Chapter 168 Extra: Time Brings Great Changes To The World
Winter was very cold in the Big Bear Tribe, but Xiong Ye and Zhou Ji were warm and comfortable.
Regardless of whether it was Zhou Ji or Xiong Ye, they both felt that they’d experienced and seen too much along the way.
Zhou Ji discovered that although the mammals in the world couldn’t be eaten, there were many other substitutes for them. Xiong Ye was also amazed to learn that the world was so big!
They constantly made their way south. The temperature became warmer and warmer, until at last, it felt like it was almost the same as summer. At the same time, Zhou Ji became sunburned even though he’d been careful about avoiding the sun.
On that day, they made a stop by the seaside once again.
The water in this world was very clear. As long as the weather was good, and it was a place where the water wasn’t dirty, the fish even tens of meters under water could still be clearly seen from the surface.
Xiong Ye had liked water ever since he was young. He would dive into the sea, and it was easy for him to catch fish.
It was even easier for Zhou Ji to catch fish. When he used his plant powers, the kelp in the sea would roll up to catch fish and send them over to him.
They would always return with a full load of food. The only thing was that they would always have many fine grains of salt on their bodies every time they came back from going down to the sea… Both of them would have to find a river to bathe in every time they went into the sea to catch prey. After washing, Zhou Ji could shrink his animal form and enjoy having Xiong Ye comb his hair, but unfortunately, Xiong Ye’s animal form was too big now. Even though Zhou Ji wanted to comb Xiong Ye’s fur, he couldn’t comb his entire body.
Zhou Ji very much hoped that Xiong Ye would improve his strength so that he would ultimately be able to become bigger and smaller just like him. Unfortunately, they hadn’t found any Beast God Fruits during their journey and had only encountered monsters that were about the same level of strength as high level Beast Warriors.
Xiong Ye had killed all of them and eaten their meat. The crystal cores contained within their bodies was brought along so that he could use them to slowly cultivate.
Unfortunately, while Zhou Ji could absorb the energy in those crystal cores very quickly even if he swallowed them whole, Xiong Ye couldn’t do the same. He had to absorb the energy contained in the crystal cores very, very slowly.
However, even if he was slow, it would still be absorbed sooner or later… Zhou Ji had confidence in Xiong Ye.
Based on their strength, they would be able to live for at least another hundred years if they were careful. He wasn’t in a hurry.
After washing up, Zhou Ji began to cook.
They’d caught a very large fish that day, and Zhou Ji planned to bake the fish whole.
He removed the shells from some shellfish and conchs, mixed the meat with seasoning and stuffed them into the big fish’s belly, then sewed it back up. He cut some holes in the fish skin with a knife, then sprinkled more seasoning on top and finally grilled the entire fish over the fire…
Having spent more time cooking, Zhou Ji became even better at cooking. From time to time, he would even innovate and make new dishes, and the things he came up with were also very delicious.
The grilled fish this time was particularly fragrant.
A large fish like this had a lot of fat in its body and had very thick skin. It sizzled as it was grilled, and oil seeped out from the skin to drip down into the fire…
Xiong Ye’s drool was about to come out.
He’d liked to eat fish ever since he was young, but only after he got to know Zhou Ji did he realize that fish could be so tasty!
However, Zhou Ji’s eyebrows suddenly drew together in a frown before Xiong Ye could eat.
“Zhou Ji, what’s wrong?” Xiong Ye asked in puzzlement. Zhou Ji’s expression made it clear that something had just happened.
“Someone’s coming.” Zhou Ji said.
“Is there a problem with those people?” Xiong Ye asked. He already knew that Zhou Ji could ‘see’ things that were happening in the distance at any time. It wasn’t surprising for Zhou Ji to know this in advance, but… was there something unexpected about the people who were coming?
They didn’t even have to be afraid of Beast Kings now.
And if they encountered ordinary beastmen, they generally wouldn’t come up to offend them when they saw that they could wander around the wilderness with only the two of them.
“Those people are in a bad state.” Zhou Ji pointed out a direction and said, “They’re over there, bring them over here.”
“Alright.” Xiong Ye agreed, then ran in the direction Zhou Ji had pointed out. After a while, he could smell the beastmen and soon saw a group of several dozen people.
When Xiong Ye saw these people, he understood why Zhou Ji had told him to go.
These people were really in a bad state, and… there were many children amongst them.
Some of them were in their animal form, while others were human, but they were all bony. Some of the children’s arms were so thin they looked like they would break with a single fold.
Even in the past when the Big Bear Tribe was very poor, the children of the tribe wouldn’t be in such a bad state.
XIong Ye appeared in front of these people, “What’s wrong with you all?”
These people were obviously surprised when they saw Xiong Ye, and then they began to mumble amongst themselves. Xiong Ye couldn’t understand their language at all.
In fact, the language of the beastmen living in the wild forest was not the same as the language of the beastmen living in the Beastman Continent, and many people of the Beastman Continent didn’t speak the words the people of the wild forest used.
For example, words like ‘pottery’ hadn’t existed in the wild forest before.
However, the previous priest of the Big Bear Tribe had come from the Beastman Continent, so despite the fact the people of the Big Bear Tribe weren’t unfamiliar with the Beastman Continent’s language, they could still speak some of the same words. It was because of this that they didn’t have any communication problems when they’d gone to participate in the Beast God Sacrifice.
However, Xiong Ye couldn’t understand the people in front of him right now.
The wild forest was to the north of the Beastman Continent, and they were now in the far south of the Beastman Continent. The Beastmen that lived here were probably too far away from the Beast God Temple and probably had no connection with the tribes of the Beastman Continent at all.
Although he didn’t understand their language, Xiong Ye could still understand the fear in the eyes of these people.
After ‘jabbering’ at Xiong Ye for a long time, these people began to run forward, and some of them even pulled at Xiong Ye to make Xiong Ye run with them.
They… were they being chased?
Xiong Ye didn’t know what had happened to these people, but he planned to bring them to Zhou Ji.
Xiong Ye broke away from the person holding his hand and ran to the front, removing some trees and vines that blocked the way as he went.
Xiong Ye doing this was equivalent of helping clear the road for the people behind him. The people behind him were a little shocked, and then they started to run beside him, attempting to talk to him as they ran.
They soon arrived at the beach and smelled the thick fragrance of grilled fish.
Yearning expressions appeared on these people’s faces, but they also became more anxious at the same time.
Xiong Ye could vaguely guess that these people were afraid to implicate him… He smiled reassuringly at these people, then turned a corner and saw Zhou Ji.
Next to Zhou Ji was a pile of sweet potatoes.
This was a type of edible plant that Zhou Ji had found along the way. It tasted sweet when it was cooked, and Xiong Ye liked it very much. Zhou Ji also liked it, and they would sometimes roast and eat them from time to time during their journey.
However, they originally hadn’t planned to eat sweet potatoes that day. Zhou Ji had most likely grown so many sweet potatoes for the sake of the people he was leading back.
These people had obviously gone hungry for a long time, and it wasn’t good for them to directly eat fish from the sea. Eating sweet potatoes would be better for them.
After discovering that they were actually by the sea, these people were all a little dazed. And when they saw the big fish that Zhou Ji was grilling, they found it even more difficult to move their eyes away.
Zhou Ji smiled at these people and handed a sweet potato to a five or six year old child. He didn’t like to meddle, but he was willing to help people when he saw that they were going to starve to death.
The child obviously didn’t recognize the sweet potato, but likely because he was too starved, he took a big bite of it after accepting it, and then gobbled it all down–raw sweet potatoes carried a faint trace of sweetness, and they could tell that it could be eaten after trying it. Of course, another reason why the child had been so willing to eat it was probably due to hunger.
When the rest of the people saw this, their eyes all grew even wider. Seeing this, Xiong Ye picked up some sweet potatoes to give to them, and then gestured for them to eat.
These people all understood Xiong Ye’s gesture and immediately began to eat. While eating, they kept looking at Zhou Ji and Xiong Ye and spoke amongst themselves.
Xiong Ye gestured again to try and tell them that they couldn’t understand what they were saying. They froze for a moment, and then also began to gesture.
When Zhou Ji had transmigrated over, he’d known nothing about the language of the Big Bear Tribe and had to learn it slowly. Having had that experience, he could soon understand a bit of the language of these people after listening to these people with his spiritual powers.
Paired with these people’s gestures…
“They’re trying to tell us that there’s a powerful monster chasing them… They’re telling us to run away quickly.” Zhou Ji spoke to Xiong Ye.
“Monster?” Xiong Ye’s interest was immediately piqued.
Zhou Ji continued, “You can go and deal with the monster when it comes.” Xiong Ye really liked to fight, and Zhou Ji would never prevent him from indulging in this hobby.
“Alright,” Xiong Ye didn’t hesitate at all before agreeing.
Then, Zhou Ji turned around and said a word that represented ‘monster’ to them. After that, he very easily broke apart a piece of wood that Xiong Ye had brought back that was easily as thick as a beastman’s waist.
His meaning was that he wasn’t afraid of monsters.
These people didn’t trust Zhou Ji and gestured again to try and say that the monster was very big. However, they didn’t stop eating sweet potatoes even as they gestured, and it appeared like they felt that… since they were going to die anyway, they may as well eat their fill first.
Zhou Ji had seen far too many huge animals and naturally wouldn’t be concerned. In fact, he couldn’t wait to come across a big fellow!
Just as he was thinking this, Zhou Ji discovered that a big fellow was really coming.
In the sky, there seemed to be something huge flying over. It was… a dinosaur?
Although the creature was very much like a bird, but regardless of whether it was Xiong Ye or Zhou Ji, they both recognized what it was… it was a Pterosaur.
It was also the biggest type of Pterosaur, a Quetzalcoatlus.
That was already a pretty big deal, but the Quetzalcoatlus in front of them now should be on the same level as a Beast King!
The Quetzalcoatlus was the largest type of Pterosaur, and ordinary Quetzalcoatlus had ten meter wingspans. They weren’t heavy because they had to fly, but they weren’t small and could eat an entire sheep in one bite.
As for a Quetzalcoatlus that had become as strong as a Beast King… its wingspan was almost enough to blot out the entire sun.
The people who’d been eating sweet potatoes had previously been anxious and scared, but they calmed down after seeing the Quetzalcoatlus.
Or perhaps they weren’t calm, but were instead very numb because they felt that they wouldn’t be able to escape.
When Zhou Ji saw this scene, he could approximately figure out what was going on.
The Quetzalcoatlus had most likely been chasing these beastmen and treated the beastmen as food. These beastmen had probably been terrified of it.
Beastmen ate dinosaurs, but dinosaurs would also eat beastmen.
When beastmen died, they would turn into their human form and wouldn’t have fur or scales. They would definitely count as delicious and convenient food for dinosaurs.
Zhou Ji was used to seeing life and death and didn’t think that this was anything worth getting angry over, but Xiong Ye stood on the beastmen’s side and was obviously very angry at the Quetzalcoatlus.
Zhou Ji said, “It’s not easy for this dinosaur to get off the ground. Let it land on the ground first, and it’ll be very easy to deal with.” Although the Quetzalcoatlus was bigger than Xiong Ye, it definitely wasn’t as heavy as Xiong Ye was. Since they were both Beast Kings, Xiong Ye should be able to deal with it.