Chapter 18   Salt Team

translator: xiin

editors: apricot & juurensha

If Shi Li had treated Lang Yin well, Lang Yin wouldn’t have been angry at Shi Li for eating her meat at all.

However, Shi Li’s attitude towards her had been very mediocre these days. Other than leaving her very satisfied that first night, Shi Li simply spent every night after that sleeping!

Lang Yin hadn’t had much interaction with Shi Li before Shi Li had moved into her cave. Back then, Shi Li had been busy trying to get more food every day and would sleep in his own cave when he had any free time, so they hadn’t exchanged more than a few words every year.

Lang Yin liked Shi Li because of his looks, his animal form, and his strength. There certainly weren’t any deep feelings between them.

She would definitely have grown to truly like Shi Li if Shi Li had been very good to her after they got together, but right now, the key point was that Shi Li hadn’t treated her well at all!

“This is meat that I was given. What gives you the right to eat it?” Lang Yin spoke angrily.

“We’re already together. Why do you have to divide things so distinctly?” Shi Li’s expression was rather ugly. Lang Yin’s current attitude made it seem like he’d been taking advantage of her!

Xiong Ye would never have been like this!

At this moment, Shi Li inevitably recalled Xiong Ye’s good points.

“If you had ever given me a share of your meat before, I would naturally be willing to share mine with you, but have you ever done so?” Lang Yin snatched back her meat. “You’ve already finished your own meat. You’re not allowed to have mine as well!”

It had been many, many years since Shi Li had been in such an awkward position, and his face turned ghastly pale.

It was Lang Yin whose heart softened slightly after seeing Shi Li’s expression. She offered Shi Li a way to back down and said, “You didn’t pay any attention to me at all after we got together and completely ignored my feelings, so I got angry! That’s why I won’t give you my food!”

Shi Li had experienced many setbacks in his previous life, but these setbacks were all basically from losing fights and other similar situations. For example, getting attacked by other tribes and being driven out.

And these setbacks didn’t amount to much in his eyes after he had become a Beast King–By then, he was already one of the world’s strongest!

He’d never experienced a woman’s criticism before.

Unexpectedly, the gentle and beautiful girl from his memories was really like this in private!

Shi Li wanted to get angry and leave, but he soon realized that in this situation where he had already offended Xiong Ye, he absolutely couldn’t afford to offend Lang Yin as well.

Lang Yin’s animal form was that of a white wolf. She had beautiful silver hair, black eyes and snow-white skin, and liked to keep herself very clean. She had been acknowledged as the most beautiful woman in the tribe a few years ago, and there were many men who liked her.

Even if Shi Li didn’t remember much about the affairs of the tribe, he still knew that he would inevitably be hated by all of Lang Yin’s admirers if he broke things off with her.

Shi Li could only say, “I’ve been sleeping in order to rest over the past few days because I was injured...” He actually had to go so far as to act feeble in front of a weak woman... When his cultivation was successful, he would definitely make Lang Yin regret it!

Shi Li had already decided that he wouldn’t keep Lang Yin around in the future. Although Lang Yin was very beautiful, it didn’t count for much in the eyes of the knowledgeable and experienced Shi Li. The daughter of the High Priest in the Beast God Temple was the truly beautiful one.

Lang Yin also hadn’t planned to fall out with Shi Li, so her expression eased as well after Shi Li spoke. However, a rift had already started to form in their relationship.

Today was another collective hunting day. Xiong Ye got up early in the morning, and Zhou Ji gave him a piece of roasted elephant bird meat that weighed about five kilograms.

Xiong Ye’s mood immediately lightened when he smelled the aroma of roasted meat. He accepted the meat and began to eat it, then said, “You should also eat more.”

“Alright.” Zhou Ji agreed.

Xiong Ye added, “It would be great if we can take down a big fellow when we go hunting later...”

Zhou Ji laughed and said, “You definitely will.”

Xiong Ye chatted with Zhou Ji for a while before finally noticing that his wound was almost healed. “Hey, how could my wounds heal so quickly?”

“Wounds will heal quickly if you eat and sleep well.” Zhou Ji replied.

Xiong Ye found this to be very reasonable. He quickly finished the roast meat in front of him and then said, “I’m going!”

He headed out as soon as he finished speaking. He had just reached the entrance to the cave when he heard Zhou Ji’s voice coming out from behind, “Be careful, don’t get hurt.”

Xiong Ye’s mood inexplicably soared.

Zhou Ji waited until Xiong Ye had left before taking out the salt his mother had left behind. After wiping off the excess moisture, he started curing the meat that had been hung out overnight.

He hadn’t eaten any of the elephant bird meat this morning.

During the apocalypse, he hadn’t been picky about food at all; he ate whatever was available since it was enough to simply be able to survive. However, after he had come to this world, he had started to become picky and didn’t want to eat anything that wasn’t fresh.

Also... He still preferred to eat various kinds of plants rather than meat.

Animal carcasses would sometimes bring about bad memories that made him unwilling to eat meat. However, when he saw Xiong Ye eating so happily, he would occasionally want to try a bite.

Zhou Ji spent some time curing the meat. By the time he left the cave, the gathering team had already set out from the tribe.

Nobody had waited for him, and nobody had called him to leave with them, but he wasn’t bothered by this as he unhurriedly left the valley.

Their tribe was situated between the subtropical and temperate zones. It wasn’t particularly cold or snowy in winter, but it was guaranteed that food would be scarce.

The weather was now getting warmer; plants were growing, and everything was a vibrant green.

When Zhou Ji arrived at the place where the people from the gathering team were, he saw that the people there were picking leaves from a certain type of tree and harvesting the tender new tree shoots along with the leaves.

These trees were very tall, so the gathering team had to climb up to pick them. Zhou Ji went to a tree that nobody had climbed up yet and pressed a hand against the trunk, lifting his head up to look at the tree.

He used his powers, and the tree began to sprout more of the tender shoots. Because he was worried that the shoots couldn’t be eaten if they grew too much, he didn’t let the leaves grow too big.

However, in everyone else’s eyes, it looked like Zhou Ji had fallen into a daze while touching the tree.

The priest who had come out with the gathering team walked towards Zhou Ji and asked, “What are you looking at?”

Zhou Ji had long noticed that the priest was coming his way and turned his head to him when he approached, “Just looking around casually.”

The priest spent most of his time in his cave, but from time to time, he would come out with his three little apprentices and join the gathering team to teach both the gathering team as well as his apprentices how to distinguish between the different plants while collecting some plants for himself.

That was why they had come out today. Earlier, the priest had reminded the people of the tribe not to remove all the branches from these trees. They were also told to remove some of the longer branches and plant them into the soil.

Zhou Ji felt that this should be a kind of tree that could be propagated from cuttings, and he confirmed this theory after testing it out with his powers.

“What does the sweet tasting plant that you brought back yesterday look like?” The priest smiled and asked.

Zhou Ji had guessed that the priest would most likely ask him this and pointed towards a place, “They grow over there.”

He took the priest with him and went to the place where he found the sweet cane. The sweet cane was probably only ready to eat in the summer, but he had sped up the process a bit, and this small stretch of sweet cane had now grown quite tall.

The priest was very happy as he brought his three apprentices with him, and they began to study the sweet cane. Zhou Ji began to aimlessly wander around again and picked up some random things as he pleased.

The priest was present, so he only gathered the edible plants that the tribesmen already knew about.

The gathering team’s harvest was very good today with him there, but the hunting team on the other hand wasn’t doing so well.

The hunters had been divided into several groups as usual, but every group had been unlucky, and not only had they caught very little prey, the prey they had managed to catch was very small. It was estimated that it was only enough food to feed the people in the tribe for one day.

Xiong He saw the situation and frowned, “We’ll continue hunting tomorrow. When the time comes, we’ll go a little further.”

Their tribe usually hunted every other day because the prey they took down couldn’t be completely preserved, and it took time for them to eat the meat. They also couldn’t catch so many that all the prey around the tribe was cleared out, or they would be left with nothing to hunt.

However, if there wasn’t enough food, they would go hunting every day.

Xiong Ye agreed, “We can get up a bit earlier tomorrow and go to the other side of the mountain to take a look.” The mountain that Xiong Ye referred to was about three or four hours east of the tribe.

Xiong He, “Good! Then that’s settled!”

After everyone discussed it and started to head back, a few people who had taken on animal forms up ahead suddenly changed back to human form and exclaimed happily, “I smell the scent of people from the tribe! The salt team is back!”

Xiong He was taken by pleasant surprise. They would usually send out the salt team to trade for salt after winter had passed, so the day that the people from the salt team returned was definitely worth celebrating!