Became a Failed Experimental Subject-Chapter 20: So Annoying

The reason I got the name Black Cat is because I often take the form of a black feline-type monster.

The only reason I take this form is because it's convenient for running away.

My body—an aberration that swallows abilities—has to take on a monster’s form in order to use that monster’s powers.

Other abilities can be brought out as needed, but things like silencing my movements, jumping, and landing without a sound—those require the physical structure of a feline-type beast.

When I use Fluid Swimming to hide underground, Yu Anna chases after the monster’s aura with her unique sense, slicing through the darkness like she's raking it with her hands.

Also, since Fluid Swimming shifts what it touches into a liquid-like state, making it intangible, there’s resistance—it doesn’t let me sink quickly.

That drawback can be solved with my darkness-sinking ability, where I vanish by submerging into my own shadow, so I’ve had to keep the form of a monster with lots of tendrils too.

Because of all that, I’ve always kept the shape of a many-tailed black leopard, though I discard wings or horns depending on the need.

There’s no better monster form for escaping—so it’s unavoidable.

Everything is to safely get away after killing a monster on the scene.

To turn back into a human, I have to disappear completely from Yu Anna’s senses.

But now, I don’t really need to do that anymore.

I can just sink into shadows, hide underground, and erase my presence. Or just dive into shadows, shift to another one, and vanish to throw her off. As long as I touch the ground, I can escape.

At some point, the rules of this chase between me and Yu Anna changed—from “run far enough to get out of her detection range,” to “touch the ground a bit away from her, and I win.”

Yu Anna’s developing long-range attacks to catch me, but, well... I can still get away safely if I’m only losing a tail or so.

Now that hiding in shadows matters more than silencing my movements, I don’t need to keep the feline form anymore.

And yet, there’s only one reason I still do.

It’s the meat humans give me sometimes for saving them.

“KYAAAH! He’s eating, he’s eating!”

“So cute!!”

If I suppress my presence, I can’t use my full strength, but against Murder-Class monsters, I can still take them down easily like this.

When I show up without triggering a monster alert and clean up all the monsters, more people have started giving me meat in return.

There are even people who don’t evacuate when the alerts go off—approaching with backpacks on. Makes me wonder if they’re insane.

If a hero’s arrival gets delayed because of them, things could get seriously bad.

Yu Anna seemed to share the same concern. She said the same thing while chasing me.

“Could you maybe not accept meat from people?! Do you know how much trouble the heroes are going through because of you?! No one’s evacuating properly!”

“KRAAK!”

She said that while hitting me with her ability right on my front paw, so it didn’t come off as particularly polite.

Still, she wasn’t wrong—so I decided I’d start refusing some of the meat.

Though... I couldn’t resist when it was really expensive and looked delicious.

Because of that, there was even a segment on the news recently saying that Black Cat’s taste had gotten refined.

“This... this is the Black Cat, huh? Heh heh...”

“You think this will work?”

“We’d better hope it does! Keh heh heh... eat up, big guy. You’re worth a fortune if we catch you.”

Maybe because of the rumors about a monster that helps humans and gets fed meat, weirdos started to appear.

Some stuffed the meat they gave me full of tranquilizers or sleeping drugs. Not that it mattered—I could eat that kind of stuff with no side effects. Still, it didn’t feel good.

Some people even set traps in places monsters were likely to appear, hoping to catch me—sometimes even locking up other people in dangerous situations as bait instead.

Using fleeing humans as bait? That crossed the line. I sniffed out the guy who set that trap and immediately tore into his arm.

Still, the tastes of the rich really are twisted—so many of them seem to want a monster that eats other monsters as a pet.

You hear stuff like that just listening to people talk while I’m eating. There’s even someone who’s put a bounty on Black Cat.

Do they think I’ll behave just because they caught me?

I’d just chew up a few arms and legs and bolt. Are they out of their minds?

Some people’s desire to catch me only kept growing, and more and more of them came to W-City from elsewhere to try.

Trying to catch a Despair-Class monster when you’re not even an S-Class hero... seriously, are they all insane?

Even when I let them go without killing them, they’re still pushing way too far now.

“It’s Black Cat! Black Cat!”

“Where?! Where?!”

Murder-Class monster alert. I appeared without triggering any extra warnings and took down the monsters, and as soon as people heard “Black Cat,” those who had been running turned back to watch.

It was ridiculous—people trying to watch monsters instead of running away from them.

But it wasn’t the first time, so I just slipped into the shadows like I always do.

Then Yu Anna dropped from the sky, casting light at my shadow.

“Grrrr...”

“Everyone! Why aren’t you evacuating?! Get out of here now!”

“Kyaaaah! It’s Yu Anna! Run!!”

“Run! Get out of here!”

They were more afraid of the damage Yu Anna might cause than me.

Yu Anna seemed too exasperated to care anymore—she just glared at me but didn’t give chase.

I also stayed still, thinking that if I ran too suddenly here, someone might get caught in the crossfire.

“This is nuts... seriously, the monster seems more reasonable than the people....”

“Kyaa!”

Right then, a tranquilizer dart came flying from the middle of the city.

I phased the syringe instantly with Fluid Swimming to dodge it, then twisted my body to smack the dart out of the air.

More shots came, but since some people still hadn’t evacuated, I couldn’t dodge them properly.

“Wait—what the hell are you doing?!”

“Tranquilizer fired at Black Cat—hit confir... no, miss confirmed.”

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?!”

The ones shooting the darts at me were heroes in black suits.

Clinging to the walls of various buildings, they kept firing nets and tranquilizers like they’d planned this for a ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) while.

Did they really think this would work on me? It was laughable—but I stayed put, worried their shots might hit the civilians if I dodged.

As soon as I let myself get hit, the heroes beamed and focused their fire.

“Stop! Didn’t you hear me say not to provoke him?! Who the hell are you?!”

“S-Class hero Yu Anna, the one who needs to stop right now is you. We’re from the government’s monster research division.”

“Monster research division...? Do you even know what the hell you’re doing?!”

“We’re successfully capturing the Black Cat you’ve never been able to catch, aren’t we?”

“Grrrrrrrr...”

Tranquilizers, tranquilizers, tranquilizers... the contents of those syringes brought back unpleasant memories.

Maybe she picked up on the disgust in my growl—Yu Anna’s expression noticeably hardened.

She snatched the hero’s radio and smashed it on the ground.

“Don’t give me that ‘successful capture’ bullshit! You think Black Cat is someone you can just grab like that?!”

“Starlight, can’t you see what’s happening right now? Black Cat is—”

“GRRRRRRAAAHHHH—!”

Everyone had evacuated.

No longer seeing any reason to keep letting those syringes hit me, I phased out—letting every physical object fall to the ground.

Then I glared at Yu Anna.

She shook her head slightly, like she was telling me not to.

Don’t want to. I’m gonna do it.

These bastards are really pissing me off—looks like I need to break a few things today.

“OHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!”

“U-URAAAAAAAGH!”

“Ugh... AAAAAARGH! Fuck you, you bastards!!”

A massive roar—sound with mass—shattered the concrete of the buildings like dandelion fluff caught in the wind.

Poised to leap in, I tore apart the arms and legs of the black-suited bastards who’d fired tranquilizers at me.

I didn’t kill them—but if they attacked, I wasn’t going to just let it slide either.

“AAARGH! R-Run away!”

“You said he doesn’t attack! Black Cat! Black Cat’s an anomalous case...! He doesn’t attack humans!”

“Who said I wouldn’t, motherfucker?! You goddamn shits! Monster research division?! I’m reporting all this—I’m showing this to the public!”

“Run! RUNNNNN!”

“Where the fuck do you think you’re going, you goddamn pieces of shit! I told you not to provoke him! Why the fuck would you go poking him and making this worse?!”

Only S-Class heroes can take on a Despair-Class monster.

That day, Yu Anna had come alone to avoid dragging other heroes into this mess—and ended up dragging along over thirty deadweights.

I grabbed those deadweights one by one and flung them aside, escalating the damage.

****

[Today, Black Cat uncharacteristically destroyed 124 buildings....]

[There were zero fatalities, but 32 people were injured. All of them were heroes from City C....]

[Should we really allow outsiders to enter W-City just to try and capture Black Cat?]

[Starlight stated that the ones trying to catch Black Cat recklessly provoked him and made things worse. Evacuating civilians also testified they saw Black Cat just standing there, quietly taking the tranquilizer darts and nets....]

[Like hell! Just because you're from a government research division, does that make you God?! What about my store?! You gonna pay my insurance?! You gonna cover the damages until I rebuild?!]

[Recently, more outsiders have been entering W-City trying to capture Black Cat....]

[W-City maintains its stance that Black Cat is still a monster, and there's no way to stop people who come to capture him. However, given how often Starlight has warned that provoking Black Cat could lead to unknown consequences, this was essentially a predictable incident....]

[Even if Starlight couldn’t capture him, she was doing a good job keeping him in check. Shouldn’t we say this was caused by the outsiders from other cities?]

Yu Anna, drinking alone in her room for the first time in a long while, crushed the beer can in her hand like it was paper.

This content is taken from freeweɓnovel.cѳm.

Since becoming a hero, how many days had been as frustrating as this one?

Now that Black Cat had learned to erase his presence and their confrontations had reached a stalemate, Yu Anna’s irritation had only grown worse.

Ironically, the less time it took for Yu Anna to lose track of Black Cat, the less damage W-City suffered.

Her working hours had gone down too, and honestly, as long as Black Cat didn’t cause other incidents and just kept killing monsters, maybe things weren’t so bad after all.

What bothered her was how the civilians kept treating Black Cat like he was a safe monster.

And that outsiders, suffering from the same delusion, were coming into W-City and stirring up chaos.

[Like, seriously—how the fuck did some B-Class heroes from City C think they could catch something even S-Class hero Starlight couldn’t?!]

[You think Starlight’s a joke? The one who took down Mirage when City A couldn’t? And now you think the Black Cat—who even Starlight can’t catch—is some pushover kitten?]

[W-City was basically peaceful as fuck lately thanks to Black Cat and Starlight ripping monsters to shreds. Who the hell expected other cities to come fuck it all up?]

[There’s even someone here offering 2 billion won to anyone who captures Black Cat. Like, are you even a person? Do you have a brain? Who the hell thinks a living nuclear warhead is worth just 2 billion?]

[If City C really wants to catch Black Cat, they should’ve sent an S-Class. Why the hell would they send B-Class heroes? Did they seriously think that’d work?]

[Star Punch! Star Pu—Kitty Punch!]

Exactly.

Yu Anna scrolled through the online community comments, feeling a deep sense of agreement.

She even saved a new meme: after the famous one of muscular Yu Anna punching a kitten, someone made a new image of a kitten turning buff and punching the word "City C."