"Boom..." "Roar..."
The tiger's roar mixed with the sound of thunder came from the depths of Niu Kui Mountain. When it reached the periphery, the sound had become much weaker, so it was drowned out by a new round of thunder.
The group of hunters carrying game and mountain products were hurrying on their way. If there was a heavy rain at this critical moment, the mountain would be wet, slippery and cold, and the road would be very difficult to walk on. They might even have to spend the night in the mountains.
"Boom boom boom..."
A peculiar echo was heard, and the leading man stopped and looked back into the depths of Niukui Mountain. From afar, on the farthest mountain that could be seen clearly, many trees and bamboos were shaking, as if gusts of black wind were sweeping out from the mountains.
"Ahh..."
Another sound was heard faintly, causing the leading hunter to have a strange illusion. He seemed to see a gray-black mist rising into the sky in the distance on the other side of the mountain, and a huge beast's head was formed under the dark clouds in the sky, roaring at the thunderclouds in the sky.
“Hiss…!”
This scene made the man gasp subconsciously, and his legs felt as if they were filled with lead and he could not move.
A hunter suddenly realized that his leader had not caught up with him. He turned around and saw that the other party had stopped there and looked at the mountains, so he hurriedly asked a question.
"What are you looking at, boss? Is there another prey?"
These words frightened the man so much that he shivered suddenly. When he looked up at the distant sky, there was no scene at all. It seemed like it was all an illusion. He came to his senses and looked at the hunter beside him.
"It's nothing, it's nothing. Let's go. We can't stop even if we have prey. We can't stay overnight in the mountains!"
The leading man urged them and quickly ran again.
"Who would want to spend the night here in this cold?"
"But we hunted a lot this time, and the stuff is heavy!" "Run, run."
A group of men carried their prey and kept moving back and forth in the mountains. Fortunately, although the dark clouds were getting bigger and bigger, and the thunder was very frequent and scary, it did not rain immediately, allowing the hunters to reach the foot of the mountain smoothly.
A group of villagers had already been waiting at the entrance of the village. When they saw the hunters coming back, they shouted excitedly.
"Look! They're back with a lot of big cargo!" "Go and help."
"Look, there's a big insect in front of us!"
"Oh my god, a big beast?" "No, no, don't talk nonsense, it's a big leopard!"
"Jackals, tigers, leopards, and giant insects are not much different."
"Yes, yes, yes, they are all top-quality leather!"
The hunters' families and the onlookers in the village all rushed out to help the hunters carry their prey. The heavy wild boars and the brightly-coated beasts were all delicious meat and furs that could be exchanged for silver in the eyes of those who knew the value of the game.
"Boom..."
The thunder roared again, and then the heavy rain finally fell. The hunters, their families and fellow villagers hurriedly fled back home.
The mountain village itself was not very large, so the two wild boars were cooked that night. The original plan was to give wild boar meat to every household in the village so that they could go home and enjoy a fresh meal of game in early spring.
However, the leading hunter was still a little uneasy after returning, so he decided to take his things and go to her parents' home with his wife.
Carrying a pork chop and a wild boar front leg, the hunter came to the house of the old village chief, his father-in-law, with his wife and children.
The mother-in-law and daughter-in-law brought up steaming wild boar chops and wild boar meat. Before cooking, they were rubbed with spicy wild ginger and wild pepper from the mountains to remove the mutton smell to a large extent, but one section of the front hoof was cooked separately and served in a large flower bowl.
"Come on, Dad, eat it while it's hot. This is your favorite front trotter meat!" "Yes, Dad, we specially reserved it for you. It's rotten."
The daughter and son-in-law urged together with a smile.
"Hehehe, you guys are filial!"
The old village chief said cheerfully, picked up a piece of hoof skin with chopsticks and handed it to his little grandson.
“Ah~”
The latter opened his mouth wide, took the pig skin in a mouthful, and chewed hard with his cheeks puffed up.
"Everyone sit down and eat!"
The whole family sat together and started eating. In addition to a pot of radish stew, the main dish was two pots of pork and a pot of rice wine. This meal was so delicious that even people in Ning'an County were envious.
"Boom..."
The thunder sounded again, but the people in the house were already used to it and they ate the meat and vegetables on the table by the light of an oil lamp.
After eating for a while, the man asked the old man in a low voice while pouring wine for his father-in-law.
"Dad, let me ask you something. I remember when I was a kid, there seemed to be monsters in Niu Kui Mountain for a while?"
"Hey, why are you talking about this?"
The mother-in-law next to her glared at her son-in-law, but the child became excited.
"Monsters? Do we have monsters here? What about gods and immortals?"
"Aren't all the gods in the temple? Eat yours."
The child's mother answered with a smile, picked up a piece of radish and stuffed it into the child's mouth, otherwise the little guy would only eat meat.
"Dad, I vaguely remember this happening when I was a kid. The government seemed to..."
"Yes! There was a similar thing in the past."
The old village chief has been the village chief of this mountain village for nearly forty years. Every head of the two surrounding villages has a good relationship with him and remembers some important things in the past.
"Counting the years, it's been almost twenty years!"
After saying this with emotion, the old village chief drank the rice wine in the small cup.
"Grandpa, please tell me about it!"
The little grandson swallowed the radish and meat in his mouth, pushed away his mother's chopsticks and begged, and the hunter hurriedly and attentively refilled his drink and picked up a piece of pork elbow with skin and meat.
"Okay, I'll tell you!"
The old village chief took a sip of rice wine, put his elbow in his mouth, chewed it, and squinted his eyes, as if he had returned to that period of panic.
"I can't remember exactly how many years it has been, but I guess it's almost twenty years. Your father wasn't much older than you back then."
The old village chief pointed at his little grandson and smiled.
"I remember that during those years, there was a tiger disaster in Niu Kui Mountain. For a period of time, the government recruited hunters like me from the mountainside to go into the mountains to kill tigers..."
Eighteen years ago, in fact, similar situations occurred not only in the Niukui Mountain Ning'an County near Desheng Prefecture, but also in the other two prefectures near Niukui Mountain. It was just that the situation in Ning'an County was more serious, and the old village chief had no access to news from other prefectures so far away.
"I was still strong at that time, and we went into the mountains twice. We also found the nest of a giant insect and killed one with our own hands, but we didn't find any human bones around it. But later..."
The old village chief showed a trace of fear.
"As the old saying goes, wind comes from tigers and clouds come from dragons. Everyone has heard it, but no one has ever seen it. But we saw it this time!"
"That night, we and more than 30 experienced hunters from the neighboring village were stationed together in a mountainous area deep in the mountains where we knew tigers were roaming... The moon was bright and the wind was clear, but suddenly a strong wind blew, the rocks and sand were dazzling, and the roar of tigers could be heard. The roar was so terrifying that even the bravest hunters were terrified!"
The little grandson had subconsciously moved closer to his mother and didn't even chew the meat in his mouth.
"But we are all hunters, so we have to keep our composure, so no one said anything. However, the beast seemed to know where we were, and it pounced and captured a hunter from a neighboring village. The beast screamed all the way. We chased after it, but we couldn't see its shadow. What's even more strange is..."
The old village chief deliberately moved closer to his little grandson.
"The wind has stopped, too!"
"Hey old man, why are you scaring the child? You are so dishonest!"
"Hehehe... kids, don't you like to hear this?"
"The little face turned pale with fright!"
The hunter quickly refilled his father-in-law's glass of wine.
"Dad, please continue."
"Well, we were a little distraught and scared after we came back, but no one could rest easy until the man-eating tiger was killed. The government also offered a large reward and sent officials who knew martial arts to help us. Some of us hunters were unwilling to give up, so we went again."
At this point, the old village chief sighed.
"Alas... My brother was also killed that time. The tiger was really weird. It carried off two people as if it was playing, and even killed seven hunting dogs. The mountain wind swept them everywhere, and the roar made the listeners' legs weak. After that, some old hunters and I were wiped out. We hunters were no match for it. From then on, no matter how much the government lobbied us, we would never go into the mountains..."
The old village chief took a sip of wine to calm himself.
"The story of the tiger in the mountains becoming a spirit started to spread after that incident, but the villages here are keeping it a secret and no one talks about it for fear of attracting attention."
"Later, I heard that the government had posted a notice and went to Desheng Prefecture to ask for help. Then some powerful martial arts masters came. They were so skilled in martial arts that they actually killed a tiger, a rare big white tiger. The skin was displayed at the gate of the county government for many days. Many people in our village went to see it!"
The hunter grabbed the chopsticks, frowned, drank the rice wine in his cup in one gulp, and asked.
"Dad, are you sure the tiger is really dead?"
"How could it be false? That big white tiger is more powerful than two ordinary big beasts. It is an absolutely vicious creature. Moreover, since then, Niukui Mountain has been peaceful. Not to mention man-eating tigers, even ordinary big beasts are almost never seen!"
The hunter hesitated for a moment, lowered his body and asked again.
"Dad, is it possible that the tiger spirit is not dead yet?"
The old village chief's scalp numbed as if by reflex, and he turned his head to look at his son-in-law.
"What nonsense are you talking about! Did you see it?"
"No, no, it's just that this time when I went down the mountain, the thunder sounded like the roar of a wild beast, and the dark clouds in the sky were falling. The wild beasts all ran out from the deep mountains. I was so scared..."
The old village chief and the man both looked out through the window, but the deep mountains blocked their view from far away, so they could only look up at the sky.
this moment.
"Crack... Boom..."
The thunder roared and was deafening. A thick bolt of lightning seemed to have three forks and fell straight into the mountain.
Everyone in the entire mountain village trembled at the same time.