10. Collaboration

Ryan's ears twitched backwards after being yelled at, and he looked incredibly pitiful.

There is a big difference in the number of lions on both sides. There are a total of six lionesses here, but one of them has to take care of her cubs.

The group that came to grab the food included 11 lionesses, and it was a huge scene. The leader of the lionesses did not look like a leader who would compromise. She would rather die than live in disgrace, and she was very brave.

The lioness leader had a fierce look in her eyes, as sharp as if she wanted to poke many holes in the opponent's body.

She, a lioness, was surrounded by five lions, but she was still not afraid and attacked with all her might. The other sisters also fought hard. After all, this was the food they had exchanged their lives for, so why should they give it up?

Qiao Jinnian was extremely anxious watching from the side, but unfortunately she was just a little human cub and she had no right to care about the grudges between lions.

What surprised her was that Ryan did not leave. With a cold look in his eyes, he stared motionlessly at the battlefield where 17 lions were locked in a battle for food.

As a lion, he was obviously not suitable to join the battle, and it had nothing to do with him, but the scene was obviously extremely unfair, and even she, a bystander, could not bear it.

If the lone lion was not a fool, he should have stayed away at this time, but Ryan seemed to want to intervene.

Qiao Jinnian did not stop him, but very consciously crawled behind a rock and hid himself with weeds, so that he would have no worries.

Seeing her actions, Ryan was a little hesitant at first, but now he had no worries. He trotted straight to a place 10 meters away from the battlefield, raised his head, opened his mouth wide, and let out a huge lion roar: "Roar, roar, roar——"

The lion's roar is very rhythmic and is the sound used to drive away other lions.

The lions who were fighting for food thought that this was the territorial lion, and their actions of biting and pouncing froze for a moment, and they looked at Ryan hesitantly.

Generally speaking, if a male lion joins the battle, the female lions will have to think carefully. After all, one male lion can be compared with five or six female lions. Just look at how huge the size difference is between the two sides. Moreover, Ryan's mane is black, and the young and middle-aged male lion with particularly lush hair looks even more powerful.

Even the lioness leader here looked at Ryan, not understanding where this lion came from.

But the lioness would not give up her food. She took advantage of the other party's pause and lunged forward with all her might, giving the other party's leader a big slap, which made the other party let out a "Ah, roar——" sound from his mouth, and was obviously stunned.

Seeing the territorial lion coming, they came to steal food, so if they didn't get it, they would just leave quickly. Unlike the people here, they had hunted the food with great effort, so how could they give up easily? The fighting spirit of both sides was different, so they retreated immediately after hesitating for a moment.

The lioness leader roared loudly at the invaders, "Roar, roar, roar—"

The lioness's roar was not as loud as that of the male lion, but this lioness was very powerful and successfully made her opponent run faster.

Having successfully protected their food, the lionesses looked very happy and quickly lay down to continue eating, fearing that the food would be snatched away by a group of hyenas or other invaders.

After Ryan helped drive away the lion group, he was about to leave, but the lioness leader roared at him: "Roar--"

The voice was low and sounded harmless, rather like an invitation.

Ryan hesitated for a moment, then actually went forward to eat the meat.

The lions invited him to eat meat with them to thank him for helping them drive away the invaders.

However, when Ryan was lying on the buffalo's buttocks eating meat, the lioness leader quietly went over, picked up the little lions one by one in her mouth and hid them in the grass farther away. She then lay beside them and guarded the group of little lions.

Qiao Jinnian felt that this lion group was very strange and wondered where the male lion in their territory had gone.

She didn't dare to come out, so she kept observing them from behind the rock.

When Ryan had eaten and drunk his fill, he shook his ears, stood up, took a few steps forward, and was about to say goodbye to the lioness leader. However, the lioness leader, who had enthusiastically invited him to have dinner with her just a second ago, suddenly looked fierce and roared loudly, warning him not to go over.

Ryan was stunned by the roar of expulsion and had to retreat repeatedly, even quickening his pace and running towards the stone where she was hiding.

In the eyes of the lionesses, the lion came to the stone and suddenly lay down. They didn't know what he was doing, so they all stood up and started roaring at him.

Ryan's ears shrank back because of the yelling, and he looked extremely pitiful.

Qiao Jinnian was also very scared. She didn't know what was wrong with these lions and why they suddenly became so fierce. She quickly crawled out, lay on Ryan's back, patted his back, and told him to leave quickly.

Ryan didn't hesitate, he immediately stood up and walked out of the territory.

When they saw her appear, the lionesses stopped roaring. One lioness even took a few steps forward to see clearly what cub Ryan was carrying on his back.

Ryan was attacked by a group of people. He felt that his kindness was being ignored. Even his tail drooped down and he looked a little depressed.

After rubbing his head, Qiao Jinnian lay down and said to him, "It's okay. Maybe they are afraid that you will hurt the little lions."

Yes, Qiao Jinnian finally figured out the reason. Generally, when a stray male lion appears in a lion group's territory, he will challenge the territorial male lions. If he wins, he will bite all the little lions to death and make the female lions go into estrus quickly, so that they can let the female lions reproduce offspring for them. After all, the heyday of every male lion is those few years. If they wait until the little lions grow up and go into estrus, then they may never have offspring in their lifetime.

For a lion group without male lions, the harm caused by stray male lions will be greater, and it will be easier for male lions to bite the little lions. Therefore, after Ryan had eaten his fill, they began to drive him away desperately.

That's the truth, but Ryan was driven away even though he did good things, so it must have affected his mood.

But he was treated to a meal of meat, which saved him from having to eat for several days.

Qiao Jinnian found some fruits that other herbivores ate on the grassland. They were green, round in shape and tasted bland, but fortunately they could be eaten as meals. She picked up several of them and put them in her pockets. She also made a strange-looking package with dry grass and carried it in her hands as a backpack. She also filled it with various fruits and took out the breadfruit and put it in to save space.

The herbivores moved north in batches. These herbivores that continued to move north were the mobile rations for the local lion territory, and the food was automatically delivered to the door.

The delicious green grass is the ultimate temptation for herbivores, but every migration is a test of life and death for them.

The man and the lion stood on the side of the wide river and had no intention of crossing the river with the buffaloes, because Qiao Jinnian watched helplessly as the crocodile in the water ate a lioness that swam slowly.

They didn't want to take any risks, after all, there were still herbivores that hadn't crossed the river, so they looked for opportunities along the river bank. Lions wouldn't go into the river easily unless they had no other choice.

Qiao Jinnian remembered that crocodiles in the water would basically not actively attack male lions because male lions were huge and difficult to deal with. Just like a pack of hyenas, they would harass female lions, but unless their numbers were huge, they would not easily provoke adult male lions.

This is the law of the grassland where the strong prey on the weak.

This should be the territory of the six lionesses. Ryan did not go any further, but just stayed by the river to observe, hoping to find food here.

Qiao Jinnian remembered that the lion group that went to suck milk lived near the valley, so let's call them the valley lion group, and this place is close to the river, so let's call it the river lion group.

Along the way, Qiao Jinnian did not see the lions of the valley lion group. Perhaps they stayed where they were. After all, their territory was very large. Although prey was scarce during the dry season, it was not completely unavailable.

The buffalo herd had all crossed the river and were continuing to move north.

Ryan followed the scent and brought Qiao Jinnian to an open place, ready to rest there. He didn't want to take any risks. After all, he had her as a cub. What if she was eaten by a crocodile while crossing the river?

Strangely, Qiao Jinnian watched Ryan sniffing the scent by the river and quickly understood what he was thinking.

Finally, the grassland he chose was probably neither the territory of the river lions nor dangerous.

The man and the lion stayed here temporarily, and the ostrich family of six who had been following them from a distance also stayed nearby.

There is no such thing as a group of ostriches invading the territory of other lion groups. After all, their diets do not overlap with those of lions.

After finally stopping to rest, Qiao Jinnian began to look for edible ingredients on the ground and in the trees. If she continued like this, she would become stunted.

After resting by the river for a few days, Qiao Jinnian actually saw a lot of bright red fruits, but since there were no herbivores eating them, she didn't dare to eat them. The brighter the color of some fruits, the more poisonous they were.

After waiting for several days, Ryan finally needed to go hunting. He had to eat every three to five days.

So, he hid her again in a high, secluded place, and then prepared to go hunting outside the territory of the river lions.

Qiao Jinnian thought that maybe he could catch an antelope or something, because antelopes are the last group of migrating herbivores, but this time, she was sitting obediently in the bushes, eating those green fruits, and she witnessed a scene of lions surrounding a giraffe.

The protagonists of this battle turned out to be a pride of river lions. What surprised her even more was that Ryan also ran up.

Maybe it was because they had cooperated once before. Qiao Jinnian couldn't understand the relationship between the lions. Last time they were obviously very afraid that Ryan would bite their children. Why did they invite Ryan to cooperate with them in hunting this time?