TPWBI Chapter 5

No goodwill or help comes without a reason. Everyone understands this very well.

The medicines Yang Yi brought were extremely precious. Just that transparent bottle, clearer than crystal, was worth countless prey and furs in exchange.

The trading caravan had used only a small amount of goods to trade away a great many slaves, furs, and other things from the tribe.

These medicines and blankets were far more valuable than what the caravan had brought!

If those people from the big tribes knew there were such medicines that could bring the dead back to life, it would stir up fanaticism, even looting.

Yet Yang Yi generously shared them with everyone. Even ordinary people could receive treatment.

Other than a god, no one could be so selfless.

“I’ve left my old place behind and have no way of going back. I need some people to help me build a new home.”

Yang Yi explained this with a mix of Chinese and gestures.

Jiao understood. This person must be a lonely wanderer.

For some reason, he had already cut ties with his old tribe and now wanted to join a new one.

“We hope we are the people you’re looking for. But as you can see, we are very poor. We were driven out by our old tribe because most of us are useless weaklings.”

The Blackstone Tribe was a large and prosperous tribe with many warriors.

Not only that, they possessed precious Blackstone to make weapons.

Blackstone weapons were sharp and tough, able to cut through ordinary stone. This made them invincible wherever they went.

They often invaded other tribes, plundering their wealth and capturing their people. They treated people from other tribes as slaves, selling them to trading caravans from the faraway Western Continent in exchange for many wondrous things from the West.

In the Blackstone Tribe, only warriors were respected. Ordinary people were like slaves, and the disabled or elderly would be abandoned.

The Blackstone Tribe had not always been like this. Ever since the current chieftain took power, they had grown more and more aggressive.

This chieftain was already old and, according to custom, would soon be replaced by a new warrior, yet he had become even more insane, unwilling to give up his position.

If not for Hei Lie’s protection, many people here would have long been sold off.

Later, they were driven out because Hei Lie had been sent away to trade for salt. The main force left to protect them had been ordered to hunt the most fearsome beasts, with most killed or wounded.

If Hei Lie hadn’t made some arrangements that kept the chieftain and the shaman from acting recklessly, they wouldn’t have just been driven out. They would have been sold as ‘meat’.

They were a group of abandoned people, visibly weak in strength, so Jiao had no way to lie or hide the truth.

Everyone looked nervous, their eyes fixed on Yang Yi, wanting to know his answer.

This man denied being a god, yet he was as extraordinary as one, giving them a sliver of hope.

Yang Yi was in no hurry to answer. After a while, he finally spoke: “What if I’m willing to stay?”

Jiao’s eyes lit up at once, and she immediately knelt. The others all knelt with her at the same time.

“We swear by the righteousness of the gods. As long as you are willing to stay and help us, we are willing to obey you unconditionally!”

Yang Yi knew very well that these people were not ignorant fools offering themselves up so easily.

It was only because they had no other way out that they would seize any chance like this.

For them, this too was a kind of gamble. They did not know whether this decision would bring blessing or disaster.

Yang Yi saw the reverence in their eyes, which came from the fact that he dared to come and go in the Black Forest and possessed weapons, medicines, and other things they had never seen before.

Although they could sense that his body was not particularly strong, they still did not dare to underestimate him.

They believed in the gods. Making an oath was a very serious matter. It couldn’t be said they would absolutely keep it, but they would not betray it easily either.

Yang Yi chose to trust them. He could only trust them.

“Get up. From now on, you don’t need to do this.”

Mao, who had long been unable to hold back, hopped around him excitedly, “Yi, you’re willing to stay?”

Yang Yi smiled and nodded, then took out a jar from his backpack.

Once again, everyone was shocked by what he brought out. It was another bottle as clear as crystal, and inside were tiny pieces that looked like little ice cubes.

Yang Yi twisted open the jar and motioned for Mao to open his mouth.

Mao didn’t know why but obediently did as told.

Yang Yi picked out a piece and placed it into Mao’s mouth. Jiao wanted to say something, but in the end, did not speak.

Since they had already decided to offer up their souls, they had to show it with actions.

“Wow! So sweet! What is this!”

Mao’s eyes widened, and he jumped up from where he was standing in excitement, licking that piece of rock sugar nonstop with his tongue. The sweetness filled his entire mouth.

No matter which world they’re in, children can never resist the deliciousness of sugar.

What’s more, here it’s especially difficult to taste anything sweet.

You have to know, that back in the Byzantine Empire[mfn]also known as the Eastern Roman Empire[/mfn], the imperial physicians even treated cane sugar as a good medicine for curing fevers.

Jiao looked utterly stunned. Yang Yi handed her a piece: “Do you want to try it?”

Without hesitation, Jiao also opened her mouth.

“……”

Yang Yi paused for a moment, then just casually fed this woman, who looked about the same age as his mother.

Jiao tasted the rock sugar, and her pupils instantly widened, too.

It was really sweet! Just like honey—so likable, so delightful.

The others, seeing this, were itching to try too, especially the children standing nearby. The way they looked at Mao was full of envy, and the way they looked at Yang Yi was burning hot.

“Here, you take these and share them.” Yang Yi took out two more jars from his bag and handed them all to Jiao, acting especially generous and forthright.

The others cheered and crowded around Jiao, with the children being the most eager of all.

The rock sugar that cost 18.9 yuan for three jars at the mall let everyone taste that delightful sweetness. Just a tiny bit was enough to easily capture their hearts.

Yang Yi beckoned Kun over with a wave of his hand. Kun came running over, all eager and fawning.

“God…”

“Call me Yang Yi.”

Kun stammered and tried to say it several times, but just couldn’t pronounce those two words right. He kept saying “Ya Yi” instead.

Yang Yi could only give up and told him to call him Yi, just like Mao did.

“This is for you. Go chop down more trees.” Yang Yi pointed at his and Mao’s arms. “This big, and this big.”

Kun swallowed hard, his head spinning from the surprise: “For… for me?”

“Not now.”

Not now, but there will be a chance later!

Kun was overjoyed, the corners of his mouth almost splitting to his ears, which made the people nearby envious, too.

But they were just envious, nothing more.

Kun was a warrior, so he was the one qualified to have the best weapons to bring out the greatest value.

Besides, Kun was just lucky today. He happened to be on duty guarding the camp.

When the other warriors in the hunting party came back, they would definitely curse him for always having such good luck.

That situation didn’t end up happening because Yang Yi took out another five unassembled Military shovels from his backpack, put them together one by one, and handed them all to Kun.

“For chopping trees. A lot of them.”

The crowd instantly erupted, their eyes burning with desire. They all crowded around Kun, trying to get on his good side.

Yang Yi didn’t bother about how they divided the tools. So long as they brought the trees back, that was enough.

He couldn’t let this group just sleep on the bare ground at night. At the very least, they needed to make wooden racks to stay off the damp earth.

Yang Yi also planned to go back to the Black Forest once to bring his things over and properly integrate himself into this group.

He didn’t want to stay in the Black Forest any longer, always sleeping with one eye open in fear.

These past days, he hadn’t slept well at all, constantly worrying that some beast would bump into his tent and bite his neck in half while he slept.

Being alone in a forest full of hidden dangers wasn’t a pleasant experience.

Yang Yi picked out five people who looked relatively healthy and sturdy to come with him, telling them to wait on the outskirts of the Black Forest while he went in alone to fetch his things.

He couldn’t expose his storage space. By using this move, he could pretend these supplies were brought out from the Black Forest, and no one would suspect a thing.

Yang Yi believed that giving someone a fish wasn’t as good as teaching them how to fish. But right now, everyone was so hungry they could barely stand. They needed to recover some strength first before they could do any proper work.

Yang Yi first gathered up his things in the forest, packed them into his storage, and then went to a spot close enough to those five people but where they couldn’t see him.

He took out a big piece of waterproof tarp, dumped out sweet potatoes, potatoes, taro, rice, and other things from his storage onto it. He grabbed the edges to wrap it into a simple sack and dragged it out just like that.

When they saw him coming out, the five people, sharp-eyed and quick on the uptake, immediately ran up to take over the load. Although they were very curious, they didn’t ask him what all this stuff was.

After ten trips back and forth, Yang Yi finally stopped.

Yang Yi had used every ounce of strength he had just to drag out ten huge bundles of supplies. He didn’t even need to deliberately time it; each trip took enough time on its own.

But these five so-called ordinary people without great strength easily carried them all away, one hand hoisting the load, the other carrying a 200-liter thick aluminum barrel full of things. It was clear the weight was quite a burden for them, but not something they couldn’t handle.

Along the way, they even had the strength to chat with Yang Yi, which gave Yang Yi the chance to learn more vocabulary.

The difference—this was the gap.

No wonder the beasts here were so terrifying. Humans here had physical strength that couldn’t even be compared to people on Earth.

Kun spotted Yang Yi’s group coming back from far away and rushed over, shouldering his Military shovel, excited to show off what he’d done.

“Yi, look. Are these logs enough? Do we need more?”

It was his first time finding tree-felling so enjoyable. This Military shovel felt like it was made just for him—especially handy, far better than the old blackstone weapons.

The other five ordinary people had performed quite well, too. Their tree-cutting speed could rival that of a first-level warrior with a stone axe, maybe even better.

No one wanted to put down this “divine tool”. They all poured out their strength with full enthusiasm.

By the time Yang Yi’s group returned, the logs they’d cut had already been stacked into a mound as tall as a hill.

Yang Yi gave their work his approval: “You did really well. For now, this is enough.”

“What are you guys carrying?” Kun saw them hauling a big bundle and carrying a round barrel made of what looked like metal—shiny enough to reflect light—and it was full of things inside.

Kun’s attention was quickly drawn to what was inside: “Is this food?”

Inside the barrel were some unknown tubers. They looked edible!

Yang Yi smiled and nodded, and everyone instantly cheered.

So much food! How long had it been since they’d seen so much food at once?

Yang Yi wasn’t a god. But to them, he was like a god!

The hunting team and gathering team had also been blessed by the gods today and brought back plenty.

The hunting team had caught a wild deer today! The gathering team had found plenty of wild vegetables and fruits, too.

This day was the happiest day these abandoned people had experienced since they’d begun their escape.

After running for their lives for so long and facing a new, barren, unfamiliar home, it had been hard for them to find enough food. Their stomachs had always been empty.

Today, they finally got to fill their flat bellies. Their bodies were brimming with strength.

The whole camp was filled with the smell of food. Everyone could get enough to eat.

“I’m so full! It’s been so long since I’ve eaten this much.” Kun gnawed on a bone, looking completely satisfied. The others all nodded in agreement.

“It tastes amazing, too. I’ve never had anything this delicious!”

“Even the picky leaders of the West Continent’s trading caravans would be amazed by this taste.”

The wild vegetable, minced meat, and bone porridge carried a fresh fragrance they had never tasted before, mixed with a hint of meat flavor. The chopped wild vegetables were no longer so bitter and astringent, and inside, there was even a kind of fine salt they had never seen before!

Together with three kinds of root vegetables they had never eaten and a bit of meat, it was not only delicious but also filling. Having less meat didn’t matter at all.

The ones who loved the wild vegetable, minced meat, and bone porridge the most were the elderly, the children, and the more seriously injured. Drinking the hot porridge warmed them up completely.

“That fine salt could be used to trade with other tribes. It could get us so many things in return.” Jiao sighed as she drank her porridge.

That fine, white, pure salt, with no bitterness or strange taste, was like the cleanest snowflake.

Such precious salt. Just a little of it could be traded for a huge pile of the old black salt, and they would probably even get extra prey hides along with it.

If they still had black salt left, they would never have agreed to use this fine salt like this, not even if Yang Yi insisted.

It was too extravagant. Truly too extravagant!

As she spoke, Jiao glanced at the five metal barrels again and couldn’t help but sigh once more.

To use such expensive metal to make cooking pots. What kind of place must be so wealthy to afford that?

These barrels could easily boil food or water, unlike stone pots that needed huge amounts of firewood and half a day to heat up. If it was a big stone pot, they had to throw heated small stones into it to help cook the food.

With these five barrels, preparing food would be so much easier and save a lot of firewood, too.

“We should use them for trade in the future.”

Yang Yi appreciated this kind of careful planning. Right now, they were in a state where expenses far exceeded income, so they had to save wherever they could.

He did have quite a bit of food in his space, but in the end, it was all finite. Only producing their own could lead to sustainable development. He couldn’t let them develop a habit of relying on him.

Taking shortcuts would only make them lose their fighting strength and be eliminated by this world.

Especially since these people ate so much. An ordinary person ate twice as much as he did, and a warrior three times or even more. Every one of them was a big eater. There was no way he could afford to keep them fed forever, even if he wanted to.

No wonder there was such a difference in physiques. The amount of energy they could absorb was on a completely different scale.

After everyone was full, the sky had already darkened completely.

Yang Yi turned on the solar lamp hanging on the tree trunk, then took a hardcover business notebook and a gel pen out of his backpack.

“Now, let’s plan for the future.”

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