The Shamang River
They hadn't gone far when shapes materialized from the churning yellow sand — a group of figures hustling toward them at a determined pace.
As they drew closer, the newcomers revealed themselves to be a team of Hunter-mages, all fairly young and clearly among the more capable of their trade.
The moment they spotted the Sand-Howl Tiger's carcass, their expressions shifted. A woman with a sallow, weathered complexion stepped forward and jabbed a finger at the group without preamble. "You people have some nerve. We spent ages tracking that Sand-Howl Tiger after wounding it, and you just help yourselves? Every Hunter-mage worth their salt knows you don't steal prey that another team has already marked!"
Her manner was aggressive, her voice shrill and grating — every word of it setting the group's teeth on edge.
"Ma'am, that tiger came charging straight at us the moment we spotted it," Zhao Manyan said, first to push back. "Were we supposed to let it eat us instead?"
"Who are you calling 'ma'am'? I'm not even thirty!" The woman bristled, practically spitting fire.
"My mistake — it's just that temper of yours. Could've sworn I was watching someone whose square-dancing spot just got stolen." Mo Fan never knew when to leave well enough alone; he and Zhao Manyan fell into a perfect double act.
The woman's face went livid. She looked ready to make the two of them regret those words in the most direct way possible.
Her team leader stepped forward — a broad-shouldered man with a thick black beard who carried himself with quiet, solid authority. He caught her by the arm and pulled her back.
He wasn't one for unnecessary conflict. They were deep in Demon-Beast territory; Hunter-mages were better off looking out for each other out here. Still, having their prey snatched without a word stung. That Sand-Howl Tiger had taken a collective beating from their whole team — it had been far from the fearsome beast it would have been at full strength.
"No wonder that Sand-Howl Tiger went down so easily," Zhang Xiaohou said, everything clicking into place.
During the fight, he'd noticed the tiger bore numerous fresh wounds and had assumed it had tussled with some other creature on its own. Now he understood: it had already fought this rival team of Hunter-mages for a considerable stretch before fleeing when it sensed it was outmatched. It had run straight into Mo Fan's group, who had simply reaped what others had sown.
"Friends, that tiger took a serious beating from us before you ever encountered it — you wouldn't have gotten the drop on it so cleanly otherwise. Here's a fair proposal: let's check the carcass together, and whatever Aberrant Bone, Aberrant Blood, or Aberrant Hide we find inside, we split fifty-fifty. That seems reasonable to me." The black-bearded leader's tone was measured and conciliatory.
Mo Fan, however, was having none of it.
*You let your own prey slip through your fingers. You come running up an age later claiming it belongs to you. And now you want fifty percent?*
*Fat chance.*
A Sand-Howl Tiger's fearsome reputation meant its remains commanded serious coin. Even without any rare windfall inside, a well-preserved carcass like this could fetch a hundred, two hundred thousand easily.
Other things, maybe. But when it came to money, Mo Fan was not giving these people a single cent.
"Shameless," Lingling said, quiet and flat. "Absolutely shameless."
"Who are you calling shameless, you little brat? That was *our* prey! You — get down here. Get down here right now and I'll show you what happens to rude little girls who don't know their place!" The sallow-faced woman exploded the instant Lingling spoke, pointing and raging.
"We are following Hunter protocol to the letter. How is that shameless?" The black-bearded leader's expression had gone cold as well.
"Has no one ever taught you to respect your elders?" Lingling asked.
"*Elders?*" The woman let out a sharp, contemptuous laugh. "Oh, that's genuinely funny. Look at you — fresh-faced little students crawling out of some university to play Hunter for a day. If we hadn't softened that Sand-Howl Tiger up for you, you'd all be bleached bones right now. You ought to be *thanking* us. A Sand-Howl Tiger is no quarry for a bunch of soft-skinned—"
Her mouth just wouldn't stop — a relentless barrage of cutting remarks. Lingling, entirely unfazed, reached into her coat and drew out her Hunter's medallion. She held it out in front of the woman's face without a word, her expression serene.
The tirade died in the woman's throat. Her eyes locked onto the medallion. Then onto Lingling. Then back to the medallion.
A Hunter's medallion was like Enchanted Gear — it was soul-branded, impossible to counterfeit.
That rival team were all Advanced Hunters, every one of them. And between the rank of Advanced Hunter and that of Hunter Master stretched a mountain's worth of bounty points. Lingling had already climbed it.
The Hunters' Alliance mandated that lower-ranked hunters show deference to their seniors — no competing for their prey, no disrespectful conduct of any kind.
The sallow-faced woman stood frozen, unable to get a single syllable out.
The black-bearded leader's indignation stiffened on his face.
*This tiny girl is a Hunter Master. So what does that make the rest of her team?*
*These people were something else entirely.*
No wonder the Sand-Howl Tiger had gone from fleeing them to a carcass in no time at all.
The black-bearded leader and the sallow-faced woman gathered their group and slunk off, dignity in ruins. They had no one to blame but themselves — they'd lost their own prey and had the gall to come demanding a cut, only to run headlong into Lingling.
The small incident was quickly forgotten as the group pressed on across the undulating, windswept sands.
The dunes gradually gave way to a Gobi landscape of exposed, sun-bleached rock — gravel and boulders spreading endlessly in every direction.
Sand-Howl Tigers appeared with growing frequency here on the Gobi. The group dodged around them wherever possible; when they couldn't avoid a confrontation, they fought. Zhang Xiaohou proved his worth repeatedly in these moments, the footwork and agility training from his military background now invaluable. Whenever tigers couldn't be sidestepped, he would dart forward and draw them off, his quick, fluid movements stringing the thick-skulled beasts along on a wide chase while the rest of the team slipped safely through.
Three tigers was the threshold beyond which things got genuinely dangerous. Most of the time, then, it was Zhang Xiaohou sprinting across the Gobi flats, leading the dim-witted Sand-Howl Tigers on a looping circuit far from the group.
They pushed through without any serious trouble, and eventually arrived at the region where the Shamang River lay.
The Shamang River was a plateau waterway that had run dry an untold number of centuries ago. Years of relentless wind erosion had scoured its bed into something immense — on a map, the Shamang River appeared like a clay-colored dragon sprawled across the land of Dunhuang, its length nearly spanning half of Gansu Province. Even at its narrowest, the ancient riverbed stretched no less than ten kilometers from bank to bank.