On the eightieth day.
The chilly morning wind swept past Klay’s sturdy log shelter by the Chilco Lakefront, producing a dull howl.
Inside, Klay’s figure moved in the dim light, his actions skillful yet exhibiting a chanical numbness.
He first added a few pieces of split dry wood to the stove that was about to burn out, then put on a heavy coat and walked out of the shelter.
Then he walked to the edge of the lake, where he had expended a large amount of energy setting up a stinging net, skillfully retrieving it with a retractable rope, though it held a thin layer of ice.
The stinging net caught nothing; the edges of the lake were beginning to freeze, soon rendering the net unusable, but Klay seed indifferent to it.
He then gently pulled up the fishing hook he had set up from the icy lake waters.
On the hook hung a pike weighing about three or four pounds, weakly wagging its tail.
This should have been a good catch, enough to et his day’s protein needs.
Yet there was no trace of joy on Klay’s face.
He expressionlessly unhooked the fish, swiftly processed it with his knife, then reset the hook and dragged the fish back to the shelter.
"Eighty days now, guys."
He placed the fish on a wooden plank, speaking to the cara, his tone as flat as if reporting the weather.
"Yeah. Another fish. Enough calories. Enough fuel. Everything seems under control."
His words were succinct, devoid of any emotion.
For this professional hunting guide, survival seed to have beco a sequence of calculable, executable formulas.
He chopped the fish into chunks, skewered them with sticks, and set them over the fire to roast slowly.
During the wait for the fish to cook, he took a small item from his pocket.
Carefully opening it, inside was a slightly curled photo.
The photo showed his wife and two cheerfully smiling children, with the backdrop of the vast pastures and blue skies of their ho in Montana.
He gazed quietly, greedily at the smiling faces of his family in the photo, the steadfast eyes in the wilderness now showing a rare trace of bewildernt.
"What am I doing here?"
A question arose unbidden from his heart, spiraling like vines through his thoughts.
He spoke to the cara, his voice low, as if musing to himself, "I ca here to prove I could do it."
"I hunted deer, I can reliably catch fish, I built this damn, sturdy log cabin. I have proved to everyone, and above all to myself, that I can survive in this land."
He paused, setting the half-eaten roasted fish aside.
"A million US Dollars? Yes, that’s a lot of money."
"But after spending eighty days here, you realize, solitude can drain things of their original color. Money, now, just looks like numbers on paper."
His gaze returned to the photo, his eyes filled with an unshakeable longing.
"I miss my wife, I miss my kids. I want to hear them arguing in the house, sll my wife’s apple pie baking, and run with my sons across the Montana pastures, chasing sheep and cattle... instead of being here, alone, gnawing on this damn, eternally salty roasted fish!"
"Now I feel like this is no longer a survival challenge,"
His voice tinged with self-mockery and weariness.
"I’m serving ti in a scenic yet utterly uninhabited prison. Doing the sa things every day, not seeing a single soul to talk to. This... this would drive anyone mad."
In the days that followed, Klay’s routine subtly changed.
He no longer actively explored new areas or attempted to set up more complex hunting traps as before.
All his actions were reduced to the minimum necessary for maintenance.
Every morning, he routinely checked the stinging net along the shore.
If there were fish, he’d bring it back for food that day. If not, it didn’t matter, as there were still dried fish in the shelter, enough to sate his hunger.
Then he’d inspect the traps set for small mammals further out.
He spent most of his ti collecting firewood, as if trying to numb his lonely heart through this pure, mindless labor.
"I don’t know how much longer I can hold on."
He sat at the entrance of the shelter, speaking calmly to the cara: "Maybe tomorrow, maybe next week. Now, I leave all decisions to God and luck."
"If in the next few days I can still catch big ones from the lake like before, maybe that ans God wants to stay and continue this ga."
"If... if the streak ends... then perhaps it’s Him telling it’s ti to go ho, Klay. Your battle is over."
After speaking, he fell into a long silence.
anwhile, on the other end of Chilco Lake, the scene at Lin Yu’an’s camp was completely different.
Since the dramatic battle on the seventy-third day seven days ago, Lin Yu’an’s whole aura had undergone a qualitative transformation.
If before he was a beginner in wilderness survival with excellent theoretical skills,
now he was more like a seasoned hunter truly integrated with the land, exuding confidence from deep within!
Such psychological elevation after life-and-death struggles with top predators can only be understood through the baptism of blood!
The success of bear hunting had completely washed away the last vestiges of fear deep within his heart towards the wilderness!
Unlike Klay, who felt numb; conversely, his handling and enjoynt of food had turned into a ritualistic daily routine.
Today’s breakfast was bear-fat fried venison steak with roasted wild onions.
He first used a self-made oil-saw chain hand saw to cut a piece from a block of rock-hard frozen bear fat.
Without rendering all the bear fat directly, neither fat nor bear at feared spoilage in this cold weather.
In a heated stainless steel pot, a small piece of milky white bear fat quickly lted.
He placed a few evenly thick slices of bear at into it, also adding a few wild onions nearby. The onions quickly softened and turned translucent, emitting a fragrant, caralized aroma in the bear fat.
Lin Yu’an quietly enjoyed this high-calorie, high-protein breakfast.
Perhaps as a lingering result of the fierce battle with the black bear, even while chewing his food, his eyes habitually, like radar, scanned the tree line surrounding the shelter.
This state resembled seasoned soldiers who had experienced brutal war, whose sensory and muscle mory remained in "standby" mode even while resting in the safest environnts.
His relaxation was solely ntal, while his body remained like a beast, forever ready to hunt!
After breakfast, Lin Yu’an began today’s routine work.
First, he went to check the snares reset on the "rabbit path."
Wearing homade snowshoes, he moved with unusual balance and speed through the knee-deep snow.
Today, luck was on his side; one of the traps had successfully caught a plump snowshoe rabbit.
He didn’t imdiately carry it back but expertly processed it on site, hanging so of the fresh rabbit innards near where a young red fox frequently appeared by the shelter.
After all, it was uncertain whether the last ti that little fox deliberately caused trouble or was giving a kindly advance warning.
Lin Yu’an preferred to think it was a warning, as the little fox’s presence indeed gave him more preparation ti.
Unlike Klay’s attitude of "leaving it to fate," Lin Yu’an was actively resisting Chilco Lake’s harsh winter.
Not only did he stockpile food and fuel, but he even began utilizing bear resources for further innovation.
He ticulously rendered large blocks of bear fat, filtering it and storing it in clay pots.
"Guys, since I ca to ’Alone in the Wilderness,’ what I’m most satisfied with so far isn’t catching a deer or a bear, but discovering pottery making in the early stage, hence having enough pottery to store various items."
He carefully cleaned the bearskin of blood with snow, frad it with willow branches along with the bear’s head, and buried both in the snow.
In this weather, it certainly wasn’t the ti for tanning the bearskin.
The ultimate showdown between Klay and Lin Yu’an had evolved into a brutal battle of wills, testing who could endure the endless loneliness longer in a psychological endurance contest!
While Klay’s heart was being eroded by solitude, turning his survival into passive maintenance,
Lin Yu’an completed a psychological transformation after killing the black bear; his survival was a proactive conquest of the wilderness.
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