??

  At this moment, I'm not alone, there's a dog by my side. Maybe I'll take the wrong path, but will the dog also take the wrong path? Humans follow their feelings, while dogs follow scents. Looking at the small stream underfoot, I suddenly understood - Stupid has been running along the water all this time, and it's very likely that in some important places, its scent was washed away by the flowing water. I squatted down and gave it two slaps on the head: "Stupid dog, now we're done for! When we get back, they'll laugh us to death!"

  It looked like it had done something wrong, and after humming twice, it drooped its tail and wanted to go back. I only had a flashlight in my hand, the kind that uses No. 1 batteries, which wouldn't last long. The sky was dark and the forest was dense, who knows if we'd get lost again soon? So I decided to follow this stream and head back up.

  I walked back for about 15 minutes and indeed found that the stream had a fork, one to the left and one to the right. I decided that I must have taken a wrong turn when I came down the mountain earlier. Standing at the fork, I comforted myself: "It's okay, taking a detour is just fine, I can go back and roast the rabbit."

  Actually, at this time I was already a little bit trying to reassure myself, people will always realize the arrival of some danger, there is a premonition. Dazed and not stopping along the road for two days sniffing around, following this stream for less than five minutes it started to get a bit anxious and restless, later becoming me chasing it away but it didn't want to move forward.

  I patted the rabbit on my hand and said, "What's wrong with you? Hurry up, all this delay is your fault."

  It cowered beside my shoes, let out two "wows" and then turned around to run back. I had a rope in my hand that it was pulling on with great force, as the rope was digging into my palm painfully. Dogs usually don't disobey their master's orders, even though Daai and I didn't have a good relationship, but my intuition told me its behavior was abnormal because Daai was extremely competitive and wouldn't hang its head in defeat even if it were bullied by dogs from other households.

  So I stopped again to comfort it, but when my hand touched its back, the degree of its body trembling almost made me unable to hold on. It was then that I saw its hind legs shaking constantly.

  "Whoosh!" I raised the gun in my hand and wrapped the rope around it a few more times. My dad had once told me that if a dog was inexplicably frightened, it must be because of the presence of a ferocious beast. In the forests of western Zhejiang province, the most common ferocious beast is the leopard, the golden money leopard! This thing is not rare at all, and can appear and disappear without warning. It's the king of the forest in this mountain range. Our family had once raised a local dog that was bitten to death by one of these things.

  The flashlight was held in my mouth, and besides the "gurgling" sound of water flowing by my ears, there were insects chirping in the woods. Stupidly, the dog was spinning around my feet non-stop. Suddenly, it pounced to my right side, almost pulling me down. It kept growling and backing away. I quickly adjusted my direction. When the flashlight shone over, a pair of dark green eyes appeared less than ten meters away from me.

  A crisp gunshot rang out, piercing the quiet night sky of the forest. I had to fire my gun; firstly for self-defense and secondly to inform my companions of my location.

  Ten meters, for a firepower like 5.6mm, is extremely wasteful. I don't know if I hit it or not. Anyway, after the rustling sound in the woods stopped, those eyes disappeared. When I walked to that patch of reeds by the river, I didn't find any bloodstains.

  "Are you going to let the dog get away?" I muttered to myself while patting Daizi: "Forget it, leopard meat doesn't taste good, let's retreat."

  It took less than ten minutes for them to hurry back, and several flashlights across from me were already swaying. They've come looking for me.

  The rabbit on the fire was sizzling with oil, and the aroma made everyone drool. I broke off a small piece of rabbit leg and threw it to Dazi in the corner, but he just sniffed it and retreated, looking completely unspirited.

  "This dead dog, how did its guts get so small again? It's scared like this by just one leopard."

  Mr. Gu smiled and said, "A small cat is afraid of a big dog, a big dog is afraid of a big cat, leopards don't even dare to mess with wolves, let alone this dog. When I was in Africa, I saw a cheetah that dared to fight a lion for food."

  "Suit yourself, if you don't eat it then forget about it." I continued eating in big mouthfuls. Ye Qiu walked over and gently stroked Dazi's head, while Dazi looked up at him with its head raised. These two were actually quite a good match.

  I had just eaten two mouthfuls when Ye Qiu suddenly walked over and said coldly: "Get up."

  "Hey, call me?" My greasy hands were in my mouth, and when he shouted, everyone else stopped too. I stood up and looked at his not very friendly expression: "Ersa, you wouldn't be thinking of hitting me, would you? I didn't provoke you or anything."

  He looked at me calmly and then said calmly: "What you encountered on the road was not a leopard."

  "Drag him over." I was too lazy to bother with this person, but he said to Cha Wenbin: "Come and smell what kind of smell is on this dog's body."

  "Oh?" Cha Wenbin looked at Ye Qiu with a suspicious gaze, knowing that Ye Qiu was always cautious. He then walked over to the stunned player and patted him on the back twice.

  "Where did you go?" Cha Wenbin's expression suddenly turned solemn, his tone was exactly the same as Ye Qiurou's. I looked at them in surprise and said: "What's wrong with you two? Can't you see that I just went to catch a rabbit? What's all the fuss about?"

  Zha Wenbin crouched on the ground, looking at me from a distance and said: "There's a corpse smell... Little Yi, did you guys encounter something?"

  Corpse? What corpse? The corpse he was talking about is a zombie. Suddenly, I remembered that this rabbit was chased out by Daidai, and the whole process took less than two minutes away from my line of sight. Either it ran to somewhere while I didn't know.

  I gnawed on a rabbit leg and carefully recalled that, apart from that gap, there was no other possibility.

  "I'm guessing that dead dog ran into something while chasing a rabbit, not far from here. Tomorrow I can take you to see it." I paused and continued: "But tonight was a bit strange, when I turned back this dog led me on a wild goose chase and we took a wrong turn."

  Ye Qiu coldly snorted and said: "Even if you lose it, it won't be lost."

  "How dare you!" I slammed down the rabbit leg and stood up, saying: "You try to talk back to me again!"

  Zha Wenbin rushed over and blocked me, saying: "What's wrong with you, why are you so angry!"

  "I'm so surprised, you all look like you're interrogating a prisoner when I come back. What have I done? Have I stolen something? I went out to find food for you, Professor Li."

  "Alright, alright, sit down." Mr. Gu waved his hand to signal me to take a seat. He said, "Don't blame them, they've been looking for you for half a day. Do you know how long you've been out?"

  "How long?" I thought for a moment, and said: "Just an hour at most, even a child wouldn't get lost."

  "An hour?" Mr. Gu was taken aback by my words, then rolled up his sleeves to show me his watch: "It's already 12:01 at night, you left the door at 5 o'clock, and returned at 11:30, they didn't just look for you for a circle."

  When I made a big fuss, it got bigger. What's going on? I took a look at Cha Wenbin, his expression was like "it's just like that". I stood up and looked at everyone in the room, suddenly feeling a chill in my heart. Am I freaking out?!

  "Old man, stop joking around!" As I said this, I had already grabbed the five-six rifle. In my heart, I thought that if I really encountered a house full of ghosts, I would first burn them to death and then deal with you, old man!

  With a "slap", my hand was severely slapped, and Zhang Wenbin swiftly used his ruler to knock away my gun. He glared at me and said: "What's wrong with you? I said you're crazy and you really are!"

  "Don't move!" I stretched out my hand to pinch his cheek, but he slapped it away. Looking at the shadow on the ground, Yuan Xiaobai was already fast asleep in the tent. I sat down dazed and said, "I really only walked for an hour, it's clearly like that!"

  "If it weren't for the gunshot, I reckon we'd still be searching." Zhang Wenbin said as he sat beside me: "Your first shot was just after you left, I thought you'd return quickly. We waited here for half a day and no one came. Ye Qiu felt something was off and went to look for you, searched for a bit then came back and we continued searching together. Xiao Bai couldn't take it and fell asleep already. Do we look like we're talking nonsense? Look at the charcoal on the ground, how many piles have been burned? It looks like only an hour has passed?"

  "I was just walking along a river and I knew I had taken a wrong turn, but it felt like only about 10 minutes difference, then when I came back I ran into a leopard..."

  "Have you seen the leopard?" Cha Wenbin asked me.

  I nodded, then shook my head and said: "I didn't see anything, I only saw a pair of green eyes very close to me in the grass across from me. I fired one shot and it was gone." As I spoke, I started to get goosebumps myself and muttered to myself: "It was so close, how could I have missed?"

  "Is there anything else? Think carefully, apart from Dazi chasing after a rabbit, what else did you encounter?"

  "Oh no, I just took a wrong turn, and then this dog started getting really anxious... Ahh..." I suddenly remembered: "I actually did encounter that thing, I remember now. Stupid was bitten by Gao Cheng's corpse before and almost lost his life. I reckon he's really afraid of it, so he's been pulling me to get away from it. So, the thing I hit might be a corpse?"

  Zha Wenbin nodded and said, "It's probably true. Don't sleep too soundly tonight. This forest isn't clean. Gu Lao, you rest first. We'll take turns standing guard in three shifts. Once it's daylight, we'll be fine."

  Just then, Dazi, who was crouching in the corner of the wall, suddenly stood up, took a few steps back, and began to growl softly towards the gate with his teeth bared...

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