Strange Life of a Cat
Chapter 356 - Chapter 356 Chapter 349 Cooperation

Chapter 356: Chapter 349 Cooperation Chapter 356: Chapter 349 Cooperation Alright, Zheng Tan finally understood the origin of Liu Ba’s name.

After finishing his writing, Liu Ba looked at Zheng Tan and asked, “Can you really not talk?”

In Liu Ba’s view, the demons in legends were all capable of speaking, and although he had never encountered such a thing before, he had come across other phenomena that science couldn’t explain easily. Once he accepted this reality, his thoughts raced towards the notion of a Cat Demon. But this cat truly had never spoken, not in person nor over the phone; otherwise, they wouldn’t need to use the more complicated Morse code to communicate and convey messages.

Indeed, right after Liu Ba asked, he received a “You’re talking nonsense” look from Zheng Tan.

Being unable to speak was one of Zheng Tan’s sore points, and Liu Ba had clearly stabbed him right there. It had been over five years since he turned into a cat, and all these years without speaking human language, not even meowing properly, had been truly distressing for Zheng Tan.

“If you can’t speak, then you can’t. But really, are you not a demon?” Liu Ba paused and then added.

When he first discovered the truth, that was when Liu Ba was the most shocked. Now, the most shocking moment had passed, and after a period of adjustment, the sensation wasn’t as intense as it was at the beginning. Last night, he was only tangled up thinking about how to have a proper conversation with this cat.

He was confident in negotiating with people, but he had no experience negotiating with cats. During this time, Liu Ba had reflected on everything that had happened since he first met this cat, remembering that he had even sprayed the cat with a water gun.

Thinking back to it now, that was really… courting death.

Zheng Tan decided to ignore Liu Ba’s nonsense.

Seeing Zheng Tan’s impatient look, Liu Ba changed the topic to something Zheng Tan might be interested in. He mentioned when he found Zheng Tan’s phone, as well as changing the ringtone of Zheng Tan’s phone and the continuous monitoring of the phone.

Strictly speaking, such behavior is illegal, but since Liu Ba could mention it so openly, he must have already erased all “traces”; without evidence, even if you want to sue, you couldn’t pin anything on the guy. Of course, people like Liu Ba are the type who exploit loopholes in the law. Private investigators are not allowed domestically, so they just adopt a legal facade. Consulting agencies, introduction agencies — they’ve done a lot of that.

Due to their professional habits, once Liu Ba decides on something, he would find ways to investigate thoroughly. Before the earthquake incident, Liu Ba hadn’t made up his mind to dig deeper because, after all, nobody wants their privacy uncovered, and he didn’t want to offend the other party. But after the earthquake, Liu Ba went all-in. Without answers, he couldn’t sleep; closing his eyes, he would think about the matters during the earthquake, and those few calls and messages. Nobody who had experienced that disaster could go back to how they were before. So, he made his move.

Of course, Liu Ba hadn’t told anyone else, which Zheng Tan still believed. It could also be said that it was because of their profession: they kept tight-lipped, and if it weren’t for their ability to keep secrets, they wouldn’t have so many elites trusting them to handle matters. This made Zheng Tan feel slightly better.

The initial unstable emotions passed quickly. Starting the conversation had been difficult, but what followed was much easier. Liu Ba was not like Long Qi; his ability to accept was strong. He didn’t care whether the cat in front of him was a God or a Demon, as long as it didn’t harm his interests, he was fine with making a good connection. Liu Ba had no great taboos about these matters, unlike Long Qi, who still avoided Zheng Tan whenever possible.

Liu Ba talked for a long time, and Zheng Tan remained in the same squatting position, silent, not reacting to what Liu Ba said, until Liu Ba started talking about mobile phone security.

Liu Ba has said a lot, but he also kept observing Zheng Tan. Seeing that Zheng Tan seemed to be mildly interested in this topic, he decided to go into more detail. Of course, he wouldn’t really reveal anything about the technical aspect.

“Mobile phones are not as secure as people imagine. If someone really wants to locate or monitor a phone, even if you turn it off, it won’t stop them. As for the common methods, they’re nothing more than viruses. Before 2004, with message viruses, a single ‘loaded’ message could monitor a phone; then came the era of deceptive viruses, and the future will be the era of exploit viruses…” These were technologies commonly mastered within their industry. There were other techniques with higher technical content, which were closely guarded secrets, since they were the breadwinning skills that no one would divulge.

“Especially now, with the rising popularity of smartphones, they’re even easier to exploit. In fact, many spy technologies have been developed a long time ago, but it might take a few years before the public becomes aware of them, and some might remain confidential forever.”

Signal interception, port security, emails and messages, cracking jailbreaks — all of these could be exploited, and with the advent of the smartphone era, it has become even more exciting for people like Liu Ba, as tasks such as tapping phones and locating targets have become easier to carry out.

“Your phone isn’t a smartphone, but its security isn’t great either. It wouldn’t be hard for me to tap into it. However, we can’t monitor your Cat Dad’s phone, and even if we could, it would carry a great risk,” Liu Ba said.

Zheng Tan glanced at Liu Ba. This guy actually investigated Mr. Jiao as well in his search for information about himself? Thinking about it, the phone Mr. Jiao currently used seemed to be issued by the institute or the university. At the time, Zheng Tan thought it was just an accessory to a year-end bonus, but listening to Liu Ba now, could that phone actually be meant to protect the private information of the researchers?

“And we generally wouldn’t easily mess with people here,” Liu Ba gestured around, meaning the Chuhua University area, “Even if we take on a job, we’d think twice about it. One reason is that there are quite a few experts within this university, along with several well-equipped laboratories. Those places have competent people; getting caught by them wouldn’t be good. It’s lucky they didn’t notice you before; otherwise, you wouldn’t have been able to hide for long. The other reason is that there are quite a few people in this university that I don’t want to provoke and cannot afford to provoke.”

When Liu Ba traced the trail to Chuhua University, he had hesitated. After considering it, he decided once again to continue his search.

“Did you know, just in your building, there are at least three people I don’t want to mess with, and I wouldn’t even think of investigating them,” Liu Ba said.

A shock went through Zheng Tan’s heart. At least three?

Seeing Zheng Tan looking at him, Liu Ba continued, “Two on the third floor, one on the first floor, and that’s just the ones I’ve seen. Who knows about those I haven’t seen.”

Two on the third floor?

Old Man Lan and his wife?

Not right! There’s another one on the third floor. Although Ermao’s family has a house elsewhere, they still come to stay here for a few days from time to time. I heard they plan to move in more permanently next year when Er Yuan, his daughter, gets older.

Is the other one possibly Ermao?

As for the first floor, it must be Big Fatty’s grandmother.

“In our line of work, many times you don’t need to look too hard, a glance is enough to gather preliminary information from many seemingly trivial things. Otherwise, if you provoke someone you shouldn’t, you wouldn’t even know how you died. Without enough brains and sharp eyesight, you won’t last long in this business,” Liu Ba said.

Liu Ba always felt he belonged to the category of people with not so bad observational skills, but he had met his match with this cat. But if it had been someone else, they might not be as good as Liu Ba–who would suspect a cat that seemed so ordinary?

“That old lady on the first floor has a mobile phone that’s not something ordinary people can use. Just one look and I know if a person is approachable. Even if I take a related job, I’d think twice about it.” Liu Ba did not want to go against the state machinery.

Zheng Tan recalled the old lady’s mobile phone. He remembered it seemed to be brandless, and he had always thought that Big Fatty’s grandmother used a regular senior citizen phone. He never expected her phone to be fancier than Mr. Jiao’s. But thinking about her son’s identity made it understandable. Maybe her son had moved up the ranks again.

Seeing Zheng Tan looking at him skeptically, Liu Ba waved his hand, “We don’t reveal our clients’ information, nor do we bother unrelated people. This incident is an exception. Aside from this matter, I really haven’t been poking around others’ business freely. We do have professional ethics.”

Ethics… Are they worth anything? Zheng Tan thought. But then he reconsidered, damn, this world is too unsafe. Not being able to get one of those fancy phones, rather than being discovered by more people, it might be better for him as a cat not to use a mobile phone at all. The thought of what Liu Ba mentioned earlier about there being many capable people on campus made him feel uneasy.

While Zheng Tan was hanging his head, pondering whether to throw the phone into the lake to destroy the evidence, Liu Ba poked him with a stick.

“Hey, what about it, are you interested in joining our line of work?” Liu Ba looked at Zheng Tan expectantly.

Old people, children, women–these are the categories of people who are likely to let their guard down around others, and animals even more so.

Seeing Zheng Tan showing no interest, Liu Ba continued, “This job brings in money quickly. How about if we collaborate, we split the earnings fifty-fifty? Don’t worry; we won’t take on any overly dangerous jobs.”

Joining this line of work? As a detective? It seemed he had already done this kind of thing before.

Zheng Tan was a bit tired of patrolling around the university, and it wasn’t convenient to go much further. He wasn’t sure if it was because he had turned into a cat that he inherited the feline traits–curiosity could kill the cat, and if inactive for a while, he got itchy paws. He always found some amusement for himself. But to truly partner with Liu Ba, Zheng Tan hesitated.

Liu Ba offered to keep Zheng Tan’s secrets, and Zheng Tan believed him, but he wasn’t ready to commit to the partnership. For one, he wasn’t that familiar with Liu Ba, and secondly, he had just returned and didn’t want to run around everywhere until after the New Year. Besides, the payment for the movie he was in wasn’t small. He wasn’t short on cash for the time being. If he worked some overtime at Xiao Guo’s place during the New Year season and made some extra cash, that would be enough for red envelopes. He didn’t want to deal with anything else.

Liu Ba had other matters to attend to, and Zheng Tan didn’t feel like listening to Liu Ba ramble on, so man and cat went their separate ways. Liu Ba told Zheng Tan to think it over and that he could call him directly if he made a decision.

Zheng Tan thought about it all night, not about the partnership, but whether to throw the phone into the lake. As for exposing his secret, as long as Liu Ba kept it, there shouldn’t be any issues for now.

Actually, just as the old lady from the lakeside villa district had said, there was more than one person around Zheng Tan pretending to be oblivious. Even though they knew Zheng Tan was out of the ordinary, they never said it out loud. Instead, they provided help, both overtly and covertly. If things really turned sour, he would seek help.

The next day, Zheng Tan strolled to the Old Tile House District, where he had hidden the mobile phone.

As soon as he entered the house, Zheng Tan smelled that someone had been there.

It was Liu Ba.

On a table towards the inside, there was a flip phone that looked around seventy to eighty percent new without any remarkable features and a new SIM card.

Zheng Tan didn’t recognize the brand of the phone. The keys were a bit larger than the ones on the phone he used before, but they seemed easy to use.

Next to the phone and SIM card, there was also a note:

“If you want to collaborate, call me~” After this sentence was drawn a large smiling cat face.

Without powering on the phone or inserting the SIM card, Zheng Tan placed both the phone and the card into the drawer where the old phone was hidden, closing it neatly. He turned and left the tile house.(To be continued. If you like this work, you are welcome to come to Qidian (NovelFire.net) to cast your recommendation votes and monthly tickets. Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile users please visit m.NovelFire.net to read.)

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