Chapter 9

The Da Xia camp finally gave birth to a Woodcutting Realm combatant again.

Everyone's mood improved a lot.

Xia Hong's mood, needless to say, originally thought it would take more than ten days, but it only took eight days, which shows the potential of his body.

It's about to be night, Xia Hong didn't drag his feet, walked to the side of the bonfire, and in the surprised eyes of the crowd, pulled out a charred stick from it.

The stick was pitch black, about half a meter long, thin at the bottom and thick at the top, and the very top of the thick end was white.

Small Torch: Generated for every 10 units of wood burned by the bonfire, can be carried around, functions similar to the small bonfire.

The special function of the small bonfire, having stayed in the cave for eight days, although it was used sparingly with wood, a total of 13 units were burned, so one was generated.

Since he is going out, he naturally has to be fully prepared.

Similar to the function of the small bonfire, that is to say, it also has the effect of deterring and killing strange creatures, but at the same time, it will also attract cold beasts.

Soon, it was dark.

Xia Hong tied the torch to his back with a rope, tucked two hand axes into his waist, and then pulled a stick about three meters long from the side of the camp wall.

He looked out through the finger-sized crack at the cave entrance, confirmed that it was completely dark, turned his head and gave Xia Chuan a final instruction.

"Remember the secret signal I gave you, I will definitely be back before dawn. After I leave, you immediately seal the cave entrance. If someone comes, as long as they can't answer the secret signal, no matter who it is, don't expose yourself, understand?"

That slaughter only happened eight days ago, Xia Chuan remembered it vividly, so he naturally understood the importance of Xia Hong's instructions and nodded heavily.

Xia Hong didn't say much more, tore open a gap, and drilled out directly.

Xia Chuan quickly sealed the cave entrance, but through the last bit of the crack, seeing Xia Hong's departing figure, there was still a trace of worry in his eyes.

…………

How big Red Wood Ridge is, let alone Xia Hong, even Xia Ding didn't know.

Da Xia is only a small camp after all. Over the years, although they have been constantly exploring, their scope of activity is the slope on the east side of Red Wood Ridge.

Moreover, they basically revolve around those six mountain caves.

The general range is about five kilometers in radius.

Within these five kilometers, the most important thing is the outskirts of Red Wood Ridge to the west.

No other reason, just because there are many trees in Red Wood Ridge.

Not only many, but also frantically extending outward.

According to reason, with the logging of nine human camps around Red Wood Ridge over the years, Red Wood Ridge should be constantly shrinking.

However, according to Xia Ding's observation, Red Wood Ridge has not shrunk over the years, but has been constantly expanding outward.

Trees grow bigger and bigger, and more and more.

Fast resource growth speed is originally a good thing for humans.

But the problem is, these trees are not just resources for them.

For cold beasts, they are the same.

The vast majority of cold beasts' habitats are in the trees.

Moreover, cold beasts, besides preying, also like to eat the fruits on the trees.

So the expansion of Red Wood Ridge is actually very fatal to the surrounding camps.

As the trees continue to extend, the range of activities of those cold beasts is getting closer and closer to the surrounding camps, and humans will become more and more dangerous.

Of course, these things are not what Xia Hong should consider at the current stage.

Although it is night, the ground is covered with white snow, so the visibility is barely okay.

Unknowingly, he had already walked to the edge of Red Wood Ridge.

Looking at it, the giant trees that could be called towering ancient trees in his previous life are sparse and ordinary here, and can even only be considered small.

Just by Xia Hong's rough look, even the thinnest trees on the outskirts have a diameter of three or four meters, and those thirty or fifty meters long are everywhere.

The inner side is even more terrifying, those with a diameter of five or six meters, or even over ten meters, can be seen, those giant trees, looking up, you can't even see the top, don't know how high they are.

The towering trees covered in white snow are hung with thousands of sharp icicles, and together with the wantonly falling snowflakes, they form a breathtaking ice and snow painting.

It's just that Xia Hong has no leisure to appreciate it at this moment.

He picked for a long time and chose a tree three meters thick.

Xia Hong walked up nervously, pushed aside the snow on the surface, and inside first revealed a layer of ice crystals, and the tree bark under the ice crystals faintly flashed a ray of red light.

Seeing the red light, and then raising his head to scan the tree crown carefully, after not finding anything, he immediately breathed a sigh of relief.

"Zhu Frost Tree, there shouldn't be any cold beasts occupying it."

According to what Xia Ding said before, there are the most Zhu Frost Trees on the east outskirts of Red Wood Ridge.

Because the branches of the Zhu Frost Tree are relatively fragile, and the cold beasts are larger, they generally won't choose to inhabit them.

Unlike Zhu Frost, a kind of tree with a yellow exterior called Jin Lin has very strong branches and a very thick trunk, which is most liked by cold beasts, and they often inhabit them at night.

Moreover, some cold beasts will also build nests and settle on them.

Plus the number of Jin Lin trees is not many, so the cold beasts that can stably inhabit them generally don't have weak strength.

Xia Hong used a stone axe to make a mark on this small Zhu Frost Tree, and after remembering the route, continued to walk inside.

The camp's food and wood are almost gone.

This tree is left to be chopped when going back, the top priority is to find crystal fruit.

"Ice Master trees like light and grow faster in places with light, so they generally grow in relatively open places."

Xia Hong recalled the characteristics of the Ice Master tree, looked around in the forest, picked a tree, confirmed there was nothing on the tree, and climbed up directly.

The outer skin of these trees is snow and ice crystals, not only bone-chillingly cold, but also slippery. It took a lot of effort for Xia Hong to finally climb to the top.

After reaching the top of the tree, the view was indeed much better.

Soon, Xia Hong discovered a relatively open area two or three hundred meters to the west.

"Eight hundred steps on the east side of Red Wood Ridge is our Da Xia's territory. If you join the woodcutting team in the future, remember this rule. If you rush into someone else's territory, if you get killed, you can't blame anyone."

Recalling the words Xia Ding said before, Xia Hong jumped off the tree and walked towards that open area on the west side.

Eight hundred steps is about a range of one li.

That open area belongs to Da Xia's territory, so it's no problem to go over.

According to reason, such an important tree that can grow staple food, the camp should have remembered the location, so as not to have to look for it every time.

In reality, it was remembered, but the death of Xia Ding and the woodcutting team was too unexpected.

The people who could go out of the camp were originally the thirteen of them, and the thirteen of them basically knew the location of the Ice Master tree.

Who would have thought that before they could tell Xia Hong, the thirteen of them died together.

Fortunately, this tree is not far away, and Xia Hong didn't spend much effort to find it.

Although he was eager for food, Xia Hong still tried his best to approach that side calmly.

Every time he passed a tree along the way, he would raise his head and search the tree crown position carefully.

At night, although it is the dormant period of cold beasts.

But it doesn't mean they won't wake up.

Up to now, Xia Hong hadn't seen any cold beasts, only learned about two or three kinds from the conversations between Xia Ding and the woodcutting team members before.

Although he hadn't seen any living ones, just from the quantity and frequency of cold beast flesh obtained by the camp when Xia Ding was still there, he could infer that their strength was absolutely terrifying.

Thirteen Woodcutting Realm combatants, in one month, only successfully hunted one juvenile bone-piercing frost wolf.

This is enough to explain many problems.

Xia Hong had to be careful; with his current strength, if he ran into a cold beast, he would most likely die.

Fortunately, the journey was safe, and in more than an hour, Xia Hong finally walked to that open area.

Arriving at the destination and looking forward, a smile was full on Xia Hong's face.

In the middle of the open area, a towering Ice Master tree more than forty meters high and covered in silver stood quietly, with crystal fruits hanging densely on it.

"The luck is actually so good, this probably has more than a thousand jin."

Xia Hong was not overwhelmed by joy and went up the tree to pick fruit directly.

Instead, he picked another Zhu Frost Tree nearby, climbed to the top.

Started to observe the tree crown part of that Ice Master tree carefully.

Looking at this, his face immediately sank a lot.

(End of chapter)