Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

  Strictly speaking, the location of the police dog nursing home was considered a small hill, not a mountain. There was no water source uphill, the roads were difficult to travel across, and there wasn’t much land to develop.

  Fu Tao pushed the wheelbarrow through the forest, making turns here and there before reaching an empty lot of land.

  It was very quiet. The land was surrounded with small trees, the biggest one was no bigger than an adult male’s forearm, while the smallest tree was the size of an adult male’s wrist. They were much more delicate than the trees deeper in the for.

  There was a wooden plate nailed to all of the little trees, and in front of every tree was a tiny mound.

  Fu Tao stopped, having found an appropriate place, and pulled the plastic sheet off the wheelbarrow before he silently picked up the shovel to start digging.

  Zhang Zian walked up to a small tree and realized that there were words on the wooden plates. They had details of each police dog that was buried there, their date of birth and death, where they rendered their services and under which unit.

  Zhang Zian counted, there was about eight dogs buried in the lot.

  The soil was hard because of the cold weather, and since Fu Tao was well past his prime, it wasn’t for long before he was out breath from digging.

  “Master Fu, let me take over.” Zhang Zian took off his coat, hung it on a branch, and walked over.

  Fu Tao stuck the shovel into the fresh pile of dirt, and looked at Zhang Zian. He didn’t think Zhang Zian was strong, he looked no different than the young city boys who weren’t used to hard work. Fu Tao didn’t want Zhang Zian to injure himself, as it’d be troublesome to put him in the wheelbarrow and push him all the way back.

  Zhang Zian didn’t say anything else, he just grabbed the shovel and jumped into Fu Tao’s shallow hole. He plunged the shovel into the soil and started digging.

  Fu Tao thought that Zhang Zian would start complaining soon after beginning, but he got more vigorous the longer he shovelled. Every movement made was controlled, his breathing was stable. He even looked relaxed.

  Zhang Zian was much stronger than Fu Tao had imagined, and it was all thanks to training under Old Time Tea’s supervision.

  “Keep it up! Motto! Ga ga!” Richard, who was curled up within Zhang Zian’s coat hood, kept making snide comments.

  “What’s the parrot saying? Does it want to have a peach?” Fu Tao asked as he wiped off the sweat from his forehead.

  Zhang Zian was so embarrassed. He threateningly waved the shovel at Richard, which made it stop for a while, but it wasn’t long after did it started up again.

  “Sigai! Motto!” Richard continued shouting all the lines it could remember from Japanese films.

  Fina and Snowy Lionet were lazily sitting on a rock, yawning out of boredom. It was already a miracle that they weren’t complaining, Zhang Zian couldn’t count on them to help with the shovelling.

  Pi looked around, found the biggest tree with the most branches, and put all its limbs to use as it tried to climb up the tree.

  It was Pi’s first time climbing a tree, and even though it wasn’t a real monkey, it still had some of the natural instincts of a monkey.

  Fu Tao, who was taking a break, saw Pi. “Hey, your monkey is climbing up a tree.”


  Zhang Zian raised his head to see that Pi was already halfway up the tree. “Pi, be careful!”


  “Zhi zhi.” Pi freed one hand to wave to Zhang Zian, showing that it was alright, but it only made Zhang Zian more worried.

  “Aren’t you going to call it down?” Fu Tao asked.

  “It’s okay, let it have its fun. It’ll come down once it’s done.” Zhang Zian laughed. It was normal for Fu Tao to have some doubts, but Pi wasn’t an ordinary monkey.

  “Whatever, I’m not going to help you look for it if it disappears.” Fu Tao said nothing more, sure that Pi would run off.

  Galaxy noticed a group of sparrows not far away as they rummaged through fallen leaves for seeds and nuts. It let out a meow and started to chase after them.

  The sparrows, sensing an incoming predator, immediately took off towards the sky. They landed on some tree branches nearby, seemingly reluctant to leave the possibility of food, as there was a shortage of it during winter. They waited until Galaxy ran off before they fluttered down and continued to search for food.

  Once they did, Galaxy would meow as it ran towards them again, and the whole game would start over. Both parties seemed to enjoy themselves.

  Richard covered its face with its wings, it couldn’t bear to see fellow birds with such low IQs.

  Pi climbed higher, to a part where the tree branch split in two, Pi noticed a birds nest, but there were no birds, only a bird egg. The shell was covered in light gray spots and dried up green bird waste.

  Pi scratched its head, it didn’t know what breed of bird this egg came from, as birds usually don’t lay eggs in winter. It left its book in the car so there was no way for him to check. Pi wasn’t worried about losing the book because Old Time Tea was inside the car, so no one would be able to take it away. Even if they did, they wouldn’t be able to understand the book.

  Pi looked around. Where’s its mother? Or its father?

  After it found nothing, Pi blinked as it looked at the lonely egg in the nest.

  Maybe the mother already flew to the south for winter. Maybe the parents lost their lives to the villagers’ guns.

  Of course, the greatest possibility was that the parents went out to look for food, and since food was hard to find in the winter, maybe they had to fly further than usual.

  Pi climbed down the tree, and ran to Zhang Zian. It poked around his coat pockets for a moment before pulling out a handful of nuts, which were also Richard’s snack.

  “What are you doing? Trying to steal my stuff?” Richard asked.

  “Zhi zhi!” Pi tried to explain, pointing to the bird nest up in the tree.

  Richard rolled its eyes. “I don’t mind giving them to you, but once we’re back you’ll have to give me double the amount you’re taking. No, five times the amount!”


  “Zhi zhi.” Pi nodded.

  It climbed up the tree again, threw the nuts into the nest, and pressed the hay that was covering the nest firmly together so that the egg would be warm and prevent other birds from finding the nest. If the parents came back, the nuts would be a nice surprise.

  The temperature now was already rising, it wasn’t as unbearable as it was before. If the little bird was lucky enough, it might be able to hatch in spring.

  Pi raised its head as it was reaching the top of the tree. The sky was getting darker while the tree trunks were getting thinner and flimsier, making it harder to climb.

  Pi slowly climbed up the tree. It even learned how to hook its tail on to a tree branch when it was about to lose balance, which would prevent him from falling.

  It didn’t take long before Pi finally made it to the top. Pi clung onto the tree as it looked down.

  Zhang Zian and Fu Tao looked very small, while Fina and Snowy Lionet were just yellow and white balls of fur. Richard was too small to even notice, except for its obnoxious voice, still hoarse and loud even from the top of the tree.

  From its position, Pi could see the nursing home and the car parked in the courtyard that looked like a shiny turtle shell. The lights were still on in the house, and from time to time, it could see people walk past the window.

  The sun was setting behind the mountains, and the evening mist covered Binhai City. The usually bustling city looked abandoned.

  Firecrackers could be heard from the villages nearby, the new year atmosphere was definitely getting stronger.

  Down below, the group of sparrows flew away after getting scared by Galaxy again, but this time they didn’t land on the tree branches near them.

  Night was creeping in, so the sparrows didn’t want to continue the cat-and-mouse game. They flew towards Binhai City, with a plan to find food in residential areas.

  Galaxy chased after the sparrows for a while before it got tired and returned.

  Passing by Pi’s tree, Galaxy raised its head and squinted to look at Pi.

  Pi waved to Galaxy, asking it to come up to play and watch the nice scenery.

  Galaxy shook its head and raised its paw to wave to Pi, asking it to come down.

  Even though the scenery was amazing, Pi had developed a feeling, as if it had to say something, to shout. Maybe this was why ancient poets loved to recite poems when they made it up a mountain. The wind at the top was a little too strong and it was really cold. There was no reason to stay up there alone, so Pi made his way down.