Along the way, Zhang Zian's heavy hiking bag weighed him down like a snail. He walked slowly, but he really couldn't run. He could only watch as the elfins swarmed in front of him. What was even more annoying was that Richard was constantly shouting, "Come on, son!" from above his head …
Seeing that the elfins seemed to have found something in front of him, he didn't have the time to deal with the b * tch bird. He stepped on the fallen leaves and walked for more than ten minutes.
"What's wrong?"
He didn't walk closer. Instead, he leaned against the nearest tree and used his backpack to push against the tree. He used the friction to let his legs rest. This was a little trick that he had learned along the way. He couldn't just take off his backpack at the slightest sign of trouble. Once he took it off, he didn't want to walk anymore.
The elfins silently separated to the left and right, allowing him to see a small animal lying on its side in the thorns in front of him.
It was a dead cat.
After seeing it clearly, he immediately warned, "Don't get too close. Be careful of infectious diseases."
"It's not an infectious disease. It was bitten to death," Fina said with no expression.
Zhang Zian sighed helplessly. It seemed that he could only put down his backpack and walk over to take a closer look. He couldn't even squat down with his backpack on. He would fall backward.
He moved his shoulders, and the backpack slid down the trunk of the tree. He leaned against the tree. The spotted owl silently flew to a nearby branch to rest, and Richard fluttered its wings to stand on his shoulder.
The elfins also considered the problem of infectious diseases, so they didn't get too close to the dead cat. After all, he had said that the prion protein could be infected even if it stepped on the urine of an infected animal. They didn't smell the urine, only the smell of blood.
He moved his sore shoulders a few times, bent down to pick up a branch, walked up to the dead cat, and used the branch to push aside the grass that half-covered the body.
The grass was stained with dried blood, but not much. There were only a few drops.
It was an adult male cat. It was large and had long hair. Its chest and abdomen were white, and the rest of its body was flaxen with brown and black markings. It should be a mixed breed with the Maine cat's blood.
Even people who didn't understand cats would know that this wasn't a wild beast of the forest, Short-tailed Cat, just by looking at this silly cat's long tail.
There was a wound on its shoulder, which was its fatal wound. If it had gone any higher, it would have injured its carotid artery. If that had happened, it wouldn't have been able to drag its injured body all the way here before dying.
The blood flowing out of the wound had soaked its long fur into a ball, making it impossible to see the exact shape of the wound.
Zhang Zian used a branch to smooth the fur around the wound, revealing a pair of wounds that were obviously caused by the fangs of some kind of beast. The inside of the wound was cone-shaped and very deep.
He then used the branch to tilt the body at an angle and used the flashlight to look at the other side of the body. There was no wound on that side.
Obviously, it had been running away after being injured, but it couldn't run any further after reaching this place, and finally died from blood loss.
The weather in the Mahogany Forest was cool. The cat had been dead for a long time, but there was no obvious rotting smell coming from it. At least, Zhang Zian couldn't smell it with his sense of smell, but the elfins should have.
When the elves arrived, there were some small scavengers or arthropods lurking nearby, but the elves ran away as soon as they approached.
"Can you tell what kind of animal bit it?" Old Time Tea asked.
Zhang Zian shook his head.
If Mike, a veteran who had lived in the forest for a long time, was here, he might be able to tell, but Zhang Zian wasn't an experienced hunter. It was impossible to tell what kind of beast had bitten it with just one wound.
Since the cat had escaped here after being injured, it wasn't the scene of the crime, and there were no footprints of the perpetrator.
"Needless to say, it must be a coyote! It's most likely the group from last night! " Vladimir said indignantly. "Black bears use their claws. What other animal could it be other than a coyote?"
"It's very possible that it was a coyote, but the problem is that this cat was able to escape after being bitten."
He was a little confused about this question. If it was able to struggle to escape after being caught by claws, that would be fine. But after being bitten by the hook-like fangs of a carnivorous beast, it could still break free and escape? If so, it could indeed be done by a coyote with a weaker bite force.
What was even more strange was that after the beast bit the cat, it didn't chase after it? Wasn't this letting the prey escape?
The elfins didn't think too much about it. Vladimir lamented and regretted letting the coyotes go last night. Maybe it was the coyotes that ran into the cat after they escaped.
Zhang Zian was a little worried that Fina was too emotional, but he glanced sideways at it. It was calmer than Vladimir, just staring thoughtfully at the cat's body.
"Fina, what do you think?" he asked.
Fina glanced at him and said faintly, "In any case, this cat died in battle. It didn't bring shame to the cats. That's enough."
Speaking of dying in battle, Zhang Zian was suddenly inspired. He quickly used a branch to pull the cat's two front paws. Sure enough, he saw a few strands of hair that didn't seem to belong to the cat in front of the paws.
He saw that, as Fina had said, the cat had died in battle. Even if the other party was far stronger than itself, it had at least tried to resist, but it only managed to grab a handful of hair from the other party.
These strands of hair were dark, but unfortunately, Zhang Zian could only see that it wasn't the hair of a black bear. It probably wasn't the hair of a cougar either. As for what kind of beast it was, he couldn't tell.
"Zian, I can't bear to leave its body in the wilderness like this. Can you please let it rest in peace?" Old Time Tea pleaded.
In the traditional concept of China, it was indeed important to rest in peace. Leaving a corpse in the wilderness would only make the corpse a meal for various scavengers. After death, not even a complete body would be left. This would affect the reincarnation in the next life, so even eunuchs would preserve their family jewels for life.
"Okay." Zhang Zian nodded.
Although this was a waste of energy and pointless work for him, since it was a request from Old Time Tea, he didn't want to refuse. From the cat's point of view, he really couldn't bear to leave the body of his own kind. This was also a cat's normal behavior.
He took out a folded military shovel from his hiking bag. Usually, he used this shovel to cut the overly long dead branches into several pieces, or cut some dry tree cores from the dead trees to ignite the fire.
He quickly used the shovel to dig a small hole under the tree that could only accommodate the cat's body. He deliberately dug it deeper so that scavengers wouldn't dig it out after they left.
After the hole was dug, he took a deep breath and used a branch to push the dead cat into the small hole. He shoveled the soil and compacted it. Finally, he covered it with dead branches and grass. From the surface, nothing could be seen.
After burying it, he packed up the military shovel and called the elfins to continue on their way.
You've already exceeded your reading limit for today. If you want to read more, please log in.
Login
Select text and click 'Report' to let us know about any bad translation.
