Shao Xuan hadn’t heard the name ‘Dao Yu’ since a long time, but it had always been in his memories.
He was on the kill list of the Flaming Horn tribe. After making use of people (wanderers) of the tribe, he betrayed and murdered them, and then suddenly disappeared – Yan Zhi was one of his victims. After the Flaming Horn tribe returned to its birthplace, the Chief and the Shaman had told the leaders of wanderers that they would kill Dao Yu without hesitation if they encounter him anywhere. However, no one could find Dao Yu and some even thought that the traitor had died. After all, he was just a wanderer.
Unexpectedly, Shao Xuan heard of this person’s name again.
“Is Dao Yu here?” Shao Xuan became serious.
Lei and Tuo also knew about Dao Yu. They didn’t forget what the Chief and the Shaman had told them and had pledged to resolutely enforce it. When they heard this information, the only thing running through their head was to kill the traitor at the very moment.
Seeing the reaction of Shao Xuan and the other two, Su Gu was relieved. In order to prevent misunderstanding, he quickly denied, “No, Fallen Leaves City doesn’t take in any convicts or traitors of the tribes. Many traitors would seek Slave Masters’ help after being expelled from the tribes. The Fallen Leaves City used to accept them earlier. However, after my father started cooperating with the tribes, these traitors were handed over to their tribes as gifts.”
Noticing Shao Xuan’s expression, Su Gu continued, “However, other cities do not act like Fallen Leaves City. More and more expelled tribesmen enter the desert cities and become senior slaves. Every time they come to the desert, the Travelling teams of different tribes would look for and chase after those expelled people, but in most cases they fail in capturing or killing them. After all, the desert is the territory of the Slave Masters.”
The reason Su Gu spoke the last sentence, was to indirectly tell the three people of the Flaming Horn tribe that they should stay calm. If they chased and killed the traitor impulsively, they were likely to get killed in the process or as retaliation from the Slave Masters.
“Dao Yu is not a totem warrior who has been expelled. He is a wanderer,” said Shao Xuan. However, noticing that Su Gu was still confused about the difference between the expelled warriors and the wanderers, he did not elaborate, but asked, “Where is Dao Yu now?”
“I didn’t know it before. But, I asked Chi Shi just now and he said he had seen Dao Yu in the Beast Battle City last year,” said Su Gu. Before, he only thought about ways to avoid traps set by his two brothers, ways to survive and improve the ability of enslavement – he didn’t care to pay attention to other matters. However, after forming an alliance with the three people, he had started inquiring about matters that are related to the Flaming Horn tribe.
“Beast Battle City?” Shao Xuan was hearing about this place for the first time. He knew of several cities that were ruled by the Slave Masters, in the desert, but he didn’t remember seeing “Beast Battle City” in the materials that Su Gu provided him.
“That’s not a city which any Slave Master ruled. It’s the place where the Slave Masters had their fun every year.” explained Su Gu.
Beast Battle City was built by the three largest Slave Masters, deep in the desert, for their entertainment and amus.e.m.e.nt. Afterwards, since the three Slave Masters felt bored for being the only three parties who took part in the compet.i.tions, they invited the Slave Masters of the other cities to have fun together.
Beast Battle City, as its name suggests, is a place for beasts battles. Many Slave Masters would bring beasts that were domesticated by them, and have these beasts contend with the beasts of the other Slave Masters, in the Beast Battle City.
“In the Beast Battle City last year, Dao Yu represented the White Stone City and defeated a beast of my father,” said Su Gu.
“Wait, why did Dao Yu contend in Beast Battle City?” asked Shao Xuan.
“Dao Yu is the ‘beast’ of the White Stone City.” said Su Gu, considering such a scenario as common. “There are a lot of slaves who voluntarily act as ‘beasts’ in the battles, in order to prove their value. If they win, they would get more benefits from the Slave Masters, such as removal of one of their shackles.”
When Slave Masters enslaved someone, the people being enslaved would gain many abilities – but these abilities would be locked with shackles and could not be used or developed. If they wanted to use or develop these abilities, they had to request the Slave Masters, who enslaved them, to unlock them.
Removing a shackle would mean that a slave had the chance to make progress. However, even slaves had different qualifications. The Slave Masters were like the Fire Seed of the tribes. They could give the slaves talents, but how the talents manifested depended on the slaves themselves.
Shao Xuan understood a lot from Su Gu’s words. As for Dao Yu…
As a wanderer with weak strength, he cheated and got materials from clansmen, achieved strong abilities and a high status after becoming a slave. Not only talented, as a wanderer of the Flaming Horn tribe, Dao Yu was also deceitful, vicious and quick-witted. With such a combination of characteristics, Dao Yu even cheated people such as Yan Zhi who had spared no effort to help him.
However, would such a person put his whole heart into being a slave?
“I’ve heard that many Slave Masters want to enslave people from the Flaming Horn tribe, but the number of the slaves from Flaming Horn tribe is not many,” said Su Gu.
“What does that mean? Besides Dao Yu, there are other descendants of the Flaming Horn tribe who choose to be slaves?” asked Shao Xuan, with a frown.
“It seems to be.” Su Gu was not sure. He just heard about these things now. Seeing the faces of Shao Xuan and the other two people glower, Su Gu stopped himself from mentioning that he also wanted slaves from the Flaming Horn tribe. *The tribesmen seemed to dislike slaves. Forget it.*
“Those traitors! How shameful!” Lei was very angry with the people from the Flaming Horn tribe who had become slaves, especially Dao Yu, who not only murdered fellow tribesmen but also became a slave!
Seeing that Lei angry enough to kill those people, Tuo stopped him. Tuo was also angry, but he understood their current situation quite clearly.
According to Su Gu’s words, Dao Yu seemed to be a slave of White Stone City and his status was not low among the slaves over there. If they went to look for him, they would definitely be in a disadvantageous situation.
“White Stone City has a bad relationship with us. Chi Shi suspects that Dao Yu and by extension, the White Stone City, was behind the recent a.s.sa.s.sination attempt in Fallen Leaves City – so he stopped you when he confirmed that you are all from the Flaming Horn tribe.” explained Su Gu.
“I see.” Shao Xuan nodded. This was understandable, but Dao Yu was a threat. He murdered the people of Flaming Horn tribe and even ruined the reputation of the Flaming Horn tribe in the desert. They had to deal with him as soon as possible.
At this moment, Shao Xuan heard an eagle’s cry from outside.
“Something happened!” Shao Xuan ran out and looked at the sky.
“What’s the matter?” Seeing the three people of the Flaming Horn tribe having a serious expression, Su Gu felt uneasy.
Not far away, Chi Shi, who was guarding the water supply next to the spring pool in the oasis, also came over. “Young master, what happened?”
Su Gu, who himself didn’t know what was going on, didn’t answer but looked at Shao Xuan.
Shao Xuan looked at the eagle in the sky and pointed to a direction. “Something happened over there.”
Chi Shi glanced at the eagle, paused, and quickly ordered the other slaves to be on guard.
*Could it be someone who wants to take over the oasis?* thought Chi Shi.
No wonder Chi Shi was so skeptical. Although the area of the oasis was not large, it was a precious resource in the desert. Wars and constant skirmishes between cities were often caused by the greed for oasis.
“Look.”
The eagle in the sky cried again, as a reminder.
“They’re coming!” said Shao Xuan.
When the group looked at the dunes in the distance, several moving black spots appeared above the sand dunes. Those black spots were actually people who were yelling and running towards the oasis.
“Those are slaves of Fallen Leaves City!” as the slaves came closer, Su Gu recognized them, “They are slaves of the Second Brother. I’ve seen the leading slave before. I heard that he went out of the city to do something on the bidding of my Second Brother, days before.”
Su Gu tried to ask around what his Second Brother bidded the slaves to do, but he failed. Those slaves disappeared after leaving the city, and the people Su Gu sent after them returned without any results. Unexpectedly, now Su Gu met them in the Oasis.
“There seems to be something terrible chasing behind them,” said Lei. He could feel the crisis which was approaching quickly and he felt a chill quite similar to the one he used to feel when encountering a powerful ferocious beast in the forest.
“Ah-Xuan.” Tuo looked at Shao Xuan as if he was asking what to do next.
Shao Xuan made a gesture used by them while hunting, which meant “Let’s wait and see”. After all, they were not in the Flaming Horn tribe territory. It was the territory of the Slave Masters and they didn’t have to spare any effort in defending it.
As the slaves ran closer, Shao Xuan noticed a sand ‘hump’ following behind them. It seemed there was something under the sand that was moving fast and winding around the slaves.
Bang!
In front of the slaves, the sand exploded, and a huge figure climbed out of the sand.
Rough scales with spinous bulges covered its whole body and its rounded pupils focused on the people who were running towards it. On the raised upper part of its body, the open mouth was like that of a python’s when it was about to swallow its prey, with an inflated neck. Its big mouth with fangs turned around suddenly after falling to the ground, like a shovel.
Because of which, the four slaves, together with the sand on the ground, were shoveled into the mouth of the giant beast.
“Quicksand Beast! It’s a Quicksand Beast!” screamed a slave guarding the oasis.
It’s said that people called them Quicksand Beasts because they could cause a quicksand effect. At the same time, it’s also known as the king of the desert beasts, not only due to their huge body and strong attack power, but also because the color of their bodies was the same as the color of sand.
The color of their skin, blood, bones and other body parts were the same as that of yellow sand and the color of their horns were similar to gold. Thus, Slave Masters liked to use their skin and bones to make furniture and the golden horns were used by many great Slave Masters to make crowns.
However, Quicksand Beasts’ sightings were not common in the desert. They only appeared for predation and humans were not on top of their palate. Therefore, in most cases, Quicksand Beasts never used to chase after humans on their own accord. Probably they felt that human beings were too tiny and didn’t want to waste time hunting humans. But at the moment, this Quicksand Beast, looked extremely angry and had chased after those slaves stubbornly. The most likely reason was that, those slaves had infuriated it.
“I see, Second Brother must have wished to hunt a Quicksand Beast and give it to our father as a birthday gift!” shouted Su Gu.
The second young master of the Fallen Leaves City had sent slaves to hunt for a Quicksand Beast. However, it seemed like the people who were sent by the second Young Master not only did not manage to hunt the beast, but also started getting chased by the Quicksand Beast, and they even implicated the people who were guarding the oasis…