Chapitre 23: The Wild Village

Ah Meow had recovered quite nicely, so, after the doctor's visit, its cast was replaced with looser bandages; this allowed it walk, although with some difficulties.

However, there were still some parts that hurt when it moved, so it felt most comfortable crawling. When they returned home, Ah Meow still couldn't fully stand up, and after a while of crawling around, it ended up collapsing on the fluffy sofa.

Later on in the evening, Hans came home drunk and directly went toward the sofa as soon as he came through the front door.

Seeing this, Li Du exclaimed, "Ah Meow is there!"

"I—" Hans hiccupped, "I see it. Do you think that—" He hiccupped again, "I'm drunk?" Hans laughed and then burped.

With his arms holding his body up beneath him, he didn't crush Ah Meow.

In this position, Ah Meow soon smelled the stench of alcohol and immediately jumped off the sofa. It started sneezing, and wobbled toward Li Du on legs that had yet to fully recover.

And just like that, motivated by the stink of a drunk Hans, Ah Meow learned how to walk again.

Hannah, who had recently been rescheduled to working day shifts, soon got off work and found the drunk Hans and complained, "Hans, can you not drink so much?"

Hearing this, Hans, who was snoring in peace just a moment ago, immediately woke up and protested, "Sh*t! I'm not just drinking. I'm also working! I was trying to get some information about other auctions!"

"Yup, I really do rely on Hans for this type of work. I thought you were sleeping," Li Du said as she walked inside.

"There's beer here! Fresh beer!" grumbled Hans, pointing toward the bag that Hannah was carrying.

At this, Hannah could only roll her eyes; sure enough, Hannah was carrying two cases of beer. More specifically, a Chinese draft.

They soon started eating dinner that consisted of fried fish, fried chicken, blueberry and melon salad, and a homemade pizza. While Li Du and Hannah enjoyed a few bottles of beer, Hans could only eat yogurt.

"You should watch out for your liver and stomach. I don't want to see the day where you die of alcohol poisoning," Hannah chided as she once again stopped Hans from stealing a beer bottle.

"There is no meaning to a life without alcohol!" moaned Hans as he collapsed on the table.

"What have you heard today?" Li Du asked while eating his fruit salad.

"On February twenty-second there's an auction at Havasu," Hans said. "I think there should be some good stuff that we can find there."

"How many storage units? Since it's on the twenty-second, we should start preparing right away."

"There's a total of eleven units this time. When the time comes, it will be good if seven or eight of them are put on auction. There are almost always people who will extend their lease at the last minute."

This happened quite often before storage auctions.

To the west and northwest of Flagstaff was the world-famous Grand Canyon. While "The Grand Canyon" was the name that referred to the location in its entirety, the gorge was dotted with many smaller ravines.

One of them was the Havasu Canyon, which was also the namesake for the town of Havasu, situated next to it.

"Havasu Canyon is very charming. Between the cliffs lies a deep blue stream and a series of elegant waterfalls. During the summer, it becomes the greatest place for a swim." Hans spoke while they drove.

"There's a total of four falls near the canyon, with small villages and trails connecting them. It is truly the picture of the perfect vacation spot, attracting tens of thousands of tourists each year.

"As a result, there is often a lot of hiking tools that can be found at these storage auctions. If we are lucky, we might even be able to find a mountain bike or an ATV, since these vehicles are often a necessity for the terrain near the canyon.

"Why do they not take them home?" Li Du asked with a puzzled expression.

"Maybe it's because they're hard to transport, or perhaps it's the nature of the wealthy: buying something solely for the time they spend at Havasu."

"That's quite the perk," Li Du commented.

Americans' wasteful habits often made Li Du quite speechless. These people really knew how to live their life to the fullest; not only the wealthy, but the poor as well.

After a while, Hans continued, "You need to prepare. The temper of the people here is quite bad—every time I've come here, I've gotten into a fight."

While saying that, he showed him a military knife hidden on his belt.

"Sh*t, why do you have enemies everywhere?" Li Du asked as he rolled his eyes.

As the rugged mountain and bumpy road passed, the sight of a quaint town soon came into their sights.

There were around four or five hundred families there, and most of them relied on the tourist industry for a living: small inns, restaurants, cafés, and bars.

They soon arrived at an inn called "Papa Smith." However, just as they stopped, a motorcycle passed and the biker spat on the ground cursing, "Yellow bastard, get out of our territory!"

Although this was clearly a form of discrimination, Li Du still asked, "F*ck, are they cursing at me?"

"Although I often lay out in the sun, I'm still a very white person—so, yes, they clearly said that to you."

As the bike had already left, Li Du could only spit on the ground cursing, "Bast*rds! With that type of culture, no wonder they are still so poor!"

"Do you now understand why I always get into fights here?" Hans laughed.

Yes, he did—Li Du had misjudged Hans this time, for Hans really didn't have any enemies here in Havasu.

"I don't get into fights, but I'm going to carry away all of the valuable things from these storage units!" Li Du vowed.

At this, Hans let out a radiant smile.

The company responsible for the auction this time was called "Western Grand Canyons Public Storage Inc." When they got to the site, the eleven units had already been reduced to ten, and they were all mini-sized.

For American storage firms, units came in five sizes: extra large, large, medium, small, and mini.

The first auction that Li Du had attended featured medium storage units with an area of more than 300 square feet. The last auction they had attended contained small units with areas of about 150 square feet. This time, the storage units were even smaller; a unit with 60 square feet of space was considered to be quite good.

This made Li Du very disappointed, as the stuff inside the units was very messy. There were bikes, boots, coats, and other such items; most of them could be considered trash, and were thus worthless.

He noted down numbers 56 and 75; the former had two Segways and a laptop, while the latter had a rubber boat and a very well-crafted set of fishing gear.

On the morning of the twenty-second, they woke up early, as usual, to check out their competition.

However, what they didn't anticipate was that in that small town, everyone also woke up quite early; even though it was only seven thirty, there were already more than twenty people waiting in front of the auction company.

After Li Du and Hans got their numbers, they went into the auction square in high spirits. At this time, a buffy black guy wearing sweaters stopped them and asked, "Hey, are you here for the auction as well?"

"Yes," smiled Li Du.

At this, the buffy guy smirked. "Ching-Chong, the monkey, is actually trying to do business."

As mocking laughter surrounded them, Li Du's smile slowly disappeared.

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