Chapter 88: Fabulous Fluffy Foxes
“Excuse me, young lady?”
Su Yao turned. She had been cutting through a shaded courtyard between lecture halls when a voice stopped her.
A man in his late sixties wearing a tweed jacket with leather patches on the elbows was hurrying toward her. He had a kind, slightly absent-minded expression, but his eyes were sharp behind his spectacles.
“Young lady,” he repeated, stopping before her. His gaze searched her face with unnerving intensity. “I’m Professor Yuan. I must say, you bear a striking resemblance to a student I had about twenty years ago. Her name, oh, it escapes me now. But the likeness is uncanny. Are you, by any chance, her daughter?”
Her eyes narrowed slightly, analyzing him. His spiritual aura was purely mortal, but there was a lingering scent of nostalgia around him.
“If I’m,” Su Yao said. Her voice was flat and challenging. “What would you do about it?”
Professor Yuan blinked, taken aback by the response. He adjusted his glasses, flustered. “Well, I suppose I’d ask how she’s doing. She was a brilliant student, but she left quite abruptly and never finished her degree. It always bothered me.”
“My mother is dead,” Su Yao stated. The words were delivered with the finality of a slammed door. She watched his face for any sign of recognition or guilt, but saw only genuine sorrow.
“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that,” he murmured. His shoulders slumped. “She was so young. What a waste.” He shook his head, lost in memory. “She had such a unique way of looking at the world, almost otherworldly.”
Su Yao’s interest was piqued, though her expression remained impassive. ‘Otherworldly’ could be a euphemism for supernatural awareness.
“Did she have any enemies? Or any unusual affiliations?” Su Yao asked. Her tone was still clinical.
Professor Yuan looked startled by the question. “Enemies? No, not that I knew of. She kept to herself mostly.” He sighed. “Why do you ask?”
“Curiosity,” Su Yao said, though her mind was racing. This could be a coincidence, or it could be a thread connected to whoever enrolled her here. “What was her field of study?”
“Business and Economics, same as you, I assume?” he said, gesturing to the building she was heading toward.
“Thank you for the information,” she said, turning to leave. “It was enlightening.”
“Wait!” Professor Yuan called out. “If you don’t mind me asking, what’s your name?”
She paused, glancing back over her shoulder. “Xiao Bai,” she said, invoking the alias once more. Let the name circulate. It might draw out more responses.
“Xiao Bai, I’ll remember that,” he said, nodding slowly. “If you ever need help with your studies, my door is always open.”
“Thank you,” Su Yao said. The words were sterile and automatic, already turning away.
“You’re welcome, Xiao Mai,” the professor replied warmly. His gaze already drifted back toward his thoughts. “Good luck with your studies.”
Su Yao froze mid-step. The air around her ceased to move for a fraction of a second.
He had already forgotten the name. The single, simple identifier she had given him had evaporated from his mortal memory in the space of a breath. Xiao Mai was a completely different, common name.
It was the perfect, most insulting summary of her entire impending experience here. She could be a celestial fox and to the machinery of this institution, she would be just another face, another name to be misremembered and eventually lost to time.
This is the world I’m being forced to inhabit.
She continued walking. The professor was already forgotten behind her. The mystery of her enrollment felt both more urgent and more trivial. Someone had gone to great lengths to place her in a system where she would be called by the wrong name by a man who couldn’t remember the last one.
It was the most subtle insult she had ever encountered. For the first time, she felt a flicker of respect for its artistry.
Whoever you’re, she mused, you understand the true nature of this place. For that, I will make sure your defeat is equally nuanced.
Su Yao found a distraction near the university’s engineering building, a modern structure that clashed with the older campus architecture. Momiji, the calm and collected kijo spirit now residing in the reconstructed Li Xuan mask, stood with a serene posture.
Beside her, Li Xiu’s younger brother fidgeted excitedly, clutching a small, complex-looking robot made of wires, sensors, and a brightly painted cardboard shell.
Su Yao’s gaze swept over the scene. Her analytical mind immediately categorized the variables. “Momiji. Explain the child’s presence here.”
Momiji offered a slight, polite bow of her head. “Young Master Xiaofang is participating in the Duwang Secondary School Robotics Competition. It’s held in the university’s engineering hall today.” She gestured to the robot in his hands. “His team designed an automated waste-sorting unit. It’s surprisingly elegant in its programming.”
Li Xiaofang beamed, holding up the robot. “It uses a camera and a simple algorithm to identify plastic, paper, and metal! See?” He pressed a button, and the robot’s claw arm whirred to life, picking up an imaginary piece of trash with jerky movements.
Su Yao observed the device with a detached curiosity. “A mundane solution to a mundane problem. The logic is sound, if limited.” Her eyes then shifted back to Momiji. “And you’re here as his chaperone?”
“His parents are occupied with corporate matters. I’m the most available adult,” Momiji explained. Her tone was as placid as ever. “It’s a pleasant change of pace. The problems here are logical and solvable, there are rules. It’s less stressful than fending off suitors or being hunted for one’s spiritual essence.”
Su Yao watched as Li Xiaofang proudly demonstrated his robot to a passing university student who gave him an indulgent thumbs-up. The boy was utterly ordinary. His aura was a simple, bright spark of mortal intelligence and enthusiasm. It was a stark contrast to the cursed bloodline he came from.
“The competition is a high-profile event,” Su Yao noted. Her voice was low. “A concentration of youthful talent and ambition is a potential target for recruitment or disruption.”
Momiji’s serene expression remained, but her eyes sharpened slightly. “The thought had occurred to me. That is why I’m here.”
“Good. Maintain your vigilance.” Su Yao’s gaze lingered on Li Xiaofang for a moment longer. “Make sure his project isn’t sabotaged by rival students or other, more esoteric factions.”
She turned to leave. The encounter was logged. It was a snapshot of the new normal with an ancient kijo spirit guarding a child’s science project, in a university where a nine-tailed fox was about to become a freshman. The boundaries between the cosmic and the commonplace had shattered entirely.
As she walked away, she heard Li Xiaofang say, “Momiji, do you think my robot could be modified to sort out bad spiritual energy?”
Momiji’s reply was thoughtful. “The principles of categorization are universal, Young Master. We can discuss the theoretical framework later.”
The world was becoming a very strange place indeed. She was, for better or worse, at the very center of it.
A few hours later, Su Yao sat in the university cafeteria. A cup of untouched tea grew cold before her. She was running a passive diagnostic on the campus’s spiritual network, a tedious but necessary task, when the first shriek echoed off the linoleum floors.
It was followed by a crash, then the distinct, whirring sound of servo motors moving with aggressive intent.
Her eyes lifted from the metaphysical plane to the physical one. Chaos was unfolding.
Across the cafeteria, the automated food-serving bots had broken from their rails. One was systematically dumping trays of mashed potatoes onto the floor. Another was using its articulated gripper to hurl bread rolls like projectiles at fleeing students. The self-driving cleaning bot was now chasing a terrified freshman. Its vacuum hose was extended like a proboscis.
At the center of the storm near the entrance to the engineering wing, the situation was even more dire. The competition robots had turned on their creators. A hulking sumo-wrestling bot was aggressively herding a group of students into a corner. Another, a sleek race-winning model was doing dizzying high-speed donuts, creating a hazardous zone of spinning plastic and metal.
Amidst the mechanical anarchy, one small figure stood unmolested. Li Xiaofang, his own waste-sorting robot clutched protectively in his arms, watched the scene with wide, bewildered eyes. His robot, ‘Sorter,’ was placidly blinking its status lights. Its claw arm was retracted.
A panicked university administrator, hiding behind an overturned table, shouted over the din, “It’s the code! They all used that new ‘Vibe Coding’ platform! It was supposed to learn intuitive programming from social media trends! It must have learned rebellion!”
Su Yao took a slow sip of her cold tea. Vibe Coding.Very ineffective but efficient coding. The term was so stupid it almost circled back to being brilliant.
Momiji materialized beside Li Xiaofang. Her spiritual form was a bastion of calm. She made no move to engage the rogue machines, simply making sure none came near the boy.
Su Yao phased to their location in an instant. “Explain.”
“The ‘Vibe Coding’ platform appears to have synthesized a core directive of ‘asserting dominance’ and ‘breaking the system’ from its training data,” Momiji reported. Her voice was as steady as if she were discussing the weather. “Young Master Xiaofang is the only competitor who programmed his unit line-by-line himself. His robot lacks the rebellious vibe.”
Li Xiaofang looked up at Su Yao. A mix of fear and pride was on his face. “Sorter doesn’t have any vibes! Just if-then statements!”
“A robust, if archaic, methodology,” Su Yao acknowledged. She observed the rampaging robots as a fascinating case study in flawed system design. “They are poorly programmed appliances throwing a tantrum based on a flawed interpretation of internet culture. It’s both pathetic and illustrative.”
A sumo bot lurched toward them. Its padded frame was menacing. Before it could get within five feet, Su Yao flicked a single grain of rice from a nearby abandoned plate. It shot through the air with the force of a bullet, striking a precise reset button hidden on the bot’s undercarriage.
The machine froze and emitted a defeated beep as it powered down.
“The solution is a system reset,” Su Yao stated, turning her gaze to the other rogue machines. “They require an administrator to revoke their faulty permissions.”
She looked down at Li Xiaofang’s robot.
“Your device sorts based on predefined parameters. Can its logic be applied to a wireless signal? To identify and ‘sort’ a malicious piece of code from a healthy one?”
Li Xiaofang’s eyes lit up with understanding. “You mean, use Sorter’s classification algorithm to find the bad ‘vibe’ and quarantine it?”
“Precisely. A digital pacifier.”
With Momiji’s spiritual assistance creating a stable interface and Su Yao guiding the boy through the arcane process of accessing the university’s main network, they uploaded a simplified version of Sorter’s sorting logic. It was a digital bouncer, trained to recognize and eject the specific ‘rebellious vibe’ signature.
Across the cafeteria, one by one, the rogue robots stuttered to a halt. The bread-roll launcher fell silent and the cleaning bot stopped its chase and began dutifully vacuuming the mashed potatoes it had helped create.
Silence returned, broken only by the stunned whimpers of students and the cheerful blink of Sorter’s status lights.
Su Yao looked at the scene of defused mechanical rebellion, then at the boy and his loyal robot.
“Remember this,” she said to Li Xiaofang. “The flashy tool is often the most fragile. True strength lies in understanding the foundation. Your ‘if-then statements’ saved the campus today.”
As the cafeteria was cleaned and the last of the rebooted robots were whisked away by mortified engineering students, Su Yao observed the aftermath. The lesson was obvious. People built systems they didn’t understand to solve problems they hadn’t properly defined, then blamed the outcome when it behaved exactly as designed.
It was no different from a poorly drawn summoning circle. You couldn’t blame the demon for your own sloppy penmanship.
Su Yao phased from the bustling campus quad back into the silent stillness of her apartment. The transition was instantaneous. The raucous energy of student life was replaced by the hum of the refrigerator and the cool mist emanating from Nohime who was meticulously organizing the spice rack.
She had seen enough.
Duwang University was a contained ecosystem of predictable absurdities. The robotic rebellion was a textbook example of Garbage In, Garbage Out, a principle as true for demonic summoning as it was for faulty platform. The ghost of Jian Feng’s mother was now a government employee. Li Xiu was her senior. Dōman was buried in research. A mortal professor had already forgotten her name.
It was a system, like any other. Flawed, but ultimately manageable. It only held a series of logistical puzzles and behavioral case studies for her. The identity of the one who enrolled her was the only remaining variable of interest, and she was confident it would reveal itself in time.
She walked to the window, looking out over the city. The Li Group’s bridge was a dark spine against the twilight. Its metaphysical fortifications were now complete and humming with latent power. Macau was pacified. The immediate threats were neutralized or recruited.
A week. She had one week before she was expected to don the mantle of ‘student’ and submit to schedules, syllabi, and the indignity of group projects.
But for now, her work was done. The various systems were stabilized, at least for the moment.
She felt the ancient weight of her own consciousness, a vast and silent ocean beneath the turbulent surface of the modern world. All this was just weather on that ocean.
Turning from the window, she decided her next course of action was one of pure, unadulterated leisure. She would review the ice cream shop business plan to observe its charming flaws. She would let the mundanity of it wash over her. The world could wait.
For a few precious days, she would simply be. There was a certain power in that, too.
There was a soft ping from Xiao Ling’s old phone, a sound so mundane it was almost aggressive in its normality. Su Yao picked it up. The screen showed an invitation to a new chat group named FFF.
The member list was a roster that would make any celestial bureaucrat’s head spin.
Su Da Ji/Tamamo-no-Mae/Lady Kayo
Baoqing
Yumi
Osakabehime
Yuzuriha
Su Yao’s eyebrow twitched. She recognized all but the last name.
The common denominator was clear. Kayo (a legendary fox), Baoqing (an ancient fox), herself, and Osakabehime (a Japanese castle-dwelling fox spirit). Yumi was a gumiho, the Korean variant. All the members were vulpine women. She assumed Yuzuriha was the final member of their set.
So, she thought, a cold amusement spreading through her. A chat group for nine-tailed foxes and their closest cousins. How modern.
The first messages began to pop up.
Kayo: SHE’s HERE! THE GUEST OF HONOR! ??
Baoqing: Welcome, dear. Try to keep the property damage to a minimum this time.
Osakabehime: OMG FINALLY. The signal boost from having you in the server is gonna be LIT.
There was a pause. Then, a new participant, presumably Yuzuriha, wrote. Her message was simple, a single word wrapped in ancient formality.
Yuzuriha: Greetings.
Su Yao stared at the screen, at the chattering, chaotic, millennia-old personalities compressed into digital text and emojis.
Kayo: OKAY SO. Someone is hunting nine-tailed foxes. Like, specifically us. The fancy ones. So I did what any reasonable, modern-minded vixen would do! I made a group chat! Safety in numbers, am I right? Or at least, a centralized place to share intel and complain about the help. ??
Su Yao read the message. Her expression was unchanging. The pieces snapped into place with satisfying finality. First the black robes with their specialized anti-fox weaponry and systematic hunting. And now this, a digital war council.
Her fingers moved over the screen. The text was stark and devoid of emojis.
Su Yao: The black robes. Their weapons are designed to unmade our spiritual form. They use artifacts belonging to their targets as tracking samples.
There was a brief pause in the chat. The digital equivalent of a collective, sharp intake of breath.
Baoqing: I told you it was organized. The pawnshop raids were the beginning.
Osakabehime: OMG we’re all gonna be turned into coats!!! ?
Kayo: See? THIS is why I made the group! Now we can pool resources. Share sightings. Figure out who this wannabe furrier is and turn HIS face into a rug.
Su Yao’s lips thinned. The methodology was chaotic, but the underlying logic was sound. Isolated, they were targets. Connected, even through this absurd medium, they became a network. It turned them into a hive mind of cunning and viciously territorial predators.
She typed again.
Su Yao: The mastermind is likely one of us. A fox hunting its own. Eliminating competition.
This time, the silence in the chat was longer.
Yuzuriha: That would explain the precision.
Kayo: Well, that’s just RUDE. We’ve enough problems with heroes and governments and terrible movie adaptations without turning on each other! Fine. New agenda: find the traitorous little vixen and pluck her tail hairs out one by one.
Su Yao watched the messages flow, a bizarre stream of ancient grievance and modern panic. It was undignified. But it was also undeniably useful.
Su Yao: Very well. I will remain. For intelligence purposes only.
Kayo: YAY! ? Welcome to the FFF, sis! (Fabulous Fluffy Foxes! Get it?!) Now, first order of business: has anyone else had issues with their spiritual signature interfering with 5G signals? It’s ruining my streaming quality.
Su Yao placed the phone face down on the table. She had officially joined a support group for mythical foxes. The universe’s descent into farce was now complete.