Fantastic Creatures’ Travelogue - Chapter 20

Chapter 20  Pressure

It seemed that the witchers stuff made Vivian quite anxious, and although the vampire was pretending that everything was fine, even someone as dull as Hao Ren could immediately sense her terror. Taking the initiative, Vivian proposed that if the witchers really appeared in the city, she would leave immediately to prevent Hao Ren from getting involved. Honestly speaking, Hao Ren was quite moved to hear this. Although the legendary vampires were cruel and brutal, this one in Hao Ren’s house obviously wasn’t. Even though Hao Ren didn’t know what the other vampires were like, he could at least be sure that the one he knew wasn’t a bad guy.

Of course, moved was moved, he really wouldn’t dare to let Vivian leave: He still had the three pieces of so-called ‘Contract with the God’ in his pocket, and if the abnormal creature in his house really left, he absolutely wouldn’t be able to explain it to Raven12345. So he just told Vivian, “You don’t need to be anxious. Even if the witchers really appeared, you don’t need to worry: I’ll find a solution…”

“Where is your confidence coming from?” Vivian looked strangely at Hao Ren, wondering why the honest-looking and trouble-fearing landlord had suddenly become so brave, “If you’re trying to comfort me, it won’t be necessary. Besides, I should warn you not to think well of the witchers, as they themselves are not pure humans. If there is a real fight, they won’t be concerned about too much.”

“To tell you the truth, I… I encountered something this afternoon, and optimistically estimating, I can’t just let you go that easily.” Hao Ren thought thoroughly about it, and felt that there was nothing serious to hide, so he reached a hand into his pocket to pull out those pieces of paper, and handed them over. Then he recounted his conversation with Raven12345 to the two nonhuman girls.

Lily was a soft-headed girl who was always confused about everything, so we didn’t need to bother about her. But Vivian carefully read the labor contract, and kept thinking about it while listening to Hao Ren speak about his experiences. “What you said is… real?” she asked, stunned.

Hao Ren shrugged, “One hundred percent true. Why should I lie to you?”

“I have heard of the multiverse concept from your people,” Vivian said, waving the few pieces of paper, “and I have to say that your ‘science’ is a pretty amazing thing. So that’s to say, you encountered a super civilization claiming to rule multiverses, and they have a specialized unit ruling each world called ‘Space-Time Authority’, and there is a strange woman named Raven12345 who called herself God, and she found you as her assistant, and top it all off, you are now…” — Vivian looked down at the contract, reading word by word — “Hilling Empire Space -Time Authority Node En35 in ‘Wang Ba Tuo Zi’, Practice Examiner, Outside-System Apprentice-Level Temporary Examiner Pre-Inspectionee…”

Hao Ren wiped the cold sweat off his forehead. Letting others read those words aloud was even more embarrassing than reading them himself.

Vivian was shocked for a moment, and then said in all earnestness, “Landlord, I know you are under a lot of stress…”

“I’m completely serious.” Hao Ren smiled a wry smile, “It must sound crazy to you. Even I, spent several hours reuniting my world view. Anyway, regardless of what the STA really looks like, Raven12345 is certainly a very, very great character, and if you don’t believe me, I’ll take you to see her next time. It shouldn’t violate the rules.”

Vivian saw Hao Ren’s face was quite serious, and she knew it probably wasn’t a joke. She thought about it for a minute, frowning. “Well, I’ve never heard of such a unit and I’ve lived for… ah, countless, anyway, for many, many years. I have memories from when the humans were still using bronze tools, but I have never heard of such a thing as the STA. The so-called Gods, I have heard of many, but most of them are just from humans scaring themselves, and the Raven12345 you said doesn’t sound like a God… Hell, where did they come from?”

“I asked her about that,” Hao Ren said, nodding. “Raven12345 said that since human developments were doing well, and she also had other things to work on, she hadn’t been concerned about the things on Earth too much. Even when the humans started propagating atheism, she didn’t care either. She just occasionally found an assistant to help her deal with some of the chores on Earth, so the humans never knew about the existence of the Empire — Oh, she always used the phrase ‘the Empire’ to refer to the Gods, which is another very strange phenomenon.”

“Well, forget about these first. Basically, the Raven wanted you to be responsible for the care of the ‘Aliens’ in your family, right?” Vivian gave the sheets of paper back to Hao Ren, “This shows that she certainly isn’t in cahoots with the witchers, which is a good thing for me. If the witchers appear and she is willing to lend a hand, that will be even better.”

“I’m afraid that’s not likely to happen,” Hao Ren said, shaking his head. “According to her, the Empire almost never directly intervenes with any events on the planet. And unless the humans seek death and intend to destroy themselves, they won’t care about it. But she’ll definitely contact me later, and I’ll wait until then to ask about the situations in detail. That afternoon, I left in a hurry, so I didn’t have time to ask a lot of questions.”

And Hao Ren finally gave her a self-deprecating smile. “Hey, you know, my brain was still turned to mush.”

“That’s nothing,” Vivian said, pointing to Lily nearby, who was in a daze, “Her brain is mush every day, and doesn’t she just live as always? Only with bravery and optimism can you live better…”

Lily immediately jumped on the table with a howl, “I dare you to say that again, motherf***er!”

Vivian was almost too lazy to answer the werewolf. She seemed to be determined, and nodded at Hao Ren. “In short, I need to find a chance to meet with Raven12345… The circumstances of her appearance were quite odd, and she seemed to know quite a bit about affairs between the Aliens and the humans. I have to ask her.” Vivian looked embarrassed, “To be honest, because of the witchers’ frequent activity and the fact that ordinary human beings have become more and more difficult to deal with in recent centuries, we Aliens have hard lives in this world. The Aliens who were on the top of the food chain before have become fringe creatures. We don’t even have our own historical heritage, and the isolation between us was so serious that much information about our own races has to be found in the records of humans. Take this werewolf as an example, in her whole life, she has never seen her own kind, and she even had to confirm the fact that she was a werewolf from the human stories. I do not want to become ignorant like her.”

Hao Ren knew that Vivian wanted to know about her own Tribe’s affairs from Raven12345, but, knowing about Raven12345’s ability to ramble about everything while still being tight-lipped about anything he shouldn’t know, he felt that Vivian had little chance of success. But in the end, he didn’t say anything.

Lily had finally recovered from her absent-minded state, and the first thing she thought of was, “Oh, landlord, shall we eat?”

Hao Ren: “…”

He was suddenly a little envious of the life and the simple but effective thinking patterns of this canine. Vivian glanced at Lily in contempt, then smiled and stood up. “Let me cook today. After all, now that I am a freeloader, and before I find a job and pay back the money, how about putting me in charge of cooking and cleaning?”

Hao Ren quickly waved his hands, showing his generosity. “No, no, don’t be so polite…”

Vivian was very serious. “This is a point of pride for me, as one member of the Blood Tribe. I cannot enjoy others’ privilege and not contribute in return.”

Lily was outspoken and straight, “Can you stop being so arrogant now that you’re this poor? Will your pride as a member of the Blood Tribe allow you to serve as a maid in exchange for the expenses of meals?”

Hao Ren hurriedly grabbed a biscuit from his side and put it into the werewolf girl’s hands to shift her attention. A soft-headed and speaking without thinking girl, even if you wanted to add insult to her injury, you couldn’t say things like that, right? Having the dignified vampire go to the kitchen to cook their food and a werewolf safeguarding his house, it had made Hao Ren think quite highly of himself. Ever since Roll first came to the house, Hao Ren had been demoted to the house’s second-in-command, so he hadn’t felt this comfortable for a long time. With that in mind, he temporarily put aside all the troublesome affairs. While he waited for the food, he served himself a pot of hot tea and read the newspaper under the cold air from the AC, pretending to be a very powerful person.

Lily was changing the channels endlessly beside him, shouting happily, “Hey, landlord, the TV is working now!”