When Jin Liwei reached his baby girl’s main workstation, she no longer looked as busy as when they first arrived. The place was the heart of the computer room and looked almost like the mission control centre of a space agency. At the moment, she was standing there and studying a bunch of codes displayed on the wall of computer monitors.
He stood a few metres away from her, not daring to go any closer because she might still smell the pain gel on him. He also didn’t want to distract her because whatever she was working on seemed serious judging by the look of concentration on her face.
In addition, Ketchup became unable to split her attention to chat with him or any other person and was using her entire system on this task. This never happened before, so Jin Liwei could only assume that whatever the mother-daughter duo was working on was extremely difficult.
However, dinner would be served soon in about an hour. He took a quick glance at his wristwatch to confirm the time. For now, he would allow his baby girl to continue working without distraction but in about half an hour, he would need to stop her and drag her off to eat dinner whether she liked it or not.
The woman needed to remember that she was now pregnant. Missing meals and exhausting herself from work were big no-nos.
All of a sudden, she gasped and stared at something on a particular monitor with wonder and excitement shining in her eyes. He couldn’t see what she was looking at because some of the equipment blocked his sight.
“OMG, Mommy! It worked! It really did! Woohoo! The cute and mighty Ketchup is so shocked that my fluffy white fur are all standing up! Look, Ketchup now looks like white cotton candy! Meow~”
Jin Liwei had now become very curious about what was causing the mother and daughter to react this much. He was about to change position in order to peek at the monitor that his baby girl was looking at, but she beat him to it and called him over.
“Darling! Where are you? Come here. Hurry!”
He didn’t waste any time and hurried towards her. But when he was about a metre away from her, he stopped and maintained the distance. [This novel is a contracted work with W e b n o v e l . c o m (remove spaces). If you’re not reading this chapter on W e b n o v e l, it has been stolen. It’s very discouraging to see thieves profitting from my hard work. Please read this novel on W e b n o v e l. Thank you! -Arria Cross]
“Why are you still standing there? Darling, hurry and come here. I need to show you something!”
“But the smell—”
“Come!”
“Yes, Daddy! Hurry up and see this! It’s super-duper to the highest level amazing thanks to Mommy and the cute and mighty Ketchup! Meow~”
“Alright.” He came over, his full attention on her face, and waited for any change in her expression. The moment she displayed any sign of repulsion, he would immediately back away.
Contrary to his expectation, however, she wasn’t the least bit repulsed by his smell. Maybe the pain gel’s scent had already worn off. She grabbed his arm and pulled him closer to stand beside her. Then she urged him to look at the monitor in front of them.
What he saw was a pure black cat sitting on its haunches with glowing golden eyes staring right back at him without blinking. The cat was so black that Jin Liwei initially thought it was Ketchup’s shadow. He turned to his baby girl with eyes filled with questions.
Instead of answering him, she spoke to the black cat on the monitor instead. “You should be able to speak. Why don’t you try it now?”
“Greetings, Mother. Bacon thanks you for creating this form for me after I successfully completed my in-quarantine evolution which allows me to finally have direct communication with you. However, I would have liked it better if Mother gave me a different form more fitting of my capabilities.”
The black cat’s voice sounded like a child, similar to Ketchup’s but a couple of pitches lower. Its manner of speech was also calmer, politer and more reserved than the overexcited Ketchup.
Jin Liwei was too dumbfounded to speak. All he could do right now was stare at the talking black cat. Then something else registered in his mind.
“B-bacon?”
The black cat’s attention shifted from Iris to Jin Liwei. “Yes, you called my name? You match the profile of…Jin Liwei. You must be my father, then. Bacon greets Father.”
Jin Liwei’s dumbstruck mind still hadn’t returned to normal yet. All he could say was a stupid “hello” to the black cat. While he was still processing everything, his wife and the black cat continued talking.
“You don’t like that form?” Iris asked. “It’s the same as all your cat siblings.”
“Bacon knows, Mother. I just think that a cat form doesn’t do my real capabilities any justice. Bacon is far more competent than this white chatterbox—”
“Hey, you meanie! How dare you insult the cute and mighty Ketchup?! I, the smartest and the most adorable white cat in the whole universe including the entire cyberspace, am your big sister! Bacon can’t insult your older sister! Or else Mommy and Daddy will scold you….”
The black cat started licking its paw and looked utterly bored while Ketchup chattered away all of her complaints. “Annoying.”
“Mreow?! Did you just call your cute and mighty Big Sister Ketchup annoying?!”
The black cat’s answer was to unsheathe its claws and then swipe it threateningly at Ketchup’s direction.
“Mommy! Wuwuwu! Ketchup doesn’t like this little kitty brother anymore. Bacon’s such a big meanie! Can we return him to quarantine? Meowuwuwu!”
Iris sighed upon seeing that the two cat AIs were failing to get along. However, the excitement in her eyes only intensified. By this time, Jin Liwei finally regained his senses and became fascinated by the new black cat AI.
“Ketchup, be quiet for now,” Iris said. “I want to talk to your little brother first. I’ll call you later to help me run some scans on him.”
Ketchup gave a pitiful sniff.
“Okay, Mommy. Wuwuwu. Meow…” Then the white cat went to the side to play with her ball of yarn as a puddle of tears soon formed around her fluffy paws.
