Building a Civilization and Raising Cubs in the Beast World – Chapter 40

Chapter 40

Bai Tu was just about to ask if he could help change the iron knife when he heard this question. Before he could refuse, he saw Bai Qi at the door with a shocked look on his face, and he was immediately at a loss whether to laugh or cry.

“It’s good in the Snow Rabbit Tribe.” Bai Tu once again said that he really had no intention of leaving the Snow Rabbit Tribe. Except for the fact that there was a Mad Lion Tribe with bad intentions next to it, he had no dissatisfaction here.

After hearing Bai Tu’s words, Bai Qi breathed a sigh of relief this time, but he still didn’t dare to relax. What’s wrong with these people! Why do they all want to take people from their tribe away? Fortunately, Bai Tu was not an orc who would just follow the invitation casually.

Knowing that this sentence meant a rejection, Hei Xiao felt a little regretful: “Then you have to be careful.” It was obvious that the Snow Rabbit Tribe could not be defeated. If a witch doctor came to cause trouble for Bai Tu, it was unknown whether this group of orcs could stop them.

Bai Tu agreed seriously. He could see that the other party was really worried about him, just like the last time at the market, when he was worried that he was kidnapped by other orcs.

The Beast God Continent is not peaceful everywhere. Some orcs will send the weak orcs in the tribe to the rich orcs in exchange for food. The orcs who are exchanged for food have the lowest status in the new tribe, even lower than the orcs who have been merged into other tribes, and beatings and scolding are common. Some orcs will stop at nothing and will secretly go to small tribes to kidnap orcs and sell them to larger tribes. Bai Tu was also shocked when he heard it for the first time. Isn’t this the human trafficker from the orc world?

Bai Qi came in to bring fruits to Bai Tu. The hunting team’s harvest today was not very satisfactory, but the picking team picked a lot of fruits. Everyone knew that Bai Tu liked to eat these, so of course they had to send them over when there were fresh ones. They were supposed to be divided during the meal, but Bai Qi washed them after the meal before giving them to Bai Tu, so it was a little late.

Bai Tu picked out a few fruits with good flavors and asked Hei Xiao to try them: “These are sweeter.” The environment of the Beast God Continent is generally similar, but there are some differences in different locations. Crops are also relatively scattered, and some fruits can only be eaten in one area. For example, this kind of big cherry, he has never found it in the market. It is considered a small specialty of the tribe.

Hei Xiao saw Bai Tu sharing with him enthusiastically and immediately found a new topic: “Do you like fruits? Next time I’ll bring you the black fruit from our tribe, and also a kind of rhubarb fruit. They’re delicious, but unfortunately they’re too far away, so they’ll go bad if you bring them here.” Hei Xiao frowned. The two tribes were too far apart. Even if the Eagle Tribe flew non-stop, it would take several days to get them here. The rhubarb fruit would start to smell bad a few days after being picked, and would only be fragrant when it was just picked.

This is normal. In the Beast God Continent, where there are no refrigerators or freezing technology, it is good if food can be preserved for two or three days. It would be difficult to preserve it for longer than that, unless it is cooked. As for food with a short shelf life, only tribes like the Horse Clan, which have fast speed and are not far away, dare to bring it to the market. Most of them are like their tribe and only bring meat.

But it’s not completely without the chance to eat it. Bai Tu comforted the other party: “I will visit your tribe later.” Living in one place for a long time will get boring sooner or later. Bai Tu plans to visit other places after everything in the tribe is on track, and by the way, see the witch doctors in this world. He was referring to the witch doctors who truly wanted to save the orcs, not those fake witch doctors who relied on their abilities to cheat and deceive people.

After hearing these words, Hei Xiao had another plan in his mind. He could continue to persuade Bai Tu to stay in their tribe. Compared with the Snow Rabbit Tribe, the Black Eagle Tribe had more people and were more capable of fighting, so they could fully protect Bai Tu. Moreover, the Black Hawk Tribe has a lot of prey, and so many people from the Rabbit Tribe went out but failed to catch any prey. What should they do in winter? The other orcs are strong and not afraid of hunger, but Bai Tu is so thin, he must not starve.

Bai Tu didn’t know that Hei Xiao had started planning his future persuasion work in his heart. After talking about the fruit, he turned the topic to what they had just discussed: “Hei Xiao, can you help me change the iron knife?” The stone knife was really not sharp enough. Bai Tu almost didn’t know how to cut food now. It was too physically demanding. His arms would be sore for a whole day after cutting almost every time. He had to rest for half a day after working for half an hour, so his efficiency couldn’t be too low.

Most of the time these tasks could be taught to others, but sometimes when he wanted to get some new food, it was too troublesome to rely solely on descriptions and ask other orcs for help, so he had to do it himself. Whenever this happened, he missed the sharp and versatile knives of modern times.

The tribe won’t have people available to forge iron tools until the snow season, so now we can only trouble Hei Xiao to help exchange two swords.

Hearing this, Hei Xiao reached out and took off the ox horn on his waist, took out the short knife inside and handed it to him: “I just happen to have one here.”

Iron knives are expensive. What’s more important is that the Iron Elephant Tribe has gradually stopped circulating iron knives over the years. Even the Black Eagle Tribe only has a few and will not take them out easily. Hei Xiao did not intend to tell Bai Tu this. The last time he saw Bai Tu, he wanted to give it to the other party, but when he went to the market, he forgot a lot of things because of Hei Yan’s mischief. Even if Bai Tu didn’t say it this time, he would have given it to him, but he just didn’t think of it for a while.

Giving weapons to each other is an act of great trust and intimacy among orcs. For example, the bone knife in his hand was given by Bai An on the day he rescued Bai Chen. Bai Tu did not expect that Hei Xiao would give him the self-defense weapon directly, and he was stunned for a moment.

Is Hei Xiao too good to him? Even though he had always had a good impression of Heixiao, he couldn’t help but worry about the other party’s behavior of giving him weapons casually: “You keep it for self-defense.” He wanted iron tools for convenience, and Heixiao took them obviously for self-defense. The other party needed it far more than he did.

“I have Hei Yan to protect me.” Hei Xiao stuffed the bull horn with the dagger into Bai Tu’s arms without saying a word, “You need to protect yourself.” Hei Xiao knew very well how dangerous it was for a young and capable witch doctor to be in the territory of a stingy and bad-tempered witch doctor. The East Continent was almost dominated by Wu Jiu, and Bai Tu’s situation was much more dangerous than his.

In order to prevent Bai Tu from continuing to think about the dagger, Hei Xiao changed the subject: “Give me some more medicines, and we will send the extra iron ore as soon as possible.”

This matter was obviously more important, and Bai Tu agreed: “Okay.” Before the rainy season, he had agreed with Hei Xiao to exchange medicine for iron ore. He has been collecting various herbs from before the rainy season to now. The picking team brings back a lot of herbs every day, and even some from the vicinity of the Blood Wolf Tribe are brought over. It is not a problem to give some more.

But Bai Tu was a little puzzled: “Is it easy for your tribe to get injured while hunting?” Logically, hunting should be easier for the Eagle Tribe than for the Rabbit Tribe. After all, Rabbits are on the Eagle Tribe’s menu. Why do we hear from Hei Xiao’s tone that there are quite a few injured people?

“When the Eagle Tribe is hunting, they are likely to encounter completely beast-transformed fallen beasts. For the safety of the tribe, they have to drive the fallen beasts away.” In fact, they wanted to kill them. Hei Xiao was afraid of scaring Bai Tu, so he didn’t tell the truth.

“Complete bestiality? Degeneration into a beast?” Bai Tu was stunned. It was the first time he heard these two words. He had never heard Bai Qi mention them before.

Hei Xiao explained: “Some adult orcs can’t control their abilities when they get old. They stay in beast form longer and longer, and finally they become completely beastly and become fallen beasts. The fallen beasts become unconscious and attack other orcs. For safety reasons, they have to be locked up.” But not every tribe can do this. Orcs in some tribes will kill the fallen beasts directly, some tribes will let the fallen beasts go out and attack other tribes, and some tribes will even deliberately send the fallen beasts to the territory of the neighboring tribe.

The Eagle Tribe has recently often discovered completely beast-like fallen beasts in their territory. Some of them will leave after being driven away, while others will keep attacking the Eagle Tribe until they are dead. For the sake of the tribe, they can only kill the fallen beasts, but the fallen beasts have strong attack capabilities, and seem to be unaware of pain, biting and pouncing madly, causing many Eagle Tribe members to be injured.

“Is there any in the East Continent as well?” Bai Tu asked.

Hei Xiao, who didn’t want to scare Bai Tu, hesitated for a moment, but finally told the truth: “Some tribes will not tell others when fallen beasts appear, and will kill people secretly. They say this is the punishment of the Beast God.” Many tribes think that fallen beasts are the punishment of the Beast God on the orcs. If they don’t kill people, the punishment will fall on the tribe. At the same time, in order to prevent other tribes from attacking them, they will deliberately conceal the fact that fallen beasts have appeared.

Bai Tu seemed to be deep in thought. In his opinion, beast transformation was obviously a disease caused by some reasons. However, due to the small number of people and deliberate concealment, no one had figured out the reasons that led to the transformation into beasts.

Since he had said that, Hei Xiao might as well remind them again: “Fallen Beasts rarely appeared in the past, only one every few years. This year we found three in the tribal territory. Your tribe should pay attention.” Although the two tribes were far apart, this situation was obviously abnormal this year. Hei Xiao wanted to bring the person to his side for protection, but the other party did not want to leave, so he could only remind him to be careful.

Bai Tu nodded seriously. He was unconscious and couldn’t tell friend from foe. He felt almost no pain. Just by listening to him, he knew how dangerous it was after transforming into a beast. He had to be careful. The force of their tribe was too low, so they had to work harder on defense.

That night, Bai Tu arranged the Black Hawk Tribe into an empty cave and went directly to find Bai An.

“Hei Xiao said that they found three fallen beasts in the territory. Chief, will there be any fallen beasts on our side?” Bai Tu still had another concern. If the fallen beasts were from other tribes, they could defend themselves, but what if the fallen beasts appeared within the tribe?

“Fallen beasts?” Bai An frowned instantly when he heard the news, “Why are there so many?” Some young orcs don’t know how dangerous the fallen beasts are, but he knows much more clearly. Those who can turn into fallen beasts are all ferocious animals. Their original forms are huge and their attack power is strong. Any tribe that fails to defend in time may be wiped out by them!

After hearing Bai An’s explanation, Bai Tu was even more shocked than before: “So serious!” This situation was much more serious than what Hei Xiao said. No wonder Hei Xiao wanted to persuade him to go to the Black Eagle Tribe. After encountering three fallen beasts, only some people were injured. The strength of the Eagle Tribe was strong enough.

Bai An sighed: “Seven years ago, a fallen beast appeared in a brown bear tribe in the East Continent. He killed seven bears, five of whom were his own cubs. It took more than twenty orcs to catch him.” The Brown Bear Tribe has a bad temper, and this matter is also the business of the other tribe. If they hear about it, there will be a conflict. Therefore, only some older orcs know about this kind of thing. They are worried that the young orcs in the tribe will talk nonsense and cause tribal conflicts, so few people mention it.

Not only did no one talk about it in the tribe, no one talked about it at the market. After all, when one changes into human form, one cannot recognize the other person’s true form at a glance. It would be bad if, during a conversation, an orc next to them suddenly said that they were from the Brown Bear Tribe. Bai Tu understood why Bai Qi didn’t tell him about this, because the other party was obviously not aware of it either. It was a secret event similar to the orcs’ custom.

Realizing the seriousness of the problem, Bai Tu felt that defense was necessary. As brown bears, they could all be killed by fallen beasts. As the rabbit tribe was not dominant in their original form, they would be in danger no matter which tribe had fallen beasts. The only problem is how to prevent it.

“Should we continue to send more people to patrol outside in the future?” Speaking of this, Bai An couldn’t help but sigh.

“What’s wrong?” Bai Tu asked worriedly. He noticed when the hunting team came back today that Bai An’s face looked a little strange. However, Hei Xiao’s arrival was more important at that time, and there were orcs from the Black Hawk tribe around, so it was not easy to ask.

“There are too few prey this year,” Bai An worried. “I’m afraid we won’t catch enough to eat in the winter.”

According to past experience, the period after the rainy season should be the time when there are the most prey, because the rain has been watering the area for a month and there are many weeds. These places are very popular with prey. But since the end of the last snow season, Bai An found that there were not enough prey in the tribe. Later, Bai Tu helped to improve the hunting method. Everyone caught a few prey, and because of the making of jerky and the travel with the wolves on the road, they exchanged more salt than before.

Not having to worry about salt after the rainy season should have been a happy thing, but Bai An soon discovered something was wrong. There were too few prey, almost the same as before the rainy season, and much less than after last year’s rainy season, especially today. Everyone went to several places but found no trace of prey.

This was too abnormal, so abnormal that Bai An was scared, because the situation was worse than in previous years. In most of the previous years, everyone saw that the prey was not caught. Although there was no harvest either, there was plenty of prey around. But this year, the prey was getting less and less.

“Were they all caught by other tribes?” Bai Tu also became worried. The reduction in prey was no small matter. It was related to the life and death of the tribe. Although he was trying to find ways to increase the tribe’s food reserves, the prerequisite was that meat must also be supplied. Wild vegetables, corn, mushrooms and other foods could be eaten, but they had to be paired with meat. It would definitely not be possible for the orcs to suddenly change from a meat-only diet to a vegetarian diet.

Bai Tu still felt something was not right, so he said to Bai An: “Okay, when you go out tomorrow, if the number of prey is still not right, go directly to the Blood Wolf Tribe to find Lang Qi and ask them about the situation there.” See if there is a problem in the Rabbit Tribe’s territory or if it is the same in all areas.

Bai An nodded, he thought so too.

“By the way, there is also the matter of fallen beasts,” Bai Tu said, “remind them as well.” There are beastmen that have appeared. The wolf tribe is a little more dangerous than the rabbit tribe, but the real reason for turning into fallen beasts is still unknown so far, otherwise it can be avoided in advance.

After returning to the cave, Bai Tu started thinking about how to increase the defense of the tribe. Patrolling is a good way, but the disadvantages are also obvious. People have to be sent out every day. These patrolling orcs cannot participate in hunting the next day, and it is impossible to use weak orcs for patrolling. This leads to a reduction in the number of hunting team members. Even if the hunting plan is changed to trap capture, it will not work if the number of people is too small.

But it is obviously impossible not to defend. Not to mention the beastman who is said to be more powerful than ordinary orcs, just the Mad Lion Tribe must be guarded against. Bai Tu wants to frown every time he thinks of this tribe. Even if the other party has not done anything to their tribe now, it is still a dangerous existence. But it is impossible to get rid of this tribe in a short time. After all, tribes that take the initiative to provoke war generally do not have a good end, and the Snow Rabbit Tribe is weaker than the surrounding tribes.

It would be best to be able to defend once and for all through physical means, not actively attacking, but also preventing others from coming in. Bai Tu thought about it and couldn’t help but think of the ancient city walls. However, building a city wall is still an almost impossible task for them now. Not to mention how many stones are needed to build a city wall, just building it is not something that can be completed overnight.

We can only try another method, preferably one that the rabbit tribe is good at. Thinking of this, Bai Tu suddenly slapped his forehead. Trap… digging holes… trench defense! This is a defense method tailor-made for the rabbit tribe.

There is an open space at the foot of the mountain where the tribe lives now. It is where everyone eats. Further out is a forest with lush vegetation similar to other places.

The orcs who keep watch at night guard this area, and it is also the place that needs special attention during patrols. After all, the territory is so large that it is impossible to patrol it all in one day. If that were the case, the entire rabbit tribe would not need to do anything else, and they might not be able to complete the territory during daily patrols.

Bai Tu sat up directly, found a half-burned branch and drew on the ground. There was no pen or paper, so in addition to carving with a stone knife, charcoal sticks were also one of the ways to record. It was very convenient to get the materials, and there were plenty of them next to the fire.

Bai Tu first drew a rough range of the tribal mountain, then circled it and calculated the feasibility of doing so. The main thing was that the trench must be deep and wide enough, at least deeper than a trap used to catch prey.

After digging, only one road needs to be left. The orcs will pass through this road when entering and leaving the tribe. This is the only road that needs to be guarded every night. Just keep an eye on this place and there is no need to arrange for patrols. The workload has increased a lot in a short period of time, but in the long run, the benefits definitely outweigh the disadvantages.

If you want to be safer, you can even leave no road and use huge wooden boards as bridges. When you need to enter or exit, slide the boards to the other side and pass on them. After you leave, slide the boards back. In this way, no matter which tribe wants to come in, they have to get their consent.

The important thing is that there are almost no Feathered Tribe in the Eastern Continent, and almost all the flying orcs are gathered in the Southern Continent. The trench can completely block 99% of the orcs in the Eastern Continent, and the Southern Continent, where there are many Feathered Tribe, will not easily cross such a large area to find them.

The more he thought about this idea, the more feasible it seemed. Bai Tu couldn’t sleep and went to discuss it with Bai An.

Bai An never expected that Bai Tu, who had just left, would come back again with a plan of defense. After hearing Bai Tu’s plan, Bai An thought for a while.

Digging a trench around the residence is not a trivial matter. It will take one or two months for the entire tribe to go out together, and they also need to hunt and gather, so half of the orcs can only dig at night. But it must be said that this plan is very tempting. After digging, it can last for a long time. During this period, there is no need to go out for patrol every night, and even fewer people are needed for night watch. You must know that after Tu Cheng left, the number of people on night watch in their tribe became six, and no one knew whether an orc would sneak out or sneak in from some corner.

After thinking it through, Bai An couldn’t help but nodded: “Dig!” Digging once can provide continuous defense, how can such a good thing not be done.

Bai An was also a decisive man. Early the next morning, he summoned all the orcs in the tribe to discuss digging defensive trenches.

Bai Tu didn’t follow him, he was cooking. It was not easy for Hei Xiao to come once, and the next time would be at least half a month later, or even longer. Of course, he had to make something delicious for him to taste.

Heixiao sat on the stool and studied the rocking chair next to him: “What is this?”

“A rocking chair, try sitting on it.”

“Did you make all these tools?” Heixiao felt that the rabbit tribe was weak in terms of military strength, but their life was still good. Heixiao somewhat understood why Bai Tu wanted to stay here.

“It was my own idea, and the tribesmen helped to make it.” Bai Tu said. Most orcs didn’t pay attention to these things, but he was used to using wooden furniture. It happened that everyone was idle in the second half of the rainy season, so he made a lot of it at once, from tables, chairs, benches to cabinets. He made everything, except for a bed, which could be arranged during the snowy season, but it was more comfortable to sleep on the floor in summer.

In fact, Bai Tu had another idea before he made the bed. He missed the kang a little. It was more comfortable to lie on it in winter than in other places. The cave was big, and even if he lit a fire, it would not heat up too quickly. Moreover, it was too dangerous to make a fire in a closed environment, and ventilation was needed. It was obvious that it would not be very comfortable in winter. There would be no such worry if he burned a kang. The smoke outlet was outside, so there was no need to worry about poisoning. It would be better if the place for adding firewood was also outside, and it could burn for any length of time.

These are just preliminary plans and we need to take our time. However, the situation is better now than before. Bai Tu pointed to a wooden cabinet not far away and said, “That’s what I use to store my medicine. You can make one when you return to the tribe to prevent animal skins and food from being scattered everywhere.”

Orcs generally pile up supplies in every corner of the cave without any care. Bai Tu wanted to clean it up when he saw it. His cave was not the largest in the tribe, but it was definitely the tidiest.

Hei Xiao looked around and liked it more and more. After looking for a while, he suddenly said, “How about I stay in your tribe?”

Bai Tu was slightly startled and asked very seriously, “Are you sure?” Are you sure Hei Yan won’t rush over to kill me?

Hei Xiao read the second half of the sentence from Bai Tu’s eyes, thought about it seriously, and sighed regretfully: “Oh, forget it, Tu, you should never just find a partner casually in the future.”

Hei Xiao: Clingy, too clingy.

Hei Xiao is attacked by Hei Yan. Let me see if there is any cutie who is standing in the wrong place.