This long-clawed squirrel monkey was clever and it knew a lot, it even seemed like it was well aware of human behaviour.
Shao Xuan stared at the squirrel monkey. His stare was so intense that raised its claws in caution.
The squirrel monkey was frightened. Its original plan was to run off during their fight. However, it didn’t think that it would once again fall back into Shao Xuan’s hands. If it was captured by the gang just now, it would have been better. The chance of escaping would be higher. Now that it was with Shao Xuan, it was very worried!
It took a long time for the squirrel monkey to voice out a vague cry that sounded like protest.
“No?” Shao Xuan glanced at the squirrel monkey, which curled up anxiously. “Oh well, how about I send you to God now?”
The squirrel monkey got anxious as it saw Shao Xuan was ready to kill him. It screamed hastily, its pitiful eyes glimmered in the light. Anyone who looked into its eyes would have been softened up.
For a moment, Shao Xuan was shaken. However, in a split second, he knew this was the squirrel monkey’s tactic. The sneaky thing!
As expected, as the squirrel monkey realised that Shao Xuan did not fall for its little trick, its gaze turned ferocious and its face turned hideous. The monkey’s mouth opened, baring its four sharp teeth murderously. It was no longer the tendered eyes pitiful-looking squirrel monkey. Instead, it was a demon on fire.
This sudden change could have caused a great shock and mental pressure to those who had the trait of cowardice, traumatizing them for a long time. An ordinary human would fluster and make a mistake.
Shao Xuan took one step back without showing any signs of panic. He raised his hand and reached it out to a few metres away from the forehead of the squirrel monkey. Under its ferocious glare, he produced a ball of blue flame from his palm.
The expression of the squirrel monkey went numb; its rage-filled eyes turned into eyes filled with fear of death. It squealed shrilly, trying to break free from Shao Xuan’s hand so that it could leave this place. However, with the vines, it had no way to break free.
“So, have you decided? Choose wisely… If you are honest with me, I will let you go, or else, I cannot guarantee that you will live past today.” Shao Xuan said.
Upon hearing this, the squirrel monkey did not think that he would be able to get away through his tactic like before. It knew what the flame could do to it. However, it never thought it would have been seeing this in such a deep forest. It was extremely disgusted and frightened by the flame. After several moments of gibbering, the squirrel monkey seemed like it had made a decision. It adjusted his posture. Its stomach bulging and contracting, squirming like there was something inside it. Then, a fist-like thing rolled out from its mouth.
Shao Xuan frowned and ripped off the leaves on the tree beside him. Then, he picked up the thing from the ground and wiped off the mucus on it.
“Fruit?” Shao Xuan asked with uncertainty.
The fruit was covered with a thick layer of skin. Thus, it was not digested by the squirrel monkey after it was swallowed.
After wiping off the dirt from it, the fruit gave off a pleasant scent- not strong, but intoxicating.
Although Shao Xuan wasn’t sure what the fruit was, the five people from before and the grudging face made by the squirrel monkey told him that this fruit was special. It would provide great benefit to human beings and fierce beasts.
While Shao Xuan was observing the fruit, the squirrel monkey was in a state of restlessness with anxiety. It peeked at Shao Xuan from time to time, but it couldn’t look straight at him. It clawed the ground repeatedly though it did not extend its class fully- it was afraid that Shao Xuan would cut them off.
“Those people were looking for this?” Shao Xuan asked the squirrel monkey while holding the fruit.
The squirrel monkey nodded his head furiously.
“Hmm.” Shao Xuan acknowledged its answer. Then, he kept the fruit covered in clean leaves and put it into his animal skin sack as the monkey watched.
When the squirrel monkey saw that Shao Xuan was looking at him, it stopped staring at the fruit. Instead, it curled up and looked at Shao Xuan, hoping that Shao Xuan would let it leave.
Shao Xuan never intended to enslave this creature and he had no plan of enslaving his second slave now. He was not familiar with this matter after all. After listening to Ji Ju, he realised that the matter of enslaving involved a lot more than he thought. If he wasn’t careful when choosing his slaves, he might involve himself with unnecessary troubles. Thus, he decided to be cautious as he did not have a lot of knowledge regarding enslaving.
Shao Xuan grabbed his stone knife and swung it at the squirrel monkey that gave him a terrified look.
The squirrel monkey thought it was about to be killed. It closed its eyes in acceptance of its fate, yet it felt the manacle that was preventing it from running away loosen. It opened its eyes in delight. There was a moment when it was contemplating to snatch the fruit back, however, it tossed aside this plan in a split second. It knew that Shao Xuan was different from all the people it had met, he was much stronger and scarier. It was lucky that it could get away from this now, but if it wanted to try provoking him again, it would surely die.
The squirrel monkey stopped thinking, suppressing its desire to get the fruit. It was planning to leave when it heard Shao Xuan calling it and said, “wait.”
The squirrel monkey got stiff and turned its body to face Shao Xuan slowly, like a robot, while thinking What now?
“Do you know about the Flaming Horn tribe?” Shao Xuan asked.
The squirrel monkey was stunned upon hearing his question. It pointed towards a direction with confusion while groaning, it sounded like it could not understand the intention of Shao Xuan saying this. Thus, it grunted to ask whether Shao Xuan was referring to the Flaming Horn tribe in the direction it was pointing at. It had seen people from that tribe before this, it could sense that Shao Xuan was similar to them, thus it was bewildered after hearing this question.
“In that direction?” Shao Xuan looked in the direction the squirrel monkey pointed. It was similar to the direction where he was heading.
“Sqeak!” The squirrel monkey once again grunted after Shao Xuan’s question. It wasn’t sure what Shao Xuan meant but it nodded anyway.
“Alright, you can leave.” Shao Xuan waved at the squirrel monkey.
The squirrel monkey disappeared from Shao Xuan’s sight in an instant, it did not walk away step by step like last time. It ran hurriedly while thinking that it would take a detour to distance itself from Shao Xuan as far as possible the next time it spotted Shao Xuan.
Shao Xuan headed in the direction he planned to after he organised his stuff.
The five-people gang from before searched for Shao Xuan in the forest. However, they did not manage to find him. When it was time to head back, they returned to their tribe with regret.
They were from the Taihe tribe, located next to the Flaming Horn tribe. Fights happened all the time, it was also normal that the things they had their eye on for would get snatched away by the people from the other tribe. However, this time it was by the Flaming Horn tribe, which they despised. Thus, they were very annoyed.
After the gang of five returned to their tribe, they informed the chief and elders that their mission was unaccomplished and the target had been snatched by a person from the Flaming Horn tribe. Upon hearing this, all the leaders were sullen.
The fruit, known as Pure Fruit was discovered by the warrior of the Taihe tribe in the forest during his hunt. He couldn’t get it during that time due to the number of fierce beasts that were hiding near the fruit. It was impossible for him to get the fruit as per his ability. Thus, he returned to the tribe and notified the tribe master regarding this discovery.
Pure Fruit was a fruit that could improve the strength of the warrior greatly, and it was very rare. Thus, this fruit was the favourite of most of the animals in the forest for it aided in the strength improvement of various animals in the forest. The smell of Pure Fruit was almost unnoticeable, it was nearly impossible to be discovered by humans.
On the other hand, most animals were more sensitive to smell when compared to humans. Thus, they would have been able to discover Pure Fruit much earlier than humans. Usually, if people found the plant, its fruit would’ve been consumed by animals already so it was very rare.
People from Taihe tribe had learned from their history and experience that when they discovered something valuable, the first priority was not to guard it against the beasts, but to hide it from their brutal neighbour, the Flaming Horn tribe. In order to obtain the Pure Fruit, the people from the Taihe tribe had made an effort in planning and concealing.
Through discussion, they decided to keep this mission secret, sending a team secretly to procure the fruit. They kept a low profile to avoid the mission being discovered by the people from the Flaming Horn tribe. It was a coincidence that the Flaming Horn tribe was carrying out hunting activities and did not notice the activities of the Taihe tribe, which increased their success rate in getting the fruit.
Unfortunately, during their procurement, the fruit was snatched by a squirrel monkey who was way too quick. The squirrel monkey swallowed the fruit as soon as it obtained it. Thus, once again, the team assigned two persons to return to the tribe and report this situation to the tribe master, while the rest of the team kept on pursuing the squirrel monkey. However, the squirrel monkey was too fast. The team had entailed strenuous effort in tracing and pursuing it. They even lost the squirrel monkey’s trail on the way, which they decided to further split the team into smaller groups to search for it separately.
The process of chasing down the monkey was difficult. The forest was too vast, they were not familiar with the terrain as these areas were located far away from the tribe. In the end, the five person team found the squirrel monkey, but they were unable to snatch the Pure Fruit.
The first time they found the Pure Fruit, it was snatched by the squirrel monkey.
The second time they encountered the squirrel monkey, it was being snatched by the person from the Flaming Horn tribe.
The time they attempted to snatched it from the person from the Flaming Horn tribe, they failed miserably.
Couldn’t snatch the fruit.
Couldn’t beat the guy.
They’d spent so much effort on this, now it was all to waste! Wasn’t it infuriating?
Raw anger shot through a white-haired elder from Taihe tribe. He pointed at the people who came back empty-handed, scolding them sternly as they had failed the mission. He concluded it with “What’s the use of you all if you can’t even beat a person from the Flaming Horn tribe?!”
Those being scolded bowed their heads and thought what’s the meaning of ‘can’t even beat a person from the Flaming Horn tribe?’ Do you think it’s easy for you to fight the Flaming Horn tribe? If it’s easy, why do you lose to the old man from the Flaming Horn tribe every battle?”
However, they would never say this out loud. It was not a glamorous affair, that they could not beat the people from the Flaming Horn tribe. They had bigger numbers, but why was it that they were the ones who lost most of the time?
On the other hand, the Flaming Horn tribe had a successful day out hunting. They were bringing the booty back to their tribe when they met their nemeses from the Taihe tribe. Upon seeing that the people from the Taihe tribe were particularly insulting and sarcastic, the leader of the team was bewildered. I know every word they said, but why couldn’t I understand their meaning? Am I missing something?
Are they insane? The leader thought.
