Chapter 1165: Stray Dog
Zhang Heng raised the Pestilence Bone Bow in his hand and aimed it at the sheepdog that was lying on the ground, seemingly asleep.
At this distance, he was confident that he could kill the sheepdog with one shot. He would shoot directly in the head, inflicting as little pain as possible to it. Leaving this world in its sleep was probably the last thing Zhang Heng could do for it.
However, the next moment, just as Zhang Heng was about to release the bowstring, the shepherd dog suddenly opened its eyes.
Man and the dog looked at each other for about half a second. Then, the dog let out a low growl, as if trying to stand up from the ground.
However, an arrow pierced through its head!
Although Zhang Heng couldn’t send the shepherd dog away in its sleep as planned, his arrow still hit the target cleanly. The hound fell to the ground after being hit by the arrow.
Zhang Heng then put away his Pestilence Bone Bow ] and turned to leave.
However, just as he took a step forward, he stopped.
Because Zhang Heng heard the movement behind him. The shepherd dog that his arrow hit almost died on the spot. It was already a corpse. Zhang Heng saw it clearly, so the movement was definitely not from the dog.
He turned around and saw another poodle trotting out of the badminton stadium’s changing room.
Zhang Heng frowned. He had not expected that there would be more than one dog in the stadium. Previously, when he had chosen this place as their base, he, Uncle Kui, and the others had searched the place thoroughly. At that time, they had not found any other animals. This meant the two dogs should have only come later.
However, for some reason, they had come here. Other than the room where the players stored their items, there wasn’t much food in the stadium. Logically speaking, it shouldn’t have attracted the dogs. Could the militia’s hunting outside have driven them here? After all, compared to the streets and the wild, the stadium was indeed safer for stray dogs.
These thoughts flashed through Zhang Heng’s mind, but he didn’t dwell too much on them. He took off the Pestilence Bone Bow on his back again and pulled the bowstring.
Zhang Heng didn’t know what the relationship between the poodle and the shepherd was, but it seemed like the two dogs knew each other. He expressed regret for killing the poodle’s companion, but for the sake of safety, he wasn’t planning to let the poodle go just because of that.
However, just as he was about to fire the second arrow, he saw another dog walk out of the changing room. It was a spaniel, and it looked much more powerful than the poodle outside.
This was not the end. Behind the spaniel was a bulldog, followed by a Great Dane and a mixed-breed.
Zhang Heng had already sensed that something was wrong. He also heard movement coming from the window behind him. A few stray dogs were squeezing in through the half-closed window, and in the direction of the bathroom. Stray dogs were also the stairway that Zhang Heng had come up. They surrounded Zhang Heng in the middle, as if to seek justice for their dead companions.
If it were anyone else, they would have been scared out of their wits by now. Even though the hounds weren’t particularly strong, not to mention a good number of small pet dogs among them, once gathered, practically no one in this abandoned city could rival them.
Only Zhang Heng was able to maintain his calm. He did a rough count and found that already more than twenty dogs surrounding him, and even more were joining in.
If everything went as planned, this was probably the largest pack of dogs in Pripyat. A few days ago, many of them were good companions for humans, good companions for the house guards, but now, they looked at Zhang Heng as if he was prey.
It was obvious that these dogs had been hungry for some time, and they had not been at peace recently. They had been chased around by the gunned militia, causing their impression of humans to take a turn for the worse. As if not enough, Zhang Heng had just killed one of them. From the looks of it, the dead shepherd dog was probably the leader of the pack.
Old and new grudges gathered together. It would be strange if these stray dogs could be polite to Zhang Heng. In fact, before they even reached Zhang Heng’s side, they had already begun to growl, falling and rising in succession.
In the end, the head of the bulldog second closest to Zhang Heng was pierced by an arrow in the blink of an eye, following in the footsteps of its companion. Zhang Heng had no intention of being polite. It was obviously impossible to resolve the situation peacefully. Thus, he did not wait for the dogs to completely gather, taking the initiative to launch an attack.
After shooting the arrow, his hands did not stop as he pulled out a second arrow from his quiver. However, at that moment, the dogs started to accelerate and charged at him.
Zhang Heng kicked the poodle that was closest to the dog that barked the loudest earlier and sent it flying. Then, the second arrow nailed the spaniel that was already in the air to the ground. However, perhaps because the radiation had affected the nerves of the dogs and witnessing the death of two of their companions, that the remaining ones showed no signs of backing down. Instead of retreating, they pounced on Zhang Heng even more valiantly.
Zhang Heng could feel the fervent atmosphere among the dogs. He turned sideways to avoid the two from the front, but the three on his right had also jumped up from the ground. There were also sneak attacks from behind and on his right hand.
This situation was indeed a four-pronged attack for Zhang Heng. Even if there was a militia team with guns, there was a high chance that they would not be able to withstand such a fierce attack.
However, just as the two dogs were about to bite Zhang Heng’s thigh, the enemy standing in front of them suddenly disappeared.
The two dogs missed their target and fell from the sky. Then, amid wondering where the enemy that was right in front of them had gone, their lives were unexpectedly reaped by a rain of arrows that fell from the top of their heads.
At the critical moment, Zhang Heng opened the shadow wings on his back and flew straight into the air. He created some distance between himself and the dogs, but he did not rise too high. After making sure that he wouldn’t be bitten again, he began to draw his bow and arrow, taking advantage of the 12 the Shadow Wings provided to harvest the dogs below him.
Zhang Heng’s Level-2 archery skills saw a dog falling to the ground and die each time the bowstring was thwacked. Moreover, Zhang Heng picked the bigger strays, which were more inclined to be fierce. In a short while, more than half the hounds were dead, and the rest were mostly small toy dogs.