I am a Big Player
Chapter 656 - 647. Stealing a Car (First Update)_1

Chapter 656: 647. Stealing a Car (First Update)_1

A week had passed, and there were no signs of the wild yak.

In the middle of the night, Ren He lay in a pit he had dug out of the yellow sand, fostering a sense of sleepiness with a face full of despair...

Over the week, Ren He had been sleeping outside under the sky, keeping watch over Li Kun and the others’ camp, fearful of missing the moment the yak would appear.

Although Ren He was indeed determined, the desert’s blowing sands and occasional sandstorms had begun to fray his nerves...

Fortunately, Ren He didn’t suffer from a fear of germs; he was now so dirty that he couldn’t bear to look at himself. Initially, he had been concerned about accidentally running into Li Kun in the desert and being recognized, exposing his ulterior motives. But now, there was no need to worry—he doubted he would recognize himself in a mirror!

With his hair grown out and a stubble-filled face that was covered in grime, Ren He gazed at the moon that shone with a clear glow over the wilderness. This godforsaken place didn’t even allow for a game of Dota, and he couldn’t see Yang Xi.

When they were together every day, he didn’t notice it as much, but now he felt the absence more with each passing day. He wondered if that internet-addicted girl was playing Dota right now?

People often say that in solitude one might reflect on their life, but all Ren He wanted was to hurry back to the city for a hotpot meal and never touch compressed biscuits again in his lifetime.

Thinking along these lines, Ren He sat up and took a sip of water from his pink, bear-shaped cartoon cup...

By now, Ren He had begun to doubt whether there were any wild yaks left in Karamay. They couldn’t have all died off, could they?!

Of course, Ren He was also well aware that if wild yaks were so easy to encounter, they probably would have already been conveniently wiped out by poaching gangs.

Yak, I hope you come to the lakeside to drink soon... Ren He let himself fall back into the sand pit to continue coaxing sleep.

However, at that moment, he suddenly heard footsteps in the distance: the sound of hard-soled boots crunching on sand.

Ren He silently flipped up and hid behind one of the odd, wind-eroded earth sculptures on a sand dune, which served as a natural cover in the desert.

Who could be coming at this time? It couldn’t be Li Kun’s people; Ren He was certain they were all at the camp.

There were only two men not in the group, the brawny ones whose ribs he had broken with a punch. Ren He didn’t think they were up to following the team, as he was confident in his ability to measure the force of his blows. Those guys would probably be bed-ridden for three months before they could even think about getting up.

So who was it? Ren He frowned, even slowing his breathing to listen for the direction of the footsteps.

"Not far now, keep it down," someone whispered. Ren He guessed there were only about three people based on the footsteps, and they seemed not to be with Li Kun—otherwise, there would be no need for such caution.

There were two other poaching gangs in this great desert, one led by a man called Li Longfei, and the other by one named Chen Guofeng. According to the information provided by Steve, they were both ruthless characters in the sandy No Man’s Land and had substantial firepower at their disposal.

Could it be that these other two factions were infiltrating the territory because Li Kun had trespassed?

In that case, whose men were these three silently approaching?

With Super Vision, Ren He watched as three rough-looking men climbed the sand dune and looked toward Li Kun’s camp, but while he could see them, they couldn’t see Ren He.

"Damn it, Li Kun and his crew have really got guts, hunting on our turf!"

"What are they hunting? Doesn’t look like they’re after falcons," someone curiously said.

"Could they be waiting for antelopes and yaks to come for a drink? How silly is that? Does anyone still hunt yaks these days? I think Li Kun and his crew have been kicked in the head by a donkey!"

After the rise in falcon hunting, hunting yaks had become a rather pointless affair.

Not to mention the huge demand from Middle Eastern tycoons, domestically too, there was a significant demand.

What’s the price of a domestic eagle? To be honest, it’s not expensive at all. Female falcon chicks weigh about a pound and two ounces, males about a pound, priced at 600 yuan each. That’s the price for chick falcons, which can be kept alive on two ounces of beef a day, though the risk of them dying is also high.

Therefore, the poachers here would also choose to sell the chicks domestically, because the Middle East doesn’t want these kinds of chicks; they want well-trained, high-grade hunting falcons.

Raising falcons is not an easy job.

Training a falcon means keeping it awake for long periods without eating or sleeping, just giving it the necessary water through a tube. The person training the falcon has to keep their eyes on it during these days because some falcons can sleep with one eye closed and one eye open. As soon as it wants to sleep, you have to shake it awake.

Sometimes one person can’t keep an eye on it alone, and several people need to take turns.

Of course, there’s also a more violent method, which carries a high mortality rate for the falcons: feeding the falcon meat wrapped in hemp or fur, which keeps the falcon’s stomach constantly moving and makes it feel hungry. After more than ten hours, the falcon is made to regurgitate the hemp and fur, a process also known as "casting." Over several days, the falcon’s energy is quickly drained, and it slowly becomes less wild and untamed than before.

So in the film ’No Man’s Land,’ several falcons are offered at once, but these aren’t all going to make it alive into the hands of the tycoons. Only the well-trained falcons are worth a million US dollars.

In this industry chain, there are those who receive the goods, those who specialize in training falcons, and those who liaise with tycoons abroad and negotiate.

And because this chain is so secretive, it makes it very hard to crack down on.

But no matter how tough the training is, once successful, it’s much more profitable than hunting yaks—hence, no one is willing to waste time hunting yaks anymore. It’s uncertain when the herd will come to the lake to drink, and yaks know the desert better than humans do; they are aware of some water sources unknown to humans.

Yet hunting with falcons seems difficult, but in the end, it’s just a matter of using birds as bait and waiting for the falcons to take the hook. The technical difficulty is actually a bit lower, and you don’t even need to fire a gun.

"Let’s go, report back to the boss that Li Kun and his gang intruded into our territory unannounced. We can’t let this slide; otherwise, word will spread that we’re pushovers. Where would that leave our face?"

Ren He understood this sentiment; after all, if anyone could hunt on your turf, eventually everyone might think they can do as they please there, and that would break the rules.

The gray world isn’t without rules, rather it has its own set of principles.

However, just as the three people were about to retreat, one suddenly said, "Why aren’t their cars parked together? Li Kun’s gotten quite capable, hasn’t he—buying a nice car like that? I reckon that SUV’s custom-modified, probably worth a few million, huh? How about we steal it as a little interest?"

Ren He, hiding in concealment, immediately darkened in the face. Li Kun and his gang didn’t have any SUVs; they all drove beat-up pickups!

That was his car!