Chapter 24: Boiling Salt
In the dense forest in the mountains, Liu Qing was holding a big fish in one hand, carrying a satchel on his back, a sapper shovel behind his back, two water bottles tied to the kettle belt, and the remaining belt was very short, hanging around his neck, with a water bottle on his left and right shoulders, and a water bottle hanging on his chest.
It was only a third of the way to go, Liu Qing was already tired and panting, there was no way, he was tired and happy, the water was there, the meat was also there, he didn't have to worry about eating and drinking, could he be unhappy! When he was about to reach the cave, Liu Qing really couldn't walk, his two arms seemed to be broken, and he almost didn't even have the strength to lift them up. I sat on the ground and rested for a while before I felt a little better. Whoever drags nearly 100 catties of things up the four or five miles of mountain jungle road, I'm afraid he won't feel easy.
I got up and was about to lift things and leave, but I found that I couldn't even lift the two fish, seeing that the door of the cave was already far away, Liu Qing had to think of a way, and got two sturdy rattans from nearby, passed through the fish's mouth and gills, put them on the left and right shoulders, firmly grasped the rope with both hands, leaned forward, and dragged the two fish forward with all the strength of his body.
When he entered the cave, he was really about to be paralyzed, so he casually threw aside the things on his body, fell to the ground and panted, unscrewed the kettle with some effort, drank a few sips of water with a clatter, and then lay on his back, his heart was empty. Xiao Wuyi twisted and walked to Liu Qing's side, as if he thought his appearance was funny, so he half-climbed and half-jumped on Liu Qing's stomach, and stepped lightly on all fours.
Liu Qing was very comfortable to be stepped on, played with Xiao Wu for a while, and felt that he was almost resting, so he got up, moved the two big fish to the big leaves he picked, cut two more fruits, and ate them with Xiao Wu. However, although Xiao Wu still eats fruits, he is obviously much more interested in meat than fruits, and every time he cuts meat, he can feel the excitement in his eyes.
This time, Liu Qing plans to make the fish and meat into dry food, except for some for these two days to eat, all the others are dried, take precautions, and prepare enough dry food, which is his specialty. Because the environment here is unfamiliar, no one can predict all kinds of emergencies, so it is very necessary to prepare food for a few days or even ten days in advance. Kill the fish, peel it, cut it into long strips, and bake one part on the grill. In addition, a drying pole was made, three long sticks were tied into a rack, two were made, a long branch was erected on top, and the extra strips of meat were hooked up with a branch, and in order to prevent them from rotting and deteriorating, a layer of salt was sprinkled on top and placed next to the fire.
As the saying goes, if you have food in your hands, you don't panic in your heart. Liu Qing looked at the piles of dinosaur meat, as well as the fish meat that was grilled and dried, and felt very satisfied. I made two pieces of fish and roasted them, sprinkled them with salt, and ate a large piece with Xiao Wuyi, rested for a while with satisfaction, and then went out to practice with a bow and arrow.
After practicing archery all afternoon, he felt that he had improved a lot, and he was very satisfied with the effect of the practice, and he did not hesitate to praise the arrow feathers made of leaves that he had come up with. The arrows that were fired by the preference were shaved off, and the number of arrows that were brought back this time was even smaller, only a few dozen. This can't go on like this, and at this rate, you have to make more arrows.
In addition to this, he has a more important thing to do, which is to find the source of the poison and find the plants that can produce that toxin, which is one of the things he urgently needs to do right now. Because in this strange environment full of all kinds of threats, that poisonous plant can definitely make his safety more secure.
Definitely not today, he didn't have time to look for it again, so he could only wait until tomorrow. While there was still a little time before dark, he planned to make some containers to collect the liquid that held the plants. Also intercepted a short section of hollow pole, and used two small pieces of wood, one for the bottom, one for the plug, after doing a good job, also specially made some water, tried the tightness, a total of four, only two of the sealing is excellent, not a drop of water leakage.
After doing this, it was almost completely dark, and Xiao Wu was also tired of playing, and got some fruit and meat, and after eating, Xiao Wu was already tired, and fell asleep alone on the bed made of hay. It may be that the sleeping position is not very comfortable, and when the body rolls, it directly becomes a four-legged person, with his legs standing straight and straight, and his four paws hanging weakly. Liu Qingzhi looked at it for a while, and felt that it looked cute everywhere, and even the sleeping posture was so cute.
He turned off the flashlight and checked the gate again, and then returned to the edge of the haystack, and lay down next to Xiao Wu, with his arm on his belly very casually.
At night, there were still some unknown animals making noise outside the cave, Liu Qing had already seen this situation, and only listened to it for a while when he woke up in the middle of the night, and felt that they had not found the cave, so he returned to the "bed" and continued to sleep.
Early the next morning, Liu Qing actually woke up earlier than Xiao Wu, who was tired like a dog yesterday, rested for a night, and actually felt very relaxed. I was going to get up quietly, but I didn't expect to wake up Xiao Wu as soon as I moved, the little guy was sleepy-eyed, and when he saw that Liu Qing had gotten up, he suddenly jumped up excitedly, and it seemed that he was going to go out with Liu Qing, Liu Qing stopped it, "You can't run around now, it's very dangerous outside." ”
After speaking, take a piece of the fish meat that was grilled yesterday and put it on a clean leaf for Xiao Wu to eat. I carried two large pieces of roasted meat, wrapped a little salt in leaves, and put them in my satchel. With all the weapons and equipment brought, he turned around and said to Xiao Wu: "You stay at home, there is water in the pot, drink it yourself when you are thirsty, there is meat next to the pot, and there are two cut fruits, you can eat it yourself if you want to, don't run around, you know?"
Xiao Wu held the meat in his mouth, whimpered and agreed a few times, no one knew if he understood it or not. Liu Qing squatted down, touched its little head and melon seeds lovingly, and said: "There is something important today, I need to go outside for a longer time, you must pay attention at home, be obedient!"
This time Xiao Wu seemed to feel Liu Qing's emotional changes, staring at Liu Qing with big eyes, looking at Liu Qing very reluctantly, this kind of look made him inexplicably familiar, it felt extremely like once, he took a vacation to play with the child at home, and when he was about to leave home and return to the team, the little baby's eyes, but he never expected that the departure would become a farewell.
Liu Qing couldn't help but hug Xiao Wu and kissed its fluffy face, Xiao Wu actually looked a little twisted, and the face kept hiding to the side. Liu Qing put it down, turned around and left. When he got to the outside of the cave, he was afraid that Xiao Wu would run out by himself, so he blocked two big stones outside the fence gate, and with Xiao Wu's strength, he couldn't open it from the inside.
Walking along the already somewhat familiar jungle road, Liu Qing quickly found that kind of vine, and what he suspected most was that this plant was poisonous. The vine is slightly slender but tough, and when cut open, there will be something fluffy at the fracture, and then soon a thick white liquid will ooze out, and after a while it will gather into a large drop. The vine still bore some fruit, the kind he had seen last time, the size of a dark red fingertip.
Liu Qing pulled some off the tree, carefully cut a section with a dagger, and after a drop of liquid condensed on it, he collected it with the container he had made yesterday, and then cut off a small section, and just kept cutting, collecting, cutting, collecting...... It's boring, but he's serious.
In addition to this, he found another kind of tree, which had long, narrow leaves, each of which was not very large, but whose roots were erect, and whose thickest roots were about the thickness of his arm. He took a fancy to its straight length that day, so he cut down three or four. When the bark of the tree is cut, it also oozes a somewhat viscous and transparent liquid, so he wonders if the tree's liquid is also poisonous.
After doing it non-stop for a long time, I finally collected a small half cup of white vine liquid, and half a cup of tree sap. After closing the lid, he pulled two large blades of grass, wrapped the two wooden cups, and carefully put them in his satchel.
Next, he planned to collect some materials for arrows, and soon found a spherical thorny plant, and very skillfully removed dozens of spikes, cleaned up the fleshy matter carried by the roots, wrapped the spikes with large leaves, and then tied them with fine vines, so as to avoid wear and tear, and also prevent accidentally piercing himself. After doing this, he already felt a little tired, sat down and rested for a while, took out the kettle and drank some water, ate another piece of fruit, and chewed two bites of roast meat.
But when he stood up, he was pierced in the wrist by a long thorny leaf, and with a shake of his hand, all the salt contained in the leaf was sprinkled. This guy has worked hard for most of the day to make such a little salt, and it turned out to be dirt all of a sudden! Angry, Liu Qing thought about it, yes, it's already out anyway, and it's close to the sea, so it's better to boil some salt and go back!
As soon as he said to do it, Liu Qing stacked the bundle of arrows, covered them with some wide leaves, brushed aside the grass, and walked towards the beach.
Or that beach, Liu Qing was still a little puzzled when he saw this endless water surface, was this the sea or a huge lake? He didn't know, but he had a shadow here, it was the huge mouth he saw that time, it looked like a legendary whale, and he was afraid that it didn't have such a huge mouth!
Walking to the coast, Liu Qing walked to a huge rock on the right as he did last time, where the water is relatively deep and clear, unlike the beach side, which is often mixed with many sand grains. After taking the seawater, Liu Qing ran directly behind the rocks and began to boil salt.
The side of the rock against the beach is a clearing, Liu Qing has already built a bonfire there, this fire is very clever, four slightly thicker firewood nails into the sand to make a pillar, the middle is filled with fine firewood and hay and the like, the small fire is alive, it crackles and burns, Liu Qing directly put the shell of the kettle full of seawater on the four pillars, and then take it down when it is almost boiled.
In his spare time, he took out the two containers containing suspected venom from his satchel, ready to take a look and study it first. But suddenly there was a huge sound of water on the sea, which made Liu Qing stand up in disbelief.