Chapter 43
Shao Sui only briefly touched the side of Mimi’s leg.
It was dry and soft.
He pulled the blanket over Mimi’s body and kissed his forehead tenderly, “Good job, baby.”
Mimi clung tightly to Shao Sui, his warm body reminiscent of a soft, small animal. He nuzzled Shao Sui’s neck, his voice soft, “That’s the second time you’ve called me ‘baby’.”
Shao Sui said, “That’s not the second time, I’ve called you that many…”
Mimi insisted stubbornly, “It’s the second time!”
Shao Sui realized that although he often called Mimi “baby” in his cat form, he had indeed only called human Mimi “baby” twice. The last time was the morning he set up the linked payment, half-asleep, he had hugged Mimi, who had woken him up, and called him “baby.”
“I was… embarrassed before, shy.” Shao Sui coaxed softly. “Can I call you that more often in the future?”
Mimi said he could.
After a while, he suddenly asked, “Shao Sui, how can I become as tall and strong as you?”
“Getting taller might be a bit difficult…” Shao Sui thought of the children in his class who were taking growth hormones, but would they still be effective for Mimi at his age?
And Mimi wasn’t actually short, already above average height for men.
“I won’t be a picky eater anymore, will that help?”
“You mean those vegetables you don’t like?” Shao Sui chuckled, “They don’t make you taller. It’s good to eat them if you can, but it’s not a big deal if you don’t, no nutrient is irreplaceable.”
After saying this, he paused, suddenly realizing the often-repeated online sentiment “Parents are also first-time parents” was a fallacy.
Parents might be first-time parents, but they had been children.
Shao Sui had been forced by Shao Jun to eat countless foods he disliked growing up. If he ate less of a particular dish one day, she would cook it every day for the next few days, even a month, until he got used to it.
Having suffered through it, Shao Sui didn’t want to force Mimi to do the same, even though his first instinct when seeing Mimi being picky was to put the vegetables back in his bowl and force him to eat them under the guise of “it’s for your own good.”
Thankfully, he always managed to restrain himself.
“Becoming stronger, however, can be achieved through hard work.” Shao Sui hugged Mimi’s waist through the blanket, gently caressing it. “We’ll exercise together from now on.”
Mimi said, “Morning jogs?”
Shao Sui rested his chin on Mimi’s head, “That won’t work, I don’t sleep until eleven or twelve, waking up early would kill me.”
Even in his human form, Mimi still had kitten-like habits, sleeping whenever he felt sleepy during the day, and waking up early, always waking him up at 6 AM sharp.
“Then, at night?”
“Evenings work, we can go for a run around seven or eight, or do some weight training at home.” Shao Sui slipped his hand under the covers and squeezed Mimi’s soft waist. “Gain some muscle.”
Mimi hesitated again, “But you like me soft, will you still like me if I’m as strong as an ox?”
Normal exercise wouldn’t make him that strong. Shao Sui suppressed a smile, “Does it matter whether I like it or not?”
“Of course it matters!” Mimi quickly looked up. “What if you don’t want me anymore?”
Shao Sui couldn’t resist, lifting Mimi’s chin and kissing him, “If you were just a kitten, staying home all day, being soft would be great. But if you’re a stray… a free cat, you have to deal with bad dogs and bad cats outside, then you need to be strong to protect yourself.”
“Same with being human, you want to go out and explore, don’t you? Then you can’t be too weak. The human world has good people, but also many bad people.”
“Mm-hmm!” Mimi nodded, then caught the loophole, “You didn’t say whether you like it or not!”
“I like it, I like baby no matter what form you take.”
If he had seen a muscular cat in the wild before adopting Mimi, Shao Sui wouldn’t have been interested. But he had adopted him, he had grown fond of him, so he would accept whatever form he took.
Just like a year ago, if he had known about cat spirits, he would have either avoided them or called the police. But his own cat turning into a human was much easier to accept.
Mimi asked seriously, “Will you still like me if I’m dirty and smelly?”
Shao Sui was silent.
Mimi crawled out of Shao Sui’s arms, “You don’t truly like me like a partner, you just like me as a pet!”
Shao Sui: “…”
Mimi picked up his clothes from the floor and started putting them on. “The internet said true love means liking someone whether they’re dressed to the nines or wearing rags.”
Shao Sui decided to fight fire with fire, “If I fell into a cesspit and smelled like sewage, would you still kiss me?”
Mimi’s jaw dropped, his shocked expression saying, How could you even suggest such a horrifying scenario?
The little cat spirit stammered, “Why would you walk into a cesspit?”
“See, liking someone has prerequisites, firstly, their character can’t deteriorate.” Shao Sui said earnestly. “They can’t go from being clean to being unhygienic, or from law-abiding to criminal.”
Faced with the cesspit hypothetical, Mimi reluctantly accepted the premise: Shao Sui’s love was conditional, he had to be a hygienic cat.
Hmph.
After appeasing Mimi, Shao Sui glanced at the time and told Director Cao he had found the person sending the photos and was going to the police station. Director Cao replied that he would contact his friend at the station to smooth things over.
Mimi got dressed, sneaking glances at Shao Sui’s phone.
Shao Sui suddenly remembered something and asked, “Did Hu… that person see you transform into a cat?”
Mimi said, “No… I ran into the bedroom, closed the door, then transformed and jumped out the window.”
“So resourceful, our Mimi, calm and collected under pressure.” Shao Sui praised. “I’m going to the police station now, can you stay home alone?”
Mimi, clearly still shaken, looked at Shao Sui with apprehensive eyes, making his heart melt.
“That man has been taken away by the police, he can’t come back and bully you anymore.” Shao Sui carried the little cat spirit back to the bed. “Wait for me here, don’t open the door for anyone.”
Mimi sat on the edge of the bed, “Will you be back soon?”
Shao Sui knelt down, held Mimi’s hand, and kissed it, “I promise I’ll be back soon, I’ll call you, okay?”
Mimi whispered, “Okay…”
Shao Sui took two steps, then turned back, adding, “The police might also call you in for questioning, I might not be able to prevent it, if that happens, just insist you hid in the wardrobe, don’t mention transforming into a cat and jumping out the window.”
Mimi nodded obediently, believing everything Shao Sui said.
Shao Sui checked the surveillance footage again, relieved to find nothing unusual. However, he heard Hu Yuan, after failing to find the cat, say to Mimi, “He lost my little toy, I don’t think it’s too much to… sample his boyfriend, right?”
Shao Sui’s expression turned icy.
Mimi, beside him, also remembered the situation, saying in alarm, “He not only likes hitting cats, but also eating human flesh!”
“He’s just scum, a pervert.” Shao Sui leaned down and kissed Mimi. “Don’t think about him anymore, play with your phone.”
Mimi looked up and nuzzled Shao Sui, even opening his mouth slightly.
Shao Sui: “…What are you doing?”
Mimi rubbed against Shao Sui affectionately, “For you to kiss.”
Shao Sui took a deep breath, reminding himself that Mimi didn’t like him that way. He wanted to get up and leave, but his feet were rooted to the spot.
When he came back to his senses, he had Mimi pinned down on the bed, kissing him until his eyes were watery.
“Mm…” Mimi whimpered, his hands clutching Shao Sui’s shirt tightly. “It tickles.”
“Where does it tickle?”
“My lips.”
“Which part?”
Every time Shao Sui explored a part of Mimi’s mouth, he would pull back, nibbling on his lips, asking, “Here… here? Or here?”
“N-none of those…”
Mimi’s breathing was erratic. The wicked Shao Sui deliberately didn’t teach him how to breathe properly during a kiss, just wanting to see him dazed and helpless, his eyes closed, clinging to him, the instigator.
Shao Sui retracted his hand from Mimi’s waist, “Okay, I really have to go now.”
Mimi grabbed his hand, “Can’t I go with you?”
Shao Sui retorted, “There are many people there, and police officers, are you sure you can handle it?”
“I don’t know.” Mimi was just worried. “What if he hurts you? I want to protect you.”
“…”
Twenty minutes later, Shao Sui parked near the police station. He turned to Mimi and said, “Wait for me here, lock the doors, don’t talk to anyone.”
“Okay!”
“Do you remember what we discussed?”
“Yes.” Mimi nodded obediently.
Shao Sui resisted the urge to kiss Mimi, it would only delay him. When he arrived at the police station, the delivery person had just finished giving his statement. Shao Sui thanked him and sent him a thousand yuan through the app.
“Sorry for interrupting your work.”
The delivery person was taken aback, “It’s okay, if I had reacted faster, he wouldn’t have gotten in… this is too much.”
Shao Sui said, “You still took a risk opening the door for me, thank you.”
Inside the police station, Hu Yuan, handcuffed, was asking, “What about the person who jumped from the building? Is he dead?”
“Who jumped from a building?” The male officer slammed his hand on the table. “Stop changing the subject, why did you have a bunch of knives in your car?”
“Can’t I collect knives? I didn’t even bring them upstairs.”
Although both were cases of trespassing, both motivated by finding a cat, carrying knives changed the nature of the crime. Hu Yuan knew this, insisting he was just trying to find his stolen cat, and admitting to trespassing.
Normally, the punishment for this wouldn’t be severe.
Then the female officer walked in, replacing the other officer, “We found something on your phone. Do you want to tell us about it, or should we?”
Hu Yuan’s eyes darted around nervously.
Shao Sui’s expression was grim, “An animal abuse group?”
“Yes.” The police officer in front of him was Director Cao’s friend. “Many members, wide distribution, and the videos are incredibly violent and graphic, we’ll investigate this thoroughly, don’t worry.”
Shao Sui breathed a sigh of relief, “Can he be sentenced for this?”
The police officer glanced around, lowered his voice, and said vaguely, “If it was just animal abuse and distributing videos, it would be difficult to say, but there are other issues, he’s been arrested a few times before… and this time, we found evidence of him organizing… gatherings, and filming and uploading videos for profit, he won’t get off lightly.”
Shao Sui was relieved, “Thank you for your hard work.”
The police officer said, “You’re welcome. Those photos he took are also a violation of your privacy, we’ll delete all backups, don’t worry.”
“By the way, what’s the deal with that young man in the photos? You told our colleague he’s your cousin, Hu Yuan said he’s your boyfriend?”
Shao Sui pinched the bridge of his nose, “Neither, it’s complicated…”
The officer said, “He’s a witness, he’ll also have to give a statement.”
Shao Sui had anticipated this, which was why he agreed to bring Mimi, to avoid making another trip.
…
Ten minutes later, the police officer sat face-to-face with Mimi, meticulously recording his statement, finding it unbelievable, “Say that again?”
Mimi recited his lines, “I’ve been an orphan since I was little, always wandering the streets. I was so hungry some time ago that I broke into Shao Sui’s apartment to steal food, and he kindly took me in after learning about my past… so I don’t have an ID card.”
Mimi, a cat spirit, had no concept of human shame, lying without a blush or a racing heart, his eyes incredibly innocent and sincere.
Shao Sui cautiously added, “He didn’t actually steal anything valuable that time, so I didn’t press charges.”
The police officer looked at Shao Sui, then at Mimi, feeling deeply suspicious.
“You don’t look like you’ve ever been homeless…” The officer, not wanting to accuse Mimi, directed his question at Shao Sui. “And you, you believed him when he said he was homeless, didn’t even call the police? What if he was a runaway? His parents would be worried sick.”
Shao Sui thought, finding his parents would be a miracle, but apologized, “He looked so pitiful, I didn’t think much of it.”
“Pitiful, or good-looking?” The police officer said bluntly, “Don’t you have a surveillance camera at home? Let me see the footage.”
The footage showed Mimi attending online classes in the morning, playing with his phone in the afternoon, and reporting to the camera every two hours that he had drunk water.
The first thing Shao Sui did when he got home was to check Mimi’s homework, criticizing him for any mistakes, and then Mimi would act spoiled and beg for forgiveness, even doing the “doggy prayer” on the sofa, “Don’t hit my hands, it hurts!” (Putting paws together like praying.)
“You’re raising a child, aren’t you…” The officer muttered, then added, “He’s already learning seventh-grade Chinese, but his math is still at the level of basic arithmetic?”
Mimi said matter-of-factly, “I can’t understand the math problems if I can’t read.”
The police officer: “…”
Unable to refute that.
Shao Sui coughed, not exposing the fact that Mimi was only learning to read so he could use his phone, “Can he get a household registration and an ID card in his situation?”
“If he’s truly been homeless since childhood, then yes, it’s just a bit more troublesome.” The police officer was now half-convinced. Mimi’s behavior didn’t seem like someone who had attended school normally. “But if he has parents, they might sue you for kidnapping.”
Mimi defended Shao Sui, “No kidnapping, I came here completely willingly!”
The police officer sighed, “We’ll need to register your information first. And you two should live separately until the results are out. We can arrange a hotel room for you nearby…”
“No!” Mimi’s eyes widened instantly. “I want to live with Shao Sui!”
The officer said that wasn’t allowed.
“Yes!” Mimi said indignantly, “I’m an adult! As a police officer, you have to respect a citizen’s personal wishes, you can’t force me!”
Shao Sui was embarrassed. He hadn’t taught him that.
The police officer frowned, worried about Shao Sui’s intentions, seeing Mimi’s youthful appearance, “But…”
“No buts.” Mimi mumbled, “I’ve been without a mother since I was little, only Shao Sui is nice to me.”
The police officer: “…”
Mimi added, “I’ll die if I leave Shao Sui.”
The police officer, weary, waved his hand, “Take him.”
