Chapter 7: Birthday is approaching

Experimental Log: Day 1

Tested [Mental Domination] on Big White.

Found that complex commands don’t work on creatures with low intelligence.

They can’t process the implanted information.

Broke down complex commands into simple ones—raise paw, turn, move forward.

After adjustments, Big White completed tasks with high accuracy.

Confirmed: the target must understand the command for it to work.

Using this ability feels like computer programming.

Damn, those dead university memories are hitting me!

Experimental Log: Day 2

So tired.

Don’t wanna study this ability anymore.

Just want to game and binge anime.

Really tempted to mess around with some Spring Breeze Elf stuff.

No, gotta stick to the rules.

Ten days of abstinence means ten days!

Come on, Lu Qingqi, you got this!

To avenge that old grudge, keep pushing!

Dug out my old university textbooks.

Electronic programming lessons are coming back.

Starting to get the hang of this.

Experimental Log: Day 3

Putting learning into practice.

Split complex commands into simple task modules.

Now I can make Big White do backflips and front flips easily.

Seriously, I could have Big White livestream to earn cat food money.

Still can’t handle complex instructions, like making Big White cook three dishes and a soup.

Cat tests worked, so I hit the streets to try it on some thugs.

Success—they knelt in public and barked like dogs.

Experimental Log: Day 4

Drowning in knowledge.

Never thought my college electronic programming would be this useful.

Chose that major on a whim after watching The Matrix—hackers seemed cool.

Good call.

The room was clean, tidy, odor-free.

Lu Qingqi set down the keyboard, rose from his chair, and stretched.

A science grad, he never expected to use electronic programming years later.

He’d picked it because The Matrix hackers looked badass—pure impulse.

“Now I’ve got [Mental Domination] down, but there’s more to unlock.”

As a hardcore novel fan, Lu Qingqi had read tons of urban superpower stories.

Protagonists either had multiple powers like Long Aotian or maxed out one.

He wasn’t a genius, but he could copy their approach.

After days of testing, he understood [Mental Domination] better.

Unlike the straightforward [Gender Swap], it had limits.

He could only control creatures he saw directly.

They had to be carbon-based and understand his commands.

Control strength depended on the target’s mental resistance.

A scarred, tattooed thug was harder to control than a scrawny punk.

Weaker minds were much easier to manipulate.

“Big White, raise your left paw,” Lu Qingqi said.

Big White, no longer the slender female cat post-gender-swap, was back to being a chubby male.

It clumsily but accurately lifted its left paw.

“Right paw.”

“Do a backflip.”

“Good boy.”

Lu Qingqi grinned, squatting to scratch Big White’s chin.

The cat purred, its earlier stiffness from control easing.

He stared at the cat, but his mind was elsewhere.

The street thugs’ pathetic display a few days ago was still fresh.

Those cocky, domineering guys turned blank-eyed the moment he locked onto them, kneeling and barking in public, shocking passersby.

Hiding in a street corner, his heart raced with nerves and excitement.

The thrill of controlling others’ taboo actions made him feel unstoppable yet uneasy.

Boys all have a chuunibyou phase, and Lu Qingqi’s had lingered since junior high.

He loved fantasizing, thinking himself above others.

It’s why he wasn’t well-liked and held grudges.

“Still, strong-willed people are tough.” He recalled a tattooed, scarred man from a test two days ago.

He’d tried making the guy yell, “I’m a little fairy.”

Felt slight resistance—the man froze, looked around confused, but didn’t act.

Yesterday, though, when the same guy was drunk, Lu Qingqi succeeded in making him shout it.

“Mental resistance…” Lu Qingqi rubbed his temples, returning to his desk.

He tapped the keyboard, recalling the drunk thug.

“Alcohol weakens mental resistance, like numbing nerves, scattering focus.”

“Other things should work too. If we follow this, desire messes with thinking most.”

“Humanity’s primal desires: hunger and…”

“Sexual desire?”

His brow arched.

His fingers flew across the keyboard, typing out test hypotheses.

The sky outside darkened, but Lu Qingqi typed on, lost in thought, until his stomach growled.

“Lately, I’m always starving~”

“I’m 25, an adult. Am I still growing?”

He rubbed his stomach.

Three or four meals used to fill him; now he needed six, plus two midnight snacks.

Ding-ling-ling—

His phone’s ringtone snapped him out of it.

He grabbed it from the table—an unknown number flashed on the screen.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Lu Qingqi?” A steady, polite female voice came through.

“That’s me.”

“Mr. Lu, your parents booked a birthday party for you at 7:00 PM on the 27th at Yunding Pavilion’s banquet hall in the city center. They asked us to confirm the time and wish you a happy birthday.”

“Got it.”

The screen dimmed, revealing Lu Qingqi’s complex expression.

He stared out at the deepening dusk and sighed.

Parents… always parents.

Since junior high, they’d rarely been home, always traveling for work.

“Forget it.” He shrugged, brushing off the faint loss. “Can’t have it all.”

He got it.

Mr. and Mrs. Lu ran a medium-sized company with nearly a hundred employees.

Big orders always demanded their personal negotiation, sending them across the country.

They barely had time at home.

Their hustle as first-generation wealth-builders let him live worry-free as a rich second-gen, in a sleek villa, no survival concerns.

Others could only envy that.

He knew there were trade-offs.

Plus, it’s not like he never saw them.

They came home for Chinese New Year, and he could video call when he missed them.

Way better than Liu Wangjiang, that abandoned kid.

Still… a nagging doubt lingered.

Their company wasn’t that big, so why so many major orders requiring them specifically?

It felt like… an invisible hand was pushing his parents away, keeping them distant.

The thought flickered, and Lu Qingqi frowned, dismissing it as overthinking.

No way.

Impossible! Absolutely impossible!

An invisible hand? Someone controlling his life from the shadows?

He scoffed, shut his laptop, and sneered.