Chapter 146: The Plan Falls Through

Four days have already passed. According to the original plan, it should be almost time to return, yet they haven't even seen a shadow of a human. Baifeng is puzzled; could it be that their tribe is the only one left in this entire Wasteland?

Including the prey captured along the way, their Dry Rations can last for another three days. They decided to search for one more day; if there are no findings after that day, they will return, replenish their Dry Rations, and after resting, change direction to continue the search.

On the last day, just as they were planning to return, they finally discovered some traces by the river. Whether it was the shattered pottery shards or the human bones left scattered about, everything indicated that there was likely a human tribe nearby, though it had probably already met with disaster.

Everyone entered a state of combat readiness. The Scout moved forward along the tracks to investigate the situation, but they returned in a great hurry shortly after, simultaneously giving the signal for everyone to prepare for an attack.

Hearing the report, the group immediately raised their bows and nocked their Arrows. Just as Baifeng was about to ask what the situation was inside, a pack of wolves chased out from behind. Seeing so many people outside, those wolves immediately came to a halt.

Baifeng did not hesitate in the slightest and directly ordered an attack. Everyone immediately fired a volley of Arrows; the few wolves that had intended to observe the situation were shot down to the ground, and the wolves watching from behind retreated.

At this moment, they dared not stop, for in war, speed is of the essence; they had to catch them off guard. Baifeng could not be sure if there was anyone else in this era who could domesticate wolves just like them.

However, with their current equipment, they really didn't fear encountering an ordinary tribe, and there were no particularly large tribes in this area; those large tribes were very far away.

As they advanced rapidly, the Scout told Baifeng on the side that they had just seen the camp of this tribe. The Tents had almost all collapsed and it didn't look like anyone was living there. Moreover, as soon as they got a little closer, they were immediately discovered by these wolves, and they had no choice but to run when they were chased out.

Baifeng asked about the scale of the camp discovered, and the Scout said it was extremely small. Baifeng was completely relieved; regardless of whether the wolves were domesticated or not, they were not afraid of small tribes.

After walking inside a bit, they discovered the wolves beginning to run in all directions. They did not hesitate at all and shot their Arrows at the wolves in their respective directions. A whole Winter of continuous practice had not been in vain; the wolves were leisurely and the distance was not far, making them perfect targets, and everyone hit their marks.

Baifeng knew his archery was not good, so to avoid being laughed at for missing, he had not fired any Arrows.

They continued to advance, and the rest of the wolves, realizing the situation was wrong, all scattered and fled. Baifeng also saw what was wrong with this camp: there were white skeletons everywhere, the Tents or wooden houses had already half-collapsed, and there were no traces of fires having been lit. This was clearly a deserted tribe.

So, everyone stopped worrying about the human issue and focused entirely on hunting down these fleeing wolves. It was not a very large pack, only about twenty or so. With so many of them, several people chasing one, they were all killed very quickly; it was just unclear if any had escaped that they hadn't seen.

They gave the shot wolves a finishing blow and dragged them over to pile them up; if they didn't finish them off, they were afraid they might suddenly bite someone, as this thing's life was indeed quite tough. They had come out this time with absolutely no harvest, and they couldn't go back empty-handed; these wolves were at least passable prey.

Without the wolves, Baifeng finally put away his bow and took his Knife to start rummaging everywhere. Looking at the wooden houses and Tents, the number was not large; even adding those two caves, this tribe should only have had a population of one or two hundred.

Outside, bones were thrown everywhere; one didn't even need to pick them up to know they were human bones. There were also skulls stuck in the mud that still had skin and hair that hadn't completely rotted away.

This scene made Baifeng feel a bit nauseous, but he still squatted down to take a closer look. The bite marks on the bones were from the sharp teeth of canines; even the Cannibal Tribe wouldn't have the ability to leave such tooth marks on bones.

Combined with the hair that hadn't completely rotted, Baifeng deduced that this should have been a recent event. It was possible that the wolf pack had attacked this tribe, which had already run out of food after passing through the Winter and was exceptionally weak, or perhaps they had died in that Snow disaster, and as the Snow melted, they were just discovered by this pack of scavenging wolves.

However, it was useless to speculate now. This tribe was likely the closest one to the Baifeng tribe in this direction, but it had already been wiped out. Baifeng's plan had completely fallen through.

But they still searched to see if they could find anything useful. A tribe of one or two hundred people, no matter how poor, should still have one or two good things.

However, there was nothing to be found outside, only picked-clean bones. Only a few caves remained to be searched.

It was quite dark inside the caves, so they lit a Torch. Unexpectedly, as soon as they entered the cave, they were struck by a chill that made them shiver, feeling numb from head to toe. Looking by the light of the Torch, there were actually several corpses inside that had been gnawed on. They were curled up on animal skins with their legs held, and the upper parts had been gnawed to pieces by the wolves, but because they were still frozen, there wasn't much of a foul stench.

The wolves, unable to bite through, had just gnawed on them like that, and the backs of the corpses were frozen to the animal skins. They wouldn't do the job of flipping the corpses; it was too disgusting. However, there were no other good things in this cave, so they quickly retreated. It took a long time of basking in the sun to dispel that cold air that had seeped into their marrow.

There was one more cave, but they didn't want to go in, so they sent others in. Those few people hadn't been in long before they came out carrying a Bronze Tripod larger than a human head. This was the Ritual Vessel of this tribe; it seemed there were no other good things.

Baifeng ordered the men to withdraw, but before leaving, they dragged over many trees that had died after being crushed by the Snow during the Winter, filled the camp with them, put them inside the caves as well, and then lit a fire to burn everything clean.

Whether it was because they didn't want human corpses exposed in the Wasteland, or because they didn't want to provide food for wild beasts, regardless of the reasoning, the value of this Bronze Tripod was enough for the people of the Baifeng tribe to do one last thing for this vanished tribe; after all, it was just a matter of convenience.

Now they had to hurry back. They had searched slowly and meticulously on the way here; if they traveled quickly, they could return to the tribe in three days.

Now they were concerned about the issue of the wolves. They weren't afraid of the fur, but the meat would rot if left for too long. Fortunately, the temperature wasn't too high now, and it was still very cold in the mornings and evenings, so it shouldn't spoil in three days.

However, knowing that these wolves had eaten people, Baifeng really had no interest in this wolf meat. But the wolf skin was a relatively important item. As for the meat, humans couldn't eat it, but after thinking about it, it would be fine to chop it up and feed it to the fish upon returning, or take it to the Dahu as bait for fishing.

The other tribesmen likewise wouldn't have the thought of eating such meat; the tribe wasn't short of meat right now.

They were now heading back to the tribe at the fastest speed they could accept. Having not achieved their goal, everyone was still a bit disappointed, but Baifeng still cheered them on, saying they would rest for a day after returning and then continue searching. He didn't believe that they were the only tribe in this Wasteland; if they were the only ones, then this place would all be their territory.