Pet King

ou do now.” Zhang Zian praised him in awe and respect.

Wei Kang waved his hand.
“Stop your sweet talk.
I won’t fall for it.
If I really opened a pet shop, I would lose all of my money in a month,” he said.
“I’m out on an errand, and your shop was on the way, so I wanted to ask how your preparations for the Egypt trip were going.”

Zhang Zian had more or less guessed Professor Wei Kang’s reason for being here, and smiled.
“What is there for me to prepare? Just give me the word, and I’ll be ready to go by the next day!”

Even though he declared it so, he was still concerned about the Holy Cat statue.
If he left Binhai City before he settled that, the situation might be blown out of hand by the time he came back.
But it was something that he couldn’t quite tell Professor Wei Kang.

“That’s good…” Wei Kang noticed the paper he was holding in his hand.
“What’s that in your hand…?”

“Oh, I obnoxiously made a proposal, and I was looking for people to sign.
Professor Wei, why not help me sign it?” Zhang Zian half-joked as he passed the bill over.

Wei Kang took it and perused it.
“Mm, this is a good thing that would benefit us! It’s a bit of a shame.
We experts should be doing things like this, but…no one wants to put themselves out there.
It’s already busy enough doing your research daily, and we have to publish a set amount of journals every year to keep our titles… Do you have a pen? Lend me one.”

Even though Zhang Zian called him “Professor,” Wei Kang was actually just an assistant professor, and he had been slaving over promoting himself to professor.
Besides better treatment, they should be able to get better research resources too.

Wei Kang picked up the pen, writing his name before passing everything back to Zhang Zian.
“If you need more signatures, the PhD students and fellows should be able to sign for you too, and I can call up some of my colleagues.”

“Then thank you in advance!”

Zhang Zian was more than glad to gain the support of all these experts, and it boosted his confidence greatly.

“No problem.
It’s a simple task.
I’ll contact them when I’m back.
Then I’ll be off, so remember to prepare carefully for our trip to Egypt!” Wei Kang reminded him.

His eyes went past Zhang Zian and Vladimir to the smudge of gold on the cat tower in the pet shop before he stepped on the gas reluctantly.

It was an excuse that he was just passing by.
In reality, he had wanted to take a look at Fina, the only confirmed cat that was from Egypt.
He felt that Fina had to be there for their trip to Egypt.

After Wei Kang had left, Vladimir finally opened its mouth to ask, “The old man earlier had a strong scholarly aura around him.
You know him?”

“Yes, he’s an assistant professor with Binhai City University’s biology faculty.
He’s a nice guy, and I owe him a lot,” Zhang Zian answered truthfully.

Vladimir hummed, seemingly not having a good first impression of Wei Kang.

“Is there something wrong?” Zhang Zian asked, confused.
Had Wei Kang offended Vladimir earlier?

Could it be that Vladimir was upset about him saying that he was a mix between a Russian Blue and China’s own cats? But that would be weird.
Vladimir had never expressed its displeasure when Zhang Zian said that to their customers on more than one occasion.

“Nothing much.” Vladimir shook its head.
“Let’s continue gathering signatures.”

Since it was unwilling to speak, Zhang Zian didn’t force it to.
When it was willing to speak, it naturally would.

His signature collection had been going a lot more smoothly than expected.
Zhang Zian gave it an extra thought.
Where should they go next?