Chapter 962: Be Steady

Ever since Xuanyuan let the people of the Fengbo Tribe leave, there had not been a single battle up to this point; this was mainly because in this era, the transmission of news was too slow, and the speed of human travel was also too slow. Perhaps even now, Linkui did not know that his Fengbo had already left the Shennong Clan.

Xuanyuan had only pressed forward a certain distance with a portion of his troops. If there is no war with people, can it still be called a war? For now, without waiting for Huaxia, Xuanyuan decided to be a bit more steady, needing only to consolidate the places they could currently occupy.

Once the Huaxia troops arrived, with the help of Huaxia's powerful Weapon, they could quickly push forward and achieve his true goal for the war.

As for Yushi Chisongzi, his tribesmen had also received the message brought by the messenger from the Fengbo Tribe at this time. At first, he did not quite believe it, and it was also very difficult for him to make this decision.

However, his current war situation was not optimistic either; every day, a battle involving dozens of people had to occur. Of course, in this era, this was already considered a very cruel war. Both sides were evenly matched, and basically, once they engaged, it was a fight to the death. His own tribesmen were being consumed day by day, and his Soldier were being worn down bit by bit by those small tribes; he felt pained himself.

A war of hundreds or thousands of people was not something that could be fought just because one wanted to. The tribes he faced were basically small tribes of one or two thousand people, and they lived extremely scattered. Although the number of Soldier they could pull out to fight was truly not many, it was already very good if a tribe could mobilize two or three hundred Soldier.

But Yushi's own dilemma was that if he wanted to move to different places to fight, the vast majority of his Soldier would have to shoulder the heavy responsibility of hunting and finding food; they simply did not have such strong and stable logistical support.

To want to stake all his Soldier in a battle, it would have to be when encountering a tribe similar to or even more powerful than his own, the kind that required going all out.

However, tribes like the Shennong Clan were not many now. There used to be many, but now, due to mutual attacks and integration, the targets left for Chisongzi were not many; instead, it should be the Fengbo Tribe that needed to face such a dilemma.

When he set out on the expedition, he brought a small half of his tribesmen, and many women in the tribe also had to be brought along, because women were also an important pillar for finding food. They also needed to build camps, cook for the Soldier, and find all kinds of edible things.

What was left in his own tribe were a small portion of men and most of the women and children. What their situation was now, Chisongzi was completely unaware. This war might have to last until Winter.

But Chisongzi truly did not want to fight anymore. He knew and recognized many of these tribes. Now, attacking people he was familiar with and consuming each other's tribesmen really made his heart ache.

Therefore, the news sent by the Fengbo Tribe made him very tempted, but he was also somewhat afraid to believe it. Such a matter concerned the survival of the entire tribe, and he dared not make a decision lightly.

But Xingtian, who was searching in another direction, did not have such worries. First of all, in Huaxia, he could be considered a civil official because he was very strategic, but his combat power was astonishing.

His intelligence and wisdom were the most important factors for Linkui's support of him. The troops he led were the largest, but he also understood that with such large-scale troops in a small place, food was the biggest problem.

Therefore, he had long since dispersed his troops. He arranged a region for each Leader, letting them fight on their own and find food on their own. But the people he split off were more powerful and greater in number than their targets, which was why they could achieve constant victory.

As for himself, he led the most Soldier and, taking the supplies Linkui sent from Changyang Mountain, precisely and violently destroyed those most powerful tribes. Every victory in war allowed him to obtain enough food to cope with the next war.

And those who failed were mostly killed and used for sacrifices to celebrate the victory of the war. Those who were not killed and survived would be sent to Changyang Mountain, where Linkui would decide their fate.

Of course, there was no need to think much about the fate of these people; naturally, they would become Slave and be rewarded to those tribes that had won battles. If this trend continued, perhaps in the future Shennong Clan, there would be more Slave than Free Person. But the mediocre and cruel Shennong of this generation had not thought this logic through.

In his view, the more Slave there were, the wealthier the tribe was, because Slave were things that could produce more food without needing to pay too much. If they died, they died; there was no need to feel pained. If it were his own tribesmen, he might feel a bit of pity.

But this was the characteristic of this era. Even without mentioning the ancient era, even by the time of the Xia and Shang, the life of ordinary people was extremely difficult. There were no enlightened monarchs; a monarch who could frequently use living people for sacrifice was a good monarch.

Moreover, unless you reached a level with a sufficiently high Nobility, you might not be able to escape the fate of being sacrificed at any time. Some people with low Nobility, perhaps if they offended the monarch, would also be dragged off to be sacrificed.

Some cultural relics unearthed at present already provided evidence: a certain Noble was riding in a carriage with the Son of Heaven, and accidentally offended the Son of Heaven's carriage. Fearing he would be killed, he fled overnight. Finally, he was discovered by other Noble on their territory, and then his head was boiled in a Bronze Ware to be used for sacrifice.

This was the characteristic of that era and the most common occurrence. A Noble's head was the good stuff for sacrifices on major occasions. Sometimes it was not that you were killed and then boiled, but that you were thrown into a large Bronze Ritual Vessel to be cooked or steamed while you were still alive.

The Noble of the Xia and Shang periods even retained the tradition of eating human flesh, and one of the reasons for Wuwang's campaign against Zhouwang was that Zhouwang had reduced the number of times he used living people for sacrifice. It was not until the Zhou Dynasty that the activity of using living people for sacrifice gradually decreased.

Therefore, even if it was an era that already had a certain level of civilization, in the eyes of modern people, it was still very cruel, let alone those years when the Cannibal Tribe ran rampant. Occasionally, there would appear a few Leader who could not bear to use too many of their own tribesmen for sacrifice, so they would choose the enemy's Noble, the enemy's tribesmen, or Slave to sacrifice.

But even Xuanyuan still maintained the tradition of sacrificing with living people; otherwise, it would be deceiving Heaven and deceiving the ancestors. Baifeng's practice of sacrificing with items, and even distributing the food to the tribesmen after the sacrifice, was, in their view, perhaps a form of deception.

But Huaxia was constantly prospering and growing, which could not help but make them reflect a little, though the reflection would certainly not be much.

However, the Huaxia people had gradually become accustomed to and understood it. After all, Baifeng was the son of the Heavenly God. The Huaxia Wine, placed there, would also gradually disappear, so it must have been drunk by the Heavenly God, which showed that the Heavenly God liked to drink. As for whether or not to use people for sacrifice, it was not that important; after all, they had never seen the people sacrificed being enjoyed by the Heavenly God.