Huo Ren barely controlled the volume of his shout, covering his mouth quickly as he spoke and dragging a groggy Mei Shengyao out of the tent with one hand while dismantling it with the other.
“Hide, quick!! The search is on!!”
Bo Jue’s head shot up, hitting Long Jia’s chin, as he grabbed his jacket and rushed out to help them dismantle the tent.
Long Jia, rubbing his sore chin, crawled out, clutching the sleeping bag and blanket, “Put it in the ditch, don’t just throw it anywhere.”
There was a dry gully nearby, dirty but well-concealed and capable of holding a lot of stuff.
The light initially flashed once every three seconds, gradually speeding up to every two seconds, then every second.
The drone was getting closer to them.
This was Huo Ren and the others’ first encounter with such a situation, and in the chaos, a tent pole was broken, and in their panic, they even apologized to the tent.
Xie Lianyun quickly wrapped everything in plastic and threw it into the gully, hurriedly pushing the uncollected stands and tables into the bushes, whispering, “Get into the cave, it’s too late to hide now—”
They rushed to find the spot they had scouted the first time they came, three people hiding in a cave and three lying in waist-high wild grass, trying to suppress even their breathing.
In a few minutes, the drone’s propeller noise approached.
Although infrared drones have strong sensing capabilities, their complex functions consume more power, so the production team’s hunter group deployed only ten long-endurance drones to conduct a more thorough search of each mountain.
Huo Ren tensed up at the sound of the engine, wishing he could suppress his heartbeat while hiding in the tree hollow.
The drone approached their location, meticulously and patiently scanning left and right.
It was just a step away from his hiding spot.
Huo Ren closed his eyes and began to pray silently.
Don’t see me, don’t find them, move on, move on…
The night-vision camera was not 4K high-definition, making it relatively difficult to operate in the dense vegetation of the mountains.
It made a round and continued moving forward with another drone a kilometer away.
Before it completely left the area, Mei Shengyao, lying on the ground, couldn’t hold back a sneeze due to the tickling of a foxtail grass.
Everyone tensed up: !!!
The drone paused mid-flight, turning halfway as if to check the situation.
A wild rabbit quickly darted out from somewhere, a piece of cotton candy in its mouth.
Chi Ji showed a look of regret.
After ten minutes, the light covered by clothes in Huo Ren’s embrace slowly went off, signaling their return to safety.
Out of caution, Huo Ren waited about three minutes to ensure the machines wouldn’t make a sudden return before imitating the call of a cuckoo bird to signal them to come out.
The group reconvened in the night, their clothes and hair covered in leaves, mud, and dew.
They had to set up the tent again.
The moonlight was bright and serene, with the calls of unidentified creatures in the distance sounding like birds or horses.
They dared not turn on the lights, so setting up the tent in the dark was slow.
Huo Ren, relying on memory to find the location again, sighed, “This is entirely a public legal education program…”
“We’ll never dare to break the law or be disorderly in our lives,” Xie Lianyun nodded in agreement: “If we ever do something wrong, being in jail or a dark cell is better than running out and hiding in tree hollows.”
They crawled back into their tents, settling down to sleep with lingering fears.
Long Jia reset the timer, noticing Bo Jue had brought an extra sleeping bag.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “It’s quite cold tonight, don’t worry too much, let’s sleep together.”
“It’s not that,” Bo Jue said with mixed feelings. “I… smell bad.”
He felt he had gone sour.
Long hair was difficult to manage at the best of times, and he had only wiped down with a hot towel yesterday and today. Hiding in the tree hollow, he didn’t know what he had rubbed against, but he smelled of earth and must.
Long Jia paused for a few seconds before taking a clean towel to wrap Bo Jue’s dew-dampened long hair, then effortlessly embraced him.
“Sleep now,” he said softly, “sweet dreams.”
Bo Jue looked up at his ex-boyfriend for a long while before finally closing his eyes.
When they had just broken up, his heart was in turmoil, not having recovered. The moment Long Jia showed his tattoo, it stimulated him, and they both made a mistake in confusion.
It wasn’t until Long Jia left for the film crew and he was forced to accept the reality of their breakup, relying on Xie Lianyun’s company, that he slowly began to recover.
Then, as the six of them reunited for a variety show, the relationship that had just calmed down became like this again.
The two of them were in the same group, living on the same floor on ordinary days. As long as Corona was there, their fates were intertwined.
Unable to break free, inseparable, yet there was no possibility of being together.
So what are we now… exactly?
Huo Ren didn’t sleep well.
He was afraid that his leadership would fail, leading the whole group into the police station.
Not long after he fell asleep, he dreamed that the police surrounded the entire mountain with eighty cars, the mountain lit up with red and blue flashing lights in the dead of night. Uncle Jiang even led the charge with a megaphone, shouting warnings: “You are surrounded! Lay down your weapons and repent! Surrender and you can still be saved!!!”
This frightened him so much that he sat up abruptly at four in the morning, causing Mei Shengyao to jump up as well: “What’s wrong? What’s wrong?”
“Just now…” Huo Ren said in confusion, “Uncle Jiang…”
The little lion first checked the light outside the tent, then looked at Huo Ren, who was still unsettled and feeling insecure, and patted him soothingly: “Go back to sleep, Huo Ren. It was just a nightmare.”
Huo Ren then relaxed and fell back into a deep sleep.
Chi Ji woke up early, still feeling refreshed after a walk around the area. He even used Mei Shengyao’s miraculous thermos to cook a pot of millet porridge for everyone, adding a few pieces of rock sugar and dried purple sweet potatoes.
Xie Lianyun, who was a light sleeper, instinctively reached for his phone and, not finding it, came out groggily to wash up.
He found Chi Ji by a nearby stream, toothbrush in mouth: “The air is nice up here.”
Chi Ji, rolling up his pant legs to try and catch fish, glanced at him without engaging in small talk: “How does it feel to be offline?”
Xie Lianyun, halfway through brushing, said with a sad face: “I’m feeling it just like you.”
Although they always supported Chi Ji in his physical internet detox, they only reduced their own use of social networks, never parting with their phones.
Now, completely cut off from the internet, everything felt somewhat uncomfortable.
Chi Ji, having caught nothing, splashed him with cool stream water, smiling: “Being offline is great, isn’t it? Life suddenly becomes so peaceful.”
Xie Lianyun, wiping his glasses, complained: “I haven’t gamed for three days, no fried chicken, no soda, how can I live like this.”
After a simple wash, they checked the traps set the night before for any signs of game.
They actually caught a long-tailed pheasant, its head and neck stuck in the trap, struggling like an ostrich.
Xie Lianyun was thrilled: “Chicken!! Chi Chi, we got a chicken!! My crispy chicken!!!”
Bo Jue coolly commented from behind: “Where are you going to fry chicken?”
Xie Lianyun, holding the pheasant, turned around, searching for a solution: “Maybe… extract the chicken fat first?”
“And the breadcrumbs?”
Chi Ji patted his shoulder sympathetically: “I’ll treat you to a bucket when we get back.”
“No way…” Xie Lianyun mourned: “After we get back, there’s the concert. Why do we have to have concerts every year, can’t we just take a half-year break?”
“Do you still want to win the crown,” Bo Jue tapped his forehead and took the chicken back: “Thanks to you and Huo Huo, the overall publicity and sales are several levels higher than before. Uncle Mei said we could score full marks in this area, just one last push at the concert, and the crown is ours—win the award and you can eat ten buckets, no one will stop you.”
Back at the camp, the big lion and the little lion were having porridge together, with Huo Ren quickly moving to start the fire, his movements brisk.
Mei Shengyao’s battery could only be used for simmering soup in a pot; boiling water for a large meal still required a stove.
When Huo Ren saw Bo Jue returning with a chicken, his eyes lit up: “More meat to eat?”
“Too bad it’s only a half-year-old pheasant,” Bo Jue commented on the pitiful cries as he weighed it: “Barely enough for one meal.”
“Then let’s tie it up for now, and just have some porridge for breakfast.”
Chi Ji quickly found a hemp rope, tied it around the pheasant’s neck with a bow, and secured it next to the tent like a guard dog.
The pheasant looked utterly aggrieved.
Their temporary dwelling was safe for now.
On one hand, there was a stream and a dry canal nearby, convenient for water and hiding.
On the other hand, the drone had already scanned the area once, and it was unlikely to return soon given the vast mountain range.
So, the first issue to address was food.
At worst, they had compressed biscuits and canned food, and at best, they could hunt nearby.
The three special forces photographers were not a concern, but the six of them together, due to high activity and stress levels, consumed much more than usual.
As they were pondering over the next steps, Xie Lianyun suddenly took out a salt shaker: “Lend me half.”
“Eh?”
Xie Lianyun, holding the salt shaker, walked out, with the others curiously following.
He sprinkled a trail of fine salt grains on the pebbles and larger stones on either side of the path, carefully spreading the grains over larger areas of granite with the palm of his hand.
Mei Shengyao, attempting to learn, asked: “Bro, are you… casting a spell?”
After using up half the can of salt, Xie Lianyun clapped his hands and walked back: “Let’s see, maybe it’ll attract something.”
“Attract what?”
“Who knows.” The young man adjusted his glasses, his phoenix eyes slightly raised: “Roe deer, wild deer, wild sheep, anything’s possible.”
In the wild, carnivores can obtain minerals and salt through hunting, but herbivores rely purely on luck.
Spreading a bag of salt in areas frequented by wildlife might just attract them in their desperation to lick it up.
“Learned something new!” Mei Shengyao clapped his hands, pulling out a small bell from his bag and tying it with a long fishing line as a makeshift alarm: “This way, when they come, the bell will ring.”
Long Jia, puzzled, asked: “Just how much stuff do you have in that bag?”
“Not much, just a few small tools~”
They made a simple net, blocked the stream with stones to catch two wild crucian carp, and cooked the pheasant with rice for lunch.
The pheasant’s tail feathers were too long, making scalding it with water a two-time task. Mei Shengyao secretly saved two long feathers, planning to make bookmarks.
Bo Jue, an expert at slaughtering chickens and fish, was undisturbed by the stench, while Huo Ren and Xie Lianyun, unable to help, covered their noses: “Is killing fish always this smelly??”
Bo Jue, with a high ponytail and a side glance, continued to cleanly remove the gills: “Can’t handle this?”
“Keep that away from me!!”
“Then don’t eat!!”
“I will!! Bite me if you dare!!”