In the boundless mountain forest, the sun shone at a slant, casting the long shadows of a boy and a wolf across the ground.
They were Fang Qianyuan and the little white wolf, walking along a mountain path.
Carrying a pheasant he had just caught, Fang Qianyuan led the little white wolf through the woods to a mountain stream near Wolf Valley.
He had stumbled upon this spot while patrolling the mountains two days earlier. It was just the place to butcher a chicken, roast some meat, and treat himself to a good meal.
Fang Qianyuan had also come from poverty. Although his father had looked after him, he had often cooked his own meals as a child, so cleaning the pheasant was quick, neat work that posed no difficulty.
First, he gathered Spirit Essence into a blade, cut a small hole near the chicken's rear, and pulled out the entrails before washing it clean. Then he sealed the opening with leaves and coated the bird, feathers and all, in damp mud from the water's edge and dry grass.
Next, he gathered dry firewood from the surrounding area, used his Spirit Essence blade to sharpen one end of a stick, and carefully began drilling with it.
He knew no fire-element spells, but fortunately he could make fire by drilling wood. After several minutes of puffing and blowing, he finally got a fire going.
Fang Qianyuan fetched a few stones and arranged them, carefully propped the mud-coated ball between them, then built up branches from the nearby fire around it, little by little.
While Fang Qianyuan worked, the little white wolf sat quietly beside him, watching. Her eyes remained fixed on the ball of mud enclosing the pheasant, her mouth slightly open and her tongue showing.
She looked just like a