Chapter 10 – Follow me and get meat in return (2/2)

Want to tag along tomorrow? Sure, but…

“You have to listen to me.” Shao Xuan said.

It was not easy for the kids in the cave to listen to anybody. Striking them, again and again, wouldn’t help for even a little bit. Many of the kids in the tribe were very stubborn, violence-resistant and they were ready to risk everything. If you beat them up this time, they’ll still try to steal or rob your things the next time. Even when the “former cave master” Ku was around, the children did not get along well. Many of them got beaten up by Ku, and Shao Xuan had in fact witnessed some of those fights. It was pretty severe, and the loser would have to recover for more than ten days to be able to stand on his feet again.

However, now, with Shao Xuan’s theory of “follow me and get meat in return,” everyone was appeased.

The next day, Shao Xuan told those kids to weave straw ropes.

In this time of the year, there was a lot of grass that could be processed into a straw rope. It was easy to find raw materials, but not everyone in the cave knew how to weave them. There were a few kids who had learned the skill from their parents, but they had never practiced it since their parents passed away.

There were originally twenty-seven children in the cave. Since former master Ku had left, and there was one silent kid who was not always around, only twenty-five children remained in the cave. Shao Xuan divided them into five groups, with five kids in each group. Within every group, there was someone who knew how to weave. Then Shao Xuan told them about the division of labor and cooperation. Someone would go to collect grass, while the others would be in charge of weaving and finding stone worms.

Except, these kids were not fans of cooperation. They would fight each other over some of the tiniest things, even when they were in the same group.

After Shao Xuan had quelled the conflicts, he thought for a moment and changed his way of expressing,

Now each group is a small hunting team! It’s your own hunting team!”

Small hunting team…

Those were magic words to those dozens of children, and all of them began to fantasize about it.

In the mind of those kids from the tribe, “hunting team” was a very fancy and bright term, that only warriors with totemic powers could join.

Joining a hunting team would mean lots of food.

Joining a small hunting team was so thrilling and unexpected! They could begin to hunt!

Shao Xuan looked at the crowd and said, “Okay, now whoever wants to quit, or disobeys my commands, or loves to fight each other, stand out now and you won’t be included in our mission!”

No one moved.

The kid standing at the very front looked at his surroundings and felt himself standing too far out, so he hurried and stepped back, for fear that he might be misunderstood as one who wanted to quit.

The one who just beat another kid in his group also acted pretty seriously, and stood there still, not slightly feeling that he belonged to the “loves to fight each other” kind of people.

“Fine, since nobody wants to quit now, let’s go! Just a reminder that you shall all follow my orders! Anyone who disobeys will get thrown out of the small hunting team!”

Shao Xuan used “hunting team” as a threat because he knew what they were afraid of. These children had a bad temper, but they were simple-minded. You can control them as long as you know what they cared about.

As expected, this time they behaved much better.

However, when it came to the real mission, it didn’t as smoothly as predicted.

Along the riverside.

Those two guarding warriors were standing not far away and they smiled as they watched Shao Xuan being busy commanding the kids to catch fish. In a fit of anger, he would just beat some kid, and the one that got beaten would just roll on the ground, stand up, wipe off the blood on his face with a smile, and then get back to work as normal.

All their dull eyes were sparkling today, especially when they would see a fish pulled out of the water. Some of them would even make a few jumps in order to vent their feelings of thrill and excitement. If the fish weren’t that aggressive with their mouthful of tiny sharp teeth that could bite their flesh off easily, they would hug the fish in their arms and take a huge bite as their unique marks.

For days, Shao Xuan would take them fishing. There were lots of fish in the waters, so they harvested a lot every day. Even if they ate with an empty belly, there would still be leftovers. However, perhaps out of the fear of hunger, those children would naturally think about storing food for bad days. Some of them got the habit from their parents and the others were just following what others were doing blindly.