High School of Demon Hunting

Chapter 772: Chapter 120 Business with Mice_1

”Hey, hey, mate!”

”Mate, hello! Over here, look here!”

Ding Dang Ears was hopping around by Xiao Xiao’s feet, trying hard to catch the young wizard’s attention: ”I think we need to carve out some time to discuss the beetle trade... How about this Saturday? I could bring a sample to the school. You decide the time, we decide the location, what do you think?”

Earlier, after Dangdang Ears proposed the idea of trading beetles for mice, the black cat and the glasses-wearing short wizard had darted aside, whispering to each other for a long time.

It had thought they were just discussing the trading method, but didn’t expect that after nipping each other’s ears, they would leave it and go back to being busy— the black cat huddled around a group of kittens, giving fiery speeches, and even walked up to some cats to put a pill in their mouths; the glasses-wearing short wizard was even worse, he hid in front of a nearby aspen tree and daydreamed, seemingly having completely forgotten about the negotiation.

Now, seizing the rare opportunity, Dangdang Ears had to remind them about the trade. After all, in his view, using his excess beetles to exchange for the wizards’ mice was a win-win situation.

However, in the view of Zheng Qing and Xiao Xiao, this so-called ”win-win” deserves double quotation marks—after all, selling mice is their main source of revenue. The market for beetles, although theoretically exists, they have never conducted a specific investigation, so they do not know the market scale and prices. Moreover, regardless of how the trade proceeds, they would lose some profits if they exchange mice for beetles.

The young wizards found this hard to accept.

For them, the optimal solution was to use Xiao Xiao’s tiny, broken diamonds to exchange for Beetles from Ding Dang Ears. This way they could discard their unwanted broken diamonds, receive a large number of beetles, and not have to lose their mice.

However, for Ding Dang Ears, this plan was not so perfect—it could collect some shiny little stones, but it would not be able to complete the task as assigned by its Ancestor. It was a tough choice to weigh the priorities.

...

Upon hearing the rumblings of Ding Dang Ears, Xiao Xiao, who was chatting with Lin Guo, lowered his head and looked at the Mouse King wearing clothes.

”What?” He blinked, seeming not to completely understand the meaning of the mouse’s words.

”I mean, should we find time...” Dangdang Ears thought Xiao Xiao really didn’t understand, so he planned to repeat his words again.

Before it could finish, Xiao Xiao waved his hand to interrupt it.

”Why are you talking to me about it?” The wizard took the notebook under his left arm, turned it around, tucked it under his right arm, then pointed with his left hand to the black cat not far away, sounding a little puzzled: ”The boss is over there, what’s the use of discussing with me?”

”Huh?” Dangdang Ears halted stuffing in its tracks, blinking its green bean-sized eyes: ”Doesn’t the book say, the real boss is always wearing black-framed glasses, carrying a notebook, and pointing to the country with a quill?”

”Where are you reading this mess?” Xiao Xiao shook his head, raised his hand to signal, and called to the black cat not far away: ”Are you done? Come over here when you’re done, the mouse is looking for you!”

The black cat, who has just hosted a mobilization and commendation assembly for all the cats, heard the words, raised its tail, and strolled over with its head held high. Poseidon and the little ragdoll cat, one on the left and one on the right, walked with tiny steps to follow.

”What’s the matter?” The black cat walked up to the dressed-up mouse, lifted his chin, and asked.

Ding Dang Ears felt the shadow of the black cat come over him, and suddenly felt that he became much shorter—plus two little things on his left and right trying to jump out of their skins, which added a few points of intimidation—it couldn’t help but shrink back, stammering out its proposal again.

”This week?” The black cat lifted his paw, fiddled with his ears, his face showed signs of hesitation: ”I’m afraid that’s not going to work.”

This was the plan he and Xiao Xiao had agreed upon earlier: not rushing negotiations, dragging it out, waiting until Absolution Hunting Team had investigated the market scale and prices for beetles, and then start negotiating with the mice; From another perspective, this was also an effective way to pressure negotiation opponents and gain more bargaining chips—however, the act of dragging feet couldn’t be too blunt, if they sent the guests away, it would be outweigh the gains.

”Don’t you wizards have the weekends off? I know, all wizards rest on the weekends!” Dangdang Ears bravely took a step forward, raised his head, and raised his voice a little: ”I’ve read a lot, you can’t fool me!”

Who would bother to fool a mouse!

The corner of the black cat’s mouth twitched, it lowered its head, and its two red orbs eyes blinked nonstop. Before he could figure out something nice to say, Xiao Xiao next to him took over the conversation and started to explain to Mouse King.

”He has a school task on Saturday night, and a class meeting on Sunday night.” Doctor Xiao opened his notebook, turned to the calendar, pointing to the densely packed circles and words on it and explained it to the Mouse King: ”Not only is there no time this weekend, I’m afraid we don’t have the time for the following weeks... Now it’s the fifteenth week after school starts, let’s see, there’s Christmas in the middle of the seventeenth week, and the annual school winter hunting event for the next three days; the eighteenth week is New Year’s Day, and we have to prepare for the final exams, because the school will stop giving lectures in the nineteenth week, to arrange for review and exams.”

”Fully booked.” The black cat glanced at the marked days, shaking his head empathetically.

Ding Dang Ears apparently doesn’t often look at calendars, facing the green and red colors on the notebook, various lines, different symbols, and texts, it all seemed like a foreign language. It felt like he was looking at something completely foreign, and his green-bean eyes soon looked like mosquito repellent coils.

”Isn’t there a sixteenth week? You guys didn’t count the sixteenth week just now!” Lin Guo nearby seemed to have stumbled upon something, counting with his fingers, shouting and yelling.

Black cat and Xiao Xiao turned around in unison, gave him a deadly stare, which immediately scared the little wizard into covering his mouth with his hands.

”Right, what about the sixteenth week? It’s next week, we can plan to meet next week.” The mosquito-coil eyes of Ding Dang Ears slowly disappeared, and the thoughts the doctor put him in disarray seem to be a little straighter now.

The black cat let out a deep sigh.

”Next weekend is Winter Solstice, and according to the lunar calendar, we have to eat dumplings and have a long sleep, you can’t go out.” Xiao Xiao, without changing his expression, full of nonsense about these traditional customs, used a feather pen to make a heavy mark on the calendar.

From a certain perspective, the doctor wasn’t lying.

Because the weekend of the next week was indeed the Winter Solstice.