Looking at the Rigal continent, from the hot south to the cold north, no matter how big or small, a truly successful hunting operation is actually comparable to a war...lā
From individual hunters holding long bows and short crossbows, they carefully lurk into the forest and carefully follow the traces of animals to hunt for life; to nobles and kings dressed in fine clothes and riding war horses, surrounded by a large group of servants and guards. They use hounds to chase the prey and then kill it with spears for fun; or they are these real professional experts in hunting large creatures, professional teams sent by major hunting mercenary groups carrying a large amount of equipment and excellent manpower.
Although the scale of the levels and the number of people are different, it is quite similar to war, which is also an "activity" in which living creatures take each other's lives and try to ensure their own survival. Actions such as hunting, the most important thing, are actually It was also the preparations before the operation, as well as the various intelligence gathering, rather than the operation itself as many people imagined.
As the saying goes, if you know yourself and your enemy, you can fight a hundred battles. Many creatures in nature, from big to small, are not weak and can be bullied. It is not an exaggeration to say that hunting them is not so much a unilateral plan of human beings as a battle between two parties. Every experienced hunter is deeply aware of the risks of hunting. Every year, countless hunters, from humble farmers to great knights and nobles, are beaten to death by the wild boar's huge tusks. Not to mention other beasts that are much larger and more ferocious than wild boars.
In addition to the prey itself, humans also need to fight many other things in the natural environment. There are hundreds of species of venomous insects and snakes in the tropics alone. Some of these tiny creatures are only the size of a palm but have powerful fangs. It is enough to pierce the weak human skin and inject lethal venom into it. Although the church's priests and some magicians had the ability to remove some poisons, most people did not make it to the town and fell to the ground in convulsions and died in the pain of nerve paralysis.
Coupled with the ever-changing weather and road conditions, if the material preparation is not sufficient, you will not have a thorough understanding of the local edible plants and mushrooms, and you will not know where the easy prey is located - or you may be convinced that this vegetation is there. There is no need to carry drinking water in sufficient places. If you can just find a small stream on the road to replenish your supplies——
Because there was nothing to eat, I was so hungry that I ate in a coma and ate poisonous mushrooms or other plants. I fell to the ground and died, foaming at the mouth. I was so thirsty that I finally found a pool, but one person was ambushed at the bottom when he was not paying attention to fetching water. The crocodiles pounce on them, bite their necks and pull them into the water, where they drown and become their food. Even excluding these unexpected situations, inexperienced people who enter the forest with insufficient equipment get lost and cannot find water sources and food and starve to death, or they find water sources but fail to notice that it is stagnant water and guzzle it without choosing food, and then end up suffering from dysentery and diarrhea. When you become dehydrated and unable to move, you can only be eaten by scavengers while they are still alive——
In this era, it is common to enter the forest and never return.
The self-sufficient life developed by human civilization over thousands of years, and the convenience of living in a civilized society where all materials can be purchased with money. Most people have become accustomed to it, so they take the dangers in the wilderness lightly - but even if you have The ability to conquer the natural environment and be able to survive in the wilderness at least for a period of time is just the beginning.
As we mentioned before, searching for something in the vast wilderness is already an extremely difficult task.
There is no corresponding knowledge as the basis for judgment. I don’t understand the habits of certain creatures, what they like to eat, where they like to stay, when they rest, when they are particularly active, and they should not be provoked. There is no corresponding tool, but just relying on them. Many people who are passionate and want to conquer the opponent with brute force have already slept in the soil at the feet of the giant beast along with their naive ideas.
Truly professional hunting mercenaries spend far more time planning and preparing than taking action.
Investigate, track, set traps, and allocate your manpower.
The members of this hunting mercenary group, who had already shown good qualities during their long journey, came to the West Lake and after a good night's rest, they began to make real preparations for hunting the Aya Snake Dragon. What did they have? How professional it was, it finally opened the eyes of the white-haired Luoan girl.
Among the young mercenaries who tried to tease her a few days ago, Mira said that one of them could not beat her. The group of people she despised quickly began to deal with the traps and tools placed around them, and they were coated with tung oil. A huge interception net made of a handful of thick and tough hemp rope was set up around the area. The hunting expert Juan and the squad leader Jeronimo directed the young mercenaries to hammer and fix the thick iron nails on the nearby ground. On the tree trunk, iron rings were fixed on top, and the ropes at both ends of the interception net were passed through the iron rings and fixed on the trunks of the two big trees, and then the net was placed casually on the ground.
The location was specially chosen and is located on a stretch of terrain that looks like a pocket at the bottom of the West Lake. The end rope of the interception net was very long. Because of the thick rope, the net was actually divided into two halves and carried on the backs of two mules. It was only reassembled at the scene and the strength of the connection was confirmed again.
One side of it is fixed between two big trees, and the long rope is pulled to the rear part hidden behind the bushes. The strong captain Jeronimo and another are not inferior to his orange card. The mercenary used an ax and a giant sword to chop down two medium-sized trees. From the bright red color of their crowns, Henry could tell that they were the Poinciana tree, one of the tropical tree species. The root system of this tree is very developed and penetrates deeply. The soil is quite deep, and although both trees are still young, cutting off the upper trunks and leaving a stump is enough for the purpose.
The end of the long hemp rope was placed near the tree stump. Just pull it through the iron ring fixed on the tree trunk in front to hang the entire interception net, and then loop the other end of the hemp rope around and around. The ground is wrapped around the stump of the Poinciana tree, and a solid interception net is enough to stop even the Aya Snake Dragon weighing several tons - but this is only the first step of the plan. Mira looked at the novice mercenaries. Quickly began to assemble the real killer weapon for this mission.
——Ballista. This was another great invention born out of the Lamanites' superb applied engineering capabilities.
Most of the bows and crossbows in the world of Rigar, regardless of the differences in materials and shapes, the vast majority of the pulling force that causes significant damage comes from the elastic bow blades. From the single-piece wooden carved straight-draw longbows preferred by the Avenella people on the west coast, to the rapid-fire bows that are also single-piece but with a recurved shape by the Skeen pirates in the north, to the common ones among the grassland peoples and the southern city-state alliance. Compound recurve short bows with exquisite craftsmanship are made of animal glue, wood chips, bamboo chips, and animal sinews. The source of tension for all these bows is their elastic limbs.
Therefore, the performance of the bow limbs determines the lethality of the bow itself - and the only way to enhance it is naturally to increase and thicken it.
The weapon that was born based on this way of thinking is the large crossbow that is common on the West Coast and uses spears as arrows. It takes several people on the roller group to wind it up and it takes more than a minute to fire it once. This weapon is so powerful that it can penetrate the giant wooden shield used to protect the archer position, the scale armor on the flying dragon, and any armor that humans can wear. However, it is large and slow-moving and has always been suitable for use as a city defense weapon—— However, the ballistae invented by the Lamanites took another development route.
The structure of the ballista is quite simple. It is composed of a strong wooden frame. The bow blade is abandoned and the torsion of the hemp rope is used as the source of lethality. The hemp ropes fixed at the upper and lower ends of the frame on both sides are twisted again and again. , when it reaches the top, insert the two pieces of wood with the bow strings fixed into it, and then fix the huge crossbow in the middle to block the bow strings. When the blockage is released, I twist the hemp rope for an unknown number of times. A huge torque was released in an instant, and the iron crossbow, about the length of an arm, was pushed by this force and shot out with the force of the wind. It was so powerful that it could penetrate the stainless steel breastplate.
Although it is not as powerful as the bed crossbow, it abandons the huge bow blade and adopts a detachable structure. It can be carried by mules and horses for long distance travel, and there is one thing that is far better than the bed crossbow - that is it The accuracy is astonishing.
Juan and his hunting mercenary team carried a total of three ballistae, two of which were arranged obliquely to the left and right front of the interception net, and were used for the final strike. They were together with the interception net. And formed a fan-shaped interception area. The two ballistae were located at the ends of the two hypotenuses of the fan shape and crossed facing the front. Temporary shelters made of cut down poinciana leaves and trunks blocked the two ballistae. Front - Although the Aya Snake Dragon is huge in size, it is not stupid. It has a slender neck and a wolf-sized head in front of it. Its eyesight is equivalent to that of a human being. When it sees someone pointing something at it, it will choose to run away from a distance. , so hiding weapons is also very important.
In addition to the two ballistas used as killing moves, the remaining one was placed on a hillside on the west side of Lake Lorena in front of the interception net. Not only that, the mercenaries of the mercenary group also did some things along the way. Other traps, such as trip wires and falling rocks, are designed to create enough momentum to make the prey panic and run towards the interception net as driven by humans.
Just hunting an Aya Snake Dragon is already such a huge effort. But despite being so well prepared, all the mercenaries of the mercenary group can do now is wait patiently. After all, animals each have their own personalities. Although the general habits can be speculated to a certain extent, there will still be some differences in each individual.
It’s not been a year or two since the mercenary group to which Juan and the others belong hunted the Aya snake dragon on the shores of Lorena’s West Lake. Although this kind of hybrid dragon is not as smart as the Yalong, it still has the ability to learn and remember. Although the snake dragons that come here are not necessarily the same group every year, some mature individuals who have experienced previous hunting and survived will naturally be more wary of this place.
As social animals, they usually try to prevent other young companions from going to this dangerous place. Therefore, only the chaotic breeding period and those who are still young individuals as hunting objects have a higher success rate. Even if these things Even the young mercenaries in the team don't know it, but some of the customary habits in every organization must actually have some practical significance.
The most effective method summarized from many years of experience. The gap between professional mercenary groups and individual mercenaries with large resources and experienced hunting experts is roughly this - but no matter what, the trap is ready. , the arrangement of the plan has been perfected, but as time goes by, the young mercenaries are becoming more and more impatient.
The sun rises and sets, day after day. Although during the day and night, you can often hear the Aya Snake Dragon entering the breeding period emitting the unique call of "Aya - Aya -" in courtship, and the noisy giant animal The noise from the group's movements could be clearly heard from a long distance away, but no snake dragon ever came to the west side of the lake.
Many young green mercenaries in the team who were obviously hunting for the first time were too nervous to sleep. Although they knew that there was no use in being anxious here, on the other hand they always cared about the night. He was afraid that when he accidentally fell asleep, a snake dragon would suddenly break into the trap set by his group.
Excitement was mixed with nervousness. In the first two or three days, every young mercenary who was doing this kind of thing for the first time had big dark circles under his eyes. However, when they began to adapt to life here, they fell asleep. It became heavy and steady - not even the thunderous mating cry of the Aya Snake Dragon could disturb their sleep.
The new recruits are like this, and the obviously more experienced group of veteran-level orange mercenaries are even more calm. In order to prevent emergencies, they are not allowed to leave too far to hunt after coming here, so including Juan Several mercenaries including them took out hemp fishing lines and iron fish hooks, took bamboo branches from nearby trees to form fishing rods, and then dug out earthworm beetles from the mudflats by the lake as bait. They started leisurely. Caught a fish.
There are plenty of freshwater fish in Lake Lorena, which is why the Aya Snake Dragon chose this place to breed. A dozen young individuals hatched from a nest of dragon eggs broke out of the mudflats and immediately ran to the water. You can start to prey on small fish and shrimps. They grow rapidly and live in the lake for about half a year. After growing up, they will swim out along the Shire River and go to other places to grow wantonly.
Naturally, many of these small snake dragons will become the food of the crocodiles lurking in the lake and some large carnivorous fish. However, when the surviving snake dragons grow up, they will return to this place again. place to thrive.
All living things are part of nature, and even humans are no exception.
Time continues to pass slowly. As the novice mercenaries and the free mercenaries serving as guards gradually adapt to the current environment, and the veteran mercenaries have long begun to enjoy the benefits provided by the lake, the mercenary team leader He The wrinkles on Ronimo's face were getting darker day by day.
Obviously, this kind of waiting day after day is a kind of painful suffering for him.
And none of this escaped the eyes of Henry and Juan. (To be continued.)
