Into the Swamp (Part One)

Heaven knew how excited, aggrieved, and homesick Luo Chong felt the instant he saw the paddy rice. It directly reduced him to tears. Men did not shed tears lightly; it was simply that he had not yet reached the depths of heartbreak.

A fine young man had died before even marrying, only to arrive inexplicably in this damned place and become a primitive. There was no vegetable oil, no vegetables, no seasoning, no iron pot, no rice or flour. Every day, it was either roasted meat or meat broth. He was nearly sick of eating it.

Although he could adapt to eating meat every day, that did not mean he did not crave staple food.

Luo Chong wiped away his tears and slapped his forehead. Paddy rice was rice, and rice came from rice paddies. Wild rice naturally ought to grow in swamplands. Swamplands were the finest naturally formed paddy fields in all of nature. How had he failed to think of this sooner?

Finding it was a decision that required no thought at all. This was the first grain crop Luo Chong had discovered in this world. How could he possibly leave it alone?

The paddy rice in the goose's stomach had already had its outer husks corroded away, revealing the rice inside. Luo Chong did not know whether such rice could still be planted, so he had to find intact rice seed.

Besides, he had never seen rice like this before. Every grain was slightly larger than a mung bean. He did not know whether that was because it had not undergone modern mechanical polishing, but one grain was equal to two or three grains of modern rice. Still, he was absolutely certain it was rice.

After finishing the roast goose, there was no time to rest that night. Luo Chong hurriedly made equipment for venturing deeper into the swamp. He had to harvest the paddy rice before those animals did. Even if he collected only one extra grain, it could become hundreds of grains the following year.

He gathered materials right there in the mangrove forest. Using the stone axe, he chopped down some long branches and saplings two centimeters in diameter, then tied them into a spindle-shaped dugout canoe frame, pointed at both ends and broad in the middle. He wrapped the bottom with the huge silver lungfish skin. Fish skin was waterproof, and wrapped around the branch frame, it became a simple dugout canoe.

Since it had to carry quite a lot, he made it fairly large: four and a half meters long and about eighty centimeters wide. It was divided into three compartments—front, middle, and rear. A person sat in the middle, while the two ends held cargo. This was also the maximum size of that fish skin. Using the diagonal length of the rectangular skin as the boat's length was just right.

This dugout canoe was very light; he could lift it with one hand. He had made one before, though back then he had used plastic sheeting and willow branches. This time, he used fish skin. A simple dugout canoe like this could even be made with cling film. As long as two extra layers were wrapped around it, it could still carry a person. It was incredibly simple and practical.

He also found some slender vines and wove several vine boards. Two smaller ones were fifty centimeters long and thirty centimeters wide. By tying them to his feet with rope, he could walk through the swamp. He tied his feet to the middle of these simple flippers, leaving only twenty centimeters between them. It was somewhat awkward, but it did not affect walking. More importantly, it reduced the pressure and ensured that he would not sink into the swamp. That was what mattered most.

There was also a larger vine board, half a meter wide and one and a half meters long. This was the final safeguard. If he accidentally fell, he could place the large vine board beneath his body. It would definitely save his life.

After finishing all that, Luo Chong checked his equipment while putting up a fence for the Blue Antelope. The fence was very simple: plant several wooden stakes and lay a few crossbeams across them.

It was a simple sheep pen, with pasture and a stream inside. That was enough food and water for one day. He would not remain in the swamp until dark.

The next morning, Luo Chong drank a bowl of goose-meat broth in the morning mist. He also chopped six-meter-tall Sweet Elephant Grass for Wuda and Ximen, then carried his simple dugout canoe and set out.

He found a somewhat deeper stretch of water, set down the dugout canoe, and paddled toward the depths of the swamp wetlands with a simple paddle shaped like an inverted Y and wrapped in a layer of snakeskin.

At the same time, in the Dark Forest, Dashu of the Tree Tribe was leading his people in catching Snow Rabbits. They no longer hunted only at night; they had even begun catching rabbits during the day.

He had promised Luo Chong that he would capture live Snow Rabbits for him, but they also had to stockpile food for the winter. Although Luo Chong had promised to exchange other prey for them, what if he failed to deliver? Only what one held in one's own hands truly belonged to oneself. It was not that Dashu did not trust Luo Chong; as Chieftain, he absolutely could not gamble with the lives of his people.

To meet the needs of both Luo Chong and his own tribe, nearly the entire Tree Tribe had mobilized. Only the elders and children under six remained behind to guard the settlement. Everyone else was either catching rabbits, gathering mushrooms, or collecting grass that Snow Rabbits liked to eat. That grass was reserved for the rabbits.

To increase production, Dashu was no longer satisfied with luring rabbits with food. He had even begun violently evicting them. Once he found a rabbit hole, he dug it open directly. If the rabbits refused to come out, he burned them out or smoked them out. This really did let him catch quite a few, including several nests of baby rabbits that had only recently been born.

Luo Chong had not anticipated this result. Otherwise, he definitely would have thanked Dashu properly. But even more unexpected was that Dashu and his people encountered some enemies while hunting.

In autumn, every tribe had to store food, and the Cannibal Tribe was no exception. Their food was people—living people. Men could be eaten, while women could be kept to bear children or work. Humans had no sharp fangs or claws, nor thick, sturdy fur. They were not fast runners, either, making them easy to catch.

On the very day Luo Chong ventured deep into the swamp, a hunting team from the Cannibal Tribe encountered Dashu and his people. The team consisted entirely of adult men and numbered a full forty. They were even riding two Dinophants. The two Dinophants were not large, only somewhat taller than humans. They were still juveniles, probably captured and raised from a young age.

The weapons in their hands were all stone axes and wooden spears. Their combat strength was formidable. Compared to them, the Tree Tribe—men, women, old, and young combined—did not even have as many people, much less adult men like the enemy.

The reason the two sides encountered each other was that the firelight from Dashu burning out rabbit holes had attracted them.

Facing such powerful enemies, Dashu immediately chose to run. What a joke—was he supposed to charge over with tree branches and fight them head-on? One swing of an axe could smash him to death. Besides, the enemy had come riding Dinophants. Those monsters looked terrifying enough as it was.

Dashu relied on fighting on home ground—no, that was wrong, on running away. Because he knew the terrain, he immediately gathered his people and fled. The Cannibal Tribe pursued relentlessly from behind. Dashu deliberately chose difficult paths, so the enemy could not catch up for the moment, but some people still fell behind.

A little girl who had come out to gather mushrooms was only nine years old. Frightened, she tripped over a tree root while fleeing and fell behind. An axe came flying and struck her in the back. Then the pursuing enemy caught up and stabbed her to death with a spear. A group of savage cannibals laughed as they surrounded her and began drinking her blood.

Dashu's eyes reddened, and his teeth clacked with rage, but he did not stop. He knew he was absolutely no match for them. Even if the entire tribe fought together, they would only end up as meat on the enemy's chopping block.

Because of the dead girl, the enemy pursuit finally faltered for a moment. Dashu hurried back to the tribe's treehouses and told Elder Tree what had happened.

The enemy was too powerful; they could not defeat them at all. Migration was their only option. But they had lived in this Black Forest for generations. Where could they go? They knew little about the outside world, too.

Mutong proposed going to find Luo Chong. Luo Chong had once left behind a Feathered Arrow and said that if they encountered difficulties, they could go to his tribe and ask him for help. Moreover, judging from the weapons Luo Chong used alone, his tribe ought to be very powerful.

Dashu agreed with this suggestion as well, but they had no idea where Luo Chong's tribe was. They only knew it was on the other side of the river. How were they supposed to bring back reinforcements?

With the enemy about to reach their doorstep, Elder Tree made the final decision. He ordered Dashu to lead the tribe eastward through the Black Forest in search of Luo Chong, while he stayed behind to hold off the enemy. He was dying soon anyway and could no longer walk. He would not drag down the tribe.

Dashu nodded sorrowfully and hurriedly had everyone pack their belongings.

Every member of the Tree Tribe wore a set of animal hide and carried only a small amount of dried meat. They could not carry much more. They strapped every wooden bucket in the tribe onto their backs, since containers were the most valuable things they had. The wooden buckets also held many live rabbits, which Luo Chong had specifically requested. Dashu hoped that Luo Chong would help them for the sake of these rabbits. They were, in a sense, a bargaining chip.