Of course he was also stung quite a few times, but he was very interested in this person

Didn't pay much attention. He was satisfied at this time, and I am afraid that there will be a rare time in this life to surpass it; For, though he was not full, he did not feel weak from hunger. This is the highest expectation that apes can achieve.

He walked to the edge of the stream, and his contented energy vanished. "The apes"

It's on that side. They're on that side every day, but they're still annoying.

There were about thirty of them, and they seemed indistinguishable from Mochizuki's own family.

When they saw him coming, they began to dance and scream on the other side of the stream; The Mochizuki clan reciprocated in the same way.

The standoff lasted about five minutes; The sudden performance ended just as abruptly, and everyone drank the muddy water. The honor was maintained; Both sides asserted their sovereignty over their respective territories. When the business was done, the clan departed along their own side of the creek. The grass to eat was now more than a mile away from the cave, and it had to be shared with a herd of antelope-like beasts that had only tolerated them. The beasts all have vicious blades on their foreheads—natural weapons that apes are not born with—so they can't get rid of them.

So, Mochizuki and his companions chewed on leaves and wild fruits, chatting to satisfy their hunger—unaware that these were the ones who were close to them, but they were the potential source of food that they did not dare to hope for. However, the thousands of tons of delicious meat roaming the grasslands and trees are not only beyond their strength, but also beyond their imagination.

It was more than enough, but they were slowly starving to death.

In the twilight, the apes returned safely to the cave. The injured female ape, who had remained in the cave, giggled with joy when she saw Mochizuki bring back a branch full of berries, and took it and couldn't wait to devour it. Although there is not much nutrition in it, it can help her stay on until the leopard's bite wound has healed and she can go out to forage for food.

There were screams and shouts from a cave at the bottom of the steep slope, and Mochizuki seemed to be awake, and he didn't need to hear the occasional roar of the leopard to know exactly what was happening.

In the darkness of the lower part, the old "White Hair" and his family were struggling and dying, but the thought that he could try to rescue him did not once crossed Mochizuki's mind. The ruthless logic of survival excludes this kind of fantasy. Screams and shouts could be heard everywhere along the mountainside, but there was not a single protest. Every cave is silent, lest it invite trouble.

As soon as the commotion passed, Mochizuki could hear the sound of corpses dragging on stones.

Only a few seconds have passed; Then the leopard took its prey in its mouth. It took its victim in its mouth and walked away slowly, not making a sound.

Mochizuki climbed out of the cave and climbed to a boulder at the entrance of the cave, where he crouched to patrol the valley.

He sometimes watched the valley, sometimes the moon, but kept his ears pricked up. He dozed off once or twice, but he woke up very much when he fell asleep, and the slightest sound would alert him. Although he was twenty-five years old, his organs were still functioning well; If he continues to be lucky and avoids accidents, disease, beasts, and hunger, he may live another ten years.

The night was getting deeper, cold and clear. There were no more alarming incidents. The moon is rising, and there are constellations that are invisible to the human eye due to parallax at the equatorial horizon. In this period of waiting in the cave to wake up and be careful, I entered the dream realm that would later be called a nightmare.

A dazzling light brighter than any star, twice slowly streaked across the sky, rose to the zenith, and then faded eastward.

Second, novelty

In the middle of the night, Mochizuki suddenly woke up.

He sat up in the dark, stinking cavern, trying to hear the nighttime movement outside, and fear grew in his mind. In his life—a lifetime in which most of his kind could expect to live twice as long—he had never heard anything like it. The tiger and leopard approach quietly, only exposed by the occasional slip of dirt or the breaking of a branch. And this is a continuous rolling sound, and it is getting louder and louder.

It sounds like some kind of behemoth swimming around at night, not trying to hide or scaring about any obstacles. Mochizuki also clearly heard the sound of a bush being uprooted, which is often done by giant elephants, but other than that, like tigers and leopards, giant elephants move quietly.

Then there was a voice that Mochizuki couldn't recognize, because it had never been heard in the history of this world. That's the sound of metal hitting stones.

When Mochizuki led his apes down to the river at dawn, he happened to encounter the "new stone" opposite. Because nothing had happened after the initial sound, Mochizuki had almost forgotten the horrors of the night, and therefore did not associate the novelty with danger or fear.

The novelty was a rectangular plate, three times the height of the moon, but only as thick as his hands folded; It is made with a completely transparent substance; It would not be easy to see if it were not for the reflection of the light of the rising sun on its outer edge.

Since Mochizuki had never encountered ice, not even clear water, he couldn't think of anything that could compare to this monster in nature. It's certainly quite attractive, although Mochizuki is cautious about most new things. But he didn't hesitate for long before he got up to the monster. Motionless, he reached out and touched its cold, hard surface.

After a few minutes of intensive thinking, he came up with a clever explanation. It must have been a rock, it must have grown overnight. That's how many plants grow—white pulp like pebbles, that seem to have been drilled out of the earth for hours in the dark.

After only three or four minutes, Mochizuki was driven by this truly remarkable abstract thinking to draw conclusions and immediately put them into practice. Those white, pulpy plants are delicious (although some of them can cause severe sickness), and maybe this tall thing is ...... too?

After a few licks and a few more gnaws, he quickly came to his senses. That's inedible; So, as a sensible ape, he continued to walk to the river, screaming at "the ape-men" as usual, and forgetting the crystalline stones.

At dusk, while watching out for wild beasts that had come out in advance to feed, they hurriedly drank water by the stream and began to climb back to the cave. They were still a hundred yards away from the "new stone" when they began to hear sounds.

(End of chapter)