Chapter 127 – The Wound
Translated by Sunyancai
The trap zone was not very large, but many wolves were trapped in there. As Shao Xuan passed by, he found there were at least seven trapped or dead wolves in the traps.
Obviously, the pack of wolves, in the pursuit of Caesar, did not think that Caesar would bring them to such a place.
When Caesar ran past here, they had no time to react. They saw Caesar run past safely, so they naturally did not think that there was so much potential danger.
Usually, not so many wolves would be trapped, because the experienced animals in the woods had an intuition which allowed them to make instinctual judgment to avoid the traps, like the wolves with a lot of hunting experience. Their failure today was just accidental, for they focused on chasing Ceasar and didn’t have a second thought.
Passing the trap zone, Shao Xuan continued chasing them following the traces.
Not far from the trap zone, there was a natural tar pit, which was the largest one in the first location of their hunting route. Every day, many animals would be trapped inside, both walking and flying ones.
Shao Xuan had even seen an ox trapped in the pit. It was stuck in the pit, which attracted many carnivorous animals rushing to the pit. As a result, all of them sank into the pit.
No one knew how many bones there were in this tar pit.
There was also a small tar pit near the tribe. Shao Xuan had seen some people take the tar from the pit to build roofs. But for security, there were always some people in the tribe responsible for guarding it.
In this large tar pit, Shao Xuan saw two wolves caught inside. One third of their legs had been stuck in the pit. They tried to get out, but failed. If no one helped them out, they would gradually sink down to the bottom, like those who had sank down before for more than thousands of years. At the bottom of the pit, they would not be eaten by scavengers, so their bones would be well preserved. In the distant future, their bones might be discovered or be buried forever.
In general, shrewd animals rarely came close to here. Those who came here might be not very clever, newcomers, or greedy predators.
The border of this piece of tar pit looked black, but in fact, not every corner there could swallow people or animals. The hunting group was more familiar with this place. They had passed through from there before, and sometimes, in order to avoid some troublesome beasts or ferocious beasts, they took it as shelter. The path was so narrow that large ferocious beasts simply could not pass through.
Shao Xuan brought Caesar here once, and unexpectedly, he remembered this place. Some footprints here belonged to him and the others were from the other wolves.
Caesar was clever, so were some other wolves.
However, two wolves were still trapped inside.
The wolves had just arrived here, they were not familiar with this place. But they might have seen a tar pit in their former territory. Their intuition told them that it was very dangerous here, but they didn’t know where to go.
Shao Xuan found some footprints around the pit, which showed that some wolves had made a detour. Those wolves that didn’t make a detour but followed Caesar got stuck.
Making a detour would take too much time, so Shao Xuan directly crossed the tar pit area and didn’t pay any attention to the two wolves that sank deeper and deeper into the pit.
According to some traces, Caesar had gotten rid of most of the wolves, and killed almost ten of them after he passed the trap zone and the tar pit area.
This wolf pack consisted of thirty members, and suddenly the number of its members was reduced by one third.
If the wolves were timid, they would probably have given up chasing after Caesar. However, it was obvious that the wolves were cruel and vengeful enough to try to keep up with Caesar. Until now, only about three or four were able to keep up with him, and Shao Xuan met several halfway.
Staying with Shao Xuan, Caesar learned how to trick others into the the traps and the tar pit, and how to provoke the ferocious beasts in their territories. What’s more, he knew how to turn the wolves chasing him into scapegoats.
The new wolf pack was not familiar with this place. This is why it was at a disadvantage.
But Shao Xuan was worried that Caesar might be injured now. In his pursuit of them, he found some blood on the ground. The blood might have been from either the wolves or Caesar. Shao Xuan needed to find him as soon as possible to confirm whether he was injured.
While running, Shao Xuan suddenly heard a cry from the woods.
Many birds in the woods were flying away while some small beasts were running out of the woods.
A giant bear!
In addition, Shao Xuan also heard some wolf howls. It was a cry from the other wolves rather than Caesar.
This giant bear was more difficult to deal with compared with the four-fanged boar. Though it looked bulky, it ran very quickly, so the hunting group stayed far away from it.
The hunting group had encountered the giant bear several times, and had been chased by it. When they met it, they often ran to the tar pit to trap it. However, it wasn’t stupid, so it stopped at the edge of the area and then walked slowly around it, roaring and staring at them with rage. It seemed to tell them: “I’ll eat you, sooner or later!”
Now, in order to defeat the wolves, Caesar even provoked the giant bear, possibly having dug his own grave.
Shao Xuan looked grave and rushed over.
The giant bear continued to roar, and soon, Shao Xuan saw the erect huge figure, exposing its fangs, and roaring towards a place on the ground.
In the direction of the giant bear’s line of sight, Shao Xuan saw four wolves. Among them, the clearly bigger one was the head. Only four wolves managed to follow him here, because some wolves got stuck in the traps or the pit, and others were left behind.
These four wolves, including the head wolf, had blood dripping from their mouths.
Looking around, Shao Xuan did not find Caesar. There was a wolf with spotted patterns next to the giant bear, whose neck had been bitten by the giant bear.
The head wolf looked reluctant to give up and still roared towards the giant bear, exposing its fangs. The giant bear was irritated, the wolves who lived here before didn’t dare to provoke it in its territory. It was annoyed by the hunting group which hunted in its territory, but each time, it failed to catch any of them. This time it only found several strange wolves.
Roaring again, the giant bear vented its anger.
The situation was bad for the head wolf, so it had to give up chasing, and turned around to run away. The other three hastened to keep up with the bear.
The giant bear, with its four limbs on the ground, chased the head wolf immediately. Shao Xuan knew its temper, and guessed it would probably chase the head wolf for a while before it came back.
After the wolves and giant bear left, Shao Xuan jumped from the tree to carefully identify the smell in the air.
There were some animals killed by the giant bear, and the smell of blood was so strong that some scavengers were poised to act.
Shao Xuan looked around and then shifted to his other vision. The surrounding green grass and trees disappeared. All he could see were the shadows of trees, stones, as well as some animal skeletons.
Fixing his eyes on one place, Shao Xuan walked over there quickly.
Shifting to his normal vision, Shao Xuan walked in front of some plants with huge leaves. Under some overlapping large leaves, some blood flowed out.
Pushing aside the leaves, Shao Xuan saw Caesar lying under the leaves.
Caesar was in a bad situation. With his special sight, Shao Xuan found that he had several bone fractures. In addition to the fractures, he had some bites, two of which were deep, where large pieces of meat was bitten off so the blood kept flowing out.
Some blood was flowing out of his mouth, so his internal organs might also be damaged.
Shao Xuan at once took out the herbal package which contained some herb powders. He sprinkled the powder on Caesar’s wounds.
The powder was soon soaked by his blood.
Doing this still wouldn’t save him. If it had been in his former life, he would have taken him to get first aid. But now in such a place, Shao Xuan could do nothing more to save him with his limited herbs.
Caesar would soon take his last breath if Shao Xuan failed to do something more to save him. He felt that it became difficult for Caesar to breathe.
Aware of Shao Xuan’s arrival, Caesar opened his eyes and intended to rise, but Shao Xuan quickly stopped him.
“Hey buddy, don’t move. You’ll worsen the injuries.”
A minor move sped up the flow of his blood, which dripped to the ground with the powder.
Hearing Shao Xuan’s words, Caesar stopped struggling to get up, and layed on the ground. He moved his head to touch Shao Xuan’s hand with his nose, humming.
“Ssh, don’t cry.” Shao Xuan gently touched Caesar’s head.
Although Caesar didn’t cry, Shao Xuan could see sorrow from his eyes, probably because he knew he was in a bad condition.
Their waiting didn’t help.
Could he bring Caesar back to the cave? It was impossible.
Because Caesar got injured so severely that he wouldn’t withstand the shocks along the way. What’s worse, it would take such a long time and he might die on the way.
Looking around, Shao Xuan took out another herbal package which wasn’t for external application. He put the herbal leaves in Caesar’s mouth, but Caesar was too weak to chew.
Shao Xuan, without delay, smashed the herbs with the knife’s back and poured it into the water gourd. Then he mixed it with water to pour it into Caesar’s mouth. He did not know whether the herb would work but he had to try.
After feeding the herb to Caesar, Shao Xuan touched Caesar’s head, and said, “Hold on, buddy. I’ll be back.”
He put down the big leaves to hide Caesar, so that those scavengers would not notice him as there was still much food left by the giant bear.
Shao Xuan picked up a few sticks and rattan grass to make a simple stretcher nearby, and then came back to put Caesar on it. He carried the stretcher and left.
There was a very large tree nearby, and Shao Xuan planned to put Caesar on the tree first. The giant bear would soon come back, so they couldn’t stay there for a long time. In addition, it gradually became dark, so the tree might be a relatively safe place for them.
Shao Xuan found a long strong rattan to tie the stretcher. Then he stood on a branch to pull the other end of the rattan over the top of another branch in order to draw Caesar up to the tree.
When Shao Xuan pulled Caesar up, the giant bear returned after chasing the wolves and saw a group of scavengers eating its prey. The giant bear roared angrily and rushed over to tear some beasts into pieces. The rest left instantly.
Making sure that no other animals were nearby, the giant bear began to continue gnawing its prey.