Republic of China: Guandong Ginseng King

Chapter 114 Occupying the Mountain Field

Things had come to this point, what else could Mr. Zhao Pao say? He could only nod and agree to sell the dog to Qu Shaoyang.

Both parties handed over the money in one hand and the dog in the other.

Qu Shaoyang directly took out twenty taels of silver from his saddle bag and placed it on the table on the kang.

Then Zhao Pao led them out of the house, untied the ropes of the four dogs, and handed them all to Qu Shaoyang.

The hunting dog was smart and knew something was wrong when it saw this situation.

The dog, Qinglang, snorted at Zhao Pao twice, walked over and rubbed Zhao Pao's leg with its head.

Zhao Pao bent down and touched the heads of the four dogs one by one.

"Blue Wolf, Erhui, Dahua, Black Leopard, I am old and cannot go up the mountain anymore. I cannot afford to support you.

I will find you a good family, and you can follow them. In the future, you should serve your master more and don't be naughty and cause trouble."

Zhao Pao had raised these dogs since they were young, and he had a very deep affection for them, treating them almost like his own children.

Now that they have to separate, Zhao Pao is reluctant to let them go.

The four dogs seemed to understand what Zhao Pao said, and they surrounded him and rubbed against him affectionately.

Qu Shaoyang didn't urge them and just watched Gou Zi and Zhao Pao say goodbye.

Finally, Zhao Pao patted the dogs on the head one by one, signaling them to follow Qu Shaoyang.

As soon as Qu Shaoyang pulled the rope, the four dogs followed him reluctantly.

Zhao Pao stood outside his door, watched the dogs leave, and raised his hand to wipe the tears from the corners of his eyes.

After a long while, the man and the dog had gone far away and could no longer be seen. Zhao Pao then turned around and went back to the house.

When Mrs. Zhao saw her husband coming into the house, she couldn't help but sigh, "Alas, you have already spent a lot of money on my illness.

Old Zhao, listen to me, we won't treat it anymore. I'll keep this little money for you to get through the river."

"Why would I leave money to cross the river? My child is gone. If you leave again, what's the point of me living?
When the time comes, I'll find a crooked tree to hang myself on and follow you.

When a person dies, he kicks his legs and doesn’t care about what happens after he dies.”

Zhao Pao’s thoughts were quite clear. He was already at this age, so what was the point of living?
It would be better for him to go with his partner, so that he wouldn't be left alone and lonely.

"Oh." Upon hearing this, the Zhao family's old woman sighed.

It is quite far from Wangjiang Tower to Maoer Mountain. Qu Shaoyang and others held the rope tightly, fearing that the dog would run away.

After a lot of effort, they walked back home. As soon as they led the four dogs into the yard, Dahuang and Qinglong became dissatisfied again and started barking at Qinglang and the other four dogs.

"Da Huang, Qing Long, stop barking. These are our dogs too. You guys should stay together from now on."

Qu Shaoyang shouted, and Dahuang and Qinglong wagged their tails reluctantly and went back to their nest to lie down.

Before Qu Shaoyang went to buy a dog, a doghouse had already been built at home.

These four dogs were in a group, and they were tied to the roots of the stick in the east garden. Dahuang and Qinglong were tied to the roots of the stick in the west garden.

You have to let them get familiar with each other for a few days first, and wait until they meet and stop pinching each other, before you can raise them together.

Then after some days, when the four dogs have become familiar with the place and know that this is home, I can take them to the mountains to hunt.

Although the dogs have been bought, we cannot take them to the mountains to hunt for the time being.

Qu Shaoyang was a person who could not sit still, so he simply went with Liu Dongshan to wander around the mountains, choosing places to dig traps, set traps, and set up pestles.

The master and the apprentice had the same goal in mind for these tasks, and neither of them suggested bringing along any assistants.

How should I put it? This is all technical work. There is a saying that skills are not passed on to outsiders. Many skills cannot be easily taught to people who are not close to you. Just like digging a trap, it looks simple, but the trap is different for each prey.

Deer cellar, wolf cellar and baizi cellar all have their own tricks.

There are traps for pheasants and rabbits, roe deer, deer, wild boars, and even sables. Can they all be the same? Each has its own tricks.

The same goes for setting traps. You need to set the right trap based on the size of the prey and how to set the trap to conceal it best so that the prey won’t notice. There are tricks to each of these.

These are all easy to explain, but the pestle and mortar is even more amazing.

To make a pestle, you first need to find a slightly wide and flat hillside.

Then they cleared out a trumpet-shaped piece of clean snow on the upper and lower slopes, without any bushes or weeds.

Afterwards, they went up the mountain to cut some wood as thick as wrists, sharpened one end, and hammered it into the ground to form a trumpet-shaped fence alley that was wide at both ends and narrow in the middle.

Then, a half-meter-high gantry was built at the narrowest part of the fenced alley.

This dragon gate was fixed with two tree branches on the ground about one meter wide, with a wooden stick as thick as an arm placed horizontally between the two branches.

Under the dragon gate, there was a huge tree hanging, about three meters long and as thick as a washbasin.

One end of the giant tree was hung up by a wooden stick about half a meter long and as thick as an egg on the dragon gate with a rope buckle, and the other end of the stick was tied with a hemp rope as thick as chopsticks.

The other end of the hemp rope was tied to a tree stick as thick as a chopstick, and the other end of the tree stick was fixed to a horizontal stick as thick as a chopstick, and the horizontal stick was fixed to two fence posts on the other side of the wooden fence nailed to the ground.

On top of this horizontal stick, there are two more horizontal sticks, each with a thick piece of bark on top.

After the pestle is ready, it can be used to catch sable, weasel, mountain rabbit, pheasant, and even fox, badger and raccoon dog.

As long as you enter the wooden fence from the trumpet-shaped mouth at either end and step on the bark, the huge tree on the gantry will fall down with a loud bang.

The pestle is ingeniously designed and has a very high probability of catching prey. It takes an experienced hunter to make this thing.

So, these things cannot be seen by the guys at all.

Otherwise, if they all learn it and go hunting on their own in the future, who will do the work for Qu Shaoyang and the others?
It is true that Qu Shaoyang wanted to train a few guys, but at most he would let them practice their shooting skills and then help out when they go hunting together.

The real core skills cannot be passed on to others.

This is not about being selfish or not, it is about the way of survival.

Teaching a disciple will starve the master to death. How can one easily pass on a skill that can make money to outsiders?
The master and his disciple had been busy on the mountain for about half a month, and they had set up three or four pestles, not to mention the other traps and traps.

"Master, we are digging traps and setting up pestles in this mountain area. Do we have to come here for a visit every day?

This place is a little far from our home, and it might be troublesome to come here every day.

In my opinion, we should build a shack nearby, and I will come and stay here every two days."

After finishing all these, Qu Shaoyang remembered that they seemed to have forgotten to build the house.

The old hunters in the mountains all have their own territories. They usually stay in their own territories and will not easily go into other people’s hunting areas.

If you break the rules, you may be beaten at best, or even killed at worst.

The mountain areas near Maoer Mountain were all occupied by other hunters, so the place chosen by Qu Shaoyang and his team was a little far away.

Being far away also has its advantages, that is, there are more prey. They have been busy in the mountains these days and have seen footprints of various animals.

Especially in the red pine forest on the mountain, there are many footprints of sables.

In order to occupy this piece of mountain land, Qu Shaoyang said that a shack should be built here.

(End of this chapter)