Wuda and Ximen

Luo Chong spent an entire day getting them ready. First, he retrieved his Back Basket, then he cut down some small trees, stripped the bark, and twisted it into ropes to make some simple harnesses.

The lead male antelope had a bridle tied to its head. The six female antelopes were divided into three groups, with two side-by-side, their necks roped together and tied to a short horizontal wooden bar. Luo Chong strung them together into a line, forming a 1-2-2-2 formation. This time, none of them could escape.

Leading the antelope team, Luo Chong found a small stream. He stewed some dried rabbit meat for dinner. The antelopes were on a hunger strike; they hadn't eaten since Luo Chong caught them, only drinking a little water by the stream just now.

Luo Chong lay by the stream, squinting at the evening clouds in the sky. Tsk, acting all high and mighty with me. If you're so tough, don't even drink water.

Luo Chong cursed disdainfully, completely unconcerned by their hunger strike.

To the east-northeast of the small stream was a colorful stone mountain, the one Elder Tree had pointed out from the Lookout Post. It was very close to Luo Chong now, only about two to three kilometers away, less than half an hour's walk.

That mountain wasn't the color of fiery clouds as Elder Tree had described, but he wasn't entirely wrong; indeed, a part of it was red. The entire mountain had sparse vegetation and abundant rocks. From a few kilometers away, you could see huge granite rocks reflecting a riot of vibrant colors under the setting sun.

The entire mountain was like a fallen rainbow, with not a single color missing – red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, and purple – along with large areas of gray and white. All the colors were distributed in bands, extending continuously towards the northeast.

Holy cow, I'm rich! This is definitely a mine! And judging solely by the colors, this is a banded ore vein with multiple minerals coexisting, though I don't know which mineral is dominant.

Banded ore veins are often formed by volcanic lava flows. If they were formed by geological pressure, those veins would mostly be layered, which is easy to distinguish. It seems there might be a volcano nearby in the distance.

It was completely dark now. Although Luo Chong really wanted to go and see, he could only suppress his impulse. He had also spent the whole day making those ropes, so he went to sleep early.

The next day, just as the sky was beginning to lighten, Luo Chong was woken by a series of grunting sounds. He squinted and looked around. A faint plume of smoke rose from the campfire; only a few glowing embers were still flickering. Luo Chong added some firewood, and soon the fire was burning.

The dim surroundings were instantly illuminated, which excited Luo Chong for a while. He strongly resisted the urge to laugh heartily and lay on the ground, pretending to be asleep.

He saw that in the small grove where Luo Chong had tied the Blue Antelopes, the two female antelopes that had escaped yesterday had returned with eight young antelopes, and they had also somehow brought back an adult male antelope.

That male antelope was mounting a female antelope tied to a tree, grunting aggressively at the tied male antelope.

Holy cow, this is like Pan Jinlian bringing her kids and Ximen to provoke Wuda! Luo Chong lay on the ground, stifling his laughter, his body shaking with the effort.

Wuda, whose horn Luo Chong had broken, was furious but could only watch as his wife was ravished by Ximen. He could only pace in circles around the tree. Now, even if he wasn't tied, he couldn't beat the other one. Luo Chong had broken his horn, making him much shorter than Ximen. What the hell could he fight with?

Luo Chong couldn't bear to watch Wuda continue to suffer, so he quietly hid behind the bushes. These were freebies brought right to his doorstep; it would be a disservice to their kindness not to keep them all.

Luo Chong didn't interrupt Ximen's good time. He quickly made a few simple rope loops, planning to catch the two runaway Pan Jinlians first. Once he controlled all the female antelopes, he didn't believe Ximen would run away.

The sky was still very dark. Luo Chong quietly crept behind the two Pan Jinlians. While they were still watching Ximen, he suddenly slipped the loops over their heads. With a pull backward on the ropes, he made them collide directly. The two female antelopes immediately took off running again, but they couldn't run more than ten meters before stopping. Luo Chong had already tied the other end to a tree.

The young antelopes were still bewildered. Seeing the female antelopes suddenly stop running, they also stopped and were caught by Luo Chong one by one.

By the time Luo Chong came back to deal with Ximen, it had just reached the peak of its antelope life when a loop was slipped over its head. Ximen was furious, put away its "stuff," and charged at Luo Chong. However, it didn't run more than five meters before realizing it could only circle the tree like Wuda.

Naturally, a violent horn-smashing ensued. Amidst Wuda's gloating grunts, Ximen was also bridled and could no longer be smug.

By the time all this was done, the sky was already bright. Luo Chong was in a great mood, drinking salted meat soup with wild vegetables added. The wild vegetables were a plant similar to purslane that the Blue Antelopes ate. Since they could eat it, it must not be poisonous. Luo Chong added a little to the meat soup, and it tasted quite good.

After the antelope herd and Luo Chong had breakfast, the team continued on their way. Ximen carried Luo Chong, Wuda carried Luo Chong's Back Basket, and behind them, two large and two small antelopes were lined up in 8 rows. A team of 18 antelopes and one young man headed straight for the Eight-Colored Mountain to the east.

The stone mountain with eight colors was named Eight Treasures Mountain by Luo Chong. It was indeed full of treasures, just lying there quietly, waiting for Luo Chong to develop them.

There were many large red mounds on the mountain, which were not the hematite Luo Chong had imagined, but just some termite nests. However, termite nests were not without use; they were excellent weathered clay. Pottery fired from termite nest clay would definitely be better than clay from the riverbank.

The orange was Cockscomb Stone, which is Realgar. It was very brittle and could be crushed into powder with a squeeze. It could be used as medicine, applied externally for snake and insect bites, or taken internally to treat internal parasites.

In ancient China, there was also the custom of drinking Realgar wine on the Dragon Boat Festival. In fact, that was deworming medicine, similar to the sugar candies Mom used to give when I was little. It's a very easy mineral to identify.

But this stuff absolutely must not be burned. The main component of Realgar is arsenic disulfide, which is poisonous. Especially the yellow smoke that comes out when it burns; after reacting with oxygen, it becomes arsenic trioxide, which is the infamous arsenic, a highly toxic substance.

The yellow was Yellow Wax Stone, which was greasy on the surface and mixed with many glittering Chalcopyrite stones. The copper content inside was almost over 80%, making it a rich copper mine.

This was the first metal Luo Chong found, and he was very excited, digging further down to see the depth of the ore. However, when he dug down a meter, the ore vein changed. Layers of Pyrite appeared below, but very sparsely.

Pyrite is easy to identify; it's yellow, flaky stone, all in flakes. Its main component is iron sulfide, so unlike hematite, which is mainly iron oxide.

It seems the nearby volcano should be an acidic volcano, producing minerals with a high sulfur content. It's also normal to find iron sulfide next to Realgar, after all, Realgar is a sulfide.

However, there was too little Pyrite here to be used for iron smelting. It should exist as an associated mineral of the rich copper mine.

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Without further ado, asking for votes, collections, and comments, asking for character hearts, the serious kind, truer than gold