Pet King

Zhang Zian had never seen Vladimir eat anything, and he knew that it didn’t need to either.

Aunt Li’s eyes scrunched up in glee seeing the blue cat eat the small dried fish. “I have never seen a cat that doesn’t eat dried fish. They eat it even when they’re extremely full.”

She didn’t notice that Vladimir had only tasted the small dried fish and opened its mouth again to spit the fish back out into the dish.

“Oh right, shopkeeper Zhang, you can bring us another two or three strays or any abandoned cats at the clinic. These cats with me are mostly adopted, and they will be leaving the shop within half a month.” She pointed at the few strays playing with the customers.

“Okay, I got it. I’ll get them sent over within the next two days.” Zhang Zian drank a few sips of the sour plum drink. The cold, sour yet sweet, deep purple liquid flowed through his throat, calming his palate and his heart and flooding his body with energy.

“Alright, I’ll be waiting for them then,” Aunt Li happily chirped.

When Zhang Zian was drinking the sour plum, he was afraid that the drink would pour onto the proposal, so he left it off to one side. Aunt Li noticed it and squinted at it, asking, “What is this?”

Since he had nothing else to do anyway, Zhang Zian explained his thoughts simply while drinking his drink. He had explained it so many times that morning, he had practically perfected the speech by now, succinct and fluent.

“Oh.” Aunt Li understood. “Then I’ll help sign too! These strays are pitiful. I always felt bad for using them to earn money, and it would make me feel better if I could help them out.”

Zhang Zian passed her the pen. “Please do.”

Aunt Li cleaned her hands on her apron, solemnly signing her name on the paper. She apologized, “My man’s helping out in the kitchen, and it’s a smelly and smoky place. His hands are dirty too, so he can’t help you sign.”

“Don’t worry about that. Go ahead and do your things. You don’t have to keep entertaining me.” Zhang Zian smiled. “I am more than grateful for your signature.”

“Then I’ll be going in.”

Someone ordered their meal right at that time, and Aunt Li quickly went over to serve them.

The other patrons felt Zhang Zian was weird the moment he stepped through the door. It was normal to bring drinks into a restaurant, since the restaurants usually sold drinks at a way higher price than others, and they might not even be the real deal. But it was weird to bring your own cat to a cat cafe. Why not just play with your own cat at home? Did it feel better to have a bunch of cats instead?

Zhang Zian didn’t know any of their complicated thoughts and concentrated on summarizing what he had learned before, strategizing how he could get more signatures more efficiently.

One of the patrons had finished their meal and was about to walk out contentedly. When he passed by Zhang Zian’s table, he kindheartedly reminded him, “Hey, your cat ran out. You should go after it.”

The weather wasn’t too hot or too cold, and the air quality was great too. There was no need to turn on the air conditioning, so the door was only half-closed, leaving the other half open for better ventilation. The cats in the shop were under Fina’s orders to not leave the shop without approval, so there was no need to worry about them running out of the shop.

Zhang Zian hummed, uncaringly, “Alright, I got it. Thank you.”

Vladimir often disappeared, and he’d long since gotten used to it.

“It ran out with the plate in its mouth. You lose your cat and you still have to pay for the plate.” Seeing how calm the other was, he couldn’t help but speak a bit more.

Zhang Zian looked down subconciously. The plate really was gone.

He downed the rest of his sour plum drink and rose. “Thank you. I’ll go get it back now.”

That just solidified his image amongst the other patrons further more as a weirdo. He wasn’t afraid of losing his cat, but he was afraid of losing the plate…

He took his jacket as he walked out, turning around in search of his cat. He soon found that Vladimir hadn’t gone far and was squatting on the roof of a building nearby. Nearby it was another few stray cats, chewing on something. He didn’t need to ask to know that they were definitely snacking on the dried fish.

Vladimir didn’t eat it itself, but it didn’t want to waste them either, so it had taken the entire plate out and shared the goodies with the strays in the area.

Zhang Zian went over slowly, waiting under a shady area.

Not too long later, Vladimir jumped down with the plate in its mouth. It turned to look at him, but with something in its mouth it couldn’t communicate, so it ran back to the shop to put the plate down before running back.

“Corruption and wastefulness are hideous crimes,” it explained.

Zhang Zian couldn’t agree more.

In reality, even if it hadn’t taken away those dried fish, he had been considering whether he should put all those dried fish in his pocket and bring them back. If he left those dried fish there, other patrons would definitely pick them up and use them to attract the cats for free.

“Those cats in the shop were all strays?” it asked.

“Some of them are, but not all of them—some of them are cats that were abandoned at the clinic when their owners didn’t want to pay for their treatment. If no one comes back for them, they’re basically strays too. Since the clinic couldn’t house them forever, we could only get the help of the people or the shelters,” Zhang Zian explained. “The two owners of this shop planned to open a shop where customers could dine while playing with cats, so it helps to connect the two. Some of the customers felt bad for playing with the cats excessively, so they adopted those that they liked back home. It was a triple win situation.”

“That’s not a bad solution.” Vladimir nodded.

“But compared to the number of strays, this is just a drop in the bucket.”

It turned to look at the signage then, asking questions in its confusion. “Businessmen only care about profits. By your words, the bosses of the shop should be against this law, right? She wouldn’t be able to get free cats then.”

Other than pleading for the protection of small animals in the bill, there was also a suggestion for the country to regulate the buying and selling of pets to ensure that customers only purchased pets after understanding the pros and cons and the methods of taking care of them. This was to prevent customers from abandoning those pets shortly after purchase. These were all the lessons they had picked up from Germany’s laws.

Zhang Zian smiled. “Not all businessmen are profit-driven. I’ve known these two owners for a long time, and they were never greedy for money. They had opened this restaurant because they had no other skill they could use to earn their income, and it wasn’t entirely because they were chasing profits.”

Vladimir stared at it. “What about you? Why did you start running your own business?”

“Me?” Zhang Zian mulled over the question before answering, “Even though a job is stable, it’s like caging yourself up. Running your own business has risks, but it is free.”

“Just like home-owned cats and strays,” Vladimir pointed out.