Chapter 143
Chapter 143
Fat Chef scratched his head. “That eagle couldn’t belong to the Quanrong Tribe, could it?”
Jiang Yunsui shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“If it really does, then this is going to be hilarious. Their tribe only has five trained eagles in total. Those things are way harder to train than dogs. If we caught one and they found out, they’d probably be furious enough to drop dead.”
The Quanrong Tribe might be angry and upset, but they were delighted.
Hehe… Time to go back and take a look.
And so, after they returned, the eagle Jiang Yunsui had “picked up” was surrounded by spectators.
It tucked its head under its wing and played dead.
“This eagle shows signs of having been trained.”
Shen Qingzhu came over carrying a bowl of meat strips. He picked up a finger-thick strip with his chopsticks and offered it to the eagle.
But the eagle refused to eat no matter what.
Fat Chef burst into laughter. “That’s it, then. It definitely belongs to the Quanrong Tribe.”
They were probably absolutely livid right now.
…
“Lost? Where did you lose it? Why aren’t you out looking for it already?!”
When he heard that one of their messenger eagles had gone missing, the chieftain of the Quanrong Tribe was furious.
Not everyone knew how to train eagles. Even among the major tribes of the grasslands, people with that skill were rare.
Their tribe only had one person who could train eagles.
Eagles were even harder to catch. They were stubborn creatures, and even if you managed to catch one, successfully training one out of ten was already considered good.
Even eagles raised from hatchlings were difficult to train.
Their tribe had only five fully trained eagles in total, and they treasured them dearly. After all, up in the sky, their eyesight was truly useful, and they always brought back plenty of information.
Their tribe had relied on their wolfdogs and those few eagles to seize this decent stretch of territory.
Now one had gone missing without a trace, and the chieftain’s heart ached over it.
“Father, it must be those people from the Central Plains!”
A somewhat sturdy woman with wheat-colored skin and dressed in animal hides walked in.
There was a fierce light in her eyes.
“Those Central Plains people don’t know what’s good for them!”
The chieftain glanced at his daughter. “Look at you. We have so many fine warriors in our tribe, so why did you have to take a fancy to those pretty boys from the Central Plains?”
Aguduo snorted. “I’m tired of looking at the men in our tribe. Men from the Central Plains are fair and clean-looking. The children I bear in the future, especially the girls, will definitely be especially good-looking.”
She liked people with fair skin. Having lived in the tribe since she was young, she was used to the tribe’s rough-looking men. By comparison, men from the Central Plains were far more attractive to her.
The chieftain stroked his chin. “I have a feeling their status in the Central Plains isn’t simple. Be careful. Don’t let this get out of hand.”
Aguduo said, “Don’t worry. No matter what status they have in the Central Plains, once they’re here, they won’t escape from the palm of my hand.”
She was very confident in herself.
The chieftain was still very satisfied with this daughter of his. Among all his children, this eldest daughter had the temperament most like his own. She was ambitious, and both her ability and methods surpassed those of his other children.
In his heart, the chieftain had basically already decided that she would be the next chieftain of the Quanrong Tribe.
Aguduo still refused to give up on those people from the Central Plains and continued sending men to search for them.
She refused to believe they could keep hiding in the forest forever.
Jiang Yunsui could never stay put in one place. Over the next few days, she often went out wandering with the patrol team.
Sometimes, she would take Zuozuo Youyou out to play on her own.
Ji Yan’an and the others were thinking about how to send word out so they could dispatch more people over here.
And so, they set their sights on the eagle Jiang Yunsui had picked up.
“Letting it out to deliver a letter… Isn’t that a little unreliable?”
If they really let it go, wouldn’t that be sending a tiger back to the mountain?
“What if we let Little Yunsui try?”
There were too few of them. Against the Quanrong Tribe, they had no chance of winning.
“No. Even if this eagle really does get a message out, our people might not be able to find this place.”
After all, most people from the Central Plains got lost easily once they came out onto the grasslands.
Unless the eagle could lead them all the way here.
“It won’t even eat the food we give it right now, let alone help us.”
As they talked, everyone started sighing.
The eagle had tried to go on a hunger strike, but it hadn’t succeeded.
On the afternoon of the first day after it was brought back, everyone saw that it still refused to eat and realized the eagle was trying to starve itself.
Jiang Yunsui had gone to find the eagle with strips of meat in hand.
A hunger strike? Had it asked her permission?
Then she grabbed the eagle by the neck, pried its beak open, and shoved the meat straight in.
The sheer brutality of the scene left everyone staring in a daze.
She forced the eagle to swallow an entire small bowl of meat.
Afterward, Jiang Yunsui even patted it on the head.
“There. Now you definitely won’t die.”
It really didn’t die. After that, the eagle seemed to have been traumatized by Jiang Yunsui’s rough feeding methods and finally started eating a little on its own.
But not much. Jiang Yunsui still shoved the rest down its throat.
In her words, eating more meant healing faster.
She firmly believed the eagle wasn’t unable to eat that much; it was just injured and had a poor appetite.
After several days, not only had the eagle not gotten thinner, it had visibly puffed up a little.
The wound on its wing was also healing at an astonishing speed.
But Shen Qingzhu did not unwrap the bandages, afraid the creature would fly off the moment he did.
“Bad news! Bad news, Young Master! Jiang Yunsui is missing!”
Jiang Yunsui had been running out a lot lately, but with Zuozuo Youyou following her, they hadn’t been too worried. After all, she could find her own way back.
But today, after so long, she still had not returned. The patrols who went out looking had not found her either.
Ji Yan’an’s face went cold. “Keep searching.”
Meanwhile, Jiang Yunsui was staring around in confusion inside an underground cave.
She had stepped into empty air and gone tumbling all the way down into this cave.
Where was this?
Why was she unlucky again?
Originally, she’d spotted a pretty wild pheasant and immediately thought of stewing pheasant with mushrooms, so she had taken Zuozuo Youyou with her to catch it.
But then, as she ran and ran, her bad luck struck.
Her whole body ached from the fall. Jiang Yunsui clutched her forehead and hissed in pain.
She quickly used Imperial Flowing Essence to heal herself a little.
Only after it stopped hurting so much did she stand up.
She looked up at the opening she had rolled down from. It was too high.
She tried several times, but she couldn’t climb back up.
“Woof, woof…”
Zuozuo Youyou ran back and circled anxiously around the mouth of the hole.
“Zuozuo Youyou, go back and get help.”
She gave up. There was no way she could climb out on her own.
She could only have them find helpers.
Zuozuo Youyou understood. After confirming Jiang Yunsui was all right, they quickly ran back to get help.
Jiang Yunsui squatted in place for a while. She had no idea when the rescue team would arrive, so she simply began exploring the cave.
What if she found some treasure?
Following the cave deeper in, she felt the air grow a little cold.
Jiang Yunsui rubbed her arms. Only then did she realize the cave was huge, and very long.
She walked for quite a while without reaching the end.
There wasn’t much inside the cave. It was pitch-black.
As she walked, she suddenly saw light up ahead. Jiang Yunsui’s eyes lit up, and she ran over.
Then she stood at the end of the cave, utterly stunned.
Because this place was actually a cliff, and below it lay an enormous valley.