When Li Long and the others reached the place where they had found fresh signs of wild boars rooting around, they happened to see two wild boars grunting as they ran toward the woods to the southwest.
Neither boar was very big, only twenty or thirty kilograms, and in no time they vanished into the woods.
"We're too late!" Li Long charged down with his gun in hand, saying as he ran, "You head back first. I'll follow them and have a look..."
"I'm going too!"
"I'll have a look..."
In the end, not one of the four stopped. They all followed them into the mountains.
Li Long remembered where they had gone and pursued them into the woods before slowing down. He could hear occasional grunts ahead. There were tracks all over the ground, mud rubbed onto the trees beside him, and fresh breaks in the branches.
All of it suggested there was a herd of wild boars ahead, but they had finished rooting up and eating grass roots early and were already heading back into the deep mountains.
The ones Li Long and the others had seen were stragglers.
Once in the woods, Li Long slowed his steps, trying not to make a sound. The others caught up one by one.
Beyond this stretch of pine woods was the mountaintop. The two wild boars plunged down the other side. Li Long climbed onto the flat slope at the top, crouched, and slowly peered ahead. The grass in the gully below was deep, and the two boars disappeared completely into it.
Fortunately, the Wild Boar Herd that had passed through earlier had trampled a broad "path" through the grass. Li Long could still see young wild boars at the rear appearing and disappearing among the grass before crossing the