Crossing to Live in the Wilderness Plains 086
Chapter 86
What happened this winter was beyond the beastfolk’s imaginations. The antelope-dragon herd came and went swiftly, and soon disappeared from everyone’s sight after just a short while. Seeing that the danger had been lifted, Ali went on with his guard duty. Aze was worried about leaving him alone and stayed with him. Chen Qi and Ake went home first.
Seeing the two men return, Ka Luo rushed up to meet them and asked anxiously, “What’s going on? Did something happen?”
Ake shook his head and patted him on the shoulder reassuringly. He replied, “It’s nothing dangerous. It’s just a herd of antelope-dragons passing by. They were heading in the same direction as the locust dragon swarm.”
“…” Ka Luo was silent, “Why would the herbivorous and solitary antelope-dragons appear on the Dora Plains? The stegosauruses won’t show up in the next few days, will they?”
Chen Qi gave him a look, “What nonsense are you spouting? If all the stegosauruses, those huge creatures, ran out here, a single foot of theirs would be able to flatten our small place.” Having said that much, Chen Qi paused for a moment, then looked at Ake and asked with a little uncertainty, “The stegosauruses would not really come out for a stroll on a whim, right? As far as I know, the stegosaurus seemed to like living alone.” Chen Qi turned to look at Ka Luo. “And they’re also herbivores.”
Ka Luo was so frightened by Chen Qi that he hurriedly leaned into Ake.
Ake shrugged his shoulders and made an indifferent expression. He walked over to the small wooden bed and picked up Ayao then sat by the heated kang bed. Now Ayao could crawl. Ake was planning to let him learn how to stand up. As long as he could stand up, it would not be long for him to be able to walk and run. Every time he saw it, Chen Qi was impressed by the pace the beastmen grew at. At the moment, he did not need to compare to believe that children here grew much faster than children in his world.
Ka Luo gulped. As old as he was, he had never seen a living stegosaurus, but he had definitely seen the stegosauruses hunted back by the females at their coming-of-age ceremonies every year. The strong body and sharp sword horns, he couldn’t help shaking when he recalled them. “Chen Qi, do you think we should build a taller wall? If the stegosaurus were really to…”
Chen Qi sighed. If a group of stegosaurus really came to attack, it would be useless no matter how high they built the wall. However, if they just passed by like the antelope-dragon herd, then it would be meaningless to build the wall taller. Chen Qi thought for a moment, “Let’s move the pucks we made earlier to the wall, and then prepare more oil and torches that can burn easily. If we really do encounter an attack, we will have more attack methods.”
Crossing to Live in the Wilderness Plains (CLWP) is translated by Betwixted Translations. The site you’re reading this chapter on stole our translation.
Both Ake and Ka Luo nodded.
There was not much difference in the surroundings of the Lion-Wolf Tribe compared to what they saw when they last came here. It seemed that the information they previously sent back with Ale had not been accepted by the Lion-Wolf Tribe.
Seeing the disappointment in Azhang’s eyes, Ahxu explained: “The people of the Lion-Wolf Tribe think that if they are attacked after the wall is built, they will not even be able to leave. After all, there are many of them, and there are also many elderly or those who have been injured and have lost the ability to transform into their beast forms. They need to take care of the needs of these people. Moreover, the Lion-Wolf Tribe is different from where you live. They are surrounded by mountains on three sides. The only way out is the area in front of them. They usually have many females guarding all around the area, so it doesn’t make much sense to have a wall.”
Azhang interrupted him, “Do our people live with their elderly?” Originally, he’d sent his clansmen here also because the Lion-Wolf Tribe would arrange the people who were incapable of fighting to live at the foot of the mountain, which was the safest place in the tribe, with enough females guarding the periphery.
Ahxu nodded. He was also very grateful to the Lion-Wolf Tribe for that reason. If it weren’t for the help of the Lion-Wolf Tribe, it would have been difficult for the rest of them to cope with this winter. The changes this winter were really too drastic. It wasn’t just the locust dragon swarms that were passing by, the hyena-drakes had also started ambushing passing beastmen. In the past, they’d obviously only attacked the places where the tribes were, and there would even be early warning signs from the messenger eagle. The beastmen were able to be prepared in advance. So unless there was a great difference in numbers, it would be impossible to suffer heavy losses.
“We were attacked by hyena-drakes some time ago.” Azhang and Ahxu briefly talked about that situation.
“You didn’t see messenger eagles during that attack?”
Azhang was dazed, “Didn’t see messenger eagles? Did you see any messenger eagles in the attack you encountered last time?” What they encountered were hyena-drakes that broke in through a hole. Azhang thought it was that the hyena-drakes had hidden deep underground for a long period of time, so the messenger eagle didn’t appear. It seemed things were not as he assumed.
Ahxu shook his head. If they caught sight of a messenger eagle, they would have detoured to a different route.
Azhang’s face sank, recalling the female hyena-drake’s actions from before, “I’m afraid it’s not that we don’t see the messenger eagles, but that the hyena-drakes have learned to avoid the messenger eagles.”
Crossing to Live in the Wilderness Plains (CLWP) is translated by Betwixted Translations. The site you’re reading this chapter on stole our translation.
Ahxu stopped in his tracks and looked at Azhang in horror. “What do you mean?”
Before the two of them arrived at the chief’s house, loud wolf howls spread throughout the whole tribe from all directions. Some females who were originally in the center of the tribe quickly gathered together and rushed out, while some males who had been out visiting hurried back into their own homes. The Lion-Wolf Tribe fell into chaos in an instant.
“There is an attack. The chief may have gone out of the tribe. Let’s go out and check the situation first.”
Azhang nodded, and the two men turned to head out of the tribe.
A huge locust dragon swarm was previously walking leisurely on the plains, but at the moment they were crazily chasing after the antelope-dragon herd. After all, the antelope-dragons were escorting their young with them, so even though they were originally fast, they had to slow down now, and could not get rid of the annoying locust dragons behind them.
It wasn’t known how the antelope-dragons had angered the locust dragons. Their numbers were already greater than the antelope-dragons’, yet now the lead adult male locust dragon had its tentacles raised high, seeming to really want to catch the hateful things in front of them that they couldn’t catch up to.
“How could the antelope-dragons appear here?”
“Why are the locust dragons here again? Didn’t they already come once before?”
“Are they still headed to the Dosa River? Our tribe is so far away from the Dosa River. Why do they have to pass by here each time?”
Continuous complaints from the beastmen came, one after the other. Ahxu smiled with irony. “It seems we don’t need to pass on information anymore.”
At this time, Ale squeezed in from the crowd in front and found the two men, then hurriedly came in front of them. “The antelope-dragon’s are too fast. When I spotted them, I was just about to head back to send a message and they had already arrived. I only had time to send out a signal.”
Before Ale had finished speaking, the antelope-dragon herd up ahead had already galloped past the tribe. They were herbivorous dragons and had no interest in the beast people. As long as these beast people didn’t block their way unwisely, the antelope-dragons probably wouldn’t even bother to glance at them.
Of course, at this time, there wasn’t anyone who was not afraid of death to dare to stand in front of a group of running dragons. The few beastmen who were standing closer to their path even retreated a certain distance away, lest any antelope-dragon suddenly left the herd and rushed out.
Following the vibrations of the passing herd of antelope-dragons, a loud noise came from behind the tribe. Azhang looked back and saw that the outermost rock mountain seemed to have crumbled, and white snow poured down, almost in the blink of an eye. All the houses at the foot of the mountain were buried under the snow, and they disappeared in an instant. Snow and mist filled the sky, covering the heads and faces of the beastmen standing out there.
Ale was so surprised that he couldn’t close his mouth. He asked Azhang in a trembling voice, “Uncle Azhang, is the Beast God angry?”
Azhang wore a terrible and gloomy expression. If Chen Qi were here, he could ask him what was going on. Chen Qi was so smart that he might have been able to guess something. But there was no time for them to think more right now. Azhang smacked Ale directly on the back of the head to wake him up from thoughts of the Beast God’s fury. “Don’t talk about this. It’s important to go and save people first.” He had seen many people moving around in those houses that were just buried under the snow.
The beastmen from the Lion-Wolf Tribe also reacted. Leaving a group of people on guard in front, the rest all rushed over to dig at the snow and try to rescue the people buried underneath it.
The clansmen sent by the Rock-Mountain Tribe happened to be near the snow-buried houses. Azhang asked Ale and Ahxu to take them to a safe place first, then he also joined the ranks in digging snow.
Crossing to Live in the Wilderness Plains (CLWP) is translated by Betwixted Translations. The site you’re reading this chapter on stole our translation.
If Chen Qi were here, he would have told him that it was a very dangerous thing to enter the snow to rescue people immediately after the avalanche. Almost as soon as the beast people entered the avalanched area, the locust dragon swarm that was following arrived near the tribe. Their figures were much larger than those of antelope-dragons, and their force when rushing past was no different from a small earthquake. The snow on the rock mountain that had avalanched began to rumble down again, this time completely revealing the original reddish-brown surface of the rock mountain.
Some of the females who had reached the foot of the mountain were unable to escape and were directly submerged in the snow. Azhang had just reached the outer edge but was also thrown to the ground by the snow and took in a big mouthful of icy snow.
Everyone was shocked. Once could still be called an accident, but could it still be an accident if it happened twice? Could the Beast God really be angry? Or did someone who angered the Beast God get buried, so the Beast God forbade anyone to save him?
The simple beast people had no knowledge of avalanches at all. They could only push all unreasonable things onto the Beast God, so that those originally unreasonable things could become reasonable again.
As the crowd was stunned, a loud shout rang out from the silent crowd, “What are you all doing standing around? Hurry up and save people.”
With red eyes, Ai Li rushed into the snow like a mad beast, digging at the snow with his hands. His home was within the area covered by the snow. His child, his less than two years old child who had just lost his dad, was still sleeping at home. He had just left for a while. Why did this happen?
A strong female who stood beside him, knelt down to dig at the snow with him.
All of them who were originally staring blankly in a daze returned to their senses one after another. Seeing a male so desperately wanting to rescue people buried under the snow, they quickly shook their heads to throw away those bad thoughts in their minds and rejoined the efforts to clear the snow.
The locust dragon swarm and the antelope-dragon herd came and went quickly. After all the slow locust dragons passed through, the females who had stayed behind to remain on guard also came back to help rescue the people buried in the snow. The whole Lion-Wolf Tribe was shrouded in a sad atmosphere, but no one was crying loudly. They all just worked hard with red eyes holding back tears.
A tall and strong giant wolf by the Dosa River just drank enough water and raised its head slightly to look at the approaching groups of antelope-dragons and locust dragons. Its golden eyes became a deeper shade because they reflected the red glow of the sunset. Giving them just a slight glance, it proceeded to turn around and left quickly along the river bank before the dragons approached.
The leader of the antelope-dragon herd slowed down when it saw the giant wolf-god from a distance. Then it raised its head towards the sky and let out a shrill call. All the antelope-dragons who heard the signal slowed down.
Apparently, the leader of the locust dragon swarm also saw this scene and held its tentacles high above its head. The locust dragons who saw their leader’s movements also stopped and raised their tentacles up as if they were conveying some information to each other.
“Aze, do you think today’s sunset is glowing a bit too red?” Chen Qi, who was accompanying Aze on guard duty, looked at the sky that was almost as red as blood and asked the person beside him.
“En.”
“I have heard a saying that the more beautiful things are, the more dangerous things are hidden behind them.”
Aze turned to look at him. Chen Qi’s originally beautiful black eyes seemed to be a little darker because they reflected a little bit of the color of the sky. Aze could not understand Chen Qi’s mood at the moment.
Words from the Translation Crew
Miiya: Sorry for the inconsistent updates. There’ll be another update this Sat, but here’s a pre-weekend update thanks being juiced up with some Kofi 😉 Hope you enjoy the read!
Translator: Miiya
Editor: MushroomNight73
Proofreader: Yume
Editor stepping into the realm of MTL translating, starting with CLWP. Support this translation with a Ko-fi. Three Ko-fis will add an extra chapter from the stockpile to the next weekly release.
This is so mysterious
Thanks for translation