Chapter 27: The First Stirring Of Greed
Yun Ce’s gaze fell on the sixth-to-last sheep cart, where it was still very quiet. Even with the battle so intense, the warrior leader had arranged for twenty people to guard it, half of whom were warriors.
There must be something very important in that sheep cart. Unfortunately, although the boars and bears had a bit of rudimentary sentience, they had not reached the level of understanding key attacks.
That area was too close to the battlefield. The men, women, and children of Hekou Village had already wisely left the houses there and moved toward the back gate of Hekou Village, which is near He Kou.
If the battle was quelled by the caravan people, they would naturally come out from the houses in the back, tidy up the goods, and continue trading with the caravan.
If the caravan was finished, they would hide in the hills behind the village. In short, there weren’t many ways to avoid harm from war; staying away from the battlefield was a very effective method.
On the battlefield, the scales of victory were tilting toward the caravan people. One boar was bound by a fishing net thrown by the warriors and was shrieking loudly. Before it could cry out a few times, a spear pierced its throat, and the cry came to an abrupt end.
A heavy hammer smashed onto the bear skull. Although the enraged giant bear tore the warrior’s armor with its claws, its chest was pierced by a spear. Staggering forward a few steps with the spear in it, it crashed to the ground.
Zhao Jin was undecided, and Yun Ce did not want to stir up trouble. He felt it was fine to let things continue developing. Whether the wild beasts won or the caravan won, it had nothing to do with him.
However, the situation was already very clear. If the caravan won, the people of Hekou Village might be held accountable. If the wild beasts won, they would probably flee immediately.
So, Yun Ce actually quite hoped the wild beasts would win.
1 Seeing that the battle’s outcome was decided, Zhao Jin called out to the crippled and sturdy women in the village, taking forks, torches, and other weapons to go forward and help the caravan. The reason was to make the caravan people punish them a little less after victory.
1 Yun Ce was naturally in the crowd, and among everyone, he shouted the loudest.
1 With the battle tilting toward his side, the warrior leader finally stopped continuously drawing his bow and shooting arrows. He had time to cast a gaze of hatred toward the people of Hekou Village.
1 He had not seen Yun Ce release the bears, but he stubbornly believed that the wild beasts escaping from the cage must be related to Hekou Village.
1 Earlier, when the wild beasts ran out, not a single person from Hekou Village helped them fight. They had shut their doors tightly and hid in the dark watching the spectacle. Now, seeing the caravan was about to win, they ran out pretending to help. This made the warrior leader vent his anger over losing many men on the people of Hekou Village.
1 When people are in a rage, those with hammers like to use hammers, those with forks like to use forks. The warrior leader was a very competent archer; his way of venting was to fire three arrows in succession toward the direction where the people of Hekou Village were surging.
1 The arrows shot down the three sturdiest crippled people at the front. The arrows entered through the throat and the arrowheads emerged from the back of the neck. Not much blood came out, and the three crippled people, who had still been full of vitality, perished on the spot.
1 When E Ji and the others saw people die, they shouted once and turned to run. While fleeing, she tightly gripped Yun Ce, who was running a bit slower.
1 In the panic, Yun Ce holding the torch dropped it. One hand pulling E Ji and the other lifting Zhao Jin, he ran faster than anyone.
1 Yi tree fiber is flammable, especially yi tree fiber with the bark peeled off, starch removed, and dried thoroughly—it ignites at the slightest spark. The torch Yun Ce dropped in his panic landed right on a pile of yi tree fiber. First a small flame sparked, then a pile of roaring flames appeared next to the caravan.
2 When the caravan’s sheep cart convoy starts trading, they naturally form the sheep carts into a circle. The acquired goods are inside the circle formed by the sheep carts, and the unacquired goods are outside the circle. The burning goods and the unburnt goods were separated by just one sheep cart.
2 When the flames outside suddenly shot up five or six meters high, the newly acquired goods inside the circle spontaneously ignited.
2 The warrior leader, whose mood had just stabilized, saw the sheep carts catching fire one after another. His eyes nearly split in rage. Ignoring the wild beasts about to be slaughtered, he desperately dashed toward the sixth-to-last sheep cart.
2 That sheep cart was already on fire, and the guards were desperately trying to put it out. The warrior leader slashed with his knife, severing the connection between the panicked, randomly jumping sheep and the cart. He grabbed the cart shaft himself and exerted force to rescue this sheep cart from the fire circle.
2 E Ji and the others ran a long way in one breath. Just as Yun Ce planned to lead them to keep running for a while and completely leave Hekou Village, the group suddenly stopped. Led by Zhao Jin, they stood like a bunch of foolish deer, watching the dangerous battlefield from afar.
2 Yun Ce ignored the dying wild beasts and instead fixed his gaze on the sheep cart rescued by the warrior leader. At this moment, the canopy of that sheep cart was already ablaze, and the flames were visibly creeping down. The warrior leader roared in some despair: “Put out the fire, quickly put out the fire! 95%”
2 Watching that guy somehow yank over a cloak and vigorously swing it to beat back the flames. However, this guy seemed to cherish his long-handled bow very much, worried it would be ruined by fire, so he specially placed it on a nearby tree.
2 While everyone was watching the spectacle intently, Yun Ce quietly slipped away. Only E Ji watched his retreating figure with concern but said nothing.
2 The covering cloth on top of the sheep cart was quickly burned away. Yun Ce, who was stealthily taking the bow and arrow, stood high and clearly saw a pair of deep blue eyes staring fixedly at him.
2 The reason he overlooked the parts beyond the eyes was mainly because the biggest feature on this thing was a pair of eyes. Yun Ce had never seen an animal with such large eyes.
3 Inside the huge cage was only a fox-sized animal. Though the animal was small, its eyes were even larger than those of an adult cow. Most fatally, its eyes were perfectly round, just like the full moon in the sky.
3 After locking eyes with this pair for a while, Yun Ce felt dizzy. The sudden vertigo made his hand almost slip off the tree trunk, nearly causing him to fall.
3 Seeing the covering cloth on the sheep cart completely burned away, the warrior leader let out a strange cry, drew the knife from his waist, and viciously stabbed toward the big-eyed animal in the cage.
3 “Gagu—” The big-eyed animal cried out loudly and busily jumped up and down in the cage to dodge.
3 “Listen, 21%”
3 With this cry, the originally lively battlefield paused ever so slightly. It might not have been very noticeable to humans, but the boars and bears not yet killed by the caravan warriors stopped their random attacks on opponents and, as if by agreement, moved toward the sheep carts.
3 When Yun Ce returned with the bow and arrow, E Ji wordlessly took the unstrung bow and stuffed it into her large cloth bag, along with the quiver. It wasn’t too obvious from the outside.
3 Yun Ce came to Zhao Jin’s side, who had not yet recovered from the grief and pain of his clansmen’s deaths, took the wooden slip from his hand, and saw written on it— I want to kill him.
3 Yun Ce rewrote: “Thought it through? Then we’ll find an opportunity to kill him.”
3 “Kill him, I’ll stay behind to atone, you all go.”
4 Yun Ce glanced at the despondent Zhao Jin, curled his lips, and said: “Taking E Ji away might be my responsibility, but the rest have nothing to do with me—that’s your responsibility. Don’t think you can commit suicide to make me feel guilty, then dump the burden you’ve carried your whole life on me.
4 Don’t play the pity card either. You, who crawled out of a pile of corpses on the battlefield, would have any qualms about killing one person?”
4 Zhao Jin angrily wrote on the wooden slip: “You disgusting nobles, why be so clever? You don’t leave any way out for people like us?”
4 Yun Ce wrote smilingly: “If I were a scion of a noble family, someone like you wouldn’t even get to see me. So, don’t feel bad that I saw through your little scheme. As long as others don’t see through it, it’s fine.
4 Last warning: if you use E Ji as leverage again, don’t blame me for mixing you with sheep dung and burying you.
4 Just as the two were silently exchanging words, a scar-covered wild boar finally used its long snout to flip over that sheep cart. A giant bear with its back full of arrows forcefully bent open the iron bars. As the big-eyed small beast broke free from the cage, the warrior leader could no longer care about harming them. With a strange cry, he dashed toward the tree where the bow and arrow were placed.
4 When he looked up and didn’t see his bow and arrow on the tree trunk, he was stunned for an instant. Then he was picked up by a wild boar weighing over a thousand pounds using its long snout. In the moment he was lifted, he stabbed his knife into the wild boar’s eye, then used the force to vault onto the boar’s back.
4 The battlefield situation changed once again. Although only five boars and bears remained, their combat power increased rather than decreased. Mainly, the big-eyed small beast standing on the bear’s back did not hurry to leave. Instead, it directed the remaining boars and bears to launch a counterattack against the caravan warriors and shop assistants.
4 The scene was full of twists and turns, leaving the people of Hekou Village dumbfounded. The combat power difference was so great between the wildly fighting wild boars and wild bears versus those with commanding combat.
4 Wild boar raids, followed by giant bear advances. Wild boars protected from behind by wild bears launching raids were invincible.
5 The warrior leader was grabbed by a bear’s forelegs. He tried several times to break free but was harassed by the giant bear’s jaws into helplessly giving up. At this point, he was already in a contest of strength with the giant bear.
5 The large circle formed by the sheep carts had become a massive fire circle. Surprisingly, that big-eyed small beast made the wild boars and bears overcome their fear of fire. Retreating into the fire circle, they would occasionally burst out from the broken fire circle, dealing massive damage to the caravan warriors and shop assistants with surprise attacks.
5 This was the second time Yun Ce felt greed in Hekou Village. That big-eyed small beast seemed truly magical; at this moment, he very much wanted to befriend it.
5 It was just that the wristband remained calm as a lake, showing not the slightest respect for advanced intelligent life.
