The little kitten was in distress.
Originally, he brought the Maine Coon here to find the guy on the Internet who disregarded cat's rights, wanting him to apologize and make amends. However, they got caught up in a treasure hunt midway.
The kitten, having had a moment of compassion, allowed the Maine Coon to save the humans who might have been killed. He couldn't have possibly imagined that the humans would exhibit absolute strength and kill all the demons.
At the cries of the dying demons, all the creatures outside the courtyard collapsed, beginning to flee the area indiscriminately. This, of course, included the Maine Coon and the stray cats that it had arranged to guard.
But how could the stray cats that had been tainted with a trace of demonic energy have ever witnessed such a scene? They abandoned the kitten at the first opportunity and chose to save their own lives.
The little kitten also wanted to escape, but alas, he was smaller than those demon-transformed rats. If he wasn't careful, he might get trampled by the panicked demon-transformed animals.
Left with no choice, the kitten could only hide in a corner, shivering in fear, hoping the Maine Coon would realize he's missing and come to rescue him.
Yet, to his dismay, the thing he least wanted to occur happened: he got caught by the owner of the courtyard. And even worse, the owner held him by the scruff of his neck in a blatant violation of cat's rights.
The kitten wanted to fight back, but all his anger could only transform into a pleasing meow when faced with the person who seemed to be the Void Refining True Monarch.
Hearing the kitten's cute, obedient meow, a warm smile appeared on Shen Yuan's face.
This palm-sized kitten, not even a month old, was probably brought here during the chaos caused by the outbreak of demon-transformed animals.
Abandoning such a small kitten here might even lead to it being carried off by a big rat.
With this thought in mind, Shen Yuan gently touched the kitten's soft nose and asked casually.
"Little guy, how about you stick with me from now on?"
The kitten was immediately struck dumbfounded.
"This guy must have learned of my identity and deliberately asked this question to coerce me into becoming his spirit beast."
"Damn, in this modern society, why are there still such conservative people who disregard cat's rights and want to turn others into spirit beasts?"
The kitten was furious. Even though Shen Yuan held his life by the scruff of his neck, he still wanted to resist.
But the next moment, Shen Yuan cradled the kitten in his arms and skillfully scratched the kitten's chin with his right hand.
The sensation of comfort spread from his tailbone to his crown, instantly disrupting the kitten's resistance thought process. Even if he consciously struggled, that comfortable feeling still made him subconsciously immerse in it.
"Mew!"
"Good, I'll take that as a yes." Shen Yuan, holding the kitten, squinted his eyes and laughed softly.
Shen Yuan's words were originally just a playful monologue, not expecting this little kitten in front of him could understand.
Anyway, this pretty young cat didn't have any identification tags on his body, so Shen Yuan planned to take him home and adopt him from the start.
But in the ears of the kitten, Shen Yuan's monologue became an entirely different concept.
"Damn humans, they use such methods to confuse me, relax my vigilance, and make me agree to an unequal contract!"
"Unforgivable, unforgivable!"
The kitten was extremely furious.
But when Shen Yuan returned to the courtyard holding the kitten, the kitten who had intended to resist, instantly backtracked.
In the eyes of others, there was no impact on the courtyard except for being slightly messy.
But in the kitten's view, this courtyard was full of the despairing wails of the dying demons and the yin spirits left behind after being torn by the space.
At the time when the Spirit Energy Tidal Surge just returned, there was not enough Spiritual Energy between heaven and earth to support the birth of ghosts. These yin spirits would dissipated when the sun comes up.
But in the eyes of the kitten now, the wailing of the desperate demon yin spirits was nothing short of horrifying.
In the entire courtyard, only Shen Yuan's surroundings maintained a zone of purity, where the incomplete yin spirits and the despairing wails would disappear immediately wherever Shen Yuan went.
That was the fear left by the demons when they were alive, a dread that pierced into the depths of their souls so profound that they dared not offend Shen Yuan, even after death.
The kitten shivered in fear, watching everything unfold before its eyes.
As long as a cultivator's strength reaches the Qi Transformation Realm and masters basic spells such as Spirit Communicating Art and Yin-Yang Eye, they can see the Yin spirits that ordinary people can not see.
With Shen Yuan's strength, he could inherently see these Yin spirits, and dispelling them would be a matter of mere thought.
However, Shen Yuan did nothing of the sort. He let the spirits roam around this courtyard, as though indulging in some perverse pleasure.
"Demon!"
"Definitely a great demon!"
The kitten was terrified.
Sticking its butt out with its head buried deep in Shen Yuan's embrace, the kitten didn't even dare to look directly at the handsome young man before it.
In the kitten's eyes, anyone with such a perverse taste could only be a notorious great demon in the Demon Path during the last Spirit Energy Tidal Surge era.
For such figures, death was only the beginning.
They ignite the soul lamp with a soul, wailing for a hundred years as the soul dissolves.
They seal the soul in the flesh, allowing the soul's will to witness the simultaneous decay of its own body and soul.
They create blood zombies holding cognizance to kill their loved ones, morphing into ruthless killing machines amidst endless breakdowns.
And these were just the most basic methods in the Demon Path. A true high-ranking demon was far more cruel and ruthless than it could imagine.
"As long as there are green mountains, there will always be wood to burn! As long as I'm alive, I will be able to escape from the palm of this great demon sooner or later."
The fear in its heart caused the kitten to abandon the idea of resistance entirely.
At least on the surface, the kitten tried to pacify the great demon, in order to avoid being used to ignite the sky lantern.
Shen Yuan, who had no idea about the kitten's thoughts at all, glanced at the little fur ball burying its butt deep in his arms, assuming that the kitten felt stressed due to the new environment, he did not take it to heart.
Surveying the dilapidated courtyard, Shen Yuan felt that the air was somehow colder than usual, with no other abnormalities.
Carrying the kitten back to his room, Shen Yuan had no desire to continue his cultivation after what had happened tonight.
Although he was not sure about the exact reason for the gathering of the demons, Shen Yuan guessed that it might be related to the Pot's Heaven Divine Power seed's cyclic spirit energy intake-output.
The part of essence element which was fed back by the divine power seed alone had led to a surge in the essence element within Shen Yuan's body. If he digested it with his heart, his strength was bound to advance further.
Before he could refine the essence element over the next few days, Shen Yuan didn't need to cause any additional commotion.
Placing the kitten on the table, Shen Yuan looked at it and suddenly proposed:
"Since you are now my cat, you should have a name that belongs to you."
"Since you're so black, how about Little Black?"
Even if the kitten had prepared itself to appease the demon in front of it, it couldn't help but roll its beautiful heterochromatic eyes at this name.
"You don't like it? I think this name is pretty good." Shen Yuan was somewhat stumped.
After pondering for a while, Shen Yuan's eyes brightened.
"That's right, your fur color is 'dark clouds treading on white snow', if you're male, I'll call you Dark Cloud, if female, White Snow. What do you think of this name?"
Before the kitten could respond, Shen Yuan again picked it up by the scruff of its neck to check the kitten's private parts to determine its gender.
The stunned kitten didn't even have time to react until Shen Yuan put it down and announced the name White Snow, only then it let out a wail of distress, as if waking up from a nightmare.
"Meow!!!"