Crow Witch

The next day, Yu Chen packed his things without disturbing anyone and left Teng Mountain before the sun rose, following the slope down to the other side.

Though he had lived in this world for over twenty years, Yu Chen had spent most of his time studying his cheat, researching sorcery, learning shamanic script, and reforming the tribe's systems.

He did not know the surrounding environment particularly well. What he knew came from records within the tribe and information brought by traveling merchants. In the languages of the Snake Tribe and the neighboring tribes, this mountain range was called Amarig or Ayagongma, meaning the great sacred land, or a paradise nestled among the mountains.

But according to merchants who occasionally came to the tribe to trade supplies, the mountains were called the Southern Wilderness.

Based on the information Yu Chen had deliberately gathered, as well as the inheritances passed down by generations of Snake Shamans, there were tens of thousands of tribes, large and small, throughout the Southern Wilderness. The Snake Tribe's former strength had not been particularly formidable in the Southern Wilderness. Even now, after reclaiming the two tribes that had split away and taking over their hunting grounds, it was probably only second-rate, far from first-rate.

The reason lay in totems and shamans.

So-called totems were, in essence, newborn deities, or reserves for godhood. Most possessed divine persona, divinity, and domains. Divinity was the mystery and origin that allowed a totem to stand above mortal things, while a domain was the manifested application of control over laws and principles. A powerful totem's domain could even double as the authority of an earth deity.

From this information, Yu Chen roughly deduced that the totems worshipped by first-rate tribes should have gone a step beyond even the Snake Tribe's Snake Totem. They had all fused with the authority of earth deities, enough to be called the mountain god or river god of a region.

They were immensely powerful. Within the range covered by their domains, Yu Chen was certain that he would not have the slightest ability to resist.

So I absolutely cannot approach the hunting grounds of those tribes. I should avoid the hunting grounds of the next tier down as much as possible too!

After walking all morning and crossing two mountains, Yu Chen's thoughts stirred. Bamboo slips rolled forth, lines emerging one after another to sketch out the shape of a map. A pale green dot sat upon it, representing Yu Chen's current location.

Following my current route, after crossing one more river, I should reach the Crow Tribe's hunting grounds. One river south of the Crow Tribe, past three mountains, is where the Wolf Tribe is located.

These two tribes may be a little weaker than the current Snake Tribe, but according to the information gathered in the past, their totems likely possess some traits of earth deities as well. Better to take a detour... hmm...

Yu Chen was reviewing the route he had planned yesterday when he suddenly sensed a faint sound coming from nearby.

His fingers formed a hand seal, and two snake shadows crawled from his sleeves, dropping into the shadow beneath his feet. Following the darkness, they blended into the surrounding grass and trees.

At the same time, Yu Chen's pupils transformed into Snake Eyes, and everything before him changed. Faint auras rose from the grasses and vegetation, while over twenty thick flares of blood qi and a concealed, muddled ripple of magical power shone brilliantly in the distance. Even more eye-catching was the faint avian phantom above that ripple of magical power.

The phantom bird continuously spread waves of aura outward, proclaiming its authority while seeming to search for something.

A group of warriors and a shaman?

Recognizing the identities of the newcomers, Yu Chen, unwilling to stir up trouble, prepared to leave.

"Caw! Caw! Caw!" A burst of crow cries rang out. Then three pitch-black crows shot out from the side like arrows loosed from a bowstring.

Yu Chen's figure swayed, his body as boneless as a snake's. With an uncanny posture, he evaded the crows' ambush and slid several meters backward. At the spot where he had just stood, two snake shadows abruptly lunged forth and bit down on the crows' necks.

At the same time, Yu Chen flicked his wrist, and a crimson dart, curved like a tiny snake, appeared in his hand.

With a flick of his finger, firelight flew from his hand and pierced straight through the remaining crow's head. Strangely, after the crow's corpse fell to the ground, it turned into a dim, lusterless crow feather.

The other two crows bitten by the snake shadows exploded instantly, turning into scattered feathers that vanished as they flew toward the other side of the forest.

"Hah!" The moment Yu Chen saw this, he knew things were bad. He made his decision at once. One hand summoned back the Fire Snake Dart, while the bracelet woven from grass, wood, snake bones on his other wrist gave off a faint glow. Layer upon layer of snake scales grew across the formerly bony bracelet.

Finally, a long banner flew from Yu Chen's sleeve. On its burlap surface, snake patterns flickered with an eerie glow. Thin mist continuously seeped from where the banner touched the ground, spreading around Yu Chen. Within the sparse fog, more than a dozen snake shadows flickered in and out of sight, lurking among the grass and trees.

"A wild shaman? A Snake Shaman?" A surprised voice sounded. A middle-aged man holding a wooden staff emerged from the dense forest, wearing black hemp clothes adorned with crow feathers. He was protected by a group of burly men clad in animal hides, armed with weapons, their exposed skin covered in colorful patterns.

"Crow Witch?" Yu Chen glanced at the man in black and casually asked.

"I wouldn't dare!" The man shook his head. "I am only a lesser shaman of the tribe."

Yu Chen sneered inwardly at this. As someone who had once been honored as the Great Snake Shaman, he knew full well what the other party's status was.

So-called lesser shamans were, by Yu Chen's standards, actually shaman apprentices. Though they could sense the power of a totem and had initially grasped shamanic script, they possessed little magical power.

Within the range covered by a totem's power, lesser shamans could generally use their meager magical power to draw upon the totem's divine might and perform some exceedingly simple sorcery. The more capable ones could, with preparation, use some high-powered spells as well.

But once they left the range covered by the totem's power, the sorcery lesser shamans could perform would lose nine-tenths of its force. Those who had only just cultivated magical power might even lose the ability to cast spells altogether.

In the old Snake Tribe, there had been dozens of lesser shamans and six or seven shamans under the Snake Shaman. After Yu Chen took office, the number of lesser shamans had grown to over a hundred.

To a tribe, lesser shamans truly did not count as important figures.

Though the Crow Tribe was inferior to the current Snake Tribe, it still surpassed the Snake Tribe in its former divided state. The crows this man had summoned just now were certainly no lowly spell.

That meant he was either a shaman who had comprehended part of the true meaning of shamanic script and condensed his own magical power, or someone deeply favored by the totem and granted its blessings.

Furthermore, anything that could make a shaman bring twenty or thirty warriors with him could not possibly be a trivial matter. Having only just left his own tribe, Yu Chen had no desire whatsoever to involve himself in it.

Unexpectedly, the Crow Tribe's shaman called out to stop him. "From the look of you, you must be the Snake Shaman from the Mist Serpent Tribe! Your tribe has already fallen to the Snake Tribe. Are you interested in helping me gather purple flowers? Once it is done, I can introduce you to our tribe's Crow Witch. When the time comes, you may look through the shamanic scripts of our inheritance. How about it?"

Yu Chen stopped and fell silent for a moment. Amid the other man's smile, he firmly made clear that he had no intention of getting involved.

Then, protected by the many snake shadows, Yu Chen hid himself within the thin mist and slowly disappeared from the group's sight.

"What a pity!" As Yu Chen departed, the smile vanished from the Crow Tribe shaman's face, and he spoke those words.

One of the warriors beside him was about to speak when the leader pulled him back. He looked at the leader in confusion, then followed the leader's gesture to the places where the snake shadows had crawled. There, scorch-like marks had been left behind. Many Crow Tribe warriors who had only just noticed them revealed fearful expressions.

"With such venom, even the Snake Shaman of the former Poison Snake Tribe couldn't have done this, could he? Just who is this wild shaman?"

"He is the Great Snake Shaman," the middle-aged shaman said flatly. "The Great Snake Shaman who helped the Snake Tribe reclaim the Poison Snake Tribe and the Mist Serpent Tribe after they split away, and who had scarcely ever left the Snake Tribe! I had long heard that this Great Snake Shaman was a peerless genius. Later, when he abandoned the totem's power, I thought he had been plotted against by the nobles within his tribe because of his youth. Now it seems he truly chose another path. And this fellow has probably already touched the threshold of a Great Shaman."

The warriors beside him also sighed in regret.

But the warrior leader consoled him, "Shaman, it is fine if he is unwilling to join us! Besides, since he has already left his tribe, we will have chances to meet again. What matters most now is the Purple Flower Rite!"

"That is true!" The Crow Tribe shaman nodded. "The Purple Flower Rite is one of the most important rites of our Crow Tribe. This truly is not the right time to let someone join our tribe."