Chapter 39 Hot Spring Trip
39 Hot Spring Trip
Today is a good day for Ziyi to take Yike to the hot springs. In Yike's words, we are going to the hot springs for our honeymoon.
After returning from a long vacation, Taiyang has been working for several days in a row and is at his post again today. The golden sunshine spreads its soft light wantonly, and the white snow reflects silver light.
"Aunt, please miss me! I will miss you too!" Yike waved at Zhang Yuling and said.
"Yike! When you are out, you must listen to Ziyi. If you encounter ferocious beasts like tigers and wolves, you must run away and don't think about fighting them. Ziyi, it's cold outside. You must find a place to rest early at night." Zhang Yuling kept nagging.
"Ziyi, take Yike with you. When you see a wild beast, don't think about hunting it. You should take Yike with you and run away. Before, you were alone and could escape if you couldn't win. But this time, you are not alone. If you can't win, it will be too late to escape with others." Li Haoran said the same thing as Zhang Yuling. They are worthy of being a couple.
"Don't worry! I know!" Ziyi said.
"Aunt, don't worry. I am a very timid person. If we see any wild beasts, we will run away as far as possible." Yi Ke also vowed to Zhang Yuling.
"Let's go, let's go! The earlier you go, the earlier you can come back!" After getting ready, he looked at the sky and urged Ziyi to hurry up. So the two of them set off for the hot spring under the reluctant gazes of Li Haoran and Zhang Yuling.
Ziyi and Yike carried dry food and weapons and rode on skis, rushing towards the hot springs. Ziyi told Yike that the hot springs were the real inner area of Longshan, where there was fog all year round and there were ferocious beasts such as tigers and blind bears, as well as packs of wolves nearby. They even caught a glimpse of wild men that looked like humans. The wild men were very fast and disappeared from their sight in an instant, but the big footprints left behind told them that it was not an illusion, but real.
From then on, Ziyi and Li Haoran basically never went to the hot spring unless it was necessary.
"How terrible!" Yi Ke was horrified when he heard it. I couldn't help but be curious, "How did you find this hot spring?"
"Well, it was fate," Ziyi said. "I was out hunting alone at the time, and I didn't expect to encounter two tigers. I could fight one tiger, but I had no choice but to run away from the other two. While I was running away, I accidentally ran into the hot spring."
"Wow! You're so lucky! What happened to the tiger? Was it scalded to death by the hot spring you led it into?"
"Haha! How is that possible? The hot spring water is not that hot. Besides, tigers are not stupid enough to jump into boiling water. There are many caves near the hot spring. I climbed into a higher cave by the vines. The tigers couldn't bite me and wandered there for two days. Maybe they were hungry, so they left. I took the opportunity to slip away. I don't know if the tigers went back in the end."
"Then if we go today, will..." Yike was terrified.
"No, later Uncle Hao and I went to search for it and found the den of the two tigers. We dug a trap and caught the two tigers, and the tiger meat was already in our stomachs. But to be honest, we have to thank the two tigers. After eating them, Uncle Hao, Uncle Hao's aunt and I are all in much better health than before. We haven't been sick for the past few years." Ziyi said happily, "Especially Aunt. She used to be thin and sick a lot. The doctor said it was due to excessive deficiency when she was a child. She needs to be nursed back to health. After eating tiger meat, she rarely gets sick."
Ziyi and Yike hurried all the way and finally arrived at the first resettlement point before dark: a big tree hole.
This tree has long and thick branches as big as a giant's arms, which are tightly connected with the branches of other trees around it, forming a tree tunnel.
The tree hole is near the tree crown. I don’t know how it was formed, but it can accommodate a person half-lying in it.
In the past, when Ziyi and Uncle Hao were together, one of them would sleep in a tree hole, and the other would spend the night in a tunnel formed by tree branches. The weather was not cold then, but now it is too cold at night. Ziyi cannot live outside, and there is not enough space for two people to sleep side by side, so they had to sleep half-sideways all night.
The next morning, Yike found herself sleeping in Ziyi's arms and felt a little embarrassed. Yike woke up from Ziyi's arms and smiled brightly: "Good morning!"
"Good morning! You stand up first, I'll stand up slowly." Ziyi said as he stretched out his hand to support Yi Ke.
"Ouch! Are your legs numb? Let me rub them for you."
"No, go out first. There's no room to squat here. It's okay. Just take it easy."
Yi Ke had no choice but to come out of the tree hole and put some clean snowflakes into the pot. Now I dug out some dry branches from the snow pile under the big tree, and tried to light them for a long time but failed to start a fire. Ziyi came down after his foot felt better and helped to start the fire. After the water was boiled, the two washed their faces and rinsed their mouths with the hot water. Finally, they boiled two more bamboo tubes of water, ate some biscuits and dried meat, and then set off for the hot spring again.
The sun is on duty again today. Maybe the horn of spring has blown too loudly, so the sun is too embarrassed to be lazy again. White clouds also floated out to accompany the blue sky.
After several days of warm sunshine, the snow covering the ground outside the mountains and forests slowly melted, the resilient grass poked its head out, and unknown birds chirped loudly, telling people: Spring has arrived in the south, so can our spring be far behind? Only the snow in the mountains has not melted yet, and under photosynthesis, it is sparkling and silver.
At this time, Ziyi and Yike had passed through three resettlement sites in succession and were preparing to stay for one night at the fifth resettlement site.
"Yike, you are so smart. Before there were skis, Uncle Hao and I wouldn't dare come to the hot spring during the snow season." Ziyi loves Yike who invented the skis.
"When the weather is warm, all kinds of animals come out to look for food. There are many poisonous insects far away from the hot springs, and there are many large beasts near the hot springs. It is really difficult to move forward. After going through so much hardship, it will take at least five days to get here."
"Then you can go to the hot springs when it's cold! Poisonous insects and most animals hibernate in the winter."
"It's hard to walk because of the snow. It's hard to get to the resettlement site with caves before dark. We can't keep warm outside the caves and will freeze to death. If we didn't have skis, we wouldn't be able to reach the resettlement site now. We would have nowhere to stay at night and we wouldn't survive in the ice and snow."
The two talked as they walked, and finally arrived at the fifth resettlement site before dark.
The resettlement site is a cave about the size of a room with a very small entrance. Ziyi told Yike that this was a cave where a leopard lived, and he and Uncle Hao trapped the leopard in the cave and killed it. After the leopard died, they used the cave as a settlement.
Every time they came, they would clean the cave, prepare firewood and water, and even put some dried wild vegetables and a clay pot. According to their previous speed of travel, it should be the fifth day to arrive here. It would be uncomfortable to eat dry food every day, so they prepared jars for making soup.
For hunters, hunting a small animal to make soup is not a problem. But this time, Ziyi and Yike only took two days to get here.
"Yike, I'll go over there and clean the rabbits. You start a fire first." Ziyi gave the instructions and left with the rabbit he caught on the road. "La la la, life is so beautiful!" Yi Ke hummed a tune while making a fire, and his happy mood spread to the surroundings.
"The clouds are floating in the sky, the birds are singing, the flowers are smiling, I am happy and carefree, Ziyi is laughing! Hey! Laughing!"
After packing up the rabbit, Ziyi returned to the cave and heard a cheerful song.
"Yike, it's great to have you!" Ziyi couldn't help but hug Yike, feeling like his heart was flying with happiness.
"Brother Ziyi, I feel the same way. I feel very happy and satisfied with you." Yike also hugged Ziyi back, "You don't know that last year, I was alone in the mountains. Apart from the sound of the wind, insects and birds, the silence was so terrifying, as if I were a blind and deaf person. It seemed like I was the only human being in the world."
"Not anymore. I'll stay with you."
"Brother Ziyi, I will accompany you too. You are so nice!"
That night, the two of them slept sweetly in the pink bubble called happiness.
They originally thought that the two would have a smooth journey to the hot spring, but when they were almost approaching the hot spring, they actually ran into a blind bear that was out looking for food.
Ziyi and Yike could hear the "crack, crack" sound of breaking branches from afar.
"Not good! Yike, hurry up and climb the tree."
"Okay, one for each of us."
The two of them climbed up the tree quickly, Yike was acting as if they were facing a formidable enemy, and Ziyi was also on full alert. Soon, the two saw a blind bear chasing a tusk pig weighing about 300 pounds.
I thought there would be a big battle, but who would have thought that the blind bear would just ignore the two men whose combined weight was not even as heavy as a tusk pig. Ziyi and Yike didn't want to cause any trouble, so they watched a pig and a bear running past. They both breathed a sigh of relief, climbed down from the tree and quickly left this place of trouble.
Before dark, the two finally arrived at the hot spring safely.
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