Yongli Village, at Xing Zhuyong’s home.

Zhao Jun, Li Baoyu, Hu Mantang, Xing Zhuyong, and another man named Li Hu, five in total, were sitting on the heated brick bed, gathered around a low table, eating.

In another room, Xing Zhuyong’s wife and their two children were eating at a separate table.

This was a custom in the Northeast: when guests were over, the women and children couldn’t eat at the main table.

Zhao Jun and Li Baoyu didn’t drink, so they just kept their heads down and ate heartily. Meanwhile, Hu Mantang, Xing Zhuyong, and the man named Li Hu toasted and drank with one another.

After a few glasses of liquor, Li Hu started to boast about how amazing he and Xing Zhuyong were at hunting.

Zhao Jun watched the boasting Li Hu without a change in expression, though inwardly he was filled with contempt. Although this was the first time he’d met Li Hu in this life, he knew exactly what kind of person he was from his last one.

Zhao Jun remained silent, but Li Baoyu, sitting beside him, wouldn’t stand for it. Li Baoyu thought, ’If you were really so great, would you have had to run to Yong’an Village to ask the two of us for help?’

He couldn’t say this out loud, but that didn’t stop Li Baoyu from joining in the bragging match against Li Hu.

"Today, my brother and I were over by Gangcha, below the Jiao River, in logging area 35. We killed a cannon eggs that was over four hundred and forty pounds!" Li Baoyu said proudly. "We didn’t even bother with the meat and came straight here with you guys."

Hearing this, Hu Mantang quickly put down his glass and asked Zhao Jun, "Nephew, is that true?"

"It’s true," Zhao Jun said with a smile. "Just a bit over four hundred and forty pounds."

"And you just left the boar on the mountain?" Hu Mantang pressed.

"It’s fine. My dad will find someone to haul it back tomorrow." After dealing with Hu Mantang, Zhao Jun turned to Xing Zhuyong and asked, "Second Brother-in-law, the Black Bear you found, was it hibernating or just passing through?"

"Passing through," Xing Zhuyong replied. He hadn’t had a chance to say so back with Zhao Jun’s family.

And on the way over, Xing Zhuyong had to drive the sled, so he couldn’t talk to Zhao Jun.

By the time they got back to his house, Hu Erya had already prepared the meal. It was past six, and the three of them were hungry, so they went straight to the heated brick bed to eat.

Xing Zhuyong was a little drunk by now. Gesticulating wildly, he explained the whole story to Zhao Jun and Li Baoyu, with Li Hu chiming in from the side.

After all their rambling, Zhao Jun and Li Baoyu were still a bit confused, but that wasn’t the important part.

After they finished eating and drinking, Hu Mantang, being older, left for home first. When it was Li Hu’s time to leave, Xing Zhuyong personally saw him to the door.

Once outside, Li Hu suddenly grabbed Xing Zhuyong and said, "Big Brother, I saw that kid Zhao Jun is carrying a gun. Be careful tomorrow. We can’t let him kill that little Black Bear cub."

"Mm, I know."

So what were these two plotting?

It turned out that the two of them had been working as temporary laborers at the Forest Farm since the beginning of winter, driving sleds for logging.

The team they were on had twenty sleds and over forty workers. They were responsible for the entire process: felling, delimbing, and bucking.

Felling is cutting down the trees.

Delimbing is chopping off all the branches from the felled trees with a Large Axe.

Bucking is sawing the logs into sections.

Then, they used ox- or horse-drawn sleds to haul them down the mountain.

Three days ago, the chainsaw operator and his assistant from their team went up the mountain to fell trees. After cutting one down, the two of them went off to the side for a smoke.

They failed to notice a hollow in the tree trunk about two-thirds of the way up. After the massive tree crashed onto the snowy ground, a black furball rolled out of the hole.

The furball tumbled in the snow and then unfurled. It was a Little Black Bear, less than a meter long and weighing around eighty-eight to ninety-nine pounds.

The Little Black Bear seemed dazed from the fall. It groggily climbed to its feet just as a large Black Bear emerged from the tree hollow.

This was a mother Black Bear weighing around two hundred seventy-five to two hundred eighty-six pounds. The local name for them references their notoriously poor eyesight, but their sense of smell is extremely keen—at least ten times better than a dog’s.

The large Black Bear smelled an unknown creature in the distance and quickly led the Little Black Bear up the slope and onto the ridge.

And the whole time the two Black Bears appeared and then left, the chainsaw operator and his assistant, busy smoking and chatting off to the side, were completely oblivious.

When they finished their cigarettes, the two took out their axes to start delimbing, but as soon as they approached the tree, they discovered the series of tracks.

Having worked in the mountains for years, how could they not recognize Black Bear tracks?

The moment they saw them, they assumed a Black Bear was nearby. They were so scared they dropped their Large Axes and ran down the mountain, abandoning even their chainsaw.

Only after they ran all the way back to the Forest Farm did it dawn on them that they had left their tools—their livelihood—on the mountain. Without them, how were they supposed to work and earn money?

It happened to be the lunch break, and the rest of the team had returned to the mess hall to eat. The two men told their fellow workers what had happened that day.

Back then, a chainsaw was worth a lot of money. Plus, the workers on the same team had been eating and living together for months and had grown close.

So, after lunch, during their break, more than twenty men took a few sleds and WHOOSHED into the mountains.

When they reached the spot, there was no sign of any Black Bears, and the chainsaw operator and his assistant retrieved their equipment.

But just then, Li Hu pulled Xing Zhuyong aside.

"What is it, Elder San?" Xing Zhuyong asked.

Li Hu was the third child in his family. People who knew him called him Li San’Er, and those who were close to him called him Elder San directly.

"Big Brother," Li Hu said, pointing with the toe of his boot at the Little Black Bear’s tracks in the snow. "This is a big mother Black Bear with a cub."

"Yeah, so what?" Xing Zhuyong asked, confused. He didn’t understand why Li Hu was telling him this. The tracks were plain as day in the snow; anyone who wasn’t blind could see they were left by two Black Bears, one large and one small.

Li Hu said, "Big Brother, don’t you have two dogs at home? Let’s take them and our guns and go hunt it."

"Well..." Xing Zhuyong hesitated. "Brother, missing a day of work costs a lot of money."

"My dear brother!" Li Hu slapped his thigh, but then immediately lowered his voice. "How much are two Bear Galls worth? Our daily wages are nothing compared to that!"

Hearing this, Xing Zhuyong was tempted. ’He’s right,’ he thought. ’The wages for a whole winter’s work for the two of us can’t even compare to one small Bear Gall.’

It was truly a case of "men die for wealth as birds die for food."

The two returned to the camp and went to the foreman to ask for leave. They claimed someone had brought a message saying there was an emergency at home and they needed to return.

The foreman was puzzled. He thought, ’These two aren’t from the same family. How could they both have an emergency at home at the same time?’

But since they were both temporary workers who were paid by the job, it didn’t matter much if they took leave or not, so the foreman approved it.

On their way home, Li Hu said to Xing Zhuyong, "Big Brother, we’re going to hunt the Black Bear tomorrow. Don’t you dare tell your father-in-law."

Although Xing Zhuyong and Hu Mantang didn’t live together, only three households separated their homes, and they visited each other daily.

Xing Zhuyong was confused and asked, "Why not?"

"Are you stupid?" Li Hu said, completely exasperated. "If you get a Bear Gall, won’t your father-in-law make you give him money to find a wife for your third brother-in-law?"

"Ah, you’re right." The mention of this annoyed Xing Zhuyong. When his second brother-in-law got married, his father-in-law had come and borrowed eighty yuan from him and still hadn’t paid it back.

The two entered the village and went their separate ways. When Xing Zhuyong got home, his wife was very surprised.

Loggers like him were supposed to live in the mountains while they worked and couldn’t come home until the New Year.

But when Hu Erya asked, Xing Zhuyong didn’t tell the truth. He just said he’d seen a sounder of boars on the mountain and was going to hunt them tomorrow, so they’d have pork for the New Year.

This made Hu Erya furious. ’This man has no sense of priority,’ she thought. ’Why is he hunting wild boars instead of earning money properly?’

Eating meat is nice, but the key issue was that his Spear Technique was no good, and their dogs weren’t tough. Nine out of ten times he went hunting, he came back empty-handed.

’With that time, wouldn’t it be better to just work hard at the camp and earn some money?’

Xing Zhuyong didn’t tell Hu Erya the truth. He just waited until the next morning, then left the house with his gun and dogs to meet Li Hu and head into the mountains.

They arrived at the spot where the chainsaw operator had felled the tree the day before. They followed the tracks over a large ridge before Xing Zhuyong finally let the dogs loose.

The moment he untied their ropes, the two dogs vanished. It wasn’t long before they heard the dogs start barking.

Xing Zhuyong and Li Hu were overjoyed. Each holding a 16-gauge, they ran forward!