AHTT CHAPTER 4

004: Yay, Neighbors!

After learning how to use the printer from Tang Yu, Sang Zhao went back to his desk.

He hadn’t been sitting long when someone from the logistics department came wandering in, saying they’d heard there might be a mouse on this floor and came to check it out.

“Mouse?” Sang Zhao was completely thrown off. “How could there be a mouse?”

He was right here, a cat! There couldn’t possibly be mice around!

The staff replied, “Yeah, we thought so too. The building’s got regular cleaning and pest control, and this is the top floor. There shouldn’t be any mice at all. But Director Tang said there might be, so we came to take a look.”

Director Tang?

Tang Yu’s face flashed through Sang Zhao’s mind.

Wait… did Tang Yu like mice or something?

As coworkers passed by and joined the small talk, Sang Zhao sat there munching loudly on a bag of salted caramel pretzel crisps he’d gotten from the snack area.

Someone joked, “Maybe we should get a cat.”

Sang Zhao thought smugly, You already have one!

Another chimed in, “Pssh, cats these days don’t even catch mice anymore.”

Sang Zhao nodded inwardly.

Exactly. I don’t either.

Listening to people chat wasn’t just entertaining, it was also educational.

For example, until now, Sang Zhao had thought the whole building belonged to Tang Yu’s company. Turns out it didn’t.

Tang Yu had started his company from scratch. They only rented the top floor, so it wasn’t a giant corporation and didn’t have its own cafeteria.

There was a shared cafeteria in the building, but according to the gossip, the food there was terrible and the line was endless. So no one ever went.

As he crunched on his snack, one thought filled his mind: Then what am I supposed to eat for lunch?

He didn’t know how to order takeout!

Had they taught that in his “Human Society Skills” class yesterday? Maybe? No, probably not. Maybe they’d mentioned it briefly. So, no, they definitely hadn’t taught it.

So what was he supposed to do for lunch?

Luckily, at ten o’clock, someone from the admin department came by to ask about lunch orders. Once Sang Zhao pieced it together, he realized they ordered at ten and the meals arrived by eleven-thirty.

Crisis averted!

When the admin asked what everyone wanted, An Tihu had just returned. Seeing Sang Zhao hesitate in confusion, she said, “Do they still have fish noodle bowls today? Get two of those, for both of us.”

The admin looked at Sang Zhao for confirmation.

He had no objections at all. His eyes practically lit up like headlights.

“How’d you know I like fish? You’re so nice, Sister An!” he said happily.

An Tihu gave him a look that was somewhere between amused and exasperated.

She pressed her lips together, smiling faintly. “Because I like fish.”

Her gaze lingered on him meaningfully, and her tone softened. “If we ever get the chance, let’s go out for fish together.”

“Sure! Sure!” Sang Zhao agreed instantly.

Lunch turned out delicious. The blackfish slices were tender, the soup fresh and rich, the noodles chewy and springy. Sang Zhao finished the whole bowl.

Afterward, he fought the urge to wash his face with his paws and wiped his mouth like a proper human.

If working life was just like this, scratching paper, people-watching, and eating fish noodles then it wasn’t bad at all!

That was what he was happily thinking… until the afternoon.

Once work resumed, An Tihu assigned him some document organization.

He had to bind messy files, put them into folders, label them, and archive them properly.

It wasn’t hard; he got the hang of it after watching once, but it was boring.

So repetitive, so dull, and so draining for a cat’s patience.

Halfway through, he slipped away to take a “break.”

He rode the elevator down to the building’s third-floor café terrace. He’d wanted to sit there and enjoy the breeze, but it seemed like you couldn’t sit unless you ordered something.

He checked his WeChat balance which was still a thousand yuan and hesitated.

He really wanted to sit there and try coffee. He’d never had coffee before!

So he ordered a matcha latte. Pulled out his phone, showed the QR code, and watched twenty-five yuan vanish.

Sitting out on the terrace, he looked around, and suddenly his heart ached.

He wasn’t good with numbers, but twenty-five seemed like a lot. His balance had gone from four digits to three!

Oh no, was he going to starve now? He wasn’t sure anymore.

No, no, it’d be fine. He took a deep breath, comforting himself. You’re a working cat now. You’ll get paid.

He took a sip of the matcha latte. It was smooth and creamy, a strange but wonderful flavor. It was so good it made his head spin a little.

While drinking, he sent a voice message to Director Li on WeChat.

“Hello, Sister, can you hear me like this? Hello? I just wanted to ask how much my salary is, I forgot.”

Director Li replied in seconds with a flurry of voice messages.

“Three thousand, maybe? Three thousand and a bit, not much more. Like three thousand one or two hundred?”

“If I asked for more, I’d feel guilty.”

“I mean, getting them to take you in at all was already doing us a favor. Asking for more money would just be unreasonable…”

Then she added quickly, “But three thousand is plenty! For humans, that’s just an okay salary, but for a little cat, it’s a pretty comfortable life.”

“Think about it. You don’t pay rent, utilities, or internet. You’ve got a metro card from us, and you can eat cat food. You won’t starve.”

Realizing her words sounded a little harsh, she softened her tone.

“Anyway, if you ever run short, tell me, and I’ll apply for a subsidy.”

Sang Zhao listened carefully to every word.

So… was he rich or not?

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After work, he went back to the Bureau for his evening classes, got a free dinner, and even picked up a few new sets of clothes before heading home.

As soon as he got back, he kicked off his shoes, turned into a cat with a little meow, dashed upstairs, and flopped onto the bed with a thud.

He was such a small cat that in the loft’s 2x2 meter bed, it felt like waking up in a personal palace.

He rolled, jumped, and pounced. Wow, it never even hit the edges! The bed had no edges! It was endless!

After a while, he lay there with his chin on his paws, swiping idly at his phone.

Phones were also fun.

No wonder humans loved them so much that they couldn’t even pet cats without checking their phones at the same time.

He scrolled through short videos, laughing at cat clips and funny skits, his soft purrs turning into little giggles.

After that, he opened WeChat again.

His account had been registered by the Bureau, nothing special about it. His username was just “Sang Zhao,” since he hadn’t changed it.

But he wanted to update his profile picture.

Clumsily, he opened the camera app, held the phone up with one paw, and took a picture of his other paw.

He wasn’t great at using it, so he took a bunch of blurry shots, but that was fine. He deleted the bad ones and picked the best.

Satisfied, he changed his profile picture to a close-up of his sharp little claws.

He admired it proudly. Perfect.

He played on his phone until after ten, then stretched out comfortably.

Time for bed!

Except… he couldn’t sleep.

This was his first time experiencing the full force of caffeine.

By two-thirty in the morning, his eyes were still wide open.

He lay there, alert, mind buzzing, body full of energy.

Why am I dizzy but so awake?! Why do I feel so… powerful?!

He was desperate.

He wasn’t like before, but he had a job now! If he didn’t sleep, how was he supposed to work tomorrow?!

Maybe he just hadn’t moved enough during the day? Maybe that was why he couldn’t sleep!

In panic, he decided to exercise. He started doing frantic parkour on the stairs.

He hadn’t been running for even five minutes when the doorbell rang.

Turning back into human form, he tiptoed cautiously to the door and looked through the peephole, imitating how his old owner used to do it.

As he peered through, his mind drifted.

Hehe, this is funny. Cat eye looking through cat-eye!

But there was no one outside.

He hesitated, then opened the door.

And froze.

Because standing outside wasn’t a person, but a giant fluffy white Samoyed dog.

The dog sat on the floor, too short to be visible through the peephole.

As Sang Zhao stared at it, the dog suddenly spoke human language.

“Hello, Cat. Are you the new neighbor?”

“Hello, Dog. Yeah, I moved in yesterday.”

The dog was all snow-white fluff, like a walking snowball or a cloud.

It seemed a little shy but raised its head politely. “Yeye lives downstairs from Cat.”

“Can Cat please be a bit quieter? Yeye has to get up early for school.”

“Oh, sorry!” Sang Zhao immediately realized.

He shouldn’t have been doing parkour in the middle of the night.

His old owners had lived in residential buildings with good soundproofing. Whenever he ran around too much, they’d get up and catch him.

Now, in this loft, the sound insulation clearly wasn’t as good. After only two days of living there, his parkour had already woken the neighbor below.

At night, no less! He’d disturbed a sleeping dog!

“I’ll remember. I won’t do it again,” he promised sincerely.

He really, truly felt bad.

But then a thought hit him. Wait, what?! Dogs could go to school?!

He frowned, indignant. “Hold on, that’s not fair. Why can dogs go to school, but cats have to work?!”

How unjust! Dogs and cats would never see eye to eye!

The Samoyed thought for a moment and said, “Not all dogs can go to school. The border collie upstairs is a teacher.”

“Teaches… you?”

“No, no. Yeye’s in elementary school. The collie teaches grad students.”

Sang Zhao blinked. “...I should’ve expected that. I should’ve expected that.”

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Tap kitty for TOC :3