Inside the private room, Fu Ye wasted no time. Silently circulating his soul power, he sealed every door and window with an invisible barrier. As the restless little cat girl scrambled to find an escape route, Fu Ye simply released a microscopic fraction of his overwhelming aura.
Instantly, the girl froze mid-leap, her muscles locking up completely as she became pinned to the spot, entirely unable to move.
Treating a wild, fierce cat like a domesticated pet simply wouldn't work. Not every feline variant possessed the sharp, adaptive wit of someone like Zhu Zhuyun. The creature standing before him was a feral beast, untamed and unyielding. For a wild little cat like this, Fu Ye had to use absolute force to teach her what she could and could not do.
Her heterochromatic eyes widened as she watched Fu Ye step closer, his hand reaching out toward her. She screamed internally to run, to claw his face, but the crushing weight of his aura rendered her completely helpless.
Terrified of what was to come, she squeezed her eyes shut. Instead of a brutal blow, she felt a warm, prickling sensation against her forehead. Snapping her eyes open, she looked up to see a brilliant beam of golden energy flowing directly from the masked man's fingertip straight into her brow.
The veins on her forehead bulged as she fiercely resisted the foreign energy, but the harder she struggled against the slave imprint, the tighter the mental shackles bound her soul.
[System Notification: Cat Girl's Favorability has dropped by -10%] [System Notification: Cat Girl's Favorability has dropped by -15%]
Hearing the real-time notifications echoing in his mind, Fu Ye couldn't help but smirk beneath his mask. He had maxed out the favorability of plenty of women, but watching a stat plunge deep into the negatives was a thoroughly entertaining novelty. Since the relationship bar was already in the gutter, he was genuinely curious to see how low the system would let it drop.
As the slave mark successfully integrated into her consciousness, Fu Ye dialed its active enforcement down to the absolute bare minimum. He looked her up and down, his eyes narrowing thoughtfully.
"Tsk. You really are a unique little thing," he mused aloud. "But I wonder what your actual figure looks like under those ridiculous auction rags."
As his gaze locked onto her body, a wave of sheer panic and vulnerability washed over the cat girl's face. Yet, immobilized by his aura, she could only watch in absolute horror.
Rip!
With a swift, careless pull, the flimsy scraps of fabric provided by the auction house tore away completely, leaving the cat girl entirely naked and exposed under the bright lamps of the room.
"Tsk. Not bad at all. Quite exquisite, actually." Fu Ye nodded in mild approval.
At that exact moment, the system chimed again, registering her immense humiliation and fury.
[System Notification: Cat Girl's current Favorability is -80%]
As Fu Ye stepped even closer to inspect his purchase, the system updated its real-time broadcast.
[System Notification: Cat Girl's current Favorability is -90%]
Fu Ye chuckled. A staggering -90% favorability was truly a first for him. The cat girl glared at him with an intensity that could kill, her teeth bared in a silent, murderous snarl. Fu Ye merely reached down, pinching her chin firmly to force her to look at him.
"Alright, stop staring at me like you want to eat me alive. Being bought by me is a far better fate than anything you would have suffered at the hands of those fat nobles."
After accurately gauging her measurements with a single glance, Fu Ye opened his system interface and purchased a high-quality, dark-green maid uniform from the store. He had no intention of taking her virtue right then and there. He wasn't that desperate or starved for affection; his harem back home was filled with top-tier beauties. There was no need to force himself onto a feral slave in an auction backroom, though he certainly intended to discipline this wild cat over time.
With a thought, Fu Ye retracted his crushing aura. Predictably, fueled by the sheer malice of her negative favorability, the cat girl lunged at his throat the exact millisecond she regained her freedom.
But before her claws could even graze his clothes, Fu Ye caught her wrist, twisted her around, and pinned her face-down onto the leather sofa with a single, unyielding hand.
Three minutes later, the room had quieted down. The cat girl was now fully dressed in the dark-green maid uniform, standing rigidly with her head bowed. Beneath the crisp fabric of her new attire, her exposed buttocks were burning a bright, angry crimson, thoroughly swollen and throbbing from a merciless barrage of heavy spanks.
"M-Master..."
Her voice trembled violently, laced with a mixture of soft sobs and lingering fear. Fu Ye's brutal, unapologetic discipline had thoroughly broken her spirit. The deep, stinging ache in her backside served as a constant reminder that the man standing before her was an absolute monster she couldn't hope to resist. She had finally accepted her reality.
[System Notification: Cat Girl's current Favorability has reset to 0%]
Fu Ye raised an eyebrow. It seemed that after receiving a proper physical lesson—and realizing her master truly had no intention of violating her right there—the sheer terror balanced out her hatred, bringing her score right back to zero.
"You still look a bit stubborn," Fu Ye warned, throwing a sharp glance at her twitching cat ears. "Let me make this perfectly clear: as long as you behave yourself and do your job, I won't mistreat you. But if you try to act out or escape again..." He let his voice trail off, letting the implication hang heavy in the air. "Well, you'll find out exactly what happens."
Without waiting for her reply, Fu Ye swung the doors open. Standing right outside was the silver-gowned attendant, holding his processed payment card.
"Here is your black card, esteemed guest."
Fu Ye nodded smoothly, taking the card and pocketing it without a word. He strode down the grand hallways of the auction house, with the cat girl trailing submissively a step behind him, her head lowered as she nursed her throbbing backside.
As they exited into the main thoroughfare, the girl's exotic, pointed ears and swaying tail immediately drew gasps of awe and envy from the lingering crowd. Several nobles who had backed out of the bidding earlier slammed their thighs in bitter regret.
Yet, despite their greed, not a single soul dared to step forward or cause trouble for the masked youth. Anyone who could casually drop 3.5 million gold coins on a mere plaything was a dangerous entity. The nobility might be arrogant, but they weren't entirely suicidal. Furthermore, with the recent memory of the mysterious powerhouse who had plundered the imperial treasury and taken Princess Xue Ke as a servant, the upper class was terrified of accidentally provoking another living calamity.
Once they completely cleared the perimeter of the auction house, Fu Ye spotted a familiar figure waiting near the carriage docks. It was the old fox, Ning Fengzhi.
However, standing right beside the sect leader was an elderly woman with silver-streaked hair. Her facial features bore a striking, undeniable resemblance to the girl walking behind Fu Ye.
"Jing'er!" the elderly woman cried out, her voice cracking with pure maternal anguish.
The cat girl's eyes snapped wide open as the voice reached her ears. "Mother!"
Breaking her submissive posture, Jing'er sprinted forward, throwing herself into the old woman's arms as they both burst into tears, embracing each other tightly.
Fu Ye watched the emotional reunion for a moment before turning a highly amused, mocking gaze toward Ning Fengzhi.
"Old fox, if you brought an audience out here to try and pull a fast one on me, you better prepare yourself for a savage beating." Fu Ye cracked his knuckles loudly, the sound echoing in the quiet street.
Ning Fengzhi felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand entirely on end. If anyone else threatened him, he would laugh it off. But Fu Ye? This lunatic genuinely didn't care about political status; if he said he was going to beat you, he would beat you black and blue right in front of a crowd.
"Ahem! Calm down!" Ning Fengzhi coughed into his fist, trying desperately to maintain his elegant composure. "I merely did a favor for her mother, allowing her to see her daughter one last time before you took her away."
Fu Ye smirked, but instead of replying to Ning Fengzhi, he shifted his gaze to the seemingly empty air right next to the sect leader.
"Tsk. Haven't I told you before? When you're around me, stop hiding like a coward inside your spatial rifts."
A phantom, dark-gold dragon claw suddenly manifested over Fu Ye's right arm. With a brutal downward swipe, he tore through the fabric of reality, ripping a jagged tear directly into the hidden pocket dimension.
Revealed inside the spatial tear was the incredibly embarrassed face of the Bone Douluo, Gu Rong.
"Hey, kid! There are people watching! Leave me some damn dignity—"
"You talk too much. Get out here!" Fu Ye interrupted ruthlessly.
Reaching his hand straight into the fractured void, Fu Ye grabbed the old man by his collar and yanked him forcefully out of the rift, throwing him face-first onto the cobblestone street.
"Ouch! My damn hip!" Gu Rong rolled across the ground two and a half times before scrambling to his feet, rubbing his backside in irritation. "You ruthless brat, doing that in broad daylight with so many onlookers!"
Fu Ye lowered his gaze, observing the old man he hadn't seen in nearly twenty years. A genuine smile tugged at his lips.
"Not bad, old man. You've actually managed to reach Level 97? It seems your cultivation hasn't completely stagnated after all."