The Evolutionary Path of the Lion

Chapter 53 Autopsy Report

Sel was about forty meters away from where she was going to land, with the stingy guy following beside her.

Chen Fei heard the soft rustling sound of the cubs stepping on the grass. Their steps were small and their direction was a little unsteady, but not chaotic. They were much more stable than last week.

A beautiful scent lingered on the west side of their lodging; she was patrolling. Today, she had walked that section of the west side twice by herself. Without waiting for his signal, she returned after the first walk, exchanged a glance with him, and then went to walk it a second time.

Chen Fei made a note in his mind.

During this time, she began to take the initiative to patrol her assigned section of the road as if it were her own responsibility, instead of waiting for him to assign it to her. It wasn't about currying favor; she genuinely treated this area as her own territory and was guarding it.

A commotion came from the bushes behind me.

rustling.

Then, rustling—bang.

Chen Fei did not turn around.

About five seconds later, a warm breath came from behind him. Big Head's big head emerged from above his left shoulder, his expression serious and his eyes focused intently on a beetle in the northwest corner of the sandstone platform.

The beetle is crawling.

Big Head's ears stood up.

His front paws gently lifted and fell, lifted and fell, the movements becoming smaller and smaller. His whole body began to press forward, his rump slightly raised, and his tail slowly stiffened.

This is the standard ambush stance.

Big Head held it in for about seven seconds.

Then he pounced.

Snapped.

The beetle has disappeared.

Big Head looked down at his forepaws, flipped them open, and found them empty. He looked up and searched around, discovering that the beetle had crawled into a crevice in the sandstone, moved its tentacles inside, and was utterly ignoring him.

Big Head sniffed at the crack.

Then use your claws to dig.

Shake, shake, shake.

Nothing was dug up.

He sniffed again, his ears twitching as if he were carefully assessing the strategic value of this failure, and finally made a mature judgment.

Forget it.

He stood up from the sandstone platform, shook his head, walked to Chen Fei's side, and lay down next to Chen Fei in a natural and effortless manner, resting his head on Chen Fei's back, pretending that nothing had happened.

Chen Fei's ears twitched.

They didn't say anything.

The two brothers gazed together at the orange light to the north, one large and one small, their heads one high and one low. The wind from the east of the grassland blew their manes slightly.

In the distance, that light was still shining.

Chen Fei thought they probably wouldn't sleep well tonight.

North camp.

The meeting continued.

After listening to Ella's deduction, Morris remained silent for a while before speaking, "Have you considered another possibility? The explanation for this is much simpler than you think; we just haven't found the right starting point yet?"

"Yes," Ella said. "I think about it every day. But every time I try to find a simple explanation, I encounter at least two data points that don't match."

"for example?"

"For example, the gun didn't fire. The simple explanation is: the poachers were attacked and didn't have time to react. But what does the forensic report say? The angle of death and the location of the wounds show that the three people were attacked from completely different postures and positions, not from a single point. It was a dispersed attack, and none of the weapons fired. You have to explain both of these conditions at the same time."

Kenneth looked up. "I've seen the medical examiner's report. It says, 'It was definitely a wild animal attack, and there may have been more than one attacker.'"

"Possibly," Ella said, "but there's only one set of continuous footprints at the scene."

The tent fell silent again.

Marcus typed a few words on the keyboard, then paused. "If it was a coordinated attack by multiple animals, why were there only one set of claw marks?"

"This is the third data point that doesn't match," Ella said.

Kaller looked at the top of the tent. "Have you considered the possibility of human safety?"

Several people looked at him at the same time.

“I mean,” Kaller picked up the water bottle again and took a sip this time, “if someone is faking the scene to create the illusion of an animal attack, then these contradictory data can be explained.”

"Three adult males armed with heavy weapons, no gunshot wounds, attacked with bare hands, no trace of human activity, and no indication of human approach detected by the equipment," Kenneth said. "Caller, what kind of abilities do you think this person has?"

"I don't know," Kaller said, "but I also don't know what animal could do these things."

Morris tapped his fingers on the table twice. "How do you explain being intercepted?"

"Protection groups have never welcomed us into their monitored areas, and today's border conflict is normal," Kenneth said. "There's no need to overinterpret it."

“Guiding paw prints,” Ella said. “I found guiding paw prints along that stretch of road, evenly spaced, with a clear direction, extending from the area of ​​poaching incidents all the way to the edge of the conservation organization’s monitoring area. This wasn’t left by animals moving randomly.”

"How do you define 'leading'?" Kenneth said. "A paw print is a paw print. How can you be sure it was intentional?"

"Spacing." Ella placed her hand on the table and gestured with two fingers. "The stride is unreasonably uniform, even around curves, with no signs of acceleration or deceleration. Animals moving in their natural state would have varying strides depending on the terrain and the distribution of their attention. This series of paw prints shows no variation whatsoever."

Kenneth looked at her for a while and then didn't argue further.

This was the first time tonight that he did not give an immediate rebuttal.

Morris noticed this detail but didn't point it out. "So what do we do tomorrow?"

"Change routes," Kenneth said. "Avoid the conservation organization's monitoring area and advance again from the east side, where there's open grass and better conditions for deploying equipment."

"The east side is the main hunting ground, with a high density of herbivores and a high frequency of activity of large predators, and many sources of interference from equipment," Marcus said.

"Then bring more equipment," Kenneth said.

Ella folded the measurement sheet and put it back in her bag. "I agree to change the route, but before setting up points on the east side, I want to rebuild a model based on today's data, excluding all known grassland individuals, and see what's left."

"You know what's left," Maurice said.

Ella didn't respond to that sentence.

Morris stood up, pushed his chair in, and said, "Alright, we'll leave at six tomorrow morning, advancing from the east side. Marcus, make three data backups, two here, and one sent back to London. Who's on the first shift tonight?"

"I'll do it," Kaller said.

The people in the tent began to disperse.

Ella was the last to stand up. Before stepping out of the tent, she paused at the tent entrance and glanced at the dark grassland to the north.

There is no sound.

There was no movement at all.

There was only the smell of wind and grassland, and one or two low howls of hyenas from some distant direction.

She zipped up the tent and left.