By noon, Inala was awake. He left two of his strongest Empyrean Zinger Scouts in the cave, one for the sleeping Asaeya and the other for the new Gannala. Their job was to protect the two and alert him of any danger.
A Zinger was capable of relaying an entire essay’s worth of information through a short shout, so it was easy to transmit information through them. Besides, their cave was situated close to the peak and hidden from view.
So, it was easy to detect any enemy long before their arrival. Even for expert climbers like a Zinger, scaling up 600 metres worth of the rugged mountain slope took minutes.
Carrying the weak Empyrean Zinger Scout, Inala arrived at the peak and took a seat, observing the settlement.
Once it was daybreak, the Rooster Tribesmen reverted to their human forms. The women were tired, but they began to clean up the battlefield promptly.
The Sludge Lizard corpses were dumped into a large vermicompost pit dug within a mountain. It seemed they had perfected the process for that, judging by how healthy and robust the farm crops were growing.
There seemed to be at least sixty vermicompost pits in the settlement. As invasion by the Slump Lizards was a daily occurrence, they filled a pit daily. After sixty days, the respective pit would be dug out and the compost would be used to feed the farm.
After cleaning up the corpses, the group of women retired for the day. It was around evening time when they woke up, dividing themselves into two groups.
The first group worked on the farm. Some of them carried the farm produce to the peak of the mountain in the centre and dumped them into the lake where the Rockatrice consumed them.
Thanks to his enhanced eyesight, Inala was able to observe that the Rockatrice had a bulging body, “It’s about to give birth. That’s why it’s consuming so much food.”
All Panic Beasts in Sumatra were the egg-laying kind. The only difference was in the hatching duration. For Pranic Beasts like the Empyrean Boars, the eggs hatch right as they exit their mother’s womb.
It was the same for an Empyrean Tusk. When a woman with the Fragment Disease gave birth, right as the baby was about to come out, its eggshell would shatter. And here, the eggshell was only a gelatinous membrane, the same as a human.
It was also why Yennda was waiting for the moment when the egg would be fully developed and before the shell shattered. 𝐎𝒱𝓵xt.𝗇𝓔t
‘Since it’s apparent that Empyrean Tusks are born through Mammoth Clansmen with the Fragment Disease, how were they born before the Mammoth Clan came into existence?’ Inala distracted himself with the thought for a few minutes while observing the working women.
His eyes then trailed towards the second group of women who exited the settlement, forming a file as they carried an earthen vase each, approaching the river. After scooping water, they returned to the settlement and poured it into a reservoir meant for watering their farm and their daily use.
They made repeated trips until the sun was about to set. Soon, once nighttime approached, the mysterious Pranic Beast in the river unleashed a burst of Prana, causing the Slump Lizards to rush out and swarm the settlement through its entrance.
In response, the Rockatrice in the lake at the settlement’s centre unleashed its burst of Prana, transforming the woman into Rooster Tribesmen.
While the two sides fought, Inala and Asaeya entered the settlement and stealthily accumulated Prana Bombs.
Before Asaeya slept, she boiled the rice grains stolen from the settlement. A morsel later, she spat it out.
At her settlement, she ate Maetalla, a nutrition-rich meaty substance created to perfectly address all of a Mammoth Clanman’s nutritional and taste needs. There were flavour varieties among Maetalla, ensuring things never got boring in their food.
This was a product of evolution micro-managed to suit the Mammoth Clan perfectly to a tee. Having been spoilt by that, Asaeya couldn’t even swallow a single bite of the rice grown at the Rooster Tribe settlement.
Even Inala, after living there for just ten months was spoilt. It felt like he would lose interest towards food the longer he consumed these bland grains and would lose body mass upon extended lack of food intake.
In the end, the duo decided to rely upon the Prana Bombs. The taste of the fluid in the Prana Bomb varied based on the Prana it absorbed. The Prana Bombs made using the Slump Lizards were pretty bland, but they were better than the grains.
Moreover, Inala made them absorb a unit of his Prana at the end. That raised its taste to palatable levels. In the end, they needed to hoard enough Prana Bombs for their further travel.
While Inala focused on accumulating Prana Bombs, Asaeya scouted through the settlement, scouring for information. By knowing the region better, she would be able to judge their location and eventually figure out the way to the Rumtara Kingdom.
It seemed the Rooster Tribe had been around for a couple of decades at least, based on the traces of items left behind in the houses. ‘If they had been around for so long, they should have scouted this region pretty well.’
Asaeya made her way to one of the largest wooden houses and hid beneath one of its windows. She inhaled a deep breath and clapped lightly.
There were many girls within the house, seemingly doing something. In unison, they felt their senses slowly zoning out, forcing them into a state of relaxation. And as their senses vanished, they fell unconscious gently.
Asaeya retracted the effects of Linked Rupture and peered in through the window, observing around ten girls within. They had been working on sewing leather armour and other miscellaneous processes associated with it. On a shelf in the corner were leather scrolls.
Information was being recorded on them using charcoal. Asaeya tiptoed into the room to avoid waking up the girls and opened the closest scroll, observing information related to farm produce recorded on it.
There was a tribe registry, their expected yield, grain reserves, proposed future infrastructure plans, etc. Asaeya soon found a map, noticing it detailed the region between the settlement and the river. There were other maps too, but this one caught her attention, ‘Wait a second…why is there another settlement here?’
There was only a blank circle drawn there, with the words next to it hinting at the possibility of a settlement. That was all. It was barebones at best, but upon pondering about it, Asaeya felt the likelihood of a settlement existing there was high.
‘If the Pranic Beast in the river is strong enough to rival the Rockatrice, then it too would have captured some of the Free Humans that ran to this region.’ Thinking as such, she began to look through the other scrolls, stunned upon noticing something, “Oh shit!”
“This region is a giant trap!”