The Entire Mountain Is My Hunting Ground

Yesterday, Huang Gui had hunted with a blade.

Today, Zhao Jun fixed his bayonet and, leveling his rifle, charged straight for the wild boar.

He wasn’t doing this to one-up Huang Gui. It was just that the boar’s front and hind legs were injured, leaving it unable to stand. Facing the four dogs tearing at it, the beast was forced to lie on the snow, struggling and flailing.

The boar was down while the dogs were on their feet. Zhao Jun’s Daqing and White Dragon were massive dogs, each weighing over a hundred pounds. When they stood beside the boar, they were nearly as tall as it, obscuring most of its body from view.

In this situation, a gunshot could easily hit one of the dogs.

That was why Zhao Jun decided to try his own hand at hunting with a blade.

As Zhao Jun advanced with his bayonet, the flailing boar suddenly found a burst of strength. It used its two good legs to heave its body upward.

But with its front right leg and back left leg both injured, how could it possibly stand on just the remaining two?

The instant the boar lifted itself, Daqing and Da Huang, who were on the same side, yanked it back down.

The boar crashed to the ground, but its head was now facing Zhao Jun.

The moment the boar saw Zhao Jun, it let out a guttural roar. Its two good legs scrabbled at the snow as it tried to rise and attack him.

Just as the boar spotted Zhao Jun, the four dogs saw him too.

As the saying goes, a dog is emboldened by its master’s presence. With Zhao Jun’s arrival, the four dogs redoubled their attack. They sank their teeth into the boar and shook their heads violently, their entire bodies writhing with the effort.

Zhao Jun didn’t dodge or try to circle around behind it. Instead, he walked straight up to the furious boar’s face.

Daqing and White Dragon flanked the boar, each grabbing an ear and wrenching its head upward. Zhao Jun thrust his bayonet straight into the animal’s throat.

PFFT!

The blade sank into its throat.

He ripped it out.

SSSHHH...

The white blade went in, and the red blade came out! 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

The instant he pulled the bayonet from the boar’s throat, a jet of blood shot out like an arrow. Amidst the boar’s faint squeals, blood gushed from the wound in its neck.

In less than ten seconds, the boar’s cries ceased. Its head slumped, its snout drove into the snow, and it went still.

Zhao Jun held his rifle and wiped the bayonet clean against the boar’s hide, then folded it back into place.

Zhao Jun shouted over his shoulder, "Baoyu, gut it!"

"You got it!" Li Baoyu came running over eagerly, drawing his Invasion Blade from his belt as he moved.

Jiang Ming and Wei Lai followed, and together the three of them heaved the boar onto its back, its hooves pointing to the sky.

Li Baoyu cut open the boar’s torso, then looked to Zhao Jun. "Brother, how much should I feed ’em?"

Zhao Jun said, "Let ’em eat their fill. Don’t hold back."

Hearing this, Zhou Jianjun, who had just walked over, asked, "Xiaojun, if we let the dogs eat their fill, won’t they be too sluggish to run after the next boar?"

For a layman like Zhou Jianjun to know enough to say that, it was only because he’d heard it from Huang Gui the day before. He assumed Zhao Jun would immediately go after the boar that had injured the man, just as Huang Gui had done.

But he had clearly missed the conversation between Zhao Jun and Huang Gui just a short while ago.

Knowing his brother-in-law was a novice, Zhao Jun smiled. "Brother-in-law, my dogs haven’t been in the mountains for nearly two months. I need to let them limber up. Once they’re warmed up, we can go after that big solitary one."

"Oh." Zhou Jianjun nodded, only half-understanding. "So we’re not going after it today?"

Zhao Jun shook his head. "Not hunting it today. But we’ll scout around up here for a bit, look for a good spot to lay an ambush."

As soon as Zhao Jun said this, Jiang Ming asked from the side, "Little brother, your method is to have the dogs corner the prey. Why are you looking to set up a block?"

Zhao Jun replied, "Based on the size of its tracks, this boar must be nearly seven hundred pounds. You gentlemen couldn’t corner it with your pack of dogs, so how could I possibly manage with just four?"

Hearing Zhao Jun put it that way, Jiang Ming and the others felt their pride soothed.

But Zhao Jun wasn’t just being modest, nor was he trying to flatter them.

It was a known fact that if a wild boar doubled in size, its fighting strength would increase severalfold.

Daqing alone could certainly handle a sow of around one hundred and fifty pounds under normal circumstances.

But two dogs like Daqing would have absolutely no chance against a three-hundred-pound sow.

Huang Gui said, "Little brother, since you’ve brought it up, I won’t keep this from you. I’ve been wanting to say this since I ran into you this morning, but I didn’t know how to start."

"I saw it just now—that Hua Gou of yours has a vicious bite. If you had a few more dogs to back him up, you really could corner that boar."

Hearing this, Zhou Jianjun quickly asked, "Brother Huang, so where can we get more dogs?"

"That won’t work," Wei Lai said. "It’s not like over in Lingnan where Brother Huang is from. We have fewer hunters here, and not many dogs. They’re all wary of strangers. If you throw a bunch of unfamiliar dogs together, they’re bound to fight."

Just then, Zhao Jun raised his left hand, his index finger tracing the lay of the land. "I took a look at this part of the mountain yesterday," he said. "It’s all wide, gentle ridges. If that boar gets up to speed, you wouldn’t be able to stop it with fewer than twenty dogs.

"On top of that, these ridges are a mess. It’s all dense second-growth forest full of thorny bushes, crabapple thickets, and spiny aralia. The dogs won’t have room to dodge. They’ll just be waiting to get gored."

Wei Lai and the others weren’t novices like the men from the Zhou Family. As veteran hunters, they naturally understood exactly what Zhao Jun meant.

And as they thought about it, it dawned on them. Zhao Jun was right. The mountain was nothing but gentle, open ridges. For a charging boar, it would be a wide-open plain.