The orcs who belong to the land of Xia will flock to the Xia clan...
“His name is Sean. If I’m not mistaken, you are the egg he saved,” Sheeta said, her expression not at ease.
Gración froze, staring at Hida as she approached him, unsure how to react.
Unlike Zelan, dragons do not simply vanish after death, leaving nothing behind. Instead, a dragon transforms into a skeletal dragon for a few seconds until another dragon touches the skeletal dragon and receives its power and inherited memories. Only then will the dragon's form completely disappear from the world.
Each dragon leaves behind only a few inherited memories, merely a few fragments from their long lives—the most precious memories for them.
The memory that Sunn left behind of Greysien was a single image: a huge, dilapidated treehouse, a fallen orc corpse, and a sky-blue egg. Greysien could only discern that when Sunn found him, his surroundings were dire.
He never imagined that Hilda knew Sean and him, and had seen him before he was even born.
"When San found you, he said he would take you back to Dragon Island, and then he left quickly. What happened to you? Why did San die? Did someone kill San?" Sheeta frowned, as if she had thought of something, and her light green eyes flashed with murderous intent.
Grasien quietly folded his outstretched wings and told the angry Zeran the story of what happened after Sunn rescued him.
Upon hearing that Sean died from his grievous wounds, Hida instinctively retorted, saying incredulously, "When he destroyed that place to rescue us, he wasn't seriously injured. How could he have died from those wounds—"
No one knew what the angry Hida realized; all they saw was that he suddenly stopped talking, like a flame doused with water, becoming silent in an instant.
As Jiang Yunlan listened to their conversation, her expression unconsciously turned serious.
She didn't know where they had been taken, but she remembered the words of the other Zerans comforting Xida and her clan when Xia Gang arrived at Baihe, assuring them that everything was alright. Looking at the actions of the bear-beastman clan, she could easily guess that Xida had also been captured and imprisoned somewhere by the beastmen.
Fortunately, just as Natsu rescued Shirai and the others, Sheeta and the others were also rescued by Sun. Greysien was probably rescued around that time as well.
"Did those orcs capture you, and also dragons?" Jiang Yunlan asked, voicing her guess.
Sheeta blinked, snapping out of her daze, and said angrily, "More than that. When the treehouse where we were imprisoned broke down, I also saw the beasts that had broken free of their restraints tearing them apart."
"They deserved it! Hahahaha!" He laughed heartily for a few moments, then his mood soared before he quickly regained his composure. "I can't understand what they did to those beasts using our power. The wild animals are so strange; apart from the birds and beasts we tried to control, all the other wild animals were killed by Sunn because they went berserk."
He said with a headache and a helpless expression, "The birds and beasts that escaped with us are really hard to manage. It's like their souls are locked up, and they can't even talk to us."
“What’s even stranger is that one night when we brought them back to their habitat, they seemed to suddenly regain their senses and left us.”
As Jiang Yunlan listened to his words, she instantly recalled the strange beasts that appeared during the beast tide, as well as the bird-beast that apologized to the morning sun.
"The birds and beasts you're talking about, are they covered in hard, triangular feathers like scales, with heads that aren't soft to the touch, and always attacking any living thing in their sight?" Jiang Yunlan suddenly understood, feeling that she had gained a deeper understanding of the unknown organization lurking in the shadows.
Shida was surprised and confirmed Arashi's guess.
They plundered the power of the elves, wantonly harmed Zelan and his companions, and captured beasts for strange experiments.
Did they do all these evil deeds just to gain power, or did they have some other purpose? Jiang Yunlan had too little information to guess. It didn't matter; whatever their purpose, she would one day lead Xia's orcs to destroy that organization.
Organizations that wantonly harm others should not exist.
Silently adding another mark to the list of unknown organizations in her mind, she pulled herself together and softened her tone to soothe the unwell faces of her clansmen.
Xia's orcs and dragons didn't think as far ahead as she did, but they could still guess that the orcs who taught the bear orcs to plunder the power of nature and the orcs who captured Shida and the others might be the same group of orcs.
“Hida…” Lorelei looked at his kin who had escaped death with moist eyes, feeling sorry for not being able to find him sooner. “After you escaped there, were you hunted down by those orcs? So when we came looking for you, you were the only one left.”
Hida couldn't bear the tearful expressions on her people's faces, so she turned her face away from Lorelei and the others.
He tried to suppress his emotions, appearing nonchalant and speaking calmly: "No, no orcs were chasing us. We didn't encounter any orcs while we were there, which is why I told you that all the orcs were dead."
"What I didn't expect was that our injuries didn't heal on the way back. Like Sean, everyone's wounds gradually became serious, and eventually we returned to nature's embrace."
He was the only one who survived. He had the fewest wounds, so he was constantly being healed by his own kind, and thus became the only Zelan to survive.
He was an orc lifted up by several Zeran.
He didn't remember how his wounds healed; he only remembered that he had been asleep for a long time and was awakened by Lorelei, who found him at sunrise. At that time, he had no wounds, and none of his kin who had escaped with him were with him.
He wondered in a daze: When did I wake up? It seemed to be during the snow season not long ago.
Hida appeared calm, but Asaka could sense that he was not in a good mood, so she quietly approached him and hugged him.
Suddenly embraced by the cub, he paused for a moment, then reached out and ruffled Chaoxia's hair, just as Lan had done to comfort the beastmen.
“There are still some of our clansmen who haven’t been found, and who occasionally suffer. I used to think that they were just going through some kind of trouble, but now it seems that they have encountered the same thing as me.” Shida gently rubbed Asaka’s head and suddenly looked up at Arashi.
Lan, who was also a cub like Asaka, listened to his voice, her clear and bright eyes gazing at him tenderly. He hadn't said anything, yet he felt that Lan had heard his heart's voice.
“I will bring them back. Xia is Zelan’s second home, and they are my people. Xia and I will protect them.”
He heard Lan's voice, and the composure he had been maintaining began to crumble. No, he couldn't be sad. Hatred could be his strength, but grief would only cause suffering to his people.
“It’s okay to cry when you’re sad,” Jiang Yunlan said softly, looking at Xida’s wide eyes. “Your people are already prepared to take you in. It’s okay to be a little weak once or twice. Zhaoxia and the others are very worried about you.”
As Hida listened, she could clearly sense the growing worry and concern from Asaka and Lorelei, which was even stronger than before.
The Lorelei and Zeran, scattered around, approached him and gathered around him.
"Seriously, if this keeps up, I'm really going to cry..." Shida said, her voice choking up, completely unaware that she was already shedding tears.
Chaoxia and Lorelei held him in their arms, silently comforting him.
After going through something like that, I should have had a good cry long ago.
Jiang Yunlan watched this scene with a sense of relief, and carefully led Greysien and the tribesmen away. Before leaving, she did not forget to move the frozen and uncooked prey to a shady place.
The quality of the fluffy creatures that Hati and his team captured this time was affirmed by 022. Jiang Yunlan pondered and decided to have Hati and his team catch some more live fluffy creatures at dawn and give them to Ling Xiaocao and the others to tame.
After taming her for a whole snow season, she should be able to walk obediently with the vehicle. After all, Fluffy is a medium-sized animal much taller than her, and it would require the tribe to expend much more effort to move her in a cage.
Upon hearing the new mission assigned by Lan, Hati responded lazily, but his expression became arrogant: "I guarantee to complete the mission."
It's just about capturing some medium-sized animals; there's no difficulty.
At dawn, Hati led a group of beastmen, carrying two days' worth of food and rope, and steadily left their resting place. The area they had explored last time no longer had any fluffy creatures; they would go further afield to search for more.
The orcs in the resting place wake up at dawn and begin a new day.
This time, even if they wanted to stay in bed longer or rest for the day, the bear-beastmen wouldn't scold or beat them after they woke up. But Bai Shui and the other beastmen got up from the animal skin-covered ground with great energy, gathered around the familiar beastmen, and went to the place to eat with their friends.
Lan had told them what Xia looked like. In the Xia clan, most items could be exchanged using copper coins and contribution points.
Food, clothing, and shelter—these were things they could obtain if they worked hard enough. They set their sights on the dormitory Lan had mentioned, hoping to live in Xia's dormitory like the orcs who had saved them.
Bai Shui and the other orcs had resolute gazes. Contribution points! Here we come!
In the treatment area, a long-eared rabbit-like beastman who had been injured and ill regained consciousness. The moment he opened his eyes, he saw a lop-eared rabbit-like beastman and various other beastmen carrying food as they approached.
Before he could even react, the white-haired, red-eyed, lop-eared rabbit-like beastman in his field of vision walked towards him.
"Great, you're finally awake. How are you feeling? Is anything bothering you?" Ah Bai approached the long-eared rabbit beastman, smiling shyly. He placed two bowls of food on the ground and helped the long-eared rabbit beastman, who was trying to sit up, to sit up.
The long-eared rabbit-like beastman was bewildered and blurted out, "Am I in the afterlife?"
Otherwise, how would he have seen orcs bringing him food?
Beside him, the orc who had regained consciousness earlier chuckled kindly and explained, “Don’t worry, you’re still alive. We’ve been rescued. Xia’s orcs rescued us from the bear orc clan. The rabbit orc in front of you is Xia’s orc, named Abai.”
We're saved?
The long-eared rabbit-orc's ears were ringing, and he couldn't believe what he was hearing. He repeatedly asked his companions for confirmation.
"We're saved!" the beastmen of Baihe said with smiles.
The long-eared rabbit-like beastman was so excited that tears streamed down his face. He had survived! He had actually survived!
"What is the name of the orc who brought the Xia clan orcs to rescue us?" he asked, moved, vowing in his heart that he would repay that orc.
"Her name is Jiang Yunlan, you can just call her Lan. She is the clan leader of Xia."
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