Chapter 24#

Chapter 24 In the Forest (2)

For people camping far away from the crowd, nights in the forest have never had much entertainment.

After dinner, He Hailou looked at the watch on his wrist: 7:08.

What would he be doing at this time usually? —Playing cards, drinking, or engaging in other similar entertainments? He Hailou wasn’t sure. His schedule was chaotic, and there were too many things to play. But at this moment, he felt that going fishing in the deep pool Gu Chenzhou mentioned was a good decision.

When he expressed this idea, Gu Chenzhou, who was observing the tree trunk with a beta light, didn’t turn his head: “Didn’t you say you could catch fish with two hands?”

“But humans are a race that understands keeping pace with the times best, aren’t they?” There was not a bit of embarrassment on He Hailou’s face.

Gu Chenzhou sneered, turned off the light and threw it back. Without even needing He Hailou to move his feet, the coin-sized lamp landed accurately in He Hailou’s palm spread forward.

He Hailou raised his eyebrows and blew a clear whistle. As a result, melodious bird calls immediately sounded in the forest to echo him. This time Gu Chenzhou turned around and cast a surprised look at the other party. He Hailou, who received this extra encouragement, was happy and whistled a little tune in long and short notes. At first hearing, it was no different from the bird calls coming from afar.

“Make an appointment, until 8:45?” Gu Chenzhou said.

One should indeed be vigilant in the wild. He Hailou estimated and nodded in agreement. Taking weapons and some simple medicines, he walked towards the direction Gu Chenzhou pointed out with the fishing rod and beta light. In a while, his figure melted into the darkness.

Gu Chenzhou turned back and sat by the fire, throwing the collected combustibles into the fire which was much lazier than before. He checked whether the set-up tent was firm and whether there were footprints of large animals around… After confirming everything, he stood up the backpacks of the two and put them behind him as a backrest, taking a nap.

The bizarre nightmare quietly came to his side again.

It sat on the ground like him. One arm on his shoulder pressed his shoulder tightly like heavy steel, and pierced into his arm like a sharp thorn.

It whispered in his ear, the voice as light as a mouse squeak, and no one could understand the content.

Gu Chenzhou wanted to leave in annoyance, but another force firmly pressed him in place… until a huge noise fell from the sky!

“Crack!”

The orange flame made a short explosion sound.

Gu Chenzhou, sitting by the fire, touched the folding crossbow placed beside him with one hand, and turned his head quickly towards the direction of the sound, casting his gaze straight forward.

It was He Hailou who walked out of the grass.

Gu Chenzhou’s expression relaxed. He glanced at his watch, 8:23—slept for less than half an hour, even more tired.

“Do you watch the first half or the second half of the night?” Gu Chenzhou rubbed his somewhat stiff neck and asked He Hailou who came back.

“You go to sleep first.” The current time was too different from He Hailou’s usual schedule. Even if he was a bit bored and tired, He Hailou didn’t think he could fall asleep as soon as he entered the tent and lay down.

Gu Chenzhou was not polite either: “I’ll get up at one o’clock.”

He Hailou gave an “Um”, skewered the mushrooms just picked on the road on a steel fork, applied seasoning and roasted them over the fire, obviously planning to use extra meals to pass the time of the night watch.

The unconscious darkness was very short, seeming to be just the time of opening and closing eyes. When Gu Chenzhou woke up and realized that he was lying on the hard ground instead of a soft bed, it was almost the agreed time.

He got out of the sleeping bag, put on the coat he took off a few hours ago, bent down and walked out of the tent, but didn’t see He Hailou within sight. Instead, he saw many fruit pits and stones of different sizes scattered around the fire.

“Here.” A human voice suddenly came from overhead.

Gu Chenzhou looked in the direction of the sound and saw He Hailou coming down from one of the trees, holding a rope in his hand. At the end of the rope… was a monkey tied?

“This is—” Gu Chenzhou paused, swallowed the two words ‘what’ which seemed a bit silly back into his throat, and changed to, “What’s going on?”

He Hailou walked into the fire, and the red flame illuminated his face.

Gu Chenzhou then found that the other party didn’t look particularly good: there were two round bruises on his face, dead branches and fallen leaves in his hair carefully designed and dyed by the stylist, and bleeding tooth marks and scratches on the back of the hand holding the rope—obviously, he had a fight with the animal he was holding, and He Hailou relied on—Gu Chenzhou looked at the monkey whose limbs and mouth were tied but had no obvious injuries for a while—human wisdom to achieve the final victory.

At this time, He Hailou with human wisdom had sat back by the fire. He glared at the monkey quite fiercely, taking out clean water and medicine from his backpack to clean and apply to the wound, while sneering and pointing to the scattered fruit pits and stones on the ground: “This monkey’s masterpiece! Wanted to grab the bag, quite strong hands!”

Gu Chenzhou subtly felt some sympathy because of empathy: Even if He Hailou had face and status in the circle or even if he was the future first prince—could he reason and compare status with a monkey in the wilderness? Only after being thrown at (fruit pits and stones), grabbed (bag on the ground), scratched (claw marks), bitten (tooth marks), etc., and suffering enough losses, could he get back at it, and obviously couldn’t be praised by others…

Really suffered this loss for nothing!

At this moment, Gu Chenzhou must not be the only one thinking this way.

He Hailou was obviously trying to calm his mood. But against the firelight, his smile still seemed a bit stiff and ferocious: “I’m going to rest, taking this.” He turned back and grinned at the monkey, pulled the rope, and the tied-up earthy yellow monkey was dragged into the tent by the human, hopping along.

Gu Chenzhou shrugged. Just as he sat down by the fire, the tent was lifted again. He Hailou pinched the monkey’s neck, and two golden heads poked out together. He Hailou even shook the small head in his hand at Gu Chenzhou: “How about taking hunting as tomorrow’s program?”

“Good suggestion.” Gu Chenzhou raised his eyes. One benefit of being away from the crowd was that neither of them noticed that they unknowingly stopped calling each other “Young Master X” all the time.

Getting the result he wanted, He Hailou retracted into the tent with satisfaction.

Time moved forward quietly. When the hazy light broke through the overlapping leaves and turned the surrounding deep black into dark blue, Gu Chenzhou carefully extinguished the last spark in the stone fireplace.

After a while, He Hailou also came out of the tent carrying the monkey. He seemed to have slept well last night. Although his hair tips were a bit messy, he was in high spirits, and the bruises on his face had largely disappeared. On the contrary, the monkey held in his hand was much more listless and rarely struggled.

People who trek in the wild for a long time often suffer from mild anorexia for various reasons. The two big men were not in the mood to spend much effort on breakfast. Gu Chenzhou was a bit better, eating some biscuits, meat strips and water in a balanced way as usual. He Hailou seemed to have no habit of eating breakfast at all. He bit a chocolate bar to replenish energy and used dried meat to tease the monkey, teaching it not to howl.

However, it was really unscientific for an amateur to tame a wild monkey in one night. As soon as the rope tying the monkey’s mouth was loosened slightly, the monkey shouted for help at the top of its lungs. He Hailou had to regretfully tie the rope tightly again, and tied a big bow on the monkey’s head with dexterous hands.

Due to hunting, the second day’s journey was carried out separately.

Gu Chenzhou took out a simple map, agreed on a location and time with He Hailou, and then they separated and moved forward.

The undeveloped forest was not easy to walk. Annoying insects and weeds surrounded you all the time. You didn’t know when spiders and poisonous snakes would wrap around your shoulders. There might also be dangers due to various subtle reasons—such as bites, unclean water, some dirty things or toxic substances. But such a vivid forest was indeed much more interesting than the developed scenic spots with only tourists.

Throughout the day’s journey, Gu Chenzhou saw a black shadow suspected to be a deer, some small feline footprints, a hyena’s tail, a rabbit nest, several big rats, countless spiders and spider webs… When it was completely dark, he finally arrived at the destination agreed in the morning carrying a rabbit smoked to death.

He Hailou had already started a fire at the destination.

He cooked a pot of fish soup with the aluminum lunch box in his backpack. It seemed to have just been removed from the fire and was still steaming. The monkey that was tied before was still tied now, but the ropes on its two legs had been untied, and it was squatting listlessly under a tree, far away from the fire.

As for the others…

Gu Chenzhou approached the fire and saw that He Hailou was carrying a rabbit just like him. Besides the rabbit, there were squirrels, pheasants, hedgehogs tied with ropes on the ground… and even some skewered on steel forks, being roasted by him… cicadas?

“Want to taste?” He Hailou seemed to be in a good mood. While fiddling with the steel fork in his hand, he smiled very happily at Gu Chenzhou—this smile was not the usual reserved smile with deep meaning, but the kind of sunny and energetic expression showing teeth.

“Thanks, no need.” Gu Chenzhou refused He Hailou clearly, and then put the rabbit that had been processed at the water source on the fire to roast.

He Hailou didn’t mind either. He grabbed the rope and dragged the monkey over, whispering something with his head down, as if teaching the other party human language.

The firelight and fragrance seemed to attract an uninvited guest. When two small green lights lit up in the woods, Gu Chenzhou touched the crossbow placed by his side. He Hailou didn’t even raise his head, and cut the rope on the pheasant with the folding knife in his hand. The pheasant, which had been frightened for a while, quickly flapped its wings and disappeared into the darkness. Also disappearing into the darkness were the two small green lights that had just lit up.

This episode did not affect the mood of the two preparing to eat.

Because of the complete victory in the number of prey, after sharing the rabbit and fish soup with Gu Chenzhou, He Hailou simply released the remaining animals except the monkey, and again like last night, each watched for half the night.

It is worth mentioning that the few cicadas roasted at the beginning were eaten by no one in the end, but entered the stomach of the monkey accompanied by the rope.

After two days of marching, two-thirds of the journey at the foot of the mountain had been covered. According to the plan, the remaining one-third would be completed on the third day, and they would climb to the mountainside to camp. But when the journey of this day was only halfway through, Gu Chenzhou discovered a big problem:

Unknown when, He Hailou walking behind him was gone!