novelslam Chapter 70 [A Tragic Song of the Hunting Ground and the Approaching Shadow]
Chapter 70 [A Tragic Song of the Hunting Ground and the Approaching Shadow]
Deep in the forest, Kahn and his squad lay in ambush.
They left the designated safe zone in Bahrain and entered an unfamiliar hunting ground.
Each person held a newly made iron spear, which was the source of their courage.
The experienced hunter lay on the ground, picking up a bit of fresh soil with his fingers.
"It's nearby, it just had a drink of water," he said in a low voice.
Kahn made a gesture.
A dozen elite hunters quietly dispersed, forming a crescent shape, and advanced forward.
The giant beast revealed itself from behind the bushes.
Its body is like a moving hill, covered with thick leather armor, and its two thick, sharp horns cast shadows in the forest.
Kahn's heart pounded as he raised his iron spear high, signaling his men to attack.
Hunters from three directions launched a simultaneous attack.
The behemoth sensed the threat and let out a deep roar, its thick limbs pawing the ground.
"Throw!" Kahn roared.
Three iron spears tore through the air, shooting towards the giant beast with a whooshing sound.
"Thud! Thud!" The two spearheads successfully pierced the thick flesh on the side of the neck.
The iron tool demonstrated its value, but this damage only enraged the beast.
With a flick of its head, the spear shaft snapped in two, leaving only the spearhead embedded in its flesh.
It spotted the nearest hunter and launched a charge.
The earth was shaking.
The young man was deathly pale. He tried to dodge, but his legs wouldn't move.
"boom--"
He was tossed high into the air, then crashed heavily to the ground beneath a tree some distance away.
His sternum collapsed completely, and a large amount of blood gushed from his mouth.
"Scatter! Attack its limbs!" Kahn's eyes were bloodshot.
The hunters snapped out of their shock and scattered, trying to harass the giant beast.
Another iron spear was thrown, piercing a foreleg, the intense pain momentarily slowing its movements.
opportunity.
Kahn personally led his men to charge forward.
He used the iron spear in his hand as a short gun, and with all his might, he thrust it into the giant rhinoceros's soft belly.
The iron spear pierced through.
But as the behemoth twisted, the spear shaft bent into an astonishing arc.
Kahn was forced to let go and rolled on the spot to avoid the giant beast's stomping foot.
Human courage and nascent iron tools appear fragile in the face of absolute power.
One hunter after another was knocked away or impaled by the sharp horns.
They used their blood and lives to leave wounds on the giant rhinoceros.
"Poke its eyes!" a heavily wounded hunter, pinned to a tree trunk, shouted with his last breath.
Kahn grabbed a fallen iron spear from the ground, and seizing the opportunity, he leaped high into the air from the side.
Using the force of his fall, he plunged the iron spear fiercely into his eye socket.
"Thud!" The spearhead sank deep into the ground.
The giant rhinoceros let out a heart-wrenching cry.
It shook its head, rampaging through the forest, breaking countless trees.
Finally, the enormous creature exhausted all its strength.
The surviving hunters, panting and leaning on their weapons, stood beside the giant beast's corpse, looking at the blood and the bodies of their people scattered on the ground.
They won and obtained the largest spoils in the tribe's history.
The cost was four deaths and seven serious injuries.
Kahn gripped the bent iron spear in silence, feeling for the first time how heavy pure force could be.
On a ridge not far behind them, several figures were hidden in the shadows.
They were orcs, elite scouts guided by the will of the Black Tide Monarch.
The battle attracted them, and they observed the entire battle.
"These humans are quite bold," a scout whispered in orcish.
"But they were idiots," another scout added. "Their fighting was so chaotic that almost half of them died trying to kill a giant rhinoceros."
"Their weapons are made of iron, but they are crude and break easily," the leading scout captain nodded, summarizing the situation.
"Delicious, but foolish prey." He pointed in the direction Kahn and the others had left.
"Their tribe is in that direction. Their strongest warriors are all here, and they've suffered heavy casualties." The scout captain turned around.
"Go back and report to the chief; it's time for a feast." He didn't look at him again.
A squad of orc scouts quickly disappeared into the dense forest.
……
Human villages.
Mason and his apprentices were busy around a newly built furnace.
This second furnace is taller and has a more rational structure than the first one.
Under Bahrain's guidance, they improved the bellows, allowing the furnace temperature to reach higher levels.
"Mason, the color of this ore seems a bit different." A young apprentice handed over a stone.
Mason took the ore, weighed it in his hand, and then tapped it with another stone.
"Bahrain said that these red stones contain more iron," he explained patiently.
Their skills were clumsy, but they made new progress every day.
On the other side of the village, Lia sat next to Anya, practicing her "Fire Stealing Technique".
Terra and several hunters stood guard vigilantly around the area.
Lia stretched out her finger and drew a flame symbol in the air.
A flame flickered at her fingertips.
"A little smaller, Lia," Anya whispered.
Lia closed her eyes and focused her mind.
The flame at her fingertips slowly shrank, from a cluster of flames to a single spark, hovering steadily.
A joyful smile appeared on Lia's face.
Just then, a commotion broke out at the village entrance.
"They're back! Kahn and the others are back!" Everyone rushed to the village entrance.
They saw the carcass of the giant rhinoceros, which was as big as a small mountain.
The immense shock left everyone speechless.
Kahn's reputation reached its peak at this moment.
His followers stood tall, enjoying the awe-inspiring gazes of their people.
"Look, this is what Boss Kahn brought us!"
"We'll never go hungry again!"
But the joyful atmosphere was quickly shattered.
People saw the wounded being carried back, and they saw the already cold corpses.
Terra and Mason walked to the back of the line.
They looked at the groaning, seriously wounded soldiers, and at the badly damaged, almost unusable pieces of metal.
"Is this your path, Kahn?" Terra's voice was deep.
"This is the path of the strong!" Kahn wiped the blood from his face. "Cowards have no right to question it!"
"Your 'power' was bought with the lives of your people!" Mason couldn't help but retort.
The rift between the militant and infrastructure factions within the tribe, instead of being healed after this devastating victory, has only deepened.
"What should we do with the spoils?" one of the hunters asked.
"Of course it should be distributed according to merit! We shed blood, so we should get the lion's share!" one of Kahn's men immediately shouted.
"The wounded need more flesh to recover! The families of our fallen brothers also need compensation!" Anya stepped forward, her voice not loud, but it silenced everyone.
A new argument broke out.
Some advocated prioritizing allocation to hunters, while others advocated prioritizing treatment for the wounded.
Just as the tribespeople were arguing heatedly about this—
"Waaaaah—waaaah—!"
At the village lookout post, the tribesman on guard blew a horn made of animal bones.
The argument stopped abruptly.
Everyone looked in the direction of the lookout post.
"Enemy attack—!!" the hunter on the lookout shouted.
Kahn and Terra were the first to react, and they rushed towards the edge of the village.
Everyone ran after them.
They climbed the simple wooden wall and looked towards the distant horizon.
A black line is appearing where the horizon meets the grassland.
Organized armies poured into the village.
Dressed in uniform leather armor and wielding weapons that gleamed with a chilling light, their steady steps exuded an overwhelming sense of oppression.
The orcs have arrived.