Endless Debt

No drinks, no popcorn, no comfortable seats, not even a place to shelter from the wind and rain. The cold wind was biting, but it didn't affect Bologue much; he quietly watched the movie until the story ended.

How interesting that the movie being shown at the parking lot cinema was exactly the one Palmer had mentioned to him before. The poster of the detective and the dog was pasted on the wall.

The movie was titled "Ninth-Grade Detective and His Invincible Hound," featuring a down-and-out detective who, despite the title, wasn't smart and lacked detective skills. He was more like a thug than a detective.

One day, after passing out drunk on the street, the detective woke up to find a hound beside him, seemingly having recognized him as its owner, and followed him home.

When they got home, the interesting part of the story began.

The hound could speak.

It scared the detective half to death, but after calming down, he learned that the hound was the product of a mad scientist's experiment, granting animals human-like intelligence and the ability to communicate.

Now this mad scientist wanted to capture more people to push the experiment forward, which was the reason behind the recent spate of disappearances.

After understanding the situation, the down-and-out detective decided to become famous and a real detective by teaming up with Sido to defeat evil.

Who is Sido? That's the hound's name.

It gave the name to itself.

It's an amusing comedy film. Sido is much smarter than the detective; the detective remains the fool, sometimes the roles should be reversed—Sido should be the detective, and the detective should be the hound.

Palmer was right, the movie was extremely funny, even Bologue was entertained and laughed.

There was a dispute between the detective and Sido. The detective, being a slow-witted guy, clearly couldn't win the argument with Sido, and in a fit of fury, threatened to take Sido to get neutered.

Sometimes Sido would request to use the bathroom like a human, but the detective would tell it to relieve itself in the dog park, which made Sido furious, chasing the detective to bite him.

While laughing non-stop, the story continued to develop—the two became increasingly tacit, the detective completely gave up thinking, becoming Sido's thug, while Sido grew into the true decision-maker, uncovering one enemy plot after another.

After going through many trials, the man and the dog forged a true friendship and destroyed the mad scientist's scheme.

The detective received everyone's attention, and wherever he went, a hound would follow him.

The story ended.

Bologue felt his tears were almost laughed out, but after calming down, he inexplicably felt a faint sadness in his heart.

"And then what?" Aimou asked.

"What do you mean 'and then'?"

"What happens to the detective and Sido afterward?"

"Nothing happened; the story ended. That's it," Bologue said.

"Then wouldn't the lives of the detective and Sido continue somewhere out of sight?"

Aimou found it hard to grasp such a movie conclusion; she thought even if the story ended, the lives of the people in the story would still continue.

"I suppose so, likely more of those chicken-flying-dog-jumping moments." Saying this, Bologue chuckled; the interactions between the man and the dog were truly entertaining.

After laughing, he found that the lively Aimou had fallen silent, and the sadness in his heart grew stronger.

"What's wrong, Aimou?"

"Sido is just a dog, it probably won't live long, will it?" Aimou said sadly.

Bologue was momentarily at a loss for what to say. He hesitantly said, "Well, there's nothing that can be done. Sido isn't a human but a dog."

"But what's the difference between it and a human? It was even smarter than the detective; the detective was the one that seemed more like the dog, right?" Aimou protested.

If the detective had been more reliable in the movie, Sido wouldn't have needed to save the day so often, which could've cut half an hour from the plot.

"I think Sido is human, just... just without a human shell."

She whispered.

Bologue didn't know what to say, Aimou's words sounded like a child's protest, but upon deeper thought, Bologue also felt unable to laugh.

"Sido wants to live like a human. After all, it's as intelligent as a human, but the detective just laughs at it, saying something like, 'Can you use a toilet?'

In the eyes of this foolish detective, at best, it's still just a dog, perhaps a smarter, talking dog at most."

Aimou's voice grew quieter until it vanished.

Bologue had nothing to say. To him, it was just a comedy film, there was no need to be so serious. But for Aimou, it was completely different; she couldn't even understand why the detective would use neutering to threaten Sido—is that funny, entertaining?

"I read a story in a book before, it's a story with a bit of cruel humor."

Aimou watched as the end credits flashed black-and-white names continuously.

"Similar to this story, it was also about a group of scientists conducting experiments.

They endowed apes with intelligence, then told them about their inevitable death.

And then the story ended, leaving the apes' tales for the readers to imagine."

Aimou's voice stopped, and Bologue fell into contemplation. He was a smart person; the stories beyond the story weren't hard to deduce.

The apes didn't possess intelligence; they lived carefree, leaving everything to instinct. But one day, they gained wisdom and learned of their inevitable demise...