Savage Village

Chen Cheng had lived with Samlet for over a decade. This was only the second time he remembered seeing the burly man cry; the first had been when Chen Cheng was born and Samlet fled with him.

Seeing Samlet shed tears made Chen Cheng feel terrible as well, but he knew this was not the life he and Samlet were meant to live.

He had no ambition to restore the nation and reign supreme. At the same time, Samlet should have been a supreme powerhouse revered by the entire continent's Human race, not a savage and nanny raising a child in the mountains.

Chen Cheng stepped forward and helped Samlet up. "Uncle Sam, you should know that I have no desire to restore the country. The Thornflower Empire is already a thing of the past. The lessons of history tell us that life must look forward.

"I was only able to grow up thanks to your care over these years.

"Now that I can stand on my own, you, as the continent's strongest Legendary warrior, should not remain beside someone as lacking in ambition as me.

"You should have a broader world before you. You stand at the pinnacle of power in this world. You should enjoy the honor and songs of praise that belong to you, instead of staying in these deserted mountains and forests with me, living as a savage."

This was the first time Chen Cheng had truly spoken of his lack of ambition to restore the nation. After hearing him, Samlet's sobs only grew harsher.

In his eyes, it was his own education of Chen Cheng that had gone wrong. He lacked the ability to let his lord do anything but hide in these wilderness forests, eroding away Chen Cheng's heart as a king.

All of this was his fault.

After weeping in grief for a while, Sam made up his mind. He would go to the City of Chaos and raise a powerful royal guard. He would give Chen Cheng hope and let him see that people in this world still longed for the Thornflower Empire.

At daybreak the next day, Chen Cheng lifted the fur blanket from his body and got up. He had intended to call out for Uncle Sam, but when he saw the empty stone cave and the animal hide on the stone table, he fell silent.

He picked up the hide and looked at it. It was a farewell letter Samlet had left for him, saying that he was going to the City of Chaos to build a powerful army for Chen Cheng and let him know that many people in this world still yearned for the Thornflower dynasty.

Although Chen Cheng was somewhat worried about Samlet, seeing that he could finally let go of him and truly go out into the world to make his mark filled Chen Cheng's heart with joy.

As for raising a force and the like, Chen Cheng did not find anything wrong with it.

After all, he was still a wanted criminal to the outside world, and he needed some subordinates around him.

As for himself, Chen Cheng had never planned to truly return to Samlet's side and take over any force.

Chen Cheng looked around the cave where he had lived for more than two years. He walked to the wooden rack holding the divine sword and bowed. Then he took the divine sword from the rack and carried it outside to the crude smelting site.

His shotgun had been handmade and smelted into shape here. Now that he had given up the great cause of restoring the nation, this divine golden sword was rather eye-catching to carry around. He might as well melt it down into gold and spend it as money.

Of course, if his ancestors from this life truly had spirits in heaven, they would surely want to beat this unfilial descendant to death. Thinking of that, Chen Cheng could not help smiling.

"Ancestors, I'm heading out into the world now. It's hard to get anywhere without a penny to my name, so please forgive me."

Chen Cheng used the hide bellows to raise the furnace's fire, then clamped up the golden sword and lowered its tip into the crucible to melt it slowly.

Yet after half a day, the crucible had been burned orange-yellow, even turning whitish and porcelain-like, while the golden sword showed no sign of melting whatsoever. It had not even reddened from the heat. When he lifted the sword out, its tip was somehow still at room temperature.

By all reason, the temperature should already have reached gold's melting point. Moreover, metal conducted heat extremely well. This left Chen Cheng in a difficult spot.

Seeing that the sword could not be melted, Chen Cheng sighed for a long while. His perfectly good startup capital was gone just like that.

In the end, for secrecy's sake, he could only cast a layer of iron over it to conceal its original glittering golden appearance.

By the time he finished, three days had passed. What he now held was an ancient-looking, mottled, somewhat pitted ordinary Iron Sword—the most common and shoddiest kind at that.

Only after seeing his masterpiece did Chen Cheng contentedly put the sword away. Then he dismantled the crude smelting site and extinguished the furnace, for he knew that setting fire to a mountain would earn him a prison sentence.

Afterward, Chen Cheng packed up the things in the cave, put on again the Level 14 Magic Beast leather armor he had kept stored away all these years, and set off with his flintlock shotgun and greatsword.

As he traveled through the deep mountains and old forests, the occasional roars of powerful beasts gave Chen Cheng the thrill of a hunter spotting prey.

At that moment, he felt as though the invisible shackles around him had been removed, and his entire being was light and joyful.

Naturally, Chen Cheng also knew exactly what he was capable of. He strictly followed Samlet's teachings from all these years, sneaking through the forest as cautiously as possible. Earlier, to prevent him from being attacked by powerful beasts while alone in the cave, Samlet had even obtained a Beast Repellent Pill made from a lump of dung from Black Dragon, a Level 16 peak, half-step Level 17 super Magic Beast.

Just because it was dung did not mean it was dirty and disgusting. Chen Cheng had thought so at first too, but when he saw that Beast Repellent Pill, he dismissed the notion.

Black Dragon, a Level 16 peak existence, was one of the most powerful creatures on the entire continent. The energy contained within him surpassed ordinary imagination, so naturally, what he excreted after eating was not only unclean—it even gave off a unique, delicate fragrance.

This was like how humans on Earth used sperm whale dung to make top-grade ambergris.

Of course, Samlet had told him all that, and Chen Cheng had also chosen to think of it in the best possible light. After all, no one wanted to believe that what they carried around on them really was a lump of shit.

With the Beast Repellent Pill on him, even if those ferocious beasts discovered Chen Cheng, they would flee far away as soon as they smelled his scent.

For several days in a row, Chen Cheng traveled in a straight line through the mountains. The forest was full of steep mountains and dense trees. If he had not lived in the woods ever since being reborn,

and if Samlet had not often taken him deep into the mountains and old forests to train his wilderness survival skills, he would have long since collapsed from exhaustion and died in these woods.

Finally, after Chen Cheng crossed a hill, his view suddenly opened up. Within the vast forest before him lay a large clearing.

A clear mountain spring babbled through the area, and beside the stream stood a small village of wooden houses. Outside the village, he could see more than a dozen natives wearing crudely made hemp clothing busily at work.

Chen Cheng knew that these people were savages not formally governed by the authorities.

When the children playing with mud on the field ridges saw Chen Cheng, they immediately screamed and ran toward the village. The working adults, upon seeing him, immediately picked up their farming tools and slowly retreated to the village entrance, glaring at him like tigers watching their prey.

Soon, Chen Cheng saw another dozen or so men, women, old people, and children emerge from the village carrying weapons. At their head stood a gaunt old man wearing armor made from Blood Wolf hide and leaning on a wooden staff.

How could Chen Cheng fail to understand what was happening? These native savages had taken him for an enemy.

Then Chen Cheng heard the old man at the front speak in extremely clumsy official language. "Our village has nothing to trade. Leave our village at once..."

The old man repeated only those few lines. Even when Chen Cheng explained why he had come, the old man ignored him and simply kept urging him to leave.

With no way to communicate, Chen Cheng had no choice but to turn and depart. His destination was a real town in this world, not a savage village full of half-naked people in hemp clothes.

Only after seeing Chen Cheng leave did the little old man breathe a sigh of relief. If he had not noticed the sword at Chen Cheng's waist, he would have long since ordered the villagers to rush forward and hack Chen Cheng to death.

Savage villages like theirs, hidden in the mountains and forests, were extremely hostile to outsiders. At the same time, because they had no systematic knowledge to learn from, slave-catching squads from outside loved finding villages like theirs, slaughtering them, and taking slaves.

Chen Cheng went around the village to the stream's lower reaches, bent down, and scooped up enough water to drink his fill. Then he filled the leather waterskin at his waist and prepared to continue on his way.

But after he had gone less than two li, he heard a huge explosion, followed by a plume of smoke rising into the air.

Chen Cheng looked toward where the smoke was rising and knew that the native savage village he had just passed must have caught fire.

Originally, Chen Cheng had wanted to leave it at that, but as the smoke grew thicker and thicker, he ultimately turned around and headed back.

Since he had encountered them in these mountains and forests, it counted as fate between him and this village. Now that disaster had struck the village, he could go back and help them put out the fire. Besides, perhaps he could find a good place to stay there for the night.

Though the Beast Repellent Pill kept him safe from the Magic Beasts in the mountains, those dim-witted mosquitoes did not care about such things and would still come to suck his blood.

What Chen Cheng did not know was that this return trip would truly change the rest of his life. His life as a slave began from that moment on.