The two men were momentarily stunned after hearing Wang An's words, which showed he didn't take the situation seriously at all.
However, once Wang An finished speaking, he ignored them, focusing instead on raising his gun with Wang Li, aiming at the two black bears.
Seeing the two of them like this, the men didn't dare say anything more; they could only watch with faces full of anxiety as their companion remained clinging to the tree.
With the marksmanship of Wang An and Wang Li, killing these two black bears would be no problem at all.
However, given the current scene, they definitely could not open fire.
On one hand, firing now would make it very easy to accidentally hit the dogs. After all, at this distance, the black bear's body might not completely block the bullet. If a bullet were to pass straight through, there was no telling which direction the stray projectile would fly.
In such a situation, even a glancing blow from a bullet would leave a dog with at least a superficial wound.
On the other hand, as soon as a gunshot rang out, the dogs would inevitably enter a frenzy, launching a violent assault of biting and tearing on the black bears.
The bears might ignore the occasional nips the dogs were giving now, but if the dogs fought for their lives, the bears would certainly stop sitting idly by and quickly enter a state of rage.
If that happened, even with the dogs wearing armor and collars, the likelihood of them getting injured would increase infinitely. This was certainly not a good thing for Wang An and his companion.
Of course, there was another very important reason why Wang An was in no hurry to shoot.
That reason was training the dogs.
Yes, training the dogs. All great hunting dogs are tempered time and again in battle; it would not be an exaggeration to call them "war dogs" who had survived a hundred or a thousand battles.
Training a dog is no simple matter. If the prey is too weak—such as small animals like wild pheasants or rabbits—it serves no purpose in training. To a mountain guide, a hunting dog that only knows how to catch pheasants and rabbits is essentially a worthless, useless dog.
But if the prey is too vicious—such as encountering wolves, tigers, or leopards—it's no longer training; it's clearly just delivering a meal to the predator!
If they encountered a "big cannon egg" (large boar), while it could serve the purpose of training, it was highly likely the dog would be gored to death or injured before the training was complete.
Generally speaking, training a high-quality mountain dog is not an easy task.
And right now, this small black bear was just right for tempering Xiao Hei and the four spotted dogs; it was practically perfect.
Although Xiao Hei and the four spotted dogs couldn't do much to the small black bear, the small black bear couldn't cause them any real harm either. Overall, they were in a state of equilibrium.
After Xiao Hei let out two wild barks, he leaped forward, snapping his jaws toward the small black bear's neck.
Unfortunately, with a casual swipe from the small black bear, Xiao Hei was sent flying right past it.
Seeing this, Hua San also leaped, biting firmly onto the small black bear's ear. Feeling the pain, the small black bear let out a sudden "aooo!" and stood up on its hind legs while swiping at Hua San with its forepaw.
It must be said that although the small black bear only weighed around a hundred pounds, its strength was significant; a single blow knocked the sixty-to-seventy-pound Hua San to the ground.
Hua San whimpered a few times upon hitting the ground, but following a few wild barks from Xiao Hei, Hua San immediately stopped whimpering and bared its teeth aggressively at the small black bear.
It was clear that Hua San wanted to complain and seek some comfort, but Xiao Hei wouldn't indulge it, appearing instead to be scolding Hua San.
Of course, this was just Wang An's guess; he didn't know exactly what was happening.
Regardless, after Xiao Hei barked, not only did Hua San perk up, but the other three spotted dogs became even more aggressive than before.
Thus, the battlefield remained in a deadlock: the seven large dogs continued to nip at the large black bear from time to time, while the five small dogs occasionally bit the small black bear.
However, the five small dogs had become much more cautious than before, and their coordination was becoming increasingly seamless.
Meanwhile, the two men standing before Wang An and Wang Li grew even more anxious.
Finally, one of them pleaded with Wang An
"Little brother, please shoot, I beg you!"
The other, with a face full of misery, said to Wang Li
"Hero, please save him! My big brother is still up in the tree!"
To be honest, these two were simply letting their worry cloud their judgment. The "big brother" they spoke of was currently hugging the tree trunk very tightly, with no sign of letting go.
Hearing this, Wang An glanced at the two men and noticed that the blood on their faces was actually from being scratched by tree branches; only the wounds on their bodies were gruesome, clearly caused by the black bear's claws.
Thus, Wang An said to them
"Do you have any medicine? Stop the bleeding on your bodies first."
The two men were stunned. They had never expected that at a time like this, Wang An would be concerned about their wounds.
After the shock wore off, the man who had spoken to Wang An said
"Our medicine is in the flower baskets; we aren't carrying it on us."
Upon hearing the words "flower baskets," Wang An instinctively looked toward the three baskets scattered about, which were already deformed and broken.
But as he looked, his eyes widened.
When "flower baskets" were mentioned, Wang Li had also looked over, and his eyes instantly went straight.
Because the baskets were shattered, deformed, and overturned on the ground, the items originally inside had basically all spilled out.
The reason the two Wang brothers lost their composure was that they saw a large pile of ginseng bundles that had spilled from the baskets.
These ginseng bundles had been camouflaged, with shrubs and small pine branches tied around the outer layers of bark.
Around the three baskets, there were approximately thirty to forty of these camouflaged ginseng bundles in total.
Furthermore, besides the pine branches, there were still ginseng bundles inside the baskets that hadn't spilled out.
Most importantly, four of the bundles were significantly larger than the others, clearly wrapped in multiple layers of bark.
It was obvious that these four bundles definitely contained the "big goods."
What Wang An found most incredible was the camouflage the three men had used on the ginseng bundles. When Wang An had scanned the scene earlier, he had already seen these bundles.
However, those bundles hadn't caught his attention at all.
(End of Chapter)