Chapter 373: Camp—Healing, Logging, and Rabbit-Catching!

"Bolu! How are you?" After decapitating the Northland Wolf that had been blinded, Jier and the other young Hunters gathered around.

Bolu's face was full of pain; his entire arm had been bitten and dragged by the Northland Wolf, and it had been repeatedly mauled right there, leaving it in tatters. At this moment, it was stuck in the sharp teeth of the wolf's maw, bleeding profusely.

"My arm, it's finished, it's finished, save me, save me." A lot of blood was flowing from the wound on Bolu's arm; his face was pale, and his voice was weak.

Seeing this, Jier hurriedly put down the weapon he was gripping tightly, pried the wolf's jaws open with one hand, and everyone worked together to extract the horrific, mangled arm from between the sharp teeth.

"It's turned into this." A young Hunter gritted his teeth as he looked at Bolu's arm, then heartbrokenly smashed his blood-stained fist hard against the snow, sending a few snowflakes flying: "How is he supposed to use a bow and arrow in the future?"

"Don't worry about that for now, he's bleeding. Quick, grip his injured arm tightly, it can't keep bleeding or he's a dead man!" After Jier finished speaking, he demonstrated how to control the blood loss from the wounded arm, and then he and two other Hunters lifted Bolu and moved him toward the carriage.

The other two Hunters gripped Bolu's elbow and armpit tightly, clamping down on the blood vessels to prevent blood loss.

This method was very effective; the dripping blood soon stopped. Although Bolu whispered that he was cold, everyone knew that Bolu, wearing thick hunting gear, wasn't actually cold—it was because he had lost so much warm blood that his whole body felt freezing.

The group worked together to quickly lift him to the side of the carriage, opened the wooden board at the rear, and sent him inside.

First, they used a rope instead of human hands to bind the arm tightly to prevent bleeding. Immediately after, the veteran Hunters took out the Ointment prepared in advance from under the carriage driver's seat. After cleaning Bolu's mangled arm with water everyone had been carrying, they applied the light green diluted Ointment onto the arm where the muscles had been torn and stitched back together.

"Ah!!! It hurts!!" Bolu roared in pain.

The two veteran Hunters looked happy, and said in unison: "It's good that it hurts, it means your arm isn't finished yet! It can be saved!"

Bolu cursed incessantly; he truly couldn't bear the pain, and not caring that the two veteran Hunters were his elders, he let out all sorts of foul language.

No one paid him any mind; everyone watched nervously as the two experienced veteran Hunters treated Bolu's wound.

Along with the hemostatic Ointment, there was a roll of clean cotton cloth. After unfolding it, they used a clean, sharp blade to cut it and wrapped it around Bolu's arm.

Finally, they tied a knot to secure it, and after waiting for a while, they untied the rope that had been binding the arm.

With the very effective Ointment stopping the bleeding, although Bolu was still shouting in pain, his life and a good portion of his arm were finally saved.

One person stayed to look after him, while the others walked out of the carriage and began to discuss Bolu's situation.

"There's no problem now. Although the injury was like that, at least the arm was saved, so he won't have to be amputated and become a cripple." A veteran Hunter wiped the bloodstains off his hands with accumulated snow.

Only then did everyone notice that they were all more or less stained with blood, so they all imitated him, using the snow at their feet to wipe their palms.

Another veteran Hunter looked at the Northland Wolves that had been killed in the vicinity: "I didn't expect them to try to ambush us; it seems those beasts are cunning. Hmm, and they had no other way to retreat. Being able to kill so many Northland Wolves in one go this time is all thanks to Jier's skill."

Jier pulled his Long Sword slightly from his waist, letting everyone see the Long Sword, which now looked ordinary.

"Is it a one-time use item?"

Jier shook his head: "No, it needs to be exposed to the sun."

Everyone looked up at the sky and found that although it had stopped snowing, it was still overcast, and there was no sun at all overhead.

The veteran Hunter waved his hand, telling the young men to drag the dead Northland Wolves over and try to recover the Arrows they had fired earlier. Now that Bolu was seriously injured, they had to rest here for a while, at least to light a fire and keep the wounded man warm.

Jier went to the place where Bolu had been dragged by the Northland Wolf, wiped the axe he had left there, and put it on his back. He also moved his Shield from his belt to hang on his back. Then, he grabbed a Northland Wolf's head with one hand and used his shoulder to carry the wolf carcass back.

These Northland Wolves were not light; apart from Jier, no one else was carrying the wolf carcasses on their shoulders—they were all grabbing the wolves by their tails and dragging the killed Northland Wolves to the carriage.

"Skin all these damn things for me!" The veteran Hunter rubbed his waist and said resentfully to the young men.

So, everyone drew their Daggers and short axes, cut open the Northland Wolves from the side of their abdomens, and carefully peeled off the Wolf Skin. Another veteran Hunter cleared the snow from the ground near the carriage, lit a fire, and then brought Bolu down from the carriage to warm himself by the fire.

"How is it? Are you still cold now?" The veteran Hunter poked the fire to make the flames burn brighter.

"Much better, not cold anymore, it's just that my arm hurts so much." Bolu let out a soft, hissing sound of pain, but he stubbornly endured most of it; after all, even though everyone was busy, they were all secretly watching his condition. The proud Bolu didn't want to leave everyone with an image of weakness.

"It's good that it hurts. Remember, don't sleep for now, stay awake, and eat something."

After a moment of silence, Bolu still asked about the condition of his arm: "My hand?"

The veteran Hunter thought for a moment and said: "Hmm, it's saved. If we send you back, we might be able to find the church to heal it. But this is for Knight Lanisha to decide; we still have to deliver the supplies to the Supply Point Camp first, that is the most important thing right now."

"I know. Let me lie down for a while." Bolu's expression changed, and finally, he leaned against the carriage wheel, tightening his cold-resistant hunting Cloak with his other uninjured hand.

"Whew!" After Jier finished processing a wolf, he took the Long Spear removed from the Northland Wolf by a companion and whistled to his horse.

"Whinny." Soon, his horse trotted over. There was a ring of snow hanging around its mouth; it was obvious that it had just secretly tried to clear the snow on the ground to find hay to eat.

"You only know how to eat, you aren't hurt, are you?" After the horse came over, Jier touched its ears and checked its condition.

Good, the Wolf Pack hadn't attacked it just now. Those wolves were specifically targeting the Human Hunters.

It seems that Knight Lanisha organizing winter Hunter crusades for several years has taught these clever beasts to ambush in advance. To be honest, if it weren't for the veteran Hunters having sharp eyes and discovering the abnormality of the snow on the tree branches on the hillside by the road in advance, they might have been ambushed by these beasts.

In that case, it certainly wouldn't have been just one person injured.

After processing the wolf skins, everyone ate something by the fire, put the gradually freezing wolf skins on the carriage, and the group set off on their journey again.

"Jier, why did you keep this wolf head?" In the carriage, a young Hunter held a wolf head that Jier had decapitated and asked Jier, who was following behind the carriage.

"Ah, that, I have a friend who likes to collect the heads of monsters and fierce beasts. I thought it would be a pity to throw it away, so I wanted to take it back as a gift for him."

"There are people who like this stuff? That's really strange." The Hunter muttered.

Beside him, a veteran Hunter resting in the carriage explained: "Don't be surprised, many rich people quite like this stuff. They don't have the guts to hunt in the dangerous, uninhabited Forest, so they have to collect some animal heads from us. However, Jier, it's fine now because the temperature is low, but once you get to the Yingdi, it's warm in there, you can't take this thing directly inside, it will stink after a few days!"

"Then what should I do?" Jier was dumbfounded; he thought it would be fine in such a cold winter.

"You dig out the flesh and blood inside the head, leaving only the fur and bones, and then you can let the other party find something to refill it themselves." The veteran Hunter spoke eloquently.

"Alright! I'll do as you say. Why don't you throw the head over, and I'll process it with my Dagger while on horseback."

After setting off again, their group finally arrived at the Supply Point Camp on the second day.

Knight Lanisha had not yet returned from Umi Lake Village. After Jier and the others arrived at the camp watchtower, they hurriedly unloaded the supplies and moved them to the small warehouse on the second floor. The injured Bolu was ordered by everyone to rest, so he had no choice but to stay in his room and sleep.

Considering the situation ahead, the four veteran Hunters asked the young men to go to the nearby Forest to cut down some thick trees. The camp had plenty of tools, so they could get the resources needed for the Forward Camp ready before the Knight returned with people.

After all, the Supply Point Camp was still some distance away from truly penetrating deep into the northern Forest; it was closer to Umi Lake and still some distance from the Forest that the Hunters would enter later.

So, Jier took three young Hunters to cut trees at the edge of a Forest that protruded from the whole area in the distance.

They had the reconnaissance and warning from the watchtower in the distance behind them. If the people on the watchtower saw any danger, they would blow a whistle to remind Jier and the others to retreat to the watchtower immediately.

Dressed properly and carrying the two axes specifically for logging, Jier left the camp, first sharpened the slightly rusty logging axes on a nearby stone, and then set off.

Logging was not very difficult; Hunters who often wandered and hunted in the Forest mostly knew how to log.

First, it was choosing a suitable large tree.

Trees that were too thin wouldn't work; after all, even if you cut them down, you couldn't use them, and you would waste your physical strength and time for nothing. Secondly, old trees that were too thick wouldn't work either, not only because trees that were too thick were difficult to fell, but also because in such deep mountains and old forests, everyone was afraid that such old trees had mysterious powers, and it wouldn't be good if you cut them down and suffered their retaliation.

The people, including the Hunter, all believe this, and Jier believes it too; after all, this is not his previous life, and this otherworld truly has all sorts of strange or inconceivable things.

Furthermore, the interiors of some old trees are mostly occupied by animals, which have hollowed out parts of the trunks to serve as a home for their families; if you were to cut down such a tree, you would have to be prepared to be attacked by these small or large animals.

The species of the tree is also very important; some large trees look lush and leafy with good growth, but their wood is soft, or contains too much moisture, or perhaps contains a lot of Grease, none of which are suitable for making things.

One must select good material with little moisture in the trunk, a straight trunk, and dense wood; it would be even better if the wood itself could repel insects, as this would prevent it from being eaten by worms or ants after long-term use.

However, Jier and the others are only making some simple things, so they just chose the wood casually.

The few of them came to the outermost edge of a protruding part of the Forest and directly selected a large tree as thick as a waist to be their target for felling.

Next was the second point of logging: they had to choose a suitable felling angle so that the tree would fall outward when it came down; this way, after simply trimming the excess branches, they could drag the entire trunk backward to the outside of the Yingdi using horses.

On this point, Jier had no experience, so he followed the instructions of a Hunter, gripped his axe, and began to chop away with a rhythmic grunt.

To decide where it should fall, one must chop more during the first wave of axe swings; this way, when the opposite side of the trunk has also been chopped about halfway, the side with the larger notch will naturally fall in that direction.

Of course, it is better and safer to tie a rope to the tree before felling and then have people pull the large tree down once the chopping is nearly finished.

But Jier and the others, firstly, did not bring such long and thick hemp ropes specifically for logging, and secondly, this safe logging method requires quite a few hands, and it would be difficult for the four of them to pull down a large tree after simply chopping it.

Perhaps Lanisha the Knight could do it.

But could one possibly let a Knight do this kind of work?

Of course not.

Thus, after Jier finished chopping his side in one go, he took off his Helmet while panting, hung it on his waist, and took deep breaths of the cold air.

"Jier, look at your head, it's steaming!" his companions saw the heat dissipating from between Jier's hair and all laughed as they teased him.

"Heh heh, you'll be the same in a moment, who are you laughing at?" Jier replied; swinging an axe at full capacity like this, while tiring, was indeed a very good method of exercise. It not only exercised his body but also allowed him to spontaneously master several techniques for swinging an axe horizontally during the continuous swings.

Soon, Jier learned the technique of coordinating body breathing with axe swings from his companion who was chopping the other side of the trunk.

Breathing did not affect the movement of the arms, and it was not like Jier, who swung the axe continuously in one breath; instead, the two of them used one logging axe each in a rhythmic, back-and-forth manner to chop at one side of the large tree.

"Tree Fell! Watch out!"

Everyone heard the crackling sound of the last bit of wood on the large trunk breaking, so they all hid in the safe spots they had scouted beforehand to prevent being crushed by the falling trunk or scratched by branches.

Boom! The crackling sound of branches breaking rang out continuously.

The large tree fell.

The top of the tree fell toward the outside of the Forest, and a large amount of accumulated snow was blown away by the falling tree; the snowflakes flew, stinging people's faces.

Once the snowflakes floating in the air settled again, Jier and the other three walked over and used axes to chop off the branches. The thick, usable branches were taken one by one to a cleared open space outside.

The other small branches were also taken over; these could be used to build a fire for warmth and cooking, or to make a Torch.

Split one end of a thick small branch, then insert two thin branches in a cross shape, then have the spread-out branches hold more material, fill it with animal fat or Grease, and finally fill the center of the Torch with some flammable things.

After clearing away the branches other than the trunk, Jier and the others chopped the trunk into sections at three-meter intervals; otherwise, the heavy trunk could not be moved by either human or horse power.

"Jier, look quickly, it's a rabbit!" A companion suddenly pointed to a patch of ground crushed by the large trunk not far away; under the ground covered by snow, a nest of gray rabbits, frightened by the falling tree, carefully poked their heads out from their burrows.

The surrounding snow had been blown away, which was how they saw this rabbit hole; otherwise, with the thick snow on the ground, it would have been impossible to discover the rabbits.

The companion was a Hunter, so naturally, he did not need to do the hunting himself. Sure enough, following two sounds of a Bowstring vibrating, the heads of the gray rabbits that had poked out from two very close burrow exits were each struck by an arrow.

"Ha, how about eating this tonight! We can just skin them and make a pouch for Bolu to hang around his neck," the young Hunter said very happily.

He grabbed the rabbits by their ears and pulled them out in one go.

Interestingly, he then lay down at the entrance of the rabbit burrow and used his ear to listen inside.

"What's wrong, is there a girl inside calling for you?" Jier squatted beside him and teased.

"No girl, but there's still a nest of Xiao Tu Zi." After saying this, he climbed up, rummaged through the chopped-off branches, and found a thin, flexible branch.

He used a Dagger to cut one end of the branch and whittled a wooden hook.

Jier squatted and watched his performance.

This young Hunter reached the long branch into the rabbit hole, fiddled with it back and forth, and finally even stuffed his entire arm into the rabbit hole.

After a while, the branch with the wooden hook actually poked out from a hole to the side.

"Wrong, wrong! It came out the side!" Jier hurriedly reminded him.

"Is that so? Looks like I should have gone from the other direction just now." After saying this, he pulled out his arm and then reached the branch into the rabbit hole again.

Jier waited for him for a while, then saw him suddenly laugh.

"Ha, caught one. Let's go!" Following the movement, he pulled the branch out of the rabbit hole.

Jier saw that on the end of the branch with the wooden hook, a rabbit not much smaller than the gray rabbit that had been shot was hanging.

"Rabbits are always in nests, there must be more." He grabbed the struggling Xiao Tu Zi, removed the wooden hook from its fur, then snapped the rabbit's neck and threw it to Jier.

Jier caught the rabbit and pinned the two ears of this smaller rabbit to his belt. The two largest rabbits had their ears tied together, and they were draped over his shoulders, one in front and one in back.

He continued to squat on the side, watching his companion's performance while waiting for the other two companions to drive the three horses over to haul the wood: "I want to see how many rabbits you can hook out using this method!"

"Hahahaha, then you'd better be prepared to be surprised; I'm not bragging, but this year I've hooked out more than thirty in one go like this. Although the tools were better," the young Hunter said confidently.