Chapter 818: The Flower Bear's Hide

Besides Xiang, there was another Tribal Chief in the crowd who was so happy he could barely contain himself, because not only had he brought gold, he had brought quite a lot of it; the main reason was that his tribe truly had nothing else to bring, so he could only bring the gold to try his luck.

But now that Xiong was still looking at the Xi Xiang Tribe's stall, he could not go directly to Xiong and call him over; that would not be according to the rules, so he could only wait anxiously with a flushed face.

Just then, Xiong said, "Alright, does your tribe have anything else, like various types of Grass Seed? If this is all you have, then I have no further need for anything; you can go take a look at our Huaxia stall, even if you don't trade, you can still handle the items and take a look to broaden your horizons."

Xiang hurriedly said, "Oh, we have Grass Seed, we do." He then took a very inconspicuous little bag from the corner of the stall and opened it to show Xiong.

Xiong pinched out a few grains with his fingers and saw that they were just very primitive, somewhat shriveled wheat; Huaxia had better than this, and such wheat could only be used to feed livestock in Huaxia, but thinking of Baifeng saying he needed wheat from different places to improve their own, which might yield unexpected results, he said, "Fine, I'll take this bit of Grass Seed too, but since this bit really has no value, I'll give you a pinch of salt, how about that?"

"That's fine, that's fine," Xiang agreed extremely readily; this bit of Grass Seed was just something they had collected along the way that they hadn't finished eating yet, and if it weren't for Xiong saying he needed Grass Seed, he would never have thought to take it out, let alone think that Huaxia would want it.

Although a pinch of salt was indeed small, it was still worth far more than this bag of wheat.

"Alright then, that's it for your tribe; there's nothing else we want here, you can go trade as you please." After Xiong finished saying this, he turned around directly, looked at the familiar faces crowding around, and asked, "Which of your tribes is closest? I'll go there first, one by one."

But that Tribal Chief who had brought the gold could no longer hold back and hurriedly said, "Leader Xiong, our tribe, I brought a lot of soft gold, can you come to our tribe first?"

The other few Tribal Chiefs all knew that this tribe didn't have many good things, and among the few tribes that were the first to support Huaxia, they were the poorest; their biggest characteristic was that they would tuck a long white feather in their hair, which was very recognizable.

Given that his tribe was indeed small and didn't have many things, everyone had no objections to his proactive behavior, and one tribe even volunteered, "Leader Xiong, why not go to their tribe first? Their tribe has very few things, it won't take much time."

Seeing that the other Tribal Chiefs had no objections, Xiong was indifferent: "Fine, then let's go."

The Tribal Chief with a long white tail feather stuck in his messy hair could be said to be very happy; he thanked those few Tribal Chiefs repeatedly while also leading the way in front.

Xiong's attention was almost entirely on that feather; with something so conspicuous, wouldn't it be very easy to be exposed when going out to hunt? But such matters generally involved people's religious habits and the like, and it might be related to some Heaven god they worshipped; in order to avoid unnecessary trouble, Xiong did not intend to ask.

Their tribe's stall was indeed very small; on a few simple skins lay some messy items, among which were actually a few huge black and white skins that Xiong had never seen before, so he didn't care about the gold anymore and went to look at the skins first.

As soon as the Tribal Chief saw that Xiong was interested in these skins, he felt there was an opportunity, so he hurriedly went up to introduce them: "This is a type of big flower bear from our place; they are particularly large in size, but they generally just eat bamboo, and we only managed to hunt these few over one winter and summer."

(The activity range of ancient pandas was larger than it is now; currently, there are only three provinces left with wild pandas, and this tribe here came from north of the Qinling, not the south.)

Xiong spread out all the skins, which were not very well processed, but the area was still quite large and the texture was not bad; overall they were white, with only the limbs being black, and the head had likely been removed because it was too troublesome to peel, but the few skins were all identical, indicating that this pattern was fixed and not random like the patterns of other wild beasts.

Xiong was very willing to acquire such skins he had never seen before, and since they were indeed quite good, he said very readily, "I'll take all these skins; let me see if there are any other good skins, and I'll give you a price for them all together."

The Tribal Chief rubbed his hands together at the side, his cheeks looking even more flushed.

Xiong picked and chose again, finding a few more skins: "Alright, just these; although there aren't as many as the previous tribe's, because these few skins of yours are rare, I'll give you a higher price; for all of this, I'll count it as two bowls of salt, is that alright?"

"Fine, fine, that's more than fine; there's also the soft gold, I'll take the soft gold out for you to see." The Tribal Chief hurriedly pushed aside a pile of gold that had been pressed down by a rotten skin; taking out so much gold was still a bit embarrassing, but now it was different—it was a great fortune.

Xiong took a look; there was a pile of gold of various sizes, and in terms of weight, there was quite a lot of it; Xiong didn't even need to pick or distinguish, as there was no filler in the gold here, at most there might be some stones mixed in on top.

Xiong weighed it in his hand; according to Huaxia's way of measuring, the gold here was definitely over ten jin, and Xiong was very satisfied and accepted it immediately.

"Is there anything else? Take it all out and let me see."

That Tribal Chief looked a bit embarrassed: "All our things are here, there is nothing else."

Xiong had no choice but to scan it roughly once more; there were indeed no good things left, just some Grass Seed, but it had already been roasted, so even if Huaxia didn't have it, it was of no use now; it seemed this tribe had truly brought out even their own rations.

"Fine, then that's it; the price for the skins is settled, and as for this gold, it's six times that of the Xi Xiang Tribe; see if you want salt or Salted Fish—if you want salt, I'll give you another bowl, if you want Salted Fish, I'll give you six." Xiong directly set the price and let the Tribal Chief choose.

This Tribal Chief didn't understand the meaning of "six times," but the Xi Xiang Tribe had been given one Salted Fish, and he could be given six, so he clearly understood the quantity.

"Then can you give me two and a half bowls of salt and three Salted Fish?" The Tribal Chief did not want all salt.

"Fine, no problem, we'll do as you say." He then turned to the Soldier behind him and said: "Zhuzi, give him the salt."

The Soldier called Zhuzi immediately performed the same operation and scooped two and a half bowls of salt for this poor tribe; with so much salt, they could trade with other tribes for Weapon, food, or people, and the tribe would be able to grow strong again.