From Robinson Crusoe

Chapter 358 The Light of the Anglerfish

The wind picked up again after nightfall.

Although the grassland was much warmer than usual after the red moon rose, it was still exceptionally cold when the wind blew up the snow.

The mammoth moved slowly across the snow with its pillar-like long legs, its thick fur braving the wind and snow, its nose drooping, quiet and composed.

Several thick animal hides were borne on the shoulders of this enormous creature, and several pitcher plant-shaped hide pouches filled with dark stones hung down from both sides of the mammoth's back.

It was pitch black ahead.

Beside the mammoth, humans wrapped in animal skins walked forward while gazing into the distance.

After the wind picked up, the outline of the red moon became unclear, and its edges became hazy.

"clods of earth".

The man stretched out a hairy hand and called to his companions who were following behind him.

Not far away, another person dressed similarly was also walking forward with his head down, followed by a mammoth, only this mammoth was a bit smaller.

Hearing the voice, he didn't respond, but simply quickened his pace slightly.

The person who spoke earlier knew the clod of earth's personality well and knew that he didn't like to talk, so he continued to ask.

"are you hungry?"

"Do not."

Tu Kuai was sparing with words, replying with only one character.

Their brief exchange ended there, and those simple syllables were quickly swallowed by the wind.

……

The mammoth maintained a steady pace, moving slowly forward.

When the wind subsided slightly, the two lit a large torch.

They were both over 2 meters tall, and the animal skins they wore made them look even larger, making them appear like two walls when they walked.

The flames were stretched backward by the breeze, and the smell of burning oil filled the grassland.

In the distance, nocturnal beasts spotted the two. The harsh winter had left them ravenously hungry, making them more daring to take risks compared to the lush summer and autumn.

However, the towering mammoths deterred their evil intentions. Even if some wild animals wandered around all day without finding anything, they would not rashly attack the mammoths, even though these two mammoths were not yet adults and were deadly enough for them.

Of course, just as there are timid people, there are also daring people.

Several large hyenas circled the mammoth at a distance of more than twenty meters, seemingly eager to attack the two.

The giant hyena is a social animal, large in size, with an amazing bite force. It is strong yet agile, and its endurance and defense are remarkable. As a predator close to the top of the grassland food chain, as long as the hyena queen dares to take a risk, they will move forward firmly.

The bright firelight and the mammoth were both a threat to the giant hyena, and the two humans, who were prey, appeared to be no smaller than the giant hyena because they walked upright.

Most importantly, these two humans showed no fear of the giant hyenas and didn't even glance at them.

After hesitating for a while, the Queen Hyena decided to proceed cautiously and led her pack of hyenas away from the area.

The stone figure walking in front of the clod of earth was completely covered in animal hide. His ugly, wide nostrils twitched, and a hint of regret appeared on his primitive, almost ape-like face.

"I thought the food had arrived."

That's what the stone said.

He then held the burning torch further away from himself and glanced at the red moon.

"Is the clod of earth almost here?"

"Do not."

……

When darkness completely dominates the land, only when you hear the wind howling across the grasslands and the occasional howls of wild beasts do you realize what a wasteland this is, as if the cold air itself is permeated with a primal, bloody scent.

Chen Zhou had just set the last trap when he dragged the cart away from the center of the supply landing area. He spread the bear skin on the cart and hid in the darkness, quietly chewing on the cold jerky.

He doesn't plan to sleep tonight.

He had made a judgment even before the beacon appeared—

If there are two supply drops for this challenge, the second supply drop will definitely be located in the southern part of the entire challenge area.

As the weather gets colder, the North will become less and less habitable. Any challenger with a brain who wants to win will migrate south.

The current location of the beacon proves his judgment was correct, but Chen Zhou did not expect the beacon to be so close to Baihar Mountain.

Chen Zhou felt that the Time and Space Administration would not deliberately favor him, which meant that the remaining survivors of this challenge were probably mostly within 100 kilometers of the beacon.

For humans, 100 kilometers is not a particularly long distance.

As far as he knows, a trail running race called the Tour of Giants was once held in the Aosta Valley in northern Italy.

The entire course is located in the mountains, with a length of 332 kilometers, a cumulative elevation gain of over 24000 meters, an average altitude of 2000 meters, and a maximum altitude of over 3300 meters.

However, even with such harsh conditions, about 50% of the participants still finish the race each year. The best of them may only take a break of ten minutes or so in the middle and can complete the race in just over 70 hours.

Comparatively speaking, trekking 100 kilometers on snow in the dead of winter is actually much easier, not to mention that these past few days haven't been particularly cold.

Moreover, the challenger's physical abilities may not be inferior to those of the "Tour of Giants" participants, and he may even be a "freak" who has been injected with gene-modifying drugs, just like him.

Not to mention that some challengers were even closer to the beacon, perhaps less than 50 kilometers away.

Before reaching the landing point, Chen Zhou thought that someone would arrive before him.

He never expected that he would be the first to reach the beacon, even ahead of the other challengers by half a day, thus gaining ample time to set up traps and make preparations in advance.

Although the supplies had not yet arrived, Chen Zhou had seized the opportunity due to his diligence.

As for the final conditions and people—

He is manufacturing it.

Chen Zhou estimated that even if he was faster, he would only be ahead by seven or eight hours at most, and by midnight at the latest, challengers would definitely arrive one after another.

He was alone, while the other challengers were likely to be in full teams.

There was nowhere to hide on the grassland, so he had to be prepared to meet the upcoming challenge as quickly as possible.

……

Having learned from Bi Kai and Gao Yao's mistakes, Chen Zhou never lit a fire.

During the day, the snowfield is completely exposed, while at night, darkness provides the best cover. Lighting a fire would undoubtedly be a foolish act that exposes our position.

Time passed slowly. He silently finished chewing the jerky, took some snow and put it in his mouth. After it melted, he got up from the cart and buried the bear skin, along with the cart and its supplies, in the snow.

Chen Zhou then took off his heavy animal skin robe and buried it in another patch of snow.

Immediately afterwards, he crouched down and walked toward the "shack" he had prepared that afternoon, took out a flint and steel, lit it, and then quickly left the roaring campfire.

The scarlet beacon hung in the sky, its towering flames and smoke below strikingly conspicuous.

The flickering flames obscured the view, making it impossible to see clearly from a distance whether there was anyone around the campfire.

Chen Zhou hid in another corner of the campfire, about 500 meters away, lying prone on the snow, quietly waiting for the "guest" to arrive.

...The campfire was fueled by grass stalks and small shrub branches. It burned loudly, but not for long. After only half an hour, it became very dim and almost went out.

Chen Zhou didn't get a challenger, but he wasn't discouraged and immediately lit another campfire.

The firewood burns with life, its light turning to darkness, and the billowing smoke gradually enters its twilight years.

Waiting, and once again, yielded nothing.

Chen Zhou almost doubted his own judgment.

He lay prone for a while longer, until the second campfire had completely died down, and then finally lit the third campfire.

After a busy afternoon, he had set up fifteen bonfires directly below the beacon, with twelve still to be built.

At this rate of consumption, all the campfires will be burned out before dawn, which brings great uncertainty to the future of the plan.

If the other challengers are not as fast as he expects, then there is a high possibility that the problem of "the fish has appeared, but the bait has run out" will occur.

However, if they stopped there, when the challengers came nearby, they would not be attracted by the flames and would not reveal any flaws, thus providing Chen Zhou with information.

For Chen Zhou, whether to continue igniting or to stop was a dilemma.

The third campfire repeated the fate of the first two; it soon went from blazing to fading and eventually went out.

As the night drew to a close, Chen Zhou finally decided to trust his judgment and lit a fourth campfire after the first one had completely lost its light.

He was like a very patient fisherman, waiting for a giant to take the bait.

……

The snow was frozen solid at night, and lying on it, you could clearly feel the cold beneath you.

The shuriken twirled between Chen Zhou's fingers. Thanks to his genetic modifications, he was still able to maintain his physical functions even on such a night, and he even felt a little hot wrapped in the animal skin.

He stared intently at the distant campfire, watching the billowing smoke rise into the sky.

Just when Chen Zhou thought that the fourth campfire would still yield no results, he suddenly noticed two points of light about 1.5 kilometers away.

"Wait for it!"

Overjoyed, he did not act rashly. Instead, he lay even lower, almost sinking into the snow, with only half of his head sticking out to observe the situation.

Chen Zhou watched intently as the firelight drew closer, gradually getting a clearer picture of the belated guest.

Two mammoths, clad in animal skins, holding torches, and exceptionally tall...

With all these characteristics combined, Chen Zhou was absolutely certain that this was the same group of challengers who had attacked Bi Kai and Gao Yao.

As he expected, among the fifty challengers were many powerful "chosen ones" who possessed animal taming skills, and these people were unlikely to be eliminated early.

He once told Bi Kai that if he had the chance, he would definitely avenge Gao Yao. Now it seems that the opportunity has arrived.

……

"clods of earth".

The stone pointed to the distant firelight in a muffled voice, offering a reminder.

He then pressed the torch into the snow beside him, extinguishing it completely.

The clod of earth, imitating the stone, extinguished the torch, and the two were immediately back into the embrace of darkness.

At this moment, only the glow of the campfire illuminated the boundless wilderness, drawing the two together like the call of prey.

The two men stopped the mammoth and took their weapons off its back.

The stone holds two spears, the spearheads made of sharp stone tools, tightly wrapped with animal hide in the slits split at the top of the sticks.

The clod's weapon was a stone fixed to a short stick with animal skin rope. This thing was very similar to a meteor hammer in later times. When swung, it could smash a person's head with just one blow.

They slowed down without communicating; they were the tribe's best hunters and were already extremely skilled at hunting.

Leading the mammoth around, they slowly approached the campfire.

But further away, Chen Zhou's gaze had already locked onto them—

To be honest, Chen Zhou found the challengers to be really foolish.

The campfire had just been lit, and the flames were at their brightest. Logically, one should not need to walk more than 2 kilometers to see the light.

Putting himself in Chen Zhou's shoes, he felt that if it were him, he would have extinguished the torch long ago and then quietly moved forward.

These two guys didn't put out their torches until they were within 1.5 kilometers. Were they so confident that the challengers by the campfire wouldn't notice them?
Or is it that even if they openly expose their whereabouts like this, they can still carry out the attack...?

Thinking of this, Chen Zhou couldn't help but recall the deceased Gao Yao and the nearly dead Bi Kai, realizing that perhaps the other challengers were indeed not so vigilant, which allowed them to be successfully attacked by such people.

Aside from extinguishing the torch too late, the two men also made sure to bring a mammoth with them as they moved forward.

Even if the night is dark, there is still a glowing beacon in the sky, not to mention the light of the stars and moon, and the white snow reflects the light.

Given the size of mammoths, unless the people by the campfire were blind, these two would inevitably be exposed to others once they stepped within 800 meters.

In Chen Zhou's view, from the moment they were discovered until now, every choice the challenger has made has been marked by arrogance and foolishness, or rather, simplistic thinking.

But it was precisely because of this that he felt even more wary—

If a fool can repeatedly profit, the only possibility besides good luck is that he is indeed very strong.

Having learned from Bi Kai that the two possessed superhuman strength, and considering the two mammoths, Chen Zhou felt that the combined strength of these two challengers might even surpass that of the two black-robed men.

Chen Zhou kept the two men's flaws firmly in mind, reminding himself—

"We cannot rule out the possibility that they deliberately exposed a weakness to lull their opponents into a false sense of security."

He then shifted his legs and crouched even lower.

……

The light from the campfire is like a tiny light bulb on the head of a deep-sea anglerfish, luring its prey who are unaware of their fate.

The hunters on land, however, were unaware that it was a trap.

The clods of earth and stones were getting closer and closer to the campfire, and the red light of the beacon was even reflecting on the mammoth's fur, making them look particularly ferocious.

As they moved forward, the two discovered messy footprints in the snow.

However, they did not stop there, influenced by the "clues" deliberately created by Chen Zhou.

The two seemed to have only eyes for the firelight, so they only glanced at it casually before continuing on their way.

However, footprints could not mislead them, but the wooden stakes buried in the snow could give them a profound lesson.

With a long neigh from the mammoth, the giant beast at the front suddenly raised its trunk, then angrily lifted its cylindrical thigh—

The wooden spikes become even harder after being frozen. The mammoths are heavy enough that when they step on them without warning, the nearly 30cm long spikes completely sink into their feet, causing excruciating pain.

"Oh~ Oh~"

Seeing that the mammoth was frightened, the clod of earth immediately imitated its cry to comfort it.

Perhaps due to its trust in the two humans, or perhaps due to its high intelligence, even though the pain in its foot made the mammoth extremely angry, it still managed to restrain its raging fury and showed its injured foreleg to the clod of earth.

(End of this chapter)