Culinary God in Wilderness

"They gathered here last night."

Following the tracks for about half an hour, Andre pointed to a clearing in the forest ahead, then gestured in a specific direction.

"When a wolf pack gathers in the middle of the night, it’s kind of like humans mobilizing an army or holding a pre-battle meeting. They use intel brought back by their scouts to decide which target to attack."

"Obviously, they ended up choosing this direction, not us."

Andre was truly an experienced wilderness survival expert. He easily pieced together the wolf pack’s movements from the night before, relying solely on the jumbled tracks on the ground.

After following the tracks a little further, Lin Chen’s nose twitched. He caught a faint, foul, fishy smell.

Not the stench of rot, but the kind of odor that comes from internal organs.

"See? This is the result of their work last night."

Andre pointed ahead with his hunting bow. On the grass, a dozen or so meters away, lay a carcass picked clean to the bone. The surrounding area was covered in dark red blood, with some leftover fur and viscera discarded nearby.

"A deer?"

Lin Chen had immediately noticed the curved antlers growing on its large skull.

But looking at the size of the skeleton, it clearly wasn’t a moose.

Andre’s gaze swept over the scattered fur on the ground a few times before he suddenly picked up a tuft with some white hair.

"It’s a white-tailed deer. I see. No wonder the pack was so cautious with their hunt."

"A white-tailed deer?"

"Yep. Alaska is a paradise for deer. Moose, reindeer, elk, red deer... there are at least seven or eight different species, and the white-tailed deer is one of them."

"They’re medium-sized and tend to be solitary, especially the adult bucks. The does usually live with their fawns, and they’ll hide them in dense thickets while foraging."

"They’re a very cautious species. The does will even eat their fawns’ droppings to eliminate any scent of their presence. They’re also fast runners with quick reflexes, which makes up for their solitary habits."

Andre knew Lin Chen didn’t have much wilderness survival experience. Building a shelter and cooking were relatively simple, but hunting was an incredibly complex skill. It was impossible to master without years of dedicated study.

That’s why Andre explained everything in such detail. He wanted Lin Chen to be able to find as many prey trails as possible so he wouldn’t be forced to quit the competition early from hunger.

’He wanted to keep eating for a few more weeks!’

"The wolf packs around here can take down behemoths like North American Bison and moose that weigh nearly a ton. For them to mobilize their entire pack just to hunt a single white-tailed deer... you can just imagine how cautious and tricky these animals are."

Judging by its size, this unlucky fellow probably weighed around 200 kilograms. Take away the inedible parts like bones and fur, and you’re left with just over a hundred pounds of meat—just enough for the pack to eat its fill.

Lin Chen nodded firmly, committing the characteristics and habits of the white-tailed deer and the wolf pack to memory.

After confirming the wolf pack had moved on, the two of them stopped tracking and headed toward the Yukon River.

With Andre leading the way, there was no need to worry about getting lost. Lin Chen focused all his attention on observing their surroundings, and he actually spotted quite a few good things.

But since they had to wade across the river to dig for potatoes today, they couldn’t possibly carry any more supplies. It would be just as well to come back and gather them tomorrow.

Walking one after the other, it didn’t take them long to reach the bank of the Yukon River. From there, they moved upstream along the bank, which would take them back to where they had met the day before.

The journey was much longer than they’d expected. Along the way, they chatted idly, sharing bits of knowledge the other didn’t have.

"Hey, look what we have here!"

As they passed a shallow stretch full of gravel, Andre suddenly pointed to a sparse white sea at the edge of the forest and exclaimed, his face full of smiles.

"When I was a kid, there was a field of dandelions just like this next to my house. In the summer, whenever a breeze blew, they’d all fly up in big clouds, just like in the movies. It was a beautiful sight."

This dandelion field didn’t have much white fluff left; it only appeared so white because of the sheer number of them.

While Andre was lost in his fond childhood memories, Lin Chen walked over to a dandelion, bent down, stuck his fingers into the soil where the root met the earth, and with a firm twist, easily plucked the entire plant out whole.

He snapped off the two lonely-looking stems in the middle, leaving only the key-like, serrated leaves.

"This stuff is great."

"..."

Andre’s smile froze on his face. "Th-this stuff is edible?"

"Not only is it edible, you can even eat it raw. It has high nutritional and medicinal value—it can fight cancer, reduce inflammation, kill germs, and relieve swelling. Of course, to be on the safe side, it’s best to boil it in water before eating, since it’s not cultivated."

"Oh my God, is there anything you Da Xia People don’t eat? Why would you even think of eating dandelions??"

"Because of war," Lin Chen said flatly, the single sentence instantly shutting Andre up.

The water level of the Yukon River had clearly dropped a lot today, and the places that were submerged yesterday were now exposed again.

The gravelly shallows, in particular, were piled high with the carcasses of Red Salmon. They emitted a putrid stench under the baking sun, attracting many scavenger birds to linger for long periods.

These were salmon that had died naturally after spawning. It was a fate sealed in their genes.

Even though he understood this in his heart, witnessing the tragic sight firsthand still made Lin Chen feel a tightness in his chest.

He stuffed the dandelion leaves in his hand into Andre’s arms. Just as he lifted his foot to move on, a dark shape moving in the shallows nearby caught his eye.

He thought his eyes were playing tricks on him and instinctively looked in that direction.

One look, and he froze on the spot, his raised foot hovering in mid-air, refusing to come down.

Andre turned the dandelion leaves over in his hands a few times. Without the white fluff on top, he really wasn’t very familiar with the remaining part of the plant.

After committing it to memory, he casually tossed it aside. When he turned his head, he saw Lin Chen frozen in a strange posture.

"What are you—???"

The words had barely left his mouth when warning bells went off in his mind. His sharp Hunter’s instincts immediately locked onto the dark shape ahead.

The moment he saw the creature, Andre froze too, his breathing becoming faint.

"A gr-grizzly bear?"

Both of them had been so captivated by the sea of dandelions that they had completely failed to notice a behemoth lying on the rocky beach not far away.

The lower half of the grizzly’s body was submerged in the river. Its two massive paws were holding a salmon, which it was leisurely gnawing on, looking for all the world like it was enjoying a nice morning tea.