Chapter 23: Investigation

A few days later, Wu Yuntian took Su Hao and jumped off the tall walls.

Cold wind blew into their face, and as they quickly dropped, Su Hao could feel his stomach rise up into his throat. As Wu Yuntian led Su Hao by the hand, they landed firmly on the snowy ground before his heart went back to normal.

Immediately afterward, the two, one in front, one in back, walked towards the distance.

Su Hao carried with him the knife he had used to kill the blue-eyed coyote, dressed in two simple pieces of iron armor. He took some furtive glances around without saying a word. His eyes looked around with curiosity and vigilance.

His iron armor he was wearing was personally made by his father Wu Yuntian, who had found two pieces of iron, punched holes into them, and simply tied them together with rope.

Su Hao disliked the two pieces of iron and considered them awkward so he asked his father why he had to have armor.

Wu Yuntian responded very seriously that the wild was very dangerous. Wearing the iron armor protected the torso and would make it harder to suffer injuries. An extra layer of protection was an extra layer of safety. With his strength as a high-level common warrior, the two pieces of iron shouldn’t be too heavy, but they could help his defense. This was a critical kind of preparation for going out in the wild.

Su Hao didn’t say anything more and made a decision that in the future he would make a more suitable armor. This kind of front and back iron pieces were really hard to look at.

After following along for close to an hour, Su Hao finally couldn’t help but ask: “Father, where are we going?”

Wu Yuntian responded without looking back: “Never speak loudly in the wild. We’ll be there soon.”

Wu Yuntian brought Su Hao to climb a small hill, past some trees. Behind the hill, the scenery was unobstructed. He pointed forward: “See the tallest tree over there?”

“I see it.”

“That’s where unihorn flower deer frequently forage. Many unihorn flower deer will appear. Walk closer to take a look.”

Su Hao hesitated: “So our goal today is to hunt unihorn flower deer?”

“No. Unihorn flower deer are too vigilant. You’ll never be able to get close to them. Your goal is the predator of the unihorn flower deer, the snow leopard. Use your knife to kill it.”

Su Hao thought about it and felt something was off: “I can’t even catch up to a unihorn flower deer. How will I catch its predator?”

“Snow leopards have a strong sense of territory. You don’t need to chase them. As long as you enter their territory, they will be aggressive against you.”

Su Hao suddenly felt a hint of danger: “Father, won’t that be dangerous?”

Wu Yuntian confidently said: “Nope! Snow leopards are stronger than blue-eyed coyotes, but they’re not much stronger. As long as you’re careful of its claws, you should be able to take care of it. Also, I’ll be watching on the side.”

Su Hao felt relieved. He gripped his knife tightly and thought of countermeasures.

Seeing Su Hao didn’t have any more opinions, he turned and moved first: “Let’s approach from the side.”

After a while, Wu Yuntian stopped and said to Su Hao: “Ok, we’re here. From here on out, go by yourself!”

Su Hao took a deep breath and began to move forward quietly. He inwardly encouraged himself: “Don’t panic. Dad’s right behind protecting me. Can’t I just call for him if I can’t win?”

But as Su Hao turned his head to look back, he already could no longer see his father’s figure.

“Where’d he go???” Su Hao’s heart rate jumped. He wouldn’t have been abandoned here right? No way, no way. Steady!

Su Hao kept moving forward for a few minutes and arrived at the unihorn flower deer territory. He could already see the unihorn flower deer foraging through the earth. These deer that only had a single horn first stuck their horn into the snow to dig around. Once they found some dry grass to eat, they would quickly raise their head and look around vigilantly.

Then what about the snow leopard? Su Hao carefully decreased his focus but kept a state where he could explode at any moment. His blood qi was ready to go.

The surroundings were quiet. Su Hao didn’t discover the snow leopard that Wu Yuntian had mentioned, but he didn’t dare to let his guard down. Prior to discovering the opposition was the most dangerous time. It meant that the snow leopard was secretly observing himself.

Su Hao’s brain was spinning furiously, trying to deduce the snow leopard’s location. His eyes kept sweeping back and forth but didn’t see anything unusual.

“Let’s try using Little Light.” A light bulb flashed above Su Hao’s head and an idea popped into his mind. He couldn’t find anything unusual, but an artificial intelligence could.

Thinking of it, he did it. He gave Little Light a new command: “Identify all creatures in my vision. Identify the animals in my vision. Identify the fur in my vision…”

A stream of precise instructions for investigation were sent out. Little Light’s calculative abilities were very quick and soon gave a response.

The living room in the marble space went through the AI simulation and had become an expanse of white. It was a simulation of Su Hao’s surroundings within one hundred meters.

Large and small red circles pointed out any locations that matched what Su Hao had commanded. Su Hao swept through the visuals. Most of them were of the unihorn flower deer. Then Su Hao continued to add a command: “Species name: Unihorn flower deer.”

“Naming successful. Data collection and comparison successful.”

“Exclude unihorn flower deer.”

Then with the next command, the red circles decreased by more than half.

The red circle closest to him was ten meters away on a tree. Su Hao lifted his head and looked towards the marked spot and saw between the snow-covered trees, there were two round blue pupils staring at him, eyes filled with coldness and vigilance.

Snow leopard!!

Su Hao’s scalp numbed. This leopard was just ten meters away but he hadn’t discovered it. If he had gone a few steps further, he probably would have been ambushed. At such a close distance, he definitely wouldn’t have been able to react.

The snow leopard also knew that Su Hao had discovered it and lightly jumped off the tree and walked up two steps, and then stood still in front of Su Hao.

The snow leopard’s body was long and skinny. Its snow white fur was sporadically covered with black spots. As it walked through the snow, it was almost invisible. Adding on its light footsteps, Su Hao guessed that if had walked behind him, he wouldn’t have noticed it.

This snow leopard looked too fierce. Adding together its tail, its body was at least three meters long. This kind of thing definitely wasn’t just a bit stronger than a coyote.

“Father told me to take care of this guy was a bit too hasty! I feel like I’m simply not its match.”

Su Hao complained to himself, but he didn’t make any audible sounds on the outside.

“Species name: Snow leopard”

“Naming success”

The snow leopard didn’t seem willing to attack first and was instead patiently waiting for its opponent to make the first move.

Su Hao thought a bit before deciding to proactively make the first attack. 𝘦.𝘤𝘰𝑚

He slowly bent over and picked up a pile of snow and compacted it into a snowball, and then threw it at the snow leopard.

The snow leopard gently leaped to dodge the snowball.

Su Hao gathered more snow and threw another one.

The snow leopard dodged and Su Hao threw again.

……

Wu Yuntian was preparing behind Su Hao in case of an accident. The scene ahead of him made his eyes twitch. He had wanted Su Hao to come and fight, not have have him in a snowball fight.

Perhaps because it felt like its dignity was under attack, or perhaps it felt like Su Hao’s pathetic attacks were non-threatening, the snow leopard attacked.

As soon as it went, it went full force.

“So fast!” Su Hao’s pupils shrank and his body tensed up.

The snow leopard’s attack and the coyote’s were different. The coyote liked to fly over and bite its enemy on the throat. The snow leopard’s body had a low center of gravity, so it used an attack that came from below. This allowed it to speedily change directions and adapt to the situation.

As the snow leopard charged, Su Hao felt a strong pressure on him and could hardly breathe.

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