Chapter 119.1

They arrived on Ancient Blue Star in the middle of the night and checked into a hotel. Early the next morning, the two humans and one badger set off for Maple Leaf Zoo.

Seeing the cage in Brother Xiang’s hand, Mu Ling asked, “Did it wake up during the night?”

Brother Xiang had taken charge of Butcher last night. If Mu Ling had kept the badger in her room, she wouldn’t have gotten any sleep, needing to keep constant watch in case it woke up, realized it had been abducted, and held a grudge.

Xiang Bei replied, “It did. I gave it some canned food.”

Mu Ling nodded, then said, “Let’s come back early so you can catch up on some sleep.”

Xiang Bei just gave a quiet “Mm.”

The taxi driver up front seemed pretty friendly. Hearing their conversation, he asked, “You two newlyweds here on your honeymoon?”

Mu Ling: “…”

Xiang Bei: “…”

Mu Ling awkwardly replied, “No, sir, we’re here on a work trip.”

The driver gave a quick “Oh, oh,” then added, “Well, since you’re here, you really should take some time to look around. Ancient Blue Star has tons of great places to visit.”

Mu Ling perked up at that and leaned forward. “What are some good places to go?”

The driver rattled off ten must-see spots on Ancient Blue Star without missing a beat. At the end, he added, “And the Maple Leaf Zoo you’re headed to now has the second-largest number of giant pandas on the whole planet! You can check off ‘see a panda’ from your list today. I’ll tell you, giant pandas only exist here on Ancient Blue Star. You won’t find them anywhere else in the galaxy. Even that super popular zoo on the Net—what’s it called, that ‘Ke’ Zoo—doesn’t have any!”

Ke…?

Mu Ling asked tentatively, “You mean Bi Ke Zoo?”

The driver replied quickly, “Yeah, yeah, that one!”

Mu Ling: “…”

Good news: Bi Ke Zoo is famous enough to be known on Ancient Blue Star.

Bad news: It’s being used as a point of comparison.

Seeing that they were young, the driver worried they might get scammed as outsiders, so he explained various tourist traps—told them to contact the police if anything happened, not to be afraid, and never to buy maps at tourist sites. He recommended downloading the official Ancient Blue Star travel map app, and warned them not to trust random people offering rides to attractions—those were always black-market taxi drivers.

From the hotel to Maple Leaf Zoo, the driver didn’t stop talking once. Mu Ling was genuinely impressed—she felt like not visiting these places would be an insult to the driver’s enthusiastic sales pitch!

By around 9 a.m., Mu Ling and Brother Xiang arrived at the zoo entrance. There were already visitors lining up to buy tickets. Mu Ling called Deputy Director Liu, who quickly sent someone to escort them inside.

About twenty minutes later, they met in the office.

Deputy Director Liu looked to be in his fifties, but his demeanor was warm and kind. He shook hands with Mu Ling, then glanced at the cage draped in black cloth.

“This is Butcher?”

Mu Ling quickly removed the cloth, revealing the Black Claw Ferocious Badger inside. Its black body and white-striped back were sprawled out, limbs splayed, sleeping like the dead.

Deputy Director Liu’s heart softened. “Adorable.”

Mu Ling nodded. “Yeah—only when it’s asleep.”

Deputy Director Liu: “…”

Mu Ling rubbed her hands together and asked, “Where’s Arrogant?”

“She’s in the enclosure. Are we letting them meet now? Your Butcher doesn’t seem quite ready.”

Mu Ling replied quickly, “That’s exactly why we’re doing it now—catch him off guard. If he was fully awake and realized what was happening, he’d probably kill me just to set the mood.”

Deputy Director Liu: “…”

Seeing he didn’t quite understand, Mu Ling gently explained that Butcher had essentially been kidnapped for this trip.

Deputy Director Liu was surprised. He’d been following Bi Ke Zoo and had seen many of their videos. He’d assumed all war beasts were perfectly obedient under Director Mu’s care.

So they have their rebels too, huh?

“Let’s go,” he said. “We’ll take the cart over.”

The ride from the office to the enclosure took over thirty minutes. The space they had prepared for Arrogant was massive—about the size of a school field. Half of it was designed like a forest, the other half like a grassland. From outside, you couldn’t see any animals—Arrogant was probably hiding.

Her Keeper had already received the heads-up and was waiting at the enclosure. After brief introductions, the keeper glanced at the still-unconscious Butcher and said, “Arrogant just retired from duty, and she’s not in a good mood. Maybe wait until he’s awake before introducing them. I’m afraid she might ambush him while he’s still asleep.”

That worried Mu Ling, too. She didn’t want Butcher to take a beating right out of the gate, so they decided to wait.

Fortunately, Brother Xiang had dosed the sleeping aid carefully the night before. They waited less than twenty minutes before Butcher twitched a few times.

“He’s almost up,” Mu Ling said.

Deputy Director Liu instructed the keeper to open the enclosure. Xiang Bei carried the cage inside, opened the door, and stepped out again.

Deputy Director Liu lowered his voice, cautious not to startle anything. “Let’s go back to the vehicle to watch. If we stay here, Arrogant won’t come out.”

Mu Ling whispered back, “Okay.”

Deputy Director Liu: “…”

Back in the vehicle, Arrogant’s keeper pulled up the enclosure’s surveillance feed.

From the aerial view, they soon spotted a lean, smaller Black Claw Ferocious Badger slowly making its way out of the trees, seemingly having caught the scent of a fellow kind.

It padded out onto the lawn, closing the distance between it and the cage. Once close, the smaller badger—clearly Arrogant—began circling the cage.

After two rounds, she let out a few harsh growls: “Gah-ha! Gah-ha!”

At that moment, Butcher woke up.

The scent of a female lured him out of the cage.

The first thing he saw was a fellow honey badger—mouth open, face contorted in a snarl.

Was he dreaming?

Probably just a dream!

Still groggy and not fully aware, Butcher charged forward and pounced.

Arrogant thought she was under attack. And being a badass flat-headed sister who feared no beast—not even tigers or lions—she sprang up and clawed at Butcher’s face.

But Butcher pinned her down, using his large size and the climbing skills honed in forest battles. With a swift move, he climbed onto her back.

This was the mating posture of Black Claw Ferocious Badgers.

That’s when Arrogant realized—this guy was in heat!

She spun around and slapped him hard, then bit him ferociously.

One of the traits of Black Claw Ferocious Badgers was their tough skin and flesh, so Butcher didn’t bleed despite the onslaught, but it did finally knock some sense into him.

The bull-headed male shook her off, backed up a few steps, and stared around in confusion.

“Gah-ha! Gah-ha! Gah-ha!” Arrogant was still yelling profanities at him—very unpleasant ones.

Having been single too long, the painfully straight Butcher could only lie on the ground, enduring the female’s wrath. Then he got up and began wandering around the enclosure again.

He sniffed as he walked. Eventually, he reached the edge of the enclosure and started digging at the mesh fence.

This was no glass-walled room. The enclosure was more like a giant wire dome covering the entire space like a colander.

Butcher dug at the fence for a while, then shifted to another spot, sniffing along the ground as he moved.

In the car, Deputy Director Liu and the keeper both frowned. “Did he give up?”

They turned to Mu Ling as if to say: So this is your legendary Butcher? The unstoppable king of beasts who conquered sky and land, unrivaled in strength?

He got yelled at by a female and now he’s retreating? Doesn’t seem so mighty after all.