Liang He sat in place, not knowing whether to laugh or cry as she watched the chase between Xu Yi and the Mojin King Tiger. To be fair, Xu Yi was quite fast; amazingly, he hadn't spilled a single drop of food from his bowl.
"Liang He! Help!" Xu Yi cried out, feeling like he was about to collapse. Catching a glimpse of the Mojin King Tiger from the corner of his eye and seeing no sign that it intended to stop, he hurriedly begged for her help.
Seeing this, Liang He couldn't just ignore him. After all, the Mojin King Tiger was now her Beast Beast.
"Ahem, Cedriel."
At her gentle call, Cedriel, who had been completely immersed in the joy of the chase, skidded to a sudden halt. Without a moment's hesitation, he trotted over to Liang He, flopped down beside her, and nudged her to claim credit for his good deed.
"Alright, alright. I know you were trying to help Doctor Xu cure his hiccups, right?"
"AWOO!" He was saying, "That's exactly right!"
Finally able to stop running, Xu Yi was rendered utterly speechless by the exchange between the human and the tiger. He wanted to retort, but then he realized something—he actually wasn't hiccuping anymore!
"Huh? My hiccups really stopped. Why is that?"
"On our Blue Star, when someone has the hiccups, scaring them is an old trick to make it go away," Liang He explained with a completely straight face, not looking at all like she was just making excuses for her Beast Beast.
However, how could the Mojin King Tiger possibly know about such things? It really was just Liang He covering for him. But Xu Yi wouldn't actually try to pick a bone with Cedriel anyway. At the very least, he felt great right now! In fact, after all that exercise, he felt like he could devour another two bowls of rice!
"Haha, well then, thank you so much, Cedriel." Xu Yi let out a dry laugh and sat back down by the pot, sweat dripping down his face. "Thank goodness I didn't drop my bowl. I'm going back to eating!"
He had to eat more to soothe his traumatized soul after being scared half to death by Cedriel!
As Xu Yi resumed scarfing down his meal, his mouth felt like it was on fire. The spicy heat was intense, yet he couldn't bear to put down his spoon—after all, he hadn't yet mastered the more difficult chopsticks.
"Doctor Xu, eat a little slower." Seeing him sweating profusely, Liang He was hesitant to let him try the steamed fish head with diced hot peppers. She was worried that such spicy food might ruin the stomach of an interstellar person like him.
But Xu Yi was eating with sheer delight. His spoon was already reaching for the spicy fish head. Before Liang He could warn him, he scooped up a massive mouthful of fish meat and diced peppers and shoved it straight into his mouth.
"ROAR!"
Don't misunderstand—this roar didn't come from the Mojin King Tiger. It came from Xu Yi. The spice had hit him hard.
"I... I, I!" Too overcome by the fiery heat to speak, Xu Yi dropped his bowl, pointed at his mouth, and frantically fanned it with his hand.
"You've been overwhelmed by the spice. Hurry up and drink some water," Liang He urged.
He wondered, "Spicy? Is this what they call spicy?" Xu Yi absorbed this new piece of knowledge while chugging water like a madman to cool the burn.
Seeing him look as though he had been set on fire, his colleagues in the control room watched with a mix of anxiety and curiosity.
"Xu Yi clearly looks like he's in agony, so why did he keep eating?"
"He kept shouting about how delicious it was, but his face is completely red. Could he be blushing from embarrassment?"
"What does 'spicy' even feel like? I've never tried it, but I'm so curious! Why is he sweating so much?"
While everyone was still marveling at how delicious Blue Star cuisine must be and wondering what this "spicy" sensation felt like, a massive wave of excitement was already brewing on the Star Network.
At first, the Star Network account named 'Fur Raising Officer' hadn't attracted much attention. But even interstellar people were utterly powerless against cute animals. Naturally, netizens who frequently browsed animal-related content began to receive algorithmic recommendations for the account.
"A Mojin King Tiger and a Canglan Hunting Eagle?"
Lick was a well-known blogger who loved nature and enjoyed interacting with all kinds of wild animals. Today, he was scrolling through the Star Network as usual, hoping to find some interesting pictures and videos for his daily post. Quite by accident, the names 'Mojin King Tiger' and 'Canglan Hunting Eagle' caught his eye.
"Lick, is there something wrong with this picture?" his assistant asked, noticing him staring intently at the screen.
As an animal rights activist, Lick frequently used his influence to launch public crusades against animal abusers, thereby protecting the innocent creatures.
"I don't know," Lick replied, frowning slightly in confusion as he kept his eyes glued to the screen. "The Mojin King Tiger and the Canglan Hunting Eagle are Level-One protected animals of the Federation. From the looks of the picture, there's nothing inherently wrong with how they're being treated, but..."
"If there's nothing wrong, isn't that a good thing?" The assistant was thoroughly confused.
"But if you compare them to the prey they've caught, the sizes of this Mojin King Tiger and this Canglan Hunting Eagle are clearly more than double the normal size."
Lick wasn't the only animal lover to notice this discrepancy.
[The proportions of the Mojin King Tiger and Canglan Hunting Eagle in this picture are obviously wrong. The blogger must have edited it on purpose, right?]
[I was just saying, how could these two species ever team up to hunt? So it turns out it's all fake!]
[Avoid this account at all costs, everyone! Editing photos as a joke is one thing, but this person is clearly faking things to farm for attention. Don't let her get away with it!]
Netizens flooded the comments, demanding that 'Fur Raising Officer' delete the photos immediately. They even petitioned the official platform to ban the account to prevent the user from unjustly profiting off the deception.
Because the Interstellar Federation placed heavy emphasis on intellectual property rights, even downloading an image online required paying Federation Coins. Getting something for free? Absolutely impossible!
Completely unaware that she had just been branded a fraud and blacklisted by the internet, Liang He was currently enjoying a carefree afternoon basking in the sun with Cedriel and Lanton.
BEEP BEEP BEEP.
Having just finished washing the pots and pans, Xu Yi was about to bid Liang He farewell when he realized his Light Brain was beeping like crazy.
"What's going on? Who is in such a rush to find me?" he muttered. As he lazily opened his Light Brain, his eyes widened progressively. By the time he finished reading, his jaw had practically hit the floor. He quickly sprinted back over to Liang He.
"Whoa!" Suddenly remembering that the Mojin King Tiger and the Canglan Hunting Eagle were lying right beside her, Xu Yi barely managed to brake in time, training himself to halt like a spooked horse.
"That was close. I almost threw myself right into the tiger's mouth." Xu Yi patted his chest in lingering fear to soothe his violently pounding heart. Meeting the three pairs of eyes that were staring at him in bewilderment, Xu Yi quietly swallowed hard. "Um... Liang He, did you create an account on the Star Network and post photos of Cedriel and Lanton?"
"Yes, I did." Not understanding why Xu Yi would suddenly ask this, Liang He belatedly realized something might be wrong. She abruptly sat up from her lounging position and looked at him nervously. "I reported it to Governor Huo, and he approved it! I didn't break any rules, did I?"
"No, it's not about breaking the rules. Well, no, you didn't break any rules." Almost confused by Liang He's panic, Xu Yi finally remembered his actual point. "The main issue is that Cedriel and Lanton are quite different from the rest of their species. They are much larger in size, so the netizens all think you faked the photos to grab attention and scam people for money."
Because of Liang He's special status, Huo An had ordered that no one should actively mention the existence of SSS-level Beastmen to her. This was to prevent her from developing any fear toward the ferocious beasts that these SSS-level Beastmen transformed into. Therefore, Xu Yi couldn't explain things too explicitly.
Fortunately, since Liang He was from Blue Star and didn't know much about interstellar affairs, it was easy enough to fudge the truth.
"Ah? Something like that happened?" Liang He sighed softly. Based on her understanding of internet culture back on Blue Star, she couldn't even bear to imagine how many people were currently flaming her online. "What should I do now?"
"How about... you post a video?" This was the first time Xu Yi had encountered a situation like this, too. The core of the problem was that Liang He hadn't been monitoring the Star Network in real-time. Seeing her prolonged silence and inaction, the netizens assumed she was intentionally avoiding the issue and ignoring them, which naturally fueled their outrage even further.
"Well, look on the bright side. You've practically become an overnight sensation," Xu Yi added. Although "overnight" wasn't exactly accurate, considering the photos had been posted in the morning and the backlash had exploded by noon.
"I suppose infamous is still famous, right?" Liang He twitched her lips in speechlessness. She appreciated Xu Yi's attempt at comforting her, but it really wasn't necessary. "I know what to do. As it happens, when Cedriel and Lanton were hunting today, I recorded a video along with taking the photos. Otherwise, I really wouldn't have any way to clear my name."
Relieved that she had kept a backup plan, Liang He hurriedly pulled out her Light Brain and pulled up the video she had recently uploaded from her recording device. Not daring to edit it this time for fear of more forgery accusations, she simply clipped a relatively non-gory segment and posted it directly.
Because Liang He had not made any statement to address the issue for so long, the trending hashtag regarding the 'Fur Raising Officer' had been pushed directly into the top three searches on the Star Network, and it was vaguely trending toward the number one spot.
When she finally released her latest update, the netizens who had been eagerly waiting to pass judgment on her immediately perked up, ready to see what kind of nonsense she was trying to pull now.
[A video recorded at the same time. Praising my amazing Mojin King Tiger and Canglan Hunting Eagle once again! PS: I welcome anyone to try and debunk this! [Video Attached]]