Chapter 697: Ghost Hunter

He exchanged some hasty greetings.

This guy, York, for some reason, gave him a crushing, excited hug, all while shouting about how incredible it all was.

His Mandarin, however, was surprisingly good.

Shen Xin turned to Great Sage. “What’s this? You really want to leave? Can you really bear to part with me?”

‘Just think about who saved you, nursing you back to health one sip of water at a time.’

Back when he was at Baishui River guarding Walnut, his daily routine hadn’t actually been very busy.

Shen Xin would often follow Chen Jia Kang and the others, wandering all over the mountains.

He’d get friendly with the takins and say hello to the Golden Snub-nosed Monkeys.

One day, while observing a troop of monkeys, he discovered Great Sage.

The monkey was already injured when Shen Xin found him.

He wasn’t very big at the time.

For macaques, they generally start weaning at six to seven months.

But even after weaning, they stick with their mothers, only starting to live independently at one or two years of age.

So, Chen Jia Kang and the others speculated that his mother had likely met with an accident and died.

As for Great Sage’s injuries, they were likely from getting beaten up by his own kind while fighting for food, with no mother to protect him.

They observed him for two days, and that was more or less the situation.

Survival in the wild is brutal. Once the alpha monkey sensed that Great Sage had become a drag on the troop, he cast him out.

When Great Sage tried to follow, all he got was another beating.

He was on the brink of death when Shen Xin and his companions finally rescued him.

Just as Shen Xin had said, they had truly nursed him back to life one sip of water at a time.

Shen Xin hadn’t originally planned to bring any animals back from Baishui River, but given Great Sage’s condition, he just went ahead and did it.

He was still little, too. In Chen Jia Kang’s words, he was in a “psychological weaning period.” As Shen Xin cared for him, the monkey quickly grew extremely attached and became inseparable from him.

But who would have known that after bringing him home, the little guy’s true, unbelievably mischievous nature would be revealed.

He was also clever, quick-witted, and a total rogue.

Hearing Shen Xin’s words, Great Sage glanced at Yang Zeran before turning and leaping onto Shen Xin, clinging to him like a koala.

‘Not leaving.’

‘But I want some tasty food.’

He then looked up, giving Shen Xin a pitiful look.

“I’m not letting you eat for your own good,” Shen Xin said, tapping him on the forehead.

It wasn’t that Shen Xin would begrudge him a bite to eat; the main issue was that his stomach was weak, so he couldn’t eat just anything.

Yang Zeran, meanwhile, was already clamoring for a barbecue that evening and asking what kind of meat they had.

Nanjiang was still hot at this time of year.

Having a barbecue at night with some ice-cold beer was the life.

“Go on, get the stuff. Tian Kui, you guys help out too. We’re having a barbecue.” Shen Xin pulled the key to the storage shed from his pocket and handed it to Great Sage.

The monkey’s eyes lit up as he eagerly took the key and jumped down.

“Tian Kui’s watching you, so don’t you dare try to hide any snacks for yourself,” Shen Xin warned.

Tian Kui let out a bark.

This angered Great Sage so much that he jumped right on top of the dog.

Tian Kui rolled over, shook Great Sage off, then turned and pretended to bite him.

Great Sage knew Tian Kui wouldn’t actually bite him, so he screeched and went to open the door.

York quickly followed, watching in disbelief as Great Sage selected a key from a ring, inserted it into the padlock, and skillfully twisted it open.

“What the fuck, how did he do that?” York exclaimed.

Shen Xin then pointed to the dogs beside him, sending them to fetch the folding chairs.

Ding Yuwei gave Shen Xin an exasperated push. “You’re really something else, always ordering them around.”

As York watched, the dogs ran into the main house, carried out several folding chairs in their mouths, and set them down under the parasol on the far side of the lawn.

Meanwhile, Great Sage emerged carrying a small box of fruitwood charcoal, just like a person.

York’s eyes nearly popped out of his head. He grabbed Jon and shouted, “Did you see that? They understand everything!”

Then he just kept repeating how incredible it was.

From the yard, you could look up and see the shimmering surface of Li Lake in the far distance—the main reason Shen Xin had rented the house.

Since it was a barbecue, naturally the more people, the merrier.

Shen Xin sent a message to his group chat, and Zhao Tianxing was already rushing over.

Doniya was coming too.

The girl had never left town. She had gone to Songpu to properly study dance and singing for a while, then started a new social media account. It was right when TikTok was blowing up, and since she was multi-talented and beautiful, she managed to cash in on the trend. She had close to 400,000 followers.

Then he sent a message to the people at the police dog base.

The younger folks like Li Jiahui, Chen Guo, and Wang Zhuo came running over as soon as they were called.

As night began to fall, the decorative lights in the yard flickered on.

While they hadn’t built it brick by brick, Shen Xin and Ding Yuwei had put a lot of thought and effort into decorating many parts of it.

They were still continuously working on it, hoping it would one day become their own cozy little love nest.

In the midst of all this, Deng Zhiliang explained to Shen Xin the purpose of York’s visit.

“He’s certainly good at keeping his cool, then,” Shen Xin remarked, glancing at York in the distance.

He was going head-to-head with Plane. York would call him a “dummy,” and Plane would fire back with “dumbass.” York didn’t get angry; he just roared with laughter.

‘He’s here for a case, a senior agent no less, and yet he’s not the least bit anxious.’

“Brother Deng, do you know what the case is about?” Shen Xin asked.

Deng Zhiliang shook his head. “I’m guessing it’s probably related to animals,” he added.

If it weren’t related to animals, they wouldn’t have come all this way to ask Shen Xin to be a consultant.

‘The great and powerful FBI… don’t they have any pride?’

Shen Xin nodded. ‘That’s true,’ he thought.

Deng Zhiliang also explained the whole backstory.

It was actually related to his trip to the United States before the New Year.

Back then, Interpol in the United States had assigned a liaison to work with him. As it turned out, this liaison was good friends with an FBI ASAC—an Assistant Special Agent in Charge.

The two met frequently, and during one of their casual chats, the topic of Shen Xin’s trip to the United States came up.

The agent asked a few simple questions and learned from his Interpol friend that the case had been solved, also getting the gist of what it was about.