Chapter 244: It’s Black Hand, Not Grayclaw
The Players were not actually in a hurry to advance throughout the Western Continent even though the Lifestone had connected the two continents.
Still, some of them tried to headed out for the lands of other nonhumans, but because of the Hyena-men’s blockade around the Long Ears’ settlement, they would run into those villains wherever they go.
Although the Hyena-men would never win against the Players in a one-on-one situation, they never were solitary creatures but were social animals instead in the truest sense of the word.
In other words, any Players running into one Hyena-men meant that there would at least be over twenty lurking nearby.
And when they fight, three Hyena-men would be easy to handle for one ordinary Player, five would take some effort whereas it’s time to run when there’s eight of them. If it was one against ten, one might even have to consider if they could escape.
Thus far, every Player who went out of the Long Ears’ village to explore came back dead. While waiting for his revival, the most miserable of them even described in horrific detail how the Hyena-men bit off his b.a.l.l.s and then sodomized him to death, a gory scene that prompted many of the Players intending to go on a solo adventure over the new continent to withdraw.
Some Players even asked the Long Ears for information about the Hyena-men, and found that things were more or less the same as what the unlucky Player described.
Unlike the Graywolfmen who commanded great combat ability and would lead their packs in open conflict against their foes, the Hyena-men were definitely limited in their ability to fight alone since they were much weaker than Graywolfmen in both physical ability and power.
However, nonhumans feared the Hyena-men more than the Greywolfmen and there was a simple reason for it: the way the Hyena-men fought was unreservedly dirty and underhanded—ambushes were already their most honorable tactic, whereas attacking reproductive organs and delicate a.s.ses were their preferred methods.
And despite being much smaller than Graywolfmen and far less strong, their jaw strength far surpa.s.sed the Graywolfmen’s. That was the reason why anyone who could defeat a pack of Hyena-men would end up losing pounds of flesh, a victory worse than most pyrrhic victories…
Furthermore, their kind had an especially strong memory when it came to grudges. It wouldn’t matter if you killed dozens of them—once marked by their scent of hatred, they would keep coming, sneak attacking their targets with extreme prejudice.
“There’s only two solutions when it comes to handling Hyena-men.” Being the former chief of the Grayclaw tribe, Zonyan knew certain information and posted it on the forums—he naturally wasn’t going to hide it. “One is to a.s.sert absolute dominance to prove that their revenge and dirty moves would only with them being dead and no other meaning. They would acknowledge your power after some time and swear fealty, obedient to your every whim.”
“The other is to gather a force strong enough to destroy their entire race, which would make them swear fealty as well. Either way, the best description for their kind is that they bully the weak while fearing the strong.
His post caught much of the other Players’ attention.
[I’m Doug Ag: I see! I guess you really are the former chief of the Black Hand Tribe!]
[Zonyan: Grayclaw, not Black Hand!]
[Pec King Joe: I see! I guess you really are the former chief of the Blackclaw Tribe!]
[Zonyan: I’ve said—Grayclaw, not Blackclaw!]
[Warrior Princess: I see! I guess you really are the former chief of the Gray Hand Tribe~]
[Zonyan: Your Highness, surely you jest. It’s Grayclaw, not Gray Hand!]
[Captain Ivan: Has anyone seen Marni? He’s disappeared again.]
[I’m Doug Ag: …Hmm. I suppose just a ‘Marni’s dead’ would suffice for a reaction.]
[The Peerless Marni Never Falls: I’m not dead! I’m just surveying for specialty products from the Rabbitfolk that could be sold at Lancaster…”
[Many Thanks Bro Vulcan: I see! I guess you really are the former chief of the Grayclaw Tribe!]
[Zonyan: Black Hand, not Grayclaw!]
[Zonyan: Wait, what?!]
Setting aside the jovial banter amongst the players and Zonyan who is not formally the chief of the Black Hand tribe, the frontline Players all understood from his post that the Hyena-men were a wall they couldn’t bypa.s.s if they want to start exploring the new continent.
And from what the Long Ears tribe had been through, it was clear that Swordtail had deliberately sent them here to hara.s.s their tribe.
But to break this wall wouldn’t be difficult—the Players only need to gather enough numbers and charge in for a Zerg Rush to break their crystals to end things immediately, since each of them were a lot more powerful than the Hyena-men.
The problem was that most of the Players were tired of fighting after the strings of major battles they had gone through. Some weren’t even bothered to farm daily quest, so why bother gathering their forces once again to do a quite meaningless battle against the Hyena-men?
Moreover, most of them still had too many rewards from the last event that hadn’t converted them into actual combat strength.
Under such circ.u.mstances, the Hyena-men weren’t attracting too much of the Players’ attention.
If one had the time to split some Hyena-men heads but get nothing, why not head to Trinia and enjoy the view of long-legged elven ladies?
Besides, Xi Wei, who was the only who could get the Players to mount large-scale a.s.sault had no intention of a.s.signing any such quests either.
He had only profited with a tiny bit of divine power in the previous event, not to mention that most of the deviant divine power that he purified with the First Flame still carried slight Fire authority.
Besides, he didn’t dare to absorb too much of it and had used most of it to bless the Players (which is why fire-type is the strongest in the current version). While his divine power not in the red, the balance between his income and expenditure remains unhealthy—forking out substantial divine power in such a time for a quest that doesn’t benefit himself much is just asking for it…
Also, things appear rather curious over here at the Western Continent. It wasn’t noticeable since there weren’t Players there before, but now that most of them had arrived, Xi Wei sensed that these lands which the nonhumans lived was stirring some weird sensation within him.
The question was that he couldn’t quite put his finger on what was weird about it, and it nagged at him like a pain in the b.u.t.t (even though he doesn’t have a b.u.t.t).
Considering that the air around the divine realm had gone so weird, apprehensive and oppressive that it had been some time since the Great Lion came to visit, Xi Wei decided to leave the Players to their own devices at the Western Continent. He would just watch over things at his own divine kingdom to better understanding current circ.u.mstances.