The seed-and-wood-powered beastmen are the children of Xia, while others...
"Aliya...cough cough, are you alright?" Ayaka covered the wound on her abdomen and used her wood power to heal herself.
She saw the blood she coughed up on the ground, frowned as she destroyed the traces that would reveal their whereabouts, and looked up at Aliya, who was also seriously injured.
They were being hunted. Aliya lost her people, and so did she.
The orcs who wanted to capture Zelan were chasing after them, and they were willing to be severely injured or killed if they wanted to capture Zelan.
When Cai Baihua saw the weak Ze Lan giving her a reassuring smile, her eyes immediately reddened. "I'm sorry, I underestimated them. I thought we could defeat them with our current strength. We really should have asked nature for help more."
Aliya gently touched the three sleeping wood elves in her arms, shook her head, and her green eyes were filled with sorrow. "It's not your fault. I was too hasty. I'm the orc who caused the natures to fall into slumber. How is Alanya now? It used its power to help us escape from the stronghold, and I can feel that it has become much weaker."
Hearing his worry, Cai Baihua carefully touched the round wooden branch on her wrist, and tears that she had been holding back for a while fell from her eyes, blurring her vision.
“Aranya’s condition is not good. It can no longer use its power, or it will dissipate.” Cai Baihua quickly raised her hand to wipe away her tears, her voice muffled.
Aliya was even more distressed. His and his kind's situation was so dire that they were unable to supply energy to the elves.
"Don't be sad, we've escaped. Let's find a safe place to rest first, and then we'll go find the other elves once we've recovered," he comforted her.
His words reminded Cai Baihua of the Xia clan who lived on the grasslands, and she thought Lan would be willing to take them in to recover from their injuries. However, Cai Baihua remembered that the beastmen who had been chasing them possessed great power, so she abandoned the idea.
Cai Baihua didn't want to bring disaster to Jiang Yunlan, and neither did Xia's Zhelan.
They struggled to escape to another place, never expecting that several days later they would unexpectedly run into the Cotton Team, who were out searching for fairies.
"Lan, they really did steal things from this highway hotel too." Feng Hong pushed open the door, glanced at the empty hotel interior, and turned to speak to Jiang Yunlan behind her.
This hotel is the last roadside lodge on the way from the grassland to Senhu Lake.
Jiang Yunlan had anticipated this, and sighed helplessly, "Let's deal with Apocalypse first, then replenish the necessary supplies for them. With those orcs roaming around, the roadside inns will have to be closed temporarily. Our tribe doesn't have enough guardians with the power of nature to assign enough guardians to each inn to defeat them."
The enemies now surrounding the Xia tribe are no longer something that explosives and artillery can handle. Gunpowder is no match for those who wield powerful natural forces.
The orcs nodded and skillfully cleaned the inn by rummaging through the supply wagons for tools. They were staying there tonight, so of course they wanted it clean. Unfortunately, the items the orcs had originally left for them at the inn had all been stolen.
Outside, the wind and snow picked up again, and a few fine snowflakes seeped into the warm inn through the broken windows. Some of the orcs, sensitive to the cold, hunched their necks and followed the cold wind to the broken window, shouting, "This window is cracked! Let's fix it quickly!"
Upon hearing this, the beastmen carried their window-repairing tools and ran over.
"Give me the plank, I'll do it." Feng Hong took the items handed to her by her tribesman with a hammer and quickly patched up the leaky window.
The beastmen busied themselves, methodically arranging supplies and repairing the inn. Jiang Yunlan carried a lamp to the lamp stands throughout the inn. Each time she passed a dimly lit area, a light would ignite from there.
After installing the lights on the first floor, she went upstairs.
The corridor on the second floor of the hotel.
Jiang Yunlan heard a sound from her right and turned around in confusion. At the far end of the corridor, in a corner, lay a type of animal common in the area. Half of its body was hidden in the darkness, its golden eyes watching her warily.
The snow season is too cold, so they set their sights on houses that can shelter them from the wind and snow, and quietly move into the hotels when the snowstorm arrives.
“They are social tree rats,” 022 said in a low voice, sitting on Jiang Yunlan’s left shoulder. “They look like rats, but they have no ears and have horns that resemble tree branches. They have round tails and their fur is similar in color to tree trunks, so they often hide around trees. Their main diet consists of tree fruits and tree seeds. They are very weak and are not dangerous creatures.”
Jiang Yunlan nodded and walked around them to continue lighting the lamps.
The wind and snow outside were pounding against the windows with a loud crash, and it didn't seem like it would stop anytime soon. She turned a blind eye and let the tree rats stay, tacitly allowing them to stay at the hotel.
After touring the entire hotel, Jiang Yunlan returned to the second floor and, as expected, saw the tree rat lying under the shelf in the corner at the end of the corridor.
They seemed to know they were safe and did not move to find a new place to settle.
"It's amazing they managed to find this place. I remember this hotel is far from where the trees grow. Did they move before the snow season?" Jiang Yunlan wondered.
022 recalled the herd of wild animals that had migrated together before and told her his guess, "Perhaps they were scared away by the passing of a herd of animals in their original habitat. These small animals are very timid."
She nodded knowingly, and went down to the hall to tell the beastmen not to get too close to the tree rats.
Jiang Yunlan and her group, who had checked into the hotel, spent three days in heavy snow together with the animals staying at the hotel.
As the snow subsided on a morning when the wind and snow had lessened, Jiang Yunlan left her room and went down to the second floor, looking up again at the corner at the end of the corridor. The tree rat was no longer there; only a pile of fruit shells remained.
She gently flicked her tail, picked up a broom to sweep up the fruit shells, and found a whole tree seed among the shells.
The tree rats forgot about the food in their hasty departure.
Bending down to pick up the dusty seed, Jiang Yunlan wiped the dust off it. A ray of sunlight shone through the window, illuminating the spot where she was standing, and she noticed that the orange seed in her hand was shiny. This seed was not from any plant she had ever seen before.
"022, can it still be planted?" Jiang Yunlan asked cheerfully, staring at the seed in her hand. "If it can be planted, our tribe will have another plant."
"My analysis shows that its survival rate is close to zero, so there's no need to plant it. But I think you could try using the power of wood to treat it and save its life. You haven't learned any skills to cure diseases, but I think this attempt might give you some new inspiration," 022 said.
Bai Su, who was helping to carry the broom, nodded in agreement.
The matter was thus decided. Jiang Yunlan planted the orange seeds in a container filled with soil and loaded it onto the beast-drawn cart. She often used the power of wood to accelerate plant growth, but she had never tried using the power of wood to cure plant diseases.
After all, the first skills that orcs possessing the power of wood learn are "plant growth," "plant control," and "plant empathy." The summer orcs also learned from observing their training that sick plants cannot be forced to grow. Otherwise, they will wither and die during the rapid growth process.
Therefore, the plant seeds, which act as guardians of the plant world, check the seeds they carry every day and remove any damaged, diseased, or dead seeds from the seed bag.
When a user of Wood Power learns offensive skills and then tries to acquire healing abilities from Wood Power, they find they cannot use the healing abilities. The healing and offensive skills of Wood Power operate in different ways, and because healing abilities are so difficult to learn, to this day, the Xia Beastmen outside of Zelan can only heal external injuries, not cure diseases.
Jiang Yunlan knew she wasn't skilled enough to cure the beastmen's diseases, but she wanted to try curing plant diseases and learn new skills to heal plants.
"Is Lan going to use the power of wood to heal the plants?" The Xia beastmen were surprised and cheered Lan on.
Inspired by Lan, the guardians with wood-elemental powers, including Kurotsuchi, also sought out sick plants and animals, attempting to heal them with their own power. Lan was working hard, and they too were striving to master the skills to cure diseases.
Perhaps after this incident, they will be able to develop new skills to cure diseases.
On a clear day, Jiang Yunlan and her group returned to the Senhu habitat.
The Forest Lake habitat, home to nearly a thousand orcs, was bustling with activity. Jiang Yunlan stepped into the Forest Lake and saw orcs in animal or human forms walking together on the street, chatting and laughing with relaxed and cheerful smiles on their faces.
The scene she saw this time was completely different from what she had seen when she last visited Senhu, which put her at ease.
With the help of the grasslands and mountains, Senhu is gradually getting on the right track. Once it achieves self-sufficiency in the next fruit season, it can start to consider its overall development direction.
Grassland habitats, as the main villages of summer, are the places with the most abundant resources and the most advanced knowledge. They can almost be called hexagonal warriors, mainly responsible for supporting other habitats and cultivating talents.
Nestled amidst mountains rich in minerals, the Mountain Habitat is primarily responsible for crafting various tools, weapons, and armor, showcasing their boundless creativity in this area.
Forest Lake Habitat, as its name suggests, is a habitat built between forests and lakes. Because it suddenly took in many fleeing orc clans, it has developed numerous farmlands, and the number of farmlands is still increasing rapidly, showing signs of surpassing the grasslands within the next two or three snow seasons.
Jiang Yunlan knew about their enthusiasm for planting and breeding, and was also considering the possibility of them developing in this direction.
However, they were terrified of the giant beast. The moment they caught a glimpse of the wooden beast, they ran away, their fur standing on end. It was uncertain whether they would ever be able to accept the wooden beast as their assistant.
Jiang Yunlan stood beside the wooden beast, holding the chain binding it with her left hand and the reins of the feathered horse with her right, temporarily abandoning her advance at the entrance of the forest lake. She looked up at the docile and gentle wooden beast, then at the beastmen peeking at her from a distance.
Knowing that the orcs were terrified of the giant beast, she shouted, "I'm going to take it to the feeding area. Any orcs who are afraid, don't go this way."
Upon hearing the words "breeding area," the beastmen became less afraid and curiously observed the enormous wooden beast.
"Taller than a large wild beast, this must be a behemoth!"
"It looks just as docile as the wild animals in the enclosure. As expected of Lan, she can even tame giant beasts!"
The orcs chattered amongst themselves, no longer afraid of the oppressive wooden beast.
Lan had tamed it; even though it was a giant beast, it was no different from the other beasts in the breeding area, nothing to be afraid of. The beastmen walked out of their hiding places with their heads held high, and under the watchful eyes of the wooden beast, they came to Jiang Yunlan to welcome her and her entourage back.
"Lan! We'll take you to the feeding area." The beastmen smiled and quickly walked to both sides of the group, just like when Jiang Yunlan first came to Senhu.
They looked at the wooden beast with curiosity, then at the things inside the carriage, and happily talked about what tasks they had completed under the guidance of the village and the steward during Jiang Yunlan's return to the grassland.
"We rushed to make all the clothes for everyone before the snow season, and with the clothes provided by the grasslands and mountains, now every one of us orcs has a thick set of clothes to wear!" the orcs who participated in the weaving task said proudly.
“Building houses takes even longer, and we haven’t finished building all the orcs’ dwellings yet, but we’ve registered them all. Orcs who have nowhere to sleep will find their own fixed spot in the habitat’s canteen, school, post office…” one orc said, her eyes sparkling. She was one of the orcs who benefited from this.
Everyone was happy that they didn't have to freeze outside during the snow season. Every morning, they would pack their things, take their items to the storage area, and then go on missions together.
They heard from the village chief that the orc who made the proposal was Lan.
The orcs of Senhu escorted the group forward, their faces beaming as they looked at Jiang Yunlan at the head of the procession. They would do their best to overcome this crisis and become a source of strength for Yunlan in the future.
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