Chapter 269 – Large-horned Raging Bulls
Greene and the others felt very strange concerning the appearance of humans on Beastmen Prairie, but they couldn’t get a handle on the situation over there, so they naturally couldn’t guess why humans would show up there.
Zhao Hai hadn’t wanted to get answers from Greene and the others, as they had never been to Beastmen Prairie. What they had known was told to them by Laura, so if they could guess what the humans were up to, they would be able to pose as prophets after some makeup.
The next morning, Zhao Hai and his company continued on their journey, but at a faster pace. He wanted to go faster, so long as they didn’t encounter any beastman tribe.
He hadn’t come to Beastmen Prairie to cause a ruckus. Helping Wales would bring him a lot of benefits, but what he needed more was new and unique magic beasts, and never before seen plants. Those were his fundamental reasons from the start.
Everything would be fine as long as the s.p.a.ce levelled up, so Zhao Hai picked up his pace. However, he didn’t put the convoy into the s.p.a.ce this time. After all, none of the coachdrivers were mortal to begin with.
On the prairie, you wouldn’t need to worry about your wagon cras.h.i.+ng sideways. There were plenty of gra.s.ses that were thicker than rugs, which acted as natural shock absorbers, so that your wagon would never be too b.u.mpy. However, your horses would need greater strength in order to pull the wagon as a result. But this wasn’t an issue for Zhao Hai, since the wagon-pulling animals were undead creatures.
Although Zhao Hai and his company increased their speed, they paid cautious attention to their surroundings for enemies. He had let out 2 flame birds in order to act as aerial recon.
Of course, just a couple of the birds would not be enough for him. He still let out a lot of blood hawks to engage in reconnaissance. Flame birds weren’t phantasmal beasts, so Zhao Hai couldn’t use them as easily as he did the blood hawks. However, flame birds were beautiful, and Laura, Meg and Nier liked them a lot, so he let them out and kept them as pets. If Wales saw the birds, he would just say that he had treated their injuries.
Zhao Hai watched the map while he was rus.h.i.+ng on, and the size of the map in the s.p.a.ce was increasing without stopping. This was good news to him. If he wandered around the prairie a lot, perhaps he would be the first person to have a complete map of Beastmen Prairie.
Zhao Hai and his company spent just 1 and ½ days to finish a 3-day trip. He couldn’t afford not to slow down when he reached an area marked on the map as having a tribe.
The marked tribe was a small one of raging bulls, which should number about 1000 people. Raging bulls were also known for their strength, and their mounts were the namesake bulls. However, the bulls were not quite the same as the the ones meant to be eaten on the continent. They were called large-horned raging bulls. They were a type of unique bovines, due to their horns being too big.
The large horns of these magic beasts were like sharpened wooden pillars. Every horn was up to 2 meters long, and the thickest they could get was a staggering half meter. They were very straight, and they grew out horizontally, like a pillar was strapped onto a cow’s head.
The raging bull race was very famous among the bull-headed races because of their cavalry charges. Their mounts, the large-horned raging bulls, might not be too fast, but once they charged, they were imposing. All because of their large horns.
When they charged, they would form a straight line. All of their horns put together was like a moving wall. The speed wasn’t very fast, but there wasn’t the slightest gap.
But this didn’t mean that the Large-Horned Raging Bull Tribe’s fighting power was great. Although such a cavalry charge was imposing, it also had a very serious flaw. Because of how large the horns were, the cavalry couldn’t change directions quickly, so the cavalry would be at a serious disadvantage when facing agile light cavalry like the jackals’.
The Large-Horned Raging Bull Tribe could be considered as a branch of the raging bull races, yet famously, their temper among the bull-headed races was anything but short. They were in the category of good guys.
Of course, none of this was written on the map which he had been given by Yale. All of it had been researched by Laura herself.
Zhao Hai was waiting for the blood hawks and the information they might be carrying. Now that they had entered the Large-Horned Raging Bull Tribe’s area of frequent activity, since Zhao Hai and the others could run into them at any moment, he let the birds increase their recon radius in order to ensure that he wasn’t going the wrong way.
The blood hawks returned after more than an hour. Zhao Hai took a glance, and noticed that they were going in circles and crying out without stopping. He turned to Laura and said, “There’s an abandoned campsite ahead. It looks like it was attacked. Let’s take a look.”
Laura nodded, and the convoy picked up the pace once more. After more than 2 hours, they discovered the abandoned campsite. There were a lot of corpses there, and all of them were the Large-Horned Raging Bull Tribe and their mounts.
The tribesmen were very similar to their mounts: tall and having large horns. The horns were longer than any other bull-headed races’ horns.
From the look of the campsite, it appeared to be of a size for about 1000 people. However, it had been attacked, and every usable thing had been taken away. Even the clothes on the dead had been stripped off.
Zhao Hai looked at this with a frown and a sigh as with a wave of his hand, he turned them all into undead creatures. He only turned one of them into a high-level undead, in order to know who it was that had attacked this campsite.
Zhao Hai counted for a bit. The tribesmen who had died amounted to more than 300. The number of youths this tribe could afford to send into battle was approximately this figure. He just picked the strongest of them all and turned him into a high-level undead, because he knew that among beastmen, the strongest ones had often been the chieftains.
Just as he had expected, the high-level undead was called Abatai, the chieftain of this tribe. Their tribe had more than 1300 people, and other than 400 youths, the rest were the elderly and women.
Their fate was normal. What surprised Zhao Hai was the ones who had attacked them. It was none other than Gasol and his people, and the attack had taken place more than 4 hours ago.
In other words, right before the blood hawks had discovered this campsite, it had been attacked by Gasol and his people. Upon reaching this conclusion, Zhao Hai immediately put Abatai and the others into the s.p.a.ce, and followed the trail left behind by Gasol and his people.
From the trail, the direction they were headed to was most likely West Wonder King’s place. It seemed that Gasol too had learned of what had happened to the Herculean Bull Tribe’s main camp, but he wasn’t as smart as Wales, who headed over to the Mastiff Tribe’s place.
Zhao Hai couldn’t help but shake his head, as he truly felt that Gasol wasn’t a smart person. The relations.h.i.+p between Gasol and West Wonder King had never been good, and yet he was now going to put himself under West Wonder King’s service. Obviously, Gasol had seen how West Wonder King and the current Fighting Bull Tribe chieftain were at odds, but he had forgotten that circ.u.mstances determined how people would move. Now that the Herculean Bull Tribe could no longer provide the Fighting Bull Tribe with any form of help, it was hard to determine what sort of att.i.tude West Wonder King would have in treating them.
But after another thought, this situation made sense to Zhao Hai. He knew of Gasol’s pain. The reason why the Herculean Bull Tribe had gotten to this point was all because of him. Perhaps he had thought about where his tribesmen would go. But what would happen even after finding them? He would only be torn into pieces by angry tribesmen, and no one would listen to him, so he could only head over to West Wonder King’s place.
It just wasn’t a good choice, Zhao Hai thought. Gasol had only several dozen guards, but from how they had attacked the Large-Horned Raging Bull Tribe, their fighting power was still great. Gasol should’ve left the bull-headed races’ territory, as staying here was only akin to waiting for death. Even if he got West Wonder King’s support, he wouldn’t be a threat to the Fighting Bull Tribe. Perhaps the Fighting Bull Tribe had never seen West Wonder King as a threat. Otherwise, the Fighting Bull Tribe wouldn’t have attacked the Herculean Bull Tribe’s main camp.
However, Zhao Hai wasn’t letting these thoughts sway his judgement. He didn’t care what Gasol’s thoughts were. What he needed to do right now was to charge forward, grab Gasol, and send a letter to Wales in order to ask about how to deal with him.
Right now, he was blood-sworn brother of Wales, not Gasol, so of course he wanted to help Wales. Whether Gasol lived or died was not within his range of concerns.
Most importantly, he had to think about the ground bulls which Gasol and his men were riding. Although he couldn’t get a hold of stoneskin bulls, ground bulls would be fine too.
Zhao Hai believed that Gasol wouldn’t be fast while bringing a lot of people with him. The latter must be having hard days. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have raided the Large-Horned Raging Bull Tribe.
Zhao Hai’s speed wasn’t slow. The wagon pullers were all high-level undead creatures. It wouldn’t be difficult to catch up to Gasol.
In order to confirm Gasol’s travel direction, he sent out his blood hawks once more, with flame birds added, of course. Now that the flame birds were his, they shouldn’t have any reaction upon seeing Gasol.
After more than 3 hours, Zhao Hai finally managed to track down Gasol’s figure. Only 2 hours later, before nightfall, he and his convoy would be able to catch up to Gasol and his men.