Transmigrated into Hoh Xil - Chapter 1

My mouth came away full of fur.

The big dog was scared out of its wits. It yowled as if it were being murdered, convinced I was about to eat it.

The noise irritated me. I bared my teeth, a threatening growl rolling from my throat.

—Shut up!

The herding dog whimpered twice. Its ears drooped, its tail curled under its belly, and fear filled its eyes.

Good. Finally, some peace and quiet.

As wolf and dog stood frozen in their stalemate, a sharp north wind swept across the desolate grassland. In this high-altitude landscape, plants had drawn on thousands of years of accumulated wisdom to evolve into the low, clustered forms they now wore.

In the distance, Yuzhu Peak towered more than six thousand meters above sea level.

It was late November, and the north wind was already turning bitter.

I flicked my ears, raised my head, and watched a sea of clouds roll over the mountains.

Savage. Barren. Dangerous…

This place—

was China’s greatest wilderness: Hoh Xil!

And I had transmigrated into a wolf.

A month had already passed, yet it still felt unbelievable. Every so often, I would find myself staring blankly at my paw pads.

Only a month ago, I had been another beast of burden grinding away in a big city.

All I had done was squeeze onto the subway. How had that ended with me transmigrating?

“Whine—whine—”

The sound broke my train of thought.

The pain was so intense that the herding dog’s whole body trembled.

I examined the bite on its right hind leg. The wound went all the way to the bone.

Bright red blood soaked a clump of sedge beneath its belly.

It wasn’t that I was heartless.

I had simply run out of options.

If I didn’t do something soon, Xia’er might not survive the night…

Xia’er was a male wolf in his prime.

When I first transmigrated here, I had nearly starved to death because I didn’t know how to hunt.

As the wolf king, Xia’er had probably never seen such a useless wolf in his life. Once he got over his shock, he kindly fed me twice.

From that moment on, I latched on to him.

Every day, I shamelessly fawned over him and tried to win his favor.

When Xia’er hunted, I backed him up. When Xia’er rested, I groomed his fur. When Xia’er drank, I stood guard.

The groveling came so naturally that I lost myself in it completely.

But not long after I found myself such a powerful patron, Xia’er was injured!

And the chief culprit was the herding dog before me.

It was all his fault!

Every time I remembered what had happened, I wanted to bite him again!

Pastoral settlements dotted the edges of Hoh Xil. The people there had practiced traditional nomadic herding for generations, and nearly every household kept several dogs to guard the home and livestock.

Because the dogs were allowed to roam half-wild, they often wandered deep into Hoh Xil.

This particular dog, Tashi, was spoiled rotten by his owner and behaved as if no law in heaven or earth applied to him—

He had actually dared to provoke a wild yak!

A sexually mature male wild yak could weigh as much as eight hundred kilograms. Its immense size made it the largest herbivore in Hoh Xil and had earned it the nickname “Demon King Bull.”

November was mating season for wild yaks.

The males, in particular, became exceptionally irritable.

After provoking one, Tashi fled with the yak thundering after him—and charged straight into Xia’er’s territory.

A battle for the pack’s very survival was about to erupt!

As wolf king, Xia’er fought without the slightest fear of death to protect his pack.

The conflict between species unfolded before my eyes in nature’s bloodiest, cruelest form—

Unable to dodge in time, Xia’er was nearly skewered by one of the enormous horns!

At that very moment, snow began to fall.

I watched helplessly as Xia’er crashed to the ground. Snow covered his outer coat layer by layer, while the vivid red of his blood set the lonely earth aflame.

That night, the pack’s mournful howls echoed through the valley.

A full day and night passed.

Xia’er did not improve.

His breathing remained rough and rasping, his chest rising and falling faintly.

For the sake of the pack’s survival, the wolves abandoned him. Crueler still, they chose a new wolf king on the spot, left the dying Xia’er behind, and ran without a backward glance toward the snow peaks at the edge of dawn.

“Huff—huff—”

Xia’er watched the pack disappear, then slowly closed his eyes.

In Mongolian, Hoh Xil meant “blue mountain ridge.”

But in November, temperatures here fell to minus ten degrees Celsius. The north wind raged across endless yellowed meadows. Snow mountains loomed in the distance, and the animals hid in valleys sheltered from the wind.

Social animals huddled against one another to survive the bitter cold.

Only Xia’er—

one solitary wolf—had no one.

He seemed to have accepted his fate. Frost and snow had frozen into tiny beads on the fur around his eyes, covering his face.

“Whine—whine—”

I whimpered and keened, nudging him with my muzzle.

—Xia’er. Xia’er.

Don’t leave me, Xia’er.

He seemed surprised. Weakly, he opened his eyes.

Blood-flecked foam clogged his throat, and a low, puzzled rumble emerged from it.

It sounded like reassurance. Like an attempt to reason with me.

With great difficulty, he raised his head as though pointing out the way. The pack had vanished into the far end of the snowstorm, but if I left now, I might still catch them.

Those intelligent eyes seemed to say, *Go.*

I wasn’t leaving!

With a thump, I stubbornly lay down beside Xia’er, warming his gradually cooling body and licking his matted, bloodstained fur.

After a moment of stunned silence, Xia’er bared his teeth at me viciously and tried everything he could to drive me away.

I still wasn’t leaving!