Chapter 533. Teasing (2/2)

Yu Xiaocao’s spirits immediately came up and a brilliant smile blossomed onto her face, “Okay ah, okay! With your archery skills, killing a tiger must be a piece of cake for you. However…do you think there is another tiger to be had on these hunting grounds?”

Zhu Junyang tapped on her nose and lightly chuckled, “Don’t worry, even if these grounds don’t have any, this prince will head into the deep mountains to find one for you! When have I ever not done what I promised before? Let’s go, we should see what their spoils are like today!”

In the evening, before the sun had set behind the western mountain range, the people who had gone out to hunt had all successively returned. There was quite a lot of game to be had on these hunting grounds and everyone more or less had some sort of harvest. Even He Wanning, who was a noble young maiden and had been taught some rudimentary equestrian archery, came back with game on hand.

He Wanning walked over with a string of colorful wild pheasants and plump wild hares. From the self-satisfied expression on her face, one could easily tell that she was very pleased with her results today. Royal Princess Minglan also had a decent amount of game on hand and she had even managed to bring down a fat and plump roe deer! There were also some young maidens from military families who participated in the hunt. They were dressed valiantly and had long strings of game hanging off of their horses. These maidens all had proud expressions on their faces.

As for the men who were skilled in martial arts and equestrian archery, they naturally had very good hauls from the hunt today. However, the person who did unexpectedly well was the rascally good-for-nothing Third Young Master from Duke Rongguo’s Estate. The amount of game he brought back was easily more than the other people’s and he even had a large wild boar in his haul. No one needed to even count to know that he was the one who was going to take first place today.

“Congratulations Brother Ning!” The second place winner, Lu Hao, elegantly cupped his hands at the other man while he congratulated the first place winner.

Ning Donghuan squeezed out a smile, “Brother Lu, how could you, as a close friend, not know how much game is from my own efforts? More than half of the game here wasn’t killed by me!”

Lu Hao noticed that most of the game had been killed with a snap to the neck. Then he looked at the two heroic looking mastiffs behind Ning Donghuan and said, “The game that your hunting dogs catch are also counted under you. You do deserve first place for this, Brother Ning.”

Ning Donghuan waved his hand frantically, “How would my hunting dogs have the ability to kill a wild boar so easily? Look more carefully at the wounds on the game. Don’t you have a feeling of déjà vu seeing this?”

Lu Hao had also gone out on the outings that Yu Xiaocao had organized before. Thus, he was a bit familiar with the hunting tactics that her two large wolves had. When he noticed that the vast majority of game here had all had their throats ripped out and their necks snapped in two, without any other wounds on their bodies, he had a better understanding of what had happened.

He remarked in puzzlement, “Aren’t Little Black and Little White quite protective of their spoils ah? Why did they allow you to take their game?” He also remembered that Ning Donghuan had once coveted the two wolves’ spoils when they were in the back hills of the Imperial Plantation. However, the young master had been punished summarily by these two wolves and had ended up with his clothes ripped to ribbons and his naked butt revealed to everyone there. When did this Ning fellow become some close to these two creatures?

“Sigh…don’t even mention it or ask!!” Ning Donghuan had a resigned expression on his face.

Apparently, Ning Donghuan had brought his two mastiffs along with two servants along to the hunting grounds. He chose a relatively safe area to hunt. As he shot prey himself, he was also training his two beloved dogs how to hunt properly. As they wandered around, the two mastiffs suddenly put their tails between their legs and looked terrified.

Ning Donghuan had thought that he had come across a dangerous animal. With his own skills, he’d be able to bring down a medium sized animal without any problems. However, if a tiger appeared or some other incredibly vicious beast, he could only run away for his life. He at least had this much self-awareness. Immediately, his heart started pounding faster as he looked around to see what was going on.

At this time, he heard the familiar howl of Little Black in the near vicinity. Ning Donghuan had salivated over these two wolves for a long time so he naturally recognized the howl. From the sounds of it, Little Black had likely encountered a large opponent and Ning Donghuan wondered if he should head forth to help in order to curry favor with Little Black and Little White. In the future, when the two of them had puppies, he might even be able to shamelessly cajole one out of them.

Thus, he gathered his courage and walked towards them. He was just in time to see Little Black easily subdue a large wild boar. Wild boars had thick hides but Little Black bit through the animal’s neck in a single bite. It was very clear that the wolf had razor sharp teeth from that demonstration. Ning Donghuan thought his eyeballs were about to fall out of his head and desperately wished he could immediately bring Little Black back home. Unfortunately, even a wild boar couldn’t put up much of a fight with Little Black, so how could he possibly subdue the wolf?

When he got closer, Little Black sensed him. Since Ning Donghuan already had a criminal record in the eyes of Little Black, the wolf stood menacingly in front of the dead boar and showed him his long, white teeth in a warning snarl.

“Don’t misunderstand!” Ning Donghuan knew Miss Yu had raised Little Black and Little White to be incredibly intelligent and that they could mostly understand what a human said. He revealed a flattering smile and said, “I’m not here to try to steal game from you…this wild boar looks quite heavy, so won’t it be quite strenuous for you to bring it back? I have a lot of people here, how about we can help you move it back?”

Little Black understood the word ‘help’ but still gave Ning Donghuan a look that was full of distrust. Ning Donghuan immediately raised his hand to swear an oath to the heavens stating that he absolutely wasn’t going to try to steal their game. He had a very sincere expression on his face and was doing all he could to convince the wolf of his good intentions.