Core Team

The camps around Redwood Ridge all followed an unspoken convention.

If someone had not broken through to the Lumbering Realm before the age of twenty-five, they were no longer worth investing much in.

It was not that there was no hope after twenty-five. Mainly, once past that age, their potential declined rapidly. With the same resources poured into them, their improvement would not match that of those under twenty-five.

The resources in question were, naturally, Frost Beast flesh and blood.

In Xia Hong's view, this unspoken convention had clearly arisen from a shortage of resources.

Before he had seen a Frost Beast, he had not understood it.

But after going out once and witnessing the ferocity of the Frost Wolves and Snow Mane, he understood. For these weak camps around Redwood Ridge, every pound of Frost Beast flesh and blood was hard-won, so its value had to be maximized.

This was even more true for Great Xia Camp.

By concentrating resources and prioritizing the breakthrough of a select few, more people would be able to go out. The camp would gain more resources, helping more people increase their strength, and the camp's overall power could then rise quickly.

The next night, under the watchful eyes of everyone in the camp, the contest began.

Of course, Xia Hong first handed each of the twenty-two contestants a pound of meat.

A pound of Frost Beast flesh and blood was naturally not enough to sustain their cultivation, but it could quickly fill their stomachs and let them unleash their greatest base strength.

After eating, the twenty-two people's complexions swiftly turned rosy, and their previously listless appearance was swept away. Compared with the hundred-odd people who had not received Frost Beast flesh and blood, they looked like entirely different people.

Xia Hong entrusted Xia Chuan and Yuan Cheng with overseeing the contest, while he seized the time to eat Frost Beast flesh and blood and cultivate.

Big Stone Camp's crushing defeat and the terror of the Frost Beasts had filled him with urgency.

Big Stone Camp had sixteen Lumberjack Level fighters, including two archers who never missed their mark. With such a luxurious lineup, not only had they failed to kill a low-grade Frost Beast, three of them had even died.

Although that had something to do with their carelessness, the Frost Beasts' immense strength and cunning nature were indisputable facts as well.

Xia Hong estimated that the Snow Mane's ramming force before its death had been close to ten thousand jin.

The strength of ten thousand jin was the standard for Earth-Piercer Level combat power.

Among all the camps around Redwood Ridge, aside from Rogue Camp, only the leader of Iron Peak Camp, Tie Ying, was an Earth-Piercer Level expert.

Xia Hong lowered his head to look at the cave floor, held his breath, clenched his fists, and smashed them fiercely into the ground.

Bang...

He already possessed the strength of five thousand jin, yet when such a powerful blow struck the ground, it produced only a rather muted sound.

The floor did not budge in the slightest. Only some dust rose near his fists.

The so-called Earth Excavation Realm referred to reaching a level where one could use brute force to break open the ground and seize the resources beneath it.

After years upon years of bitterly cold weather, all soil had become incomparably hard. Not to mention the area around this cave, which was made entirely of stone.

This survival difficulty really is hell-level!

The ground was too hard, which meant farming was impossible.

Humans could obtain food only from the trees outside that could survive in the extreme cold and bear fruit, such as the Ice Vast Tree.

But could those trees be grown as crops and transplanted back to the camp?

Xia Hong had asked Xia Ding that question before.

The answer was no.

Because those trees needed sunlight to grow.

Sunlight existed only during the day, but the daytime temperatures were fatal to humans.

Moreover, daytime was not only freezing cold. Frost Beasts ranged farther and were even more violent in temperament, while the most deadly threat was the strange monsters that could appear at any moment.

A few years ago, Rogue Camp had tried transplanting Ice Vast Trees onto the ground near their camp cave.

But within days, the Ice Vast Trees had attracted a large gathering of Frost Beasts, ultimately causing heavy casualties in the camp.

Only then did people discover that when Frost Beasts could not hunt food, they would also use the Crystal Fruit on Ice Vast Trees to fill their bellies.

With that, transplanting Ice Vast Trees had become almost impossible.

Not necessarily. If the camp becomes strong enough and no longer fears Frost Beasts, it could still transplant Ice Vast Trees as close as possible.

Great Xia Camp was naturally still a hundred thousand miles away from meeting that standard. He was merely entertaining the thought.

Although countless thoughts filled his mind, Xia Hong's cultivation never stopped.

After throwing four consecutive sets of Long Fist, his beast-hide clothes were nearly soaked through with sweat. Only then did he completely release the burning sensation that had risen in his body after swallowing the Frost Beast flesh and blood.

But after lightly clenching his fist and sensing the slight increase in strength, Xia Hong frowned again.

"After breaking through to the Lumbering Realm, my limit for bearing Frost Beast flesh and blood has increased by another two pounds. I can now eat seven pounds a day, but my improvement efficiency seems to have slowed somewhat too."

The higher one climbed, the harder everything became. That was an objective law.

Xia Hong naturally did not dwell on it. Just as he finished his exercise and prepared to stop cultivating, Yuan Cheng and Xia Chuan had already approached him with five people.

"Yue Feng, Lin Kai, Qiu Peng, Lu Yang... Xu Ning."

Xia Hong merely swept his gaze over them, and their five names immediately surfaced in his mind.

He paused only when he reached Xu Ning.

The camp had only a hundred-odd people in total, and only a little over twenty were of the same age. Xia Chuan knew nearly all of them.

In truth, this result had not been particularly unexpected.

Xia Hong knew that the descendants of the Lumber Team members would certainly win.

The reason was simple. Compared with the others, those descendants of Lumber Team members had received Frost Beast flesh and blood before and possessed some foundation in strength.

And that was indeed the case.

Yue Feng was the son of former Lumber Team member Yue Fan, Lin Kai was Lin Yu's son, Qiu Peng's father was Qiu Ping, Great Xia's only archer, and Lu Yang was Lu Ting's son.

Among the five, Xu Ning alone was not the descendant of a former Lumber Team member.

That was why Xia Hong had paused when he first saw him.

Not being a Lumber Team member's descendant meant that he had never eaten Frost Beast meat before, nor had he ever cultivated.

To still fight his way into the top five under those conditions was no simple feat!

Xia Hong turned to Yuan Cheng and asked, "How much strength do they each have?"

"Yue Feng has exactly 2,000 jin, Lin Kai 1,800, Qiu Peng 1,700, Lu Yang 1,500, and Xu Ning has 1,100."

Xia Hong looked into Xu Ning's eyes, and they immediately lit up.

For someone eating Frost Beast flesh and blood for the first time, the increase could not possibly be too great. That meant Xu Ning's base strength was already terrifying.

"This kid might just give me a surprise."

Xu Ning was clearly somewhat insecure. Seeing Xia Hong look at him repeatedly, he immediately grew nervous, his gaze flickering away slightly.

Xia Hong understood. Of the five, Xu Ning alone was not descended from a Lumber Team member. Coupled with the gap between his strength and that of the other four, it was perfectly normal for someone his age to feel inferior.

So Xia Hong no longer deliberately focused on him. Instead, he took out the five portions of Frost Beast flesh and blood he had long since divided behind him and handed them to the five.

"Starting today, I'll make time every day to teach you Long Fist. You ate Frost Beast flesh and blood before this, but if you absorb it using traditional methods, given your current physical condition, you can eat at most half a pound a day—perhaps not even that much. Practicing Long Fist can improve your efficiency in absorbing Frost Beast flesh and blood, and your strength will increase faster too. So if you want to grow strong quickly, learn it carefully and seriously. The next time the camp gets Frost Beast flesh and blood, it will be the same as this time: whoever is closest to the Lumbering Realm gets the largest share. Understood?"

The five took the Frost Beast meat, their faces brimming with excitement. Hearing Xia Hong's instructions, they all raised their heads with solemn expressions and answered in unison:

"Yes, Chief!"

Thinking of the people from Big Stone Camp, Xia Hong looked at the five before him. Though he knew the gap was still enormous, he finally felt a little more secure.

More than ten days had passed since the Lumber Team had been wiped out.

As the chief, he finally had his first small core team.

Great Xia Camp had also recovered a little of its vitality.