Late afternoon, more than two hundred miles east of Qingshan County, a desolate low mountain forest.
"Woof, woof"
"Woof, woof"
In the mountainside, a previously silent pine forest with needles turned white, several dog barks abruptly rose.
Before long,
"Creak"
"Creak"
The sound of stepping deep and shallow in the snow followed, getting closer and clearer.
Soon, a figure appeared, clad in a deerskin coat, wearing a felt hat, carrying a bow and arrows on his shoulder, and a wood chopping knife at his waist.
The figure was a scruffy-bearded Han man with dark weather-beaten skin, marked with some frost-ridden cracks and signs of hardship.
Breathing out white mist, he spotted his six hounds barking around the base of a tree from afar, and immediately became alert. He hurriedly lowered his large bow from his arm, and with his other hand, took an arrow from the basket on his back, bending the bow and aiming towards that direction.
