Li Qi looked around the tiny tribe.
Calling it a tribe was generous. In truth, it was merely a household. This world seemed far from having developed things like cities; all their bonds were built upon blood relations.
Correspondingly, among the newborns of the household, only the eldest sons and females were kept. All other males would be driven from the tribe once they came of age, to seek out other households.
Li Qi looked over the tribe. There were seventeen people: several pairs of parents and children. They were aunts and uncles, nephews and nieces to one another, all living together.
But there were no married couples. This was a group-marriage system. So long as they were not relatives, all men and all women were shared with one another. The children they bore were likewise raised by the tribe as a whole. Males from outside tribes would produce qualified descendants with the women who remained, largely eliminating inbreeding.
Besides them, there was an old grandmother. Li Qi knew that she was already forty years old, frail with age and liable to die at any moment. Yet because her son had once been the eldest son and was now the head of this household, she was still allowed to remain.
Normally, elders at this age would be abandoned. It saved food and spared the tribe the burden of caring for them. But the head of this household was clearly unusual.
Not only had he not abandoned the elder, he had done his utmost to care for her, allowing the old grandmother to reach the venerable age of forty.
It was already nighttime. Apart from several of the youngest children, who still brimmed with energy, everyone moved with extreme sluggishness. They were clearly exhausted to the bone.
They had labored all