The Flower Of The High Mountain Turns Into A Cat And Is Picked Up By A Human Chapter 50

Chapter 50

Che Deze reached out to stop him, but failed.

Bai Chendeng tilted his head back and popped the fruit directly into his mouth. Crucially, it had seeds. Bai Chendeng chewed twice and was forced to spit out seven or eight hard seeds.

He frowned, savoring the taste. It was sour and astringent, with a faint sweetness, but other than that, there seemed to be nothing unusual.

“Mr. Bai, you were too hasty. How do you feel now? Are you alright?”

Che Deze was helpless.

Bai Chendeng furrowed his brow: “I seem fine. It’s just an ordinary fruit…”

His lips parted, exhaling a puff of hot air. A look of sudden pain flashed across Bai Chendeng’s face, and he immediately began to gasp violently.

“Mr. Bai!”

Everyone quickly gathered around. Seeing Bai Chendeng immediately show symptoms after eating the fruit, they grew anxious and panicked.

“Medicine, the antidote is here. I don’t know if it will work. We just tested it; it was just an ordinary fruit. How could this happen!”

This damned, familiar feeling…

Bai Chendeng’s face grew increasingly pale. Part of the reason was his body’s spontaneous rejection, and part was his anticipation of what was about to happen. The first time was novel, the second time was familiar. He still felt embarrassed, but it was much better than the first time.

“Cough… I…”

Che Deze supported his arm, urgently saying, “Here is medicine and water. Take a moment, and take the medicine immediately…”

Bai Chendeng waved his hand. A faint blush spread across his face, earlobes, and neck, more vibrant and dazzling than the fruits hanging on the Grapevine.

Seeing him coughing and wheezing so badly, Che Deze simply reached out and patted his back, like an elder soothing a child, patting him rhythmically.

It wasn’t until Bai Chendeng used the leverage to grab the arm of another team member that he finally lowered his head, closed his eyes, and, as if resigned to his fate, spat out a golden hairball.

“…”

“!”

After the silence came wordless shock.

The Great Demon before them was truly a cat!

And he could spit out hairballs!

Behind the screen, the team members remaining at base also fell into a deathly silence.

After a long while—long enough for the image to linger on Bai Chendeng’s flushed earlobes for a full half minute—Zheng Shu let out an instinctive sigh of admiration: “Wow—”

He clutched his heart.

“Haha.”

He had been struck.

Fortunately, the six-person team were not fools. After a moment of astonishment, they exchanged glances and silently agreed to keep quiet and focus on the task.

Che Deze supported Bai Chendeng’s shoulder, placing a pack underneath for him to rest.

The others were not unfamiliar with Bai Chendeng, the Great Demon. After all, doing background checks and recording data on such a powerful entity was basic training.

In just a few seconds, they had already figured out the purpose of the hairball.

The fruit indeed concealed something—something that existing technology could not detect. Bai Chendeng hadn’t noticed anything unusual until he swallowed the fruit, and his body’s rejection caused him to cough up this glittering golden hairball.

It was too precious.

Too rare.

Too adorable.

It was golden and round, like a ball of spun gold thread, and slightly damp.

Even Sang Qiwei, who was still asleep and being supported, curiously opened his eyes a slit to peek at the golden hairball.

“Captain?”

Shen Lezhi asked.

Had he sensed something?

Sang Qiwei whispered a few words into his ear.

Shen Lezhi nodded repeatedly.

The golden hairball was only a good start, and it was far from the time for Sang Qiwei to fully wake up. So, closing his eyes, Sang Qiwei drifted back to sleep.

Shen Lezhi commanded in a low voice: “Collect more fruits.”

The fruits were squeezed into juice and stored in specialized containers.

Assuming Bai Chendeng had recovered, the team members began to handle the small hairball.

The golden hairball was picked up by one hand. The team members examined it carefully for a while and made comprehensive recordings at fixed points in front of the camera.

Listening to the serious description, Bai Chendeng curled his toes, wishing he could cover his ears.

After the display, a talisman was affixed to the hairball.

This was followed by a second, then a third, until the hairball was completely sealed, no longer showing a trace of gold, wrapped entirely in yellow paper.

A red string was tied around the ball. The team members moved their lips, chanting incantations.

Miraculously, the yellow paper ball spontaneously floated up. After vibrating twice in place, it shook all over and immediately flew in one direction, but was restrained by the red string, unable to escape.

“It’s over here. We’ve found the direction.”

“Good.”

“From now on, anything can happen, and we might encounter any danger. We absolutely cannot relax our vigilance. No one is allowed to leave the person next to them by more than five body lengths. Ensure everyone is within the sight of others. No unauthorized separation from the team.”

“Yes!”

Bai Chendeng took the lead, following the yellow paper ball as it flew forward like a swallow returning to its nest. He forced himself to shift his attention away from the hairball, treating it as if it had nothing to do with him.

Outside the screen, the team’s progress was transmitted in real-time.

Bai Chendeng had demonstrated this unique ability during the Eye Worm incident, which was nothing short of a divine skill. Spitting out a golden hairball this time was an inspired move. Without this hairball, the rescue team would likely have been stuck here.

They followed the direction of the yellow paper ball, expecting to encounter some danger. However, the scenery along the way remained unchanged—still full of trees and grass—only the terrain gradually became gentler, no longer excessively steep.

Che Deze followed behind Bai Chendeng. Instead of relaxing, his heart tightened, growing increasingly uneasy.

Not only him, but all the team members could feel it. As time passed, the surroundings remained ordinary mountain forest scenery, which made them feel stifled and irritable, as if something was pressing on their hearts, refusing to dissipate.

They walked for an unknown amount of time, long enough for the team members’ movements to become sluggish, their stamina exhausted, and even moving their legs felt strenuous. Then, Bai Chendeng stopped.

He looked around in confusion.

“How long have we been walking?”

Che Deze replied belatedly: “It must have been two hours… I’m so tired…”

Bai Chendeng felt that something was wrong.

“We haven’t arrived after two hours?”

“Almost. Perhaps it’s right in front of us.”

“Right in front of us?”

“But I’m so tired.”

Someone muttered, pulling their heavy legs out, only to sink slightly into the accumulated leaves the next second.

Bai Chendeng looked at the team member carrying the camera equipment and asked, “Have you contacted the personnel back at base?”

The team member responsible for this was named Shi Hong.

The last team member was Qiu Dongyang.

Shi Hong paused for a moment, then said, “We’ve been in contact the whole time. The last contact was three minutes ago, I…”

“Huh?”

He checked the log and found a problem.

Che Deze frowned: “What’s wrong?”

Sang Qiwei, supported by Shen Lezhi, slowly opened his eyes.

“Contact… is lost… But I clearly! I clearly spoke to them three minutes ago! Wh-why!”

A strange cry escaped Shi Hong’s throat.

The seemingly ordinary mountain scenery suddenly felt eerie and terrifying. Even the dappled light filtering through the gaps in the leaves vanished abruptly the moment they realized the anomaly, becoming dark and cold.

Shen Lezhi shouted sternly: “Shi Hong! Stay calm!”

The sound was like thunder exploding in the ears of the communications team member, Shi Hong. Realizing his state was wrong, he quickly took a deep breath, forcibly calming himself down.

“S-sorry, something is wrong with me… Contact was lost half an hour ago, but during that time, I thought we had seven conversations and didn’t notice anything unusual.”

Che Deze frowned: “Don’t just say you; none of us noticed anything unusual.”

He surveyed the surroundings, taking in the other five people besides himself.

“Captain Sang, you?”

Sang Qiwei, who had been drowsy, opened his eyes, revealing a pair of bright, piercing pupils.

It seemed the situation was dire.

Even Captain Sang sensed danger.

Sang Qiwei: “Qiu Dongyang, how do you feel?”

Only then did everyone notice Qiu Dongyang, the team member who had always had little presence in the group.

He slowly raised his head, looking at the crowd: “I, I’m fine, just a little tired.”

The Sun-Glow appeared in Bai Chendeng’s eyes. Looking at Qiu Dongyang, he belatedly realized that this person’s lower legs had sunk into the ground, making him half a head shorter than the others.

His scalp tingled. The crisis warning erupted instantly.

Bai Chendeng walked directly to his side, grabbed his shoulder, and pulled him out of the ground.

Qiu Dongyang felt as if his flesh and blood were being forcibly torn apart, letting out continuous screams.

Everyone’s expression was solemn.

It wasn’t until Qiu Dongyang was lifted by Bai Chendeng, gripping his shoulders, that a small patch of the mental fog lifted from the others’ minds, and they realized what had happened.

Shi Hong shouted with concern: “Qiu Dongyang!”

“It hurts… it hurts…”

Qiu Dongyang was set down. The moment his legs touched the ground, they began to sink again.

Shen Lezhi: “What… what is going on?”

Sang Qiwei took a stack of talismans from the large backpack he was carrying and plastered them all over Qiu Dongyang’s legs.

Sure enough, once the Spirit Isolation Talismans were applied, Qiu Dongyang stopped sinking.

He breathed a sigh of relief: “It works!”

Sang Qiwei applied Spirit Isolation Talismans to everyone, one by one, to prevent anyone else from being affected.

Contact was lost, and they didn’t even know how the enemy had managed it.

Even now, they hadn’t figured out where the enemy was or how they had unknowingly fallen into confusion.

Che Deze rolled up Qiu Dongyang’s trousers, revealing normal skin without any wounds.

“I can’t find any anomaly.”

Everything was unknown, which was far more terrifying than being able to see the gap between friend and foe.

Bai Chendeng leaned over, squinting to examine him closely. After a moment, he shook his head: “No anomaly.”

Contact was lost, and the danger was unknown.

Che Deze frowned: “Captain Sang, should we continue deeper, or…”

They couldn’t just hesitate and linger here.

Sang Qiwei glanced at the surrounding environment, where visibility was decreasing, and sighed.

He took off his half-person-tall backpack and retrieved a handful of straw-like, disposable storage tools from the side pocket.

Inside the transparent tubes, deep red, blood-like viscous liquid was bubbling.

Che Deze murmured: “Is this the juice squeezed from the fruits we collected earlier?”

Sang Qiwei’s eyes were sharp: “We have already entered a dangerous area. The reason we haven’t noticed the anomaly is that the strangeness of this place is like a surface and inner world. You can think of us as being in the surface world right now, but our bodies have already been affected. To enter the inner world, we need to take a risky move and voluntarily accept the infection.”

He spread the six tubes of blood-red fruit liquid in his palm.

“Qiu Dongyang’s situation is not good. He should be quickly taken down the mountain for treatment, but we all know that splitting up is a major taboo at a time like this. So, if we go deeper, we go deeper together. If we leave, we leave together.”

Sang Qiwei’s tone held an undeniable resolve.

“Continue forward, or temporarily retreat. Choose.”