War Photographer's Notebook

Chapter 1124 The Original Transaction on the Wasteland
On the tundra where the wind was raging, a pine tree that was only as thick as a thigh had been sawn off its windy canopy, and by the way, the remaining part was used to prop up a not-so-big canvas tent.

At the entrance of this simple tent that is almost covered by snow for one third, four reindeer are lying on the thick pine branches in the lee of a watered snow wall, burying their snouts in the warm thigh nests , Relying on the fur all over the body to resist the severe cold, from time to time, he would sneak a bite of the pine needles used as mattresses.

Inside the tent, Wei Ran was sitting on a wooden box covered with animal skins, and was using an ax to chop the stakes obtained after sawing off the crown of the tree into firewood suitable for burning.

Across the tin barrel with burning charcoal fire, Mesut was holding a piece of dead wood in one hand, and using a Finnish knife in the other hand, carefully carving a reindeer that also buried its mouth in the hollow of its thigh.

It was already a week after the two of them crossed the Yenisei River, and it was also the second day of the blizzard.

Due to the lack of shelter from the coniferous forest, the snowstorm here was more severe than what they had encountered on the east coast when they had just escaped from the labor camp.

Let alone rushing in such weather, even if those reindeer just stood up, they would be unconsciously turned away by the strong wind.

Because of this, their only choice was to build the tent as firmly as possible, pile the snow thicker, store as much firewood as possible, and wait patiently for the snowstorm to stop.

After chopping the firewood, which is estimated to be enough to burn for most of the day, Wei Ran pulled in the log that had slipped in through the gap in the tent mouth, then picked up a wooden stick and slapped the tent in a circle. The canvas shook off the accumulated snow outside.

After finishing his own work, he lay on the warm sleigh, covered with a wolf fur blanket, and stared blankly at the top of the tent above his head.

In the past two days, or in this week, he and Mesut have talked about all possible topics more than once, so that both of them can't help but start to miss the unknown Ihor.

At least with that devil around, they might have more topics to talk about, instead of the boring time that they can only find things to do without the tent as they are now.

"Do you want a drink?" Mesut asked, but he didn't stop the carving work in his hand.

"Don't drink it, save it for life-saving." Wei Ran waved his hand and asked after a pause, "How far have we run?"

"I don't know." Mesut replied calmly, as if he didn't care about this issue at all.

"What's the date today?" Wei Ran asked another question.

"The 27th or the 28th," Mesut replied uncertainly, "or the 29th, I'm not too sure."

Hearing this, Wei Ran, who had no topic to talk about, fell silent again.

"How much supplies do we have left?" Mesut asked almost every few hours.

"There is still a lot of flour and oats, there is also a lot of dried venison, and the cans are almost untouched, but there are only three... no, only two and a half venison legs left." Wei Ran replied without thinking Said, "There are not many vegetables, there are still 19 potatoes, 12 carrots, and 11 onions."

"And vodka and kerosene"

Mesut added without looking up, "There are still two barrels of less than 40 liters of kerosene, and there are only two and a half bottles of vodka left."

Looking up at the two unlit kerosene lamps hanging on the tree trunk, and the Winchester lever-action rifle also hanging on the tree trunk, Wei Ran yawned and asked, "What are you doing? A Christmas present?"

"Christmas present?"

Mesut blew the sawdust off the piece of wood in his hand, "It's a Christmas present, I'm making a compass."

"how to do?"

Wei Ran became interested, so he simply got up and took down an oil lamp to light it, and put it on the wooden box that served as a table.

"Mainly rely on this"

While talking, Mesut pointed to a diamond-shaped iron piece with a hole in the middle placed on the lid of the box, "I magnetized this piece of iron with the magnet that Sergey's grandson often plays with."

Mesut said and showed the round hole dug in the middle of the reindeer wood carving in his hand, "When I hang this piece of iron in it with a fishing line, it will probably be used as a compass. Of course, it can also be used now. Can use."

As Mesut said, he took out a thin wire from his pocket, passed it through the round hole in the middle of the diamond-shaped iron plate, lifted it up and hung it in front of the two of them.

After a moment of rotation, the patch finally stopped and pointed steadily in two directions.

"This is south." Mesut glanced at the diamond-shaped iron piece, raised his finger and said in a certain direction.

"What else did you make?" Wei Ran asked after the other party put away the diamond-shaped iron piece, which was a little bigger than melon seed skin.

"Yes, there are many more."

Mesut opened another wooden box, took out an inconspicuous but heavy canvas bag and threw it to Wei Ran.

"What is this?" Wei Ran asked before opening the canvas bag.

"Ice picks and ice hammers, and some pitons and crampons for climbing."

Mesut paused, and while he was busy carving his compass, he added, "Of course, the ice ax and ice hammer haven't had time to attach the handles yet. If you really have nothing to do, you can attach handles to them yourself."

Wei Ran weighed the heavy package of forged metal parts, "It seems that you really planned to cross the Ural Mountains from the very beginning."

"certainly"

Mesut replied with a natural and extremely confident tone, "And I will definitely cross the Ural Mountains."

Hearing this, Wei Ran smiled without saying anything, reached out to open the canvas bag, and took out the contents one by one.

In addition to the pair of sharp-toothed crampons that can be directly worn on the felt boots, there are 12 different styles of pitons, and the rest include the hammer head of the ice hammer, the head of the ice ax and the head of the ice ax One-piece tail vertebra, plus several thick iron rings.

He glanced at the other party's unclosed box without any trace, and there was another canvas bag of the same size inside, but it was only that one.

There is no doubt that Mesut was not only ready to cross the Ural Mountains from the very beginning, but from the very beginning, how long did he intend to play with Ihor!

After thinking about it secretly, Wei Ran picked up the axe and sawed off a section from the canopy branch protruding from the tent mouth, then picked up the axe, and patiently made the wooden handles of the ice ax and ice hammer.

With something to do at hand, the time naturally passed quickly.

When Mesut finally made the suggested compass, he finally installed a half-meter-long wooden handle on the ice ax under the guidance of the other party, and fixed the tail vertebra and the pickaxe with a few nails provided by the other party. .

On this day, the blizzard that had raged outside the tent for four days finally subsided, and the long-lost aurora was finally visible overhead.

Not daring to waste too much time, let alone waiting for the short dawn, the two immediately packed their bags, fed each of the four reindeer a handful of oats, and set off.

On the tundra that was still howling with the cold wind, the two sleigh cars finally ran towards the Ural Mountains seven to eight hundred kilometers away.

In the following period of time, the two stopped and stopped without any sense of time, and Wei Ran didn't bother to count the number of times they appeared during the short day, and because there was no map, they didn't know what they were doing right now. Where - or even if there is a map, in this endless wild tundra is not much practical significance at all.

I don't know how many days after the blizzard, Wei Ran, who was about to fall asleep in the warm sleigh, suddenly woke up, grabbed the reins to stop the sleigh, and then tore off Mesut with a piece of wood. Windproof glasses made of animal skins.Pulled out the Winchester lever-action rifle hidden in the blanket, adjusted the scale with a simple estimate, aimed at a white fox in the distance that was poking its beautiful sharp beak into the snow again and again, and pulled the trigger!
"boom!"

Accompanied by the clear gunshots, the fox's beautiful white fur and the surrounding snow were immediately stained red with blood.

Before Wei Ran put away his rifle, Mesut on another sleigh also shook the reins immediately, yelling at the sleigh and rushed over.

"Good marksmanship!"

Mesut picked up the big furry tail of the fox and shook it towards Wei Ran. He skilfully peeled off the fox's skin and stomped it on the snow, then threw it on the sleigh cart. The decapitated fox meat was covered with snow and tied with a rope to the handrail at the tail of the sled.

Although the two of them could no longer remember that this was the first few days of fleeing, they had already grown messy beards along the way.On the sleigh carts of the two, they also accumulated a dozen or twenty pieces of animal skins, mainly fox skins, and two large strings of skinned fox meat.

"How many bullets are there?" Wei Ran waited for Mesut to get closer and asked. Although he was holding the gun, the bullets were kept by the other party.

"There are still more than 20 rounds," Mesut said, "find a place to camp."

Naturally, Wei Ran didn't have any objections. After the two of them set up the tent more and more proficiently, the fox they just killed was also chopped into pieces and thrown into the pot.

However, before the pot of fox meat was cooked, a sled cart pulled by sled dogs appeared in the southwest direction of the tent!

Wei Ran and Mesut looked at each other, and then looked at the sleigh that was clearly coming towards them. The former loaded the gun with a "click", while the latter shot the bullet from his boot. Pulled out a mine explosive and hid it in his cuff.

"Don't shoot without my signal," Mesut warned in a low voice before the sleigh stopped.

"I know." Wei Ran nodded imperceptibly.

Less than 2 minutes before and after, the dog sled stopped far away, followed by a bearded man wearing almost the same style of buckskin robe and carrying a shotgun, walked down from the sled car, far away. He beckoned to Wei Ran and the two of them, and at the same time yelled something in words that neither of them could understand.

"Are you a Nenets?" Wei Ran responded loudly in Russian, "Do you know Russian?"

I don't know if I understood what Wei Ran was saying, this Asian-looking man with a beard spread his hands and walked over, ripped off the windproof glasses that were almost the same style as the two of them, and continued to listen to them with the two of them. Speaking something in a language he didn't understand, he looked at the two sledges that hadn't pushed into the tent.

Fortunately, the bearded man didn't know the two of them, and he obviously didn't look like the person who was chasing them.

Seeing this, Wei Ran and Mesut breathed a sigh of relief, and the former even picked up a piece of frozen fox fur and handed it to the bearded man.

After taking the fox fur and looking at it, the bearded man walked towards his sleigh, searched inside for a while, counted out eight bullets and handed them to Wei Ran.

(End of this chapter)