Condes Mountains
Mellen has been working as a forest ranger in the snow-capped mountains for nearly fifty years. It is not an exaggeration to say that he knows every plant and tree on the mountain like the back of his hand.
Every time he was on patrol, he could find out in the shortest time where there were traces of outsiders, where new groups of animals had migrated, and even where foxes had given birth to cubs.
Because of this, he has a very good relationship with wild animals. Even the most timid species will let down their guard when they meet him, and will often follow him closely when he patrols the mountains.
The forest and mountains are part of nature. Even if Myron knows this place well, he would never dare to claim any ownership of the forest.
But he has indeed regarded this place as his only home.
In his early years, Myron left his hometown and came to the vast snow-capped mountains thousands of miles away. The hometown where he was born and raised was far away and had long been out of reach.
Being a forest ranger is no longer just his duty, but a part of his life.
It is precisely because of this that when facing the "Cheetah", Myron felt unprecedented frustration.
The presence of these poachers was first noticed one spring a few years ago.
During those days, Myron noticed that many returning migratory birds had begun circling in the sky, and the time of their return was half a month earlier than in previous years. He thought it must be a rare warm spring.
This is good. The small river in the forest will melt more, so that the small animals won’t have to gather together tightly when drinking water.
Although the mountains are covered with snow all year round, not all places are covered with ice. There are small warm areas where strong convection currents collide.
There is a mountain stream that runs through the dense forest in the center, forming an ice stream flowing down from the glacier on the top of the mountain. The surface is covered with ice, and there is gurgling water flowing underneath.
Apart from the influence of warm wind, there are no big trees on both sides of the river to block the sunlight, so it can be well exposed to sunlight on sunny days.
In spring and summer, small patches of thin surface ice may melt.
The spring water from the top of the snow-capped mountains is sweet and clear. At this time, when the animals living in the forest need to replenish their body water, they no longer need to rely on looking for clean snow and chewing it to eat.
Myron would often go out with a hammer. When he saw a place where the ice had melted, he would use the hammer to break the ice nearby to ensure that there would be more drinking water and provide convenience for animals that came to find water.
That day he went out to patrol the mountains as usual. Before he got close to the river, he heard the sound of gurgling water coming from the river, which was clearer than yesterday.
This is a sign that the ice is melting more, and it seems that the weather is really preparing to warm up.
Myron was in a good mood and continued walking forward humming a little tune. After reaching the river, he noticed something was wrong while looking for a suitable area to knock.
The stream surrounded by the glacier should have very clear water, but now it has a layer of light pink on the surface.
That was diluted blood flowing down from upstream.
Although natural selection does occur occasionally among animals, and the appearance of bloodstains in the mountains is not particularly strange, and it has been very quiet recently with no poachers going up the mountain, Mellen still feels uneasy.
He quickened his pace and climbed up the mountain along the river. After walking about two or three hundred meters, he saw a few broken feathers scattered on the ground, as well as bloodstains that had blended with the fallen snow and looked like they were left not long ago.
The broken feathers were brightly colored, with unique circular patterns of varying sizes. They were from the colorful geese that had just returned from wintering outside a few days ago.
When animals are surviving, in order to avoid being discovered by natural enemies, they always evolve their skin and hair into colors similar to their habitat, so that when they encounter danger, they can try their best to reduce the risk of exposure and avoid being predated by natural enemies.
Birds like the Tufted Goose are just the opposite. They always maintain the most eye-catching feather color, which is even more noticeable when they live in pure white snow.
This has led to the species becoming increasingly scarce.
In addition to being hunted by wild beasts, humans have also begun to focus on their peculiar long feathers.
The color is unique. Some workers once tried to imitate it by using dyes, but the final color was less than one-tenth of the real feather.
Then some people began to have illegal intentions, hunting the colorful geese and plucking their feathers to make highly ornamental decorations.
There were traces of a struggle on the snow, with only a few broken feathers and footprints heading in a certain direction that had not yet been covered by the wind and snow.
Judging from the situation at the scene, it is obviously the latter. The colorful geese were hunted by poachers, and the people should have just left not long ago.
Just last month, we caught two poachers in the act and sent them to jail. I didn’t expect that someone else would be unable to restrain themselves and go back into the mountains again so soon.
It's windy and snowy at this time. If we wait any longer, the footprints will be completely covered by the falling snow, making it extremely difficult to find the person again.
Without further ado, Mellen followed the direction of the footprints. After leaving the river, he did not go down the mountain, but continued inward and arrived at the pine forest.
Pine forests are much shorter than silver fir trees and grow very compactly with each other, so sunlight rarely penetrates the needles and reaches the ground.
Therefore, the temperature dropped significantly as soon as they set foot in this territory, but Myron was already used to it.
However, the poacher's movements completely disappeared after he passed a raised branch.
The snow beside him was extremely smooth, and there were pine trees around him that were only one person wide. He looked at the rough bark on the surface of the tree trunks and wondered if this person had climbed up the tree.
Why would a good person run up a tree instead of walking on the ground?
Although the pine trees here are only three to five meters high, they are covered with a thin layer of snow. They don't look like anything special, but they are extremely slippery once you step on them.
Even if they can barely climb a tree, they will not be able to use their agile posture to walk in the crowns of nearby pine trees.
Even if he wanted to cover his tracks, there was no need to take such a risk. If he fell from the treetops, it would not be worth it. Besides, he was actually a little late just now, which meant that the poachers didn't know someone was following him, so it was even more unnecessary.
But apart from this one path, no matter how carefully he looked, Myron couldn't find any traces that could be followed.
He had no choice but to go back, but the fact that there were new poachers in the mountains made him very concerned.
Myron wanted to patrol more often in the next few days and then go to the small town at the foot of the mountain to inquire whether there were any new outsiders staying in the hotel.
But before he could find any clues to learn more, he witnessed the scene of animals being hunted.
The victim was a short-haired deer in the mountains.
He was patrolling the mountains the next day when he heard short bursts of gunfire coming from the valley.
There was only one sound, lingering in the valley, and judging from the distance, it was not far away.
Myron ran over quickly, and when he got closer, he heard the mournful cry of the deer again.
He was a burly man with a ferocious look, running in the snow with a cloth bag in his hand. There was a large amount of blood on the back of his hand, which was obviously not from his body.
"Don't move!" Myron was glad that he brought a hunting rifle with him today. He had already put the rifle against his shoulder and warned.
"Stop meddling in other people's business." The man frowned and spoke viciously.
Seeing that his intimidation failed, Myron squeezed the trigger hard: "This is not meddling in other people's business. This mountain is my responsibility to protect."
"You old bastard." Unexpectedly, the other party was not afraid at all. Instead, he took out a pistol from his waist, pointed the gun at himself, and shot without any hesitation.
Thanks to a sudden gust of strong wind, the bullet's movement was affected and it just grazed Myron's neck, leaving only a shallow burn on it.
Poachers are doing illegal things, so naturally they are not kind-hearted. He has fought with many people before.
But since they are just hunting animals, basically there will be no head-on conflict when they meet, but they will run away if they can. After all, the money earned from a poaching trip is fixed, and it is definitely not as important as life.
This was the first time that Myron had encountered someone who attacked without any prior warning.
He reacted in just half a second before firing, aiming at the opponent's calf.
The man only groaned, staggered a few steps, and then swept the snow with his pistol, raising large flakes of snow, which he then used to cover his disappearance in the wind and snow.
The fawn lying on the ground was still gasping for breath. Myron didn't bother to chase the man anymore, but went to check the injuries of the short-haired deer.
The short-haired deer was dying. The wound was on its chest near the bend of its front legs, and the wound penetrated along its belly. Large amounts of blood dyed its brown hair red, but fortunately its internal organs were not damaged.
Relatively speaking, what was more fatal were the two bloody wounds on the head.
The most precious part of the short-haired deer is the pair of antlers that grow into adulthood, which are extremely nutritious. The growth conditions of the antlers are special, and they often only grow two to three centimeters in a whole year.
Looking at the size of the deer, you can tell that the antlers dug out are already top quality.
The man was very ruthless. He did not cut the antlers horizontally at the junction of the antlers and the skin with the tip of the knife. Instead, he continued to cut downwards in order to obtain more antler tissue.
The flesh and blood were cut off, and the blood dripped down the top of the head to the face and then fell onto the white ground.
The brown fur of the fawn was soaked with blood, and it was obviously frightened. In the past, when it met Myron, it would come up to him affectionately, but now, seeing him approaching, its big round eyes stared in fear in the direction he was coming from.
But it was injured and fell to the ground. It struggled several times but couldn't move to stand up and almost kicked Myron.
"Don't be afraid," Myron whispered soothingly, stroking the back of the fawn's neck in comfort.
The skin under his palms trembled uncontrollably, and his movements became gentler. To prevent the deer from moving while bandaging it, he grabbed the deer's limbs and hooves with one hand and pressed them under his knees to barely hold it in place.
I didn't have any hemostatic medicine on me, so I could only tear some cloth to cover the wound.
In fact, the fawn soon became obedient. It was obvious that it had lost more blood than strength and was already drowsy.
Myron carried the short-haired deer on his shoulders and carried it back to the cabin step by step. After taking care of it for ten days, the deer finally returned to the jungle.
After this incident, Mellen dared not let his guard down anymore and expanded his search area every day, hoping to find the poacher he had met that day.
After encountering them many times, he learned that it was a mature poaching gang called "Cheetahs".
They were ruthless, but also knew how to bide their time. Every time Mellen was about to learn more, the other party would remain quiet for a while.
This dragged on for almost two years, and apart from getting to know a few members, he never actually caught any of them.
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