Chapter One: Fish or Hamster â You Canât Have Both
When Xiao Yu realized that the brakes had malfunctioned, it was all too late. This brand-new car that he just received for less than two months sped forward without a care and crashed into the incoming recreational vehicle ahead.
The car tires streaked across the surface, creating a very sharp screech. After a loud bang, the recreational vehicle that received that dreadful impact came to a gradual stop at the side of the bridge. As for Xiao Yuâs car, it flew straight off the bridge after the fierce collision.
Boom!
River water flooded into the car from all directions, blocking out all noises from the outside world.
Although Xiao Yuâs name was homophonous to âlittle fishâ, on the contrary, Xiao Yu was definitely not a swimmer. As the shadows of death started to overwhelm him, just before Xiao Yu lost his consciousness, he thought regretfully â if there was a next life, he really wished to be a fish that had complete freedom â the type that wouldnât drown to death even if he were thrown into water.
As the suffocation became more intense, Xiao Yu closed his eyes and waited for death. He slowly felt his body becoming lighter and lighter, lighter and lighter as if he was floating on clouds.
Then â
And of course, he was reborn! Otherwise, how would this story have been written?
âHuihui, Huihui, stop sleeping, wake up, I have something to say.â
Amidst the confusion, Xiao Yu felt something sharp poking his forehead. As he painstakingly opened his eyes, what came into his view was a finger painted with nail polish.
Xiao Yuâs eyes traced the finger and then saw a very huge face.
Thatâs right, a very huge face. From Xiao Yuâs angle, he could clearly see the personâs gigantic mouth and a pair of nostrils that looked like two bottomless pits.
At this very moment, Xiao Yu recalled the fear of domination by the giants that humanity had long forgotten, buried deep in their souls.
âHuihui, Iâm sorry, but weâre moving soon. I canât keep you anymore. I hope someone will adopt you soon.â
The owner of the voice stood up and headed outside. At this point, Xiao Yu realized that it was a woman.
Who was she? Did he know her?
Xiao Yu instantly went through the list of names in his mind â there was no such woman.
Wasnât he in an accident? Wasnât he dead already? Where was this place, heaven?
There were so many questions that it almost drowned Xiao Yu. First, he looked around at his surroundings. Then he realized that he was surrounded by a type of soft, strange thing that resembled pencil shavings.
He tried to move his limbs to confirm that he had not become disabled.
Itâs just that⌠why were his hands covered with grey fur?
Xiao Yu stared closely at his own paws and sunk into a magnified dazed look until he saw that woman carrying a bag of items and as she walked back. She poured a bunch of things before him.
âThese will last you awhile if you eat sparingly. Iâm leaving, Huihui.â
Along with the words said by the woman, in his line of sight were some colorful and interestingly shaped objects.
But that was not the main point. The main point was that Xiao Yu could see very clearly from the womanâs eyes an object that might be him.
A gray-colored fur⌠hamster?
Thump, thump.
He died in the car accident and was reborn as a hamster?
Thump, thump.
Xiao Yuâs little heart pounded hard for few times before he closed his eyes and fainted from the joy (shock) of rebirth.
Two days later.
Xiao Yu split open a pink-colored snack: this is too sweet â nope.
This is too soft, sticks to the teeth â nope.
This is too bitter, tastes bad â nope.
After picking around for quite some time, he finally found a few pieces of melon seeds.
Xiao Yu happily stuffed them into his cheek pouch making his small face instantly bloated.
Although the fact that he had been reborn into a hamster made Xiao Yu puzzled for a long time, he was not a greedy person; to be able to live another life was already an accidental surprise â he shouldnât ask for more.
In fact, for the past two days, Xiao Yu had been pondering about the philosophical question of whether or not he was a fish dreaming about a hamster or the other way around. However, he very quickly gave up on those thoughts.
(T/N: Fish = Xiao Yu)
Instead of entertaining himself with such thoughts, he figured he might as well think about what he was going to do next.
Xiao Yuâs luck was obviously not so good: the hamster that heâd possessed was originally kept by a woman as a pet. However, because the woman was going to relocate, she gave up Xiao Yu. Although she had left behind quite a lot of food for Xiao Yu, due to the recent hot weather, the food easily turned bad. Plus, it was not good a long-term plan to just sit here and do nothing.
Xiao Yuâs current plan was to prepare some rations and then search for a new owner.
Of course, he would want to live on his own, but to live a life of a savage was just too much for him. Moreover, he still had a soul of a human in him.
Without mobile GPS guidance plus an overly small sized body that narrowed his view, it was not long before Xiao Yu had lost his way.
Thankfully, the woman had abandoned Xiao Yu in a grass patch. Xiao Yu guessed that it was one those public greenery areas and that would lead to the main road after a short walk.
Just as he suspected, Xiao Yu soon reached the end of the grass patch.
Great, the first step was complete. Now, it was all about choosing a rich person to secure a stable life for the future.
Ah, youâre asking how to secure a stable life? Without a doubt, it was to shamelessly cling to that person!
Canât you see that cute, short gray fur, that short little tail, and that little round stomach? No human could possibly resist that, okay?!
However, Xiao Yu and his wonderful expectations would find very soon that reality was vastly different from imagination.
âAAAHHH!!! Mice!!!! Help!!!!â The beautiful lady screamed, and her voice echoed off the skies, scaring a flock of birds away.
The beautiful ladyâs âbodyguardâš comforted her while saying, âIâll kill this mouse.â He raised his foot and aimed at Xiao Yu.
Xiao Yu scuttled in all directions to flee the scene; he barely escaped the foot stomp.
Even though Xiao Yu had distanced himself, he could still hear the lady wailing away, which made him, who had a successful escape, very furious.
There was no mouse as adorable as him. He was a hamster, HAMSTER!
Actually, he couldnât blame the passerby for mistaking him â Xiao Yu was originally covered in gray fur, and its features werenât as obvious as those Syrian hamsters. In addition to not being able to roll himself in a sand bath for several days, his entire body was covered in dust and dirt. At first glance, he really did look like a mouse.
Thatâs how important it was to look attractive.
Xiao Yu panted heavily after dashing for quite a distance away. Just when he pulled a stop to catch his breath, he heard another scream. With that, he had no choice but to begin his escape journey. Finally, Xiao Yu ran to a place where there were no people. He did not dare to walk along the road, so he cautiously fled into a lawn at the side.
Hidden by the thick underbrush, Xiao Yu finally let out a sigh of relief.
After calming down, Xiao Yu ate the melon seeds he hid in his cheek pouch. Then he felt depressed; the current him probably wouldnât get beaten to death for being mistaken as a mouse, but this couldnât go on.
The plan to find a keeper to try his luck on wasnât feasible now. What if he really got beaten to death? Whether or not heâd be able to be reborn once again was a mystery. Returning to nature and finding a way to survive seemed like a better plan to stick to.
That was just that though. The sun above his head was burning. That made Xiao Yu doubt his survival in the outside world.
No, no, he couldnât be so negative! No matter what, he was a human in his previous life! By using the intelligence of a human, he will survive the ordeal!
Xiao Yu mentally encouraged himself, then headed towards the deeper parts of the lawn.
As the sun set, the chirping of the insects echoed continuously in the summer evening. The fading sunlight that left the horizon and blanketed the earth with a layer of warm glow added a romantic atmosphere.
At that very moment, Xiao Yu was not interested in admiring the scenery, neither was he in the mood to listen to the chirping of the cicadas.
He was thirsty and hungry; he did not know where he had walked to. There was not even a pond nearby to drink some water from, much less talk about food.
Xiao Yuâs current location was in fact in the garden area of a villa estate; there were only verdant and lush trees that seemed to reach the skies.
If Xiao Yu was just a hamster, he mightâve been able to survive. But he had a soul of a human after all â things like munching on flowers and grass to survive were just too much for him. Then, he saw a villa from far away. He thought about stealing some food from there in his mind.
Even if there were no food, at least some water to drink.
With his previous experience of getting chased by people, this time Xiao Yu dared not to act recklessly. He first observed for a while. When he did not see any servants walking in and out the villa, he sighed in relief. Fewer people meant that his safety level had increased extensively.
Xiao Yu was once a decently rich personâ yet the size and the uniqueness of the villa was something he could not strive for in his previous life. He guessed that it might be one of the many properties that belonged to those big bosses. If that were the case, then perhaps it might not even have anybody living inside it; that would be the perfect deal for him.
Seeing the sky gradually darken, Xiao Yu clenched his teeth and climbed along the wall. From the ground floor, he climbed through the window gap into the villa. The window led directly to the kitchen. From the window ledge, he landed on the kitchen stove. He held his breath and observed his surroundings. Fortunately, there was not a single person.
Xiao Yu sighed in relief that his luck was still not that bad while he carefully turned on the faucet.
Swoooshhhhâ-
After enduring thirst for the entire day, Xiao Yu who finally found a water source dashed into the water for a shower without a care. After drinking until he was bloated, Xiao Yu felt that his life, no, his hamster life, was finally complete.
Unsure if he would still be this lucky the next time around, Xiao Yu sighed and turned off the faucet.
Why not find some food in the room and bag it? Who knows when he would need to look for food again in this kind of human territory.
With that in mind, Xiao Yu jumped and leaped off the waist-high stove.
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At that very moment, he had completely forgotten that he was just a hamster that was less than ten centimeters in size.
Boop.
The hamster curled into a ball and rolled a few times on the ground, beautifully knocking himself out.
Translatorâs Note:
[1] The Chinese term used here is ć¤čąä˝żč â which means that the âbodyguardâ could be a boyfriend/partner/self-proclaimed person that is protecting a lady. Since thereâs no specific background information, Iâll just leave the term as âbodyguardâ. (Itâs not anyone important anyway, fret not.)