"Ning Jie, wake up, wake up!"
Ning Jie opened his eyes in a daze, the dim sky and a freezing chill desperately drilling into his nose.
Burst after burst of urgent dog barking drilled into his ears, making his already muddled head ache as if it were being drilled.
"Second Uncle?"
Looking at the badger-skin hat before him and the date-red face whipped by the north wind, Ning Jie was momentarily in a trance.
Wasn't he out for a stroll holding Chen Ruoyu? Where was Chen Ruoyu! How was his eldest grandson?
"Are you out of your mind from that fall? Get up, our dogs have cornered a big beast!"
Second Uncle pulled Ning Jie to his feet in one motion, drew a handful of bullets from inside his coat, and handed them to Ning Jie.
"Use the solid slugs, dammit. Dahei's nose is really something else; it flushed that old Ancient Boar right out from under the round-date vines."
The freezing bullets instantly aligned Ning Jie's memories...
Hunting wild boars at Liudaogang Head—he was back in 1985!
The barking grew clearer and clearer, the trance-like feeling slowly fading from Ning Jie as he glanced into the distance. More than twenty hounds were circling and tearing at a colossal figure in the center.
An Ancient Boar!
They always said in the Northeast: first a boar, second a bear, third a tiger. The combat strength of an adult wild boar was absolute peak among large Northeast predators.
An Ancient Boar—that was a name reserved only for a female wild boar of advanced age that had lost its fertility, having broken through the limits of its own body.
An ordinary wild boar weighed around five hundred catties at most, but an Ancient Boar had to be at least eight hundred catties, looking for all the world like an armored vehicle draped in sharp-spiked armor.
Taking down the broken-stocked rifle slung across his back, Ning Jie familiarly loaded a solid slug into the chamber.
Ah, '85. Guns and hunting weren't banned here yet. As the sole hunter in Beigang Village, he hadn't spent these years doing little; he frequently helped the production team deal with wild beasts that wreaked havoc on crops and livestock.
Lifting the rifle and gazing at the eight-hundred-plus-catty behemoth before him, Ning Jie's body couldn't help trembling slightly.
He had to see Chen Ruoyu again! To see that little one who had been the emotional sustenance of his later years once more, along with the woman who had stayed by his side for the better part of a lifetime.
Dahei was the lead dog of their pack. Hunting was inseparable from dogs.
Being able to keep more than twenty dogs was largely thanks to the fact that these dogs could usually go up the mountain and forage for food themselves, and occasionally help improve the family's meals when times were slow.
As the lead dog, what was required was peerless intelligence and mastery of the hunting timing.
At this moment, Dahei's jaws were clamped fiercely onto the Ancient Boar's windpipe, and fresh blood streamed in bubbles down the boar's neck.
Its two front paws hooked into the boar's neck, its back paws curled and kicking against the boar's chest. No matter how the crazed Ancient Boar shook, Dahei hung on motionless.
The rest of the hounds circled, darting in to take a bite whenever the boar wasn't paying attention, then quickly retreating.
These dogs were extremely experienced, all targeting the Ancient Boar's hind legs. The boar's fur was matted with mud and smeared with pine resin; not only could the dogs not break through this defense, but if they took a bite wrong, their jaws would be pierced right through.
Why did the Ancient Boar rank first in combat strength? It was because of its absurd size and the armor accumulated over years and years. Ordinary bullets could only pierce the skin; it was hard to deliver a fatal shot with a single round.
Moreover, a sterilized Ancient Boar had a fiercely volatile temperament—it was essentially a menopause temper paired with Sylvester Stallone's peak combat strength, making it terribly troublesome to deal with.
Second Uncle kept his rifle raised and aimed, muttering under his breath, "This won't do. I can't get a bead on it at all. If I'm not careful, I'll hit the dogs."
Ning Jie was also constantly searching for an opening. Now that the dogs had surrounded the prey, there was simply no way to scatter the rest of the pack.
If the other dogs dispersed, the Ancient Boar would undoubtedly choose to kill Dahei hanging from its neck first.
Hunting dogs were still relatively easy to find in this era, but a lead dog was too hard to come by. He couldn't risk Dahei.
Yet this Ancient Boar was too massive; it couldn't be exhausted to death anytime soon. Dahei hanging by the throat consumed a tremendous amount of stamina. Though it was biting the windpipe, this injury wouldn't be fatal in the short term.
The Ancient Boar's neck was too thick, and a dog's jaws too small; it couldn't bite all the way through.
"Second Uncle, let's close in."
Second Uncle decisively shook his head. "What kind of nonsense are you spouting? Even if a few dogs die, it's only a pang of heartache. If we let that thing gore us, we'll lose a layer of skin even if we survive."
A big yellow dog clamped its jaws onto the wild boar's hind leg. The Ancient Boar let out a shrill squeal of pain, its back leg kicking out fiercely and landing squarely on the yellow dog's belly.
This yellow dog was vicious-natured and stubbornly refused to let go, taking the full force of the boar's kick.
It panted heavily, blood pouring in a torrent from its mouth—some from the Ancient Boar, some from itself.
Ning Jie's eyes instantly turned red. These dogs had all been left behind by his father. In the years before his rebirth, especially in his later years, he had often dreamed of carrying his broken-stocked rifle and leading this pack of dogs up the mountain for a battue.
Seizing this window, the rest of the dogs swarmed forward in an instant, five or six sets of jaws pressing almost as one, sinking their teeth deep into the Ancient Boar's left hind leg and pulling back with all their might.
"Squeal! Squeal!"
The wild boar shrieked miserably, spinning around with all its might. Its tusks, thicker than a thermos bottle, flared outward, and every toss and flick of its head sprayed a mist of blood.
The wails and cries of pain from the hounds blended together. Ning Jie drew the short knife at his waist, ready to charge in.
Quick as lightning, Second Uncle hooked his arm around Ning Jie's neck from behind and swept his left leg out, sending Ning Jie crashing flat onto the snow.
"Are you out of your damn mind? If anything happens to you, how am I supposed to face your mother!"
"Hunting is like this! Your dad and I hunted our whole lives. Until the prey drops to the ground, until the dogs press the attack and pin it down, we can't move in!"
"You damn well keep your eyes open and watch! Those dogs of yours, the ones your dad left you—they're dragging that Ancient Boar down with their lives! What the hell do you think you're going up there to disrupt for?"
Ning Jie suddenly froze.
That's right. His father had taught him this logic since he was a child. Why had he suddenly lost his head...
It seemed the heavens hadn't only given him a second chance at life; they had brought back his youthful, hot-headed temper right along with it.
"I know, Second Uncle."
With a dark face, Second Uncle pulled Ning Jie up and handed him the dropped short knife. This short knife had been dismantled from a wartime infantry rifle; it still bore two blood grooves on a blade that was straight and exceptionally sharp.
"When the Ancient Boar drops its belly to the ground in a moment, you go up and finish it! Stick it in the neck if you can, otherwise gut it!"
Ning Jie took a deep breath. The battle had reached its white-hot climax; if not for the big yellow dog's desperate gamble, it would have dragged on for at least another twenty minutes.
In a battue, once the dogs closed in, there was basically no chance to fire a gun.
This was a clash of blades when enemies met on a narrow path. Whoever couldn't hold on and fell first—that was who would die!
"Thud!"
Amidst the wild boar's reluctant and furious snarls, the eight-hundred-plus-catty behemoth crashed heavily to the ground. In an instant, more than twenty hounds rushed forward like madmen, fighting desperately.
Ning Jie moved.