Chapter 431: Tiechui Cunzi, The Boar Hunt

The next day, the group continued on their way.

After a simple meal early in the morning, they mainly focused on feeding and watering the horses pulling the carts; since everyone was traveling by horse and carriage, these silent animal friends were the main force of this journey.

The drivers had received a good night's rest, so they were in high spirits in the morning, keeping a steady pace and maintaining a uniform formation. However, the young warriors sitting in the carriages were exhausted and weary, feeling even more tired than when they had traveled on foot before.

Although they weren't walking, sitting in a carriage was a very tiring and grueling affair. Especially as the carriages vibrated with the undulating terrain; whenever the wheels rolled over a small stone, the entire carriage would jolt violently, startling the dozing warriors awake.

Seeing this, Jier was helpless. Although he had some knowledge and ideas about automotive suspension from his past life, the current conditions of the caravan made it impossible to improve the shock absorption of their carriages at all.

He could only tell the warriors to rest as much as possible when they made camp at night, and to reasonably arrange for short, frequent shifts of sentry duty so that every warrior could get a little more rest at night, ensuring they would be in good spirits during the day.

Furthermore, when they stayed at inhabited villages later on, they wouldn't need so many people on sentry duty, and if they could have a soft bed to rest on, surely the warriors would get better sleep and enjoy more comfortable resting conditions, right?

Just like that, every two hours of travel, they would stop for one hour to let the warhorses and pack horses rest, and to repair the parts of the carriages damaged by the rapid travel and vibrations.

Before dark that day, the group arrived at Tiechui Cunzi, which they had visited before.

"Looking at the sky today, everyone should just rest here in Tiechui Cunzi. Anyway, this is an uninhabited village; all the villagers have gone to take refuge in the Northern Border's Yemei Town."

Jier called out, letting the caravan move into Tiechui Cunzi.

Of course, the first thing to do upon entering the village was for everyone to prepare for battle, guarding against the possibility of parasitic vines lying in ambush.

But the group had overthought it. Compared to the uninhabited southern villages, Yemei Town, with its large population, was clearly the preferred destination for those alien monsters. In the empty village, there was only a sounder of wild boars and a few foxes taking advantage of the lack of people, bumping and turning around the village, searching for food everywhere.

The foxes were more alert; seeing the human carriage caravan early on, they tucked their tails and snuck away through the gaps in the village wall, not even giving the boar family a hint. As a result, by the time Jier and his men entered the village and searched in all directions, these wild boars, which had been grunting and rooting through the ground for food, finally thought to run away.

"Ha, don't let them get away! We'll eat this tonight!"

Jier shouted excitedly. He jumped onto a high point of a villager's house and used his loud voice to command everyone in the team who had scattered to hunt the boars.

"Priest! Priest! Those boars are about to run away from your side, hurry and stop them!" Jier called out loudly, while directing Bata'er Jiaoshi, who was closest, to intercept the boar family trying to escape the village.

Bata'er Jiaoshi looked helpless. He was a priest of the Agricultural God Church, familiar with farming and animal husbandry, but hunting wild beasts was not within the duties of the Agricultural God. Hunting animals to make a living went against the doctrine; compared to hunting, the Agricultural God and the Church encouraged believers to raise and breed animals.

He was helpless, but he also wanted to eat something good today, so he stood alone at the village entrance, took a stance, and scared off the boar family that didn't dare to approach.

"Grunt, grunt—"

The boar family didn't dare to charge at the human emitting a cyan glow, so they turned and scattered, trying to find a path to run out in other directions of the village.

"Siter! Shoot your arrows quickly, there's a small one running to your left!" Jier commanded loudly. He didn't join in personally, because if he did, this family of boars would be finished in a few strikes. These boars could also provide the team with some combat training, as wild boars were indeed very fierce animals; even for fully armed human warriors, it was hard to say who would win or lose in a fight against an adult wild boar.

Hearing Jier's warning, Xueya Siter immediately flipped and climbed onto the roof of a nearby mud house. Only after getting up did he take the crossbow used by the Kendall Militia, which Jier had lent him, from his back.

He stared unhurriedly at the fleeing small boar with his eyes, while his hands skillfully took out a crossbow bolt, cocked the crossbow, loaded the bolt, and finally raised the crossbow to aim.

By this time, the small boar had already run far away, and it looked like it was about to turn a corner and go behind the house in front.

Xueya Siter, however, held the crossbow in his hands steadily, resting one end of the crossbow against his shoulder, while one hand firmly gripped the front of the crossbow, and his right hand rested slightly on the lower part, lightly touching the trigger mechanism.

Seeing his chance, he lightly pressed the trigger. His shoulder jolted, and the crossbow bolt turned into a poisonous snake that had long been coiled and ready, tracing an almost straight flight path and piercing the neck of the fleeing boar in the distance with a 'pfft' sound.

"Oink—oink—"

The small boar let out a sharp scream. Because it was in a hurry to escape, it had been running at full speed, but it was suddenly struck by a cold arrow and instantly flipped over, crashing into the wall.

The juvenile boar seemed to have been hit in a vital part of its body, so it cried out miserably, immediately attracting two furious female boars from the side, which rushed straight toward the injured piglet.

Seeing this, Xueya Siter immediately climbed nimbly to the roof of a sturdier, taller house nearby.

Don't think that boars can't get onto a one-story roof. In such a remote little village, villagers built every house low to save on building materials. With a boar's running and jumping power, it wasn't impossible for them to sprint and climb onto a one-story roof.

For his own safety, Xueya Siter moved to a safer place early on.

Sure enough, the two arriving female boars were furious. After rooting at the injured cub and discovering that its breath was fading rapidly along with its wails, they rushed straight at the human who had wounded the cub.

The low villager houses couldn't stop the two boars at all. They were smart; one leaned against the wall, using its own body as a temporary step for its companion to charge onto the one-story villager roof.

But Xueya Siter laughed out loud, because he was on the roof of a taller house next to it. Now, this female beast, eager for revenge, could only fall into his trap.

"Take this arrow!"

After saying that, he pulled the trigger and released another crossbow bolt he had already prepared.

But this shot didn't hit accurately. Although it pierced into the boar's body at such a close distance, it didn't hit a vital spot, only hitting the abdomen.

Although wounding the viscera in the abdomen was a serious injury, for a wild beast with such tenacious vitality as a boar, an abdominal wound didn't affect their combat effectiveness in the short term.

"Are you okay? Siter, do you want me to find two people to help you?" Jier's shout came, which made Xueya Siter feel a bit embarrassed.

He hurriedly shouted: "No! Not at all! I can handle two boars by myself. There's another big one heading that way; you just remind the people over there. I don't need any help here!"

He was being stubborn, while the injured female boar below had also gone mad, fiercely slamming its front tusks against the wall of the house where Xueya Siter was.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The two-story villager farmhouse, built of sturdy wood and local mud bricks, was still quite solid. Although the few impacts from this mad boar slightly shook the second floor of the house, its own pair of short tusks were broken off, and its sturdy, thick nose, used for finding food, was also dripping with blood, the skin and flesh torn open. Yet it stubbornly continued to slam its body against the house, seemingly thinking that if it could knock down the human house in front of it, the human above could be killed by a few of its thrusts?

It wasn't that easy. Xueya Siter indeed didn't need anyone's help. He took his time cocking the crossbow, took out a new bolt, and even blew on the tip of the bolt, blessing himself for good luck, before loading it and aiming at the mad boar just a few meters below him.

"Fury, while it brings strength, also causes one to lose judgment!"

Saying this, he pulled the trigger. Whoosh—

This time, the arrow accurately hit the side of the boar's skull.

The thick, coarse skull couldn't stop the penetration of the metal arrowhead on the crossbow bolt; as it broke through the skull, it simultaneously shredded the brain behind it.

No wailing, no struggling.

Thud!

The adult female boar, weighing at least over a hundred kilograms, fell to the ground while charging and building up momentum. Its head had been blown open, but its body was still alive at that moment; the slightly twitching hooves proved it.

Seeing this, Jier also called out a compliment to Xueya Siter from afar.

On the other side, however, Weier faced a great crisis, because the liege of this boar family—the only adult male boar—had come straight for him.

And it charged directly at him.

Weier originally didn't want to participate in this meaningless hunting activity, but Knight Jier seemed very excited about it, commanding and encouraging the warriors in the caravan to hunt this small group of boars without joining in himself.

In order to win the Knight's friendship, Weier jumped off the carriage, drew his Steel Sword, and prepared to defeat the sturdiest boar to receive the Knight's praise and commendation.

That was the plan, but in reality, when the only adult male boar, the sturdiest of the group, charged at him, Weier panicked.

Because he couldn't think of how, with just the ordinary Steel Longsword in his hand, he could fight and defeat this furious beast, weighing two or three hundred kilograms, covered in coarse black hair and thick mud, charging at him at a speed comparable to a warhorse's sprint?

"Quick, dodge! Get out of the way! That guy from the south!"

Jier shouted urgently from a high vantage point. Reminded by this cry, Weier finally realized he could not meet force with force, nor could he stand there blankly thinking about whether he could block or knock down this wild boar; he should dodge! Dodge! Get out of the way!

At the critical moment, Weier dodged to the side, finally moving out of the way before the wild boar's tusks could toss him into the air.

But it wasn't over. With a boom, the male wild boar smashed through a low mud-brick farm wall behind Weier, but it clearly didn't suffer any injuries. Shaking its head and body to shed the scattered mud bricks and dust, the sturdy and fierce male wild boar turned around and accelerated again, charging toward the Swordsman Weier.

This time, there was no need for Jier to remind him. The agile Weier dodged to the side, and while evading the wild boar's charge, he used the Long Sword in his hand to stab the wild boar's head.

"No, oh my, its head is as hard as armor, why are you hitting its head, Weier? Stab its side, the abdomen! The abdomen!"

Not far away, the shout of the Knight Jier arrived in time, which made Weier realize that the target he was fighting was not a Human; the Sword Technique he used to deal with Humans was of little use, and there was a different way to fight beasts.

Moreover, the tip of the Long Sword he used to poke the wild boar's head only went in halfway, scratching the wild boar's skull and slicing off half an ear, without causing any further damage.

No, it should be said that it actually had the opposite effect; the injured male wild boar became even fiercer, its wild nature stirred up.

With a rumbling sound, the wild boar didn't hit anything and suffered a minor injury itself, then crashed into the courtyard of another Villager's house.

Obstructed by the low earthen wall of the courtyard and the Thorn Hedge on top, Weier could not determine where the wild boar had gone for a moment, and could only guess from the various noises in the courtyard that the wild boar was charging around inside.

"What to do? What to do? How can I defeat such a beast?"

Weier muttered to himself, his nerves highly tense. While holding the Long Sword and standing in place, he leaned forward to look into the courtyard, searching for the tracks of that male wild boar. Jier, meanwhile, was watching Weier from a high point not far away, somewhat failing to understand what was wrong with this guy.

Facing a sturdy wild boar, one should either look for an open space or a narrow place that could restrict the opponent; what was the meaning of just standing there blankly? Was he relying on his own superior skills?

One must know, if this wild boar were to butt Jier even once, Jier couldn't take it. Weier was just an ordinary Human; how could he have such confidence to deal with a wild boar?

Jier shrugged, deciding to watch this superb hunting performance by Weier.

The wild boar crashed around randomly in the opposite farm courtyard for a while before stopping its destruction. At the same time, because it no longer made any sound, Weier outside the courtyard could not figure out the wild boar's current position or movements.

He had a faint premonition of danger, so he extended his Long Sword forward along with his arm, turned his body sideways, crouched slightly with his legs, and his breathing gradually became rapid, preparing himself for a full-scale battle.

Suddenly, a rapid sound of hooves stepping rang out in the courtyard, followed by a boom, and the sturdy wild boar smashed through the courtyard wall again, charging straight at the Human Weier.

"Turn to the side and stab the abdomen, turn to the side and stab the abdomen..."

Weier kept muttering, his eyes fixed on the wild boar charging rapidly toward him.

He maintained his position without moving, looking as if he had been scared silly. The companions nearby who were paying attention to this side exclaimed at the sight. Jier also frowned at the first moment, but soon Jier chose to trust Weier, believing that this young Swordsman with a story wouldn't be so pathetic as to be killed by a wild boar in a remote little village.

Therefore, Jier did not call out a reminder as he had last time, and he himself did not move, just watching as things unfolded.

"Careful!"

"Dodge!"

The surrounding companions exclaimed one after another.

At this moment, Weier, whose attention was entirely on the charging wild boar, was completely unaware of the warnings from others. As he controlled his body, just as the wild boar was about to hit him, he performed the most thrilling side-dodge, evading the wild boar's frontal charge.

At the same time, Weier thrust his Long Sword with one hand, piercing the wild boar's flank from the side. He was just about to grip the sword hilt with both hands and exert force together to widen the wound in the wild boar's flank and cause great damage to the beast.

But his plan was good, yet when it came to implementation, there appeared some 'slight' deviations.

He had overlooked that his opponent was not a Human, but an injured beast weighing two or three hundred kilograms, moving on four hooves trampling the ground.

Therefore, the moment he dodged to the side, thrust his sword into the wild boar's flank, gripped the hilt with both hands, and stood firm intending to widen the wound, Weier was dragged away by the wild boar, which did not stop its straight-ahead charge.

"Eh? Eh eh eh eh???"

Weier held his sword hilt tightly without letting go, and the Long Sword was firmly stuck into the wild boar's flank, so as the wild boar continued its charge without stopping, Weier was dragged along and carried far away.

"Hey!"

Jier slapped his forehead, feeling that he had overestimated this guy Weier. This guy might be a good hand at fighting people, but he was clearly lacking in experience in confronting beasts.

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? (End of this chapter)