Chapter 665 - 552: The Cabin, Walnut’s Stage Three

Chapter 665: Chapter 552: The Cabin, Walnut’s Stage Three

「February 7th.」

Everyone began their preparations first thing in the morning.

Ding Yuwei had gotten a scarf from somewhere and personally wrapped it around Shen Xin’s neck before he left.

"Isn’t this a little tacky?" Shen Xin couldn’t help but mutter.

’And this color is just awful.’

Ding Yuwei’s hands didn’t stop. After she finished wrapping it around him, she said, "Staying warm is the top priority. There’s still a snow line where you’re going. Who knows how cold it’ll get at night."

Shen Xin thought about it and agreed. It seemed leaving Ding Yuwei behind was the right call.

The plan for today was to take Route 4.

They had arrived at Liujiaping on the 27th and investigated for a week. Now, they were in the second phase of their plan: checking the old patrol routes.

Back then, the Liujiaping Protection Station had two patrol groups, with a total of eleven Patrol Officers.

There were six fixed patrol routes in total.

Three were shorter, and three were longer.

The three shorter routes just circled the periphery of Mount Motianling. They were patrolled by teams of two, but if the schedule was tight, one person could go alone.

Barring any incidents, a round trip could basically be completed in a single day.

As for the three longer routes, one went south, deep into the high-altitude heartland of Mount Motianling. Another went west, roughly following the 3,000-meter elevation line, parallel to the mountain’s ridges.

The last one went east. Together, the three routes covered the entire Mount Motianling area.

These three routes required at least two people to start, and a round trip could take three to four days.

The routes were adjusted later on, but the general paths didn’t change much.

Compared to trekking through untamed wilderness, these fixed routes were actually a bit easier to traverse.

They checked the three shorter routes first.

It took three days, and they found nothing.

Today, they were preparing to check Route 4. Because the journey was long, they had to bring all sorts of wilderness survival gear.

However, the patrol team had also mentioned that there were fixed rest stops along the route, so it shouldn’t be too much of a problem.

But it was still a high-altitude area where the snow hadn’t melted and the paths were difficult to walk. The team had to be kept lean, so Ding Yuwei didn’t go.

Zhou Huayong brought one of his team members along.

Chen Jia Kang and his group were also going.

Including the special task force, the party of fourteen shouldered their gear, brought Walnut, and set off directly.

They didn’t bring any bamboo. The mountains were full of it, ready to be cut and eaten on the spot.

Route 4 was the one that went south, toward the high altitudes.

It was considerably shorter than the other two long routes. The plan was to make the round trip in a week.

The group moved in fits and starts.

Chen Jia Kang and his team took the opportunity to conduct some field survival surveys on the giant panda population on the North Slope of Mount Motianling.

That afternoon, they even made an unexpected discovery: a pile of giant panda droppings.

Walnut went up to an old tree and sniffed around it repeatedly.

He had caught the scent of his own kind and seemed rather excited, letting out curious calls.

"This was likely left by a female giant panda," Chen Jia Kang analyzed.

He explained that giant pandas typically urinate everywhere and rub their rears on things, using the secretions from their perianal glands to leave behind a unique scent, marking their territory.

The reason Walnut was so excited was probably because he sensed the presence of a female.

Giant pandas in the wild usually breed between March and May.

But they usually have to find a partner in advance.

Otherwise, they’d end up like Teddy, left all alone and forced to seek comfort from Shen Xin.

So, this search for a mate might start earlier, pushed forward into February.

Therefore, during this period, the female giant panda’s purpose in leaving her scent was to attract a mate.

Shen Xin understood. He chuckled and patted Walnut’s head, teasing, "So, the wild ones smell sweeter, is that it?"

The zoo got a wife all ready for you, but you weren’t interested. You just had to have a wild one.

Walnut turned his head away, pretending he hadn’t heard a thing.

They paused briefly to collect the dung sample, then the group set off again.

They found nothing else that day. That night, they stayed in a simple shelter built specifically for the patrol route.

It was a tin-roofed shack. While it had a stove they could light, the wind blew in from all sides. In any case, Shen Xin didn’t rest well. The moment he lay down, his ears were filled with the HOWLING of the wind and the cries of unknown animals.

The next day, the group set off again.

They didn’t encounter any more giant pandas along the way.

In such a massive reserve with only about a hundred pandas in total, an encounter wasn’t easy to come by.

According to the plan, they were to spend the night near Kengtou Cliff.

The elevation there was just over 3,000 meters.

Zhou Huayong thought the group was moving too slowly.

There was no helping it; Walnut needed to stop constantly to rest, be fed, and taken care of.

So, by dusk, Zhou Huayong was getting anxious.

He said this was an old route, and if they wanted to avoid sleeping out in the wilderness, their only option was to reach Kengtou Cliff as quickly as possible.

There was an old mountain shelter built there where they could rest.

But of course, just as they’d feared, the mountain winds began to howl at dusk, and it even started to snow.

They were at an altitude of 3,000 meters, after all.

Fortunately, the snow wasn’t heavy. With their flashlights on, it was nearly seven in the evening when, guided by the GPS, they finally reached the abandoned mountain shelter Zhou Huayong had mentioned.

It was a wooden cabin, with two rooms—one large, one small.

Although it was abandoned, it had been built with solid materials back in the day, using logs thick enough that the main structure was still intact.

Thick snow weighed down the roof, the door was shut tight, and a profound silence hung in the air.

Yang Zeran was frozen to the bone and urged Shen Xin to hurry up.

But just then, Walnut, who was walking beside Shen Xin, abruptly slowed his pace.

[’Here.’]

He looked around warily, a hint of confusion and hesitation in his eyes.

"Wait a minute!"

Shen Xin shouted, stopping the others who were about to enter the cabin.

’Walnut’s reacting to something.’

Shen Xin quickly crouched down and asked Walnut what was wrong.

"Flashlights, everyone turn them on," Shen Xin added.

Pandas have night vision, but their eyesight is still poor.

The group was exhausted and out of breath, but at that moment, their spirits immediately lifted.

Chang Zhigang and the others watched Shen Xin nervously.

Shen Xin, however, was focused on Walnut.

The panda walked slowly to the front of the cabin, looking around blankly, searching his memory.

Suddenly, he remembered.

In an instant, Walnut let out a series of sharp cries.

He grew agitated, then suddenly charged forward, slamming into the cabin’s main door.

There was a lock hanging on the main door.

Zhou Huayong had forgotten about that. He didn’t have the key—it was probably long lost anyway—and was just thinking about prying the door open when he saw Walnut charging at him and scrambled out of the way in fright.

CRASH!

The impact shook snow loose from the roof.

The wood holding the door latch in place must have rotted. Under Walnut’s monstrous strength, it was smashed open.

Amidst a cloud of dust, Walnut charged into the cabin.

His sudden action startled everyone.

Shen Xin hurried in after him. He swept his flashlight across the interior and saw Walnut standing motionless inside.

The panda let out low, angry snorts, then slowly walked toward a support pillar against the wall.

The cabin wasn’t large, maybe about twenty square meters. In the back, there was a bed and a stove.

"Walnut, don’t be scared. It’s me," Shen Xin called out urgently.

’This is just like when he saw the footage of Wang Shulin for the first time.’

’But why here?’

Shen Xin didn’t have time to overthink it. The most important thing now was to calm Walnut down.

Telling the others to stay back, Shen Xin called out to Walnut again and again.

’My voice is the best medicine to calm him.’

It was as if Walnut couldn’t hear him. He slowly lay down next to the pillar, lowering his head to sniff all around.

Shen Xin continued to call his name as he slowly approached.

"Walnut, don’t be afraid. I’m here."

Just as his hand was about to touch Walnut, the panda turned his head, let out a sorrowful cry, and rushed toward Shen Xin, knocking him over and burrowing into his arms.

"It’s okay, it’s okay."

Shen Xin could feel Walnut’s fear and quickly hugged him, trying to soothe him.

’Good thing he didn’t go into a frenzy. If he had, no one would have been able to restrain him.’

Walnut cried out sharply, his thoughts flooding out in a frantic torrent.

[’Mother.’]

[’Bad men.’]

[’Blood.’]

"It’s all right, I’m here," Shen Xin said, hugging Walnut tightly, his heart pounding.

’Judging from his thoughts, it seems Walnut’s mother died here.’

’But that’s not right.’

’This place is far from Hetaoping. It must be twenty or thirty kilometers away as the crow flies.’

’Why would it be here?’

[’Bad.’]

[’Catch them.’]

Walnut looked up, crying out at Shen Xin again and again.

He had often heard Shen Xin muttering about catching the bad men who killed his mother, which was why he was having these thoughts.

And in this moment, those emotions reached a peak.

Abruptly, the icon above Walnut’s head changed.

’Stage Three!’

Shen Xin’s heart leaped in shock.

At the same time, Shen Xin immediately understood why Walnut had entered Stage Three.

’He’s asking for my help. He has an intense emotional need for me.’

The next moment, Stage Three was complete.

As Shen Xin held Walnut, a scene flashed before his eyes.

There was a light.

But it was indistinct, flickering not far away. Everything else was a blur.

’This must be Walnut’s perspective. His eyesight is poor, so anything far away is blurry.’

’And that light must be the fire from the stove.’

Then... a body.

The corpse of a giant panda, lying right in front of Walnut.

From Walnut’s point of view, he could see his own small paws trying to nudge his mother awake.

But there was no response.

Shen Xin saw blood. Her belly was covered in it.

Walnut fumbled his way into his mother’s embrace, as if seeking one last bit of warmth.

His mother didn’t move.

Just by watching, Shen Xin could feel the little cub’s desperation.

Then Walnut found a nipple. He must have been starving, because he began to suckle impatiently.

Perhaps his mother had only just died, because he was still able to draw milk, mixed with her blood, into his belly.

And with that, the vision came to an abrupt end.

Shen Xin snapped back to reality. Looking down at Walnut, who was still whimpering in his arms, his heart ached with pity.

’What I just saw was Walnut’s memory.’

’Which means he watched his mother die right beside him. He drank her milk as it grew cold, drank until nothing came out, until his mother showed no sign of life at all.’

After an experience like that, it was no wonder it left such a deep impression on him, even though he was so young at the time.

But the question remained: why here?

Shen Xin’s gaze swept over the wooden cabin. In the beam of the flashlight that had rolled onto the floor, he could see only dust and abandoned spiderwebs.

’What happened here nine years ago?’

Shen Xin had no way of knowing, but he didn’t dare let Walnut stay there any longer and quickly carried him out.

"Chang Zhi, this is the place. I’m sure of it."

If something happened back then, it happened here.

This must be the root of the case involving six deaths.

Chang Zhigang, stunned but invigorated, pumped his fist and quickly ordered his men to secure the scene.

He then grabbed Zhou Huayong and started asking about the cabin.

"I remember that before the incident, there’s no record of Liu Baoli and Yang Guofa patrolling Mount Motianling together. So, would they have come here outside of their regular work hours?"

Chang Zhigang knew the details of the case like the back of his hand.

The patrol team had scheduling records. Although they hadn’t paid attention to Yang Guofa during the initial investigation,

he now recalled that before the incident, Liu Baoli and Yang Guofa had never patrolled Route 4 together.

’So why was the panda killed here?’

According to their speculation, the four men—Liu Baoli, Wang Shulin, Wang Erpeng, and Yang Guofa—had all been present at the same time when they killed the giant panda.

Therefore, the location and time had to match up for all of them.

Zhou Huayong looked a little flustered. "Who would come all the way out here for no reason?" he said hurriedly. "There’s not a living soul for ten kilometers in any direction. Why would they come here?"

After speaking, he seemed to suddenly remember something. "Although, if you’re asking about Lao Liu and Yang Guofa coming here together, there was one time," he said after a moment of thought.

"At the end of November in ’08, some newspaper reporters came here to do a special feature story."

"They wanted to follow us into the mountains. I remember it was Lao Liu and Yang Guofa who took them."

"That year was a cold winter. A blizzard hit the mountains early and sealed the passes. They ended up getting trapped in the mountains—trapped right here, actually. They were stuck for about ten days."

"That fits what you were asking, about the two of them coming here together. But that was back in ’08. It shouldn’t be related, right?"

Whether it was related or not remained to be determined.

But Zhou Huayong’s mention of reporters who were trapped in the mountains for ten days immediately caught Chang Zhigang’s attention.

He quickly grabbed Zhou Huayong’s arm and asked for the specific details.