
“Exactly,” Cen Yao nodded.
“The dungeon wouldn't place an old newspaper here for no reason.”
“Much less deliberately erase all other content and leave only this article.”
“That teenager from the Coffee Community must have a huge connection to the Cat Cafe.”
She said slowly, “Based on the timeline, he was fifteen years old back then.”
“So much time has passed now, and he must have long since grown up. In fact, he is very likely the owner of this coffee plantation.”
Pei Tinglan's expression gradually darkened.
That teenager had once abused and slaughtered cats and dogs in his neighborhood.
Years later, a coffee plantation appeared, housing a large number of illegally captive civet cats forced to gorge on coffee cherries, subjected to electric shocks, and enslaved to death.
There was indeed an incredibly clear thread connecting these two things.
It was no coincidence.
Rather, it was the continuation of malice.
Perhaps even an escalation.
“Third.”
Cen Yao didn't give them too much time to ponder.
“Since entering this dungeon, we've seen the daytime staff, and we've seen the cat-headed and dog-headed people at night.”
“But where is the owner?”
“Where is he hiding?”
Zhu Lingxi gazed at her quietly.
Pei Tinglan tapped his finger on the armrest of his wheelchair.
“He hasn't shown himself.”
“No,” Cen Yao shook her head gently. “It's not that he hasn't shown himself. It's that he's been hiding somewhere all along, watching us.”
She recalled what the pot-bellied man had said when she was tailing him during the day.
The manager didn't like losses.
Especially when money-making assets ran away on their own.
An ordinary employee wouldn't mention the owner in a tone bordering on sheer terror.
And they certainly wouldn't treat the capture of a few 'escaped civet cats' as something more critical than actual production.
The owner here was definitely not just a boss running a coffee plantation.
He was the most pivotal figure in this dungeon.
And the most likely source of all this evil.
“Fourth.”
Cen Yao raised a fourth finger.
“During the day, no matter how much of a ruckus we make, the ones hunting us down are only ordinary staff members.”
“Aside from the area near the main gate being off-limits, as long as we don't get caught, we can go almost anywhere.”
“The breeding area, the production area, the warehouses, outside the office building, and even that abandoned cabin.”
She looked at Pei Tinglan.
“Even your Talent can be used.”
“The dungeon hasn't imposed any penalties for it. Though, of course, your case might be an exception.”
Pei Tinglan's expression shifted slightly.
This was indeed something he had found odd before but hadn't deeply analyzed.
Dungeon rules were usually incredibly strict.
Especially in C-rank dungeons. While they weren't as fraught with lethal traps at every turn as high-tier dungeons, they still wouldn't normally allow players to use their Talents to control NPCs so easily.
Yet during the day, when he controlled that employee, he had met with almost no resistance.
His Talent flowed so smoothly that it felt as if they weren't even inside a dungeon.
Cen Yao continued, “This indicates that during the day, aside from being unable to leave, there are almost no rule restrictions in the coffee plantation.”
“Or rather, the daytime rule restrictions aren't very aggressive toward us.”
Zhu Lingxi slowly nodded.
“The day seems dangerous, but in reality, it only traps us.”
“Exactly,” Cen Yao said. “The dangers during the day are mostly human-related—capture nets, stun batons, and cages.”
“Fifth.”
“At night, we regain our human forms and can use our Talents and items.”
“But the night also brings hordes of cat-headed and dog-headed people hunting us down.”
“Day and night are two completely opposite extremes.”
Cen Yao held her wand horizontally across her palm, her gaze sweeping over Zhu Lingxi and Pei Tinglan.
“A dungeon will never leave players with a truly unavoidable death sentence.”
“This coffee plantation is no different.”
“At night, we are strong, but we face the threat of being swarmed and killed by monsters.”
“During the day, we are weak, but we have a much wider range of movement and can interact with more ordinary human NPCs.”
Her voice wasn't loud.
But every word was crystal clear.
“Night and day should be balanced.”
The indifference in Pei Tinglan's eyes had vanished at some point.
He looked at Cen Yao.
For the first time, he was truly following her train of thought to analyze this coffee plantation.
Zhu Lingxi murmured, “But during the day, we are civet cats.”
“Civet cats are naturally weaker than humans.”
“We have no Talents, and no items.”
“This isn't balanced.”
Cen Yao's gaze fell upon the civet cats she had just released.
A scrawny civet cat stood not far away, quietly watching her.
A piece of its left ear was missing, and there was a large, scabbed wound on its back.
Cen Yao looked at it and said slowly, “Therefore, during the day, there must be something that acts as an advantage for the civet cats' side.”
“We just haven't discovered it yet.”
She thought of the fear in the eyes of the ordinary civet cats during the day.
She also recalled how, when she was escaping, some of the civet cats—despite being completely numb—still responded to the noise she made.
They had been trapped for too long.
They had been domesticated for too long.
Yet, they had never truly lost their instinct to resist.
No one had ever told them that they, too, could fight back.
Cen Yao's fingers tightened slightly.
“And one more thing.”
Rate on N.U.
