Rebirth in 1972: Redemption in Changbai Mountain

It didn't snow last night, and the wind was just right, so Zhou Rui's footprints were clearly visible.

The three followed the footprints, but halfway there the footprints disappeared, leaving only the traces of crawling.

"Junior Brother has collapsed." Gu Shaofeng squatted down and looked at the straight line in front of him, which looked like it had been plowed.

Wang Zhen looked at Xiaoxuebao, who was more than 300 meters away: "It must be because the sound of his footsteps was too loud that Junior Brother was afraid that the tiger cubs would hear him, so he crawled on the ground."

The three continued forward. The area Zhou Rui had climbed was not flat; some parts were deep and some were shallow.

Zhang Shitou was very observant. Pointing to a relatively deep pit, he said to the two, "Junior Brother has been lying here for quite a while. The tiger cub must have become alert, because Junior Brother stopped moving and compacted the snow."

The three followed the trail to the end, where they found a clear snowdrift and marks indicating where a gun barrel had been set up.

Zhang Shitou looked back and saw that the shallow pits were connected in a line.

"In this cold weather, it took my junior brother quite a while to climb just over a hundred meters, all for this final shot."

Gu Shaofeng nodded silently. If it were him, he probably wouldn't have had the patience. It seemed that this was the difference between him and his junior brother, and it wasn't just a matter of marksmanship.

"Alright, we've finished watching, let's go back," Gu Shaofeng suggested.

"You two go back first. I'm going to set some traps and see if I can catch any wild animals," Wang Zhen said enthusiastically. With such a large amount of pig offal buried here, he didn't believe that not a single one would come to steal it.

"Fine, you decide what to do. Stone, let's go."

In Xia Mao Village, Wang Shouye led Zhou Rui through the village. It was a cold winter morning, and no one went out; there were only a few scattered people on the road.

Wang Shouye had been to this village before and knew where the village chief lived, so he didn't need to ask and just led Zhou Rui there.

"Old Yang, Old Yang, are you home?" Wang Shouye didn't stand on ceremony and shouted loudly before even entering the courtyard.

"Who is it? What's up so early?" The voice was loud and clear, and the person didn't seem to be very old.

"I am Wang Shouye from Wangjiazhuang."

As Wang Shouye answered, the door opened, and a middle-aged, burly man emerged, looking about the same age as Wang Shouye.

"So it's Wang Pao from Wangjiazhuang. You haven't been to our village in ages! What brings you here?"

"What wind? A northwest wind, I guess. Haha..."

"Come on in, have a cup of hot water to warm up. And who is this?"

Village Chief Yang greeted them warmly, then noticed Zhou Rui standing behind Wang Shouye. He had never seen Zhou Rui before; Zhou Rui was younger than any of Wang Shouye's other apprentices he had met previously.

As Wang Shouye led Village Chief Yang inside, he put his arm around his shoulder and introduced him, "This is my new apprentice, Zhou Rui. Rui, call him Uncle Yang. Old Yang and I have a long-standing friendship."

"Hello, Uncle Yang."

"Okay, okay." Village Chief Yang nodded; the child was polite.

"Let me tell you, my little apprentice is much better than those blockheads. They might be counting on him in the future."

"Oh?" Village Chief Yang didn't know Zhou Rui and didn't reply. He was just a little surprised by Wang Shouye's high regard for Zhou Rui, since Zhou Rui looked too young and wasn't even an adult yet.

Upon entering the house, it was warm and cozy, and the two quickly took off their coats, otherwise they wouldn't be able to stand it.

There was no one in the house. It was unclear whether he didn't have a wife or if his wife wasn't home. Village Chief Yang personally poured water for the two of them.

After taking off his coat, Wang Shouye didn't immediately get onto the kang (heated brick bed). Instead, he took out a piece of meat weighing three or four pounds from his bag. It was all fat, white and shiny.

The village chief poured two glasses of water and brought them over, and then he saw the fatty meat on the table.

"What are you doing, giving me a gift?" Village Chief Yang asked with a smile, his words simple and direct.

"I need your help, so I can't come empty-handed." Both of them were similar in personality, never beating around the bush.

"Haha...you're still as blunt as ever. So, what do you need my help with?"

"Here's the thing. I took a job at Xiangyang Forest Farm, supplying meat to the farm's canteen. So, I was hunting in these mountains with a few apprentices, and yesterday we caught a litter of wild boar. There's a lot of meat, and we can't transport it all. I was thinking of having you find about twenty or thirty people in the village to help us get it down."

Wang Shouye didn't say that Zhou Rui was the one who did the work; some things didn't need to be explained clearly.

"How many wild boars did you hunt? It takes twenty or thirty people?" Village Chief Yang was a little frightened.

"Thirty-four, all adult wild boars weighing several hundred pounds each." Wang Shouye's number did not include the three small wild boars, which were eaten as roast suckling pigs and therefore did not count.

"Of course, I'm not asking you to help for nothing. I'll give you three wild boars from your village as payment. How about it?"

Although it was a question, Wang Shouye was certain that Old Yang would agree. Their village wasn't big, only about three hundred people.

With three wild boars, each person could get two or three pounds of meat. Such a good deal was practically handed to them; no one would refuse.

"Alright, you guys wait here, I'll go to the brigade's broadcast system and call for help." Sure enough, Village Chief Yang was very excited. After all, there was no risk; he could get so much meat for free just by putting in some labor. It would be foolish to refuse.

"Wait a minute." Wang Shouye quickly grabbed Lao Yang.

"Is there anything else?"

"We'll go with you. We'll also need to borrow your village phone to call the forest farm and ask them to send someone over to pick up the meat."

"Okay, let's go together."

After making the call, Zhou Rui waited at the brigade headquarters. He was there to pick up the forestry driver, and Wang Shouye led some villagers to haul some snow sleds up the mountain.

Upon reaching the mountain, the thirty burly men couldn't help but gasp in surprise at the mountain of wild boars piled up on top of them.

"My God, they really killed so many wild boars."

"There are quite a few, but not as many as three years ago. Three years ago, we hunted at least a hundred wild boars. Almost everyone in our village came to help bring them down."

"Compare this to three years ago. Three years ago, when there was a pig plague, militia from all around the town came—over two hundred men and guns, and forty or fifty dogs. How many people are there this time?"

"Yeah, as expected of Wang Pao, his skill level is really high. He wiped out the wild boar herd with just a few apprentices."

"Yes. I heard from the captain that Wang Pao is willing to give our brigade three wild boars as payment, so we'll have meat to eat today."

"Then I want the fatty part, look at that big fat piece, slurp..."

"Come on, do you think you can just pick and choose the captain?"

"Why can't we choose? The team leader said that everyone who works here will get an extra five pounds of meat."

Wang Shouye greeted his apprentices and was pleased to see that the campsite had been cleaned up.

Turning to the villagers of Xia Mao Village, he shouted, "Alright, folks of Xia Mao Village, you've all seen what's going on. Hurry up and load all the wild boars onto the truck. The village has started boiling water; you all want to eat meat as soon as possible, don't you?"

"Alright, Wang Pao. Just you wait and see. With our combined strength, we'll get you down the mountain in no time."

"Yes, Wang Pao. You're so generous in your work, we can't afford to mess things up. We can't just take advantage of you for nothing."

"Men, let's show Wang Pao the strength of Xia Mao Village. Let's get started."