Animal Detective

Chapter 276 - 238: Once the Golden Headband Is Worn, You’re a Police Dog from Now On

So, Shen Xin decided that when training began, the first step had to be instilling discipline.

He had to correct their undisciplined nature.

For now, he would keep them penned up.

The conditions at the police dog base were excellent. Each police dog had its own dedicated kennel.

It was even like a one-bedroom, one-living-room setup.

The base had cleared out two rows of kennels for Shen Xin’s project.

Shen Xin put Tian Kui in his kennel and fed him. Once Li Jiahui had finished stitching up Tian Xian’s wound, they set off again.

Including Tian Kui, that was only five dogs. He was still a long way from his goal of twenty.

He had to visit a few more private rescue shelters today.

Nanjiang City didn’t just have Chen Fang’s shelter; there were three other similar ones.

If they were quick, he planned to check out a few shelters in Pingyu and Yanling as well.

From the very beginning, the plan for this project was to only use stray dogs to save money.

If they had chosen purebreds, at ten or twenty thousand yuan per dog, twenty of them would have cost hundreds of thousands.

The strays from the shelters didn’t cost a penny, and taking them even helped reduce the shelters’ burden. It was a win-win.

As the two drove off, Li Jiahui asked if Shen Xin had been injured while subduing Tian Kui.

"It’s best that you weren’t. But you should still be careful."

Li Jiahui cautioned him, having noticed the teeth marks on his protective sleeve.

Recalling Tian Kui’s ferocity, she could guess what had happened.

Shen Xin couldn’t help but mutter, "You sound just like my older sister."

"Who are you calling your sister!"

Li Jiahui huffed. The last thing she wanted was to be a sister to him.

Chen Fang held the title of Vice President of the Nanjiang City Small Animal Protection Association.

But such a self-established organization was essentially meaningless.

After all, the owner of the shelter they were headed to also held a title: President of the Nanjiang City Stray Animal Protection Association.

This shelter was in Xinbei District, on Yangshan Street.

The owner’s name was Li Dian.

The name of a general from the Three Kingdoms period, but when they met him, they found a thin, bespectacled man who was the complete opposite of big and burly.

His shelter was on the outskirts of Yangshan Town, also in a large, rented courtyard.

When the two arrived, he wasn’t there. An employee at the shelter greeted Shen Xin and Li Jiahui.

Shen Xin was a little surprised.

’Running a shelter is already a huge investment. But this guy actually hires employees.’

Before long, Li Dian returned.

He had taken a cat-finding job and had gone out with another employee to look for the cat.

Cats are restless, especially house cats. They never learn and always seize any chance to run outside, completely unaware that they have zero survival skills out there.

This had given rise to a new profession: professional cat finder.

Apparently, the fees were quite high.

And Li Dian offered such a service.

As he gave Shen Xin and Li Jiahui a tour of the shelter, Shen Xin was surprised to learn from their casual chat that Li Dian had actually turned his rescue operation into a business.

"You can turn this into a business?" Shen Xin asked, surprised.

He felt that running a shelter should be more of a charitable activity.

Li Dian didn’t seem the least bit embarrassed. He said frankly, "Let’s be honest. If you’re just constantly pouring money into it, rescuing cats and dogs at any cost, I really don’t think you can last very long."

"There are so many stray cats and dogs in the city, how can you possibly manage them all? You bankrupt yourself, and in the end, you’re left with a pile of cats and dogs you can’t even afford to feed. What do you do then? Abandon them again?"

"In my opinion, that’s just foolish charity, which is even more terrifying than malice. It’s better to be like me and work hard to turn it into a business, an enterprise. That’s the only way to make it sustainable in the long run."

Shen Xin nodded thoughtfully and asked curiously how he did it.

Li Dian didn’t hide anything and shared his business philosophy.

He had seen the potential in the rapidly growing short-video market. He created accounts, took on promotional deals, and drove traffic to his own e-commerce store to sell pet supplies.

He also used the platform to promote adoptions and work hard to find homes for the stray cats and dogs.

His adoptions weren’t free. He charged a small fee, just enough to barely cover some of his expenses.

Finally, he subsidized the shelter with his professional cat-and-dog-finding business.

"It’s a struggle, but it can cover my shelter’s expenses, and sometimes there’s even a small profit. I’m optimistic about the short-video industry, though. In the future, I might really be able to make a success of this."

Shen Xin gave him a thumbs-up.

Shen Xin agreed with his perspective.

There was nothing wrong with doing good deeds, but to go as far as Chen Fang—selling her houses and bankrupting herself—seemed ill-advised.

"Chen Fang?"

Hearing Shen Xin mention Chen Fang, Li Dian’s brow furrowed instantly.

Seeing his reaction, Shen Xin asked him what was wrong.

A flash of disdain crossed Li Dian’s face, but he just shook his head, saying he didn’t want to gossip about other people’s business.

’He definitely knows something,’ Shen Xin thought.

Shen Xin said, "Li Dian, we’ve heard some talk that there are problems with Chen Fang’s shelter. If you know anything, you can report it to us, and we’ll investigate."

Li Dian hesitated, then prefaced his statement with a disclaimer: "This is all just hearsay, mind you. I don’t have any proof."

He leaned forward to pour tea for Shen Xin, then said, "She often organizes people to ’rescue’ cats and dogs, right? The kind where they intercept trucks."

"The general process is that she organizes it, volunteers donate money, they buy the dogs from the dog meat traders, and then bring them back to the shelter to have a vet come and treat them."

Beside him, Li Jiahui frowned slightly.

She had participated in one of those before.

Li Dian continued, "I heard from a vet clinic that used to work with her that she’s ruthless, always squeezing them on prices."

"Here’s how she does it: she works with the vet clinics to issue all sorts of treatment invoices—for a lot of money—and then the clinics give her a kickback."

"Word is, she can get a kickback of over ten thousand yuan from just one of these events."

"And another thing, she provides pet blood donations. Some injured pets need transfusions. It’s not that common, but supposedly she’s monopolized that whole business here in Nanjiang."

"You need to do blood typing for that. If one dog isn’t a match, you have to try several more. Then you draw the blood. A single transfusion costs several thousand yuan. Even if it doesn’t happen often, if she has a monopoly, that’s still a significant income."

"And as for where that blood comes from... you can probably guess."

Since Li Dian also ran a shelter and worked closely with vet clinics, he had the channels to hear about these things.

Shen Xin and Li Jiahui both frowned.

Li Dian said, "Honestly, if she were like me and just treated it as a business with clear pricing, that would be one thing. Some people enjoy the process of rescuing animals and are willing to donate money for it. They see it as a good deed and get some kind of psychological comfort."

"But what I can’t stand about her is that she’s cultivated this public persona of a selfless philanthropist who’s bankrupted herself for charity. It’s a classic case of hypocrisy. Isn’t that just shameless?"

"She talks about selling three of her houses—that’s total bullshit. Just at the end of last year, when a new development opened up in the New District, a friend of mine who runs a vet clinic saw her there. She bought a three-bedroom apartment, and apparently paid in full."

"The price was nearly thirty thousand yuan per square meter. How much do you think she’s been making on the side?"

Hearing this, Shen Xin’s brow furrowed even more tightly.