The Record of Unusual Creatures

Time flew as one week passed by.

Hao Ren had enjoyed a peaceful week, which was rare since he took up the job as an inspector living on the edge a couple of years ago. The days were quiet after Vivian ‘gave birth’ to a palm-sized Malevolence. Every day, what Hao Ren did was mostly checking news from the monitoring outposts, drafting the development plan of the frontiers, attending to the daily problems of the Twilight survivors faced. Except for the occasional babel of the supernatural creatures at home, his days were generally pleasant.

The little Malevolence had been staying with them for a week now.

At first, Hao Ren and Vivian were worried about having to live with the Malevolence, but as it turned out, their concerns were unfounded. The Malevolence was not as dangerous as they imagined. Even Lil Pea started to treat the little one as a non-threat—that was how feeble that thing was.

Meanwhile, the little Malevolence was still as angry and restless as usual as she tried to challenge the world that she saw as another hell.

After the first night, Vivian let the little Malevolence out of the cage. Just like she had thought, the little Malevolence was restive because she was upset for having to stay in the cage. The first place the little Malevolence went to after leaving the cage was the mouse hole, and things got a little quieter since then.

Hao Ren sat on the sofa, watching marine documentaries with Lil Pea. Y’zaks’ brows knit together as he read The Classic of Mountains and Seas . There was a slight scraping sound coming from the corner of the living hall. Hao Ren casually glanced over there, but he appeared to be careless. “It seems she has made the mouse hole her home. I don’t know if a creature like the Malevolence knows what home means, but she likes that mouse hole a lot.”

“It feels funny,” the old demon said as he raised his head. “I thought she would have caused bigger harm.”

As soon as Y’zaks’ voice trailed off, the paper box in the corner slowly moved. The little Malevolence was pushing the box away as she squeezed herself out through the gap between the paper box and the cabinet, and then checking the surroundings before running towards the direction of Hao Ren and Lil Pea. The little Malevolence struggled to climb onto the armrest of the sofa, and then maneuvered herself around the fruit bowl on the armrest, and finally launched herself in the air for a short distance before landing right in front of Lil Pea on the coffee table. Hao Ren and Y’zaks did not even look during the whole actions of the little Malevolence. Even Lil Pea, getting used to the drill, merely looked uninterestedly at the clumsy movement of the little Malevolence.

The little Malevolence vociferated threateningly, threw a bunch of dark-red energy arrows, and then lunged forwards. But Lil Pea just squinted as a silver-white sacred flame burned the bolts into ashes a dozen centimeters away from her. With the flap of a tail, the little mermaid sent the little Malevolence flying out to the other side of the living hall.

Hao Ren was still enjoying his TV while Y’zaks was reading The Classic of Mountains and Seas . Lil Pea dusted the table with her tail and then curled into a ball and slept.

Meanwhile, as the little Malevolence crash-landed, she rolled a few times on the floor before grinding to a halt. Defiantly, she got back to her feet and aimed for her next target.

Rollie sent her back with a slap.

Lily threw her out from the room straight into the trash bin beside the kitchen door.

Nangong Wuyue tossed her from upstairs.

At last, Vivian caught her in the kitchen. Grabbing the little Malevolence by her collar, Vivian came out into the living hall. With her free arm akimbo, Vivian yelled at Hao Ren, “Could you please take care of her. She just jumped into the hot oil pan while I was cooking!”

“How? You, the parent body, couldn’t even control her.” Hao Ren glanced up at Vivian. “Let her be. She will go hungry after a while, like clockwork.”

While saying, Hao Ren looked at the piece of paper pinned on the refrigerator not far away; it was a journal written in cacography.

“XXXX – XXXX o’clock: Sleeping in the mouse hole;

XXXX – XXXX o’clock: coming out to launching her offensive;

XXXX – XXXX o’clock: getting hungry and having her meal;

XXXX – XXXX o’clock: attacking people or chewing the power cables;

XXXX – XXXX o’clock: getting hungry and having her meal;

XXXX – XXXX o’clock: starting to bite things indiscriminately and trying to destroy the west wall with magic. Since she is only interested in damaging the west wall, an iron plate has been put in place in the corner of the west wall as her punching bag. Do remember to check the iron plate for damage and change if necessary. Probably she is doing exercise.

XXXX – XXXX o’clock: back to the mouse hole, usually staying quiet until the next day so that super-cute Rollie could enjoy a more tranquil moment sleeping in front of the hole.”

Vivian and Hao Ren jointly compiled the journal, dictation by Hao Ren, and handwritten by Rollie.

Vivian buried her face in her hand while Hao Ren lay on the sofa listlessly. Vivian knew there was nothing she could do, so she left the little Malevolence with Hao Ren. “She’s yours now. I have to go cooking.”

The first thing the little Malevolence did after breaking free was lunging at Hao Ren and biting his finger. Unhurriedly, Hao Ren took a piece of crumpled paper out from his pocket and smashed the little Malevolence down. This crumpled paper would be enough to have the little guy occupied for the next ten minutes.

Such was the life of the little Malevolence in Hao Ren’s home.

Be it a way of life or just an instinct, the routine of the little Malevolence was as dull as it was predictable. Attacking people in the house was her only hobby during her wake times. But she could do no damage to anyone with her level of strength, and would quickly run out of steam and seek the sacrifice of fresh meat and blood. Hao Ren had bought half a kilo of meat, still bloody, from the market and stored it in the refrigerator. The little Malevolence had no idea how to open the fridge, but she knew where her food was, and whenever she was hungry, she would lie in front of the refrigerator and wait for someone to feed her. Other than messing around and eating, she spent the rest of the day in the mouse hole.

The little Malevolence had no complex thinking and feelings and was not an animal, but occasionally she manifested seemingly an emotional reaction. Hao Ren still could not figure out what type of creature the Malevolence was, but he started to think that Raven 12345 wanting him to keep the Malevolence made sense: the little guy could be an invaluable study subject.

The little Malevolence growled as she tore the crumpled paper into pieces. The blood stains on the paper were attracting her attention. “Her behavior is different from the ordinary Malevolence,” Hao Ren said casually.

“It’s the same.” The MDT said while lying idle on the coffee table. “It’s a wonderful phenomenon: when a creature shrinks into a miniature size, it will become harmless and funny; but if it were to grow into a human-sized monster tearing a person apart, you’re not going to think it is harmless and funny anymore. It would be a disaster when it enlarges a few thousand times in size.”

Hao Ren nodded thoughtfully and looked at the little Malevolence. “It would be a lot better if she could calm down and stop making it as if we are bullying her.”

“That’s probably impossible,” the MDT said. “Unless she could think, or her weak emotional response could be amplified enough to produce feelings; otherwise, Malevolence would never stay quiet. Ahh, someone is calling you.”

“Who is that?”

“The call is routed through the earth communication network. It’s an IDD call from White Flame.” the MDT said. “Should I let the call through?”

Hao Ren froze for a second before realizing that he had asked a favor from the demon hunter earlier. He quickly ordered the MDT to let the call through.

“Hao Ren,” the voice of White Flame was heard through the MDT. “It’s about the investigation: I have found an Olympus investigation paper in the library.”

“Investigation paper? What does it say?”

“Most of the records are about the actions of the demon hunters destroying the Mount Olympus, which I think you’re not going to be interested. But there is an attachment that might be useful. If the information is correct, during the destruction of the ancient otherwordlings in Greeks, a Zeus attendant had escaped with a large number of files and ancient artifacts. Included in the files are Athena’s research materials, which could contain what you are looking for.”