After much going back and forth, the little stray dog still ended up at Ye Yang’s place.
Chi Lian had wanted to take Tu Tu home, but he was currently living at the YCG branch, where spiritual energy was abundant and unsuitable for ordinary humans and animals.
He certainly wouldn’t dare ask Boss Long. As for Xing Tian and Sister Wu—forget it. Those old immortals lived in the demon realm, which was even less suitable.
Grey did live in the human realm, but he was a goose—and he hated dogs with a passion.
The only one with the right conditions to foster Tu Tu was Ye Yang.
Shen Ming, carrying a batch of freshly baked pork mooncakes, opened Ye Yang’s door only to be greeted by a scene of utter chaos inside.
The two “little chicks” had formed a united front against the “little mutt” on the floor. Both sides were evenly matched, neither giving ground, fighting more fiercely by the minute. A water glass on the dining table had been knocked over, leaving a puddle on the tabletop.
Shen Ming: “…” He frowned and released a faint hint of his pressure. The three little creatures immediately panicked and scrambled into the gap behind the sofa. Forget fighting—they huddled together, trembling violently.
Shen Ming set down the mooncakes, wiped the table clean, and then called out, “Ye Ye?”
“I’m in the bathroom~ Be right out!”
The little sea hare was soaking in freshly delivered seawater from the South China Sea secret realm, stretching out his body.
After drying himself off, Ye Yang couldn’t be bothered to revert to human form. He wiggled out slowly and crawled up the table leg onto the dining table.
“Hey? Where did the three of them go?”
Three tiny heads peeked out from behind the sofa. The moment they saw the terrifying presence that was Shen Ming, they instantly ducked back.
Ye Yang nearly burst out laughing. “No wonder they suddenly went quiet.”
Shen Ming picked up a steaming hot pork mooncake with his chopsticks and placed it in Ye Yang’s bowl. “Eat it while it’s hot.”
Ye Yang had been smelling the aroma all along. Now, he climbed his whole rabbit self into the bowl, devouring the mooncake with his unique eating posture while mumbling, “So good, so good! Oof, hot~”
Only after finishing the entire mooncake did he flop contentedly onto the table and ask Shen Ming, “Teacher Shen, what is this? It’s delicious.”
“Mooncake.”
Ye Yang froze for a moment, then suddenly remembered mentioning a few days ago that he had missed the Mid-Autumn Festival entirely due to two months of closed-door cultivation. He had felt a little regretful about not being able to celebrate the festival this year.
The Mid-Autumn Festival had long since passed. Christmas was only half a month away. But upon hearing Ye Yang say that, Shen Ming had gone out that very day to buy ingredients and made a batch of pork mooncakes himself.
“Teacher Shen, you’re way too good to me!”
“You can’t go back and celebrate the festival, but mooncakes can be eaten anytime.” Shen Ming picked up a mooncake for himself and then asked, “How did you end up raising a hou?”
“Pfft, Teacher Shen, you misspoke too!” Ye Yang laughed heartily. “That dog isn’t mine—it’s Chi Lian’s. He’s just staying with me temporarily.”
“Ah, I didn’t expect Little Crow, Little Parrot, and Tu Tu to get along so badly. They’ve been fighting ever since I got home. Good thing you’re here, Teacher Shen, or I wouldn’t have known how to sleep tonight.” Of course, he could just not sleep, but Ye Yang had stuck to a human sleep schedule for years now. Suddenly disrupting that rhythm would feel strange.
As he finished speaking, Ye Yang suddenly noticed that Shen Ming had gone quiet. Uh-oh—had his teasing just now made Teacher Shen upset?
But when he looked at Shen Ming, he saw the man staring at the sofa with a thoughtful expression. After a long moment, Shen Ming looked down and asked him, “You thought what you brought home was a dog?”
Ye Yang: “…Yeah.” Wasn’t Tu Tu just a little mutt? He couldn’t possibly be that mistaken, could he?
Shen Ming raised an eyebrow and suddenly lifted his hand. Tu Tu was abruptly hoisted into the air by an invisible force.
The puppy was terrified and struggled—only to break free with almost no effort. But when he landed back on the ground, he had completely changed form.
“What is that?!” Ye Yang yelped.
A dragon’s head on a horse’s body, a lion’s build with rabbit ears… Aside from being smaller in size and having very tiny horns, this creature was indistinguishable from the legendary hou. One large rabbit ear stood straight up while the other drooped—it was almost cute.
But cute or not, it didn’t change the fact that this was a divine beast!
This was no dog—this was a hou!
And even if it wasn’t as massive as the legends described, this hou was still enormous. Kneeling on the ground, its upright ear nearly brushed the ceiling!
Little Crow had already fled behind Ye Yang and Shen Ming. Little Parrot had been on the verge of fainting from terror ever since Shen Ming first released his pressure, and now lay completely motionless on the floor, playing dead.
Shen Ming said calmly, “Still an adolescent hou.”
Ye Yang couldn’t stay seated. He transformed back into human form and stood up, staring at the suddenly revealed hou in shock. “You… what’s going on here? Why did you trick me?”
All the suspicious events from before suddenly clicked into place in his mind. “Ah, I get it now. That scammer offering free puppies earlier—that was you too, wasn’t it?”
Forced back into its true form, the hou didn’t dare stand up. It kept its head lowered in a submissive posture, and if you looked closely, its legs were trembling a little.
Shen Ming glanced at it with disdain. “He’s asking you a question. Speak.”
Tu Tu shuddered violently, both ears flattening back against his head. In a tiny voice, he spoke: “I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt anyone.”
Ye Yang hesitated for a moment. “Are you male or female?”
Tu Tu, with a mix of fear and sadness, said, “Of course I’m male!”
Ye Yang quickly apologized. “Sorry, sorry. I was just asking casually.”
Tu Tu sniffled. “My voice is naturally like this. Maybe that’s why I was abandoned.”
The conversation was drifting further and further off course. Shen Ming couldn’t help interjecting, “First, explain why you deceived Ye Ye.”
Tu Tu trembled again and glanced fearfully at Shen Ming. “I… I just wanted to find a place to recover from my injury.”
As he spoke, he slightly lifted one of his hind legs. Only then did Ye Yang notice a long, irregular wound on his belly near the inner side of his right thigh. Not only had it not healed, but there was also rotten flesh around it—it looked gruesome.
“That’s serious…” Ye Yang couldn’t stand seeing this. He stepped forward, placed his hand on Tu Tu’s flank, and channeled energy into him. Although it couldn’t directly heal the wound, Tu Tu immediately felt much better as his internal potential was mobilized.
“Thank you!” Tu Tu raised his two front legs and bowed to Ye Yang, accidentally pulling at the rotten flesh on his wound. The gesture looked both fawning and pitiful at the same time.
Ye Yang took the opportunity to observe further. The wound seemed quite old, and his suspicion grew. “Why didn’t you just recover somewhere hidden? Why were you so determined to find me?”
Tu Tu looked utterly sincere. “My wound just wouldn’t heal, and I was too afraid to go back to the demon realm. Then I happened to notice you saving a stray cat, so I went out of my way to find you.”
“When did I… ah, I remember now!”
If Tu Tu hadn’t brought it up, Ye Yang would have long forgotten about it.
Shortly after coming out of seclusion, Ye Yang had come across a stray kitten by the roadside. It was covered in wounds—whether from other animals or humans, he couldn’t tell—and was already on the verge of death.
Feeling pity, Ye Yang had carried the kitten to a veterinary hospital. The cat had been barely breathing on the way there, and it was only thanks to Ye Yang’s ability that its condition reversed course.
Tu Tu had followed them the whole way and sensed a very soothing aura coming from both the kitten and Ye Yang. That was when he started racking his brain for a way to get close to Ye Yang.
Shen Ming, who had been watching coldly, finally asked another question. “How did you get that injury?”
Ye Yang also had a question. “You said you escaped from the demon realm, but how are you so familiar with human networks?”
These two questions struck at the heart of the matter and also touched upon Tu Tu’s background.
But considering that one of the people in front of him was helping heal his wound—making him a good being in Tu Tu’s eyes—and the other was incredibly powerful (and if they were bad, he couldn’t beat them anyway), Tu Tu hesitated only briefly before confessing everything.
Tu Tu didn’t have a name because he had been abandoned at birth. He had never met his parents. If not for his inherited memories, he wouldn’t have survived at all.
A cub couldn’t survive alone in the brutal demon realm. By a stroke of luck, Tu Tu had made his way to the human realm.
He had a natural ability to hide himself—none of the many great demons in the company had detected his disguise. If not for encountering Shen Ming, he never would have been exposed. Thanks to this, Tu Tu had never been discovered by YCG either.
With that ability, and because hous naturally resembled dogs, Tu Tu had drifted from place to place in the guise of a puppy. His only problem was that he couldn’t grow slowly like an ordinary dog. At most, he could stay in one place for a month before having to move on.
Some humans would feed him, some would take him home and give him names. Tu Tu had a pile of names, which was as good as having none at all.
“I’m a crippled hou. I have no combat ability—I can’t even win against stray dogs on the street. But I learned how to use the internet by following different humans, and I… I also stole a few phones…”
Ye Yang: “…” Well, then.
As for the wound on Tu Tu’s body—that was pure bad luck.
He had been doing just fine in the human realm, transforming into different dog breeds and living with humans, eating and drinking his fill. Life was great. Then, right before meeting Ye Yang, his last owner suddenly died.
The elderly woman had some underlying health issues, but she was mobile and had a good appetite. No one expected her to suddenly have a cerebral infarction. When it happened, she was home alone. Her gambling-addicted son was nowhere to be found—he’d probably run off somewhere again. In the end, it was Tu Tu who called emergency services, summoned the ambulance, and even opened the door for the paramedics.
Because he couldn’t speak in front of humans, it took a while before the ambulance could take the old woman to the hospital. In the end, she still passed away.
Her son never showed up through the whole ordeal.
Tu Tu was sad, but there was nothing he could do about it. He stayed at the old woman’s house for a few more days, planning to finish the remaining dog food before leaving.
But then, unexpectedly, YCG agents showed up.
Tu Tu could tell these people were anything but ordinary. He secretly followed them and discovered that there was an organization called YCG in the human realm.
“Back then, I hadn’t met you or Chi Lian yet, so I didn’t understand much. I thought it was an organization for capturing demons. I panicked, thinking they’d come for me, so I fled back to the demon realm.”
But the moment he returned, he ran straight into a war between Luoyang City and another city. He was accidentally injured by a brutal guard from Luoyang City and had no choice but to escape back to the human realm, too terrified to ever go back to the demon realm again.
“After all, I know the human realm better. But this wound—I really couldn’t do anything about it.”
Seeing that neither Ye Yang nor Shen Ming spoke, Tu Tu grew a little uneasy. “Everything I said is true.”
What he didn’t know was that the more Ye Yang listened, the more familiar Tu Tu’s story sounded. By the end, he immediately realized—Tu Tu’s former owner, the elderly woman, was precisely the victim of that cult possession case they had handled not long ago!
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