Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
In the deserted green space, an occasional scream from one or two stray cats would not alert anyone’s attention, right?
Zhang Zian looked at the scattered blood on the ground and the pair of steaming balls, and he couldn’t help but sigh. The fox mourns when the hare passes; sympathy is felt for one of its kind!
After Snowy Lionet was done with the operation, it felt very excited, and jumped up and down. “Meow! Meow! Meow! There are now fewer males in the world!”
“Don’t lick your paws. We’re not sure if these stray cats carry any bacteria, so wash your paws in here.” Zian pointed at a bottle of disinfectant, gesturing for Snowy Lionet to wash its paws.
“Chie! Hesitant, stinking man!” Snowy Lionet glared at Zian, but it also didn’t want to be infected with some random sickness. It was afraid that it would affect the relationship it had with Fina, so it did as it was told and washed its paws with the disinfectant.
After washing, its paws were not only clean, but they also carried a weird smell, which temporarily made it lose any interest in licking its own paws.
The few male stray cats shivered in their cages. Blood was dripping off the lower half of their bodies, and their eyes were empty as if they had lost something important.
“Meow! Meow! Meow! I just don’t understand… Why did you ask me to leave a mark on their ears?” Snowy Lionet asked.
Zian answered, “That’s for marking purposes––to separate out which cat has already been castrated. Otherwise, wouldn’t there be a mix-up?”
It was a custom established through a long social practice. After sterilizing a stray cat, they would cut a corner of their ears. So when other sterilization personnel saw the mark, they would know that the cat had been sterilized, and they would then avoid wasting resources.
“Chie! There’s still a need to leave a mark? Will you mix up males and females? Whether it’s male or not, all I need is one look to tell!” Snowy Lionet snorted. Its eyes slowly moved up from Zian’s crotch, looking to the left and right. “So which ear’s your choice?”
“I’m not picking either ear! I don’t need you to sterilize me!” Zhang Zian firmly refused.
“Hmph, then I can only choose one on my own. I’ll let everyone know that your balls have been removed!”
All the male cats that had lost their manhood were staring at Snowy Lionet with resentment. Instinctively, they constantly felt like licking their wound. Zhang Zian had planned to take them all back to the pet shop and put an Elizabethan collar on each cat so the wound would actually heal.
After he was done, Zhang Zian went to visit the Li couple.
Recently, the Li’s snack bar had been doing quite well. It was already past breakfast time, and they were having a short break before lunchtime. The Li couple was at the counter doing their accounts.
Aside from them, there was a young man with an unfamiliar face there. He had glasses on and was bent over, playing with the cats.
“Uncle Li, about your cats here… How many are left?” Zhang Zian looked around the shop, only seeing two cats.
“We were going to talk to you about this matter! Most of the cats in the shop have already been adopted. We were about to ask if there were any more abandoned cats at the clinic,” Aunt Li said.
Zhang Zian nodded. “For the time being there are no abandoned cats, but there are a few stray cats. Once they’re done with their vaccinations and sterilizations, I’ll send them here after observing them for a few days. Although they’re strays, they seemed to have been abandoned by their previous owners. They’re quite friendly to people.”
“That’s great! These days, the customers have been complaining that there are too few cats. Some are even not willing to come anymore!” Aunt Li said.
Zhang Zian gestured with a glance to the bespectacled young man and softly asked, “That is…?”
“He’s here to adopt. He’s currently still under observation,” Aunt Li softly replied to him.
“That’s about it then. I still have something on, so I’ll take my leave first.” Seeing that it was getting late, Zhang Zian said his goodbyes.
After Zian walked out from the Li’s Supreme Snack Bar for Cat Fanciers, he started up his Wuling Shenguang and drove towards the sea to continue with his daily chores.
When he reached the seaside and got out of the car, he immediately saw a weird-looking whale kite faltering in the low altitude.
“Dad! What kind of crappy kite did you make? It can’t even fly!” a kid complained.
“You can’t blame me for this! The wind is strong today! The wind direction is also a mess… It’s coming from the east now and north in the next gust! Even a better kite would not be able to fly!” his dad responded.
Zhang Zian stepped onto the beach. He could hear the familiar voices coming from a distance.
When Zian got closer, it was indeed Huang and Xiao Zhi. They were flying their kite by the seaside. That day, however, things didn’t seem to be going well for them. The whale kite couldn’t seem to fly, or it would fly a good twenty to thirty meters before it would fall back down. The kite had also almost fallen into the sea, too.
Xiao Zhi was constantly complaining, while Huang was constantly explaining.
The whale kite was quite well made, but the design was horrible; it looked nothing like a whale. The only characteristics that resembled a whale were the nostril above its head and the baleen on both sides.
“Good morning,” Zhang Zian raised his hand and greeted them.
Huang and Xiao Zhi both turned around to look.
“Yo, Brother! You’re here!”
“Unc… no, Big Brother, look at the kite my dad made! It’s too crappy! It can’t even fly!” Xiao Zhi complained.
“I told you that it’s the wind today!”
Zhang Zian laughed and said, “You guys really enjoy life! You come over daily to fly kites by the beach.”
“Cough! There’s nothing much to do these days, so I took some days off to accompany the kid. Today’s the last day, then I’ll be heading out of town for work. I don’t even know when I’ll be back.” Huang sighed, his voice was filled with the helplessness of a middle-aged man. “But Brother, don’t you have to go to work?”
“I’m… considered a self-employed person. I’m run a pet shop, so I have more time for myself.” Zhang Zian did not want to bother their father-son bonding time, so after talking for a while, he wanted to continue what he went there for.
“Pet shop?” Xiao Zhi overheard their conversation and became interested. “What pets do you sell?”
“Cats, dogs, and fish,” Zhang Zian answered.
“Do you have whales?”
“Nope, whales are too big, so you can’t keep them.” Zhang Zian asked, “Xiao Zhi, do you like whales a lot?”
Xiao Zhi nodded his head, then looked towards the sea. “Big Brother, will the minke whale ever come back again?”
“About that… who knows. Maybe it will.” Zhang Zian did not want to disappoint him, so he said, “But, even if it does come back, it won’t get too close to the shore so it doesn’t become beached again. No one would fall for the same trick twice. Plus, whales are very smart, so of course they wouldn’t get beached twice.”
“Oh…” Xiao Zhi nodded his head, looking like he understood.
“This kid… He’s particularly fascinated with whales now. He’s even had me print a lot of whale pictures and put them up in his bedroom… His room is an underwater world now.” Huang laughed.
“I think that’s great. Having an interest is a good thing,” Zhang Zian said.
The two adults were chatting when Xiao Zhi suddenly pointed towards the sea and shouted, “Dad! Big Brother! Look over there! The minke whale is back!”
