Yan Mo did not study this strange terrain, he only felt that the hard sand near a straight line is quite strange, it is as if nature has built a wall between the two quicksand pools, and that such a narrow wall can still stand, perhaps also related to the quicksand squeezing on both sides.
Leaving aside the unusual terrain, the thing that makes Yan Mo’s head hurts the most is the distance between their group and Bing and Yang Wei.
They’re lucky that the people of Yuanji are used to bringing bundles of straw ropes on long journeys. In addition to the leather cords on them, altogether they have two twenty meters or so ropes.
Yan Mo ties an overhand loop on the ends of the two straw ropes. Straw ropes wasn’t that sturdy to begin with, let alone ropes they have to improvise on the spot. So he needs to use both ropes and there’s no time to plait them into one straw rope.
“Who’s the strongest? Who can throw most accurately?”
Lie replies, “Shan’s the strongest. Bing throws the best, he’s not here so the best thrower is Diao.”
Yan Mo glances at Yuan Zhan, turns out you’re nothing special.
Yuan Zhan actually understands the little slave’s mocking eyes. He thinks inwardly, just wait till you see my strengths.
“Then can Diao-daren throw these two ropes near Bing-daren?”
Diao bent down to pick up the ropes, weighing them in his hand then looks at the distance, slightly hesitates, “The rope’s a little light, but I can try.”
“Wait.” Yan Mo gestures at Diao to give him the rope, and asked Shan for two pieces of their cured meat. He ties the rope around the meat then pulls the knot tight. Then returns the rope to Diao, “How’s the weight now?”
When Diao feels the weight, he grins, “You’re so smart! What a good idea!”
Yuan Zhan follows by rubbing the little slave’s head, Yan Mo’s face is filled with black line.
When they start the rescue plan, even Yan Mo doesn’t know whether it could succeed. But they can only deal with he desperate situation as salvageable.1
Yan Mo told the loudest Meng to shout to the two people, “Bing! Do it one by one. You’re in way deeper, we’ll pull you up first. Yang Wei you have to wait.” Bing, listen. Grab the ropes. If you’re afraid to release your grip, take off that meat on the rope and put the loop on your wrist. Then take both ropes and grab them with both hands.”
Bing and Yang Wei listens carefully.
“Our side will take the other end of the rope but we won’t pull you out with force. The quicksand will also pull you down! Not only will we fail to get you out, the quicksand will strangle you alive. You have to do it by yourself. You need to use the ropes as your support to climb out bit by bit. You absolutely can’t rush. After you get your body out, lean forward and inch to the sand. Continue to move towards the firm sand. You can also use your spear to gain leverage. After your whole body is out of the sand, try using the spear to climb up the narrow road, and walk towards us, can you do it?”
Bing rolls his eyes, “I’m not disabled. Throw me the rope, I can climb out if I have a rope!”
Seeing Bing is still lively, everyone feels lighter.
The straw ropes land near him. Bing inserts his spear into the narrow ground, one of his hands grasps the wooden spear as support while the other hand releases its grip little by little. This hand was digging into the sand before, the joints are still a bit stiff. He has to try hard for a while before he finally gets the ropes twisted to his wrist. He doesn’t waste the meats either. He eats it all to replenish his strength. He brings the ropes together and grips it as a guiding line as he was told to do.2
“Now–!” Yan Mo reminds the warriors to not pull him over, they just need to act like a wooden stake, hold the rope in place and let Bing climb out on his own.
“We’re ready Bing!”
Bing grasps the ropes and climbs out bit by bit. When most of his body has lied on the firm sand he stabs his spear into the sand. With that as anchor, he first pulls out one foot out slowly and places that foot onto the narrow road. He uses the spear as support to rise up little by little. He finally gets most of himself out of the suction, his body can now move around a bit.
Everyone looks on nervously at Bing. Yang Wei is also watching, head stretched up, wishing he is the one free and walking.
Bing, with the help of the spear and ropes, safely gets out of the quicksand. He has a secure foothold on the solid sand.
“Woooh–! Great! It worked!” Meng is overwhelmed with joy!
Lie who’s more calm also smiles widely. Although they have to spend a lot of time, this is the first time someone who has sunken more than half a body has come out alive of the sand.
“Now it’s Yang Wei’s turn.” Yan Mo finds that everyone has fallen into a weird silence after he said this sentence.
Meng clicks his tongue disdainfully. “That guy!” Though Meng looks scornful, he doesn’t voice opposition to the boy wanting to save Yang Wei.
Maybe because everyone has seen or heard what Yang Wei had done.
Yan Mo himself doesn’t want to save the Yang Wei. He feels that this guy will definitely hold them back. Save him this time, who knows how he’ll trouble the group again next time.
However!
“Yang Wei’s situation is not like Bing-daren. He is now lying on the road, he’s not that affected by quicksand, but he’s too timid. Even if we throw the rope to him, he might not be able to climb up. What’s more his legs can’t exert force, we don’t have time to wait for him to slowly climb up. In this case, we can be the one to pull him over.” Yan Mo picks up the rope Bing had thrown over and makes the loop at the end bigger, big enough that it can encircle a person’s waist.
“Throw the ropes to him, tell him to put them both on his body. That way there’s no worry about him losing his grip and we will have easier time pulling him up. One thing though. He only has a leather skirt on, ehm, and it’s gone now. As it is if we just drag him all the way over he’ll be seriously injured due to friction.”
“So what do we do?” Meng stares at the wide loop of ropes with bright sparkling eyes. He now feels Zhan’s little slave is so smart. They’ve had ropes since forever but never thought it can also be used to save people like this. The most important part is the rope’s knot!
If he makes the knot even bigger, if he throws over the rope with such knot, use the loop to catch beasts, then won’t he be able to loop then drag his prey home?
Waaa!!! That doesn’t seem difficult at all! He’ll definitely try that!
“Two ways. First, throw him some hide that can cover his whole body so he can put it on, then throw him the rope so we can drag him. The other way is, tie the ropes on the hide’s left and right sides, and then throw it over to Yang Wei. We let Yang Wei himself slowly climb onto the hide. He’ll clutch onto the hide’s both sides and climb up onto the hide. We pull the rope, dragging both the hide and Yang Wei over.”
Eventually everyone and Yang Wei himself chooses the first method.
Yang Wei grabs the rope and follows to Yan Mo’s directions, one rope is tied on his hips and the other under his armpits. Then he gathers the long part of the rope together and clutches onto them.
Yan Mo gives the directions, everyone pulls, and soon enough Yang Wei is pulled close to safety.
What’s unfortunate is that when dragging Yang Wei one of the straw ropes snaps under so much pressure. But fortunately the other rope lasts up until the last one meter of the road. Finally, everyone uses human train method, holding onto each other’s waist. Aside from Lie who hasn’t recovered from a fractured hand, they hold their companion in a line. At the front of the line, Shan leans out his body, his hand stretches forward to pull Yang Wei over.
Yang Wei is safe. But that doesn’t mean people are over what he did before.
Bing walks over to him, strips off the animal hide he’s wearing and threw it to Yan Mo. He drags Yang Wei up and takes him to one side, beating him up right then and there.
Yang Wei hugs his head and shrinks into himself, crying and yelping, letting his master punch and kick him.
No one goes over to talk Bing out of it, it seems that everyone thinks Yang Wei should be beaten.
The beating looks and sounds awful. …But serves him right. Yan Mo’s ability to empathise has long died when his son died. He simply doesn’t care whether Yang Wei gets beaten to death or not, even if it’s someone he just rescued twice. He even thinks that Bing who was almost dragged to death by his slave would directly kill Yang Wei and eat him. In the end, Bing seems to just want to inflict pain to the one who harmed him and that’s it.
Will the guide increase his scum value for looking at someone getting beaten? Yan Mo reckons Bing has beaten him enough and is about to pretend to persuade him to stop when his boy-owner walks up to him with a scary face.
What are you up to? Yan Mo intuitively feels strange, he’s suddenly on guard.
Yuan Zhan’s eyes tells him the answer, we also have things to sort out! He grabs the boy by the neck and lifts him up.
“U– Urg! …Ah– Zhan? …Daren?” Yan Mo feet dangle above the ground, his face is filled with blood from being strangled. His hands claws at that hand, to make him relax his grip.
“Zhan!” Lie stops the young man, “He did it out of good intentions, and he’s still a little kid. Let’s forget it.”
Yuan Zhan flings Yan Mo to the ground in smooth motion, then steps on his stomach, cursing, “Daᴍn good intentions!” He almost got everyone killed!”
Fuᴄk! I just saved your people. Not only are you not grateful, but you’re doing this to me? What do you mean forget it? So I did all that saving for nothing? Yan Mo wishes he has reform guides for every one of them!
Treating someone who saved them like this? Punish! Punish them all! Increase their scum value, 10000 points altogether! ᴀssholë Yuan Zhan gets a 10000 points for himself!
Cao Ting anxiously looks at her master, Diao who got her message also says: “Zhan, the result is that all of us are fine.” In fact, I have to thank your little slave, if it wasn’t for him, my Cao Ting would be dead.”
Cao Ting went to the front of the war and kneels. She doesn’t dare ask for his leniency, she doesn’t have that right as a slave.
“But now I don’t have a backpack. I also lost the food and salt in there.” Meng muttered on the other side. It’s not that he wants Zhan to punish the little slave, he’s simply feeling unwilling towards the bag he’d only had for a very short time. He can hunt to replenish the meats he lost, but there’s no way to make another backpack right now.
Yuan Zhan uses his spear to hook up the backpack Yan Mo put on the side and flings it to Meng. “For you.”
Meng is so excited to get another backpack.
Lie slaps the back of his brother’s head, then took back the bag and flings it back to Yuan Zhan. “It’s okay. We still have one one our side, keep this one for yourself.”
“Brother!” Meng shouts.
Lie kicks his idiot brother to the side. Meng stomps his foot in annoyance and turns around towards Zhan’s little slave, wanting to poke him to vent.
Is Yan Mo someone easily poked randomly? When no one pays attention, he flitted by Meng’s wrist and pricks there with his golden needle. Just now he didn’t dare to prick Yuan Zhan, firstly because everyone was looking at them and he can’t very well attack him in front of everyone’s eyes. Secondly, because he has pricked Yuan Zhan once, if he does it again, Yuan Zhan would probably notice it.
Meng’s finger has just touched the little slave’s cheek when it suddenly stops. Meng shouts in fright, “Ah! My hand! I can’t feel my hand… It can’t move! Big brother! You broke my hand!”
Everyone ignores him.
Meng desperately shakes his hand, he even puts it in his mouth and bites down on it. But no matter how much he fusses there’s still no feeling on his hand. No one believes him, too. Meng starts to wail. He crouches down while holding his right wrist, howling dramatically.
Yuan Zhan’s eyes flitted over from the little slave to Meng. His eyes show a strong suspicion.
He clearly remembers the little slave can slip down from his body because there was suddenly no strength in his arms, but not long after it’s okay again. Before it happened he clearly felt on something stabbed at his neck and shoulder areas, like it was pricked by the round desert tree’s needles.
Something’s wrong with the little slave, he needs to keep an eye on him!
On the other side, after beating up Yang Wei Bing’s unpleasant mood is dispelled for now.
Everyone gather together again, getting ready for the long journey ahead and checking their luggage.
Yan Mo climbs up from the ground. He’s about to put on the Yang Wei’s tattered beast coat when Cao Ting stops him. She takes off what she’s wearing in front of him, giving him her clothes and puts on the worn-out one.
“Xiao Mo, thank you for saving me. You’re a good person.” Cao Ting says softly. She limps back to her owner, not waiting for Yan Mo’s reply.
Yan Mo feels a bit upset inside. He didn’t really intend on saving Cao Ting, it’s just that he’s forced to. But… this is fine too. Getting people’s gratitude is always better than getting hated. Pursing his lips, Yan Mo doesn’t hesitate to put on Cao Ting’s clothes.
It’s clothes made by a woman after all, it feels more comfortable than the one he patched together.
Everyone takes note of the items we have left.
Other than what they’re wearing and spears on their hand not damaged as much, the rest of their stuff suffers loss or damage, and most of the losses are Yuan Zhan’s and Bing’s items.
At present the whole team has a total of four backpacks, but only three bags of cured meat.
Fortunately, the loss of salt is not big, aside from everything in Meng’s bag that Yuan Zhan threw away and Bing’s luggage that he lost in the quicksand, everyone still has their salt.
The only one who has lost his wooden ladle is Bing.
Lie still has his backpack, he affirms that he didn’t lose his flint stone during the run.
Considering everything, the overall loss doesn’t seem too big. Everyone feels that the losses cannot be called losses, because everyone managed to stay alive. They just feel a bit unfortunate that they had to throw away one bag.
Because these backpacks sturdiness and practicality have withstood that crazed running, greatly proving the value of having it.
The warriors look at their four backpacks just like they’re looking at some treasure.
Shan and Diao wants to share their meat with Yuan Zhan but is rejected by Yuan Zhan.
“We’re now a certain distance from the tribe, almost entering level three warrior’s hunting range. It’s not safe here, we have to quickly decide the direction to go, and then find a safe place to spend the night.” Lie speaks with a serious face.
“Which direction should we head to? If we walk any further, we’ll enter the desert.” Meng finds that he can feel with his hand again. He stops shouting and jumping, but will still glance at his right hand from time to time.
Lie doesn’t immediately make a decision, he looks to Que Ya instead.
Que Ya slaps his own head then begins telling everyone what he heard before about the continent’s end.
According to Que Ya description, he saw that self-proclaimed Gaoshan warrior for the first time at the rocky shore during an exchange. That man seems to have gone through a long and hard journey, only coming across this exchange at the rocky shore by accident.
“I think the man is at least a four level warrior, otherwise he wouldn’t be able to walk through all of prairie and black woods until the rocky shore.” Que Ya says.
“He walked through the Black woods?” Lie is surprised.
Que Ya nods, “That’s what he said.”
Yan Mo discovers that after Que Ya confirms it all the warriors present show deeply awed expression. That involuntary respect and fear arising in people towards those stronger than themselves. Just like when they are facing their own tribe’s chief.
Just how strong are level four warriors?
This, Yan Mo have no way of understanding at the moment. Only when he entered the depths of the prairie and through the black woods himself, will he only to deeply understand just how powerful that level four warrior who had walked through the prairie and the black woods was.
“Then why would he mention about continent’s end to you?” Asks Bing.
Que Ya recalls, “That time, he was resting not far away from me. I sensed he was very strong, so I went closer and asked him where he came from and from which tribe.”
“He told me that he’s a Gaoshan clansman, they live far away from here and left the tribe because he was looking for something very important to them.” Que Ya talks to this point, then suddenly sighs, “He also said that there were a total of five people at the start, but along the journey, one by one is gone, leaving only him who reached so far.”
“What is he looking for?” Bing asks again.
Bing’s curiosity seems to be much bigger than others, can’t hold back his questions, and always want to increase his own sense of existence. This type of personality… makes Yan Mo feel slightly familiar.
A certain someone touches his nose. When he was in middle school, it seems like he was like that too?
Wants to stand out at all times, wants to show off his ability in everything. Feeling that that middle school is too small for him. Whatever the school activities, he wants to stick his foot in. Whatever competition it is; he has to take the prize. Won’t give in to other people, speaks harshly.
Even when he’s done something wrong, he won’t admit it. He also likes to be hold special by other people, to be praised. He made enemies at every step but he never perceived it. Up until he was hit by attacks one after another. Only after he had an actual big loss did he learn how important ‘keeping a low profile’ is.
But river and mountains may change, one’s nature may never.
Even if it can be supressed for a period of time, his real nature will still emerge time to time. The result was, later no matter when studying or at work, there’s many people who hated him.
There may be no real issue with this kind of personality. At most they encounter more difficulties in life than others, then in the future they will naturally mellow down when they matured and find their own way of interacting.
But Yan Mo just happens to be someone who can’t accept even a bit of loss. He has the tendency to treat people who are bad to him even worse and take revenge. Following his nature, he had done some very bad things to those who hated and didn’t bring him any profit. Things that would really add scum values for himself.
He doesn’t know if Bing is one of his own kind, but this is enough for him to dislike and stay away from this person. Bad people don’t like people who are like them, and will never believe the other, because they know exactly what kind of scum they are. Even if he had saved Bing, stories like the farmer and the snake are not uncommon in this world.
Yan Mo thinks darkly with a blank expression.
“I don’t know.” Que Ya shakes his head, “He didn’t talk in detail, but he’d sometimes say he might have to go to the end of the continent to find what he was looking for.”
“Where is the end of the continent?” Meng snatches the first chance to ask before Bing does.
Que Ya grasps his head, “I don’t know that well too, maybe the Gaoshan know?”
I thought you really knew some valuable information, in the end isn’t it the same as not saying anything?
What Yan Mo feels is trash information is in fact very valuable for Lie. He follows up with another question, “Where did that Gaoshan man go to later?” Did you see him leave the rocky shore?”
“I think he looked for the Bai Ri people later, it seems like he had something to ask from them. Then that man left with the Bai Ri…… Wait a minute! “ Que Ya hits the ground with his spear, suddenly shouts, “I remember now, he can ride a horse!” He can ride horses like the Bairi tribe! Those Bairi people gave one of their horses to him, then he leaped and rode it. And that horse didn’t throw him off! “
“Does that mean Bai Ri and Gao Shan are related?” Da Shan’s deep bass voice sounded.
“There’s high possibility.” Lie ponders, “Just like what our previous lord priest said, our tribe’s men can’t only be together with our tribe’s women. We have to switch with the other tribes, otherwise our tribe will slowly decline. Lord priest didn’t say why, but after the three of our clans merge together we really did become much stronger. Maybe the Bairi and Gaoshan are like us, planning to merge into a new tribe?”
Yan Mo thinks to himself, seems that the priests here have noticed the negative effects of inbreeding. Maybe they can’t understand why it’s like this, but it’s enough as long as they know its harm.
Is this how primitive society develop, bit by bit? There are various threats to their survival, so under the impetus of their wiser priest some tribes gradually came in contact with people outside their tribes. This then develop into annexing or living together, and forming new tribes. The cycle continues, first with tribes, then forming a bigger town, then forming a country.
“The Bairi people lives on the prairie to the East.” Yuan Zhan suddenly says.
Lie has obviously thought of this issue too. He turns to Yan Mo, asks, “Xiao Mo, do you know where the end of the continent is?” How far is it from the tribe? How long would we need to walk? Is it really possible to find salt-producing sea3?”
Who knows ne? Just keep going. As long as they don’t die, maybe one day they’ll reach the sea. Of course Yan Mo won’t say it like that. He’s in the middle of thinking about how to word it. He suffered a blow before, he has to think about what to say in order to really establish trust in him in these primitive people’s heart.
Lie doesn’t give him the time to think, he suddenly become hostile, “I order you, now, immediately. Clearly tell me the direction and how many days before we arrive. IF not……!”
Yuan Zhan’s hand quickly clutches his neck.
Again?! Yan Mo’s heart falls.
He was a fool to think that he and his stupid boy-master has started to get along. When the older teen choked him before, although Yan Mo was very angry, he could also feel that Yuan Zhan was harsh on him just to block the words others may say. The guy didn’t even use any strength when he choked and stomped him.
But now with just a sign from Lie, this guy is ready to kill him. Just look at his quick movements, there’s not even a little hesitation!
But why do these people suddenly turn violent, wasn’t it fine just moments ago? Did he say something wrong? No way, he hasn’t had time to say anything yet!
1. treat a dying horse as if can still be saved: deal out any options in face of desperate situation.
2. 
3. 海 is sea, but they can put 大海 in front of that ‘sea’ which makes it like big sea – ocean. and it doen’t make sense in english when a word sea is suddenly another word ocean. I’ll use both I’m lazy
*Bai Ri – worships sun
*Gaoshan – high mountain
Padam Gurun 