The Xia clan from the forest went to the beach to catch sea monsters...
The unicorns, land-dwelling beastmen, built many houses using wood and a special kind of seaweed in places not near the coast.
They settled here, farming, hunting, and developing their clan.
Moon Horn entered the house, ripped off the animal skin covering his face, and gasped for fresh air. It was already the hot season, and the skin covering his face was suffocating him. If it weren't for the sun's heat, he wouldn't want to wear this damnably hot orcish thing.
"Lan, are our summer clothes stored in here?" He squatted down next to the pile of baskets that the Xia clan beastmen had brought into the house, pointing with a hint of curiosity at the well-sealed baskets and looking at Jiang Yunlan with a curious gaze.
Jiang Yunlan nodded and said to the excited unicorns, "We haven't taken all the items yet. Let's open them up and check them all together later."
The unicorns had no objections and happily ran out of the house to help Xia's orcs carry supplies over.
The composed Moon Horn didn't go to move anything. He forced himself to stay inside the house, straightened up, and turned to Lan, his golden eyes sparkling. "Lan! It's the hot season now. The clan leader took the cubs to the vicinity of our clan's birthplace. Only we clan members are left here. Lan and I can discuss the exchange."
"Where were you born?" Jiang Yunlan asked in confusion, and received an explanation from Yue·Unicorn.
She was surprised to learn that unicorns and amphibious beastmen were originally of the same race. They didn't look like beastmen of the same race; Jiang Yunlan hadn't expected them to be of the same kind.
"Did you come here from the ocean? Why?" Her confusion deepened.
The unicorn people are not well adapted to the continental sun. Their clan lacks nature and is easily scorched by the sun, even though staying in the ocean would be better for them than living on the continent.
Moon Unicorn scratched his head and said cheerfully, "Our ancestors said that after the Age of Calamity, our original habitat gradually became unsuitable for us to live in. Since the hornless beastmen were on the continent, our branch came here first."
"Unfortunately, we unicorns cannot adapt to the continent like the hornless beastmen. Without the protection of nature, we fear the sun and have been living near water until now."
When he was born, his clan had already settled on the mainland. He had seen the sea and had played and frolicked with his clan in the shallow waters.
However, from the day his clan left the ocean and came to the continent, he was destined never to return to the sea and never to see the visions his ancestors had told him about.
The unicorns' habitat in the ocean is too far away; it is no longer a place where they can live.
Yue, holding a basket, stared at Lan and said in a cheerful voice devoid of any gloom, "Lan, everything's been moved over. Can I open it now?"
Jiang Yunlan nodded after counting the goods on the trade list. She was about to ask her people to help the unicorns open the chests when she saw the unicorns pulling the hornless beastmen to open the chest lids.
The opened baskets were intact, except for some missing edges on the lids.
Surprisingly, the seemingly carefree unicorn and the hornless beastman who always had "kill, kill, kill" on their lips did not cause the kind of house-destroying chaos that a husky would.
"Look! These are the summer clothes that Xia asked us to make for us. Now we can wear cool clothes when we go out during the hot season!" The unicorn people, each with a set of clothes, happily told the hornless people who were still using their animal forms.
"Oh oh oh!"
The amphibious beastmen, including Lin Shui and Wu Jiao, exclaimed excitedly, "Great! You'll have fewer fevers now!"
"These are lemon leaves, used to make tea. They're a perfect food for our kind. Lan said there aren't many left, only a small jar for us. Do you want some? We'll share half with you," the unicorns said happily, taking out a jar of lemon leaves.
The orcs, including Linshui and Wujiao, exclaimed, "Oh! It's Xia's food! We want to eat!"
Because they had attacked the Xia clan, the beastmen, including Linshui Wujiao, were extremely guilty and thus showed extra enthusiasm in their support. *Ahem*, they would absolutely not tell their kind about this.
And Lan has already forgiven us. The guilty-looking hornless beastman thought this, and straightened up.
A joyful atmosphere filled the entire space, and Xia's orcs were infected by their happy laughter, laughing and calling them to try on clothes.
Unicorns are different from hornless people. They are humanoid without tails, and the only features that reveal their animalistic nature are the single horn on their foreheads and their beautiful, coral-like ears.
After changing her clothes, putting on gloves, and covering herself with a cloth mask, Yue picked up Xia's hat, pressed it down on her head, and tied the hat string.
Under the watchful eyes of his clansmen and the Xia clan beastmen, he lifted the animal skin door and stepped out of the house into the sunlight.
The blazing sun shone on him, warm but not painful, without the stinging sensation of it pricking his skin. He couldn't help but spin around in the sun a few times.
"It doesn't hurt anymore! Summer clothes are so much more comfortable than grass skirts, it doesn't hurt at all!" Moon Horn pressed her gloved hand against her straw hat, running excitedly around the wooden house where Jiang Yunlan and the other beastmen were. "So cool! So cool! It's not stuffy at all~ It's so much better than animal skin!"
His fellow tribesmen couldn't resist seeing this, so they all changed into their full costumes, put on Xia's shoes, and rushed outside, happily spinning around together.
Jiang Yunlan stood outside the house watching them, and smiled happily just like them.
"Is there anything that needs to be changed?" she asked Moon Unicorn, who had run up to her again.
Moon Horn braked just in time, turned back to Lan, and shook his head with a smile. After shaking his head and grinning foolishly for a few seconds, the head he had flung away returned to his brain.
"The clothes are a bit loose, but I think it's good that they're loose!" he said.
Xia brought many clothes, both large and small. He chose a size that was just right, and it fit him perfectly. He loved it.
Hearing his praise of Xia, Jiang Yunlan's smile became even brighter.
The unicorns, dressed in their new clothes, were reveling in the sun. Seeing the orcs like Lin Shui and Wu Jiao emerge from their houses, they pulled them along, spinning them around. Unicorns, unable to adapt to land, generally don't transform into their animal forms. The hornless orcs, on the other hand, are accustomed to roaming the continent in their animal forms and rarely revert to human form.
Just like now.
"Lan! Are you going to the beach?" Yue·Dujiao asked in her newly learned Chinese.
If they were to communicate in their own language, they would prefer to call the ocean their birthplace.
“Go. Your clan’s cubs are all by the sea, right? Xia will send the cloaks for the cubs there, as well as the clothes for the semi-adult and adult orcs over there,” Jiang Yunlan said.
"That's great! It's the hot season now. There will be some delicious sea creatures over there. We'll catch some for you to eat!" He laughed, then turned to call two of his kind to join Xia's group. His gaze shifted to his fellow humans, "Would you like to catch some sea creatures to take on the road?"
The horned beastmen did not refuse and followed the Xia clan beastmen to the beach where they could catch sea beasts.
They remembered there was a large cave there where the unicorn people would bring their cubs to live during the hot season.
The hot season is when the unicorns teach their semi-adults and cubs hunting skills, and also when they capture sea monsters to make blocky food.
Linshui Wujiao occasionally brings his people to bring snow to their clan's farmland, and each time they receive a lot of cube food from them.
The sea cave was some distance from the unicorn people's wooden house. Jiang Yunlan set off for there on the morning of the second day after arriving at the unicorn people's habitat.
At this time, Xia's team had already packed the items they had exchanged with the unicorns.
"Does Lan really like this food? It doesn't taste good. Making it taste better is a hassle; you have to rub all the husks off." Yue·Unicorn wondered, looking at the pile of rice and wheat that Jiang Yunlan had loaded into the car, her eyes filled with disbelief.
They're really hard to eat; they're tough, and it's even worse if you eat them with the shell on. If you boil them with too much water, they easily become soft and mushy, resulting in a strange texture.
In short, it's a food that's hard to make delicious. It only tastes a little better when boiled with lots and lots of water, but then you still can't fill your stomach.
He looked at the unappetizing food with a worried expression and advised, "Lan, are you really not going to choose anything else? We can change it."
Jiang Yunlan smiled and shook her head: "I like this food. It's delicious."
The unicorn people were worried. They simply didn't believe that rice and wheat could taste good, and they all repeatedly scanned the rice and wheat on the truck with skeptical eyes. It wasn't that they didn't want to believe Lan; this stuff really didn't taste good, they had tried it.
“You’ll understand when we get to the seaside, when my clan has finished husking the rice and wheat and started cooking it,” Jiang Yunlan said confidently.
She already knew why they thought rice and wheat tasted bad. They weren't very good at cooking rice and wheat, but that didn't matter; she was.
The unicorns set off with skepticism, quickly putting the matter out of their minds. They still didn't believe that rice and wheat could taste good.
Xia's group had vehicles, but they had to take a long detour to reach the seaside cave, avoiding the steep paths they usually followed. Therefore, it took the unicorn-man a day and a half to lead Xia's clan of beastmen and their kin to their chieftain.
The weather is fine today, and the chieftain of the unicorn people is teaching a group of semi-adults how to capture baby sea monsters.
Moon Horn saw them preparing for the hunt but didn't disturb them. He took Lan to see the cubs in the cave and then led Xia's team to choose a cool place to rest.
Xia's orcs didn't seem to like water and didn't want to stay in caves with water, so he had to take them to the bottom of a cliff where the sea couldn't reach.
"There's another cave here, but it's not as cool as the one near our birthplace. Are you really going to live here?" Moon Horn asked, puzzled.
“Yes, we want to stay here,” Jiang Yunlan said firmly, declining the invitation extended by Yue to the Xia clan.
Just kidding, Xia's beastmen and their animal forms are all furry. People going to live in caves flooded with seawater are probably just trying to experience what it's like to drown.
Moon·Horn was disappointed, but quickly became excited again, and together with Linshui·Hornless and other orcs, they pulled the Xia clan orcs to the edge of the sea.
Today is almost the best time to catch sea creatures; staying on the shore will prevent us from catching any prey.
"You guys go ahead, I'll stay here and guard the supplies." Yan Duoyu resisted, lying down directly against the wooden cart. Taking a bath was fine; she was used to it and did it often, but she didn't want to hunt by the sea.
Jiang Yunlan sensed her strong aversion to the seawater and didn't force her to go with her.
After all, her beast form is a leopard.
Jiang Yunlan followed Yue Dujiao to a suitable place to hunt sea beasts, with a group of beastmen such as Hati, Feng Hong, and Heitu around her who were not afraid of touching the seawater.
The sea creatures have arrived.
The large sea monsters, carrying their cubs, rushed ashore, where they lay down comfortably to rest and breathe, occasionally turning over to bask in the sun. They pass through this area every summer, resting here for a sufficient amount of time before returning to their habitat with their newborn offspring.
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