LSLFBW: Chapter 95

The little snow leopard yawned loudly, picked up the roasted meat that had fallen on him, ate it in a few bites, and stood up, stretching.

Taking a nap was indeed more comfortable than sleeping at night.

Qi Bai pushed open the lid of the small bamboo basket. It was already bright outside. The little snow leopard got ready, jumped, and ran a few steps on the ground to steady his body.

QI Bai turned into human form, ran back to the small bamboo basket, and took off the big shorts and straw sandals pinned to the basket.

Qi Bai put on his clothes and shoes. He took out a small bamboo tube, rinsed his mouth, wiped his face, and said to Lang Ze, “I’ll go to the back first.”

The white wolf noticed the movement beside him and growled in response.

Lang Ze led the way at the front of the team. Qi Bai walked to the back, smiling and greeting other tribe members along the way.

Once he got to the middle of the group, he saw Diao Lan and Hu Xue walking beside a cart and weaving straw ropes.

Qi Bai quickly took two steps. “Are Quan Nan and Niu Xi still not awake?”

Hu Xue pointed to a place not far from the team and said, “They just woke up and saw that the ropes were almost ready, so they ran to prepare leaves and branches.”

Qi Bai followed the direction indicated by Hu Xue and saw two figures climbing up the tree. It seemed that they wanted to cut some twigs from the tree.

Qi Bai said, “Then I’ll go find some big leaves too.” Then he ran back to Lang Ze, hung the sheathed bone knife on his waist, turned around, and started looking for big leaves on the side of the road.

Life in the Beast World was like this. Everything needed to be created by themselves, but at the same time, beastmen were never afraid of any hardship. They wouldn’t delay the work at hand even when they were on the road.

They made large-leaf umbrellas for the other two carts. Qi Bai and his companions actually made smaller umbrellas.

However, these weren’t for their own use but were fixed to the saddles of the beastmen. This finally made the scorching sun less unbearable.

After a few days of hard work, Lang Ze said while drawing a map in the evening, “We are approaching the territory of the Xishui Tribe.”

QI Bai flipped through the bamboo slips and said, “We walked for eleven days.”

QI Bai originally thought their travel speed wasn’t very fast and it would take them a long time to reach the Xishui Tribe. In fact, there was only a difference of one or two days, which was faster than Qi Bai had imagined.

Qi Bai said, “Our movement is quite big. Will we alarm the Xishui Tribe?”

In the Beast World, there was no such thing as visiting each other. It was okay to meet acquaintances, but conflict was inevitable if both parties didn’t know each other.

Lang Ze pondered on it for a moment. “This route was originally provided by the Xishui Tribe. It is only a matter of time before we pass by here. The chief of the Xishui Tribe should’ve made plans long ago.”

QI Bai nodded. “Then let’s follow the original plan and look for Xishui directly.”

Qi Bai didn’t expect that the very next day after their discussion, a broad river suddenly and naturally appeared in front of everyone.

Quan Nan stood on tiptoe and looked down. “Is this the sea? Is there salt in it?”

Hu Qiao explained, “This isn’t the sea. The sea is blue, and it is much bigger than this.”

Quan Nan and Niu Xiu looked at each other with disbelief in their eyes.

Niu Xiu whispered, “This river is more than a dozen times the Man-Eating River in size, yet it isn’t even the sea.”

Quan Nan nodded. “Yes, I really can’t imagine what the sea looks like…”

Hu Qiao hurriedly patted his chest and said, “When we come back from the trading day, I will definitely take you to the beach to see the sea.”

Qi Bai frowned and turned to look at Hu Qiao.

Hu Qiao touched the back of his head in confusion, but didn’t think about it any further because Quan Nan and Niu Xi had surrounded him.

Xiang Yu and Huan Ping remained in their beast forms, listening to the chattering of several people and snorting from time to time to agree.

At this moment, Qi Bai didn’t have time to think about the unlucky flag Hu Qiao set up.

It was because from the very beginning, his attention was drawn to a forest in the distance that seemed somewhat strange yet familiar.

Qi Bai walked to the side of the white wolf. “Lang Ze, can we rest there?”

Looking in QI Bai’s direction, Lang Ze saw a low… bamboo forest?

The white wolf swept QI Bai’s calf with his tail.

A wolf howl ended the discussion among the people, and the team set off again. Their destination was the forest Qi Bai pointed out.

Qi Bai could originally follow the white wolf calmly, but as they got closer and closer to the forest, QI Bai felt his heartbeat getting louder. Then after seeing the appearance of the plant clearly, Qi Bai could no longer suppress the joy in his heart.

Lang Ze heard a short cheer beside him. Then Qi Bai rushed past him like a small cannonball.

At this moment, Lang Ze also noticed something strange. This thin forest wasn’t the bamboo forest he thought it was.

After settling down at the edge of the forest, everyone started to build a stove, boil water, and cook.

But Qi Bai was lazy for the first time. He used a bone knife to cut off a purple pole. He couldn’t help drooling helplessly when he saw the yellow juice flowing out from the middle of the pole.

Lang Ze came over and saw Qi Bai gnawing on the branch with tears streaming down his face.

Lang Ze hesitated and looked back at a loss. He found that none of the tribe members noticed this side. Then he stepped forward and tried to lower his voice. “You…”

“Woo woo woo.”

Lang Ze, “I…”

Qi Bai thought the food he was most looking forward to was chili peppers, but he didn’t expect that he would cry like a loser after taking a big mouthful of sweet juice.

Qi Bai cried and waved his hands. He cut a piece of sugarcane with a bone knife, and stuffed it directly into Lang Ze’s mouth, indicating: Stop talking, take a few bites quickly.

Lang Ze’s expression froze, and his eyes dilated subconsciously.

Was this a branch? In this world, there were actually such sweet branches…

After Qi Bai and Lang Ze returned to the camp with sugarcanes and distributed them to every member of the tribe, the first person to shed tears like Qi Bai was the usually very calm Xiang Yu.

Xiang Yu covered his face with his rough, cracked hands. “I have lived for so many years, and I have never tasted anything so sweet.”

Diao Lan was also quietly chewing the residue in his mouth. Qi Bai had told everyone that the residue had to be spit out, but no one was willing to spit out the sweet sugarcane residue.

Lang Ze looked at their expectant eyes and said, “We still have to set off on time today. We can’t waste time on the road.”

Everyone understood this truth. Every day they wasted in the wilderness increased the dangers they faced. No one could say that Lang Ze’s choice was wrong.

However, just as everyone was feeling a bit disappointed, Lang Ze once again walked toward the sugarcane forest with a bone knife.

Hu Meng looked at Lang Ze’s back in confusion. “What do you mean? Didn’t you say that we should leave on time?”

Qi Bai also stood up and said with a smile, “But I still have strength now.”

Ma Ling jumped up immediately and took out his bone knife. “I still have strength. Let’s cut some down before we set off.” Then he ran toward the sugarcane forest in a hurry.

Qi Bai stopped Diao Lan and Hu Xue, who were about to go forward. “Let’s pack the carts and try to free up one cart to load the sugarcane.”

Hu Xue wondered, “Why do we need a cart?”

QI Bai smiled. “Just listen to me. You will know later.”

No one had any objections. QI Bai might be the youngest among the sub-beastmen, but Yang Luo had already instructed everyone before they set out.

Lang Ze was the captain of the horned beastmen, and Qi Bai was the captain of the sub-beastmen. All matters, big or small, must be arranged by the two captains.

Qi Bai didn’t usually act like a captain, but he wouldn’t be vague when it came to making decisions.

The three carts weren’t completely full to begin with. Therefore, the straw rope of one of the carts was untied and the rattan baskets stuffed into other carts.

In the end, the entire cart wasn’t emptied as desired, but there were only three rattan baskets left. Put them at the very edge and it was no different from the entire cart being empty.

Qi Bai asked Quan Nan and Niu Xi to guard the cart and tie up the sugarcanes that the horned beastmen cut down, while he took Diao Lan and Hu Xue to the river.

After a while, the three of them worked together to bring back a concave stone. They put the stone onto the cart, used it as a base for burning fire, and fixed the clay pot on the stone.

At this time, the sun had just passed overhead. Everyone was sweating profusely, but no one felt tired.

Without much rest, they filled the bamboo tubes with hot water and moved forward along the river bank.

This time, the five sub-beastmen didn’t walk on the ground with the team as usual. Instead, they sat directly on the cart and listened to Qi Bai’s words carefully.

“Once sugarcanes leave the land, it will rot after a while like any other food. But if we turn it into sugar, it will be good even after a few years.”

Quan Nan raised his hand and asked, “I have never seen sugar before. How do we make sugar?”

“Sugar and salt are similar. Salt is boiled from seawater, while sugar is boiled from sugarcane juice.” Qi Bai pointed to the nearly 200 catties of sugarcane nearby. “In the next few days, we will make sugar from the sugarcane.”

It wasn’t just the people sitting on the cart who felt refreshed, but even the elephant pulling the cart in front. On the land where the beastmen’s march passed by, they left traces that looked like saliva.

A few people started to work immediately. They peeled the sugarcane, cut it into small pieces, put it in a stone mortar and crushed it. Finally, they used clean animal skins to press out the juice and collected it into a clay pot.

They lit a fire in the concave stone slab and slowly boiled the sugarcane juice in the clay pot over low heat.

The sugarcane juice gradually became viscous and the color darker until it turned brown-red.

Then extinguish the fire and wait for the clay pot to dry naturally. At this time, they would get a whole piece of solid brown sugar at the bottom of the clay pot.

Several people broke off fingernail-sized pieces of brown sugar and put them into their mouths. The mellow, sweet taste filled their mouths.

Niu Xi firmly said to Qi Bai, “Grow sugarcane! Bao Bai! We must grow sugarcane!”