This time, the mountain barbarian horse team traveled for five days.
The male barbarian attendant looked fearsome, but he was actually quite young — probably only fifteen or sixteen — though he was tall and well-built. He had watched curiously the day he saw Lorist weaving the straw shoes, crouching beside him for a long while. Lorist had picked up the skill of weaving straw shoes during his mercenary days, and the design was modeled after the cloth shoes from his previous life — shaped for left and right feet separately, which set them apart from the crude straw shoes worn by the common folk in Galentea.
The male barbarian attendant took the finished straw shoes and examined them for a long time, clicking his tongue in admiration. But he didn't keep them for himself — after studying them for a good while, he handed them back to Lorist, only asking to be taught how to weave such shoes. Lorist was more than happy to oblige, chatting with him as he taught.
The male barbarian attendant said that the White Snow Mountain Lord, the golden-circlet female barbarian, had saved Lorist because she was worried he would be tormented to death by the wolf-like female barbarians, which would prevent her from bringing Lorist to her father as a trophy. After all, Lorist was the only plainsman prisoner she had captured who bore a golden badge and held some status.
This explanation finally helped Lorist understand why the golden-circlet female barbarian had rescued him from the other barbarian women only to leave him completely unattended afterward. Lorist seized the opportunity to ask the young male barbarian attendant whether, when they had first found him gravely injured and unconscious, there had been anyone else nearby. He was desperate to know
The male barbarian attendant nodded and said there had also been a fool — immensely strong, so much so that even two six-ring Ule couldn't hold him down. But aside from his strength, the fool had nothing going for him. Once they had captured him, they tossed him in the rear column and set him to looking after the pack horses.
Ule was a term the mountain barbarians had coined themselves, meaning warrior. The six rings indicated a tier of strength. The mountain barbarians believed that
Lorist's heart surged — Redi's whereabouts were confirmed at last. But he couldn't understand why the male barbarian attendant had called Redi a fool.
The male barbarian attendant said the fool was also mute. When they had first found him, he was covered head to toe in wounds, stark naked, and had even bitten a magical wolf to death with his bare teeth — though he was fairly docile. As long as you gave him food, he was perfectly obedient and would do whatever he was told. Other than his tremendous strength, he had no other skills to speak of.
Lorist felt that what they were describing didn't quite sound like Redi. If it was Redi, then something must have gone wrong. But he could barely look after himself at the moment, and his movements were restricted to the area around the golden-crowned female barbarian chief's tent. There was no way for him to go check the rear column and see whether that fool the male barbarian attendant had mentioned was Redi. All he could do was endure and wait for an opportunity.
Perhaps it was because he had taught the young male barbarian attendant how to weave grass sandals, because dinner that night was considerably more abundant. The young male barbarian attendant brought Lorist a hind leg bone with a good amount of meat on it, though half of it was charred. But regardless, it was still meat, and it delighted Lorist greatly after days of eating nothing but blackened flatbread.
That night when they camped outdoors, Lorist half-reclined against the bundle of belongings unloaded from the horse's back, covered by that animal hide. He appeared to be sleeping, but in reality he sat cross-legged, slowly circulating his small celestial circuit to recover his internal energy. Under the current circumstances, he couldn't perform the great celestial circuit. Lorist worried that if he entered the state of complete mental void and some barbarian came over and kicked him, the resulting deviation would at best leave him crippled, and at worst cause half-body paralysis — in which case everything would be over.
In the distance, a volcano resembling Mount Fuji in shape appeared on the horizon, and all the barbarians cheered — their settlement was near.
After another half day's travel, the volcano was right before their eyes. However, the barbarian column did not head toward that volcano. Instead, they turned a corner and made their way toward a shorter mountain ridge nearby.
Halfway up the slope of the ridge, there was a massive stone cliff. Below the cliff stood a fortified settlement enclosed by wooden palisade walls, and its main gate was already open. Amid the cheers of the gathered barbarian elders and children, the column marched in proudly, heads held high.
Once inside this crude settlement, Lorist discovered that beneath the stone cliff at the front of the compound, there was an enormous cavern, and the column was heading straight for it. But as they neared the cavern's entrance, Lorist was pulled aside. The young male barbarian attendant told him that as a slave, Lorist was not permitted to set foot inside the sacred cave.
So Lorist could only stand beside the cavern entrance, watching the column slowly file inside. This was the first time Lorist had seen the full extent of this barbarian column numbering in the hundreds. He had previously been at the front of the procession and only knew that the column numbered in the hundreds with close to a thousand pack horses, but what they had gone to the barbarian plains for, he had no idea. Now he understood — this barbarian column had gone to the plains to hunt and stockpile meat for the winter hibernation. One only needed to look at the enormous bundles of wind-dried magical beast meat wrapped in animal hides piled high on the pack horses' backs to know.
Damn it — these beasts can all go into the cave, but I'm the one who can't, Lorist crouched beside the cavern entrance, grumbling silently. He was genuinely curious about what the inside of that massive cavern looked like. Just then, he saw Redi.
The person in front would shout a command, and only then would Redi move a step.
Lorist jumped to his feet. "Redi! Redi!" he shouted, running over and throwing his arms around Redi—
A powerful force yanked at the dog chain fastened around the collar on Lorist's neck, sending him sprawling flat on his back. A burly Hill Barbarian holding a leather whip cursed as he stepped forward and lashed down. Lorist could only shield his head with both hands, enduring the searing pain.
The Hill Barbarian had only lashed four or five times when suddenly Redi, who had been standing blankly to the side, let out a low growl from deep in his throat. He lunged and tackled the man to the ground, baring his teeth as he tried to bite into the barbarian's throat. The Hill Barbarian was startled but quick-witted enough to jam the handle of his leather whip into Redi's mouth. All one could hear was Redi crunching down on the whip handle with a grinding sound.
Several more Hill Barbarians rushed over, pulling and dragging Redi off the man. The Hill Barbarian climbed to his feet, his face flushed red as if truly enraged. He pointed at Redi and hurled curses, ordering the barbarians holding Redi to let him go so he could teach the creature a proper lesson.
To everyone's surprise, once the Hill Barbarians released Redi, he didn't lunge at the Hill Barbarian. Instead, he dashed over to Lorist, dropped to the ground, and pressed his head against Lorist's body, nuzzling and rubbing against him — just like a puppy fawning over its master, the only thing missing being a tongue licking his face.
Everyone stood there dumbfounded. Only then did the Hill Barbarian realize that Redi had attacked him because of the lowland slave on the ground. Lorist sat up and pulled Redi into his arms, his heart sinking. Tears rolled down his cheeks. Redi's condition was clearly the result of severe head trauma — apart from still recognizing him and showing that look of attachment in his eyes, he seemed to have forgotten everything else.
"What happened here? Why are you blocking the way into the cave?" The golden-crowned Hill Barbarian woman arrived with a large retinue.
The Hill Barbarian hurried forward to report. "Mountain Lord, that mute simpleton seems to know your lowland slave. Just now the slave rushed over and hugged him, calling him Redi or something, and blocked the path of our horse train. I tried to beat him, but that mute simpleton pounced on me and tried to bite…"
The golden-crowned Hill Barbarian woman waved her hand to show she had heard, then looked with great interest at the two figures embracing on the ground. She asked Lorist, "Hey, who is he to you?"
Lorist raised his tear-streaked face. "He is my student, and also my squire. If he hadn't saved me, I would have been killed by my enemies long ago. But after we fell into the water and got separated, I never expected that he would end up like this — an idiot who can't even speak anymore…"
The golden-crowned Hill Barbarian woman nodded. "Since he is your squire, I will allow you to take him aside. Don't block the way into the cave for the rest of us. You are my first lowland slave with some measure of status — so you may keep your squire. That is what proves you have standing."
Lorist couldn't have cared less whether he was some privileged lowland slave with the right to keep a squire. Being reunited with Redi was the greatest surprise he could have asked for. He hurriedly scrambled back to the edge of the cave with Redi in tow, clearing the path for the herd to enter. His mind was already turning over how to examine Redi and figure out exactly which part of his head had been injured.
It was nearly dark by the time the entire Hill Barbarian herd had filed into the great cave. The young male barbarian attendant then came over and led Lorist and Redi to a dilapidated wooden shack at the edge of the village. He called out a few times, and a hunchbacked barbarian elder emerged from within. The attendant spoke a few words to the old man, who nodded and then led them to a small, low shed not far from the shack. He pointed at the shed and gestured for Lorist and Redi to go inside.
The young barbarian attendant stopped Lorist and said very seriously, "You'll be spending the entire winter in this shed. If you can't endure it, you'll die. So while there's still some time before winter sets in, gather as much dry grass and other insulating material as you can. If you need anything, let me know and I'll do my best to help. Oh, and my name is Ashu — you can have the guards at the cave entrance pass along any message to me."
After the young attendant departed, the hunchbacked barbarian elder looked at Lorist and sneered, "A lowland slave with status and a squire — hahaha, how absurd. I've never seen anything so ridiculous. But no matter. You'll both be dead by the time winter's over, and the Mountain Lord won't care about two frozen corpses."
With that, the hunchbacked elder motioned for Lorist to follow him. They went back to the decrepit wooden shack, and the old man went inside and emerged with a tattered animal-hide pouch, which he tossed to Lorist. "Take it. This is your food for the month. Hope you manage to last that long — ha! Now get back to your shed."
The worn pouch was filled with mountain kudzu root — a plant similar to potatoes, high in starch with a slightly bitter taste. It was the fruit of a climbing vine and made for excellent emergency rations when adventuring in the wild with no other food. The pouch held roughly forty to fifty catties. Lorist now understood what those dark, doughy flatcakes he had been eating were made of. The kudzu root was ground into flour, mixed with minced meat and wild greens, then baked on a stone slab to produce trail rations.
A pile of weeds gave off a rotting smell. The floor was covered in dust and soggy mud. In the corners sat several piles of excrement — some shameless soul had apparently turned this shed into a public latrine.
The shed didn't even have a door. Only half a stinking scrap of animal hide hung in the entrance, flapping lazily in the wind. Lorist recalled what the young attendant Ashu had said, and the hunchbacked elder's mocking words. They were right, of course. Trying to survive a frigid winter in a shed like this would certainly leave them as two frozen corpses.
But Lorist couldn't have cared less about the shed. Who would actually spend winter in a place like that? That would be truly insane. What mattered to him was that no one was watching them now, and he could finally resume his internal energy cultivation without interruption. Once his power was restored, he would take Redi and head straight back to his family's territory. Who would want to stay here as a slave?
Although the night was somewhat cold, sleeping under a beast hide to block the wind was far better than staying in that stinking shed. Lorist found a cracked clay pot, went to the small pond at the base of the stone cliff on the other side, scooped up some water, and washed a few mountain kudzu roots. He and Redi ate them raw — Lorist only ate two, while Redi wolfed down five in one go…
Late at night, when everything was quiet, Lorist quietly slipped into the shed, held back his disgust at the smell, and began practicing his cultivation, circulating a full Grand Celestial Revolution…
As dawn approached, Lorist emerged from the shed with a heavy expression on his face and sat down beside the soundly sleeping Redi. Things were not as simple as he had imagined. First, he had only managed one Grand Celestial Revolution the entire night. His internal energy had not recovered as quickly as he'd hoped. On the contrary, he discovered that the meridians inside his body were extremely dry and rough. Many of them were still fractured and unrepaired, making the flow of energy incredibly difficult. His internal organs ached faintly as well.
A single Grand Celestial Revolution through the night had recovered roughly one percent of his previous internal energy. Before his injuries, he could circulate three Grand Celestial Revolutions in a night, and even after depleting his energy entirely, he could recover at least half. Now he was essentially back to the stage when he had first begun practicing the Golden Water Art — he needed to clear his meridians all over again and repair the damage. Lorist estimated it would take him two months to nurse his body back to health and return to his former level.
If he were to quantify his internal energy, the one percent recovered tonight amounted to roughly one hundred threads. No wonder that in the past few days, a single Minor Celestial Revolution had only yielded one or two threads of recovery. At the time, he had been too thrilled just to possess internal energy again to wonder why it was returning so slowly. Now he finally understood. It truly was a case of being thrown back to the starting line overnight.
Lorist let out a deep sigh, then lifted Redi's upper body and leaned him against his own. Redi opened his eyes and gazed at Lorist with an innocent look. Lorist softly told him not to move, placed his right palm against Redi's back, and channeled all of his remaining internal energy into him to probe the internal condition of his body.
Redi's body was in terrible shape as well. That Galentea Great Swordmaster's twin palm strikes on Redi's back right before death at the cliff's edge had shattered several nodes of the hexagonal blood circulation system inside his body, which was why Redi could no longer circulate his Combat Force. Moreover, Redi had fallen from a cliff over twenty meters high. Without the protection of Combat Force, his head had slammed against rock repeatedly during the tumble down before landing in the water, taking several severe impacts. This had caused blood clots to form inside his brain. Lorist suspected that these clots were pressing on Redi's cerebral nerves, robbing him of his memory — the fact that Redi could still remember Lorist at all was nothing short of a miracle.
There were only two ways to cure Redi. The best approach would be to restore the blood circulation of his Combat Force and use it to smash through the clots in his brain. But Redi had lost his memory — even if his body were healed, whether he could remember how to circulate his Combat Force was still a huge question. The second method was for Lorist to use his own internal energy to forcibly break up the clots in Redi's brain and bring him back to consciousness first. The problem was that this method would take considerably longer and show results more slowly.
Perhaps the two of them really would have to spend the winter in this wretched shed. Lorist stared at the ramshackle structure beside him, lost in thought.
…(To be continued.)