Chapter 333: Who Was Wrong |
Hoshino Gen looked at his sister for a long while before letting out a soft sigh. "Strictly speaking, I am Daihaku's owner. If he committed a mistake, the victim should have come to me to vent their frustrations. Instead, you were the one subjected to this undeserved misfortune."
Naturally, Hoshino Rin did not accept this reasoning. She continued to pout her little face. "But I was the one who took Daihaku and Shiro to the pet center for boarding..."
"So you think it is perfectly justified for you to get scolded?"
Hoshino Rin pursed her lips and remained silent, clearly still feeling a bit wronged. After all, a little thought made the situation obvious. Since the pets were left at the pet center for boarding, no matter what happened, the responsibility naturally fell on the center that had taken the animals and collected the money.
Whether out of her inherent kindness or guilt driven by empathy, upon hearing that her family's beloved Woof-chan had bitten someone else's dog, immediately offering to cover all medical expenses and compensation was already a rare gesture. Yet now, the other party had tracked down her contact information just to verbally abuse her... She truly felt wronged.
Tears welled up and rolled down her cheeks as she spoke in a tearful voice. "They said they are going to kill Daihaku to make him pay with his life..."
Hoshino Gen's expression remained placid as he asked casually, "Do you think he should?"
Crying, Hoshino Rin shook her head. "I don't know..."
Daihaku was the dog her brother had brought home. Just like Shiro, he was a member of the family, and of course, she cherished and adored him. But Daihaku had indeed made a mistake. The dog he had bitten to death was also a beloved pet, and her compensation could not bring it back to life. Therefore, if the other party was truly determined to kill Daihaku as payment, she had no idea what to do.
She did not know how to handle it, so her only recourse was to seek out her brother.
And what could Hoshino Gen do?
If the person who had berated Hoshino Rin over the phone had dialed his number instead, there would be nothing left to say. No matter who the caller was, he would never have given them the chance to utter a second insult.
As for whether this would be unreasonable, considering it was his wolf cub that had bitten someone else's dog to death... that was out of the question. The unreasonable party was the pet center that had taken custody of the cub, not him. Moreover, his array of means and the corruption he bore were not meant for reasoning with others anyway.
But since Hoshino Rin was the one who had been scolded, how to deal with the other party still depended on the will of the victim herself—
Hoshino Gen thought for a moment before suddenly picking up his mobile phone from the bedside table. He opened a game application with a red dress icon. Then, he typed into the pink chat box: "Check if the pet center where Daihaku is staying has any surveillance footage of him going crazy. If there is, bring the video up for me to see."
The cartoonish little girl on the screen flashed an OK gesture. She then pulled open the door of the girly room in the background and walked out, disappearing from view.
Hoshino Gen waited for a little over a minute. Suddenly, his screen went black, and immediately after, a video began to play—
From a top-down perspective, one could see the spotless floor partitioned into square activity areas by fences. Various breeds of pet dogs were in their respective enclosed sections, heads lowered as they ate dog food from their bowls.
Among those dogs, Hoshino Gen spotted Daihaku and Shiro. Daihaku, in particular, was so tiny, yet his diet was completely different from the rest. While the other dogs ate standard kibble, he was dining on meat chunks.
This was naturally the arrangement Hoshino Rin had made when she dropped Daihaku and Shiro off. After all, when at home, Daihaku was unhappy without meat and stubbornly refused to touch even a single bite of dog food.
In the surveillance footage, whether the aroma of the meat was simply too rich, or if Daihaku's tiny cub stature made him look like an easy target, a black-and-white Border Collie in the adjacent enclosure took two bites of its own food before instinctively shifting its gaze to its "neighbor's" bowl. Tongue lolling, it locked its eyes on the savory chunks of meat in Daihaku's dish.
Then, turning its head, it took a few steps forward and nudged with its snout. The latch on the fence gate separating it from its neighbor clicked open...
The black-and-white Border Collie blatantly barged into the wolf cub's "territory." Sniffing the air, it used its head to shove Daihaku—who was no bigger than a typical puppy—aside. Then, stretching out its neck and curling its tongue, it snatched up a succulent piece of meat.
"Grrr... argh..."
A low, slightly milky growl echoed right next to its ear, but the Border Collie paid no heed, merely continuing to eat heartily. Then, it let out a miserable yelp. After his warning growl proved ineffective, the wolf cub lunged forward without a second thought, sinking his teeth directly into the neck of the Border Collie that had dared to steal his food.
"Yelp! Yelp!"
The miserable howling could be heard clearly even through the video feed. On Hoshino Gen's side, aside from Tamamo-no-Mae who was clinging tightly to his arm, Hoshino Rin and Monica had also crept over at some point.
The group gathered around the mobile phone, quietly watching the scene unfold on the screen.
The Border Collie's desperate struggles knocked down a whole section of the surrounding fences. The pack of pet dogs, who had just been peacefully minding their own business and eating their meals, immediately fell into a chaotic frenzy. Dog bowls were knocked over one by one, scattering large amounts of kibble across the floor.
A nearby Shiba Inu took advantage of the chaos to sneak a bite of Daihaku's meat. Seeing this, Daihaku immediately released his jaws from the Border Collie and dashed over to defend his food. This time, he clamped down on the thief's ear, viciously tearing it completely off right then and there.
Another dog began to wail, howling even more miserably than the Border Collie lying on the ground with blood gushing from its neck. However, the tragic state of the two dogs did not deter the others. Instead, even more dogs rushed in to fight over the meat chunks. Only a few smaller breeds scurried around the periphery—and, of course, the Samoyed, Shiro, who cowered in a corner, too terrified to move as he watched the chaotic battle.
A ferocious expression twisted Daihaku's immature face. With a low growl, he charged straight into the pack. He might have been young, but he was a wolf; he might have been facing a horde of dogs, but he was the bloodline descendant of the Female Wolf King!
How dare a bunch of mere pet dogs try to steal the food of a Wolf King's descendant?
His anger was completely justified.
He tore into the pack, lunging left and right. Wherever he passed, choruses of whimpers and bursts of blood spatter followed in his wake. Domesticated pet dogs raised in captivity, pampered in a greenhouse environment, possessed absolutely no ferocity. In fact, due to their owners' training, many would not even dare to fight back when attacked. Thus, a single wolf cub facing over a dozen large dogs actually looked somewhat invincible.
It took a long time to describe, but in reality, all of this transpired in less than half a minute. Yet, those thirty seconds were enough for the staff members, who had briefly stepped out on an errand, to hear the commotion and rush back, bringing an abrupt end to the chaotic battle.
Hoshino Gen's gaze rested on the black-and-white Border Collie, which was still lying on the floor gasping for breath after having its neck bitten. "It seems this is the one that died..." he remarked coolly.
He lifted his eyes to look at Hoshino Rin, who had stopped crying, and asked casually, "It seems Daihaku did not do anything wrong... Since Daihaku is not at fault, you are naturally not at fault either. Therefore, the one in the wrong is the person who called to insult you. When someone does something wrong, they must take responsibility for their mistake. What do you think?"