When I got home, I put down the dozens of kilograms of goods that had been weighing on my shoulders and the badger on the ground, and took a few deep breaths before doing anything else.
It's great to get these things, but transporting them back is a real pain.
It seems I need to make preparations as soon as possible and head to the hilly area to the east to see if I can manage to catch a calf of a wildebeest.
These guys aren't very smart and they're tough, making them perfect for manual labor.
However, their large numbers pose a significant challenge, and we need to devise a solution.
Otherwise, they'll probably have to get me to have offspring before they can get their own.
After running around all day, Pat was a bit hungry, so I fed him some more bear liver. He probably wasn't hungry.
Apart from the two times it hunted, this thing spent almost the entire time lying flat and sleeping. I wonder what its kind would think if they saw it like this.
It was still early, so Top and I cooked some taro noodles and dried meat together to eat. The dried meat served as a topping for the noodles.
A bowl of taro noodles with more than half a bowl of sliced meat. You probably won't find another honest and reliable owner like me here.
Top still has a special fondness for all taro products, slurping them up with great enthusiasm.
After eating the noodles, my hunger subsided considerably, and my energy returned somewhat. Those natural rubber sap can't be left sealed like that for too long, otherwise they'll smell bad and affect their quality.
I need to remove the water from these stock solutions first, because the stock solutions themselves contain gel, so I came up with a way to quickly remove the water from the stock solutions.
I went to the stream and found a lot of yellow mud, then pounded it to make mud bricks, and then made it into a mud slab one meter by one meter.
It needs to be a little thicker; I made it about two centimeters thick.
After doing all this, I swept one side of the clay slab with water, and then used a smooth wooden board to repeatedly scrape it to make the surface of the clay block smoother.
The edges of the clay slab also need to be glued with a two-centimeter-thick strip of clay, making the entire clay slab look like a wooden serving dish.
Next, the clay was piled up and baked thoroughly until the thick clay block turned white, using the same method as when firing pottery.
After it cools down, I can pour the milky white natural rubber slurry I collected into it.
Because the clay blanks haven't been fired yet, their porous structure easily absorbs water. Once the natural rubber slurry is poured in, the whitish clay blanks immediately become moist at a visible speed.
At this point, the water in the original solution is absorbed by the dried clay, leaving behind only the wrinkled natural rubber.
However, these gels only remove most of the moisture; some remains, so they cannot be completely removed with this method and still need to be dried.
It took me ten separate processes to completely finish processing this large half-jar of mud. In the middle, I dried the water-soaked mud slabs again using the same method before continuing to process the natural rubber slurry, so it took quite a bit of time.
By the time I had finished processing all the natural rubber sap and dried it, it was already dark.
I sighed; it seemed I wouldn't be able to finish it today. The final step would require more time.
That concludes my work for the day. I packed my things and returned to my residence.
I poured a cup of water from a ceramic jar into the cup and drank it all in one gulp. The water had been boiled, so it tasted a bit smoother.
Cool boiled water is more effective at quenching thirst than regular tap water, as it can quickly replenish the water lost by the body due to sweating and other reasons.
After working around the fire for so long, my mouth was incredibly parched. Drinking a glass of cool water made me feel much better.
As usual, I started a fire first. Fire brings an unparalleled sense of security. Especially in such a wilderness environment, the bright and warm firelight can illuminate all the dark corners.
I hung the rabbit upside down, suspending it by its two hind legs. After making a circular cut around the joints of its limbs with a skinning knife, I then made two incisions along the direction of its two hind legs, allowing me to peel off its skin completely, just like taking off a sock.
I tied the cylindrical rabbit skin that I had taken off with a thin rope and hung it on the pole where I had previously dried taro noodles, letting it air dry naturally.
Rabbit offal is a real treat, perfect for feeding Pat. Today I didn't hold back; I fed Pat the whole rabbit's internal organs, including its heart, liver, spleen, lungs, and kidneys.
Pat played a significant role in making our harvest possible. It was he who took care of both animals, allowing us to have fresh meat to eat.
So I decided to give Pat some of the remaining hog badger's organs and meat as well. I'll make an exception this time, considering how hard it hunted, and let it eat until it's about 80% full.
After processing the rabbit, soak it in water in a porcelain basin to remove any remaining blood from the meat.
Next, we dealt with the badger.
I'm not going to skin the badger; the pelt isn't very big, and the fur isn't soft enough—it's rather stiff. So I've decided to just give it a fire therapy treatment instead.
Under the scorching heat of the fire, the badger's fur immediately emitted a burnt smell, which was quite pungent.
Fortunately, my residence is located on a cliff, and with good ventilation, the acrid smoke will dissipate quickly.
Once the badger's skin was charred black, it was almost done. I used a machete to scrape off the charred fur and dark brown skin.
The process was very relaxing; the blade scraped vertically against the taut, singed badger skin with a sharp, sizzling sound. Each cut revealed the slightly yellowish skin beneath, much like peeling a loofah.
After rinsing off the black substance on the surface, the part I was most looking forward to—unpacking the goods—arrived.
As the knife sliced open the badger's belly, a layer of white fat, at least two fingers thick, came into view. I was overjoyed; this badger had indeed not disappointed me.
But I knew it wasn't just that. After removing the heart, liver, spleen, lungs, kidneys, and excrement from the abdomen, I used a cleaver to split the abdomen in two from above the spine in the middle.
At this moment, the badger has a piece of fat about an inch thick on each side. For an animal of this size, having such a thick piece of fat is quite remarkable.
I rendered out all the fat and lard; it should have yielded about five or six pounds of oil.
I'm quite satisfied with the result, considering this guy only weighs about 20 pounds. Surviving in the wild is already difficult enough, so storing up so much fat must have been quite an achievement.
I cut off some of the badger's liver and lungs to feed Pat. According to the custom back home, after a hunt, the owner has to share a portion of the spoils so that Pat will be motivated to work in the future.
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