Know, know, know…
The annoying cicadas chirped one after another along with the swaying branches in the woods. Four scholars who came trotting over with bookshelves on their backs threw the bookshelves to the ground, wiped the sweat off their faces and sat down in the shade of the trees. They stretched their necks to expose the skin under their collars, felt the cool breeze pouring in, and moaned comfortably.
"… We are unfamiliar with this place. We four brothers are not going to the wrong place, are we? There is not even a village or a mountain village around us. We can't even ask for directions."
"you do not say."
The four scholars wiped the sweat off their faces and drank the water in their pockets. Someone stood up and tilted his head to look at the dilapidated house not far away. The eaves of the house were tilted and half collapsed. The sunlight shone through the branches into the inside. Dust was flying and the ground was a mess with a thick layer of dust.
Wang Feng picked up half of the pottery pot and walked out, holding it in his hand and waving it towards his three brothers.
"I guess someone must have lived here before."
"He must be dead." Ma Liu, one of the three men, tied the water bag tightly and wiped his mouth: "Didn't you see a big grave next to him? He must be buried in it."
The other two were stunned for a moment, and instinctively turned around to look at the mound of earth that was half a head taller than where they were sitting, and gently poked Ma Liu who was still talking excitedly.
"Don't say such unlucky things. The soil is still fresh."
"That's right. The room is full of dust. No one has lived there for many years."
Over there, Wang Feng, who was walking back, threw the broken clay pot in his hand onto the pile of dirt. He just agreed and said, "It's indeed full of dust in there." At that moment, his feet were unstable, he stumbled and almost fell to the ground.
"Wow, where did such a big hoof print come from?"
Hearing the eldest brother's voice, three scholars nearby hurried over to take a look, waved their robe sleeves and said "Hi~", then leaned their backs against the mound and sat down again.
"Brother, you are too cautious. Since it is a hoof and not a claw mark, it means it is a vegetarian beast. There is nothing to worry about."
"That's right, it's either a wild buffalo or a wild boar, there's nothing to worry about, just cook."
"Hehe, if it's a wild boar, maybe we can have some meat."
"You wish. Wild boars are not that easy to deal with. Their skin is tough and their meat is fishy. They are rough and hard to swallow."
Wang Feng patted the dust off his worn cloth shoes, said something, then picked up a few dry branches and came over. Suddenly, a few pieces of hard soil slipped off the large pile of earth behind the four people and rolled down.
Here, the scholar who lit the fire was still talking.
"... But I heard there's a chef in the capital who knows how to deal with this kind of wild delicacy. When it's alive, he drains its blood and skins it while it's not paying attention. His knife skills are clean and sharp. Before it's completely dead, he marinates it with spices to remove the fishy smell. I was lucky enough to taste it in my early years. The taste... Tsk tsk."
At this moment, Wang Feng suddenly opened his eyes, as if he was savoring the delicious food at that time, and then remembered something and looked at Zhang Ti.
"Oh, I just remembered what you said about the pile of dirt..."
"Oh, the soil I'm talking about is so dark in color, it must have been turned up from underground... Come... Come..."
At this point, Zhang Ti began to stutter and looked at the other three scholars with a stiff expression on his face. He finally squeezed out the last word "de".
Wow~
A pool of mud spread and rolled from the feet of the four people, covering the campfire, and the flames that had just risen were instantly extinguished. The four people stared at each other and swallowed their saliva.
cluck~
Then, he slowly raised his eyes, twisted his stiff neck with difficulty, and looked at the pile of earth behind him. A piece of mud slipped off, revealing a bulging fur inside, almost the size of a human head. There seemed to be something inside, moving back and forth a few times, and then suddenly opened its eyes up and down, and its round eyes glowed faintly like lights.
"Oh my god—"
The four people's hair stood up in an instant. They shouted, jumped up on the spot, and huddled together.
In a moment, the mound rose high in their sight, and the sliding and rolling soil exploded with a bang, and mud, sand and fine stones splashed everywhere, hitting people's faces painfully.
Ahem~~
A pig's roar rang out, and amid the flying dust, a huge, crawling body lifted itself up from the ground with all four limbs, shaking a row of steel bristles from the back of its head to its back. Its pig-like mouth had fangs, and its eyes were as bright as lightning as it stared at the four scholars over there. Its long mouth opened scarlet as fire, and its fangs shook twice with its head like steel files, and its huge hooves dug the ground.
"What a big wild boar..."
The four scholars stood there in a daze. Among them, Wang Feng reacted quickly. He pulled the sleeves of the three and shouted anxiously, "Climb the tree! Pigs can't climb trees!"
“We don’t know how to do that either!!”
Ma Liu, Zhang Ti and Zhao Tang were also shouting anxiously. Seeing that the huge wild boar was heading towards them, the four of them gave up their bookshelves and immediately turned around and crawled towards the nearest trees. After all, two legs could not outrun four legs, but the four of them each hugged a big tree and put their legs on it, but they could not get up.
Boom!
Boom!
The black hooves over there fell to the ground one after another, and the huge pig body faced the four people hugging the tree, grunting and breathing heavily, the crawling body wriggling, the hind legs touching the ground, the front legs slowly rising with the upper body, the hooves turned into the shape of human palms, and then stood up, with rough black hair all over the body, a long beak and big ears, fangs turned up, and a row of steel bristles extending from the hind legs to the spine, and it stepped forward with a hoof print, and the thick layers of fat on the bulging belly were rippled.
"Scholar, were you just talking about how to eat pigs?"
The sound was as sharp as the friction of iron, and the four scholars who were hugging the tree were so scared that they stumbled to the ground. They kicked their legs and flew backwards. When they saw the wild boar with a black-haired pig face, fangs and a human body, they screamed immediately.
"Pig... demon—"
In an instant, a huge figure walked across the light spot, filled with demonic energy. He opened his long mouth and sucked hard, causing a strong wind and shaking the entire forest.
The sun shone through the swaying woods, and the shrill screams startled a flock of birds. Sensing the horrible breath, they flew away to the farther foothills in a black mass.
The sun shines brightly on the foothills. Someone looks up at the scorching sun in the clear sky. Next to him, a Taoist stands blankly on the edge of the cliff, looking at the endless foothills.
“Ahh—”
After a moment, the Taoist turned around with a scream, looked at the scholar who was looking up at the sky, and chopped the dry grass on the ground with his feet.
"Where's the Hu Ji you mentioned? Where's the fun and interesting place you mentioned?"
The Northwest is desolate and rugged, surrounded by brown and yellow ridges, sparse vegetation, and barren mountains and wilderness. There is not even a few acres of farmland, let alone a passing caravan.
The wind blew yellow sand in. Lu Liangsheng looked at the sky, retracted his gaze, waved his robe to block the blowing sand and dust, got off the donkey, and flipped through "Boundless Mountains and Seas" in his hand.
"I'm not lying to you. If I were to lie to you, it would be this book. According to the records, it should be around here."
"you!"
The Taoist gave him a dirty look and sighed. He was just about to look around to see if he could find some game to eat when the small door of a compartment on the bookshelf behind the donkey suddenly opened.
Toad, with half of his body hanging out from the ground with a rope around his neck, spoke in a serious voice.
"Liangsheng, there is a demonic aura!"
Bang, bang, bang—
When Lu Liangsheng heard his master's words, he turned around and saw a black flock of birds in the distance, which split into several groups and flew far away towards the foothills in all directions, as if they did not dare to stay for a moment.
"Old Sun!"
The scholar said softly, and the Taoist shrugged helplessly. He took out a demon-detecting talisman, wanting to see what kind of monster it was. He took it out and held it between his fingers, but before he could chant a spell, it exploded with a bang and turned into a ball of flames.
"Hiss! Damn it, the demonic energy is so strong, so hot!"
Sun Yingxian blew hard on his fingers. The scholar next to him frowned, pulled the old donkey over, and cast a spell to shrink the earth into an inch. In a blink of an eye, they arrived at the mountainside. Following the traces that seemed like someone had walked by, they summoned the moonlight, leaped up, and landed outside the distant woods like a big bird into the forest.
Behind the galloping old donkey, the Toad Taoist was sitting cross-legged in a cubicle with a rope tied to his body. He excitedly licked his lips with his long tongue and rubbed his webbed feet.
"I've had something nourishing again, hehe... hahahaha—"