Culinary God in Wilderness

Freshwater Lobsters are, to be blunt, just crayfish.

America is the native home of the Freshwater Lobster. The vast majority of them found around the world today originated here.

He hadn’t seen a single crab since the last time he’d caught some. He had, however, caught plenty of crayfish.

The crayfish here have no natural predators. There are few native species in the river, and the locals don’t eat them, so they’re basically living in paradise.

In terms of size, the small ones were about the same as the crayfish back home, while the big ones could even rival a spiny lobster.

Lin Chen, long since accustomed to the gigantism of Alaskan wildlife, saw no issue. He just happily scooped them all up in his net and tossed them onto the snow, where the cold would stun them.

"You all see me getting a big haul every day, but my more observant viewers have probably already noticed something."

He lifted the gillnet, revealing numerous translucent ice crystals hanging from the spot where it connected to the wooden frame.

"The river hasn’t frozen over yet, but it’s obvious the temperature is dropping day by day."

"In a little while, the river’s surface might freeze over. I’m not sure what kind of impact that will have on the King Salmon migration."

’If the river really freezes over, it probably won’t affect the schools of fish swimming below. In fact, it’ll become a natural protective layer for them.’

’Plus, he hadn’t run into any Black Bears or brown bears recently. He had a reasonable suspicion that the big fellas had already gone into hibernation.’

’But it was still only early November, so it was hard to say for sure if they’d begun hibernating. He still needed to be careful when he was out and about.’

As he was cleaning the ice from the top of the gillnet, the bushes on the opposite bank rustled, and Andre emerged.

His face lit up when he saw Lin Chen.

"Hey!"

"Out catching fish this early?"

Lin Chen gave a casual nod and a grunt in greeting, then cut straight to the chase.

"Andre, what’s the status on hunting the Musk Ox you mentioned?"

"You found a herd of Musk Ox too?"

Andre yelled back as he stripped off his pants, shoes, and socks. He rubbed some snow over his body before holding his clothes aloft and slowly wading into the water.

It wasn’t the first time he’d seen it, but witnessing the man’s terrifying feat again, Lin Chen couldn’t help but suck in a sharp breath.

"Can’t you build a raft or something? It’s snowing, and just watching you get in the water is making me shiver."

"Hmm?"

Andre, now in the middle of the river, froze. "Oh, right. How did I not think of that?"

"..."

Lin Chen’s mouth twitched. He silently gave him a thumbs-up.

’The river was only about a meter deep at its most. A long wooden pole could easily be used as an oar to steer a raft.’

’Foreigners really are all brawn and no brains.’

Once Andre climbed out of the river, dried himself off with snow, and got dressed again, he rubbed his hands together with a chuckle and returned to their previous topic.

"The Musk Ox herds are supposed to live in the Arctic Tundra, in an area about one or two hours north of here—and I mean by car."

"It’s probably because of the snowfall. A few herds wandered near our area while searching for food."

"We’ve got the Yukon River here, plus lots of smaller tributaries. That means there’s lush moss, making it an ideal natural buffet for them. That’s why they’ve temporarily stopped here."

"’I see,’ Lin Chen said, nodding as if he were just figuring it out. ’How many were in the herd you found?’"

"About twenty or thirty. But they seem to have crossed the river recently, probably to find other nearby herds."

"Then they must have joined up with the herd I found. I’ve been watching that herd every day for the past week. It started with thirty or forty head and has now grown to seventy or eighty."

"Well, that’s a no-go then."

Andre spread his hands and shrugged decisively. "The fact that Musk Ox don’t run away makes it impossible to hunt them with primitive weapons. The only chance you have is when the herd is small."

"With a herd of seventy or eighty... forget the two of us, you could throw in the entire production crew and all the other contestants, and you still wouldn’t want to mess with them."

"Unless you have a gun."

"What if we use a trap?"

Lin Chen still hadn’t given up.

’He couldn’t help it. There were only two types of wild cattle in Alaska: Musk Ox and bison.’

’A bison weighing nearly a ton was out of the question, so he had to go for the easier target.’

"A trap? It could work, but it wouldn’t be very effective."

Andre wasn’t impatient. He patiently explained why, both for Lin Chen’s benefit and for the viewers at home.

"Think about it. Given a Musk Ox’s size, if you want to dig a pit trap it can’t climb out of, it would have to be at least three meters wide and two meters deep, right?"

"And with all the snow on the ground, just digging that one pit would take a whole day. What if the herd moves on in the meantime?"

"Second, in the winter, Musk Ox mainly eat moss and twigs from shrubs, though they’ll eat dry grass too. Any area they choose for a temporary habitat is going to be covered in moss and other plants. How are you going to lure them to your trap?"

"And finally, even if you did manage to get one into a trap, the rest of the herd would form their defensive circle around the pit. How are you supposed to break through that wall to kill and haul out a three- or four-hundred-kilogram animal?"

The three reasons Andre laid out sounded flawless, leaving almost no room for argument.

Lin Chen nodded silently, not pursuing the topic further. He looked as if he had given up on the idea.

’But that wasn’t true. There was one last method—the most common one, in fact.’

Seeing that Lin Chen seemed to take his words to heart, Andre patted his shoulder comfortingly.

"It’s alright, Lin. I get it. Almost every contestant comes here with Roland as their goal, trying to replicate or even surpass his achievements."

"You’re a rookie in the wild, but you’ve already managed to hunt a Black Bear. That’s incredible. Even I, an old Hunter with thirty years of experience, haven’t done as well as you."

"Hunting Musk Ox takes a lot of luck, and it’s especially tough in the winter. If you’re really interested, you can come back when it’s warmer. With the fame you’ll have after the show, getting a hunting permit will be easy."

"Enough about the Musk Ox," Lin Chen said, his eyes lingering on Andre for a moment. "Did you come over for a meal?"

"Yes!"

"What’s there to eat?"

"Uh... good question."

Andre stared with innocent blue eyes, blinked, and scratched the back of his head. "I was planning to come over first and see if I could hunt something, but I ran right into you instead."

"’Just so you know, I haven’t redeemed for anything new this time. I haven’t been hunting, so I don’t have the stock. If you’re hoping for a new dish, it’s pretty much impossible.’"

"’Besides, Robert announced a new rule. To balance the gap between contestants, the redemption prices for the top-ranked pros will go up. It’s to keep our lives from getting too comfortable.’"

"’As far as I know, it’s affecting me and Connor. Not sure about the other two.’"

"Oh, right," Lin Chen said, suddenly thinking of something. "Do you happen to know the general location of the carpenter and the doctor?"

"’Not too sure,’ Andre said, shaking his head and pointing northeast. ’I just know that when they were moved by helicopter, they headed that way after leaving my camp. But I don’t know who it was or how far they went.’"

Northeast?

’Isn’t that where the Musk Ox herd is?’

’He quickly realized that northeast from Andre’s shelter was likely also northeast or east of the Musk Ox herd’s location.’

’The Yukon River runs from southwest to northeast, so that contestant was probably on the same side of the river as him. That meant he wouldn’t need to cross.’

’Should I risk it and go have a look?’

’Right now, there were six wilderness contestants and four pros left in the game. Besides Andre and Connor, there were still two other pros, and five other wilderness contestants he hadn’t accounted for.’

’A two-in-seven chance. He probably wouldn’t win that gamble.’

’He didn’t think he was that lucky. Ever since he was a kid, nine times out of ten, any lottery ticket he bought—including the ones under bottle caps—was a dud. He only ever won a "free bottle" or a tiny cash prize on the rarest of occasions.’

’I’m not doing anything else, and I have to go check on the Musk Ox herd every day anyway. I can take the opportunity to search the area for signs of human activity. It’ll be worth it even if I just rule out one possibility.’

’If he really managed to find that contestant, he could find out the general location of one or even two others.’

At that thought, he couldn’t sit still any longer. He waved a hand at Andre.

"Go on back. You don’t have any new game, and I don’t have any new spices. You can probably replicate most of the things I’ve made for you before. Instead of wasting time, we should be preparing for winter."

With that, he neatly folded his gillnet, closed the door to his storage shed, and set off along the riverbank, heading northeast.

"Hey?"

Andre was still processing what had happened, but Lin Chen was already far in the distance.

He scratched his head again, glanced at Lin Chen’s retreating figure, then back toward the shelter.

’What was that about? He’s telling me to go back? Does he not want to team up this time?’

’Making his own food was out of the question, at least for the time being.’

’He’d tried over and over again himself these past two weeks, but unfortunately, cooking wasn’t something you could learn just by watching.’

’Even when Lin Chen had explained every step in painstaking detail, by the time Andre got back to his own shelter and picked up a knife, he’d have forgotten most of it.’

’The only things he’d managed to cook successfully were meat skewers and grouse roasted in a pit he’d dug.’

’As for anything else, like stews or stir-fries, he’d tried once and had the good sense to give up.’

’He had come over this time mainly hoping to learn a few more tricks from Lin Chen—ideally with some hands-on tutoring so he wouldn’t ’get amnesia’ the moment he got back to his own camp.’

He hesitated for a long moment, then abandoned the idea of helping Lin Chen catch fish to stock his larder.

"’Ah, forget it. I’ll just follow him and see what he’s up to,’ he muttered. ’It’s against the rules to help someone without an official agreement to cooperate, anyway.’"

The owner wasn’t home, and he’d feel awkward resting in another man’s shelter. He decided to just follow the kid and see what he was up to.

’If I can help him out, that would be best. Then he’ll have no reason to refuse to team up with me.’

Lin Chen had no idea that a pitiful man, tormented to tears by his own culinary failures, was now quietly trailing him.

He leaned forward slightly, trudging through the snow, one deep footprint after another. He mostly stuck close to the tree trunks as he moved.

It was a little trick he’d figured out over the last few days.

Trees grow on solid ground, and their roots hold the surrounding soil firmly in place, preventing hidden pits or uneven terrain.

By walking next to the trunks, he could not only use them for support but also be sure that the path underfoot was flat and safe.

After walking several hundred meters through the woods along the riverbank, he suddenly froze, hiding himself behind a tree trunk.

In the middle of the Yukon River not far away, four familiar, enormous figures stood, their gazes fixed on the dark shapes swimming ceaselessly beneath the surface.

"’A group of brown bears?!’"

Lin Chen took one look from a distance and immediately pulled his gaze away, a bitter smile forming in his thoughts.

’He hadn’t run into them for over a week. He’d almost started to think they’d gone into hibernation, but of course he had to run into them now, of all times.’

’Wait a second!’

He suddenly remembered something.

’The first time he’d encountered brown bears... hadn’t Andre been right there beside him?’