Chapter 474 (1/2)

Ducklings

They hatched?

It had been a long time since the fat duck stole eggs. Compared to other eggs, these were very late.

They were from the same nest, yet why would an egg taken by the fat duck take so long to hatch? There were too many coincidences to be explained that way. One couldn’t say that the fat duck was just untalented at brooding either, for the difference should not be this huge.

“I’ll go check it out.” Shao Xuan passed the things he was holding to Zheng Luo and the rest, squeezed through the crowd and followed the duck keeper to the duck house.

“It has been snowing so much, we sweep more than three times every day. We sometimes have to get up at night too.” The duck keeper was worried. “Many ducks froze to death too.”

The ducks that refused to approach the tribe, living in the forest outside died from the cold. The older ducklings did not survive too. There were also many more ducks that brought their ducklings into the tribe’s duck house for shelter.

Shao Xuan observed the duck house as he listened to the keeper.

It was quiet here. There was an occasional quack but it did not sound energetic either.

He came to the pen where the fat duck lived. The keeper did not enter, merely pointed inside and stood at the entrance. Every time he pushed the door, the duck would attack so he could only listen from the outside.

There were sounds of ducklings.

Shao Xuan pushed the door open and felt a burst of murderous aura.

To prevent cold air from entering, he quickly closed the door behind him and took out his glowing crystal.

When the duck recognised Shao Xuan, it froze. All its feathers were standing, making it like a puffed up ball. It maintained a defensive stance, unmoving. Its eyes looked at Shao Xuan, as if it didn’t expect Shao Xuan’s arrival. It was still very cautious and scared of this person.

Shao Xuan looked at its nest. There are several balls of green there. They looked up at the source of light but didn’t seem to see Shao Xuan well. They panicked, sensing a foreign presence but calmed when they sensed the fat duck by their side. Shao Xuan noticed that when one duckling stood up from the dried grass, some of it caught on its foot. The blade of grass was sliced in half quickly.

That meant they had sharp hooks at the ends of their feet too, like the fat duck.

There were still unhatched eggs next to the duck. All these eggs were laid at different times anyway, so their development stages were different.

Shao Xuan counted eight green ducklings. Before he left, there were thirty-one eggs. This meant twenty-three were left.

Not sure if all of them would successfully hatch.

Shao Xuan thought it was peculiar too.

However, this development meant the duck had it all planned out. It knew how to choose eggs that would hatch ducklings resembling it.

So that was why it did not care much about the ducklings outside. Perhaps it only cared about offsprings that looked like it. Right now, the way it guarded these eggs day and night was a huge difference from how it treated the rest.

In the natural world, animals killed anything that didn’t look like them. This duck had the same behaviour. It was only kind to the ducklings that looked like it. Everything else didn’t matter.

When he left, Shao Xuan saw odd pieces on the ground. He peered closer. They were fish scales!

Using his special vision, he scanned the entire duck house. In a corner, there was a layer of dried grass. Underneath were small fish, fruits etc.

This duck was fully prepared.

He exited the duck house.

“How many hatched?” asked the keeper curiously.

“Eight hatched, it’s still brooding the rest.”

“What do the ducklings look like?”

“They look like the fat duck.”

The keeper was very curious but it was a pity he couldn’t go in.

“Don’t worry. They’ll come out after winter,” said Shao Xuan.