Strange Life of a Cat-Chapter 189 - Cats Fantasy

Chapter 189: Chapter 189 Cat’s Fantasy

Chapter 189 -189 Cat’s Fantasy

It seemed like finding inspiration while carrying a guitar was tough for Jin. When Zheng Tan ran into Jin in campus again, he genially took Jin to the bamboo-formed archway. However, when they got there, someone was already sitting and playing the guitar.

Zheng Tan took a look; the person was slightly heavyset, wearing a T-shirt printed with an “eggplant” and looked quite young, probably a freshman.

Spotting Jin with his guitar, the person beckoned Jin over to chat. When his gaze fell on Zheng Tan, his expression stiffened for a moment but he said nothing.

Initially planning to walk away, Zheng Tan thought for a second, then climbed up a nearby tree to listen to their conversation.

This person, named Zhang Qie, known to his acquaintances as “Eggplant,” was a freshman and a member of the Guitar Association. Since the association had performances every May and October but not everyone got a chance to perform on stage, Zhang Qie was practicing hard, hoping to secure a spot.

However, when it came to guitar skills, Zhang Qie was still no match for Jin.

“Not bad, man!” Zhang Qie praised. He regretted learning that Jin wasn’t from their university, otherwise, he would have invited him to join the association. Having heard that Jin had played in squares and underground passages, he said with admiration, “Every time I saw those street musicians, I always wanted to hang out by their side. My classmates even thought I was embarrassing. You know, most of those people play really well, and the acoustics in the underground passages are particularly good.”

After reflecting for a while, Zhang Qie talked about his guitar journey.

“At first, I couldn’t press the strings down, but it got a lot easier after I developed calluses, although it was somewhat painful. But, as a man, you can’t fear pain!! You have to be harsh on yourself! Otherwise, you can’t improve on the guitar!” Zhang Qie lifted his hand to show off the hard-earned calluses.

Zheng Tan glanced over at them, thinking how easily please this chubby guy was.

After hanging around for a while, Zhang Qie and Jin exchanged phone numbers, and Jin was invited to visit Chuhua University in a couple of weeks, when Zhang Qie would take him to see their Guitar Association’s performance.

After showing Jin around the campus, Zheng Tan left him to his own devices and went off to find his own fun.

Three days later when Zheng Tan thought Jin had already left Chuhua University, he saw him again.

That day Zheng Tan didn’t leave the school for his usual stroll because the sheriff and Ah Huang had both been unusually let out, and Da Pang had been kicked out by his owner’s grandma to get some exercise. So, the four cats leisurely made their way to the Old Tile House District.

Zheng Tan had hoped to find a quiet spot in the shade to nap on a rooftop in the afternoon, but before he got close, he heard the sound of an electric guitar nearby.

The sheriff moved his ears, seeming to want to turn around and leave, but seeing Zheng Tan continuing towards the noise, and since the other two cats didn’t leave either, he followed along.

Zheng Tan was curious about this noisy newcomer and wanted to see what was going on.

An old utility shed had been cleared out and was now filled with about a dozen students, with the sound coming from inside.

The other three cats stopped not far off, but only Zheng Tan approached, jumped onto the windowsill, and looked inside.

The window was open. Zheng Tan stood near a large table, which had a pot of flowers that partially concealed him. The people inside didn’t notice him—they didn’t have the mind to notice, focusing intently on the two people in the center of the room.

There was also a guitar on the window-side table, and no one was sitting in front of it, so Zheng Tan could see inside clearly.

In the center of the room stood two young men, one of whom was Jin. The other wore a black vest, had dyed yellow hair, a bit long, tied into a small braid.

The two were in a heated electric guitar battle. Zheng Tan didn’t know what it felt like to compete like this, but seeing both drenched in sweat, he guessed it wasn’t easy.

The bystanders, including Zhang Qie who Zheng Tan had seen before, were as excited as if injected with adrenaline, faces flushed, seemingly holding back something, some even unconsciously gesturing with their hands.

When the two finally stopped, the people around them burst into spirited discussions, a few even screamed.

Indeed, as an outsider, Zheng Tan could only enjoy the spectacle. Though he thought the duo played incredibly well, he wasn’t as thrilled as the others, but man, their fingers moved damn fast when they played.

“Boss, should we choose him?” asked a tall girl with a ponytail.

The guy with the braid who had just jousted guitars with Jin nodded, spoke a few words to Jin, took a phone call, and then asked Jin, Zhang Qie, and two others to stay and look after the place for a while as they needed to step out.

The Guitar Association’s original practice space was undergoing a university-wide renovation, so they had to temporarily relocate. They applied for a building in the Old Tile House District for temporary use until the renovation was complete.

Listening to the four people left in the room talking, Zheng Tan learned that the topic was about next week’s guitar performance by Chuhua University’s Guitar Association. They had planned to begin with a duet guitar performance of Canon, but unfortunately, the guitarist who was supposed to perform with the association president had injured his fingers and had to be replaced. The association couldn’t find a satisfactory replacement within their ranks, so they had settled for external help and contacted Jin. After selecting and reselecting from seven reinforcements brought in from other school guitar associations plus Jin, following an intensive guitar session, the association’s decision-makers had finally settled on Jin.

Hearing that Jin had been chosen, Zhang Qie was thrilled, by contrast, Jin was much calmer. After hearing the others play, he knew this outcome was inevitable. Those who stayed to perform at Night Building were almost professional, and on top of that, their technical skills were excellent. After being immersed and battle-tested at Night Building for so long, he was somewhat better than most in school.

Initially, when asked to try out, Jin hadn’t immediately agreed. After all, if he decided to join, he would have had to come frequently for rehearsal before the performance, and there were also several important performances at Night Building, making his schedule very tight. After much deliberation, he had decided to come, and now, he didn’t regret his decision at all.

Having entered this complex society, jumped into this huge dye vat, it was difficult to remain untouched, especially working at Night Building for some time. Jin had understood its hardships and seen the filth behind some of the glitter. But after getting used to it, he found he had lost that pure passion. Yet here, he had found that lost purity.

The four people inside the room were still energetically discussing guitar-related stuff, like metal 5 chords and high octave decomposition, which Zheng Tan didn’t understand. He also hadn’t seen the guitar solo part of “Crossroads” mentioned by Zhang Qie, so Zheng Tan truly wasn’t interested in their conversation.

Just as he was thinking of going down from the windowsill to find another place to sleep, Zheng Tan noticed that the sheriff and Ah Huang had come closer, probably because no one was playing the guitar intensely now, so they bravely neared, jumping on the windowsill and curiously peeking inside.

Da Pang saw the three cats on the windowsill, yawned lazily, and then leisurely walked over and jumped up onto the windowsill.

Four cats were squatting side by side on the windowsill when the people inside immediately noticed them.

Zhang Qie had the strongest reaction. Seeing the four cats, his first instinct was to quickly scoop up his water cup from the table into his chest.

Three people, including Jin, were taken aback by Zhang Qie’s reaction.

“Why the reaction, Eggplant?” one of them asked.

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Zhang Qie gestured towards the cats on the windowsill, “The dreadful experience at military training!”

The two others “oh-ed” in understanding. Seeing Jin still in confusion explained the funny incident during military training.

During that military training, Zhang Qie’s platoon wasn’t far from Jiao Wei’s, and Zhang Qie was also a victim of an incident involving the sheriff and Ah Huang knocking over a water bottle. His favorite water bottle had fallen down the stairs due to Ah Huang, losing a big chunk of its paint, which made Zhang Qie so upset he’d lost weight.

While the two were talking, the sheriff, who had been cooped up inside the house for so long and was more mischievous, stepped onto the large table from the windowsill and approached the guitar placed there.

The three people in the room looked at Jin; the guitar was his. He had played that guitar when he came to Old Tile House, and after that electrifying guitar session, he had left it there without putting it in a bag. He owned three guitars, and the one there was the cheapest, more common, similar to those some students in the association used. He wouldn’t dare carry the expensive ones around, but that didn’t mean he didn’t care about it, just that, after looking at the Black Cat squatting on the windowsill, Jin hesitated for a moment.

If Zheng Tan hadn’t been there, Jin would have rushed over to protect his guitar.

Zheng Tan didn’t stop the sheriff; he was rather curious to see what the sheriff would do next.

For a moment, no one in the room spoke. Everyone was watching the sheriff’s moves. It was much quieter now than it had been during the peak of the guitar session ten minutes ago, fittingly now matching the Old Tile House District’s quietness.

The sheriff tilted his head and looked at the guitar, his tail slowly waving, and then he reached out a paw and hooked it onto one of the metal strings of the guitar before retracting it.

The vibrated sound made by the metal string startled the sheriff into arching his back and jumping back a step. Once the sound had faded, he bravely moved closer again as if addicted, continuing to hook the metal strings with his paw.

He didn’t fret, and the sounds produced were just open string sounds, which to Zheng Tan were purely noise, and the sheriff’s actions seemed like mere mischief, curiosity-driven play, lacking any sense of musical artistry.

To Zheng Tan’s surprise, Jin didn’t stop the sheriff from tampering with his guitar. Instead, he immediately set down the sheet music he was holding, pulled out a notebook and pen from his guitar bag, and began to write something.

Perhaps it was the exhilarating guitar session with others just before, but Jin was in a great state now. Once he started writing, he was immersed in his own creative world, perhaps including the “music” played by the sheriff.

Zhang Qie walked over for a peek, then his mouth fell agape. He quietly walked back to his seat and mouthed to the other two—”composing”.

Zheng Tan also saw Zhang Qie’s mouthing. Looking at the sheriff playing with the guitar strings to make noise and at Jin immersed in composing, Zheng Tan couldn’t help but doubt whether he lacked not only musical talent but also music appreciation standards. However, seeing the uniformly stifled expressions on Zhang Qie and the others, he suddenly felt that Jin was indeed talented, otherwise how could he find inspiration from such noisy “music” played by the sheriff?

It had been said that cats are the melancholic poets of the city, inherently solitary, wandering artists. Zheng Tan had never believed it, but now it seemed it might be true, only that he didn’t understand the art that belonged to cats.

Half an hour later, the briskly writing Jin looked up at the three cats on the windowsill and at the sheriff standing in front of the guitar, attentively grooming his paws, then picked up his pen and wrote four characters on the notebook—”Cat’s Fantasy.” (To be continued. If you like this work, please go to Qidian (qidian.com) to cast a recommendation vote or monthly ticket. Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile users, please read on m.qidian.com.)