Always Ending Up as an Animal Cub

The students were busy putting out the fire, and Yu Tong leisurely slipped through their legs.

The system stayed silent in the space, and Yu Tong told it not to worry, as he was very good at starting fires.
The system took a deep breath and asked softly: “Why are you so good at this?”
This time, it was Yu Tong’s turn to fall silent.

He didn’t know what Yun Mingchen was busy with, more than an hour passed, but he still hadn’t shown up.
Just as Yu Tong was about to leave the dormitory area, he heard a commotion behind him, as if the group of students were looking for the president's cat.
The Imperial First Immortal Academy covered a vast area, and the system didn’t have a map that could track the villain's location in real time.

Yu Tong’s body was only three months old, and for him to find Yun Mingchen in the academy was like looking for a needle in a haystack.
He thought it would be more efficient to wait for someone to bring him there.
Before starting the fire, Yu Tong took a shower in the bathroom. Now, his body was free of bloodstains, only covered with ash and water marks. No one would be able to tell he was a killer cat.

The student council members who were helping to find the president's cat turned their heads and saw a small cat lying in the grass nearby, looking dirty and gray.
He squatted down and took a photo, sending it to the president: “Is this your cat?”
It was quiet for a few seconds on the other side, then a message came back: “I can’t tell because it's too dirty. My cat is very smart. If you call him Xixi, he’ll respond to you.”

“If he doesn’t respond, please take him to the pet hospital and check if he has any injuries. He looks like he’s only a few months old, and I’m worried he might get sick from being frightened by the fire.”
The student council member, while marveling at how gentle and kind the president was, crouched near the edge of the grass and called: “Xixi, Xixi, come out! Meow—meow—”
Yu Tong reluctantly walked out, and the male student happily picked him up.

His two paws rested on the male cultivator’s chest, and Yu Tong turned his head to peek at his phone screen.
Today, his luck was good; the male cultivator was chatting with Yun Mingchen.
Male cultivator: “President, should I take him to the nearby pet hospital to check and bathe him?”

Yun Mingchen: “The barrier hasn’t opened yet, and we don’t know when we’ll be able to get out. Please take care of him for now.”
Male cultivator: “Okay, President, how’s the situation over there?”
Yun Mingchen: “Not very optimistic, but don’t worry. We will handle the barrier.”
The male student, holding the cat in one hand and his phone in the other, slowly walked toward the pet hospital on campus.

Perhaps to maintain the image of the gentle male god, Yun Mingchen replied quickly and with great patience.
Yu Tong snooped along the way and roughly figured out the villain’s situation from their conversation.
Last night, monsters attacked the school, killing thirteen students in one go, and two alchemy students, one male and one female, went missing.

This morning, the teachers in the Foundation Establishment stage went out to search for the monsters on campus.
Yun Mingchen, leading the student council members in the Concentration stage, searched the school for the missing alchemy students. The members in the Body Refining stage stayed in the dormitory area to maintain order.
While following the remaining clues and tracking down the academy’s back mountain, a dense fog suddenly filled the area.

It was a high-level formation, and Yun Mingchen and the others hadn’t found a way out yet, so they could only wait for the formation teacher to come and help.
The teachers had chased the monsters into the underground secret realm and wouldn’t return for another hour.
Although the fog itself wasn’t harmful to humans, there were occasional traps hidden within. While trying to avoid them, the student council members got separated in the mist.

They could contact each other by phone, but the fog was so thick that they couldn’t see anything, and it blocked the sound. Even with their phones, they couldn’t find each other.
Now, Yun Mingchen was alone in the fog, searching for the scattered members.
No matter how Yu Tong looked at it, he felt there was something suspicious about the fog.

He poked the system and asked, “Xiao Ba, was this part in the original text?”
The system, still shocked by how pure and cute the host looked, possibly a murderer and arsonist in his past life, blankly replied: “It was, but it was only briefly mentioned. The original text is too long, and it's normal if you missed it. The fog plot is interwoven with the male lead’s daily life, and he heard about it from others but didn’t participate himself.”
“It’s probably that the student council got trapped in the fog, and Yun Mingchen was attacked and severely injured, leaving some lasting damage that slowed his cultivation. Because of this, the villain became more extreme and brutal.”

Yu Tong was taken aback. “I’ve already gone through the sections in the original text that will be relevant this week, and I don’t recall this part.”
“Well,” the system replied, “the fog part is between the flower thief incident and the male lead destroying the monster's lair, becoming the academy’s new male god. There’s a gap of about three or four days between the two. The flower incident is still more than ten days away.”
“Did the plot happen early?” Yu Tong asked.

The system hummed, “That’s normal. The text is fixed, but the world it generates is alive. When we do tasks, we often encounter broken or fragmented worlds.”
Yun Mingchen was still in the fog, in immediate danger. As an elite AI, 8102 also realized the urgency of the situation.
Based on the clues in the original text, it quickly drew a map leading to the back mountain. Yu Tong got the map and was about to jump out of the male cultivator’s arms.

The male cultivator was still chatting with Yun Mingchen. As Yu Tong turned his head, he happened to see the chat interface.
Male cultivator: “Someone on the forum posted a surveillance video saying this cat was picked up by the president on the road.”
Yun Mingchen: “Yeah, it’s very small, looks pitiful.”

Male cultivator: “President, you’re so gentle. I’ve always admired you. Too bad I’m not a girl, otherwise I would really want to become your Dao partner.”
Yun Mingchen: “Thank you for your affection.”
Male cultivator: “President, the name you gave the cat is so cute. Why Xixi? Does it have any special meaning?”

Male cultivator: “President?”
Male cultivator: “Are you okay, President?”
Male cultivator: “President?”

Yu Tong: ...
Stop sending messages, the president won’t reply to you. Yun Mingchen still has to maintain the gentle prince persona. The words “dog thing” can’t come out of his mouth.
After using his cat-like agility to escape from the male cultivator, Yu Tong followed the map provided by the system and quickly ran towards the academy's back mountain.

The back mountain had a medicinal herb plantation and a secluded area for closed-door cultivation, an area that was usually off-limits to students.
Yu Tong made several jumps and pounced into the deep area of the back mountain, where he saw only tall iron fences and a “No Entry” sign hanging on them.
He circled the area but didn’t find any fog.

The system analyzed in his mind, trying to prove it was really a capable elite AI.
“I think the villain is quite clever. The monster attack on the students was likely planned by him. Do you think the fog plot might be something he staged?”
Yu Tong shook his head confidently. “No. Since Yun Mingchen set up so many defensive systems on the cat cage, it shows he already knew the servant would try to kill the cat. If I were him, I would definitely wait until the servant's issue was resolved before staging the fog.”

“If not, the two events would easily collide, and someone like Mr. Wen or others hidden in the dark would figure out he’s just pretending to be a useless young master.”
The system felt Yu Tong had a point. “It seems like the fog was an unexpected situation, not part of the villain’s plan. When are you going into the forest? Should we wander around more?”
Yu Tong was about to say that the back mountain's forbidden area was too vast for aimless wandering.

But then he suddenly remembered something.
His earlier assumptions were based on the belief that Yun Mingchen couldn’t use his own abilities to walk out of or control the fog.
However, if the formation was truly set up by the villain, Yun Mingchen could easily walk out of the fog. In that case, the two incidents—the servant killing the cat and the fog—would no longer be conflicting.

He could first find a way to separate the student council members, giving himself a chance to act alone.
Then, when he received the alarm from the defense formation on the cat cage, he could quickly return to the dormitory.
Last night, the monsters killed people in the dormitory, disrupting the surveillance. When the servant killed the cat, it was during the time students were in their morning classes.

At that time, there was no surveillance or anyone in the dormitory, and the teachers were all out searching for monsters. Even if Yun Mingchen had returned midway, no one would have noticed.
With his cultivation, he could easily hide in a corner and quietly observe what was happening in the dorm.
Yu Tong shared his guesses with the system.

8102 was startled, “Damn, that’s so sinister? You’re overthinking it, right?”
Yu Tong nervously scratched the tree bark with his paws. “This is just my guess.”
“You better not scare yourself,” the elite AI exhaled, analyzing seriously. “Didn’t you see the chat earlier? The formation teacher will be back soon to deal with the fog. The villain can’t predict everything. How would he know the servant would kill the cat in the morning? What if he was planning to do it at night or before the fog came? In that case, the villain’s plan would be ruined.”

Yu Tong let out a sigh of relief.
The system had a point. He had been too nervous.
Yu Tong straightened up, wagging his tail as he walked toward the forbidden area.

As he entered the restricted zone, he suddenly felt a chill on his back, as if something was watching him.
Yu Tong quickly turned around.
There was nothing behind him—only the silent woods and his puffed-up cat tail.

After confirming there was no danger, Yu Tong pressed down his big tail with his paw.
“Be good, don’t get puffed up. You scared me.”