Chapter 65: The road home is very long

"Bang! Bang! Bang!"

Li Long fired a bit too hastily. He felt he should have hit a wild boar, but if he kept pulling the trigger on the Type 56 semi-automatic rifle, the recoil would definitely affect the stability of the barrel. He didn't know if he could actually knock any of them down.

After firing, he looked over there; not a single boar had fallen, and they were still charging up the ridge. Li Long immediately scrambled up, crouched halfway, aimed roughly again, allowed for lead, aimed at the high point of the ridge, and pulled the trigger continuously, emptying the remaining bullets.

While he was firing, Halimu hadn't stopped either. The sound of gunfire echoed continuously in the valley, feeling quite deafening.

"Let's go, let's go take a look." Halimu was also a bit frustrated. He hadn't chosen a good spot this time, and he felt the reason was mainly his own fault. Who could have known that the wind direction in this valley would change suddenly, and that those wild boars, which looked stupid and reckless, would have such a good sense of smell?

The two of them carried their guns and charged down the mountain, then walked up toward the ridge. When they were almost at the top, Li Long breathed a sigh of relief.

A wild boar lay in a snowdrift a few steps before reaching the top of the ridge. Blood had soaked a large area, and the snow nearby was a mess from the boar's death throes.

This was a half-grown pig weighing fifty or sixty kilograms. Li Long poked it with his bayonet to check; fortunately, it was a sow.

Even for small boars, if they aren't castrated, the meat has a rank smell. By comparison, sows don't have this problem.

Li Long took advantage of the fact that the pig wasn't quite dead yet, stabbed it in the neck with his bayonet, and at the same time, stepped hard on the boar's heart position continuously. The wound on the pig's neck spurted out jets of blood.

The cleaner the blood is drained from the pig, the better the meat tastes.

Halimu crossed Li Long, charged to the top of the ridge, looked down, turned his head, and said to Li Long:

"There's one here too, but it's smaller, bigger than a large sheep."

Li Long said with a smile:

"Then this pork will be delicious."

Halimu dragged that wild boar to Li Long, which moved Li Long a bit—after all, some taboos were still quite strict in later generations. Now it seemed that Halimu truly regarded him as one of his own.

Li Long followed the same procedure and drained the blood of the small pig—it was a pity that the small pig was a boar, but fortunately, it was quite small. If it had grown for another year, the meat wouldn't have tasted good. After draining the blood, he used a knife to slit the wild boar's belly to release the gas. He couldn't bear to throw away the things inside the belly, so he didn't gut it. Last time, the two pigs weren't gutted, and the taste wasn't good. It was also rare for the people in the team to eat meat, so no one mentioned it, but after Li Long ate the meat, combining his experience from two lifetimes, he knew where the problem lay.

He had to learn his lesson.

"I'll go back and lead the horse," Halimu said.

"No need." Li Long waved his hand, pulled out the plastic sheet he had prepared from his sheepskin coat, unfolded it, and spread it on the snow.

"Use this." He handed the gun to Halimu, then dragged the sow onto the plastic sheet. He didn't even need Halimu's help for the small pig; he just picked it up and placed it next to the sow.

This plastic sheet was thick enough, and Li Long felt it should be able to hold up.

He tied the two back corners of the plastic sheet together, then grabbed the two front corners and slowly dragged them down the mountain.

With the downward momentum, plus the fact that it wasn't heavy itself, and the relatively low friction of the snow, Li Long dragged both pigs all the way to the valley by himself.

Once here, dragging them back up the mountain wouldn't be easy, but Li Long had already observed the terrain. He followed the valley diagonally toward the northeast, where there was a rift valley leading to the spot where the horse-drawn carriage was parked. He didn't need to cross the ridge to get there, but he had to take a detour.

Halimu followed behind Li Long and said with some surprise:

"This method is quite good! Li Long, next time you come, can you bring more plastic sheets like this? Maybe we can use them too."

"No problem." Li Long was proud of this idea of his. The main reason he did this was that he didn't want Halimu to get his hands dirty. More than an hour later, the sky was already bright. Although the sun hadn't risen yet, everything around could be seen clearly.

"Look, a roe deer!" Suddenly, Halimu pointed at the ridge, and Li Long hurriedly looked up.

An animal that looked about the size of a small deer glanced down from the ridge, then charged down that way and disappeared from sight.

Wasn't it said that roe deer are very stupid? Li Long didn't see at all where this guy was stupid; it was quite clever, wasn't it?

Or was the breed here different from the one in the Northeast?

But he didn't have time to think about these things right now. Even though dragging these two wild boars was easier than dragging wood, after dragging them for so long, Li Long felt he was already exhausted.

Halimu wanted to lead the horse again, but Li Long waved his hand, gritted his teeth, and said:

"There are only a few hundred meters left, just hold on and we'll be there."

It really was only a few hundred meters, and one could already see the white smoke rising from the winter camp here.

Halimu quickly headed toward the winter camp, while Li Long dragged the two pigs to the horse-drawn carriage. He had originally intended to load wood, but now it seemed better to load the pigs first.

With the experience from last time, he wedged the carriage on the downhill slope and carefully rolled the pigs down from above, and they landed right in the carriage. These two pigs were much lighter than the last two, so Li Long didn't spend much effort loading them.

It was just that if he thought about loading two wolves as well, there wouldn't be much room left for wood.

He decided not to load wood at all; Li Long thought he would also let Number 76 have an easier time.

!.

When he returned to the winter camp, Li Long couldn't wait to drink a bowl of milk tea, and only then did he recover.

After breakfast and resting for half an hour, Li Long and Halimu started loading other things, preparing to leave.

This time, he not only brought back wolves, wild boars, and jade, but also a bag of astragalus, a wolf skin, a piece of velvet antler, and a deer antler that Halimu had found.

Li Long planned to sell all these things to the purchasing station after going down the mountain, so he would have another sum of savings, and he would be one step closer to buying a bicycle, a sewing machine, and a hunting rifle.

Although using Halimu and Yushanjiang's Type 56 semi-automatic rifles for hunting now was very good, Li Long knew that once April or May arrived, they would have to drive the cattle and sheep to the summer pasture deep in the mountains, and at that time, he would have to find his own gun if he wanted to hunt.

After all, the summer pasture was very far from the mountain pass, and Li Long didn't plan to run that far—a trip occasionally was fine, but going often was impossible.

He wasn't Tarzan, after all.

The carriage slowly went down the mountain, and Li Long was in a good mood. Halimu had originally wanted to load some milk curds for him, but Li Long refused; he truly couldn't get used to eating this kind of "specialty."

By the time he saw the county town, Li Long had already walked for quite a long distance. Although sitting in the carriage didn't take much effort, it was truly cold. He felt he was almost practicing the art of shrinking his yang, and his face was frozen numb.

Therefore, upon entering the county town, Li Long went to the meat canteen first to eat some hot food. But he didn't dare leave the carriage; after all, the things on the carriage added up to several hundred yuan.

He could only hurriedly drink a bowl of free hot tea, spend nine mao to buy three large meat buns, and head toward the purchasing station while eating.

This time, he would have to see how much money he could sell them for.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 66 =====