Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Zhang Lisheng intuitively felt that there was a powerful power around the burning flame around his body, but he could not use this power for himself. He, whom it injured severely and could not even maintain his sitting posture, fell to the ground, listening to the dream-like chant of unknown meanings that had somehow filled the sky as his consciousness gradually blurred.
He only felt a sense of desperation that was both amusing and pathetic in his heart. Mixing both English and Mandarin together, he muttered to himself, “Sacrifice and war are the two great things about a country!… Indeed! Sacrifice and war are the two great things about a country! If the one I cultivated was the Witchcraft’s Gate of Sacrifice instead, perhaps I could have used the power of these beliefs to fight for my survival. This is just like a donkey trapped in a raw meat shop! There are so many nutritious foods everywhere, but it has no choice but to starve myself to death for not having a stomach that can process meat…”
As his eyes slowly grew lifeless, he eventually fainted.
Right at that instant when the young man lost his consciousness, his favorite jelly gem he bought from the jungle town in the Amazon and something he had worn on his wrist and an accessory he had never taken off before suddenly shone faintly in seven colors for the third time. It extended out along Zhang Lisheng’s fingers and eventually covered every part of his body.
The soft stone penetrated into his incomplete body, making up the flesh and bones on his body till they were complete again. When the blazing flame of faith came in contact with the jelly gem enveloping Zhang Lisheng, it was like a fog that had floated into the iceberg, as it condensed silently into grains of bean-sized shining colorless diamond pebbles that rolled to the ground.
As the beads condensed more and more, the flame on the Tudenan’s totem pole had extinguished slowly. The ray that the tribal book of history emitted as it hovered in the air gradually dimmed as well.
In the end, the heavy bark book fell from the air as though it had lost all its capabilities to support itself. It just so happened to crash down onto Zhang Lisheng’s head, who had become skinny but unscathed.
When his head was hit by the force, the young man’s body trembled and his eyes opened in a trance. Through the obscured haze, he could faintly see the thousands of bark houses surrounded by the fire and the countless indigenous people kneeling on the ground. Zhang Lisheng who had just been through a life-and-death situation pondered over it for a long time in confusion before finally realizing where he was.
“Great Raider! Y-You’re… What happened…” Right at this moment, the Tudenan headman asked horrifyingly in a whisper.
Earlier, when Tugra saw the tribe’s greatest reliance who suppressed their dissidents and who was also the biggest impedance of the headman to exercise his right, did not become stronger as the other ordinary spiritual monster guarding the tribe after taking in the offering, he became extremely panicked at once. However, at the same time, he also felt a bit of joy, so he could not tell what he was feeling at all.
He could only stand up in a panic first and kneeled again after he came near to the Raider. Incoherently, he spoke, “Legend has it that if a spiritual monster’s strength is not powerful enough, the extra offerings will just go to waste, and the offerings had never injured anyone…”
“Tugra, stop nagging! Flesh and blood! Give me the flesh and blood of beasts!” Suddenly, a slightly hoarse voice interrupted the Tudenan’s headman as it gave out an order.
“Flesh and blood! You want flesh and blood?” Having used to being ordered around, Tugra immediately stood up and shouted, “Lusula, flesh and blood! The Raider needs flesh and blood of the beasts…”
As he was shouting, his voice suddenly turned hesitated and into a whisper.
However, at this moment, the others had already heard the Tudenan’s headman’s order. Before he could finish his words, a fat aborigine who had two feathers on his heart stood up from the ground cleverly, and while howling and crying, he ran towards the beasts pile that they had piled up like a mountain, still covered with fresh blood.
“The flesh and blood of beasts… The flesh and blood of beasts… The Great Fanbeast! Didn’t the hunting team catch a Great Fangbeast today? Hurry! Offer it to the Raider now! Offer it to the Raider…”
Under the leadership of the Tudenan chores chief, soon, they transported a beast that looked like a wild boar with great buck teeth that weighed several hundreds of kilograms to Zhang Lisheng’s side.
When they had presented the beast’s naked body that they had cut open and was still emitting warm aura to the young man, he smelled the sweet bloodied scent in the air and gritted his teeth. Using his entire force, he brought his mouth to the flesh and blood without hesitation.
When the flesh and blood entered his stomach, Zhang Lisheng could feel that the depleted energy in his body had returned. He realized that he was finally completely out of danger, so he looked up and breathed a long sigh of relief, “Tugra, let the tribal warriors hunt some fresh flesh! The faster the better!”
As Tugra caught the eyes that were emitting faint radiance again on the Raider’s grey face, the complicated unexplainable feeling in his heart disappeared without a trace. Kneeling beside the Great Fangbeast that had become dry now, he buried his head in the muddy soil, and replied respectfully, “Yes, Great Raider!”
When night fell, Zhang Lisheng had already eaten the carcasses of seven wild beasts. In the next few days, his food intake did not decrease and the only difference was that he slowly recovered from eating raw meat to cooked food again.
After receiving the nourishment of countless essences from the blood food, the heavy injuries on the young man’s body soon recovered. Two weeks later, he recovered to his original state.
The afternoon sun sprinkled through the transparent crystal on the roof into the newly built bark house, giving the house a faint golden glow.
With his mind, Zhang Lisheng commanded the wizard power in his body to surge like a flowing river. Not feeling any slightest obstacle, a fleeting happy expression appeared on Zhang Lisheng’s calm face as he sat in this brand new bark house beside the Tudenan’s totem pole, enshrining the tribal book of history that had its layout completely changed by him.
Turning around and sitting on the animal leather chair under the enshrining platform, he looked up at the plain-looking bark book placed in the wooden cage on the high platform. After remaining silent for a long time, he suddenly said, “Tugra, I used to think it’s impossible for the spiritual monster to guard the Hellfire tribe for no reason in these tens of thousands of years. As expected, all of this is actually according to mutual benefit. The Hellfire people used their imaginary power of faith in exchange for protection from the spiritual monster and this seems to be quite a fair trade.”
“Great Raider, other than the Hellfire tribe’s faith, the offerings that the spiritual monsters receive include exquisite stone tools, the joy of blood sacrifices, and so on. They’re not as generous as you are to Tudenan!” The Tudenan’s aborigine who was kneeling behind the young man looked dumbfounded for a moment before replying with a blatant wry smile.
“No matter how many offerings there are, the most important offering is still the power of faith!” Zhang Lisheng turned around and took out a diamond-shaped round stone condensed from the flame of faith. Its brilliance had already converged, from the leather bag attached to his waist. Playing in his hand, he continued, “Who would have ever thought that this stone that has almost zero weight actually contains some kind of omnipotent power.”
After listening to the Raider’s words, Tugra hesitated for a while and whispered, “Raider, I don’t know if the power of faith is omnipotent, but I only know that, whether it’s in real life or in the legend, it should not… it should not…”
Zhang Lisheng knew that he was a creature from a foreign world in the Shrimp World No. 2, like a virus cell that invaded the body. The strange danger many mother cells would not encounter might just happen to him, particularly when it involved such mysterious things like faith and gods. With a good sense, he told Tugra as he shook his head, “There’s no need to explain anymore, Tugra! I was the one who had been too careless and did not take enough considerations. Stop thinking too much… all right, go call Turaru!”
“Yes, Raider!” The Tudenan’s headman appeared to relax a lot as he stood up and walked out of the treehouse.
As Zhang Lisheng watched the aborigine disappearing, he rubbed the jewel that was condensed from the flame of faith in his hand as a helpless expression appeared on his face when he muttered to himself, “The possibility of having a long life almost lost to the temptation of having supremacy, even if such temptation could only achieve the possibility of success by up to 20%. The complexity of the human heart is really unimaginable. It’s a good thing that there are few people like this in the Hellfire tribe… Ah, forget it. In any case, it’s much more beneficial for me to have such a person to occupy the position of the Tudenan’s headman during my absence. I might as well think of some other useful things carefully then! Sacrifice and war are the two great things about a country! If I could use the power of faith freely, the help it’d give me would be so huge that it’s unimaginable. Now that I have such a powerful force in front of me, I can’t use it at all! This is just… just a waste of a great treasure! Not only that, in accordance with my plan, Tudenan will only become stronger, and the Hellfire people believing in me will only increase in the future! Don’t tell me I’ll just let these go to waste like that?! No! No! I have to think of a way, think of a way…”
Faintly feeling that the power of faith would definitely be his biggest reliance, the young man frowned and forced himself to let his imagination run wild. As he was doing so, Tugra brought the first Tudenan warrior who had successfully accepted the Gold Core fragment implantation into the big bark house.
Both of them waited respectfully by the side until Zhang Lisheng finally turned his gaze to them. Only then did they crouched on the ground.
“Great Raider, you’re my living faith. You’re Tudenan…” The young aborigine warrior was the first to preach heartily.
After listening to the praises from his devout believer, Zhang Lisheng nodded and said, “Get up, Turaru. The reason I summoned you is that you’re the first Hellfire tribesman who successfully accepted the ‘gift ceremony’. I want to ask, has your strength been growing lately?”
“No, Great Raider!” When Turaru heard so, he froze for a moment before replying in frustration. “I have failed to live up to your expectations! Even though I bring my subordinated warriors to the jungle every day to hunt the most ferocious beast, I still …”
“No, no, Turaru! I’m not blaming you,” Zhang Lisheng burst out into a chuckle and shook his head. He put the faith stones back into the animal skin pocket at his waist and left only one that he took between his fingertips as he told the aborigine warrior, “This magical power I have given you will not increase by just relying on fighting beasts alone.”
