I Overhear Animals' Thoughts to Feed My Family

Chapter 178: Chapter 174: Heavenly Dragon Meat

Zhao Wendong wasn’t in the mood to cook anything fancy today. He boiled some hot hominy porridge, heated up their dry rations and jerky, and that was dinner. Still, a meal like this was considered one of the best in the Commune. Just having a large, filling portion was better than what most families had.

Zhao Wenwu got sleepy right after eating and fell asleep as soon as he lay down. Listening to his snores, the others quickly started feeling drowsy too. The animals were all fed one by one, and the dogs even got an extra portion.

The little White Weasel, despite its size, was a carnivore. Fortunately, it didn’t have a big appetite and was full after just a few bites of meat. It then obediently curled up in Lin Zhiyin’s arms, much to Zhao Wendong’s displeasure. ’There sure are a lot of little things trying to steal my spot,’ he thought.

After washing the dishes with the water used to rinse the pot, everyone crawled into their bedrolls. Lin Zhiyin and Jin Xiuying were next to each other, with Zhao Wendong on one side and Zhao Wenwu on the other. Next to Zhao Wenwu were Zhao Wenjun and Er Gou. The six of them fell silent, each lost in their own thoughts, and soon drifted off to sleep.

The next day, everyone woke up quite early. They briefly went outside to wash their faces with snow. Zhao Wendong checked the time; it was just barely nine o’clock.

”Let’s go to the hot spring today!”

The moment Zhao Wendong finished speaking, Lin Zhiyin cheered happily.

”Yay, we can take a bath!”

She had almost forgotten what a proper bath felt like over the years. She hadn’t given it much thought, but now, the prospect of bathing made her feel itchy all over. She packed her soap, towel, and other necessities—all of which were new, bought for her by Zhao Wendong.

At this thought, Lin Zhiyin couldn’t help but glance at Zhao Wendong again. As the saying goes, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. To her, Zhao Wendong was becoming more and more handsome, so perfect he practically took her breath away.

After breakfast and taking care of their personal business, they put the stone slab back in place to camouflage their shelter and started heading toward the hot spring. Xiaojin might have been grumpy from waking up; it was squatting dazedly in its wooden cage today and didn’t give Zhao Wendong the signal that it wanted to go out for a stroll, so Zhao Wendong just left it be.

Each of them was laden with all sorts of gear, much of which was for emergencies and might never be used.

[Something’s here]

Up ahead, General, who was clearing the path, twitched his nose, dug his paws into the ground, and let out a low growl with his body lowered. Seeing that the dogs had found something, Zhao Wendong quickly signaled for Zhao Wenjun to release them.

The moment the leashes were undone, the three dogs shot forward. Behind them was a flash of white—the sly little fox. Perhaps feeling its position was threatened, the fox was being particularly well-behaved and eager today.

WHIRRR~

The moment the dogs pounced, several wild pheasants flew out from the bushes ahead.

”It’s Flying Dragons!”

Er Gouzi had sharp eyes and recognized the pheasants at a glance. In the Northeast, wild pheasants are generally divided into four types. The most common is the ring-necked pheasant. It’s the largest of the pheasants, with a body length of nearly a meter, though half of that is its tail. In some places, it’s called the white ring-necked pheasant because of the complete white ring around its neck.

The crown of this pheasant is a light greenish-gray-brown, with a broad white stripe extending from behind the eye to the side of the neck. Its face and the skin below its throat are bare and bright red. The back feathers are straw-yellow, covered in dark brown V-shaped patterns. The breast feathers are a light reddish-brown with a metallic sheen, and its flanks are a pale straw-yellow. The tail feathers are grayish-yellow with over a dozen dark brown horizontal bars. Their flying ability is average; this is the type that, when chased into a panic, will dive headfirst into the snow.

The other two types are the black pheasant and the white pheasant, and their appearances are about what you’d expect from their names. White pheasants are rare now; even in his previous life, Zhao Wendong had only seen them a few times. As for these Flying Dragons right here, their scientific name is the hazel grouse. To people in the Northeast, they are the king of mountain delicacies. The common saying, ”Dragon meat in the sky, donkey meat on the ground,” refers to the Flying Dragon as the ”dragon meat.”

The Flying Dragon is slightly larger than a pigeon but much smaller than a ring-necked pheasant. It has a small, erect crest of feathers on its head, like a little hat. Its throat and undertail coverts are pure black with a white border, resembling a black scarf. Its body is covered in grayish-brown feathers with dark brown and ocher markings. The belly is a pale brownish-yellow. The tip of its tail has a wide black subterminal band and a white edge, while the central tail feathers are entirely brown.

Hunters from the Poison Faction are generally fond of targeting pheasants because they like to eat grain. A common method is to drill a hole in a soybean or something similar, add a bit of potassium aluminum cyanide, and then scatter them in the wild. Then, they just wait for the pheasants to come and eat. A pheasant that eats a poisoned bean will die instantly, with no chance of escape. The Hunters then retrieve the pheasant and will separately remove and bury the gastrointestinal tract containing the poisoned bean. And just like that, they’ve caught a pheasant.

These days, with the heavy production of various chemical fertilizers and pesticides, potassium aluminum cyanide isn’t hard to find. Therefore, there are many members of the Poison Faction. Pheasants in the outer areas of the mountains are basically extinct, all killed by the large number of these Hunters. Only the pheasants in the deep mountains have managed to survive, but with so many beasts in the deep mountains, their lives are also constantly at risk. If it weren’t for so many members of the Poison Faction, they would actually prefer to live near the edges of the mountains, with some even venturing into villages to find food.

The different types of pheasants also have different calls. Many Hunters from the Poison Faction can identify their target just by its sound. For example, the ring-necked pheasant usually goes KOK-KOK-KOK, while the females like to cackle, GAK-GAK-GAK. The black pheasant goes GURGLE-GURGLE, the Flying Dragon goes CHEEP-CHEEP, and the white pheasant sounds like a songbird, TWEET-TWEET-TWEET.

”Should we shoot them?”

Lin Zhiyin grew anxious as she watched the Flying Dragons fly far away with the dogs in hot pursuit. Zhao Wendong just smiled and shook his head.