Chapter 1434: Chapter 1282: The Ancient Beast Era 39
Among the Mammoth tribe’s population of twenty thousand, those with strong combat abilities number around fifteen thousand, with the rest being children and the elderly. The Mammoth tribe is powerful and has always respected the elderly, so there are quite a few seniors within the tribe.
The Mammoth tribe’s combat strength is formidable, not only deterring other beastmen from causing problems but also causing wild beasts to understand the benefits of avoiding confrontation, leading to nearly zero external threats.
The Mammoth tribe doesn’t have high dietary demands, as they primarily consume vegetarian food, which is easy to acquire. These factors lead to a child mortality rate of less than thirty percent, allowing most children to survive.
It’s due to such low mortality and external safety that the Mammoth tribe has thrived into a Great Tribe with a population of twenty thousand.
However, grandeur inevitably comes with limitations, as per natural laws. Thus, the powerful Mammoth tribe faces particular challenges in population reproduction.
Other beastmen reproduce freely, but for the Mammoth tribe, pregnancy is difficult. While other beastmen can have several children, the Mammoth tribe can only have one child at a time.
If not for these limitations, the Mammoth tribe would have long become a Super Tribe, instead of having a mere twenty-thousand-strong population.
If there’s anything about the Mammoth tribe’s life that can be considered difficult, it’s in food storage. While wild vegetables are easy to find, storing food for the entire cold season is not a simple task.
Before each cold season, the Mammoth tribe requires the entire tribe to work day and night digging wild vegetables and picking wild fruits just to barely meet their needs.
Though the Mammoth tribe has safely endured every cold season, this year they faced misfortune with a great flood, plunging the tribe into a crisis.
The Mammoth tribe is truly strong, but their weakness is also apparent: they must rely on vegetarian food, which is scarce in the cold season.
If the Mammoth tribe could eat meat to survive the cold season, then with their strength, they would comfortably get through it even without food reserves by relying on hunting.
Earlier, Li Yi wasn’t lying; the Silver Tiger Clan truly saved countless lives of the Mammoth tribe this time.
Li Yi, Li Er, and Li San went out to search for food, unaware that after they left, the elders of the Mammoth tribe had already decided to leave the tribe together to avoid burdening the children within.
This time, those seeking food from the Mammoth tribe weren’t just the three brothers, but other beastmen as well. However, Li Yi and his brothers were the first to return, bringing back enough food to sustain the tribe throughout the cold season.
Now, only half of the beastmen who went out to search for food have returned. These people are cheering around a mountain of vegetables, while the young Mammoth beastmen are feasting heartily, having been hungry for so long.
Ever since the flood occurred and entering the cold season, the Mammoth tribe has been enduring constant hunger, rationing their food. It’s no wonder these children can’t resist eating heartily, and even the adults are secretly swallowing their saliva.
Due to their strength, the Mammoth tribe has never experienced days of having to meticulously calculate their food and endure hunger. It is only now that they understand how unbearable hunger can be.
Leading the Mammoth beastmen is a man draped in thick beast skin, adorned with vibrant feathers on his head, standing an impressive four meters tall, even among the Mammoth tribe. This man, rippling with well-developed muscles and elegant muscle lines, is the Great Witch of the Mammoth tribe, Wu Yan.
While other beastmen have been excitedly celebrating that this cold season won’t be spent worrying about starving to death, thanking the Silver Tiger tribe for their generosity, Wu Yan stood in contemplative thought, gazing at the heap of vegetables before him.
Li Yi returned and seeing Wu Yan’s thoughtful expression, he approached in puzzlement and asked, "Great Witch, is there something wrong with these wild vegetables?"
Wu Yan nodded and pointed at the mountain-high heap of vegetables in front of Li Yi, asking, "Take a closer look at these wild vegetables. Do you see anything odd about them?"
Li Yi looked for a good while and replied, "They are indeed different. These wild vegetables are much larger than those we dug up and taste much better, almost without any bitterness.
I have no idea where the Silver Tiger tribe obtained such good wild vegetables. When I was eating at the Silver Tiger tribe, I already felt they were exceptionally tasty."
At this point, Li Yi even made a lingering expression, remembering the delicious taste of vegetarian food he had at the banquet of the Silver Tiger tribe, which was indeed unforgettable.
Wu Yan, observing Li Yi’s expression, couldn’t restrain himself from smacking him on the back of the head, leaving Li Yi bewildered and blinking at Wu Yan, confused and aggrieved, "Great Witch, why did you hit me?"
"I hit you because you’re foolish." Wu Yan pointed displeasedly at the vegetable mountain beside them, "Such an obvious issue and you can’t see it. Aren’t you being foolish?
Look closely at these wild vegetables, they are nearly uniform in size, and there are only a few types. Each type is available in overwhelming quantities, and each kind is larger and better than those we dig up. Do you know what this implies?"
Li Yi, being the clan leader, was not truly foolish. Previously, he had been thinking in habitual ways, never considering that cultivation might exist, allowing a single type of vegetable to be cultivated into thousands. After Wu Yan’s prompt, Li Yi realized where the issue lay.
"Great Witch, are you saying that perhaps the Silver Tiger Clan has mastered methods to extensively cultivate and optimize wild vegetables, and that’s why they have so many?"
Wu Yan nodded, "Yes, such skills are unheard of. Our Mammoth tribe has always struggled with not having sufficient food reserves.
Even though we manage to gather enough wild vegetables every year, it’s just barely enough. Any unexpected trouble can cause issues, like it did this year.
The Silver Tiger tribe seems quite agreeable to interact with. You saved people from their tribe, and they generously gave us their reserved food to help us through hardships.
This kind of tribe, if living together, should get along well with our Mammoth tribe." Wu Yan’s intention was already quite clear; he wanted the Mammoth and Silver Tiger tribes to live together.
And with Wu Yan being the Great Witch of the Mammoth tribe, no one would oppose his decision. The matter Shuangshuang had been contemplating—forming an alliance between the Mammoth and Silver Tiger tribes—was thus resolved.
In fact, the Mammoth tribe was thinking this way mainly due to the frequent desire of small tribes to live together with the Mammoth tribe seeking protection, and hence the Mammoth tribe had already formed the concept of tribes living together. Coupled with the Mammoth tribe’s gentle and inclusive nature, these thoughts emerged rather easily.
This reveals the Mammoth tribe’s integrity. If it were another powerful race, upon discovering the Silver Tiger tribe’s skills, their first thought would likely be how to seize these methods.
But the Mammoth tribe instead thought about living together, offering their own strength for protection in exchange for these methods.
This was precisely why Shuangshuang, having understood Li Yi’s nature and trusting Yan Ming’s divination skills, laid sweet bait for this circumstance, anticipating that the Mammoth tribe would voluntarily come to them.
Of course, were the Mammoth tribe to have ill intentions, Shuangshuang wouldn’t be afraid; her combat strength was enough to handle an entire Mammoth tribe.
