Prologue:
''I was born in a litter of three pups, my brother, my sister, and me. Our mother was a German shepherd, I'm not sure about my father's breed. We were born on the street. Yes, we were street dogs. My father… my father was caught and brought to the pound, my mother told me, but that was all she has ever told me about him. I've never met him, never seen him before, I don't know his name nor his breed, nor my grandparents or anyone else that involved my father.
We were born during late winter, our mother was ill. When we were around four weeks old she died and my siblings and I were left on our own. It was a hard world; no one took us in, no single dog adopted us into their pack of strays. We were doomed to die. Until the humans came.
My siblings were adopted by humans, but I was the only one being left behind. I don't know why, probably they didn't like me, or I wasn't nice-looking enough because I was a mutt, maybe. But then again, so were my siblings. I still don't know the reason why I wasn't adopted, and I probably will never get to know.
How did I survive, you might think. Let's say there was this old dog, I can't remember what he looked like, but he took me in and cared for me until I was six months old. He made me street wise, taught me all sorts of things on how to survive, until he died of old age. I was six months old, he was ten years old. It was a big difference, he could have been my grandfather, maybe even my great grandfather, but I liked to call him… dad. Because he had been there for me, because he was the only father figure I had ever known. He was a real sweetheart, and I still miss him.
I'm now one year old, yes, a yearling, and still roaming this world on my own. I'm a loner, a packless loner that survives by eating the scraps from trash cans humans leave behind. Sometimes I steal from humans and pet dogs, just to make sure I get myself fed enough. It are hard times, really hard times.
Though, I've always had hope, because my mother used to tell me and my siblings stories when we were only a few weeks old. She told us about this huge pack of stray dogs living in the forest, completely free from humans, hunting together like wild wolves, like they really are wolves. The pack of Ōu, in the Ōu Mountains in Japan, lead by the great tora-ge dog Gin, which later on passed his leadership on to his son Weed, who was a tora-ge dog just like him; a silver coated dog, covered in stripes.
Why do I keep hope, you ask? Well, my mother always told me these stories were real, a true legend. And my wish is, that I will one day stand next to their alpha, and be part of the Ōu pack. I want to become part of them, I want to be a true wild dog. Not a stray, but a wild one. I will find them someday, and then I will finally be a true wild dog.''