" Eric, 40 points, failing grade."
" Aruk, 70 points, passed."
" Dennis, 90 points."
Black closed his notebook, put his sunglasses back on, and concealed the complex emotions in his eyes.
" Su Wei, your observation skills have impressed me. But the wilderness is not just about exploration and shooting; it's more about survival."
He strode toward the roaring tracked vehicle and waved for the others to follow.
"Get on the bus. We're going to the last test center."
"If you don't want to be frozen solid, you'd better hurry. We're heading to a real slaughterhouse."
The car doors slammed shut, shutting out the wind and snow.
Su Wei sat in the bumpy carriage, able to feel the gazes cast upon him by the other three men.
He didn't respond, but simply put his hands back in his pockets quietly.
The tracked vehicle rolled over the snow and drove off into the distance.
Chapter 74, Section 3 Assessment: Site Clearing and Logic Analysis
The roar of the tracked vehicle crushing the ice finally stopped, and the inertia caused the people inside the vehicle to lurch forward.
The engine shut off, and the surroundings fell silent, save for the faint crackling sound of the exhaust pipe cooling down.
The silence lasted less than two seconds before a strong, unique smell seeped in through the cracks in the car door.
It wasn't the scent of pine resin, nor the crispness of ice and snow, but rather a stench of rust, disinfectant, and the stench of entrails.
Black pushed open the car door, and a biting cold wind rushed in, but it couldn't dispel the smell that filled his nostrils.
This is the official material recycling and processing center of the Hunters' Guild on Kodiak Island, or to put it more bluntly, a slaughterhouse.
Su Wei jumped out of the car, his boots stepping onto the hardened cement ground mixed with black ash and bloodstains.
Before me was a huge, semi-open factory building, with countless iron hooks and sliding rails hanging from the ceiling.
Even during the off-season when heavy snow closes the mountains, the lingering smell of blood still hangs in the air.
Black took off his sunglasses, casually draped them over his collar, and walked straight to a row of refrigerated cabinets in the corner.
"This is not just a place of killing."
He patted the heavy metal door, the echo reverberating through the empty factory.
"It only takes a hunter a second to fire a bullet, but that's the beginning of the responsibility, not the end. Bringing the meat back, cleaning it, serving it on the table, or bringing it here to exchange for dollars—that's the complete cycle."
Eric covered his nose, his face clearly showing his resistance.
I'm going to throw up.
Eric said in a muffled voice.
Swallow it back.
Black said coldly.
He yanked open the cold storage door, the sliding rails screeching as they spun.
The four large items were carried out by staff using a trolley.
The four black-tailed deer, which had just been shot dead for population control, still had warm bodies and their limbs were not yet stiff.
Black took a boning knife from the knife rack on the wall; the blade gleamed coldly under the light.
"The third and final assessment item: Site cleanup."
He tossed the knife onto the scratched stainless steel workbench.
"Each of you gets one. The requirements are simple: remove the internal organs, skin it, and cut it into quarters. You have forty minutes."
"There are only two scoring criteria: don't break the intestines and contaminate the meat, and don't waste good meat."
Black stepped back, holding his notebook, and pressed the stopwatch.
"Start."
The air inside the factory seemed to freeze.
Dennis was the first to move.
The old hunter, who had suffered a crushing defeat in the shooting competition, grabbed the skinning knife with the wooden handle. Without even touching the deer's body, he rubbed the blade against his leather apron a couple of times.
Then, he grabbed the deer's hind leg with one hand, and with an extremely skillful tip of the knife, he pried open the skin at the Achilles tendon and slid it downwards.
With a tearing sound, the skin and flesh separated.
Aruk also got the hang of it.
Although this kid is usually loud and boisterous, as a local native, he has watched his elders process game since he was a child.
He mumbled some kind of tribal song that the Su Wei couldn't understand. Although his movements were rough and wide, he was strong and didn't hesitate when tearing the fur.
Su Wei stood in front of his own control panel.
He gripped the slightly heavy boning knife, its surface cold and rough to the touch.
There was no system notification sound.
There is no pop-up window for opening the dissection module.
Killing fish and killing deer are vastly different in terms of operation, so it's normal that the system doesn't support them.
Su Wei took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the slight tension in her heart.
Although he had dissected a black-tailed deer before, this was different.
This is an assessment.
Moreover, his anatomical skills were not proficient to begin with.
However, although he lacked professional skills, he had other advantages.
The hand stability gained from Cooking LV3, combined with the understanding of structural logic provided by Mechanical Repair.
He viewed the deer as a machine, with its skeleton as the frame, muscles as the transmission, and internal organs as the engine.
Once you understand the structure, disassembling it isn't much harder than disassembling the engine of that snowmobile.
Su Wei troops have started operating.
Instead of showing off his backhand flick like Dennis, he opted for the safest forehand grip.
The knife tip pierced the soft tissue below the sternum.
The resistance was greater than expected; the fur's resilience stubbornly resisted the blade's edge.
Su Wei slightly twisted his wrist, using the curve of the blade to make a small incision. Then he inserted his index and middle fingers into the incision to stretch the peritoneum and prevent the tip of the knife from piercing the stomach below.
If your hand trembles, the sharp blade could instantly slice your fingers or pierce your stomach, which is filled with corrosive stomach acid.
But he remained steady.
Very stable.
The blade slid along the back of my fingers, like unzipping a smooth zipper.
The heat mixed with the stench of blood hit him, but Su Wei remained unfazed and quickly proceeded to the next step of the stripping process.
On the other side, Eric's platform was a scene of disaster.
He was clearly overwhelmed by the rising heat and the smell of blood, and with Black watching him the whole time, his mental defenses completely collapsed.
He waved the knife wildly, trying to end this disgusting process quickly.
Pfft.
A muffled thud.
Immediately afterwards, a nauseating, sour stench exploded out, even overpowering the original bloody smell of the slaughterhouse.
Eric's knife plunged deep into the deer's rumen.
Yellowish-green semi-digested grass gushed out from the incision, instantly contaminating most of the abdominal cavity and the lean meat on the inside of the hind leg.
"Oh, God..."
Eric gagged, threw the knife on the table, and backed away.
Black's expression instantly vanished.
He quietly walked over, glanced at the mushy mess of meat, and then drew a huge X on Eric's report card.
"Get out of my way."
Black pointed to the door.
"Don't let your incompetence continue to insult this deer."
Eric blushed and tried to explain, but under Black's murderous aura, he could only slink away into a corner.
Forty minutes later.
"Stop."