"About thirty breaths," Du Jianshan counted, waiting for the last bit of strength to dissipate before slowly pulling the spear out. He wiped the spearhead clean on the muddy ground, then looked back at Xiao Shuan, "Can you stand up?"
"My legs are still shaking." Xiao Shuan sat on the tree root and smiled, but his smile was filled with lingering fear. "If it hadn't been for the slippery moss, I would have been toppled over by it just now."
"When hunting wild boar, you can't get any meat without suffering some losses." Old Zhou washed his knife with a kettle, looked up and said, "If Jianshan hadn't led it astray today, you wouldn't have been able to get that rope in."
“You two held on, that’s how you managed to stop it.” Du Jianshan said as he grabbed a handful of hair from the back of the wild boar’s head, pried open its mouth to check the color of its teeth, and pinched the base of its ear to check the wound. “Old Zhou, the bullet hole in your right shoulder is shallow, and the tendon in your leg was severed cleanly, so the flesh is still usable. It’s just that it’s been holding on for too long, so we need to bleed it out quickly.”
"I'll get a bowl." Xiao Shuan rummaged through his basket, pulled out an enamel mug, and squatted down under the pig's neck to collect the blood. "My sister-in-law was nagging last night about not having any pig's blood. She said that if you mix it with some scallions and it's good to have with wine, she can eat two bowls."
Old Zhou laughed and scolded, "All you ever think about is wine. Go back and share some with your family, but the team has to weigh it first, no embezzlement allowed."
“You know the rules.” Xiao Shuan grinned. “Now that this side has been divided, it should be Old Zhao’s turn. That kid of theirs has been crying from the beginning of the year to the end.”
"We definitely have to divide it up." Du Jianshan looked at the sky. "The sky will be dark in another hour. Let's deal with the internal organs first, clean it out, and carry it down the mountain. Xiao Shuan, go and wrap that green vine around it, and find two straight sticks so we can carry it."
"Wow!" Xiao Shuan jumped up, his legs still weak. He ran a few steps while holding onto a tree, then turned back and said, "Brother Jianshan, how did you learn that move? The one where you use a dart to strike the upper jaw."
"I've watched the old man squatting in the ditch twice." Du Jianshan opened the cloth bag at his waist and took out a small, gleaming dagger. "Wild boars have vicious eyes. When they charge, they only recognize straight lines. If you give them an angle, their landing point will change. Don't try to charge head-on; use their momentum to save energy." As he spoke, he cut a line down their abdomen. "Keep your hand steady, don't cut through their intestines."
Old Zhou, standing nearby, pulled the intestine out by the end, muttering, "It smells like wild garlic; things get fatter in the fall. Hey, Jianshan, can you smell it?"
“I can smell it.” Du Jianshan nodded. “There’s a wild garlic slope below this row of fir trees. If it doesn’t rain tomorrow, I’ll dig up half a basketful and take it back to dry.”
Xiao Shuan returned carrying green vines and two hawthorn stalks. "These stalks are straight and have sinews." He pressed the vines to the ground and twisted them. "I'll tie them into a figure-eight loop so they won't hurt my hands when I lift them."
“Okay.” Du Jianshan took out the intestines and stomach, found a hollow under a pine tree and buried them to avoid attracting wolves. He patted the dust off the pork with a cedar branch. “Don’t peel off the skin. Hang it up in the wind when you get back. We’ll process it tomorrow. The skin can be sold for money, and we’ll keep the fangs too.”
Old Zhou looked up: "Does the supply and marketing cooperative accept teeth?"
"We'll take them, the craft cooperative will too." Du Jianshan shoved two hawthorn stalks between his front and back hamstrings, then waved to Lao Zhou, "Try your shoulders. Xiao Shuan, you stay behind."
The three of them pulled together, lifting the wild boar half a foot off the ground. Xiao Shuan exclaimed, "Wow, that's heavy!"
"Nearly two hundred pounds." Old Zhou gritted his teeth. "Don't run downhill, the moss is slippery."
They shuffled back. A flock of gray magpies chattered in the windy spot, as if announcing some excitement. Leaving the arbor of fir trees, they reached a sunny, rocky area where the light was more open. Du Jianshan stopped to catch his breath, wiping the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand; the sweat had a metallic smell.
“Jianshan,” Old Zhou suddenly lowered his voice, “You said that the pig went down the bramble slope to the left, probably because someone was chasing it. Look at these footprints all along the way, they’re mixed and messy, some with shoe soles and some with straw boots.”
"Hmm." Du Jianshan's eyes darkened as he scanned the mud prints on the stone. "The footprints are shallow, and the ankles are outward, like those of a young child. There's also a line of footprints with serrated edges, probably the rubber shoes that the group down the mountain got recently."
Xiao Shuan felt a chill run down his spine: "They dare to come here to herd pigs? Didn't we just have a meeting where they said that hunting in other villages requires a permit from the commune?"
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