I Really Want to Pet My Wife's Cat Ears - Chapter 10

Chapter 10: Ten Cats

Thoughts were just thoughts. Shuo Yu resisted the urge to use the cloud-avatar to see if she could embrace Ji Mianmian.

She had realized by now that Cat Island Diary wasn’t just a cat-raising game; it was a virtual companion game. Based on her experience, characters in otome games were very reserved and proud in the early stages; one wrong move could cause favorability to plummet, leaving the player out in the cold.

While Ji Mianmian’s appearance and personality were soft and sweet, she had a stubborn streak in her bones—otherwise, she wouldn’t have been able to raise two kittens all by herself. Shuo Yu respected Ji Mianmian and cherished her. She didn’t want her own flippancy to create an ugly scene that would end in a “chasing-wife-at-the-crematorium” scenario.

“Are you scared?” Before officially diving, Shuo Yu controlled the cloud-avatar to turn and ask.

Most cats are terrified of water. To them, the ocean must be a place of immense horror.

Wearing a diving mask and an oxygen tank, Ji Mianmian—who was clumsily kicking her fins in the water—smiled and shook her head, proactively taking the cloud-avatar’s hand to walk into the sea. She was very happy to participate in the diving activity.

Seeing her so brave, Shuo Yu immediately activated the [Swim with Cat] function. Unexpectedly, the cloud-avatar scooped Ji Mianmian into its arms and darted into the deep water like a gust of wind.

On land, the cloud-avatar felt cold and damp, but in the sea, compared to the even colder seawater, it actually felt somewhat warm. Intuition told Ji Mianmian that this entity made of flowing mist was just Shuo Yu’s incarnation. Even so, she was happy to change from communicating from a distance to being able to touch and hold hands face-to-face.

Shuo Yu felt a surge of playfulness and led Ji Mianmian in a wild swim through the ocean. Two intertwined white wakes appeared on the shimmering surface of the sea. Unfortunately, the interaction card had a time limit.

The quality and quantity of the pearls collected were closely related to the final settlement score, and reaching the highest score would yield extra rewards. Given how much grinding and paying it took to synthesize just one such card, Shuo Yu was quite hungry for that reward.

Otherwise, she could have stayed and played with her all day long as long as Ji Mianmian didn’t call for a stop.

Before descending, Shuo Yu carefully checked the oxygen level in the tank on Ji Mianmian’s back. She reluctantly controlled the cloud-avatar to let go. “Wave your hand in front of me if you feel uncomfortable. Let’s find the pearls now.”

Most marine pearl oysters are hidden at depths of 8 to 15 meters. During the day, sunlight can reach that depth, so there was no need to turn on the diving lights. Shuo Yu activated the [Search for Pearl Oysters] skill. The cloud-avatar hovered in the water, flicking its arms lightly, and two currents of water surged forward. The currents acted as if they had eyes, splitting into several clusters on the seabed and circling the locations of the oysters.

Cat Island Diary made the details of the sea very realistic. Although the two had been swimming on the surface for a long time, Shuo Yu had also observed the seabed conditions. The map had no repeating textures or models; it looked no different from a real beach. Seaweed swayed in vibrant green, and corals were vivid and bright, completely hiding the plain oyster shells. Without the “bug” that was the cloud-avatar, Shuo Yu certainly wouldn’t have been able to see many of the shells with the naked eye.

Shuo Yu pulled Ji Mianmian to the surface, momentarily dazed by the girl’s wet face. “Mianmian, the places with the water-ripple circles are the pearl oysters.” She quickly recovered and pointed at the swirling bubbles underwater, explaining how to find the oysters.

The two dove back into the water and split up to start working. Shuo Yu hadn’t expected the game to account for the difficulty of sound traveling underwater. As a “water-vapor complex,” the cloud-avatar had no physical body and could speak freely, but Ji Mianmian simply couldn’t hear her voice.

Every time Shuo Yu picked up a few oysters, she would turn back to sneak a glance at Ji Mianmian, ensuring the dark blue diving suit remained in her field of vision. While controlling the cloud-avatar to find oysters, she wondered if the cat ears and tail were afraid of water and if it felt uncomfortable being wrapped up.

Unlike Shuo Yu, who was multitasking, Ji Mianmian was very serious about her work. Shuo Yu had provided such a good safe zone for her and the kittens while asking for nothing in return; she had always wanted to repay her. The materials gathered from the forest before weren’t worth much, but the pearls inside these oysters were so beautiful—they surely had some value. It was the first time anyone had fished for pearls around Cat Island; this part of the sea was untouched, and the oyster stock was very plentiful.

Shuo Yu thought that if there was still time on the interaction card after the collection was done, she would definitely take Ji Mianmian for another swim. However, the first thing she received was a system notification:

[The interaction will end in ten minutes. The Mimic Cloud-Avatar, interaction skills, and interaction equipment will be reclaimed. Players and cats, please evacuate from the sea area in a timely manner.]

If it were any other interaction on land, Shuo Yu could have pestered Ji Mianmian to keep her company after the items were reclaimed. But now they were in the sea; if the diving suit vanished, Ji Mianmian would surely choke on the water. Shuo Yu didn’t dare gamble with her life. After collecting the last oyster in her hand, she controlled the cloud-avatar to pick up Ji Mianmian and swim toward the surface.

The girl’s eyes were filled with curiosity and the shyness of being held at close range. Droplets of water slid down from her hair. Shuo Yu thought to herself that this was far more stimulating than the “Hibiscus emerging from the bath” scene she had looked forward to earlier.

She explained: “The interaction is about to end. Let’s go back to the shore.”

“Will the cloud-person disappear too?” Ji Mianmian’s face was filled with unmistakable disappointment, and she no longer struggled against the embrace.

Shuo Yu sighed with regret. “Probably. I’ll save all future interaction cards for you. Whenever there’s a chance, we’ll come out and play together. I want to spend more time with you, but the conditions don’t allow it.”

It was only then she remembered that the game company hadn’t changed the way interaction fragments were obtained. As far as she knew, there were only two ways: receiving them weekly from the monthly card or getting them as drops from fighting evil spirits. She didn’t know when the next interaction card could be synthesized.

“It’s okay. I can see you even when the cloud-person isn’t here.” As if to comfort her, Ji Mianmian pointed toward the sky. “I can see you up there!”

Shuo Yu turned to look at the sky, but there was nothing there except blue sky and white clouds. She guessed that what Ji Mianmian meant was a part of the “player-tracking” function; as long as the game was open, she could sense her presence. From an NPC’s perspective, waiting for a player to arrive must be a lonely thing. But Shuo Yu had her own life and couldn’t stay logged into the game 24 hours a day.

Shuo Yu didn’t want to dwell on it and changed the subject. “We have to get to the shore quickly. We’ve collected so many oysters, the Great Oyster King will be so angry he’ll try to bite someone.”

Ten minutes later, Shuo Yu looked down and saw the mist that formed her body beginning to dissipate in all directions. She only had time to touch Ji Mianmian’s furry cat ears before her vision shifted back to the long-distance third-person perspective. The cloud-avatar had truly vanished. This bout of happiness had only lasted two hours.

Seeing the “disappointed,” “sad,” and “crying face” emojis popping up over the girl’s head on the screen, Shuo Yu also felt a pang of heartache and silently cursed the developers. She moved the controller, using the “Greet” and “Pet” interactions on the cat-girl one by one.

She comforted her softly: “Mianmian, don’t be sad. Let’s go open the pearls.”

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