The System Mistook Me for a Cat

Chapter 81

Chu Tingwu raised her hand: "The documentaries I've watched are all related to animals."

And they were all shown to her by the system, used as teaching materials.

Man Xing's viewing habits were a bit more varied, but clearly, both of them only had experience in watching, not in filming themselves.

Chu Tingwu: "Let's just try it out first."

They opened a documentary about entrepreneurship and, after a brief understanding, discovered that many of the early contents were actually reshot during post-production, or replaced with some stream-of-consciousness shots—

Who would record their struggles at the beginning of their career when there was no sign of success yet?

It is usually the successful ones who get documented, as success transforms their previous failures into embellishments on the path to success.

Man Xing said goodbye to Chu Tingwu, who then made a "layman but I'm the boss" remark: "You can take the drone home and film some mirror shots on your own."

Man Xing: "…Alright."

Man Xing left with a drone in her arms.

As she sat in the car, she was still a bit dazed, subconsciously turning her head to look at the drone's packaging box.

When she returned to her rental apartment, she took the drone out again.

Drones, due to their many restrictions, are not commonly used for everyday filming—there are height limits, areas with high human traffic also restrict flying, some locations require prior application, and there are time limits on flight duration… Holding the spherical drone, Man Xing suddenly thought:

"The company's new drone model has solved the problem of unsafe low-altitude flying and has a more powerful battery life. If we can further reduce the cost, could we compete in the camera market?"

The stability during flight is definitely lower than that of ground-based cameras, but Man Xing found that the effect already surpassed handheld cameras, and the image precision was also high enough.

She had a feeling that the company could make a big profit from drones, and in a few years, the boss would naturally become a "successful person" in the worldly sense.

…And then make a documentary about her own experiences?

Man Xing: "…"

Something felt off. Was the order reversed? It felt like success was being pursued just to make a documentary.

-

When Chu Tingwu saw Man Xing the next day, she noticed that her assistant had a pair of not-so-obvious dark circles under her eyes.

Man Xing had spent the entire night drafting the framework for a charity foundation and presented it to Chu Tingwu for confirmation.

According to Chu Tingwu's plan, the charity mission of their foundation would be to help other organizations improve their structure and achieve financial balance, guiding them toward a healthy trajectory, similar to a form of implicit "investment."

Perhaps to make it easier for Chu Tingwu to understand, Man Xing had included an example of a "small charity organization" in her PowerPoint presentation.

Man Xing: "This was previously Youyou Kindergarten in the southern district of Jin City. Later, the kindergarten closed down, but the building remained. The principal and their family continued to live there, and then they started taking in stray animals."

In fact, the first thing left at the kindergarten gate was a baby.

It was likely left by someone nearby, knowing that this family was kind-hearted. However, the principal called the police, found the baby's family, and sent the child to be raised by an uncle's family.

After that, a half-dead puppy was left at the kindergarten gate.

This time, the police found nearby middle school students and could only give them a warning.

From the moment they took in that dog, the number of animals the kindergarten found increased… puppies, kittens, and even monkeys. Twenty years quickly passed, and the initial animals had all passed away, while the principal and his wife had grown old and frail, but the total number of animals continued to increase.

Now, Youyou Kindergarten has over fifty animals, mostly abandoned pets, cared for by the principal and his wife, along with their two children. However, most of the time, only the principal and his wife were there, as their children had married and moved out, not wanting their parents to continue caring for the animals.

This small kindergarten… or rather, small animal sanctuary, had actually made the local news in Jin City—

The principal's children had sought help through the news, hoping to find other "charity organizations" to take over the animals so they could take care of their parents.

But on one hand, other organizations didn't have the capacity, and on the other hand, the principal and his wife were unwilling.

At this point, they hadn't realized that they themselves were a "charity organization," but they had only completed the first step, which was to perform charitable actions.

Man Xing tapped the screen: "Performing charitable actions is a very simple thing, just needing to extend a hand. Those who can keep reaching out deserve respect… But a mature charity system not only needs to give outwardly but also requires a healthy cash flow and the ability to continue operating even after the main figures are gone."

On one hand, the couple was entirely relying on their retirement pensions and their children's support to care for the animals, and on the other hand, if the principal and his wife passed away, their children would definitely not take over the animal sanctuary: the most likely scenario would be to sell the kindergarten's land, send the animals to other places if possible, and euthanize those they couldn't.

The charity foundation that Chu Tingwu decided to establish was dedicated to helping these people with the latter two aspects.

After listening to Man Xing's explanation, she silently raised her hands to clap.

Man Xing: "…Boss, you haven't named our organization yet."

And right now, there are no recruits, and our own institution doesn't have a mature system, let alone the ability to help others.

Chu Tingwu: "=="

Naming is hard.

Chu Tingwu: "What about Starcloud?"

Starcloud Charity Foundation. Those immature small organizations are like small stars on the ground, emitting weak light on their own, but the foundation will help them gather together to form a dazzling star cloud… Of course, the above flowery meaning was something Chu Tingwu thought of only after naming it.

She just thought that since Man Xing was in charge, she took a character from her name.

She explained this to the camera, had the system record it, and thought it could be included in the documentary later—

Man Xing: I'm still right here!

Starcloud Charity Foundation… Although it started from scratch, it indeed began.

Just like other small charity organizations that started from zero, as long as they begin, infinite possibilities arise.

-

That being said, after leaving, Man Xing sat in the car with the drone in her arms for a long time.

"I don't have experience in this area…"

She felt a heavy sense of responsibility.

While collecting information, she had naturally watched the interviews with the principal and his family. These could be turned into video clips and text descriptions in the PowerPoint… but in reality, they were living, breathing people.

Whether as a small employee or an assistant, she could always do her job well and maintain a stable mindset—because she didn't believe her work would change anything. She was just providing services to the boss, being a small cog in the company. If she didn't do well here, she could always improve herself and find another job.

But managing a charity foundation was different.

Every decision she made could affect others. For her, it might be just a few days' salary, but for the people the organization helped, it could be enough to sustain their small charity for a week.

A completely different sense of responsibility weighed on her heart.

She paused, then turned on the drone's recording mode and spoke these thoughts into the camera:

"I may not know if I can do it perfectly… but I will do my best."

System: "…"

"If she's just worried about accounting or finances, there won't be any problems as long as I'm here," the system told Chu Tingwu, sharing the footage it had captured. "Everything hasn't even started yet, so why does she feel such a heavy sense of responsibility?"

Chu Tingwu replied, "Because she's starting to see."

"We actually have many donation channels available, and some kind-hearted people choose to donate directly through software to various organizations—"

In reality, they often don't know exactly where their money goes, whether it will become textbooks or breakfast for a child in a remote mountain area. Some people might check the specifics of the organization's work to get an idea of how the funds are used.

But personally getting involved in running a charity organization is a completely different experience. It's foreseeable that Man Xing will encounter more and more people and see the "end point" of where the money flows.

Donating to a sick and pitiful person is a different feeling from seeing them lying in a hospital bed, barely breathing.

Chu Tingwu will also start to "see," but the pressure she feels will certainly not be as heavy as Man Xing's. This is equivalent to shifting the burden onto the other person and standing behind the camera.

Seeing that the system still didn't understand, she explained, "Suppose I disappeared and you couldn't find me, but you thought that donating to a homeless shelter might give me a chance to have a full meal... would you donate?"

The system responded, "I would definitely always be by your side!"

Chu Tingwu insisted, "Just imagine it!"

The system: "T-T"

The next day, Man Xing noticed that her collaborator, the "system," had inexplicably become more urgent in its actions.

The Starcloud Charity Foundation did not lack initial funding and was established relatively smoothly. Man Xing hired a professional manager and then began recruiting staff. She herself was responsible for overseeing the overall operations.

Charity is charity, but a foundation is a business—the simplest way is to invest the foundation's funds in stocks to earn dividends, use the dividends for charitable activities, and maintain the foundation's operations.

The manager she hired was mainly responsible for the later stages of maintaining operations, busy with recruitment.

Investment was handled by the system, while Man Xing's tasks were twofold: setting up an auditing department to determine which charitable institutions they would help, promoting the foundation to attract more small charities to approach them, and constantly discovering institutions in need of assistance, such as that small zoo.

The other task was to seek more investments.

It was also because work became more hectic that Man Xing realized she could no longer continue as her boss's assistant.

And her boss didn't hire another personal assistant, as she didn't seem to need one.

The boss simply pulled a professional driver from the drone company to drive for her.

Man Xing: "..."

There was a feeling that if it weren't for this charity organization, as soon as the boss turned 18 and could drive herself, she would be completely out of a job.

So Man Xing worked even harder.

During the establishment phase, the "system" helped the boss integrate three of her organizations, obtained tax breaks through the charity application, and promoted the foundation through an app. They also gathered a group of people from the drone company's partners, seemingly preparing to attract a second wave of funding.

Sometimes when Man Xing chatted with the system, she couldn't help but feel—

The system asked, "Will that self-service cat-feeding organization feed stray cats that look a bit... human?"

Man Xing: What kind of cat looks human?

That's called a homeless person!

Yes, it often asked some strange questions.

The drone orb always followed her around, and Man Xing gradually got used to ignoring it.

The boss's "friends" from the entertainment industry also found out about her charity organization (though she hadn't actively promoted it) and came forward to offer investments or donations.

Man Xing had a dinner appointment in the evening but spent the afternoon at a bustling street food stall, chatting and eating with the director and his family.

The foundation decided to start in Jin City and Fallen Phoenix City, focusing on these two points and gradually expanding outward. Initially, they would be stationed in Shannan Province, helping various institutions within the province—

The director's son was a bit skeptical: "You promised to provide a channel for recruiting volunteers, help my parents register as a formal charity, and even buy insurance for both the animals and people... so what's in it for you?"

Even though his parents had been doing good deeds all their lives, people don't believe that good things will just fall into their laps.

The main issues for the director's kindergarten were manpower, funding, and abandonment.

Man Xing came with another manager, bringing along the plan they had prepared—

For manpower, the main issue was the lack of a systematic way to recruit volunteers. However, the Starcloud Charity Foundation could serve as a platform to help provide channels and rationalize recruitment.

For funding, as long as the couple signed the agreement, Man Xing could allocate a fixed sum from the foundation's funds according to the contract. This funding was similar to "stock ownership," with the annual allocation being the dividend earned, which would be used mainly for volunteer compensation, feeding costs, and insurance fees, as well as paying for lawyers' contract fees.

The abandonment issue was written into the contract: On one hand, it dealt with the abandonment of animals, as new abandoned animals were often brought to the zoo by others. The director and his wife had installed cameras, but the cameras were deliberately destroyed, and they never caught the culprits, so they stopped installing them.

The Starcloud Foundation would fund the reinstallation of cameras and catch the previous vandals, turning them over to the police.

In fact, by the time they met, those individuals were already in the police station.

The director's daughter: "You're really fast."

She was starting to believe in the foundation... and she wondered how they had caught the culprits when they hadn't been able to find them even after asking around. Did they have a "heavenly eye"?

Man Xing said, "On the other hand, there's your abandonment issue."

The children exchanged glances, and the director and his wife were momentarily stunned but didn't say anything.

Man Xing continued, "We'll help find suitable adoption agencies and gradually adopt out the animals. The process won't be too fast, and it's likely that not all animals can be adopted. So we'll also take action to ensure that the animals helped by the Starcloud Foundation can enjoy their later years."

"Enjoying their later years" naturally meant that after the director and his wife passed away, the charity organization would not disappear. The foundation would send someone to take over and relocate the animals to other places for care.

This was a huge relief for the director's children.

After discussing everything clearly, they decided to hire a lawyer to sign a formal contract.

—The Shangjing law firm that had long collaborated with Chu Tingwu opened a branch in Jin City, with its office directly below the floor where the Starcloud Charity Foundation rented space.

However, before signing the contract, the director's children consulted another lawyer to review the contract. It wasn't until seven in the evening that the contract was finally signed.

Man Xing left, and the director's family also headed out.

The director's daughter stood downstairs, looking up and couldn't help but sigh:

"Dad, Mom, I really feel a weight lifted off my shoulders now."

A heavy stone had been moved away.

Her parents were already old, and she herself was about to become a grandmother. What would she and her brother do with the animals if their parents passed away?

Throwing them away would be painful, but keeping them was impossible to manage.

The director's daughter had never considered this "charity," only thinking that her parents were overly kind. It was only today, after being educated by Man Xing and others, that she realized this was actually a form of charity... and that their small charity group had been helped by a larger organization.

She was a bit happy, her emotions complex, and looking at her somewhat uneasy parents and exchanging glances with her brother, she whispered, "Tonight, let's take the kids and have dinner at home, shall we?"

“Home” refers to Youyou Kindergarten.

After the last big argument, their parents have been coming over for brief visits, and they haven't returned for quite some time.

-

After finishing her work, Man Xing changed her outfit and prepared to head to the evening banquet.

Although she didn't need to dress too formally, she couldn't just show up in her sportswear.

However, she didn't notice that while she was eating at a street food stall, someone in a car by the roadside had been watching them for a long time—

Lu Cenyin and Assistant Shi were stuck at a red light, and when Assistant Shi turned his head, he recognized Man Xing after a moment of scrutiny.

Assistant Shi: “Man Xing…”

Lu Cenyin: “Hmm?”

Man Xing was assigned by Lu Cenyin as the personal assistant to her younger daughter, Chu Tingwu. Therefore, not only did she need to take care of Chu Tingwu's daily life, but she was also responsible for communicating with Chu Tingwu's teachers and others.

Previously, this part of the work was handled by Assistant Shi, who had Teacher Yuan's phone number saved on his phone.

After Man Xing took over, she not only knew Chu Tingwu's exam results but also her vacation schedules and work content… But not long after Chu Tingwu's birthday, Man Xing submitted a report to Lu Cenyin, roughly stating:

“Although I was assigned by you to assist the young boss, now she is my actual boss. Therefore, I will no longer report her daily life in detail. Please rest assured, the boss may be young, but she is mature and steady in her actions. If there is a major issue that requires your intervention to resolve, I will definitely contact you.”

Lu Cenyin: “?”

Assistant Shi, who also caught a glimpse of the report, couldn't help but inwardly complain: Man Xing, do you still remember who's paying your salary?!

However, Lu Cenyin didn't get angry. She simply showed the report to her eldest son, Lu Tinglan, and used it as a reminder: “Look at this. If you could be as capable as Tingwu and directly take over my people, would I need to worry about your entrepreneurial ventures?”

Lu Tinglan: “==”

He had previously been passionate about starting an indie game studio with his college friends—although indie games weren't profitable, confident young people always believed they might be the exception. As it turned out, they weren't. When the studio was on the verge of collapse, Lu Tinglan could easily extricate himself, but his family was well-off, and his classmates might not be so fortunate.

So, he eventually humbled himself and sought help from his mother.

Seeing that he had softened, his mother sent someone to help clean up the mess, buying out their game rights and, somehow, managing to raise enough funds to cover the studio members' severance pay.

Lu Tinglan then followed his mother home, tidied up, and was about to start getting involved in the company's business.

Of course… Lu Cenyin actually hoped he would go back to school for another degree. This eldest son of hers wasn't very decisive, and his entrepreneurial experience hadn't made him any smarter; he still carried a bit of the naivety of someone fresh out of school. But since the timing was right, she decided to let him get his feet wet first.

Lu Tinglan was also in the car, as they had a gathering tonight.

When Assistant Shi pointed out Man Xing's location, he was momentarily puzzled:

What had his sister been up to lately?

Chu Tingwu's daily life always seemed very rich... and he often saw her in various places, from official news broadcasts to viral videos on foreign platforms, to the birthday big screen blessings and local Jin City newspapers.

After signing with a live-streaming platform, her live-streaming schedule had also become more stable. Lu Tinglan occasionally tuned in to watch—

Sometimes Chu Tingwu would be hanging dangerously on a climbing wall, reciting words while chatting with the audience; other times, she would just be shopping, feeding cats, arguing with cats, or doing parkour, skateboarding, cooking, or even live-streaming her homework.

Lu Tinglan would watch for a while, quietly throw in some live-streaming gifts, and then leave.

He always felt that Chu Tingwu recognized his account, as she sometimes thanked the gifts. For other people's IDs, she would read them out, but when she saw his account, she would only say a simple “Thank you.”

But no matter when, every time Lu Tinglan saw Chu Tingwu on camera, he felt the scene was full of vitality:

She must have made a lot of friends, as so many people had sent her birthday wishes. She must be living a free and easy life, successful in both her studies and career… Even if the scenes on camera were just ordinary daily routines, those routines seemed to shine with a special light.

Lu Tinglan couldn't do that.

Why was Man Xing here… But since Man Xing was Chu Tingwu's assistant, it seemed normal for her to be wherever Chu Tingwu was.

When they arrived at the reserved restaurant and encountered Man Xing, who had changed into a different outfit, Lu Tinglan didn't find anything unusual.

Man Xing was in the middle of a conversation, only half-turning to show half of her face, unaware of her former boss and her son approaching from behind.

She was a bit warm, so she had taken off her coat and draped it over her arm. It was already autumn, so she was wearing a high-necked sweater. She stood very straight, and when speaking to the person in front of her, her eyes sparkled with a bright smile—not because of who she was talking to, but because she was full of confidence in the business she was discussing.

Lu Tinglan could tell.

He heard her say: “The boss founded… the Starcloud Charity Foundation… Yes, I believe…”

She loved her current job.

Lu Tinglan followed his mother into the private room, but as the door opened, he couldn't help but glance back.

The door closed.

-

Man Xing returned happily.

Of course, there were many aspects of her work that bothered her, and not everyone she encountered was good. Dealing with small charity organizations often brought her frustration… But whenever she saw Chu Tingwu, her mood would calm down.

Although her boss was still in high school, Man Xing somehow felt that with her boss and the system around, any problem could be solved.

And when she was really tired, she would go to her boss's house to "cuddle with cats."

Of course, it wasn't Three-Five-Five… Three-Five-Five wasn't willing, so most of the time, they would bribe Cao Meng with snacks, who would then bring over Meiqiu.

Man Xing held a black, barking "cat ball" and, after reporting her work to Chu Tingwu, said: “Shannan Province has been very supportive, but next we might need to participate in some official events. Chu Chu, do you need to take leave from school?”

Events like official meetings, ribbon-cutting ceremonies, and project visits would require someone to represent them.

Although her boss was still a minor, Man Xing had an inexplicable sense of pride, wanting to show off her boss:

As she spoke, she even lifted the Meiqiu in her arms.

Chu Tingwu: “?”

Something felt off.

Chu Tingwu: “I've already participated, so I can't participate again.”

Man Xing: “Hmm?”

Chu Tingwu had indeed participated—

Her documentary filming plans were known to her friends, and yesterday, the Jin City police suddenly extended an invitation:

They invited her to film a documentary about police cats and expressed interest in discussing cooperation related to drones.

Man Xing: "Well… luckily I'm not your personal assistant anymore."

Chu Tingwu: “?”

Man Xing: As her boss always found alternative paths to success, it was a bit embarrassing for her as a personal assistant not to know the channels her boss used.

System: “==”

System: “=v=”

System: "Little one, it turns out I'm actually your personal assistant!"

Chu Tingwu: You've always been.

System: “Well… then, Three-Five-Five could also be the driver. Cat moms can carry their kittens… it's just that you've grown too big for her to carry.”

But that must be Three-Five-Five's fault for being too small.

Chu Tingwu: “…” She couldn't carry me even when I was small!

The driver had only been hired recently, and now there was already internal competition in the office. That was a bit too early!