Four cats had their faces twisted, the round faces of the group of three stray cats kept up their wariness, their whiskers trembling. Baring their teeth with their bodies trembling and revealing tiny sharp teeth.

Arching their waists, their fur exploded like being fried.

Bai Xia Xia’s back stiffened, wanting to cry.

Didn’t I just want to give up? What, you still want me to leave my name in history? Saving the evidence to let who see! Does being a cat mean that I don’t want dignity?!

She immediately ran away, avoiding the embarrassment, and turned her head around to see which bastard was harming her by wandering between options, and ultimately feeling reluctant to give up the group of three stray cats that he had found just now[1], Bai Xia Xia felt like she had nothing to live for, deciding that she had to remember who that shameless bastard that violated a kitty’s portrait rights was!

And work hard when there was an opportunity, to delete the evidence.

“Ka-cha, ka-cha!”

In the fixed screen, the snow-white and elegant Persian cat was sitting nobly, it had long put down its paws. The airplane ears were pressed down until it maintained a straight line with its tiny head, and under the sunlight, the cat’s heterochromatic eyes were clear and bright.

Cat with ears in airplane form.

With light shining on the cat’s fur, it had a light layer of gilt gold.

Bai Xia Xia tilted her head: So long as I act like nothing happened, the one who feels awkward won’t be me.

I’ll never admit that the one who surrendered and gave up was me. Cats can’t create other accounts, so I can deny it ah[2]!

And thus, what Liu Feng, who was crouching down to take pictures, saw was a Persian cat leisurely, very calmly, ruffling its ears, supporting up its airplane ears once again.

Then very indifferently, very grandly turning its head to glance at him, as if it was saying: What are you looking at?! You fool!

Liu Feng… with trembling fingers, very excitedly started pressing on the shutter again.

He was a professional photographer, who walked through the streets of big cities all year round, taking photos of old streets that were gradually disappearing and that had been eroded by time, but that still existed.

Old Bei Jing’s siheyuan[3], Qingdao’s red tiles and green trees, Suzhou’s landscape garden houses… the photos that he took captured the historical heritage of China for thousands of years, the combination of graveness and local characteristics was extremely exquisite.

Siheyuan from the outside.

Courtyard area of a Siheyuan.

Qingdao’s red tiles and green trees.

Suzhou’s landscape garden houses.

After repeatedly being featured in National Geographic, during recent years, Liu Feng was stuck in a bottleneck.

He wandered in all types of big streets and small alleys that had their own special characteristics all year round. He watched as big cities unstoppably built high rise buildings, produced an endless stream of new structures.

That was a symbol of the country’s progress and the economy taking off, their appearance made people rejoice, but it also represented an unknown number of old buildings being destructed.

Liu Feng did not understand economy; however, this type of progress and change made it difficult for him to accept.

He was infatuated with the profound and archaic historical structures that had been polished by the vicissitudes of time, he wanted to let the people, the world know the beauty of Chinese architecture— —changing greatly through time, everlasting.

Their historical architectures of China, in the end, will be like this shattered country that was reconstructed, going through strong adversities, yet remaining unsurpassably beautiful.

It was unlike the dead and withered as said by that group of people who were presumptuously arrogant and who did not understand Chinese historical architecture.

He wanted to let the Chinese buildings that were photographed by him, be exhibited in the whole world.

These things that were inherited, they were right in the daily lives that the people were accustomed to, they were common and yet uncommon.

He could not accept, nor could he watch these old things that proved legacy and culture, be destroyed ruthlessly.

To be replaced by others.

Those were all things that Liu Feng determined to be hidden treasures, but he was helpless.

Depression, suffocation, irritation, helplessness, and the flimsy feeling of not being able to change the current state of matters made Liu Feng lose his inspiration, as if he was stuck in a repetitive weird cycle.

Repression made him unable to find a bursting source of inspiration, unable find a uniquely beautiful instance that in the past, did not need him to think and would just naturally be captured by him.

Because of that, Liu Feng had put in a lot of hard work. He took the initiative to get in contact with architects, writers, and archeologist professors of faculties, running with them with the objective of preserving the historical buildings, voicing their thoughts, filtering to their greatest extent, and working hard to leave the best things that could be left to their sons and grandsons and later generations.

But it was useless, he thought that by doing these, by struggling, by giving his all, his heart would feel a little better, would be able to find the inspiration that he had lost. But it did not, it did not happen at all!

Liu Feng was about to go crazy! Photography was his everything, promoting ancient Chinese architecture was his dream, but now, he was like a hunter who had lost his sword, a dancer who had lost his legs.

So how could he not become crazy.

He did not want to admit to losing, so he lingered in the streets and alleys of the city the whole night, madly and unstoppably taking photos.

The houses and streets in the photos, they were either exquisite, rough, gone through great changes, or ancient… there were also those who were good, bad, or maybe in the eyes of others they were good enough. But in Liu Feng’s eyes, they were just defective products that were full of craftmanship.

Translator’s comments:

None for this chapter.

Translator’s notes:

[1] This part is confusing but explaining it now will be a spoiler. It’ll make sense later in the chapter. It was a bit weird for the author to have included that part there, but eh.

[2] So, in forums or online platforms, people can have an official ID, but they can also create other accounts with another name and act like they’re not themselves, but they are themselves. The one who took the photo saw Bai Xia Xia acting cowardly, but in the present, she’s an elegant Persian cat, so what she’s trying to say is that between the two, her right now is the real one, and that the other one is fake, and since cats don’t know how to act, then her cowardly self was just an illusion, or not her.

[3] Siheyuan are a historical type of residence that was commonly used throughout Chinese history. A big, extended family could live in the four wings surrounding the courtyard in the center, and it signified wealth and prosperity.