Outside the window was the Gray Dome, and not far away was a Floating Island spinning like a top.

Sunlight bathed the tall buildings above, where snow-capped mountains and extensive green fields were a sight of refreshing delight.

But beneath the Floating Island, in the shadows, dense buildings lurked, giving off a chilling and eerie sense.

It was like a stranger standing silently outside a frosted glass window… Even a casual glance could immediately evoke a deep chill, like at the bottom of a lake in winter.

"What a sunny day it is today."

However, the man sitting across from Russell, sipping freshly squeezed orange juice, casually remarked, "It's really good that it's not raining."

"Yes."

Russell softly agreed, turning his head.

By common sense, it was indeed a sunny day.

There were no storms, no typhoons, no blizzards, and no thick clouds falling from the horizon like barriers covering the Sky Dome…

…but perhaps it was an illusion.

Russell always felt that the sky shouldn't look like this.

He seemed to have seen somewhere, a brighter… not grey or dull yellow, but a cloudless, azure sky.

—But that must be an illusion.

Everyone knew that the sky was naturally grey.

Throughout history, this world had never had an azure sky.

"Although… it's my first time in first class," Russell fixedly eyed the man across the table, his golden cat ears twitched anxiously, and his tail rose high, slowly swaying from side to side, "but generally speaking, does the Tianen Group sell first-class cabin tickets to two completely strangers?"

Above the man's head were a pair of white, fluffy canine ears, and his hair—so voluminous it was frightening—even covered his tail.

On his face, there were scar-like etched lines.

These lines traveled from above his left eye, moving from the eyebrow to the chin. The eye it passed over had long been replaced with a cold, exquisitely diamond-like Prosthetic Eye.

Just being gazed at by that single Prosthetic Eye made one feel a chill down their spine.

The man didn't respond to Russell's query. Instead, he smirked and counter-asked, "Kid, are you alone?"

"That's quite rude, sir. Although it might seem unbelievable, I have graduated from my master's degree two years ago,"

Russell responded discontentedly, "It's just due to my prone-spiritual issue that I look a bit young. Just like… your size being so large."

Every person develops a degree of prone-spiritualization soon after they start speaking; it varies in intensity from person to person.

Russell had seen individuals with heavy prone-spiritualization who were covered in fur and stood like upright brown bears. Aside from being able to talk and wear clothes, they were almost indistinguishable from actual bears; there were also those with minimal prone-spiritualization, possessing only a pair of cat ears and lacking even a tail.

As for Russell himself, he possessed the reflexes and flexible body unique to dune cats, having lower weight, stronger leaping and balancing abilities, and more explosive power than normal humans. His ears were larger than other feline-prone spirituals, giving him better hearing.

He was a rare "entirely positive trait individual," meaning he had not inherited any negative traits from his prone-spiritual.

…provided being short isn't considered a negative trait.

If ear height were included, the guy in front of Russell would be close to one point nine meters. Without counting his ears, Russell was only one point six five meters tall.

Even just sitting across from Russell, this guy made him acutely aware of an intense oppressive feeling.

"Prone-spiritual doesn't necessarily affect height; that's classic pseudoscience. For example, my prone-spiritual is a Samoyed, and by breed, that's just a medium-sized canine,"

Mr. Samoyed casually remarked while chewing on his straw, "For instance, I also know a moose. He's pretty tall indeed, about one point eight meters, but if you're talking prone-spiritual, the moose is one of the largest in the deer family. Not to mention that… you have lovely light golden hair. What kind of cat is your prone-spiritual?"

"Both my mother and I are dune cats. It's said to be a very small cat… though I've never seen one,"

Russell responded listlessly, "But it could also be a genetic issue, considering my mom is even shorter than me…"

"Just by looking at you, I can tell your mother must have been a beauty,"

The young man genuinely exclaimed.

Russell was aware that he had inadvertently revealed some personal information.

But there was no helping it.

Although this "Samoyed" was continuously smiling, Russell's instincts kept telling him that this man in front of him was very dangerous.

Russell's heart thumped wildly against his chest, his ears stood straight up, tense and fur slightly bristled, even causing his stomach to ache.

—He had never seen someone so terrifying.

Like those in dramas, when someone in debt sat in front of an underground gang leader… that's probably the feeling.

He was restless.

Russell instinctively tried to speak out some of his less important information.

It was like when he had done something wrong as a child, suspecting he might be discovered, he would suddenly become talkative. He would voluntarily admit some less significant mistakes in an attempt to divert the other's attention.

According to Prone-Spiritualization Study, this was a typical instinct for humans with small animals as their prone-spiritual.