Chapter 28: The Death of Tribespeople

The tribespeople who went out to gather chestnuts ran back to the tribe in a panic. By the time Baifeng saw them, he saw that they were all still shaken, their weapons were nowhere to be seen, and when he asked them questions, they couldn't even speak clearly.

As for those who had been gathering chestnuts, they didn't even know where they had dropped their baskets and containers. Only one person, who perhaps even forgot they were still carrying a basket, sat among the tribespeople who had fled back without even taking off the nearly empty basket.

It was only after they gradually regained their composure that Baifeng was able to roughly piece together what had happened from their chaotic accounts.

Because they had not encountered any danger before, they had let down their guard while gathering chestnuts. However, a tiger suddenly charged out, pinned one tribesperson down, and after biting them to death, it rushed over to search for targets among the crowd to hunt.

Seeing a tribesperson killed by the tiger, this gathering team, composed mainly of women, had no ability to resist an adult tiger. They dropped their things and fled for their lives, not caring how many people were killed, just blindly running toward the tribe.

After waiting at the camp for a long time without seeing anyone else emerge from the forest, Baifeng knew that those people were not coming back.

Baifeng would not blame them for not resisting or for fleeing instead of saving others, because he felt that he himself did not have the courage to face a tiger head-on. He was not Wu Song from the novels, and the tigers of today were not the docile pets kept in zoos for people to admire in later generations.

Baifeng did not remember the names of all the tribespeople; he only remembered some. But among those sent out in the morning, some familiar faces were no longer to be seen.

The Baifeng tribe lost six tribespeople during the Autumn Harvest.

The gathered chestnuts were being dried to prevent mold during storage. After eight days of gathering, the chestnuts could already fill half the warehouse. Combined with other grass seeds, wild vegetables, and wild fruits collected, and paired with meat, it was enough for the entire tribe to get through a prosperous Winter.

It was just that Baifeng was too greedy; food was definitely better the more they had, and the tribespeople could also feel at ease seeing a full warehouse of food.

For the safety of the tribespeople, Baifeng decided that starting tomorrow, they would no longer go out to collect food. At most, the still-large hunting team would no longer split up, but would act together as one group.

The others in the tribe were not overly sad and soon returned to their normal state to continue working. Being killed by wild beasts while out looking for food was too normal; humans were hunters, but they were also prey.

Baifeng could not even spare the time to forge Iron now; he could only anxiously wait for the other two teams that were out to return safely.

The team that went to gather at Dahu returned safely. Carrying or holding their full harvest, they returned to the tribe with pride, waiting for Baifeng's welcome.

When Baifeng saw them, he did not first ask about the harvest, nor did he praise the person with the most, but instead counted them twice one by one. Only after confirming that not a single person was missing did he say those words: welcome home.

Upon learning that tribespeople had been killed by a tiger, the expressions on their faces also turned sad. The stable life of this period had made them almost forget the cruelty of Nature.

It was not until the sun was half-set and the sky had turned dark that the Hunter Team finally returned. Their harvest was not very rich, even worse than usual.

In normal times, Baifeng would not have thought anything of it, but after this incident, the fact that this group returned right at the deadline ignited a nameless fire in Baifeng. Coming back so late—were they staying in the forest to feed the beasts?

Unfortunately, they had not yet noticed Baifeng's displeasure. Lu ran happily to Baifeng and said, "Tribal Chief, I was just about to catch a deer today, just a little bit more! If it weren't for the fact that it was getting dark, I would have caught one today!"

Baifeng's face turned as dark as the sky: "You mean to say that they came back so late just to accompany you to catch a deer?"

"Yes, Tribal Chief, didn't you ask them to supervise me?" Lu had not yet realized Baifeng's displeasure.

Baifeng let out a huff and said directly to Lu: "From tomorrow on, you don't need to go hunting. Stay in the tribe and move Bricks to build houses. I cannot let you harm everyone just because of your one-sided words."

"As for what I promised you before, you don't need to catch deer either. When you have made five hundred earth bricks, I will give you a Knife all the same."

Having said that, Baifeng walked straight toward his own house. He didn't even have the mood to eat now.

Lu was already stunned, not understanding why the Tribal Chief would suddenly lose his temper at him. He turned to look at his companions in the hunter group to seek an answer, but they were equally confused about what had happened.

Currently, Xiong was still responsible for managing matters like the tribespeople. Although Baifeng was the Tribal Chief, because his temper was good, everyone listened to him but did not fear him. Xiong had stepped down from the position of Tribal Chief, but the whip was still in his hands, and he was responsible for things like distributing food.

Because Wu understood simple arithmetic, after Baifeng taught him the decimal system, the warehouse was placed under his responsibility. Now he was still following Baifeng to learn simple characters, at least being able to use writing to simply record what was in the warehouse and how much of each item there was.

After Wu counted everyone's harvest for the day, moved it into the warehouse, covered it with the heavy door, and barred it with wood, he waited for Baifeng to issue the order to eat.

Baifeng had no heart to eat. He felt that he could not distance himself from the death of the tribespeople. The human-centric thinking of later generations was firmly rooted in Baifeng's mind, making it impossible for him to easily accept human death like the tribespeople.

Wu was responsible for counting the quantities, and Xiong was responsible for distributing the food. Dinner passed in a gloomy atmosphere. Even the children who were usually mischievous did not dare to be reckless, feeling that the atmosphere was not quite right.

Baifeng was almost sleepless all night. Although he had no mood to eat, the food without oil or fat made his stomach feel uncomfortable in the morning, so he got up early and cooked some chestnut porridge.

Hearing that they didn't need to go out to gather today, the tribespeople didn't know what to do and could only wait for Baifeng to arrange other work for them.

The hunters definitely had to continue going out. Their team was large, and generally, no blind animal would look for trouble with them. Moreover, their Weapons were complete, and they were all strong and sturdy. The tiger here should be a South China Tiger, not that large in size, so with so many people, there shouldn't be any accidents.

However, Baifeng still instructed them to be sure to return early and never wait until the sun was about to set, as their lack of nutrition caused their night vision to be almost zero.

As for the gathering team, they finished their work early, and the water storage project that Baifeng had prepared to carry out after the Autumn Harvest was completed would have to start ahead of schedule.

With so many people, the water consumption was huge, but the lake water would definitely freeze in Winter, and there would no longer be water in the natural channels reaching the camp directly.

At this time, it was necessary to dig water storage pools or cellars, filling them with the water from the channels while it was still available to ensure the water supply for Winter.

One cellar for ten people—at least forty would have to be built to last until the lake water thawed.

However, Baifeng still had to do one thing first, and that was to carefully count every single tribesperson. Those without names would be named now. No matter what, there could not be any more tribespeople passing away, nor could there be any more situations where it was unknown who had passed away.