Chapter 572: Tiger meat is not to be eaten

After Wang Cai Mi left, Li Long chatted with his family for a while longer, then drove the tractor to the Old Ma Hao.

He wanted to check on Uncle Lao Luo.

The tractor was parked, but Uncle Lao Luo hadn't come out, which surprised Li Long a bit. He pushed the door open and went in, finding Uncle Lao Luo sitting on a chair with a somewhat pained expression.

"What's wrong, Uncle Lao Luo? Are you sick? Let's go, I'll take you to the township to see a doctor!" Li Long said immediately.

"No, no, no, I'm not sick," Uncle Lao Luo hurriedly stood up and said, "I'm really not sick, don't you worry."

"But I saw you looking like you were in pain just now..." Li Long asked, puzzled.

"Sigh, I got butted by that male roe deer," Uncle Lao Luo gave a bitter smile. "The deer in our enclosure had their velvet antlers cut off, but the roe deer's velvet was too short, so we didn't bother with it at the time. As a result, once winter arrived, that velvet turned into horns."

"It butted you?" Li Long asked.

"Yeah," Uncle Lao Luo said. "I went to feed them early this morning, and I had to clear out the leftover grass stalks from yesterday's feeding before entering the enclosure. I didn't watch out and got butted over, and I twisted my arm when I fell."

"Then I'll go slaughter it now. If this thing dares to butt people, it can't be kept." Li Long stood up; slaughtering a roe deer was still very easy.

"No, no, no, you can't slaughter it," Uncle Lao Luo hurriedly dissuaded him. "We still need to keep it for breeding."

"It's not like it's the only male roe deer."

"It's just the most aggressive one, so the offspring it produces are good," Uncle Lao Luo said, being a professional. "We have to keep it."

"Then we'll saw off its horns." Li Long felt that some restrictions had to be placed on it; otherwise, if it injured Uncle Lao Luo again later, then they might as well not raise them at all and just slaughter them all.

There were still over a dozen wild boars in this enclosure.

Uncle Lao Luo wanted to help, but Li Long stopped him. He wasn't even afraid of the large red deer, so how could he not handle this small roe deer?

He found a saw in the tool room, but Li Long looked at it with some disdain. The hand saws used in later generations were so convenient; this frame-style saw was really not satisfying to use.

But there was no other way; this was all they had. Those small saw blades were even worse to use and prone to snapping.

When he walked to the edge of the enclosure, Uncle Lao Luo also came out draped in a cotton-padded coat.

"I'll just watch, don't mind me," Uncle Lao Luo was still a bit worried.

Li Long smiled, placed the saw on the wall, opened the enclosure gate, and walked in.

Outside the roe deer enclosure was an open pen where they grazed during the day; inside was a warm shed with a roof, and the entrance was blocked by a soft cotton curtain so that when the roe deer entered the warm shed at night, the curtain could block the wind.

There were quite a lot of roe deer now, but fortunately, the enclosure was large, so they were still quite comfortable.

There were three or four male roe deer. The others had small horns and backed away when they saw Li Long enter, then looked at him curiously. Only one male roe deer, seeing Li Long enter, not only didn't back away but instead took two steps forward, clearly having designs on Li Long.

This was the one.

Seeing Li Long standing still, the male roe deer lowered its head and butted over. Its horns were twenty or thirty centimeters long, with many small bumps at the base, a small fork branching out in the middle, and sharp tips like small daggers.

If this had hit him directly in the front, wouldn't it have pierced right into his body?

While Li Long was still thinking, this thing had already butted straight over!

Li Long didn't even dodge. When the thing rushed over, he grabbed both horns with his hands, twisted and flipped, and the roe deer was flipped directly to the ground by Li Long!

Although he had used the roe deer's own momentum, Uncle Lao Luo, watching from behind, couldn't help but shout "Good!" at just this move.

That was damn slick!

Li Long stepped on the roe deer's neck with his foot, reached out to take the saw from the wall, and then pressed the roe deer's head with one hand and began to saw.

At this moment, the roe deer was scared and bleated in panic, but the other roe deer didn't have any feeling of "grieving for their own kind"; instead, they watched Li Long's actions curiously and stopped eating grass.

Roe deer horns were very hard. Li Long used a lot of force while sawing, and quite a few horn shavings fell to the ground. There was even a small roe deer that wasn't afraid at all and even wanted to come over and lick them to see what they were, before being scolded away by Li Long.

"In another half a month, that deer might give birth to a fawn, and these two roe deer are the same," Uncle Lao Luo said. "When the time comes, I'll snatch the placenta and freeze it; you can take it away when you come back."

"No rush," Li Long said. "Uncle Lao Luo, you need to take care of your arm; this is no small matter. It takes a hundred days to recover from a bone or tendon injury..."

"How is this a tendon injury? It was just a bump, how could it be that serious?" Uncle Lao Luo moved his arm and said, "You don't need to worry about it, go do your own thing. I can take good care of these animals."

In the enclosure next door were red deer. These things were clearly larger than the roe deer, but their antlers had been cut off when they were growing, so they didn't have horns. At the moment, they were also eating grass very quietly; perhaps they had gotten used to it after being in the enclosure for so long.

A few minutes later, one horn was sawed off. Li Long leaned the saw against the wall and flipped the roe deer over with both hands. The roe deer wanted to struggle, but Li Long's strength was too great, and it couldn't break free at all.

A small roe deer went to smell the saw, and Li Long waved his hand to drive it away.

After sawing off the other horn, Li Long finally let the roe deer go.

This thing had no temper left after being tossed around by Li Long; after being released, it climbed up and ran to the corner of the wall. Li Long had originally prepared to deal with its counterattack, but it seemed it had lost its nerve.

"Uncle Lao Luo, should we saw off the others too?"

"No need, no need. Those ones are very docile; they were raised from a young age and are obedient. This one was half-grown when it came, so it's not tame."

"If it's not tame, then discipline it. Keep a shovel handle on the side; when it acts up, give it a few whacks. After being hit enough, it'll be obedient."

Some animals just can't be given a friendly face.

Since Uncle Lao Luo said those roe deer didn't need to be dealt with, Li Long didn't meddle further and left the enclosure with the two roe deer horns.

A small roe deer wanted to follow him out, but Li Long pushed it back.

Li Long gave the two roe deer horns to Uncle Lao Luo.

"What do I need these for?" Uncle Lao Luo waved his hand. "They're useful for you; you can sell them for money."

"It's not like I'm short of this little money. You keep them, or keep them for yourself. Or wait until the New Year, if someone comes to pay a New Year's call and you think the child is good and you have a good relationship, you can give them away."

"Alright." Uncle Lao Luo wasn't being coy and said with a smile, "This thing is a rare item too. When the students are on vacation, they come in groups to see the roe deer and deer here."

That was true; in this day and age, only Wucheng and Shicheng nearby had zoos, and it was very difficult to see animals other than livestock and nearby wild animals.

So these raised wild boars, deer, and roe deer really had become rare items.

Li Long chatted a bit more with Uncle Lao Luo, agreeing to slaughter a few wild boars after a while, and a red deer and a roe deer before the New Year, then Li Long left driving the tractor.

The sun was already slanting west; if he didn't leave now, it would be dark soon.

On the road, he could already see students returning from school, and Li Long even bumped into Li Juan, who was riding a bicycle with Li Qiang on the back. He stopped to chat with the two children for a few words, then headed towards the county.

With the matter settled, Li Long didn't rush to Kuitun immediately; he needed to deal with that tiger bone and meat first.

The next day after breakfast, Gu Xiaoxia went to work, Han Fang went to school, and Sister Yang cleaned up the kitchen and pushed her cart out to sell food. During this period, she cooked two meals every morning; one for Li Long and the others, and one for the porridge, pancakes, etc., prepared for sale.

On the cart, there were also chopped pickled vegetables, chili oil sauce, and so on; it was said that the people at the free market liked them quite a bit.

Li Long went to lock the door, then opened the side room door, and carried the bag containing the frozen-solid tiger bone and meat towards the glass room in the back.

For an ordinary person to be able to carry a 100-kilogram bag of grain, they were already considered a strongman—at this time, there were indeed quite a few young men who could carry that much.

The batch of young men like Li Jianguo who came to support the border from the interior when they were hungry were considered the batch in the village most capable of hard labor. According to what Li Jianguo told Li Long, there were quite a few in the team who could carry a 100-kilogram large sack of wheat.

Li Long knew this too; let alone at this time, even thirty years later, there were old men in the team the same age as Li Jianguo who could carry fifty or sixty kilograms of corn at once.

But for something weighing over a hundred, nearly two hundred kilograms, someone like Li Jianguo couldn't carry it.

Li Long could.

He felt his strength was still growing, though not as fast as before.

He put the bag into the glass greenhouse; the temperature here was high, and Li Long felt that it wouldn't take long for the tiger bone and meat to be in a semi-thawed state.

Then it could be dismembered.

The bones were useful, and the meat should be useful too.

In short, as long as nothing was wasted, it was fine. He went to the tool room again to get a large piece of plastic sheeting and two large basins, spread the plastic sheeting on the ground, and placed the large basins to the side.

He took the tiger bone and meat out of the bag, placed it on the plastic sheeting, and used a knife to slowly dismember it first.

The tiger hadn't been gutted yet; he suspected that the meat might not be edible anymore. But that was fine, as long as the tiger bones were there. As for the tiger penis, it shouldn't be affected by the rotting stomach, right?

The first thing Li Long cut off was the tiger penis. After examining it carefully for a while, he set it aside.

Next, starting from the legs, he used a knife to slowly cut the frozen meat along the grain, find the joints, and then break it down.

The tiger's body had frozen solid in the ice and snow, but it had been in the Li family's side room for some time; although it hadn't softened, it wasn't as hard as when it first froze.

Li Long spent over an hour working on it leisurely, but he had only managed to remove four bones; fortunately, the bones weren't small.

Two or three kilograms of meat had also been removed, so Li Long stopped; his legs were numb from squatting.

The temperature in this glass greenhouse would rise during the day to above zero, and he planned to wait until the afternoon when the tiger bone and meat had thawed some more before going to dismember it.

Carrying the dismembered tiger bones, tiger penis, and tiger meat, Li Long left the glass greenhouse. It was enclosed on all four sides with blue bricks on the floor; after the roe deer were taken away, Li Long had cleaned it up carefully, so there was no smell, and there was nowhere for mice to get in, so he was relatively at ease.

!.

Li Long placed the thoroughly cleaned tiger bones in the side room, together with the deer antlers and wolf teeth he had stored. Once this stuff was cleaned out, you couldn't tell what it was at all.

He planned to peel off the skin on the tiger's head in the afternoon and hide it; that way, no one would be able to tell what it was.

As for the tiger penis, he would put it away to air-dry slowly and soak it in wine when he had time.

Li Long had just about finished cleaning up when the door rang, and Sister Yang pushed her cart into the courtyard.

Li Long helped Sister Yang take the pot down and discovered that there was still nearly half of the porridge in the pot left unsold.

"Business wasn't good today," Li Long said.

"Yeah, someone went earlier than me and was also selling porridge," Sister Yang didn't mind and said, "There were also pancakes, similar to mine. I'm thinking of adding some eggs to the porridge tomorrow, having some egg drop, cooking it a bit thinner, and selling it at the same price; it should be better."

Not bad; Sister Yang was still quite shrewd when it came to doing business.

Sister Yang didn't mind, so Li Long didn't say much more. She went to cook, and Li Long went to clean those rooms.

This Sihe Academy had many rooms, most of which contained old goods and things piled up by the original owners. Li Long cleaned out some of the rooms, either to live in or to store things.

But most of them hadn't been cleaned yet, such as the rooms facing the street.

He planned to clean them out bit by bit; if they could be used in the future, it wouldn't be bad to rent them out as storefronts.

At noon, Li Long asked Sister Yang to take some of that tiger meat and stir-fry it to eat, but it turned out the meat was quite sour and even had a faint smell of rot, so no one wanted to eat it.

So Li Long planned to discard the rest of the tiger meat; it must have been the rotting stomach, or perhaps tiger meat just tasted like that.

When dealing with it, he discovered that the tiger was still quite fat and had quite a bit of oil, but since he planned to discard it, he found a bag to put it all in, planning to put it in the tractor and throw it into the wilderness when he went to Kuitun.

From nature, return to nature.

Next, Li Long spent the afternoon and the next morning removing all the tiger's bones, placing them in the side room, and preparing to let them air for a period of time before soaking them in wine.

He didn't dare ask anyone for a recipe for this stuff anymore; he could only send some to people he had good relationships with under the name of lynx bones, or soak them in wine directly and distribute some to them when the time came.

This was a big deal; Li Long felt that if it were leaked, he might not be able to bear the consequences.

As for the tiger meat, he divided it into two bags and put them in the tractor's cargo bed. No one went to ask him what it was.

Li Long told Gu Xiaoxia about his plan to go to Kuitun, and that afternoon he went to the team again to tell his father and mother.

"Since you're going, bring some rice and flour for your second brother, second sister-in-law, and the children," Li Jianguo, as the eldest, was very thoughtful in this regard. "It's not easy for them to live in the city; with just that little salary, I don't know if it's enough to support a family of four."

Li Long loaded two bags of rice and two bags of flour onto the tractor, covered them with plastic sheeting, accepted his father and mother's instructions, promised he would be careful, and then drove the tractor to Yang Hua's house.

He had to ask if Yang Hua had any instructions for Yang Yongqiang.

Yang Yongqiang wasn't married, so he lived in the company dormitory and ate at the company canteen, so there was no need to send rice and flour. Li Long listened to what Yang Hua had to ask and then returned to the county.

He took advantage of the fact that it wasn't dark yet to go and withdraw some money; this was intended for buying a combine harvester.

The next day, Li Long put the Type 56 semi-automatic rifle into a gun bag and carried it on his back, then wore a thick leather coat inside out, put on a hood specially made for him that made him look like a robber, put on a leather hat, and then drove the tractor "putt-putt-putt" towards the west.

The weather was exceptionally clear; whether it was the western part of Maxian or the southern part of Shicheng, at this moment, everything as far as the eye could see was covered in white snow, and the few clouds in the sky were as white as cotton.

Li Long looked and smiled; if he told the people here right now that thirty years later this place would be developed and full of high-rise buildings, but the sky would be murky every winter, he reckoned no one would believe it.

They couldn't even imagine it.

When the tractor drove to the Old Street, Li Long didn't stop; it had only been less than half an hour, and he didn't feel cold.

It wasn't until he was out of the Shicheng city limits and reached a regiment farm to the west that Li Long stopped the tractor, bought two kilograms of sesame pancakes at a small shop, and asked for a bowl of hot tea to drink.

Actually, even if he didn't buy anything, he could still drink hot tea; Li Long felt this was quite good, and he felt at ease.

After resting for a while, seeing that there was still plenty of water in the tractor's radiator, he continued forward.

At noon, Li Long arrived in the no-man's-land. He saw herds of Mongolian gazelles originally picking up something to eat by the side of the road; when the tractor came, they ran wildly towards the high ground in the south, then stopped at a distance of fifty or sixty meters from Li Long, looking over here.

Li Long immediately became interested. He stopped the tractor; the Mongolian gazelles noticed, and then immediately moved another twenty or thirty meters away.

This herd of Mongolian gazelles had thirty or forty members, big and small. Li Long climbed onto the tractor's cargo bed, squatted down, braced his knees against the side of the cargo bed, took the Type 56 out of the holster, disengaged the safety, pulled the bolt to chamber a round.

Then he aimed.

The Mongolian gazelles in the distance were still very clear in Li Long's eyes; he aimed steadily and pulled the trigger.

The huge gunshot echoed in the air, and a sturdy Mongolian gazelle with sharp horns fell to the sound; the herd of Mongolian gazelles exploded all at once, scattering and running towards the further south.

Li Long intended to fire another shot, but those Mongolian gazelles ran too fast; when he aimed, he only saw shadows, so he had to give up.

He unloaded the gun, engaged the safety, carried it on his back, and walked south with a bag in each hand. After walking twenty or thirty meters away from the main road, Li Long began to invert the bags and scatter the tiger meat.

By the time he reached the Mongolian gazelle, those two bags of tiger meat had already been evenly scattered by Li Long over an open space of several tens of meters in radius; you couldn't tell from far away.

Li Long looked at the dead Mongolian gazelle. The bullet had hit its head; just now Li Long had clearly seen this thing staring at him, so he had chosen it.

The horns on this Mongolian gazelle's head were thirty or forty centimeters long, which was considered relatively rare. Li Long dragged it back by its horns.

Just as Li Long was about to get onto the main road, a Dongfeng truck drove over, bringing a burst of snow mist.

Seeing Li Long carrying the Mongolian gazelle, the driver honked the horn, which should have been an expression of admiration for Li Long's marksmanship.

Li Long smiled, and after the car drove past, he threw the Mongolian gazelle onto the tractor, used a knife to make a cut on its belly, making a not-too-long opening to let the heat inside dissipate.

That wasn't all; he took out the internal organs like the stomach and intestines and put them in a bag. It wasn't easy to deal with right now, so he just left them in the cargo bed and continued forward.

This counted as a small interlude on the journey.

Next, he continued to head west. Between Shawan and Kuitun, there was a large stretch of Gobi desert, growing short tamarisk and saxaul, and from time to time, he could see herds of Mongolian gazelles, and even packs of wolves.

It was just that in front of this big monster of a tractor, these guys all ran away.

Li Long had originally thought about whether he could hit another Mongolian gazelle, but there was just no opportunity.

While resting in the middle, Li Long ate a few sesame pancakes with snow, which counted as solving his lunch, and then stuffed some snow into the tractor's radiator. The top of the radiator was already hot, and the snow melted as soon as it went on; very quickly, the water was filled up.

Walking a bit further, he could already see the silhouette of the Kuitun military station. (End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 573 =====