“Can we eat… these mushrooms?”

Li Kun crouched beneath a large tree furred with vivid green moss, carefully pulling out a thick, plump white cap mushroom.

“You can eat them, but eating them will send you to the immortal realm.” Li Que said.

Li Kun dropped the white mushroom in his hand, thoroughly deflated.

Shen Zhuxi walked with her head down, struggling to trace Li Wu’s footprints in the muddy ground carpeted with fallen leaves. After following them for so long without a sight of the man, she couldn’t help asking: “Just where on earth has Li Wu gotten to?”

“Big Brother would be worried about the tiger cub growing up and hurting people, so he’d naturally go deep into the mountains.” Li Que said. “Let’s keep walking and see.”

Shen Zhuxi looked around uncertainly, then raised her voice and called out “Li Wu” into the quiet mountain forest.

Her voice echoed through the still woods. No one answered.

“Sister-in-law, let’s keep going.” Li Que said.

Shen Zhuxi followed his lead, and the three continued deeper into the forest.

The disappearing footprints unsettled her, and she couldn’t stop herself from asking: “Could he have… run into some wild animal in the mountains?”

“Big Brother is so clever — even if he did, he’d come through just fine.” Li Que crouched down beside a pool of standing water, head not lifting as he said, “Sister-in-law, come look at this — what do you make of it?”

Shen Zhuxi went over and bent to look at the completely unremarkable puddle.

“…What is it?”

“Look carefully.” Li Que said.

Shen Zhuxi looked carefully. She could see every slight movement she and the others made reflected in the surface of the water, but she still had no idea what Li Que wanted her to see.

“Second Brother, come look too.”

Li Que called Li Kun over, and all three crouched in front of the entirely ordinary puddle. Li Kun was just as clueless as Shen Zhuxi — he rattled off several guesses, including water plants and reflections, all of which Li Que dismissed.

“So what exactly do you see?” Li Kun scratched his head and ears, growing so agitated he started to lose his temper.

“You have to look carefully, pay close attention. If you see nothing, it’s only because you haven’t looked closely enough.” Li Que said with certainty.

Shen Zhuxi regarded him with deep suspicion. Li Kun might not have looked closely enough, but she genuinely had — and there was plainly nothing in this puddle!

Three pairs of eyes stared fixedly at the perfectly empty puddle of water, their backs entirely unguarded, facing the forest.

From deep within the shadowy trees, a large tiger with black and golden stripes and blazing eyes stepped silently out. Its sharp, hook-like claws extended beyond its toes; its tail, hard and powerful as an iron rod, swept lazily behind it. Its hungry gaze locked onto the three figures with their backs turned.

“You’re tricking me! Where is it?!”

“It’s right there, so obvious — how do you still not see? Look, what’s that?”

“There’s nothing here! Nothing! You’re lying!”

The tiger drew closer and closer. The sharp fangs in its jaws gradually came into view. Its posture shifted — it lowered its body, and the muscles of its two front limbs rose beneath its fur like stones pressing against skin —

“ROAR!”

The tiger launched itself forward in a sudden burst, lunging straight at the three unguarded backs!

“Second Brother — there’s a giant mountain chicken coming at your back!” Li Que shouted, and before Shen Zhuxi could even register what was happening, he pressed down on the side of her head and rolled them both hard to the left!

“GIANT MOUNTAIN CHICKEN!” Li Kun let out a great roar, and on pure instinct, swung a fist straight at the back behind him!

Shen Zhuxi crashed to the ground and stared wide-eyed as that fist landed squarely on the tiger’s broad, square head.

A solid thud, and the tiger was knocked flying, slamming into a nearby large tree like a thrown sack.

The tiger hit the ground and sprang back to its feet almost instantly, unleashing a furious, enraged roar at Li Kun, who stood there with his fists clenched.

The tiger’s roar drained the color from Shen Zhuxi’s face! She was about to tell Li Kun to run when Li Kun’s eyes lit up. He raised his fists and charged:

“Giant mountain chicken! Giant mountain chicken!”

The most impossible thing in the world was happening.

Shen Zhuxi stared in stunned disbelief as a bare-handed man charged headlong into a raging tiger. She had no idea how powerful a tiger’s strike could be, but she heard the terrifying rush of wind beneath those claws.

When the tiger swiped a paw at Li Kun, the Shen Zhuxi watching from the sidelines nearly fainted — yet Li Kun showed not a shred of fear and blocked it with his bare hands!

What was more — he actually blocked it!

As though brawling with another person, Li Kun seized the paw the tiger had swung out, then swung the tiger itself in a wide arc and hurled it into a nearby tree trunk with practiced ease!

A crack like splitting timber!

A tree that would take two people to encircle snapped clean and fell, taking the tiger down with it!

“YEAH! Tonight we eat chicken!”

Li Kun beat his chest and let out a great roar, then in a few great stomping strides leapt on top of the tiger. He grabbed the dazed tiger by the head — still too stunned to recover — and drove several straight punches down, making certain it had no chance of recovery at all.

With one final crack, like the clean splitting of a watermelon by bare hands, the tiger beneath Li Kun went limp.

Panting with exhilaration, Li Kun dragged the now-breathless tiger back before Shen Zhuxi and Li Que, beaming with pride: “Tonight we eat chicken! Big Brother gets to eat, Zhuzhu gets to eat, I eat, Third Brother eats!”

Li Que stepped up to the tiger, rolled aside its limp body, and examined the wounds along its underside: “We’ve stumbled onto a fortunate catch — this tiger was already injured before.”

Shen Zhuxi was still sitting on the ground. First she had been too stunned to move, then too afraid to. She watched with her own eyes as a real, live tiger still had the nerve to flee — and even fight back. That was not something an ordinary person could do. Not something she could ever do, at least.

Even just looking at the tiger’s corpse, Shen Zhuxi felt her entire body go rigid, unable to move.

“You… when did you notice?” she said, stumbling over the words.

“Not long after it started following us.” Li Que said. “This tiger was quite cunning — it kept trailing behind us, waiting for the moment to ambush. So I simply used this trick to draw it out.”

“I’m the one who killed it!” Li Kun announced again proudly.

Shen Zhuxi had been frightened nearly out of her wits just moments ago, and right now couldn’t care less how the tiger had died. She looked Li Kun up and down urgently: “Are you hurt?!”

“No, no…” Li Kun shook his head, entirely unbothered. “Diao’er… is strong. Crab walk.”

Li Que smiled. “In the years when we had nothing, we did all sorts of things, including going up the mountain to hunt tigers and sell the bones and hides. One tiger is nothing — Second Brother can handle it on his own.”

“One tiger is nothing?” Shen Zhuxi gaped. “You were risking your lives!”

“Nowhere near as impressive as Sister-in-law.” Li Que said with a grin. “Both the tiger cub and the tiger-slayer listen to Sister-in-law — Sister-in-law is the most formidable of all.”

Shen Zhuxi smiled, a little self-conscious.

Li Que reached out a hand to help her up. Just then, the sound of dry leaves crunching came from somewhere in the forest.

Li Wu ducked out through the trees. He looked at Shen Zhuxi, sitting disheveled on the ground, and frowned: “I heard a tiger’s roar and thought it was a passerby in danger — what are you all doing here?”

“Where’s Li Juan?” Shen Zhuxi struggled to get up on her own, and Li Wu came forward and gave her a steadying hand.

“…Isn’t Li Juan locked up at home?” Li Wu looked at his two brothers.

The brother who had slain the tiger and the brother who had lured it into a trap both bowed their heads in guilty silence at the same moment.

“Don’t you dare threaten them!” Shen Zhuxi, standing at the top of the food chain here, narrowed her eyes, and Li Wu immediately withdrew the reproach in his gaze, saying awkwardly, “When did I threaten them…”

“You secretly took Li Juan away without saying a word to me. Where is it now?” Shen Zhuxi said. “Don’t tell me you’ve already let it go?”

Li Wu hemmed and hawed — one look and it was clear Shen Zhuxi had guessed correctly.

Shen Zhuxi’s eyes immediately brimmed with tears: “How could you send it away behind my back? I didn’t even get to see it one last time…”

Li Wu fumbled hastily with his sleeve to wipe her tears: “Hey, stop crying! I didn’t tell you precisely because I didn’t want you to be upset!”

“But even if you didn’t tell me, once I found out Li Juan was gone, I was still going to be upset!” Shen Zhuxi said, aggrieved. “It slept outside my door every single night — now that it’s gone, who’s going to sleep outside my door and protect me…”

Shen Zhuxi’s voice had taken on the trembling, near-wailing pitch of full-blown tears. Li Wu recognized the warning sign and swiftly clapped a hand over her mouth before the crying could erupt.

Shen Zhuxi looked up at him with water-filled eyes, brimming with grievance.

“If you want a cat, I’ll go catch you a real one. Forget about the fake cat…” Li Wu nudged the tiger corpse at his feet with his foot and called out, “Isn’t there a fake cat right here? I’ll skin it for you and make you a keepsake — fair enough?”

“No.” Shen Zhuxi mumbled into his palm.

“Then what would make it fair?” Li Wu asked.

“Win… winter’s here…” Shen Zhuxi said between sniffles, “The bed at night is a bit cold…”

“Done!” Li Wu said with unmistakable relief. “I’ll have it made into a mattress pad for you!”

Shen Zhuxi wiped her tears herself: “…It’s not a relative of Li Juan’s, is it?”

Li Wu and Li Que exchanged a lightning-quick glance and said in unison: “No.”

Shen Zhuxi looked between the two of them suspiciously: “Why are you two so in sync?”

Li Que smiled cheerfully: “Big Brother and I might not be blood brothers, but we’re as good as — of course we’re in sync.”

“Big Brother, I killed it! Tonight we eat chicken!” Li Kun hauled the tiger by the head, still happily claiming credit.

“This is a tiger, not a mountain chicken.” Shen Zhuxi patiently corrected.

“There are chickens inside it.” Li Kun said to her with equal patience.

“He once killed a tiger,” Li Wu said, “and when he cut it open, there were three whole chickens inside, not yet digested.”

Li Kun smacked his lips, nearly drooling on the spot: “Delicious… so delicious…”

“Big Brother, Second Brother and I should take the tiger down the mountain.” Li Que said.

“Take it to the magistrate’s office first to claim the reward.” Li Wu said. “Fang Tingzhi has put up a bounty for tigers — whoever brings in a tiger gets two hundred taels of silver. Make sure to get the hide back for me, and ten jin of tiger meat as well.”

“Understood.” Li Que said with a smile.

As Li Que helped Li Kun hoist the tiger carcass onto their backs, Shen Zhuxi screwed up her courage and helped steady it with a hand. This tiger had to weigh somewhere between two and three hundred jin — the muscles of its forelegs alone were more powerful than Shen Zhuxi’s thighs. Even dead, the touch of it made her heart race with instinctive alarm.

And Li Kun had beaten a fully grown tiger to death with his bare hands. If she hadn’t seen it happen right in front of her, she would never have believed it in a thousand years!

If this man had gone and sat for the military examination back in the day, he would have been a guaranteed first-place laureate in the military exams. Who knows — by now he might have been surrounded by a devoted wife and young children, instead of standing here drooling over a tiger.

Shen Zhuxi couldn’t help but feel a pang of sorrow for him.

“What are you standing there gawking at? The others have gone.” Li Wu waved a hand in front of her face, unimpressed. “I’m standing right here in front of you — instead of looking at me, you’re looking at someone else? Am I not worth looking at?”

This windbag.

She had a favor to ask of him, so what she said was not entirely sincere — and not entirely against her will either: “Handsome. You’re the most handsome one.”

“What are you after?” Li Wu became alert at once.

“Can you take me to see where you let Li Juan go?” Shen Zhuxi asked. “Maybe it’s still there waiting for me…”

“Waiting to eat you?” Li Wu said.

“Just take me to have a look!” Shen Zhuxi’s old habit of coaxing her Imperial Father and Consort Mother surfaced unbidden — she grabbed his hand and began to shake it. “I’m not even holding a grudge over you sneaking Li Juan away. Just take me to see it!”

Li Wu stared at the hand that had reached out and grabbed his. The corner of his mouth flew up at a speed matching Li Kun’s when he spotted a roast chicken after ten days without meat.

He cleared his throat with studied composure:

“Since you’ve gone to the trouble of asking me so nicely… come along then.”