Chapter 95 It’s snowing, let’s get a gun
I first heard the term “young eagle” from my grandfather. He said there is a kind of young eagle that just left the nest. Their temperament is much softer than that of ordinary eagles. They are very courageous but not very wild. After simple training, they can be easily put into the air.

The most commendable thing about this eagle is not its ability to work, but its extremely high affinity.

If the falconer is trained well, the eagle will be more affectionate than an eagle raised from a nest of chicks.

Grandpa Yue Feng once encountered a young hawk with this kind of character. He set up a net in the fall and went home to eat food on the same day. He stayed up all night and the next day he could call two meters away in the yard with a string hanging.

I went out for a day and experienced the challenges. On the third morning, I found the shaft. It was already in the mood. I went out like an eagle. It only took one stroke to put it on.

After the eagle is released, when it catches prey it will chirp like a young eagle begging for food. Sometimes, if it catches small prey, it will even catch it and fly back to the falconer to “ask for credit and reward.”

What Yue Feng found most incredible about this story of Milk Eagle was not these, but what happened next.

Winter has passed and spring has come, and all things are reviving. It is time to release the falcon back into the mountains. However, the young falcon raised by my grandfather refused to leave after his legs were untied, the bells and other falconry equipment were removed, and he was released. He hung around the doorstep all day long, foraging in the pine forest during the day, competing for territory with native birds such as sparrows and jays. When dark came, he returned to the falconry bar under the eaves to spend the night.

After the summer, the yellow feathers of the eagle have all faded into the white feathers of the sophomore eagle, and the black back and white stripes of the feathers look like frost and snow, which is very beautiful.

This strange baby eagle was raised in my grandfather’s house for five years, free-range in spring and summer and taken to the mountains for hunting in winter.

Until the spring of the sixth year, the eagle did not come back for several nights in a row. Grandpa went to the mountain to look for it for several days, but in the end he only found a pair of eagle wings left as the fox had eaten it.

The scientific name of the goshawk is the eagle owl, which is a very large owl and a nocturnal bird of prey. In addition to hunting mice, rabbits, birds, etc., it also preys on other birds of prey. Birds like goshawks are basically blind at night, and when they are attacked by eagle owls, they have no room for resistance at all.

The heartbroken grandfather carried his shotgun and wandered around the woods for more than a week, finally avenging his own eagle. From then on, he was devastated and his health gradually deteriorated. His family never raised eagles again.

And now, the little chicken eagle that was originally an ordinary one when it was put into the net, and was almost released by Yue Feng on a moment’s thought, could actually be a rare young eagle?
Thinking of this, Yue Feng pulled the string and walked towards the place where the eagle landed. When he reached the bushes, he saw the little chicken eagle stepping on the sand chicken under its feet, plucking its feathers and calling softly.

“Hey!” Yue Feng shouted the command to feed.

ji! ji! ji!

The chick hawk’s begging cry also echoed.

Yue Feng had no intention of replacing the first adult eagle’s prey immediately, and just let the chick be stepped on and eaten by the eagle.

When the eagle was about 60% full, Yue Feng covered the eagle’s claws with his sleeves and took the prey off.

The little chick hawk stood on Yue Feng’s hand again, as if the seal in its body had been unlocked after this hunt. Yue Feng pinched some meat and teased it with the command to feed it.

The meat was too small, and the little guy looked everywhere for food, but couldn’t find any. It actually started begging for food while flapping its wings like a little swallow that had just left the nest.

Seeing this scene, Yue Feng was completely stunned.

In his previous life, he had handled at least eighty goshawks, if not a hundred, and he had personally trained at least several hundred falcons of all sizes.

Yue Feng had raised even young sparrowhawks, but he had never seen a wild sub-adult eagle flapping its wings to beg for food in the hands of a falconer.

Yue Feng, delighted, fed the little eagle with minced meat, then mounted the eagle and turned around to walk towards home.

If this is really the legendary Milk Eagle, my father will definitely be very happy when he knows the news.

Ordinary falcons are flat-haired beasts that eat red meat and poop white feces. Their IQs are not very high. Even if you take out an eyelid cub from an eagle’s nest and raise it, it still won’t be friendly to humans once its wings have grown.

The baby hawk that Grandpa once raised was like a special kind of goshawk. When he was a child, Yue Feng had countless fantasies about it, but he never had the chance to see it. He never thought that an inconspicuous baby hawk could actually reproduce the glory of Grandpa’s hawk raising back then! !

The eagles in my house are free-range in spring and summer. If I tell this to an expert eagle handler, he will definitely be shocked.

With such an excited state of mind, Yue Feng returned home with the eagle on his back and the half-eaten sand chicken in his hand.

At this moment, Father Yue Lei was flying Yue Feng’s iron-backed red eagle in the yard, listening to the radio.

“dad!”

“Why are you back so early, did you become an eagle when you went out?”

Yue Lei thought his son had gone out to get into trouble with an eagle, but when he saw Yue Feng holding half a leftover sand chicken in his hand, he immediately realized that his son had gone out to become an eagle.

“Don’t mention it. I stayed up until 3 a.m. last night, but this little eagle stuck its head under its wings and refused to lift its head no matter how much I touched it!

I was setting up a hawk in the yard this morning. After it was out of the way, I saw that the hawk was in the mood, so I set it up in the woods by the river to try it out. Guess what I found?”

Yue Feng had a smile on his face and actually kept the secret from his father.

Yue Lei tilted his head and gave his son a stunned look: “Speak human language, but you are keeping me in suspense again!”

“Hehe, this little chicken eagle might be the kind of milk eagle that grandpa mentioned before!!” Yue Feng did not dare to show off and went straight to the point.

“What? How did you figure that out?” When Yue Lei heard the words “Naiyingzi”, he immediately straightened his back.

Yue Lei had seen the young eagle that Yue Feng’s grandfather raised at that time. Although the eagle’s work was not outstanding when it was first caught, it had been training and accumulating experience in human hands. After molting and becoming a fledgling, its ability to catch prey improved significantly.

In the following years, it became even more so. Every hunt would gain it experience. It was very friendly and did not need to pinch its food to control fat. There were several times when it would not hesitate to catch prey even with a crop on its head.

“Look!!” Yue Feng secretly tore off a small piece of meat from the sand chicken, and then handed the meat to the little chicken eagle while shouting the command from afar.

ji! ji! ji!

The little eagle flapped its wings and began to beg for food again!

“Fuck! He’s really a milk eagle!

The eagle your grandfather raised looked like this when it was being fed!

After being trained, the eagle no longer needs to be tied up. After eating, it will sit on the pole for most of the day. When it gets cold at night, it will know to go into the house. The white mark behind the door of our west room is left by the young eagle that came into the house in winter and beat the eagle when we sleep at night!”

Yue Lei gave his son more details about the baby.

Yue Feng casually fed the chicken eagle with a strip of meat and said with a smile: “My grandfather can handle an eagle well, and now I can definitely do it! I will make it some food and continue to go out for actual combat tomorrow!”

“What’s the matter? Now that you have a new love, you don’t want to bother with your old love anymore? I have been setting up this big eagle for you all morning. Why don’t you go to catch rabbits today?” Yue Lei stared at the young eagle in Yue Feng’s hand, and his eyes betrayed himself. Yue Lei also liked this kind of eagle that is hard to find.

“Hey, go! How can you not go! Hold the little eagle for you and give me the big eagle. I’ll release the eagle after I have breakfast!” Yue Feng knew what his father was thinking. Since he liked it, let him play with it. It would be fun to recuperate at home.

“That’s more like it, you’re smart!” Yue Lei was rarely arrogant.

……

Just as Yue Feng’s family was filled with loving father and filial son, rejoicing over the discovery of a suspected baby eagle, on the other side, in a cafeteria at the Hongqi Coal Mine, a silent smoke of gunpowder was gathering.

Fu Qinghe and Zhou Jianjun had agreed to a regular delivery of game meat, which temporarily helped them win back a game in the competition with the Second Canteen. During this period, Fu Qinghe even looked a bit arrogant when he walked around the canteen.

On the contrary, Niu Fusheng, who had always been at odds with him, was very low-key. There was an adequate supply of game every day, including live game such as rabbits and pheasants. Logically, he should have come up with a few new dishes and create something new.

However, Niu Fusheng neither wrote the names of the new dishes on the blackboard nor actively promoted them. He just quietly did his own thing. The top leaders, led by Qiu Guohua, did not come to the second canteen in recent days, which instead gave some middle-level leaders a break.

Unexpectedly, the good times did not last long. Fu Qinghe, who had been showing off for two days, waited in the morning but no one showed up. Zhou Jianjun, who had promised to send him game, disappeared!

This was a very difficult situation. Senior leaders from the city were coming to have lunch at noon, so Director Wang informed Fu Qinghe in advance, and Old Fu patted his chest and took on the responsibility.

But it’s already past eight in the morning and Zhou Jianjun hasn’t delivered the game yet. What should I do?

Fearing for an accident, Fu Qinghe arranged for two apprentices to go to Xing’an Village in person. However, when they found Zhou Jianjun, they learned that both of Zhou’s eagles were dead and they would no longer be able to provide live game.

The eagles are all dead, so what can we use to catch game? When Fu Qinghe heard the news, he almost fainted.

It was already past nine o’clock and lunch would start in two hours, but the ingredients for cooking had not been found yet. Fu Qinghe was so anxious that in less than two hours, his mouth was full of blisters.

If this matter is not done well, it will not just be a matter of losing face. Even Wang Mingyuan, the office director, will have to bear the brunt of the consequences. No one will benefit from it.

After trying all the possible ways, he still couldn’t find a solution. Fu Qinghe had no choice but to grit his teeth, pull out a pack of Ginseng brand cigarettes with a cigarette holder from under the cupboard, tuck it under his armpit, and go to the second cafeteria with his head held high.

In the second cafeteria, Niu Fusheng was sitting on a stool in the lounge drinking tea. When he saw Fu Qinghe come in, Old Niu was slightly stunned.

“Hey! Master Fu, what a rare guest. How come you have free time today to come and inspect our work in the second canteen?” Niu Fusheng raised his head and glanced at Fu Qinghe, teasing in a flat tone.

“Lao Niu! I’m here to ask for your help!” When the time came, Fu Qinghe no longer cared about his face. He put the cigarette under his armpit on the table and went straight to the point.

“Ginseng brand! These cigarettes are rare, they must cost more than one yuan a box, right?” Niu Fusheng glanced at the cigarettes on the table and didn’t respond. “Today, the city leaders came to inspect the mine, and we will entertain them in the canteen at noon! The person who is responsible for sending me the game has a problem at home, and I can only bite the bullet and come to you for help!

No matter how much we fight openly or secretly, that is a conflict among the people. If something goes wrong with the hospitality, the entire mine will be in trouble!

I beg you, please help me!” Fu Qinghe whispered in a very good manner.

“It’s not easy for me to help you with this. Once this is done, our Second Canteen will become a vegetable market. If you need anything, you can come to me and get it. I, the chef, won’t have to cook anymore. I will be directly responsible for the logistics and purchasing for the First Canteen.” Niu Fusheng said meaningfully.

“This… just help me this time, and don’t do it again, okay?”

Fu Qinghe also knew that his request was a bit excessive. They were already competitors, and now others were eager to laugh at him.

It’s embarrassing for the mine, but I’m not willing to accept the situation in the second canteen.

If it were based on Niu Fusheng’s temper, he would not give face even if Wang Mingyuan came to discuss the matter today, unless Qiu Guohua came.

But he thought of what Yue Feng whispered in his ear that day, and forced himself to suppress his anger.

“It’s not that I can’t help you, but I have a condition!”

Seeing that the other party was willing to give in, Fu Qinghe immediately breathed a sigh of relief: “Just let me get through this first, and we can negotiate any conditions!”

“From today on, the mine’s reception duties will be split equally between Canteen 1 and Canteen 2! Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays belong to Canteen 1, and Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays belong to Canteen 2. If you have reception duties during the weekends, you can take turns!
As a condition, we can provide you with the wild game ingredients purchased by our Second Canteen at the purchase cost!” Niu Fusheng brought up the idea that Yue Feng had given him in public.

Hearing this, Fu Qing and Ya Ma were stunned.

Strictly speaking, Fu Qinghe’s background and connections in the mine are slightly better than Niu Fusheng’s. As the office director, Wang Mingyuan can usually decide where to entertain guests with just a word. With the same strength, it is very difficult for Niu Fusheng to get a chance to stand out.

In this situation, if Niu Fusheng wants to maintain his base, he can only think of other ways.

After all, although live game is difficult to get, it can always be obtained if you pay a high price and find the right person. The only card Niu Fusheng has is his cooking skills and the stable supply of game.

Canteen No. 1 has a good foundation and strong momentum. If Canteen No. 2 takes this opportunity to “divide the river and rule” with Canteen No. 1, it will definitely be more beneficial than harmful to Niu Fusheng.

At best, if the other party regrets, Niu Fusheng can still use the game ingredients to strangle the other party, and he will not suffer any loss. If the other party always abides by the rules, the survival space of the second canteen will not be greatly affected.

“This this……”

Fu Qinghe hesitated for a long time and did not dare to agree. After all, this involved factional disputes in the mine. He was just a chef in a canteen and could not make the decision with just a few words.

Niu Fusheng pushed the cigarette on the table in front of the other party and said, “Since it’s difficult, forget it. Just figure it out yourself! Even if you can’t handle the reception mission well, no one will die anyway!”

It was true that no one would die, but Wang Mingyuan, who was in charge of this area, was in complete trouble because of the internal fighting in the cafeteria, resulting in the fact that the senior leaders who came to inspect the restaurant could not eat the dishes that they had specifically requested.

There was a ready-made reception plan but it was not used. This is not a mistake but an attitude problem.

The mine manager sounds like he has considerable power, but he also has to obey the leadership of the Mining Bureau. If they make things difficult for you, just bear with it.

“Fuck! I agree!!” Although Fu Qinghe was extremely unwilling, things had come to this point and it concerned the future of his nephew and son-in-law. Fu Qinghe could tell which was more important.

“Okay! A grown man’s word is as good as a stick. I don’t need to talk to Director Wang, right?”

“I’ll go tell Xiao Wang!”

“Okay, the ingredients for the second canteen are all in the warehouse at the back. There are pheasants, hares, sand chickens, and flying dragons. Take them first for your lunch treat!”

……

Niu Fusheng, who achieved his goal, also breathed a sigh of relief. The trick Xiao Yue suggested really worked.

Over the next few days, Yue Feng kept part of his attention on this chicken hawk.

It’s true, as the eagle becomes more mature, the characteristics of the milk eagle become more and more obvious.

Although this Little Eagle does not have any obvious advantages in terms of appearance and skeleton structure, it has no obvious disadvantages in actual boxing hunting. Its pursuit speed is not slow and its success rate is not low.

What made Yue Feng a little mad was that after being released for a few days, the little hawk actually started to cling to people. At dawn in the morning, it started calling for going up the mountain, more accurate than an alarm clock. There were a lot of hawks tied to the hawk pole, but it was the only one that called out most cheerfully.

Sometimes when it fails to catch the bird while chasing its prey, it will just need to shout from a distance and the eaglet will fall into its hands by itself. Its obedience and affinity with the falconer are truly terrifying.

In actual combat, when it catches prey as big as a flying dragon or a sand chicken, it will howl non-stop and flap its wings at the same time, which makes Yue Feng have the illusion that his falcon is a bit dog-like.

What made Yue Feng even more satisfied was that the little eagle seemed to be able to distinguish different people. After the eagle was familiar with it, there was no problem in handing it over to Xiao Tao and the Zhang brothers to take it up the mountain to work, but in their hands, the eagle’s performance was relatively normal.

Only in the hands of Yue Feng and Yue Lei would this little eagle show more personalized and intimate behaviors such as begging for food and flapping its wings.

The Yue family father and son put in extra effort to train this extremely special chicken eagle into the state of the young eagle that Yue Feng’s grandfather had raised.

Later on, we simply stopped tying the eagle to the eagle bar outside the house at night. Instead, we let the eagle stand on the back of a chair and placed it in the sleeping room to keep it friendly with people.

The white mark left by the falcon decades ago behind the door has been replaced by a new eagle, like a reincarnation. The myth of the falcon in the hands of the Yue family is slowly awakening.

With the addition of this chicken hawk, the four members of the falconry team resumed their daily routine of going up the mountain without the need for rest.

However, before, everyone liked the Big Blue Harrier more, but now, it was the turn to release the Chicken Hawk, and everyone was even more excited.

In actual combat, the eagle can catch sand chickens and flying dragon birds. The fist hunting speed is enough. If you occasionally encounter a large pheasant, you don’t have to worry about hurting the eagle.

Because of the unique family nature of this chicken eagle, Yue Feng feeds it more food every day. In addition to the feather shaft that continues to shed, it also has a large crop almost every day.

In this state of not controlling food intake and giving it as much as it eats, in just less than a week, the chicken eagle’s weight recovered and even exceeded the fatness when it was put down from the net, and it weighed 1.4 kilograms.

With stronger physical reserves, he became more powerful in chasing prey such as pheasants. Basically, if he encountered a big pheasant in the mountains, it would rarely escape within a wing’s reach.

This young eagle received sufficient practical experience at the hands of Yue Feng’s team, while the Iron-backed Red Eagle in Yue Feng’s hand was also not idle.

In order to supply wild rabbits and pheasants to the canteen, Yue Feng would take a big eagle out every day. When the eagle goes out every day, it would more or less encounter pheasants. Therefore, the pressure of supplying pheasants to the canteen was much less for Yue Feng himself, and he spent more time catching wild rabbits.

After catching about a hundred wild rabbits, Yue Feng’s Iron-backed Red Eagle was finally fully trained.

Any rabbit that flies within fifty meters has a chance of escaping from this Iron-backed Red Eagle less than one in a hundred. The Iron-backed Red Eagle’s actual catching methods are also constantly being updated and iterated.

From grabbing the buttocks and pinching the waist in the beginning, using brute force to subdue the hare, it evolved into pinching the waist and pressing the neck, and later on, it became holding the head with both claws. At this point, the Iron-backed Red Eagle’s rabbit catching skills can be said to have graduated perfectly.

Half a month passed in peace and tranquility as he caught rabbits and pheasants and released hawks in the mountains. Yue Feng’s savings officially exceeded the 2000 yuan mark.

That evening, Yue Feng’s family of four were having dinner when his father’s radio reported the weather forecast that it was going to snow in the area where Xing’an Village was located.

“Dad, it’s going to snow!” Yue Feng put down his chopsticks immediately and his face lit up when he heard the weather forecast.

When Yue Lei heard his son mention snow, he looked up and said, “You’re getting antsy, can’t you hold it back?”

Yue Feng was touched by Laozi’s words and scratched his head a little embarrassedly: “Hehe, the mountain is closed due to snow, and the temperature will drop immediately. It won’t take a few days for the river to be blocked, and it will be a good time to go up the mountain to hunt!”

Yue Lei nodded: “After dinner, I will go to your uncle’s house and ask him to write you a letter of introduction. I will ask your uncle Li to take you to Tiecheng to buy the gun!”

“You don’t have to make the trip. Last time we had a fight with the Zhou family, I told my uncle in advance at the village office. I can go there by myself later!”

“That’s fine. We have rabbits and pheasants at home. We can take one of each with us when we go over!”

“it is good!”

Thinking that he would have his own gun soon, Yue Feng didn’t even want to continue eating his dinner. However, under his father’s gaze, Yue Feng didn’t dare to show off. He had to behave absolutely steadily and steady, otherwise even if the gun was bought, Yue Feng would most likely not be allowed to be the main attacker.

Guns are very sensitive objects at all times. They have great destructive power. If used well, they can kill bears and tigers. If used poorly, they can also hurt people and yourself.

More than a month has passed since Yue Feng’s rebirth. Objectively speaking, his performance is steady and down-to-earth, which is remarkable among his twenty-year-old peers.

But no matter how capable my son is, he is still a child in my eyes. If Yue Feng behaves in a slightly frivolous manner, it will be hard to say whether I will be given the right to control the first gun in the family.

After all, in the eyes of his family, Yue Feng was just a rookie who had never been to the mountains or fought in a large-scale expedition. He was far less reliable than Yue Lei’s sworn brother Li Wentong.

Restraining his excitement, Yue Feng finished his dinner. After saying hello to his parents, he couldn’t wait to go to Wang Jianguo’s house with the pheasants and rabbits.

Chapter 3 is a long chapter with more than 6,000 words. Enjoy your reading!
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(End of this chapter)