The Record of Unusual Creatures

Panda Novel

With utmost enthusiasm, Lily invited Hao Ren to her place. The husky said that they needed proper planning to find a person, so she insisted on bringing Hao Ren to her home for dinner.

The dumb maiden made a blunder by going to Siberia instead of the city in the south. But her ability and will to survive in the wild was exceptional. After leaving the village, Lily found no rush to go to the south. While on the wrong way to the north, she frequently stopped to explore places that interested her. She would spend more time in one place if she found it fascinating. Due to these diversions, Lily had taken several years to reach Siberia.

For a werewolf maiden who came from a remote mountain village and had to suppress her true self, the journey in the wild was probably the happiest period of her life since birth.

Lily lived with a wolf pack and naturally remained far from the human world. There was a wooden cabin in the pine forest. A hunter used to stay there but was long gone at that point. There used to be other sporadic human settlements around the woods, but the snow had swallowed them all. Now, the cabin in the woods became a shelter for Lily.

The wolves had their place to stay around the wooden cabin. When Lily ordered them to dismiss, the beasts quickly disappeared into the woods. But Hao Ren could still sense their presence not far away as the wolf pack did not move more than 300 m away from the cabin. He could hear the wolves’ growl in the wind occasionally. Lily pushed the door of the cabin open and invited her guest into the house.

The interior of the cabin was not what Hao Ren had imagined.

It looked old and even like it was about to collapse soon, but it was a different world inside the cabin—it was clean and tidy. Lily used animal skin as well as an old wooden board to seal the gaps in the wall, and planks to reinforce the rotten overhead beams. The hunter’s hut was a very basic structure, divided into two partitions—the inner and external rooms. The inner room was used for food storage and living quarters, while the outer room was much like a kitchen stuffed with all kinds of clutter—a rusty ax, broken wheels, torn fur, and even an antique shotgun, the barrel of which had been rolled up like a ball of string. Apparently, it was the result of the husky using it as a hand exercise tool.

The clutter formed a small hill in the corner. Most of the stuff did not look like they belonged to the previous cabin owner. It seemed that they were more likely part of the husky’s collection. Lily was a hoarder back then.

Lily noticed that Hao Ren’s eyes were on the clutter in the corner. Instead of feeling embarrassed, she proudly said, “Oh, you’ve noticed that. That’s my collection. Let me tell you, I rarely see people here, but a few people still pass by occasionally. These people usually carry all kinds of rare and interesting stuff with them. My wolf pack would monitor them from afar. When they spot anything interesting, they grab it from the humans and bring it back to me. But don’t worry, I don’t let them hurt those humans, just take some stuff from them.”

Hao Ren finally understood what the wolf ambush earlier was all about. “The gray wolves were planning to rob me earlier?”

Lily scratched her head and put on a sly smile.

“I was almost robbed by a pack of wolves. Can you believe what just happened to me?” Hao Ren forced a smile. “They switched places and seemed to be in a formation. Did you teach them all of that?”

“It’s the art of war. Do you know the art of war?” Lily began to boast. “There was a learned old man in our village. He told me that the art of war is a power tool. Zhuge Liang, the military strategist in the period of the Three Kingdoms, used stones to draw a formation and defeated 100,000 enemy troops. So I borrowed the comic version of the ‘Romance of the Three Kingdoms’ from the old man.”

While she spoke, Lily took out a thread-bound book, which looked old and worn. Years of usage had worn the book’s cover out, and there was no way to tell which volume it was from the cover. It was one of Lily’s treasured possessions. “I had to beg the old gentleman for a long time before he lent me his book… Oops!”

“What’s wrong?” Hao Ren asked.

Lily cried, “When I ran away from the village, I forgot to return this book to him.”

“You’re only remembering it now?”

“Ah, after finding your friend, I can sneak back into the village and return the book while I’m on my way to the city,” the husky maiden said before she set the matter aside. “Let’s have something to eat. After fighting with you, I’m starving.”

Hao Ren looked on as Lily made a fire with flint and dried grass in the pit at the center of the cabin. She then took out a beaten old iron pot, stuffed it with snow, and put it on the fire. Once the snow melted, they would have a pot of hot water. Air-dried bacon was hanging on the beam. Lily broke a few small pieces and threw them into the pot. Together with some beans and grains, which she took out of nowhere, she made a hot pot of meat porridge. Lily ran to the back of the house and dug out two frozen salmons. After letting them thaw by the fire, she put them on a skewer and grilled the fish on the fire.

Lily did everything so skilfully and quickly that it dazzled Hao Ren.

The dog who was used to spoon-feeding actually possessed survival skills.

“The brown bear that lives nearby gave me the fish. He’s an expert in catching fish. So I always trade other food items that I’ve hunted for his fish,” Lily said as she stirred the meat porridge with a long iron spoon. “But seasoning is hard to come by. There is a saltwater lake far from here, where I can get salt. There’s nothing else other than that, so you have to get used to it.”

While watching Lily preparing the dinner, something crossed Hao Ren’s mind. He quietly took a packed item out of his Dimensional Pocket. “Why don’t you try this?” he asked.

Curious, Lily took the pack in her hands. She pinched and sniffed it. “What is this? Is it edible?”

“Peel away the plastic wrap,” Hao Ren said with a smile. “It’s a pack of Spicy Sticks. You’ll like it.”

Lily cautiously fiddled with the packaging for a long time before she clumsily removed the wrap. A thick and pungent smell instantly drifted into her nostrils. The husky put a strip into her mouth. “It tastes like noodles. It’s delicious!”

Sure enough, the love of Spicy Sticks was in her DNA.

In no time, Lily had finished half a pack of Spicy Sticks. She then suddenly stopped. “I have to save the rest. It can be used as a seasoning for the porridge.”

“You can eat as much as you like. I have plenty,” Hao Ren said and laughed.

Lily looked at Hao Ren curiously. “How did you conjure this thing up? Where have you hidden the things that you used to treat the wounded wolves? Do you know magic?”

“This is my ability,” Hao Ren said. He knew that it was a period in Lily’s life where he could easily fudge his way through. “Just as you can become a powerful half-wolf, half-human, I can conjure a variety of things.”

“Can you conjure Zhuge Liang, the one who knows to execute the stone formation.”

“I don’t think you understand what I mean,” Hao Ren said.

“What about Zhang Fei, the general? I want to see who’s stronger between him and me.”

“I don’t think that’s necessary. Needless to say, you are the strongest in history. Nobody could have done what you’ve done by swinging the stone column in the Temple of Athena like a propeller.”

“Athena what?”

“You have many questions,” Hao Ren said.

“Oh, then I should stop asking,” Lily said, pursing her lips. But after a few seconds, she turned around again and asked, “What about the propeller?”

“Let’s talk about our search plan, shall we?” Hao Ren said.

One had to watch out when chatting with the husky; she was highly divergent in conversations. Hao Ren should have remembered this. After all, he had known her for three years.

However, it was also easy to sway Lily back to the topic. The husky maiden flicked her ears and said, “Ah, finding someone. What kind of person do you want to find?” Lily asked.

“Someone just like us, a non-human,” Hao Ren said. “I’m not sure where she is, but I only know that she’s hibernating in a place where no human would ever go. The natural phenomena around her are abnormal.”

As he spoke, Hao Ren tried to figure it out in his mind. According to the handwriting on the crepe, Vivian’s last known activity in Siberia was a battle with the vengeful spirit 300 years ago. Her hibernation should have started not long after the combat. On the other hand, Lily was almost a hundred years old in the real world. Seventy of those years had been spent in the human world. Meanwhile, the Lily before him had not come into contact with human society.”

When looking from this context, there was a considerable time gap of about 200 years.

Why is this so? Hao Ren wondered.

Did Vivian sleep for 200 years? Or was Lily wrong about her age? Or in that distorted space and time, history no longer followed the original time scale?”

All three scenarios were possible.

“Are you in a daze?” Lily asked.

Her voice jolted Hao Ren out of his thoughts. “Oh, ahem, ahem, I’m fine. Where were we? Oh, we were talking about her sleep.”

“Sleep? Your friend has hypersomnia?” Lily asked, scratching her chin. “This snowfield doesn’t seem like an ideal place to sleep.”

“I think the sleep you’re talking about is not what I mean,” Hao Ren said, rubbing his forehead. “Never mind. It’s a little difficult to explain it to you. I have her belongings here. Can you sniff her scent out?”

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