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Chapter 5: Freaking Ridiculous

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Of course, at the door, Xiao Qu also saw those few cockroaches. And the moment he saw the cockroaches, he began to really imagine the grand scene of a black cat pouncing on them. Unfortunately, the black cat in front of him coolly swept its eyes over them before jumping on a chair that was still considerably clean, lying down on it, and closing its eyes to rest. It didn’t even glance at the pork ribs with taro or sweet and sour pork on the table next to him, which were still warm.  

Comrade Xiao Qu immediately had a suffocating feeling. He looked closely at Zheng Tan, who was lying with his eyes closed on the chair with no intentions of moving at all. Then he checked to see if he had covered the dishes of food. He thought for a bit, but he still didn’t take care of it. He turned off the lights in the living room and shuffled to his room.

After Xiao Qu sat down, he opened the community forums and found the thread he posted from a few days ago. He left a response to a certain reply. “Nonsense, the rats at my house don’t eat cockroaches, and the cat I borrowed also doesn’t pay attention to them!”

Ever since finding out that his home had rats and that the mouse traps didn’t do their job, his first thought was to go online and post a request for help. The forum members had advised him to buy mouse traps and glue traps. There was even a reply by a member that summarized the reason why the rats had become smarter. “Animals that had experienced SARS would undergo an enormous spike in their intelligence and vitality. Those that didn’t gain intelligence and strength to survive have already been killed by humans during the SARS incident.”    

As a result of the mouse traps and glue traps failing, besides suggestions of buying rat poison, the next top suggestion was to find a cat, which resulted in Xiao Qu going to ask the Jiao family to borrow their cat.

Of the users that were in favor of borrowing a cat, there was one user that left a post flaunting their pet cat saying, “Cats and rats can also be regarded as the natural enemy of cockroaches. They can also prey on the cockroaches.” Xiao Qu was precisely writing a message to that person right now.

In the end, that user replied, “No matter how you look at it, this cat doesn’t pay attention even to cockroaches, which means it definitely doesn’t know how to catch rats. Even if it wanted to catch them, it’s not certain that it can.”

“Let’s wait and see!” Comrade Xiao Qu’s keyboard made banging noises. He pressed the keys with great force, as if he wanted to directly stab the other person’s body.  

While Xiao Qu was arguing with people on the forums, to the side, Zheng Tan opened his eyes. He flexed his paws, silently looking at the sharp claw protruding from his finger.

Regarding his first trial of catching a rat, he wasn’t a single bit nervous at all. On the contrary, Zheng Tan was quite excited, but he was unable to say why.  

It was the same last night. After killing the mice in succession, he didn’t feel even slightly nauseous. Instead, he felt this indescribable bloodthirsty excitement arise from the bottom of his heart.  Normally, he didn’t have this feeling. Perhaps it was because he hadn’t paid much attention to it. Maybe the events last night had acted like a fuse that ignited the bloodthirsty trait in the bottom of his heart.

Anyways, this should be the original nature belonging to this animal’s body.

Cats were the type to go hunt even if it had its fill, as if killing was a part of its instinct. Even the gentle looking house cat would posses this nature.

Just like what the docûmentary that Jiao Yuan and them had watched a few days earlier had said, “Harbored inside the body of every cat that is bursting full and lazily laying by the stove is a tiger hidden just around the corner.”

Zheng Tan exhaled and relaxed his paws. He calmly laid there with his eyes shut, but his ears remained perked up. From time to time, his ears twitched due to sounds of movement. But because these sounds weren’t created by a rat, Zheng Tan continued to remain motionless.

Time slowly passed, as it gradually became deeper and deeper into the night. Zheng Tan hadn’t found any traces of movement by the rats. However, the surroundings really held the scent of rats. It was proof that rats had been out and around not long ago. Zheng Tan also wasn’t in a hurry and calmly waited in the dark and messy living room.

Borrowing the light from the bedroom, Zheng Tan was able to clearly discern the whole living room.

Most of the people in the eastern residence had already gone to sleep, and the surroundings were no longer clamorous. On the Jiao family’s side, everyone should definitely be asleep at this time. And on this side, other than the sounds coming from Xiao Qu’s typing and cursing, there were no other movements.  

Hm?

Zheng Tan’s ear twitched and suddenly opened his eyes. His pupils dilated under the  dark environment, and due to his current state of mind, they dilated even further.  

Zheng Tan quietly jumped down from the chair. His movements weren’t slow at all. Under the veil of darkness, he kept his body low and stopped after arriving next to the pile of magazines. Zheng Tan’s concealed movements were all learned from Detective.

Inside the bedroom, Xiao Qu had just finished playing a round of game, so he took off his earphones and loosened his sore neck. When he turned his head, he happened to see Zheng Tan quietly coming down from the chair.

Something interesting’s about to happen?!

Xiao Qu hurriedly got up from his computer chair and took out a digital camera from a drawer. After pausing for a bit, he put the camera down and flipped through his cabinet to find his digital camcorder. After turning it on, he tiptoed out of the room. Who would’ve thought the sudden sound of a cell phone ringing would give Xiao Qu a scare. Xiao Qu hastily reached to answer the phone with one hand, lowering his voice to talk.  

Zheng Tan waited in the darkness. That rat came out from the side of the study. The rat didn’t even go towards the kitchen. It was obvious that the rat was already familiar with the surroundings and the habits of the head of the household. Xiao Qu essentially never made his own food. All of it was either take-out or food from the dining hall. All edible food was either placed in his bedroom or in the living room. Right now, this rat was going along the corners of the wall towards this side of the room. After moving for a bit, it stopped and checked for any signs of danger.  

This rat and the white rats that Zheng Tan had killed last night were about the same size. When compared, however, the vigilance of this rat would leave the lab rats behind by hundreds of miles.

When it was about to reach the door to the bedroom, the rat’s attention was mostly focused on the person who was currently on the phone inside the room.  

Just as the rat approached the door to the room, Zheng Tan made his move.

Like an arrow, he sprinted the short distance at full speed, straight at the prey!

When Zheng Tan hurtled towards the rat, the rat suddenly discovered, to its surprise, the presence of a low-lying hunter! The path to return to the side of the study and to find a place to hide in was somewhat long. Even if it turned and sprinted with all its might, after a few steps, it would definitely be overtaken. Therefore, the rat’s plan was to directly rush into the bedroom. Xiao Qu’s bedroom was a little bit more organized than the living room, but it was still a mess. As far as the rats and cockroaches were concerned, the places they could take shelter were much greater in there. So long as it reached the bedroom, Zheng Tan wouldn’t have any methods to catch it in the short term.

However, it no longer had the chance.

A black furry paw with sharp claws had stepped on its tail. Without waiting for it to move, the other paw had already pressed down on its neck.

Ka!

The sound was so small that people had essentially no way of detecting.

The rat then dropped dead onto the floor, without even a twitch.

The entire process happened so quickly that the rat didn’t even have time to make a squeak.

Xiao Qu who had just reached the door felt a black shadow flash by his feet. Looking down, he saw a black cat, and under the cat’s paw was also a rat that no longer budged.

“Holy… sh*t!”

Xiao Qu almost immediately tossed out the cell phone and digital camcorder from his hands.

He looked at the cat, then at the rat, and then back to the unused camcorder in his hands.

“fúck!” Xiao Qu cursed out loud.

It’s already over?

Shouldn’t the cat first chase the rat around the house, and then when it catches it play putty with it, and it will finally eat it when it’s nearly toyed to death

fúck, before he had even said two sentences on the phone, it had already ended?

What kind of sick, clean and smooth claw technique is this?!

T-t-this… is freaking ridiculous! What the hell!

Who said that a cat that didn’t catch cockroaches can’t catch rats? Who is he going to pressure!

“Hey, Qu Qu, what’s going on over there?” The person on the other side of the phone thought something was wrong with Xiao Qu, so they asked.  

“Hey, your mom!” Xiao Qu hung up the phone and turned on the living room lights so he could see better.  

Xiao Qu took the two chopsticks that were sticking out from his unfinished lunch box and jabbed the rat.

No movement.

Is it truly dead?

Feeling as if the chopsticks weren’t very suitable, Xiao Qu threw them away. He then went into the kitchen and grabbed the tongs that he hasn’t used since moving to this residence. He grabbed the rat and swayed it around a few times, confirming that it had died. He then grabbed his digital camera again and took pictures of the rat from various different angles. He immediately returned to his computer, no longer interested in playing the game. Instead, he hastily uploaded the picture onto the forum. The images vividly described the scene that had just happened moments ago. The result was that a lot of people posted that they didn’t believe it.

There was an experienced cat owner who posted a few pictures. Some of the rats in the pictures had holes bitten all over them, and some of them were left with incomplete limbs and tails, their torsos missing.

Xiao Qu turned his head and looked at the black cat that was currently stretching; that cat didn’t even want to give his prey a second look. Xiao Qu continued to argue with the members on the forum, and at this time, his phone rang again. Xiao Qu used his shoulder to hold up the phone while he continued to type up a storm.

Zheng Tan circled around the house, not finding any other scents left by rats. He didn’t wait here silently anymore.

Zheng Tan was preparing to once again return to the chair and nap for a bit. Zheng Tan twitched his ears upon hearing singing coming from someone downstairs.

Leaving the room, Zheng Tan came to the balcony. Filtering out the sounds from Xiao Qu talking on the phone and his typing, he carefully listened and heard it with clarity this time

“Last night, ~last night’s stars, ~already falling, ~~fading away~into the distant Milky Way. ~~~”

Zheng Tan: “…”

They deliberately lowered their volume, but they couldn’t conceal the characteristics of their voice. It was sung with vibrato in order to express the emotions of the song, and Zheng Tan made the connection of this to a ditty that was even older than him…

Mind-numbing, the damn bird downstairs wasn’t asleep in the middle of the night and started to sing nostalgic old songs again!

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