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

  Little White left the pet shop so easily that Zhang Zian and Vladimir couldn’t tell what just happened.

  “Meow! What a crazy dog! ” Vladimir said out of spite, “If he could make a hole, then leave on your own!”


  Little White didn’t fall for the trap or put up a fight. Even if he had made a hole in the air wall, Vladimir might find fault with it and say that the air wall itself wasn’t complete or as strong as before.

  He had identified the direction and chose to go north along the wall. Although he wasn’t sure about the specific location of the waste purchase station, he could always find it because the pungency of the smell of waste increased the closer he was.

  Zhang Zian stopped him and said, “Why don’t I drive you there? I’m free right now and it’s too early to sleep. My nightlife should be more exciting.”


  Little White hesitated and shook his head. “No thank you, you can take me to the city and I’ll walk the rest of the way. I can’t thank you enough already for that.”


  “It’s alright. You were right before about those empty bottles and cans being picked up by stray dogs in the heat. I shouldn’t be too generous or friendly with others,” Zhang Zian apologized.

  During the day, the employees of the waste purchase station deliberately left out the empty bottles. What he thought at that time was that if he cooperated with them for a long time, he could overlook some losses. However, Little White got angry later on. He reflected on why he thought this way and realized it was because he still didn’t equate the labor done by the stray dogs to that of humans.

  If the same bottle was picked up by an old man and someone deliberately withheld back his money, others would’ve interfered. The old man’s life was already hard enough, so why not go on and take further advantage of him? However, as for the bottles picked by stray dogs, others would’ve thought that there wasn’t much else to it. A few bottles less were no big deal. Besides, dogs ran fast and had a lot of stamina. At most, they could pick up a few more bottles.

  Both people and dogs were all manually picking up bottles. Didn’t they all put in the same hard work? People chose not to respect dogs but should respect the effort they put.

  Although this wasn’t deliberate occupation discrimination, a person working at a waste recycling station wouldn’t have been as moral. On the basis that the work is difficult to endure and dirty, Zhang Zian decided that it was more humane to close an eye and not be too hard on them. Even so, they wouldn’t have appreciated it or known how to be grateful. It was more likely that he would’ve been treated as a fool, which may have intensified their efforts to take advantage of him.

  To compensate for this, he planned to take Little White on a trip. It was best if he could negotiate with them this time. They wouldn’t be able to deduct the quantity next time.

  If the negotiation failed, he would have to react accordingly.

  He told Little White what he thought, and Little White nodded.

  Back at the shop, he told the other elves to go ahead and sleep first since he was coming back late. He pulled down the shutter door, let Little White sit in the MPV and drove north to the suburb.

  This time, Vladimir wasn’t with them. Little White didn’t have to ride in the same car with his rival.

  When night arrived, the temperature dropped significantly. With the windows open, the night wind blew into the car in a rather pleasant way.

  There were fewer vehicles in the evening. The MPV maintained a steady but fast speed and soon passed through the city and into the northern suburb.

  It was quite dark in the countryside. The distance between the street lamps was quite large, their brightness was somewhat weak leaving nearly no light between each lamp.

  Zhang Zian then slowed down. In areas like this, driving fast was not a good idea. You never knew if anyone was going to randomly cross the road or not.

  Suddenly, a yellow shadow swept past the car; either it was too fast or the car’s lights were too dim. Zhang Zian didn’t see what it was, so he quickly stepped on the brakes and the car screeched to a halt. The vehicle merely bumped the object a little.

  Little White was caught off guard. He didn’t wear a seat belt since it wasn’t designed for dogs. He rolled out of the seat during the braking process in such an embarrassing manner and got stuck between the seat and the glove box.

  Afraid that he had bumped into someone, Zhang Zian broke out into a cold sweat. A moment later, he came to his senses. He reached out for Little White’s leg and pulled him out of the gap.

  “Thank you,” Little White said, feeling rather awkward.

  “What was that just now?” Zhang Zian pretended not to see his embarrassment and looked aside. By now, the thing disappeared in the dark, but they only knew it was an animal.

  With the window open, Little White took a deep whiff and said, “It’s a dog, likely a stray dog living in the countryside.”


  Although the dog ran away, the rotten stench and sour musk still lingered in the air. It smelled like rotten vegetable leaves in garbage heaps. Clean and decent dogs in the pet shops never had this smell.

  In suburbs and villages, it was very common to keep a large or medium-sized dog with a complex pedigree dog to guard the house. In other words, the mongrel which was mixed with several breeds that Zhang Zian didn’t recognize was usually tied up in the yard. There were also free-range puppies or stray dogs. The Binhai City Dog Breeding Regulations were for urban areas only, so nobody checked here.

  “It’s too dangerous. I nearly hit it,” Zhang Zian wiped the sweat off his forehead.

  Fortunately, he was able to slow down the car ahead of time and only stepped on the brake. If he swerved the steering wheel, his vehicle was more likely to roll over so he could avoid pedestrians or animals.

  There were often stray cats, dogs and other animals on the highway who get killed and crushed when crossing. Traffic accidents caused by their crossing of the highway were also common.

  Little White thought, “I’ve been ignoring it before this. Since there are also stray dogs in the north, the East and West……”


  “None to the East, unless there are sea dogs.” Zhang Zian corrected.

  Little White said, “Well, I’m only familiar with the small geographical area southeast of Binhai.”


  Before this, just feeding hundreds of stray dogs in the landfill was enough to give Little White a headache. Every day, he had to think about finding clean food and had no time for other things. Now that the problem of food has been solved, he could relax for the time being. He now had more energy to devote to other issues on his mind.

  Zhang Zian thought, “If we could find a way to integrate the stray dogs in the north, west, and south, we would stand a better chance against the stray cats.”


  Zhang Zian calmed down, looked at the navigation map, and found that the waste purchase station was not too far from where they were. It seemed to be in the direction the stray dog was going just now, but it went through a shortcut. All he could do was continue along the road.