Chapter 28: Follow Me
Luo Zhen did not expect that the day of evacuation would come so soon. The wind and rain suddenly became stronger that night and even the reinforced tents were blown away. The cold wind and rain continued to pour in from the gaps. If the stakes that were used to fix the tent were not buried deep enough then he was afraid their tent would have been overturned to the ground.
“Everything is packed.”
Lu Zhan looked at the sky while he stood at the entrance of the tent, he turned around and picked up the backpack that he had just made while stuffing the dried meat and wild fruits into the backpack.
Soon the roar of a beast came from the direction of the tribe, which was a signal for the people in the tribe to evacuate as soon as possible.
“Shall we go now?” Luo Zhen took the wooden bowl, bone knives, and the like, and finally put two cuckoo birds in a makeshift cage. The cuckoo birds were obviously not used to being confined in such a narrow place and were very disobedient. Their little feet scratched and scratched, trying to break free.
Upon seeing this, Lu Zhan reached out and pinched the necks of the two cuckoo birds, and the two little guys instantly became quiet.
“Did you squeeze them to death?” Luo Zhen was taken aback. Although these two little guys have not yet begun to lay eggs, he has been raising them for a few days. As long as it was not a last resort, he didn’t want to kill these two now. If these little guys were killed, he didn’t know when he would find another bird with such a large egg production skill.
“No, they are too noisy. They just fainted and will wake up in about half a day.” Lu Zhan lifted the animal skin curtain of the tent to one side and looked out. Without moonlight, he couldn’t see too far, Luo Zhen saw that the other party listened carefully for a long time, then turned his head and said to him, “Wait a while, we will follow Hei Ya and the others.”
“Okay.” Luo Zhen nodded.
The rainwater flowed into the tent against the ground, and the fire in the room was blown out. Even though the ground was paved with a layer of stones, the rainwater had already soaked past the stones and reached Luo Zhen’s feet.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Lu Zhan glanced at Luo Zhen’s feet. He probably wanted to reduce Luo Zhen’s nervousness so he smiled and said, “This method of covering your feet with animal skins is good, at least you won’t have to worry about being caught by the weeds on the ground. Dead branches will also scratch at you but you shouldn’t keep them tied for too long or else, your feet will rot.”
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Luo Zhen twitched at the corner of his mouth. Thanks to the rain in the past few days, there was enough water to use so Luo Zhen would boil a little hot water to wash each other’s feet every day, or else he would always be assaulted by the smell of feet.
“Why are you still here? Didn’t you hear the evacuation signal? You should leave quickly, the water in the river has risen.” They were interrupted by a rough male voice while they were talking, and they looked back and saw a tall figure. The man stood at the door, turned around, and left after saying what he wanted to say.
Luo Zhen looked at Lu Zhan and asked with his eyes, are we leaving now?
Lu Zhan stretched out his hand and squeezed the back of Luo Zhen’s hand, soothing him, “Let us wait a bit more, Hei Ya and the others have not come yet.”
“Okay.”
Waiting in the storm and rain without the slightest hint of a human companion is a very tormenting thing. It was probably because there was someone around him that Luo Zhen was not too flustered. To distract himself a little, he checked the house again to see if there was anything else he could take away.
The waiting time didn’t take long and soon, there was a sound of footsteps at the door of the tent. Jiao Zhu was carrying A-Shui while still holding a huge animal skin bag in his arms. The bag had a part of it that wasn’t covered and Luo Zhen could see that it was full of pieces of meat.
“Why are you still here? Hurry up, the water in the river is coming towards us.” Hei Ya said in a bit anxious tone, “Just now when Jiao Zhu said that there was still a fire ongoing here, I didn’t believe it. The Beast God is here with his wrath. What are you waiting for, your little partner to die?”
Lu Zhan saw Hei Ya’s family coming, carried the animal skin backpack behind him, and then helped Luo Zhen also carry the animal skin backpack he had with him. Although his movements were neat, his pace was not rushed, and Hei Ya almost died of anger. “This…Ah… I was already very worried when I didn’t see you there…”
“Now is not the time to speak, the people of the tribe have almost evacuated. We would be too late if we don’t leave now.” Jiao Zhu urged him from the side, his gaze scanning the backpacks on the two of them, but it was not suitable for him to ask more.
The direction they are heading to is dark, and coupled with the lack of any lighting tools, they can’t even see the distance a few steps away. Their eyes seem to be decorations, with no use at all.
When the rain fell on their bodies, it was a bit painful. A group of people ran forward with their feet surrounded by weeds and vines, the soil was softened by the rain for several days. Their path was muddy and soon their feet were as well.
“Follow me.” Seeing that he was about to fall to the ground, a warm touch came from his wrist. Lu Zhan pulled Luo Zhen toward him without letting go. His eyesight was much better than Luo Zhen’s, even though they were in such a harsh environment, he could still carefully avoid the weeds and vines blocking the way, as well as the depressions on the ground that were stepped on by ferocious beasts.
“Okay.” Luo Zhen felt relieved when someone took his hand because he believed in Lu Zhan’s ability, he knew that even if he couldn’t see the path he was no longer afraid, and ran forward with his companion firmly.
On the way, they met other people from the tribe. As people gathered, maybe it was because the volume of people was large or because everyone was tired from running, all of them walked the same path without conflict. As the ground slowed them down, some of the soldiers began to exchange information with one another.
“Not just Heihe River, there was also a large lake about a few days away from our tribe that has flooded, and the forest leading there is like a pond. The water is as high as half a person, and it is pouring towards our tribe.” A soldier of the hunting team looked at Jiao Zhu, “What’s the situation in the area where you went to investigate Jiao Zhu?”
“The water in the Heihe River rose very quickly. The terrain on our side was originally lower than that on the opposite side of the river, so all the extra river water rushed to our side. I heard from the patrols that after it rained, they hadn’t seen the trail of hyenas again, and even the skin and bones sent there showed no signs of being touched. It seems that those hyenas have already returned to the southern foot plains, and even evacuated to a deeper place.”
“The Beast God has allowed this, why is there so much rain this time? Did the Beast God cry constantly after encountering sad things?” A younger woman wiped the corners of her eyes, no one knows if it was tears that she was wiping or rain.
She was carefully carried behind her back by her partner. Hearing her words, the beastman warrior carrying her on his back said, “There is a tribe near the big lake and I have made several transactions with them. They seem to have the custom of offering sacrifices to the Water God. Our disaster this time was all because of too much rain. Could it be that the Water God of their tribe was angry, so he was angry and planned to punish us?”
“Do you mean that the Water God is not satisfied with their sacrifice?” Another person answered.
Luo Zhen felt a thump in his heart and turned to look at the man who was still holding his wrist. There was no expression on Lu Zhan’s face, or maybe it was the surrounding darkness that concealed the other’s expression. Luo Zhen could not see what was Lu Zhan’s thoughts at the moment anyway.
Seeing that Luo Zhen was looking at him, Lu Zhan smiled and moved his hand down, inserting his five fingers between Luo Zhen’s fingers, squeezing the other’s already frozen fingers, “Be patient. We will be there soon.”
Luo Zhen was stunned. He didn’t expect Lu Zhan to say this, it was as if the other party hadn’t heard the discussion of those people at all, or did he just not care about those people’s discussion at all? If another person met him, would the other person blame him for the disaster because he was once a sacrifice? Luo Zhen didn’t dare to think about it.
The wind and rain were too heavy, and it took them more time than before to get to their destination. Soldiers who had arrived earlier already set up several tents, and Heishan was arranging for people to go to the tents to shelter from the rain. There are not many tents. After giving priority to women and children, there was no extra place to house other ordinary people. Lu Zhan took Luo Zhen and hid under a banyan tree. The dense branches and leaves of the banyan tree can shelter part of the rain from the sky. It’s better than letting the rain sprinkle on your body in an open place.
“Can we only escape here?” Luo Zhen looked at the faint lightning on the horizon and asked Lu Zhan, a little worried.
There was no forest in this area. The few trees that grow sparsely grow very tall. When the lightning flashed just now, he saw a burnt tree not far away from the corner of my eye, but because it was too dark, Luo Zhen was not sure if he had seen it wrong. Now they are hiding under these trees to avoid the rain. He was used to seeing news of people being struck by lightning, which made him very worried that the lightning would directly strike them down.
Since A-Shui came too late, Jiao Zhu directly took him by his side and did not let A-Shui squeeze into those small tents alone. Lu Zhan untied the animal skin backpack and took out a piece of skin that was dry. A-Shui’s animal skin was replaced by Jiao Zhu’s. A-Shui was just an ordinary person, a child, and could not bear to be tossed in the cold rain for such a long time. If their luck was a little bit worse, such a night would be enough to make A-Shui die.
“There are too many of us, and the animal skins we brought here are not enough, so we can only use these first.” Lu Zhan handed the last piece of animal skin to Luo Zhen. He heard the worry in the other party’s words and comforted him, “It’s very safe here. No matter how heavy the rain is, it won’t flood here. You change your animal skin first, if you wear wet animal skin for a long time, you will get sick.”
In this situation, being sick is almost equal to death. Looking at the pale face of his little partner, Lu Zhan felt a little worried for the first time.
Before Luo Zhen reached out to take the animal skin, there was a huge lightning followed by thunder, which exploded not far away without any warning, and the surroundings were illuminated like daylight for an instant. Luo Zhen saw the scene in front of him. A few tents away, a spruce nearly 20 meters away was struck by lightning. The trunk of the tree was instantly scorched, and orange flames began to appear on it. It burned stubbornly for a while, and was soon extinguished by the strong storm.
I read that it’s a big NO-NO to take shelter under a tree when there’s a thunderstorm because one lightning might say “Fook this tree in particular.”
During thunderstorm one should avoid clustering together,right? They’re wet in the middle of a thunderstorm..😢