By the time Xue Jing emerged from the bathroom, an hour had passed.
He walked into the living room and saw Miao Miao curled up on the sofa, wallowing in self-isolation.
"Hmm? You've changed back?"
Xue Jing exclaimed in surprise.
On the sofa was not the beautiful black-haired cat-eared girl, Ning Fengwan, but a black cat with four white-gloved paws.
"Mm," Ning Fengwan buried her cat head in the crevice of the sofa and responded in a muffled voice, sounding very dull.
She didn't know how to face Xue Jing anymore.
To have such an intimate contact with him in her human form... and to have even brushed against that unsheathed holy sword.
For a girl who had never even held a man's hand, it was too much stimulation.
At the thought of it, she wanted to slam her head against the wall and die on the spot.
Ning Fengwan stretched out two cat paws and covered her face.
"Wan, how did you change back, and can you change again?"
Xue Jing sat down on the sofa beside her.
"You should call me Sect Leader..." Ning Fengwan said feebly, then sighed,
"...I don't know, I just calmed down and then turned back into a cat."
"Now I can't turn back into a human again, this is really inexplicable."
She felt a bit disappointed, yet she was also secretly relieved.
If she could completely return to her human form, she would have no reason to continue staying at Xue Jing's house, and she would have to resume her role as the Sect Hierarch of Dragon Cult.
Although she had temporarily reverted due to triggering some special conditions, the situation was still unstable, so she had to continue staying with him.
"Hmm... I've recently met someone who knows quite a bit about Divine Relics. I'll go ask her about the specifics tomorrow," Xue Jing pondered.
Ning Fengwan nodded her head without asking Xue Jing how he came to know such a person, simply gazing at him with her emerald green, vertical pupils, her eyes full of complex emotions.
For a moment, silence descended, and an awkward air gradually filled the space between them.
Xue Jing had been pretending as if nothing was amiss after coming out of the bathroom, but he was beginning to feel the strain.
He cleared his throat and said unnaturally, "I'll go out for a walk."
Then he got up, took his keys, and left the house.
Upon hearing the door close, Ning Fengwan sprawled upside down on the sofa, staring blankly at the ceiling.
Images of what had happened in the bathroom floated through the girl's mind, making her toss and turn restlessly on the sofa.
...
The next morning, when Xue Jing woke up, he lifted the quilt and, seeing Miao Miao still asleep beside him, smiled.
After cooling off separately the day before, the awkward atmosphere had dissipated by the time Xue Jing came home, and the way they interacted had seemingly returned to normal.
At least on the surface, it was.
As for how things would develop in the future, and what the incident in the bathroom the previous night would ultimately lead to – only time would tell.
After preparing breakfast as usual and a notification on his panel, Xue Jing's [Cooking] Skills finally advanced to the level of Lv4.
He went out for his routine jog, took a bath after returning home, and then set off for Qingcheng University.
Without any delay, he made his way directly to the seventh floor of Qing University Library.
In the dimly lit, old library, there was still only one girl, sitting on a wooden chair, engrossed in her book, exuding a serene atmosphere all around her.
Today, the girl wasn't dressed in the body-hugging white T-shirt and skinny jeans from before, but in a black blouse paired with an off-white grey checkered women's shirt tied at the waist, accentuating her slender waist. She wore fitted black trousers that hugged her long, shapely legs and simple white canvas shoes on her feet.
Because it was a novel experience, Xue Jing couldn't help but take a few extra glances at her before pulling out the "Crown of the Wicked Woman" and the "Utterly Ordinary Glasses" from his backpack and placing them on the table in front of Wu Youqing.
"BOSS, mission accomplished," Xue Jing said with a smile, sitting down in a chair.
Wu Youqing closed the book in her hands and blinked, with her light purple eyes looking towards Xue Jing.
"You did well this time, you worked hard,"
she said softly.
"I'm sorry that I didn't anticipate someone else would come and interfere unexpectedly, putting you in danger," the young girl said, with a hint of guilt on her face.
Xue Jing shook his head and replied, "You're not omniscient, how could you foresee everything? Since I chose to join the company and signed the contract, I was prepared for this. This level of danger is to be expected, don't worry about it."
Wu Youqing nodded and said softly, "Even so… due to the special circumstances of this containment mission, I will upgrade it to a C+ level evaluation, and increase your profit share as compensation."
She took a document from the bag on the chair next to her and handed it to Xue Jing.
"The man you killed has been taken care of yesterday, and his identity has been investigated."
Xue Jing took the document and opened it.
A passport photo was printed on the file folder, showing the man Xue Jing had killed yesterday.
His name was Zhu Yingkun, hailing from one of the three major Inner Ring Cities of the Fifth Urban Circle, Yuan City.
"This man was a C-level Custodian affiliated with Xu's Containment Company."
Wu Youqing leaned forward slightly, toward Xue Jing, and said.
"However, when I contacted Xu's Shelter yesterday, they were quite certain that Zhu Yingkun was not assigned to handle this containment task, it was his own personal action."
"It's an unclear and confused matter now, and that's as far as it goes—but I don't think Xu's Shelter is trying to pass the buck."
"To leave his own jurisdiction and come all the way from the Inner Ring to here to contain a C-level Divine Relic, it really doesn't seem like an assignment given by a containment company."
The girl spoke softly in front of Xue Jing, with her hair hanging down before her eyes, giving off a faint and elusive fragrance.
"Regardless of the reason, I will have Xu's Shelter give you some compensation," she said.
Xue Jing nodded, "If you've decided, that's fine."
In any case, he hadn't been at a loss, he had pulverized the other party.
"Speaking of which, the autopsy report of Zhu Yingkun is a bit strange," Wu Youqing said meaningfully, gazing at Xue Jing.
"Apart from one of his eyes being destroyed, there's hardly any wounds on his body surface, but his internal organs are as if they have been gnawed away into nothingness."
"That kind of wound, even detection can't figure out how it happened…"
Xue Jing pinched his chin, "Hmm… can I decline to comment? Pretty please?"
For now, he didn't know how others would view an ability like Shadow Flame, akin to superpowers, so it was better to keep it hidden.
Wu Youqing nodded, unconcerned, "It's fine if you don't want to say anything. Everyone has their secrets, and it's enough to know that you have the necessary containment abilities."
She took out another item from her bag.
It was a black identification card similar to an ID card, with a material resembling obsidian, reflecting slightly under the dim light.
The front was embellished with white brushstrokes depicting 'Death of a God', exquisitely crafted.
The back held several lines of text.
[Wu's Divine Relic Containment and Research Co., Ltd.]
[Special Hire C-level Divine Relic Custodian·Xue Jing]
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