Huang Si sat quietly beside his corpse for a while, mourning the member of the Human Race he had once cared about and helped.
Huang Si felt it was good that he could see him off one last time.
However, the peace was soon broken.
The squad led by Shu Zi appeared below the cliff. Seeing a stranger inexplicably beside Hei Zi, Shu Zi tensed and shouted, "Who are you? What do you want? Hand Hei Zi over!"
Shu Zi still remembered that Hei Zi had indeed been saved by the gods, who had sent that monster to return him to their settlement.
So could this strangely dressed person be...
Though Shu Zi spoke sternly, he didn't dare approach just yet. After all, he had no idea who the other person was.
Huang Si glanced at Shu Zi and his men, then vanished.
Shu Zi stood dumbstruck in the night breeze for a long, long time before finally coming to his senses. Then he and his companions went to examine Hei Zi's body.
That man's gaze had chilled him to the bone.
There had been no hostility in it, not even the slightest emotion—only endless indifference.
Yet for some reason, that indifference had seemed more terrifying to Shu Zi than any hostility.
Fortunately, the man had left.
Shu Zi and his companions carried Hei Zi's corpse to the center of the Ape-Man Tribe's settlement, where a huge bonfire was burning.
Many Human Race companions stood guard beside the fire, while the corpses of quite a few ape-men lay scattered around it.
Several hundred more ape-men were crouched on the ground, holding their heads as members of the Human Race kept watch over them with weapons. Most were women and children.
"Blackie is dead! We avenged Xiao Hua!" Shu Zi used the string of the God Bow to cut off Hei Zi's head, then held it high.
The people of the Human Race around him responded with a deafening roar.
Shu Zi still felt a chill in his heart. To bolster his courage, he continued to shout:
"Blackie can't torment and harm us anymore! The evil god behind him was scared off by our bravery, too! He won't come back! We've all done well!"
"The evil god has been driven away!" the people around him shouted along with him.
Shu Zi fell silent for a moment. He was waiting.
Then nothing happened, and Shu Zi knew they were truly safe.
"We won!" he cried joyfully.
Huang Si watched the jubilant people of the Human Race from the air, not far away. An evil god? That concept wasn't bad. He could find a suitable artificial intelligence to take over the role later.
Where there was light, there was shadow.
Where there was justice, there was evil.
Where there were gods, there were demons.
This world could be no exception.
Otherwise, without a sense of crisis, humanity would stop striving to improve.
The Human Race's campaign had ended in a great victory. They had not only killed Hei Zi but also slain many of the ape-men who had helped him, while sparing the women and children.
At first, the people of the Human Race had spared them simply because they didn't want to kill so many. But then they found themselves at a loss. What should they do with them?
A man named Gouwei came up with an idea. He had often run errands for the elders at the ancestral shrine and had a shrewd air about him.
"The women and children are weaker, so they'll be easier to keep under control. Why don't some of us stay here and make them work for us?" Gouwei suggested.
Shu Zi shook his head. "Women aren't as strong as men to begin with, and we already have women and children of our own to support. What could they do for us? It'd be good enough if they could support themselves. How could they do anything for us?"
Gouwei was stumped, too. Shu Zi was right. Besides, these people seemed a little slower than their own, and they might not be able to do the work properly.
"Then let's do this." Gouwei chopped his hand downward in a gesture of slaughter. "Keep the able-bodied women, and kill the rest, including the children! We don't need them eating our food."
Shu Zi hesitated. "What if we let them go?"
"Absolutely not, Chief!" another older man cried. "We burned their land and killed their people. If we let them go, they'll all become our enemies and come back for revenge sooner or later."
Shu Zi hesitated for a long while and discussed the matter with the others. In the end, he decided to follow Gouwei's suggestion.
Almost every man except Shu Zi chose a woman. A few particularly strong men even picked two and held them in their arms.
The others insisted that Shu Zi choose one as well, but he refused no matter what they said.
Once everyone had made their choices, Shu Zi led his men into action.
In an instant, screams filled the air, and blood ran through the ape-men's settlement.
The captive women trembled, no longer able to summon the will to resist.
The course of civilization was often accompanied by bloodshed and cruelty.
Over the following years, the Human Race, led by Shu Zi with the God Bow in hand, spread across the surrounding Ape-man Tribes, large and small.
They formed alliances and intermarried with the weaker tribes and those more willing to cooperate, gradually bringing them under their rule.
As for the powerful tribes that stood firm, the Human Race made examples of them, clearing the way with blood.
In the past, the Ape-man Tribes had been deeply hostile toward the Human Race, who possessed language and intelligence. Whenever a member of the Human Race was sent to live among an Ape-man Tribe, they were ostracized and bullied.
Now, however, the tribes had only two choices: either treat the newcomers with the utmost respect as honored guests or be reduced to ashes beneath their might.
Times had changed, and the Ape-man Tribes regretted their past actions.
Now, members of the Human Race were highly sought after.
If someone from an Ape-man Tribe took a member of the Human Race as a partner—or even merely had a child with one—their standing in their original tribe would improve greatly.
Civilization had conquered savagery, and it was also eroding it.
One day, the true ape-men would fall behind and vanish completely.
Huang Si's consciousness arrived at the Signal Tower near Fang Mountain, the Human Race's main settlement. From there, he gazed into the distance at the lively, bustling temple.
The temple enshrined three Ancestral Deities. A steady stream of people came and went, and many devout worshippers knelt inside.
Huang Si's consciousness passed through the temple walls, and he saw Shu Zi kneeling at the very front.
Every autumn—the season when Xiao Hua had died—Shu Zi came to the Ancestral Deities' temple to pray.
The Human Race still had no proper calendar, so they could only estimate the passage of time by observing the changing seasons.
Shu Zi's prayers were always the same. He begged the gods to bring his wife back to life.
"It's been five years. Why hasn't Shu Zi remarried?"
Huang Si wasn't being sarcastic. His real body was sitting in his living room, eating a snow mochi, and he had merely sent a sliver of his consciousness over to check on things.
But seeing Shu Zi like this made Huang Si think he was being a bit of a nuisance.
Five years had passed, and he was still praying for Xiao Hua's resurrection. Huang Si had indeed been overly optimistic back then when he had the three Ancestral Deities promise to return Shu Zi's wife if he remained devout and distinguished himself.
But five years in the Green World amounted to only one week for Huang Si. And in that week, he still hadn't found a way to reverse the soul assimilation.
Shu Zi was too impatient.
That might have been understandable for an ordinary person, but Xiao Hua was also the wife of the Human Race's chief.
He still didn't know what kind of trouble might arise if he returned her.
Back in the real world, Huang Si made a decision. The two worlds' time flowed at a ratio of 323 to one. If Shu Zi was still insisting on getting his wife back before Huang Si finished his snow mochi, he would send her back, consequences be damned.
As the chief of a tribe, Shu Zi naturally had people who couldn't stand to see him refuse to take another woman.
Sure enough, after the prayers, one elder after another came over to try to persuade him.
Shu Zi made excuses, saying that he already had a son. If he raised his son to adulthood, his line wouldn't die out.
"But one child isn't enough! What if he dies young?" A group of elders continued trying to reason with him.
But Shu Zi's resolve was firm. He wouldn't accept any woman unless Xiao Hua came back to life.
"The dead can't come back to life!" someone tried to reason with him.
Shu Zi only said, "The Ancestral Deities promised me. If they haven't brought her back yet, then I must not have been devout enough or done enough. As long as I..."
Huang Si had been holding the little wooden fork in his mouth, hesitating to eat the last bite of his snow mochi.
He had wanted to wait.
But after hearing Shu Zi's superstitious words, Huang Si coldly ate the last bite.
He would give Shu Zi what he wanted.
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