Animal Detective

Chapter 277 - 239: Stealing Dogs

Shen Xin walked into the free-roaming area.

The ground was paved with red bricks, and simple cat trees had been built out of wood.

Li Dian had cats here, too.

Cats and dogs coexisted peacefully. Shen Xin even saw a cat lying next to a dog, both sunbathing at the base of a wall.

The rescued stray dogs were well-cared for. They didn’t bark randomly at the sight of a stranger; a few even approached Shen Xin on their own, sniffing at his pant legs.

Based on this alone, Shen Xin felt that Li Dian was taking good care of these dogs.

When humans are good to them, they remember it, and that’s how they learn to trust and be affectionate with people.

Among them was a black-and-white dog with big dark circles around its eyes. Before Shen Xin could even use his "ultimate move," an affection icon had already appeared above its head. It trotted over and affectionately licked Shen Xin’s hand.

In contrast, the dogs at Chen Fang’s shelter had been extremely wary of him, which was enough to show that there were some problems with her rescue operation.

"TSK TSK TSK!"

He activated his ultimate move. Of the thirty to forty dogs in the free-roaming area, more than half had their attention drawn to Shen Xin.

Even a few cats turned their heads to look at Shen Xin, their eyes filled with curiosity and intrigue.

Shen Xin crouched down and began interacting with them, looking for dogs that were friendly enough and had temperaments suitable for police work.

Li Dian leaned against the fence, watching intently. He then asked curiously why they were choosing stray dogs to be police dogs.

"I’ve heard from people who run kennels that your police dogs are all purebreds from selective breeding programs. You pick the best of the best, and it’s a huge effort to train just one. Why have you started picking strays?"

He also couldn’t see anything special about Shen Xin’s selection process.

It looked less like selecting and more like he was just playing with the dogs.

Li Jiahui briefly explained the project the city bureau was launching, then said, "Shen Xin is a bit special. How should I put it... He’s just very good at training police dogs, even adult strays."

"Oh, right, have you seen the Tingyang Branch’s short video account? Dou Dou and Tiger Stripes were both trained by him."

As soon as she mentioned the short video account, Li Dian knew what she was talking about.

With over a million followers, it was one of the more prominent accounts in Nanjiang.

"So he’s the handler in the videos who never shows his face! That’s really impressive. I remember Dou Dou was just an ordinary stray."

Li Dian was amazed. "In that case, please pick a few more. It’ll lighten our load and give them a great opportunity."

He knew very well that the food standards for police dogs were extremely high.

Besides, becoming a police dog was an honor.

Li Jiahui nodded slightly.

Meanwhile, Shen Xin had already started taking pictures with his phone so he wouldn’t forget which ones he’d chosen.

Shen Xin could clearly feel that the dogs rescued by Li Dian were different from the ones at Chen Fang’s place.

The ones at Chen Fang’s were like they were still strays, sufficiently wary of humans.

But here at Li Dian’s, they had regained their trust in humans and were willing to be close to them.

That’s why when he unleashed his skills, the effect was outstanding.

Out of nearly forty dogs, Shen Xin found six that he felt were quite suitable.

Li Dian had another free-roaming area in his backyard with twenty to thirty more dogs. Maybe he could pick a few more from there.

’This is almost enough to meet my goal.’

Sure enough, after going to the backyard to look, he managed to pick out another three.

That made nine dogs.

Shen Xin mulled it over and decided to raise his target.

’Didn’t Li Mo come up with that idea about the Celestial Spirits? The 36 Celestial Spirits... In that case, I might as well get 36 dogs.’

’I’ll pick the best of the best from them and select the final 10.’

’The larger the sample size, the better the final selection will be.’

"I’ve picked out nine dogs. I was wondering if that would be okay," Shen Xin said, finding Li Dian to ask.

Li Dian quickly replied, "Of course it’s okay! To be honest, even if you took all of them, I wouldn’t have any objections."

After a pause, he asked curiously what Shen Xin’s selection criteria were.

He really hadn’t been able to figure out how Shen Xin was choosing them.

Shen Xin couldn’t explain it, so he just said, "It’s a secret."

Li Dian understood instantly. ’It must be a secret method from the K-9 base.’ He immediately stopped asking.

Shen Xin and Li Jiahui had come in one car and hadn’t expected to find so many suitable dogs. There was no way to transport them all.

Li Dian offered to help by driving them over in his pickup truck.

Shen Xin said, "Oh, we couldn’t possibly trouble you."

It wasn’t a short drive from here to Nanzhu.

Li Dian waved his hand. "Don’t mention it! You’re lightening my load. I couldn’t be happier."

Shen Xin agreed. This worked out well, as he had to go to another rescue shelter later.

’I need to pick out the dogs as soon as possible and start training.’

The other rescue shelter was in Lankou Town in Donglin, which was near Nanjiang’s largest dog market.

They had contacted the owner in advance, but he was out buying supplies and wouldn’t be back until the afternoon.

It was already almost eleven o’clock, so they might as well have lunch before heading over.

Shen Xin said, "Why don’t we go check out the dog market?"

Now that they were in Lankou, he remembered there was a dog market nearby.

It also happened to be an even-numbered day, so at this time, the dog market probably hadn’t closed up yet.

Li Jiahui had no objections.

Her profession involved working with dogs, so she often came to Lankou and had wandered through the dog market many times.

It wasn’t far, just a short drive away.

They parked the car and strolled into the market.

Li Jiahui knew the conformation and prices of these dogs like the back of her hand. And, as women often do, she treated it like a shopping trip, constantly pointing out to Shen Xin which dogs had poor conformation, were disqualified from breed standards, or were priced too high.

Shen Xin pointed out that people here bought dogs based on affinity; if they were truly concerned about conformation, they wouldn’t be buying from a place like this.

Shen Xin saw some rabbits, and an idea struck him. He asked Li Jiahui how their base trained police dogs for physical fitness.