Ch76.1 – Hot Pot
Zhu Zhan had been given medicinal herbs that would weaken him. making it so that he was unable to support himself or walk even short distances. So naturally, this meant that he and his men had no way to leave.
Xiong He was warm and hospitable as he invited them to stay and even arranged a separate cave for them to all live in.
This cave had just been excavated recently and wasn’t very big. It only had barely enough space for all of them to live in, but it was already a vast improvement over asking them to stay in the collective cave.
After they had been settled in, Xiong He and Xiong Ye continued to deal with the Barosaurus.
It was such a big Barosaurus and had so much meat… Just thinking about it made people happy!
Xiong He led people to cut the Barosaurus into pieces, then brought the entire dinosaur back to the tribe, leaving nothing behind. Even the bones were brought back.
Although they had recently obtained a lot of meat, they were still unaccustomed to wasting food.
Besides, these bones could be used for many things… A single one of these bones was already big enough to serve as a bench!
Of course, even before using it to make furniture, they would first scoop the bone marrow out; it couldn’t be wasted.
Bone marrow was truly delicious!
As for the Barosaurus meat… Because the Barosaurus had been poisoned, all the meat was first brought to the river and washed before being taken back to the tribe. They would boil it later to ensure that all the poison was removed.
As night fell, many fires were set up in the tribe, and several large pots were placed on the fire.
Today was another day where everyone could eat meat freely and fill their stomachs as they liked.
Zhou Ji yawned. When he arrived down in the valley, he saw Xiong Ye holding a sharp piece of stone and knocking it against a bone. It was obvious that he was trying to get the bone marrow out from inside the bone.
Zhou Ji thought about it and went over to find the priest, “I have a pretty good way of eating meat… Do you want to try it?”
The priest’s eyes lit up, “What method?”
Zhou Ji had always been able to make a variety of appetizing food. Now that Zhou Ji had spoken, he began to drool even as he felt his chrysanthemum tighten in phantom pain.
Chili peppers were delicious, but they also hurt his chrysanthemum!
However, he didn’t care!
“I’m talking about something called hot pot.” Zhou Ji said. “Have someone bring over an empty pot.”
The priest didn’t even hesitate before sending someone to empty out the largest pot they had.
This pot had been chiseled out not long ago back when the tribe hadn’t had enough prey to hunt and hadn’t gone out hunting. The priest had asked them to make it out of a large stone, so it was very big!
The man who was suspected of being Zhou Ji’s father had smashed one of their pots before, so they had to make a new one to replace it.
Zhou Ji saw a pot that was so huge that someone could curl up and sleep inside it and couldn’t help but give a heartfelt sigh over the amount of food beastmen could eat.
The tribe had even created a special frame in order to hold up this large pot. It was open on one side and surrounded the pot on the other three sides, and because the pot was too high, they had also placed stones on the sides they hadn’t left open so that people could stand on the stones and cook.
It was quite user-friendly.
Zhou Ji stood on the stone and roughly measured the pot’s capacity with a wooden spoon, then asked people to put some fat from the Barosaurus into the pot.
The people of the Giant Pig Tribe, who had just settled down in their cave, couldn’t help but sniff a few more times, “How fragrant!”
After they had arrived here in the wild forest, due to the fact that they hadn’t taken many things with them, they could only eat the meat of the prey they killed and roasted and hadn’t eaten anything good in a long time…
Zhu Zhan’s mouth was watering and full of saliva.
For better or worse, the others had already eaten. Only him… Although he had eaten his fill, he had thrown it all back up!
After melting down the Barosaurus fat in the pot, Zhou Ji poured in a bowl of fried chili peppers.
The dried chilis reheated in oil were simply too fragrant; Zhou Ji added some other spices and the entire valley was filled with a wonderful smell.
Of course, there were those who felt a little choked by this smell…
“What kind of smell is this?” The people of the Giant Pig Tribe sneezed repeatedly.
As for the people of the Big Bear Tribe… they were already used to this kind of feeling. The priest even commented, “Today’s smell… How could it be so fragrant!”
“Dried chili peppers fried in oil become even more fragrant.” Zhou Ji explained. He then had people add boiled water as well as some bone marrow into the pot.
In fact, they should have first stewed some bone soup before adding it to the chilis and oil, but there wasn’t enough time for that. Tossing the bones in like this would create a lot of foam that didn’t look very good…
So he simply put the water and bone marrow in directly.
The bone marrow would be particularly oily after it was boiled, but the people of the tribe would probably enjoy it.
Stone pots conducted heat very slowly. Although they had poured hot water into the pot, it still took a long time for it to boil. Zhou Ji finally said, “Alright, you can put meat inside now. When the slices of meat are cooked, you can fish them out and eat them.”
When the people of the tribe heard his words, they all came over and surrounded the pot. Xiong Ye was no exception.
Zhou Ji called out, “Xiong Ye!”
Xiong Ye immediately ran over to Zhou Ji’s side, “Zhou Ji, did you need something?”
Zhou Ji said, “The two of us will make another pot.”
He had purposely made a big pot for the tribe just so that he could avoid having everyone come find them in their cave and ask questions while he and Xiong Ye were eating.
Now that there was a big pot available, the others wouldn’t come and beg him to share even if they had made a small pot for themselves.
Xiong Ye’s eyes immediately lit up when he heard Zhou Ji’s words.
No matter how good the things in that big pot were, the things cooked in it definitely wouldn’t be as delicious as the food cooked in the small pot that Zhou Ji prepared specifically for them!
The two of them chose a spot in the valley to settle down. Xiong Ye moved over a stool for Zhou Ji, then set up their own pot and started a fire to begin cooking.
Zhou Ji fried the chili peppers with the very fragrant vegetable oil he had made himself.
In the modern era, only hot pot made with butter could be called fragrant. However, Barosaurus fat wasn’t as good as butter, so he simply chose to use vegetable oil instead.
He used the oil to stir fry the dried chili peppers, then added water and bone marrow… Zhou Ji also had Xiong Ye bring out a series of side dishes from their own cave.
The people of the tribe liked to eat meat, but he still preferred to pair it together with vegetables. If he had his way, he personally felt that vegetarian dishes were better.
Of course, he had also prepared a lot of meat for Xiong Ye’s sake.
Zhou Ji had just finished the preparations, and Xiong Ye already couldn’t wait any longer before dropping a piece of meat into the hot pot soup. Once the meat was cooked, he fished it up and asked Zhou Ji, “Will you eat this meat?”
“Yes.” Zhou Ji said.
Xiong Ye placed the piece of meat into Zhou Ji’s bowl.
At the same time, Zhou Ji placed a green vegetable into Xiong Ye’s bowl.
Xiong Ye: “……”
The two of them had a pot of their own and ate together particularly comfortably, making the people of the tribe feel a little envious watching them.
Of course, the most envious people were the ones from the Giant Pig Tribe.
The people of the Giant Pig Tribe felt that the scent of the fried chili peppers was a bit intimidating, so they didn’t like it. But after the people in the tribe began to cook hot pot…
“What exactly are they doing? Why does it smell so good!?”
“They’re all fighting over it. It looks very delicious.”
“I want to try it…”
……
Zhu Zhan’s subordinates were all discussing the hot pot. Zhu Zhan swallowed hard; this talk only served to make him even hungrier. At this time, he suddenly thought of something, “Don’t I have some clothing? You can use my clothing to trade them for something to eat!”
This tribe had taken down a Barosaurus and definitely weren’t short on meat, but wasn’t the clothing they had brought with them from their tribe very valuable?
He had used a hundred kilograms of meat to trade for that clothing!
However, he liked his animal form, so he didn’t wear that clothing very often.
“My lord, the people of this tribe also wear clothes. Our clothing probably isn’t worth much.” One of Zhu Zhan’s subordinates sounded quite dismal as he spoke.
“They also wear clothes?” Zhu Zhan looked down and saw Zhou Ji who was wearing clothes as he ate hot pot alone with Xiong Ye.
It was already dark out, but the tribe had lit fires, and the two moons in the sky shed a lot of light on the scene… They could see Zhou Ji’s appearance very clearly.
Zhou Ji’s skin was snow white, his black hair glossy. Not only did he wear clothing, he was also wearing shoes. When he ate, his teeth could be seen… His teeth weren’t worn down at all!
Even those well-raised brothers of Zhu Zhan weren’t in as good of a state as he was.
Zhu Zhan clicked his tongue, then said, “Bring me down there. We’ll go over and take a look.”
Zhu Zhan’s men immediately carried the still-weak Zhu Zhan down to the valley.
Zhou Ji and Xiong Ye were eating meat at the moment.
The flavor of Barosaurus was actually quite good. Zhou Ji ate quite a lot of it, and when Xiong Ye saw this, he immediately went to obtain some more. After cutting it into small pieces and washing it clean, he gave it to Zhou Ji and let Zhou Ji eat as he liked.
He was very happy seeing Zhou Ji enjoy his food so much.
“Zhou Ji, this hot pot is really delicious.” Xiong Ye said.
“It’s indeed quite nice, only it’s a bit too hot for it in summer… It’s truly delicious in winter.” Zhou Ji said.
Now that Zhou Ji had mentioned this… Xiong Ye immediately began to look forward to it.
If he could eat this kind of hot pot in winter… He would rather not hibernate!
Zhu Zhan arrived while the two were talking.
After his leg had been healed, Zhu Zhan looked a lot calmer. He sat down beside Xiong Ye and spoke to him, “I saw you before I fell unconscious. I heard that you were the one who brought me back? Thank you.”
“No need for thanks.” Xiong Ye said.
“Thanks is definitely needed. How could I not be thankful!” Zhu Zhan refuted him, then looked at Zhou Ji, “This is?”
“This is Zhou Ji, my mate. He was the one who healed your injury.” Xiong Ye introduced them.
Zhu Zhan was shocked. He had been told before that his injury had been healed by the Beast God’s messenger, but he hadn’t expected that the person in front of him would be that supposed Beast God’s messenger.
No wonder he had such a noble and delicate appearance!
Zhu Zhan’s expression was complicated as he glanced at Zhou Ji again, “I didn’t expect that there would actually be people who could cure blasphemers in this wild forest.”
“It’s just an injured bone, not some sign of a blasphemer.” Zhou Ji said.
At first, when Zhu Zhan heard that Zhou Ji was the Beast God’s messenger, he had been a little unhappy. Now that he heard Zhou Ji say such things, his impression of Zhou Ji improved a lot.
He laughed and said, “If only everyone thought like you. I wouldn’t have been forced to this place, then!”
“My lord, it’s good that you came here. Your leg has been fixed!” Someone spoke up from behind Zhu Zhan.
“But how many people died?” Zhu Zhan shot back.
The person behind Zhu Zhan froze.
And at this moment, Zhu Zhan turned back to speak to Xiong Ye and Zhou Ji again.
Xiong Ye didn’t know much about the outside world and didn’t say much, but Zhou Ji asked him about many things.
Zhu Zhan didn’t hide anything and shared all of it, even explaining his origins.
Zhou Ji listened very carefully.
The more Zhu Zhan spoke, the more depressed he became––he had been talking to these two people for so long, but neither of them had even thought to invite him to eat!
Before, he had already felt that their food smelled particularly good when he was in the cave, and he couldn’t help wanting to eat it. Now that the food was right in front of his eyes, he wanted to eat it even more…