"This... this is our legal advisor, Qin Mu."

Several seconds later, Wan Zhongyuan regained his composure. He hurried forward, positioning himself between Qin Mu and Cheng Chuxiao, and wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. He cautiously said to Cheng Chuxiao, "Miss Cheng, please be a bit more polite in your speech. Some people... may not be someone you can afford to offend."

The words "What are you?" just now had really frightened him. In the nursing home, as the deputy director, he wouldn’t dare to shout at Qin Mu like that. The other colleagues who knew the details were calling him "Brother Qin," almost treating him as if he were their own brother. After all, Qin Mu’s brilliant achievements were there for all to see. Offending Qin Mu had no benefits whatsoever; one careless mistake and you could land yourself in trouble. If one maintained a good relationship with him, he could help with any trouble encountered in the future. But this Cheng Chuxiao, on the other hand, went ahead and hurled abuse directly at Qin Mu. It gave him a scare. Qin Mu was quick-tempered, and the repercussions might not involve her alone.

"Legal advisor?" Cheng Chuxiao was utterly oblivious to the severity of the issue and merely furrowed her eyebrows. She muttered with a sneer, "The name is quite common. I think I’ve heard it before." Afterward, she looked coldly at Qin Mu and scoffed, "But since you are a legal advisor, you must be extremely familiar with the law. You should know how to compensate for damaging someone’s property or pet, leading to the pet’s death, right?"

As soon as she finished speaking, she distinctly felt that the atmosphere in the reception room was somewhat off. Everyone’s expressions were a bit odd, as if she had said something wrong.

Behind Wan Zhongyuan, Qin Mu was likewise staring coldly at her, almost laughing out of anger. This Cheng Chuxiao... actually turned around and asked him if he knew the law.

"According to the provisions of the Civil Code, damaging someone else’s property constitutes a tort and incurs civil liability, such as restoring the original condition or compensating for losses," he thought for a moment, then directly quoted the relevant articles from the Civil Code, verbatim, without a single error. "Regarding damage to someone else’s property, if restoring it to its original condition is possible, it should be done. If it is impossible to restore the original condition, compensation for the loss should be paid. However, this principle applies when the fault lies entirely with the infringer. In this particular incident, while it appears Old Zhang killed the dog, the root cause was actually the dog being unleashed."

"This is the surveillance footage. You can see that you didn’t leash your dog, resulting in this large dog running around the nursing home and charging at our elderly residents." Qin Mu’s face was stern. He casually took out the surveillance footage obtained from the monitoring room and displayed it in front of Cheng Chuxiao. The surveillance clearly showed what happened at the time of the incident: the dog kept charging towards Zhang Qingyuan. For any normal person, the first reaction would be that the dog was going to bite them. Therefore, Zhang Qingyuan ended up killing the dog.

"According to the provisions of the Civil Code, tort actions require identifying the at-fault party, and in this case, the fault lies entirely with you," Qin Mu said coldly to the aggressive and unreasonable Cheng Chuxiao before him. "Our side does not need to bear any responsibility."

Any tort action requires determining the at-fault party. For instance, in traffic accidents, after an incident, traffic police need to issue a liability assessment report, which serves as a basis for compensation and penalties. A pet dog does not possess human rights and cannot constitute so-called personal injury; it is considered a type of property. Strictly speaking, by Old Zhang killing Cheng Chuxiao’s pet dog, he infringed on her property rights. But the tort action had a cause: it was triggered because the dog first lunged at a person. It wasn’t that Old Zhang deliberately killed the pet dog without any reason.

"What do you mean?" Upon hearing this, Cheng Chuxiao’s face changed. She stared at Qin Mu and demanded, "Are you saying that my Binbin’s death was in vain?" Her face was frosty, filled with anger, clearly on the verge of exploding. Qin Mu’s utterly "cold" words almost made her explode with fury. She never expected such cold and heartless words to come from a living, breathing person! Such a lovely dog, so understanding, had accompanied her for three years. Now it lay cold on the ground. Yet someone was saying the dog was property, and in the case of a tort, the at-fault party had to be determined—and the fault didn’t lie with them!

"Since you know so much about the law, and you say that dogs must be leashed when walked, then tell me, which law states that when I take my dog out, I must leash it?" She furiously looked at Qin Mu, directly challenging him on legal grounds. All along, when she took her dog out, she had never leashed it. Her dog was also very gentle and had never harmed anyone else. Yet such a kind and lovely dog was killed by an elderly man today! The thought of not making the other party pay was something she simply could not swallow!

"A year ago, Article 30 of the ’Animal Epidemic Prevention Law’ clearly stipulated: Units and individuals who raise dogs shall vaccinate them against rabies as required. When taking dogs outdoors, they should, as per regulations, affix a dog tag and take measures such as leashing the dog," Qin Mu stated calmly. In stark contrast to the woman’s agitation, he was exceedingly calm, completely unperturbed. Since she demanded a legal statute, he would provide the relevant one. For others, this might be difficult, but for him, it was merely a matter of searching his memory.