Pet King

Early morning.

Zhang Zian was woken up by his natural clock.

He yawned. He didn’t sleep well the night before, not because of anything in particular, but because he had been dreaming. In his dream, he stood on the street, holding a piece of paper and pen in his hand, and stopped pedestrians walking by to ask them to sign his petition. For some reason, however, he could not say anything in his dream; the only thing he could do was say “ah” over and over again. He was very anxious in his heart, and in the end, he woke up.

Whatever one thought about during the day, they dreamt about at night. He knew why he had that dream. It was, of course, because of the proposal for protecting small animals. Over the last two days, his thoughts had been consumed by it. Even when he was sleeping he dreamed about it.

The temperature was getting warmer and warmer, and even the mornings were not cold. Zhang Zian stood up, wearing his pajamas, and grabbed a piece of paper from his desk.

The empty spaces in the proposal had been filled with names––even the back was totally filled with signatures. There were not only signatures from people he was acquainted with; there were actually more signatures from strangers. He had not tricked them into signing. If they wanted they could randomly call to check on the status of the proposal, they were more than welcome to.

When the next meeting of the Chinese Peoples’ Political Consultative Conference was held, he intended to read the proposal in the meeting. He hoped to get the attention of the people there.

Anyway, he could only do so much. The rest was based on the people’s decisions… But there was one thing he did not doubt: China would one day have a law for the protection of small animals. It was just a question of time.

When he put down the proposal and turned around, he found that Famous was already awake and in a daze. The light from the nightlight had been buried in the sunlight of the morning.

The other elfins also woke up one by one. Zhang Zian walked over to ask, “Famous, did you not sleep well?”

Famous shook its head and said in confusion, “I had a very strange dream.”

“All dreams are very strange.” Zhang Zian smiled and said, “I often have dreams about marrying a wife!”

“Ga ga! You already feel that it is strange to dream of marrying a wife? You should dream of marrying a husband! That would be more accurate!” When Richard heard their conversation, although it was lazing around on the bed, it jumped up like it had been injected with chicken blood. Its face was full of excitement.

Zhang Zian’s facial expression did not change as he threatened it. “I love killing birds in my dreams. You better be careful.”

“Ga ga! Are you sure you’re not killing your own small bird?” Richard called out slyly.

“Meow, meow, meow! I can help you!” Snowy Lionet added, rolling over like a ball of fur.

“You live a comfortable life right now. Be careful, or I’ll bring up the list to use against you in the future!” Zhang Zian stared at Richard. There was no point in arguing with Richard. It would often pull Zhang Zian down to its level, then use its rich experience to attack him. Only using a chicken feather duster could let him fully express his anger!

As for Snowy Lionet, it was better to just ignore it. He really could not stand it trying to sneak attack him at night.

“Ga ga! I’m so scared! I want to poop green pills now!”

Zhang Zian was speechless. He turned to Famous and asked, “What did you dream about?”

Famous said, “I don’t know how to describe it… Dreams I’ve had in the past have been very lifelike, but I was always just a bystander. Whatever I did was destined to be unchangeable. The dream I just had was different… I forgot what happened, but the most important thing was that it was like a half-dream and half-awake event. I knew I was dreaming, and I felt as though I could control something, such as when to wake up. So I tried it, and I woke up.”

Zhang Zian thought about it. “Hmm… I seem to have heard something about this before… Let me try to remember… Have you heard of ‘Qingming dreams’?”

“Ga ga! Qingming dreams? There’s rain at the Qingming Festival, and the Zhang family children want to break their backs. Ask where there are calcium tablets, and I point at America!” Richard came out of the bathroom with a stink and joked. “Speaking of that, when are we going to visit England? I want to buy you a Scottish skirt to wear… Scottish men are so happy that they can wear women’s clothes!”

“I thought about that. Someone in one of my dreams said that China’s greatest and longest art form is men crossdressing…” Famous recalled.

Zhang Zian said, “These words… There really was someone who said that before.”

“Right. What is a Qingming dream?” Famous did not care who had such foresight and was instead concerned about its dream. It was the first time it had heard such a foreign phrase.

“Qingming dreams… They are metaphysical and controversial. People who believe in them are highly respected. People who don’t believe in them sneer at them. There is hardly any intermediate transition zone.”

Zhang Zian thought for a moment and began to talk about what he had heard. Many boys were interested in mysterious things when they were young. For example, he had a pile of UFO Exploration magazines left at home that were collecting dust somewhere. At that time, he was quite addicted to the magazine and spent his pocket money on them.

Qingming dreams, to put it simply, were when one was in an awake state while they were dreaming. They were also called lucid dreams.

For a normal dream, the person having the dream would not know that they were dreaming, even if the dream was very unbelievable. The person dreaming would keep moving on in the dream like a wooden puppet being controlled by strings, and would forget the dream entirely upon waking up.

There were different levels of Qingming dreams. They were generally more realistic. The dreamer could vaguely realize that he was dreaming, but the feeling of powerlessness still existed. It was just like watching a movie with a fixed plot. Even though they knew the movie was going to have a tragic ending, they were unable to do anything. The sober state was often fleeting and elusive.

At a higher level, the dreamer knew that he was dreaming. If it was a good dream or a wet dream, of course, he was willing for it to go on. But if it was a terrible nightmare, the dreamer would be anxious to wake up. Sometimes, when the dreamer was in a hurry, he could wake himself up and break away from the nightmare.

Most people had more or less experienced the above three dreams, but they may not have remembered them after waking up, which was not out of the ordinary. But the controversy of Qingming dreams was in that it could be further controlled by repeated practice, which could not only end nightmares in advance, but also prolong good dreams… and wet dreams. Even further, people could control their actions in their dreams, as well as change the direction of their dream. It was said to practice reality at the highest level, and even ignore the boundaries between dreams and reality to reach the metaphysical level.

“Ga ga! Qingming Dreams––the gospel of premature ejaculation, and the secret of women’s climax!” Richard sneered at the slogan, imitating the small advertisement. “Only an idiot like you would believe in this!”