The moment the experience notifications rang out, Chang Jiu immediately opened the system panel.
【Summon: Calico Cat — Lv. 0 (1/100)】
【Attribute: Metal】
【Combat Power: Unknown】
【Traits: Unknown】
【Skill: “Golden Eyes”】
【Description: Looks no different from an ordinary cat. However, it should be exceptionally beautiful by feline standards.】
There was no difference from its original stats. The only change was the information displayed after Lv. 0.
As an experienced player, Chang Jiu obviously couldn’t have misread it.
That was the current experience and the amount of experience required to level up!
“So besides grinding monsters and completing quests, I can level up by spending money too?”
Chang Jiu immediately perked up. She gave the little cat a thumbs-up.
“Well done, Kitty!”
The calico cat proudly lifted its head and narrowed its eyes, looking rather pleased with itself.
“You can pay to level up, and you’re spending someone else’s money!”
Chang Jiu didn’t even need to think about it. She immediately gave the order.
“Come on! Where did you find that soul stone? I’ll take you there so we can spend to our heart’s content!”
The little cat let out a cheerful meow and led the way with its tail held high, taking Chang Jiu deeper into the mine.
Before long, with the calico cat guiding her, Chang Jiu found a partially excavated mine shaft.
The mining lanterns inside had long since gone out, but Chang Jiu could still make out the surroundings. Faint, milky-white glimmers dotted the mine walls.
Those were all unmined soul stones.
By their faint light, she could also see several mining carts parked nearby, filled to the brim with discarded rocks.
Mining soul stones was extremely difficult.
They weren’t particularly hard, but they were usually embedded within ordinary rocks. If someone wasn’t careful, they could easily shatter the soul stones, causing the soul power contained within them to rapidly dissipate.
Chang Jiu picked up a mining shovel—one of the things she had taken from the miners’ corpses earlier.
She held it up and examined the rock wall.
She genuinely had no idea where to start.
What could she do?
Her secondary profession in the game hadn’t been mining. She really had zero experience with this line of work!
The calico cat’s long, slender whiskers trembled in rhythm with its swishing tail.
It circled Chang Jiu’s feet anxiously, rubbing its head against her again and again, clearly waiting for its owner to feed it.
“Meow, meow!”
Chang Jiu thought about it for a while.
In the end, she simply scooped the cat up and brought it over to one of the soul stones embedded in the mine wall.
“Do it like this. First, stick out your left foot, then your right foot. Good, you’ve learned how to walk. Now go learn how to run across walls!”
The cat turned its head and gave her a look.
In the end, it fell silent, as though it had just sighed.
Under Chang Jiu’s eager gaze, the calico cat lowered its front half and raised its hindquarters, giving its body a slight wiggle—
“Whoosh!”
It nimbly scrambled up the wall.
The next moment, the glow of the soul stone quickly dimmed.
And once again, that pleasant notification rang out in Chang Jiu’s mind—
【Ding!】
【Calico Cat Experience +1!】
【Player Experience +1!】
“It worked!”
Chang Jiu clenched her fist in celebration, while the little cat in her arms waved its left paw along with her.
Sure enough, if you didn’t push a summon a little, you’d never know how easy it was to be a Summoner!
Once she confirmed that soul stones could be used for leveling, Chang Jiu got to work as well. From below, she directed the calico cat to absorb the energy from the soul stones one by one.
After repeating the process several times, she gradually figured out how it worked.
The calico cat didn’t actually need to swallow the soul stones.
It only needed to make contact with one to absorb some kind of energy from inside and convert it into experience points.
Once the energy had been extracted, the soul stone became indistinguishable from an ordinary piece of scrap rock.
It could even choose whether or not to absorb the energy on its own!
But before Chang Jiu could even celebrate, her vision suddenly went black. She hurriedly grabbed onto the mining cart to keep herself from collapsing.
This body was probably so frail because it had already died once. At first, Chang Jiu had assumed she was simply starving, but now she was gradually realizing that something was wrong.
She brought the mine lantern closer to her wrist.
Her body was becoming increasingly stiff. When she pushed up her sleeve, the untouched skin on her arm was so pale that she hardly looked alive. A faint bluish-purple tinge had already appeared beneath her skin, while her body temperature continued to drop, as cold as though she had been soaked in ice water.
Chang Jiu pressed a hand against her chest.
In the deathly silent mine, even her heartbeat was so faint that it was almost impossible to feel.
“This is even more troublesome than yesterday…”
Chang Jiu slowly leaned against the mine wall and began regulating her breathing.
Her soul had entered this body, but before she arrived, the original owner seemed to have been attacked by a large group of soul beasts—
Soul beasts didn’t just devour human souls. They could also drain the vitality from human flesh.
In other words, this body should have died a long time ago.
Chang Jiu’s arrival had perhaps delayed the body’s complete deterioration, but she couldn’t replenish the life force it had already lost.
“Meow!”
As Chang Jiu sat there, something fluffy suddenly appeared in her palm.
She looked down.
The calico cat, which had still been absorbing energy from the soul stones moments ago, had somehow returned to her side. It sat beside her, staring at her with obvious concern.
Summons and their Summoners were connected to one another, so it had sensed that something was wrong with Chang Jiu’s body too.
Chang Jiu scratched beneath its chin and remained surprisingly calm.
“I’m fine. My HP bar is just almost empty.”
The little cat understood.
It flicked its tail, then suddenly turned around and dashed toward the dark depths of the mine.
Chang Jiu hadn’t even had time to wonder what it was doing when the calico cat came racing back.
The little cat was baring its teeth, dragging along a worn-out thin blanket that had apparently belonged to one of the miners.
It dragged the blanket all the way to Chang Jiu’s feet, then looked up at her with its round little head tilted back.
Chang Jiu froze for a moment before taking the tattered blanket and gently rubbing the top of its head.
“Kitty is such a good cat.”
“Meow!”
The little cat arrogantly raised one paw and waved at her, signaling for her to lie down.
Then, with a flash of white, it nimbly scampered across the mine walls.
Perhaps it was just Chang Jiu’s imagination, but the calico cat seemed to be absorbing the soul stone energy much faster than before.
At first, it had patiently waited for each soul stone to be completely drained.
Now, however, it seemed almost frantic.
Whenever it encountered a particularly large soul stone that was taking too long to absorb, it simply bit down on it.
“Crack!”
“Crack!”
Wherever the calico cat went, the glow of the soul stones throughout the mine dimmed one after another.
And along with it came the constant sound of experience notifications ringing in Chang Jiu’s mind!
【Ding! Experience +1!】
【Ding! Experience +1!】
Finally, after the calico cat’s relentless efforts, a dazzling golden light suddenly burst forth inside the mine!
【Ding! Level Up! Current Calico Cat Level: Lv. 1. Player Level: Lv. 1!】
Chang Jiu never would have imagined that one day she would actually get carried through a level-up by her summon!
Even leveling up during the beginner phase had been difficult in the game.
She still remembered when she had first started out in the beginner village. Her first summon had no combat ability whatsoever, so Chang Jiu had no choice but to drag it around grinding for experience.
She spent an entire day helping more than a dozen NPCs feed pigs, fish, catch chickens, and even steal dogs before finally managing to level up once.
And now?
She had barely sat here for a while before leveling up!