Chapter 69: The Trap
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The wind howled past their ears, and they had no idea how far they had run when the horse finally came to a stop.
Shen Hong clutched his stomach, having run full tilt. The mountainous path was rough, and they hadn’t dared to stop along the way. Only now did they feel the turmoil within their bellies, almost on the verge of vomiting.
They had reached halfway down the mountain, and looking back, there was no sign of the wolves catching up.
A new recruit said, “W-We’re safe.”
Shen Hong stared blankly at his waist. He had grabbed a bamboo stick when they fled, and he had given it to He Yan. He thought of He Yan and his face turned pale again. Trembling, he asked, “… What about He Yan?”
With only a bamboo stick in hand and the one mandarin duck blade lost by Shen Hong, the other embedded in the throat of the alpha wolf, He Yan was left without any weapons. The three remaining wolves were charging at him, and he was all alone. How could he escape?
“Should we go back and check?” he mustered the courage to suggest.
“What nonsense are you talking about?” Zheng Xuan looked at him coldly. “The wolves are still there. We’ve barely managed to escape. You want to go back and throw our lives away?”
“But He Yan is back there, all alone. We can’t just leave him,” Shen Hong thought of He Yan, his eyes welling up. He believed He Yan was a good person. They had just been together, sharing pine nuts.
“He told us to go down the mountain and find the instructors, right?” The new recruit beside Zheng Xuan said, “We’ll go down and inform the instructors to come rescue him, right?”
“No.”
Shen Hong couldn’t believe his ears as he looked at Zheng Xuan. Zheng Xuan’s expression remained unchanged. “If we tell the instructors, they’ll find out we crossed the ridge.”
“He just saved us. Without He Yan, we’d be dead by now!” Shen Hong shouted.
“Do you not realize that all three of us almost died? He’s alone against a pack of wolves, a certain death!” Zheng Xuan’s voice was even louder than Shen Hong’s. “Crossing the ridge is a breach of military orders. The punishment could be a caning or even a beheading. Do you want others to die for He Yan, who is already dead? Shen Hong, is that what you want?”
Shen Hong was left dumbfounded by the shouting. He was naturally timid and fearful. If not for the sudden change in his family’s situation, he would have lived his whole life as the owner of a small medicinal shop, living an ordinary and uneventful life, free of troubles or calamities. Now, faced with this sudden crisis, his heart was in turmoil. The mention of possible beheadings sent shivers down his spine.
He still had a mother to care for at home. If he died, his family would be left without any male members. How would they survive?
“I… I…” Shen Hong stammered, unable to find his words.
“After we descend the mountain, we will act as if nothing happened. Once the sun sets, we’ll inform the instructor that He Yan didn’t listen to advice, crossed the ridge, and we couldn’t find him,” Zheng Xuan said emotionlessly.
This not only closed off He Yan’s last escape route but also framed him with violating military orders. Shen Hong shook his head, but the other two were already worried about potential punishment and readily agreed. Zheng Xuan stared at Shen Hong and said, “If you want to go report this, go ahead. It’s up to the instructor to believe you or us.”
With that, he didn’t bother with Shen Hong’s expression and spurred his horse forward. Shen Hong had no choice but to follow, the colors of the mountains gradually darkening as they moved forward.
…
The evening grew late, and there was almost no light left in the jungle.
The horse was lost on the White Moon Mountain, and He Yan gripped the bamboo pole. Glancing behind, she let out a sigh of relief, having managed to shake off the pursuing wolves.
It was the first time she had seen such relentless pursuit by wild wolves. She shook her head, reminded of the wolves she encountered in Moxian years ago. During the famine in Moxian, wolves within a hundred-mile radius had been caught and eaten. They were nothing like the audacious ones in White Moon Mountain. Thinking of this, she thought Zheng Xuan was really foolish to want to capture wolf cubs. Wolves couldn’t be tamed; the only ones that could be tamed were domestic dogs that wagged their tails at people. Wolves only knew how to sever human throats.
The horse turned in place and refused to move forward.
The forest was everywhere, looking identical in every direction. She had been fleeing from the pack of wolves, unable to mark the trees as she went. It was possible they had already crossed over the hill, and she had no idea of their current location. If Shen Hong and the others couldn’t inform Liang Ping in time, by nightfall, they wouldn’t be able to leave the woods. Without a firestarter, encountering wild animals would be dangerous, leaving them with no choice but to spend the night on the mountain.
Thinking about this, she sighed and dismounted. She intended to search for any sheltered cave in the vicinity that could provide protection from the wind. As she got off her horse and stood upright, she suddenly felt that something was amiss.
She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but if she had to describe it, it was probably the instinct honed over years of battling on the battlefield – a sense of danger. She instinctively turned her head and felt a dark shadow sweep past above her. Something grazed her neck, leaving a trace of blood.
The horse was startled, rearing up on its front hooves. He Yan hadn’t tightened the reins, and the horse charged forward without looking back, disappearing into the depths of the forest in the blink of an eye. She turned around and saw the black shadow that had just lunged at her, now lurking in the grass, its two blue eyes gleaming.
It was one of the wolves from earlier.
He Yan observed the wolf for a moment, then looked in the direction it had come from, and suddenly, it all became clear. Among the wolves that had pursued her earlier, there was one clever enough to know it couldn’t catch up to her on horseback, so it took a shortcut. While White Moon Mountain wasn’t He Yan’s territory, it was the domain of these mountain beasts. She realized that this wolf had once again lain in wait, biding its time, waiting for her to drop her guard before lunging to sever her throat.
In fact, the wolf had almost succeeded.
He Yan touched her neck, feeling the searing sensation of the wound that had drawn blood. The wolf, seeing its initial attack fail, bared its sharp teeth and pounced at her from behind.
Rolling on the ground, He Yan narrowly avoided its claws, a sense of urgency filling her. With the horse gone, she could only fight this wolf, armed only with a stick.
When Shen Hong had gone up the mountain, even a set of throwing darts would have been helpful. She cursed under her breath, swung the pole forward, and lunged at the wolf’s head.
The bamboo stick struck the wolf’s head with a loud “bang,” and it snapped in the middle. The wolf’s head tilted from the impact, a trickle of blood flowing. It glared at He Yan, emitted furious howls, and lunged at her once more.
“What a useless stick!” He Yan cursed, sidestepping the attack. However, the wolf was cunning; it didn’t attack head-on. Instead, it circled around and launched an attack from behind, intending to bite her neck. He Yan evaded a few times, but was unable to dodge one bite, and she twisted her arm, thrusting her elbow into the wolf’s belly. The wolf let out a pained cry and lunged at her again, desperately attempting to pin her down.
The two struggled on the ground, causing the leaves and twigs to rustle in the forest. He Yan tugged at the wolf’s head, preventing it from biting her. She pondered whether she’d have to resort to biting the wolf herself. Just as this thought crossed her mind, she suddenly felt the ground beneath her feet give way. Before she could react, she felt herself falling, and then heard a “thud.” The next moment, she found herself on the ground, alongside the wolf.
The sky transformed into a circular view, the branches of the trees seeming taller. The ground was uneven and muddy, and the wolf who had just stood up.
She and the wolf had fallen into a trap together.
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