Chapter 466 - 463: Extreme Joy Turns to Sorrow
Chapter 466: Chapter 463: Extreme Joy Turns to Sorrow
In the gloomy jungle, two brown figures sat facing each other with a campfire burning between them, sending up wisps of white smoke.
Bi Fang found two slender branches, folded the snake meat and threaded it through, propping it over the blazing fire. His face was “scarlet red,” looking like an old farmer sunburnt under the sun.
After peeling off the skin, the fresh meat with streaks of blood curled and shrank under the flames, oozing droplets of fat.
Even without any seasoning, the wafting aroma of the meat was enough to make one’s mouth water; Bi Fang could feel his stomach growling.
Leonardo felt the same way, yet as he looked at the patterned snake skin, the temptation was mingled with waves of nausea and a sourness in his throat.
These two completely opposite symptoms appeared at the same time, making him feel extremely uncomfortable.
[Can we eat it now? It feels done.]
[It seems quite good.]
[Actually, it’s so-so. Without seasoning and basting, wild game grilled like this would probably be as tough as shoe leather, unless it’s not fully cooked.]
[When you’re hungry, everything tastes good, even a shoehorn would taste good.]
[Indeed, I think that kind of dry, tough meat is the tastiest.]
[Wait, isn’t this burnt now?]
While the audience was discussing, they saw that Bi Fang did not stop, but kept roasting.
The surface of the snake meat was charred, yet he continued to roast it.
Isn’t this burnt?
Is it still edible?
[Hahaha, all the newcomers up there, right? It has to be burnt to ensure the parasites are killed!]
[It’s all protein, treated equally!]
[Old Fang used to eat intermediary viper like this, it looked like charcoal too.]
Bi Fang explained, “Yes, it’s for safety. The high temperature of an ordinary flame can kill almost all living things in the world, hence parasites are completely out of the question.”
But just as the snake meat was gradually turning into charcoal, thus safe to eat, a huge figure was slowly approaching from a dark corner unnoticed by anyone.
The thick scent of smoke, char, and cooked meat enveloped Bi Fang’s nostrils, preventing him from detecting any anomalies.
Large white hoofs tread on the rotten leaves, leaving deep prints, and only when stepping on a dry branch did the keen-sensed Bi Fang notice something was off.
“What was that noise?”
“Huh?” Leonardo looked around in a daze, but did not spot anything unusual.
Bi Fang looked up alertly, not daring to relax for a moment in the tropical rainforest.
In the rainforest, anything goes, even tigers…
The conversation ceased, the charcoal crackled under the licks of flame, and the vast rainforest quickly fell silent except for distant bird calls that seemed almost inaudible.
What’s going on…
The previously warm atmosphere suddenly vanished, turning eerily serious, and the audience couldn’t help but tense up. The once natural and harmonious bird calls now sounded like mournful screams.
“Crack!”
Another sound of dry branches breaking—it was completely different from the sound of bamboo charcoal bursting in flames. Something was really coming!
Leonardo’s breath hitched. His senses weren’t as sharp as Bi Fang’s, and his vigilance was much lower. He hadn’t even heard the breaking of the dry branches just now and was still pondering whether to try a bite of the wild snake meat. But he was certainly not foolish; that sound was definitely not the noise of burning wood!
The primitive rainforest is just too dangerous!
It’s been less than half a day since we arrived, and we’ve already encountered so much!
Thinking of the Bamboo Viper he had run into not long ago, Leonardo now felt another unidentified creature approaching. Instinctively, he thought to get up, but Bi Fang seemed to have anticipated his move, firmly grabbing his arm.
Bi Fang’s smile slowly vanished, and with an extremely serious expression, he warned in a low voice, “Don’t move! Don’t move unless you’re sure of the situation. If it’s a tiger, the moment you move, it’ll more likely target you!”
A tiger?
There are tigers too?
The audience was somewhat stunned; if the bystanders were like this, then the person involved was even more so. Leonardo felt all color drain from his face, turning him deathly pale.
Bi Fang held onto his arm, clearly feeling the other trembling, so he had no choice but to offer some simple words of comfort.
At such a close distance, if it really were a carnivorous beast, it would definitely have already spotted them. Running away would only make the beast feel that they were scared and incite a bold attack.
“Don’t panic, humans aren’t on a tiger’s menu. As long as we don’t trigger its hunting instinct, listen to me, we should be fine. Even if it really is a tiger, we can get past this crisis!”
“The approacher is not hiding its sound, so it’s unlikely to be a predator.” Bi Fang analyzed calmly. No predator would deliberately make such a noise; the hearing of forest animals is much more sensitive, so a real tiger would not behave like this.
It’s more likely to be a hoofed herbivore!
Hearing these words, as if infected by Bi Fang’s calm composure, Leonardo, who had been trembling all over, gradually recovered his senses.
In a dangerous situation, a calm, collected, and strong person has a great power of influence.
They can completely become a pillar of strength for those who are in utter panic.
Besides, at this moment other than trusting Bi Fang, there was no other choice. If they really encountered an uncontrollable force, Leonardo believed that Bi Fang wouldn’t just run off faster than him.
Crack, crack.
The sound of dry branches and leaves being trampled was getting closer, like the bell tolling for one’s life.
The approacher was not swift, and as the sound grew clearer, Bi Fang also determined the direction of the noise. Three cameras simultaneously aimed into the darkness.
A huge shadow gradually became distinct, and the audience held their breath.
[Holy shit, what the hell is that?]
[So big!]
[What demon or devil is this!]
As the giant creature behind the bushes became clearer, Bi Fang’s pupils shrank sharply, his body tensed as if struck by an electric current, frozen in place.
Leonardo’s forehead was slick with cold sweat, and seeing Bi Fang’s state made him even more restless: “What on earth is it?”
He instinctively wanted to turn back to look but was pulled back by Bi Fang, who whispered furiously, “Don’t look back!”
“It’s an ox!”
“An ox?”
[An ox?]
[Can we have it as an extra meal?]
[What’s there to fear from an ox?]
In the camera’s view, the vast silhouette of the animal became clearer. What appeared first was the highly raised and knotted muscles; the sparse light that fell upon those muscles made them seem like little hillocks!
As the creature continued forward, everyone finally saw its full form.
That was a gigantic dark buffalo with white “socks” on the lower part of its limbs, and a pair of immensely thick white horns that emerged from its wide, pale crown. They stretched outward and then curved upwards, like a pair of huge bugles, filled with a bizarre sense of power.
When the audience saw what kind of buffalo it was, they were shocked.
“Holy shit, is this a buffalo raised by Schwarzenegger?”
“Can wild ones even grow like this? Even steroids wouldn’t be enough, right?”
“They’re not running away?”
“Run, and die even faster, perhaps?”
“Looking at the style of this buffalo, did it come from Fist of the North Star?”
“This buffalo works out, I bet it spent at least ten months of the year in the gym!”
Everyone was amazed at the size of the buffalo, those tendons and muscles, simply unimaginable to grow naturally.
Initially, when they heard Bi Fang mention it was a buffalo, some people were relieved, recalling the docile old yellow bulls they had seen, until this moment, with those huge horns and muscles bulging out, everyone knew this big fellow was not to be provoked.
To rush up would mean death!
“What on earth is it?” Leonardo was getting anxious. He had already made out that the thing was right behind him, but Bi Fang’s warning made him dare not look back; his body hair stood on end, and he got goosebumps all over!
Even his breathing turned erratic, thinking if he ever encountered a bear, would he react the same way?
Shivering incessantly, as if on the brink of an abyss.
They really should have gotten the director on the scene to film this segment; perhaps he could have won an Oscar for it.
“It’s a Wild Baizhi Ox.” Bi Fang took a deep breath, feeling both tense and a bit relieved.
Indeed, it was as he had guessed, a grass-eating hoofed animal.
But still terrifying!
The distance between them was less than fifteen meters!
For the ox, it was just a short sprint; once it charged them, in a matter of seconds, both Bi Fang and Leonardo would lose their lives, easily killed by it.
“It’s really a buffalo?” Leonardo was stunned, but unlike many domestic viewers, he felt more nervous!
Domestic viewers generally perceived buffalo as hard-working, honest, and gentle—family members who had accompanied the agricultural civilization for thousands of years. But to Leonardo, the impression was entirely different.
All Leonardo could think about now was bullfighting!
He had witnessed with his own eyes a matador being skewered by an enraged North African Bull!
And then stomped into a bloody mush by massive hooves; it was a tragic accident where the fighter meant to subdue the wild bull stopped breathing within a few short seconds.
Leonardo’s voice trembled, “The Wild Baizhi Ox compared to the North African Bull…”
“Isn’t even worthy to carry its shoes.” Bi Fang shook his head, “The Wild Baizhi Ox is the world’s largest buffalo, with a shoulder height that can exceed two meters, and a weight that can reach one and a half tons, while the North African Bull is only about half a ton.”
Leonardo shuddered again, one and a half, half a ton… wasn’t that a threefold difference?
Imagining the North African Bull enhanced threefold, his desire to look back grew even stronger; this unknown feeling could drive him mad!
“Careful, it’s coming this way!” Bi Fang yanked Leonardo’s arm fiercely and pulled him down to the ground.
Lying on the ground, Leonardo finally caught a glimpse of what the so-called “buffalo” looked like.
With just one glance, he almost fainted.
Is this really a buffalo?
Bi Fang followed Leonardo, hunkering down close to the ground, and whispered, “It might have been attracted by the snake meat.”
Attracted by snake meat?
“Cows eat meat too?” Leonardo seemed to have heard something that shook his worldview; aren’t cows herbivores?
Is it really a cow from the same planet?
The image of the colossal beast baring a row of even teeth and tearing a large chunk of flesh from his back made Leonardo nearly pass out.
“Yes,” Bi Fang affirmed confidently, but he didn’t explain why. Instead, he took Leonardo’s hand and began to retreat slowly, “Can you crawl? Follow me and crawl backward.”
“As long as we don’t make an aggressive move or show danger, wild oxen rarely attack animals smaller than themselves. You just need to stay low and slowly back away, and you can generally escape danger.”
“There have been experiments before where two teams lined up in a bullring and advanced. If they saw a bull charging, they would lie down, and the bull would stop. Both teams safely crossed the field like this.”
“Keep in mind, those were bulls from bullfights, genuine North African Bulls. Maybe they aren’t as strong as the Wild Baizhi Ox, but they’re definitely among the world’s most aggressive cows.”
As Bi Fang and Leonardo crawled backward, Bi Fang continued to explain in a low voice, never taking his eyes off the Wild Baizhi Ox. Though he spoke confidently, exceptions always existed, and he couldn’t let down his guard.
“North African Bulls are naturally combative and fierce. Plus, with special training grounds responsible for bull breeding, selecting the most ferocious individuals, if they could get by unscathed, other bulls probably had a good chance of escape too.”
“No way? The matadors were all knocked down, but the wild oxen still didn’t spare them.” Watching the growing distance from the Wild Baizhi Ox, which didn’t show much sign of aggression, Leonardo relaxed a bit, but his hesitation grew with this new information.
He had witnessed matadors violently dragged under and carpeted by bulls; why would the bull keep attacking?
“That’s because the matadors have attracted aggro, you know, from playing video games? If you crouch and walk behind a monster, there’s no problem, but if you slash it, it’ll chase you for five hundred miles.”
“When you haven’t provoked the wild ox, and as a creature shorter than it, it doesn’t see you as a threat, so it doesn’t attack. But if you’ve already angered it, even if you bury your head in the ground, you can’t shake off the aggro; it’ll make sure to stab your backside thoroughly.”
As they spoke, the two had crawled more than twenty meters. The wild ox had reached their original campfire, nosed the sand a bit, and the flame quickly went out.
It rubbed against the snake meat and began to eat, seemingly ignoring the two large figures lying nearby.
Feeling a preliminary sense of safety, Bi Fang, too, breathed a sigh of relief; that was too close.
He reached back and touched his own back, all soaked in cold sweat, and the red mud he had put on earlier became sticky again.
Crawling along the way, a faint red mark was visible.
Bi Fang’s nervousness had been so evident that even the viewers noticed it.
[Even Old Fang can have a day when he is scared?]
Bi Fang just smiled bitterly; how could he not be scared?
“In some countries, the habitat of the Wild Baizhi Ox overlaps with that of the Bengal Tiger, but the victim is often not the Wild Baizhi Ox but the Bengal Tiger.
Because the horns of the Wild Baizhi Ox are extremely sharp and exceedingly hard, when they attack, even mighty tigers lose the battle, forced to hunt only the calves.”
In the wild, this creature is like a Schwarzenegger among humans; it has virtually no natural predators, especially the adult male Wild Baizhi Ox, who can virtually ‘walk sideways’. The one in front of us is a typical male Wild Baizhi Ox.”
Now temporarily out of danger, Bi Fang and Leonardo lay not far away, starting to “size up” the situation.
“How do you know?” Leonardo was startled, lying flat on the ground trying to look up, but the light was too dim and they were too far away; he couldn’t see anything.
“Because Wild Baizhi Oxen like to live in herds, forming groups, it’s only the males that prefer to go solo and then look for a mate during the rut in November or December.”
[With an ox that big, how long could you eat it?]
“That, I wouldn’t dare; in our country, it’s a top-level protected species.”
Bi Fang chuckled at the barrage of comments, but the next second, he couldn’t laugh anymore.
A huge black centipede slowly climbed onto the webbing between his thumb and forefinger.