Wilderness Survival with Druid System

Enduring the putrid stench hanging in the air.

Chen Wen and Vikram walked down toward the bottom of the valley.

As the two of them drew closer, Chen Wen was the first to notice something wrong with the soil underfoot: ”What we’re stepping on here hardly counts as soil. It’s a mixture of flesh and dirt. The winters here are freezing cold—blood that seeps into the ground will freeze. How much blood would have to accumulate to form such a vast stretch of blood-soaked earth?”

Chen Wen felt a chill run all through him.

This Hunting Owl group had been poaching here far longer than he’d imagined!

Vikram didn’t speak. He just stared at the heap of bones piled up in the valley.

Chen Wen shifted his gaze to the bones as well, and noticed that the most numerous among them were yak and Tibetan antelope bones.

Those two kinds of bones were also fairly easy to recognize.

Yak bones are thick and heavy, and their skulls are usually split open—done to remove the yak tongues and process them into combs.

Combs made from wild yak tongue fetch a high price on the market!

Even though the country has now banned the buying and selling of such combs, in many unseen corners their prices are still sky-high!

The Tibetan antelope bones, on the other hand, are thinner and smaller, and scattered about.

Most likely the result of being torn apart by many wild predators.

”Too many, way too many...”

Vikram said in disbelief, ”How many animals would you have to kill to pile up this many bones? This is practically a mountain of bones!”

”I’d guess no fewer than a thousand head.”

Chen Wen muttered.

Besides wild yaks and Tibetan antelopes, he even spotted bones that looked like horse bones.

But he couldn’t be sure whether they belonged to Tibetan horses, River Curve Horses, or even Tibetan wild asses!

”These freshly dumped carcasses are Tibetan antelopes. Judging by how fresh the bodies are... damn it, they’re still poaching!”

Chen Wen couldn’t help swearing.

He felt as if a nameless fire was boiling in his chest.

Hadn’t Hunting Owl already been fully exposed?

Even if they hadn’t all been caught, the ones left shouldn’t they be fleeing in panic by now?

Why was this poaching still going on?

Chen Wen didn’t want to dwell on it.

He looked toward Vikram, about to speak.

But Vikram had already stopped in front of a pile of bones.

Sensing Chen Wen’s gaze, Vikram turned to look at him, shock flashing in his eyes: ”Chen Wen, you have to come see this!”

”What is it?”

Chen Wen’s expression hardened as he strode over.

But almost at once, what he saw on the ground made his face change dramatically—a human skull.

”Call the police! No—have your association handle this! We’re staying out of it!”

Vikram blurted out, backing away to a distance.

He didn’t want to disturb the integrity of the bones.

Neither did Chen Wen.

Back at the association, the moment the two of them saw this scene, Qu Yong cut the video feed. Now only his computer could see their footage.

Before Chen Wen could reach out on his own, Qu Yong, brow deeply furrowed, was already contacting Liu Yu. He felt utterly drained.

The Mountain Apex Challenge had gone on for so long that many people had already approached the central zone.

Previous contestants had run into poachers before, but he had never seen a poaching operation this severe.

The protected area was heading for a serious incident!

Thinking this, Qu Yong followed Chen Wen and Vikram’s lead and pushed the matter onto Liu Yu.

It wasn’t that he was unwilling to act, but that only Liu Yu could handle something like this.

...

On Chen Wen’s side.

He and Vikram left the valley and sat on a hillside some distance away, their emotions refusing to settle.

Having spent so much time with his animal friends, Chen Wen had long since come to see animals as independent beings, spirits existing in their own right, not dependent on human thought.

He even regarded many animals as friends.

Though he hunted, his hunting was usually for food and safety.

He didn’t see himself as some extreme animal-rights activist, but what he’d just witnessed in that valley had truly rattled him.

It was the same for Vikram.

His uncle had taken him around animals raised by humans, as well as animals helped by humans, since he was a child, so Vikram also carried a deep kindness toward animals in his heart.

He might be a mercenary, but his family kept six dogs and three cats; his feelings for animals ran just as deep.

What they’d just seen had left him emotional too.

”The poaching’s still going on. I even feel like those bastards must have dumped those carcasses right before we got here.”

As he spoke, Chen Wen felt as if someone had splashed a couple drops of lemon juice into his nose, sour and stinging.

Vikram rubbed his nose and muttered, ”But there’s nothing we can do. They have vehicles—just finding them would be hard enough! And even if we did, we couldn’t catch up!”

Chen Wen stood, facing the direction of the Qiangtang core zone, the northwest.

He was silent for a moment, then said, ”Maybe we don’t have to chase them.”

Hearing this, Vikram turned to look at Chen Wen.

Chen Wen went on: ”I still remember the map of this area. Those poachers—their fake mining site is just up ahead, not far from here. We can go over and take a look. If they’re still poaching, it means they’re damn bold.”

At that, Vikram’s eyes lit up. ”You mean they’re playing under-the-lamp blind? Even after the protected area carried out a search of the mine, they still chose to stay there?”

Chen Wen nodded. ”I think that’s possible, though we can’t be sure. But if there’s even a chance, we have to try! We can’t just sit here and do nothing, can we? What do you think?”

Hearing him, Vikram rose to his feet. ”You’re right! My uncle has told me something similar—he said there are far, far too many animals in this world suffering at the hands of poachers. We can’t stop all of it, but we must at least stop the few things happening around us. Even if it’s just one case, that’s still one animal freed from a poacher’s harm, and that means what we do has meaning!”

Chen Wen roughly grasped what Vikram meant and praised him: ”Your uncle is a man of great wisdom.”

Vikram nodded. ”I think so too. He’s one of the few sages we have back home. Chen Wen, we’ve already been sitting here for a long time.”

Chen Wen drew out his spear. Facing the howling gale, he pointed the spear toward the core zone. ”Then let’s move!”

...

Their decision to risk entering the core zone was also seen by Qu Yong.

But he didn’t try to stop them.

Stopping them now would be useless; the two of them, fired up as they were, wouldn’t just back down.

All Qu Yong could do was notify the rescue team to prepare for a search and rescue, while cutting off the video feed from Chen Wen and Vikram’s cameras. Outwardly, the announcement was that both of their cameras had been damaged and needed replacing.

That was one of the few things Qu Yong could still do.

...

Back with Chen Wen.

When the animals saw him return, they keenly sensed that something was off about his mood.

The Snow Leopard felt it.

It could smell the dense blood-reek and stench of rot from afar.

Whatever had happened there was dangerous—no one should go near it!

Every cell in the Snow Leopard’s body was warning it.

The Golden Eagle, having witnessed what was over there, was now a bit sorrowful.

Though it was a predator, it didn’t slaughter its prey wantonly, so after seeing carnage like that, its spirits had sunk.

Seeing this, Chen Wen led the Golden Eagle a little way off from Vikram, though not too far.

Vikram’s hearing wasn’t very good.

In a low voice, Chen Wen tried to soothe it: ”Golden Eagle, you saw what happened just now. But don’t let yourself sink too deep into it. At the very least, we still have the ability to keep more animals from being hurt.”

At his words, the Golden Eagle feebly flapped its wings.

The comforting didn’t have much effect.

Chen Wen thought helplessly.