"Li Chen, what are you busy with?"
A few days passed, and Mei Xuan came to visit again.
She was not particularly curious about the arts of the Puppet Dao, but this concerned living bodies. Moreover, Li Chen had promised that once the conditions were right, he would help her recover her Original Body, or even obtain a more perfect innate Dao body and, like him, enter the lofty realm of transcending the ordinary and attaining sagehood. That had stirred some interest in her.
Yet the moment she entered the laboratory, she froze.
Before her was a pretty girl with cat ears, wearing a snug little leopard-print leather jacket, sprawled over the table in a lazy doze.
A fluffy tail also grew behind her hips, and she seemed to thoroughly enjoy Li Chen's stroking, letting out a purr.
Li Chen was gently stroking the girl's head with one hand and holding a chapter from the Complete Book of the Puppet Master Order with the other, frowning in deep thought. Seeing Mei Xuan enter, he set the book down and asked, "What brings you here?"
"You, you, you... this, this, this..."
Mei Xuan pointed at the cat-eared girl, so agitated she could barely speak.
"You mean Lin Yue?" Realization dawned on Li Chen, and he explained, "I tried bringing in a cat for Primordial Spirit Modulation, but it caused a severe conflict within the body, so I simply adjusted the human body as well."
Li Chen said, "But that gave her soul the combined attributes of a human, a sword, and a cat. It certainly isn't a lasting solution. She still needs further adjustment."
"I don't think you're doing this for research at all. You clearly did it on purpose!" Mei Xuan suddenly felt a little regretful. If she handed her