Chapter 1233: Ju Leaves His Name

Two days have passed, and not a single person has come to the Golden Autumn Gathering. Ma, growing increasingly anxious, has now completely given up hope. He knows that this year's Golden Autumn Gathering is a total failure. If he can manage to get a commendation, he'll be lucky; when he gets back, he'll try again to see if he can speak with the Prince and just get himself sent to school.

"Ma, let's leave after we finish breakfast today. It's certain that no one is coming, and the agreed-upon time has arrived."

Ma wiped his face and sighed: "Fine, Regimental Commander Ju, let it be. It's just our bad luck this year. Even if we had come earlier, it wouldn't have mattered. It's all because of that heavy snow, which made everyone think Winter had already arrived, so no one came."

"Exactly. Once we carve our names on the trees and stones later, we'll have completed our mission, and then we can head back."

Ma nodded and turned to eat breakfast, though he felt the breakfast didn't even taste good anymore.

After finishing his meal, Ju took an iron rod and began carving with a clinking sound into a stone used for tethering cattle, writing: "No one came to the Golden Autumn Gathering, Ju left his name."

Limestone is very brittle, so it was easy to carve the characters; it's not like basalt or something, which has such high hardness that you couldn't carve characters without good tools. Besides, there has been no volcanic activity in this location, so basalt doesn't exist here.

Ma also used the iron rod to clink out a "Ma" character, proving that he had been here too.

One wasn't enough to be safe, so the two of them each took out a Knife and carved it again on some thicker trees nearby. It had to be a few meters away from the camp, otherwise, if another tribe came early next year and cut the tree down for firewood, it would be a disaster.

Moreover, it had to be thick enough so that those tribes without good tools wouldn't bother to cut down a big tree; wouldn't it be faster and less effort to use their own Stone Axe to cut some dead trees or small trees?

After finishing this, the two looked at each other, sighed, packed their things, and prepared to leave. Soon, the camp was cleared, leaving nothing behind.

However, the cattle were carrying a bit too much in supplies, and nothing had been traded away. At Ju's request, they directly unloaded the salt from two of the cattle and poured it straight into the lake, and a small salt island immediately formed in the lake.

Too much was poured, and the salt hadn't had time to dissolve yet, though it would gradually disappear into the lake water. However, the water at the edge would certainly have a stronger taste; it just depends on which wild beast is lucky enough to come to this spot to drink and get to drink such salt-rich water.

No one would feel bad about the salt; salt is the one thing Huaxia is not short of now. To raise livestock well, when they first started transporting supplies to the Western Development Group, a whole warehouse of salt was shipped. Besides the refined salt for people to eat, there was coarse salt for the livestock.

If you want to raise livestock to be fat and healthy, salt is a must. Unrefined mineral salt is even better; otherwise, those livestock would definitely go eat dirt, especially the saltpeter soil with white alkali.

It's better to feel bad for the livestock than for the salt. On such a difficult road, they have to carry so many things, swaying as they walk; they look much thinner than when they came. The people of the Western Development Group can basically be called herdsmen; they don't feel bad about the salt they can't finish, they only feel bad for the cattle.

And just like last year, the plates and such were just skipped across the water and sunk into the lake. They didn't use boxes or crates to pack these plates anymore, but used lighter bamboo baskets, lining them with some dry Grass or the like.

Although it wasn't heavy, the surface area was large, which affected the cattle's progress. Once the items were sunk in the lake and the baskets were discarded, several cattle were suddenly unburdened, and their speed could be much faster.

It's just a pity that one doesn't know if those Porcelain, Glass, and such will ever see the light of day again in the future. If they really could see the light of day, would they count as national-treasure-level artifacts? Why would the humans of that year discard such items here? They aren't burial goods, there's no tomb—how curious it would be! It would become another unsolved historical mystery. If the stone Ju carved could be discovered together with them, and the handwriting hadn't been eroded by Nature, it could provide material for later generations to imagine a reasonable story.

Ju is on his way home, and Xiong is also on his way home, though Xiong's home is a bit further away.

After they hunted an elephant last time, their dietary problems were solved for several days, but the problem didn't last long. Just a few days after setting off again, they ran into the team delivering grain. Now, they didn't have to worry about food at all for the rest of the journey; they could go straight back to the Xuanyuan Tribe.

The road from the Shennong Clan to the Xuanyuan Tribe has been completely leveled; there is no difficulty and no pressure. Even a swamp can be filled with wood to make a road for you. As long as there are enough people and they exert enough strength, a simple road that people can walk on is no problem.

It's not like they need to build bridges in the sky or drill through mountains; it's not that difficult. No matter how great the difficulty, as long as human intelligence and industry are developed to the right point, what cannot be built?

Now we can build railways on permafrost; in the future, we can build elevators directly on the Himalayas. If we want to watch the sunrise at the world's highest peak, we'll just take an elevator up.

As he got closer and closer to the Xuanyuan Tribe, Xiong's heart grew more and more anxious. The older he got, the more he missed home and wanted to go back; perhaps this is related to human genes.

No matter the animal, as long as it gets old, it will definitely be driven out of the group, or it will be snatched away by a wild beast before it even lives to the day it's old enough to be driven out. In this era, in this world, there is no wild beast that can die of old age.

Xiong's heart is afraid. Once a person is old, if they leave the tribe, it means death. Having finally found a tribe strong enough to ensure he won't be driven out when he gets old, he certainly wants to hurry back to seek protection.

This has nothing to do with the body; it has to do with age. Young people have a restless puberty and just want to leave their original tribe to strike out and create a new one. They will develop a resistance to their original tribe, especially resisting their parents, who symbolize power, and rebelling against their authority, because their genes tell them: you are already strong, you can start to compete for power, fight for mating rights, and reproduce offspring.