Chapter 243 – Sneaky Move
When Zhao Hai heard what Laura said, he felt that there were words within her words. He looked at Laura in confusion and asked, “What do you mean?”
Laura glanced at Zhao Hai and then snickered, “It means, those liars were not real merchants. They had background. Solid background.”
Zhao Hai looked agape and asked, “You mean someone made the liars act this way? Who? For what?”
Laura let out a bitter smile and replied, “Who else could it be? The ones who are afraid of beastmen getting powerful. Among them are Fansile family, as well as Axu Empire’s royal members. There are many merchants on Beastmen Prairie right now, and they are their spotters. If they find out which tribe is very powerful, they will both think of a way to weaken that tribe. In order to weaken a tribe, there’s no move more vicious than cheating. This move doesn’t need manpower and too much wealth. Even less so for fighting, and it can let them fulfill their goal. That’s why a lot of people use this move.”
Zhao Hai seriously never thought that it was because of this. He did a double take and said, “No wonder Yale just interrupted Wales. It seems like Yale treated us as those sort of liars as well. Blame me, for I just spoke too surely.”
Laura laughed, “We can’t blame you as well. What you said was the truth. It’s just Yale doesn’t believe you. Once we make more contact, they will believe it. That’s right, Hai-bro. Do you feel that Wales’ camp is a little strange?”
Zhao Hai nodded, “It’s a little strange, yes. This camp is full of combatants, and not a single woman. This is a little inexplicable.”
Laura nodded, “I can tell as well, but from the look of Wales, it’s not like he had anything important to do, so why would he come all the way here?”
Meg, who had never spoken just now, said, “Can be it be that Wales is here for a trial? Wales is the 7th son of the Herculean Bull Tribe’s chieftain, which is basically a prince. Human nobles usually let their own children go out to brush up, and Wales’ identity is also a noble one, so he might be here for a trial of combat, right?”
Laura and Zhao Hai both did a double take, and then Laura laughed softly, “It seems like we’ve thought things to be more complicated than they really are. Yes, I also heard that the great tribes’ princes would also come out for trials. It seems like Wales is part of it as well, but the matter of him being surrounded by jackals is also full of fishiness.”
Zhao Hai nodded, “This matter is somewhat odd, but it’s not what we need to concern ourselves with. We’ve arrived at our destination and we dealt with the Jackal Tribe, right? I even stored the Jackal Tribe’s people, but none of them alive, unfortunately. Still, there are two mounts which are alive. They’re now in storage.”
After the battle, Zhao Hai put the jackal tribesmen corpses into the space. In order to avoid Yale’s suspicions, Zhao Hai personally used the black mist spell to cloud the battleground, and then collected the corpses. He didn’t turn the jackal tribesmen into undead creatures in a hurry. He still wanted to get some information from their mouths.
But he also couldn’t let Wales and Yale know that, so he used the black mist spell to cloud the battleground. By the time it dissipated, the jackal tribesmen’s corpses had disappeared. This would make Yale and others think that Zhao Hai had turned the corpses into undead creatures which he put into his summoning space.
This was also the common method used by black mages on the continent. Usually after they killed their enemies, they would turn their enemies into undead creatures and then put them into their own summoning space. Not only would this deter enemies, it would also add to their own strength. That was why Zhao Hai did it earlier. Both Yale and Wales weren’t the slightest bit suspicious.
Laura nodded and said, “Let’s wait until it’s night to sort out those jackal tribesmen. We don’t know when Wales will come look for us, so let’s not enter the space.” Zhao Hai nodded as well. He didn’t intend to enter the space at this time.
Zhao Hai and others didn’t know that Wales and Yale were talking about them at the moment.
When they saw Zhao Hai and others leave the tent, Wales spoke to Yale in confusion, “Teacher, why didn’t you let me and Zhao Hai continue on? If he has a lot of grains and they’re very cheap, then it’s great news for our Herculean Bull Tribe.”
Yale glanced at Wales and shook his head, “I feel that Zhao Hai wasn’t being truthful. Does he really have grains in his hands? Do not forget Black Bear Tribe’s lesson 5 years ago.”
The Black Bear Tribe lesson 5 years ago which Yale meant was that scamming incident, when a human merchant who had cooperated with Black Bear Tribe many times in the past promised to prepare the grains meant for lasting through winter. Because the Black Bear Tribe worked happily with the other party, they wouldn’t expect that the other party would cheat them. As a result, the black bear tribesmen never bought any grains from other human merchants to pass the winter.
Yet that human merchant had disappeared in the end, and never appeared on the prairie. By the time the Black Bear Tribe fell for it, it was already too late. They didn’t stockpile grains for that winter, and the snowing was fierce. It was hard to mobilize the forces, and the entire Black Bear Tribe faced the danger of food depletion.
Eventually, they had no choice but to eat argali and other magic beasts in order to overcome the danger. Even so, many of the Black Bear Tribe’s slaves had starved to death. The once powerful Black Bear Tribe had weakened. If it weren’t for their powerful fighting abilities, they would’ve already been terminated.
Afterwards, this matter had caused a huge backlash on the Beastmen Prairie. There was even a period of time when all the races on the prairie didn’t do business with human merchants. Many of the merchants had unrecoupable losses because of this.
When Wales heard what Yale said, he was startled and said, “It can’t be. I don’t think Zhao Hai is that sort of person, and he’s holding a friendship flag. Aren’t you worrying too much?”
Yale shook his head, “It’s always better to be a little more cautious. We must always remember the Black Bear Tribe’s lesson. Regardless of whether or not Zhao Hai has the grains, we cannot put all the fortunes on him.”
Wales didn’t object regarding this point. Putting all of one’s fortunes on someone else is too risky. He wouldn’t do it, so he didn’t object to what Yale said.
Yale looked at Wales as he said, “Don’t you think it’s very strange that we were under attack today, Wales? When did those mongrels get so gutsy and they dared to attack us?”
Wales was startled, “Then teacher, what you mean is?”
Yale replied, “There’s something fishy about this. Even though the mongrels will rob anyone, when they do, their teams have elderly and women, and usually act in a whole group. But the ones who attacked us today were all strong and of age. No elderlies and women. Have you heard of any jackal tribes that mobilized 2000 strong adults to conduct robbery before? Furthermore, we’re just here to roam so we didn’t bring a lot of valuables, and just 300 warrior guards. We’re more powerful than the smaller tribes with this kind of strength by many measures, yet the mongrels still came for us. This isn’t like their usual style of action, so I’m saying that this matter is very strange.”
Wales’ facial expression kept changing as he heard Yale’s words. He wasn’t a fool. He knew what Yale’s words meant.
Although Wales was the chieftain’s 7th son, he was his father’s most favorite son, and he was smart since he was little. This might not mean much to humans, but in beastmen tribes, it was an incredibly positive trait.
Beastmen had direct personalities. Normally when there were beastmen that weren’t too clever, they appeared to be silly in others’ eyes and easily deceived, so the beastmen placed great importance on smart children and assign a prophet teacher to them since little for education. This kind of children were often the ones to become the next chieftains.
Since little, Wales proved to be very smart, so his father assigned Yale to him when he was 5 years old. This was almost like a hint to everyone that he was ready raise Wales as a successor.
If Wales’ other brothers had ordinary strength, then it wouldn’t be much. The Herculean Bull Tribe would complete the succession smoothly. But the problem was that his brothers were powerful as well. It would be problematic.
Wales’ eldest brother Gasol stayed at his father’s side since little and always fought for Herculean Bull Tribe. In the beastmen circles, he had a glorious nickname of ‘bull-headed war god’. His strength was enough to match against a human level 8 expert. Among beastmen who admired strength, Gasol’s fame was quite large. His prestige was very great within Herculean Bull Tribe as well.
Even though Gasol wasn’t as smart as Wales, he helped their father manage the tribe’s matters all these years, so his performance could be said to be commendable. That was why many people were supporting him in Herculean Bull Tribe and wanted him to be the next chieftain.
Wales’ second brother Paul wasn’t too worth the attention. Because Paul had always been a very short tempered person, even though he was powerful and eager to battle, he was obviously not chieftain material. But Paul had a very good relationship with Gasol, and he always supported Gasol in becoming a chieftain.
Wales’ 3rd and 4th brothers were killed in action during their teenage years. The ones who could remember their names in the tribe were few.
Wales’ 5th brother Hales had a sickly body since little. He would get sick in half of every year, so he was a forgotten existence in the tribe who didn’t pose any threat.
Wales’ 6th brother Mendez had a very good relationship with Wales. He took great care of Wales since little, but his current age wasn’t very high so he couldn’t be of much help.
Wales had 2 more younger brothers, but their age was still little. They didn’t even have the right to engage in trials, not to mention helping out.
Wales had another 4 older sisters, but they were married to another bull headed race that wasn’t weak: Fighting Bull Tribe. Wales had a good relationship with his 2nd and 3rd sisters, while the eldest and 4th sisters were in good relationships with Gasol.
To really count it up, Gasol had larger odds than Wales in becoming the chieftain of Herculean Bull Tribe.