Returning to the beast world, Zhang Che, who was currently riding his Elephorse as he munched on condensed biscuits, had no idea that Huang Tielan had gone to his place.
Mm, actually Zhang Che didn’t ask Huang Tielan to visit his mother. All this was that chubby chick’s own idea.
Tielan felt that since it was hard to make Zhang Xiaoche fall for her via pursuing him directly, why not take a roundabout route and visit his mother more while he was fighting in the beast world, earning some brownie points.
It had to be said that this chubby chick’s expectations had half-succeeded. She had indeed left a deep impression in Sun Lan’s heart, though it wasn’t a very good one.
-This miss is over 1.8 meters tall, her weight was also definitely over 80kg. How could it be that she was dating her son?
-This is definitely intolerable!-
Which mother would want to see her son finding a chubby chick who was so large in both dimensions for a girlfriend?
Of course, Sun Lan didn’t let show that on her face. Instead, she was wearing a smile on her face until Huang Tielan excused herself, citing that she had lessons in the afternoon, that Sun Lan let out a sigh with creased brow, sitting on the sofa for a long while speechlessly.
~~~~~~
Zhang Che was riding on the Elephorse, galloping back towards the the narrow basin between mountains in a rush.
He kept feeling that there should be more Elephorse herds deeper in the basin.
Individually weak beasts that prefers to gather in groups like Elephorses are the best hunting targets for the current Zhang Che.
It could be said that Zhang Che had tasted the sweet taste of success in the morning, killing over three hundred Elephorses in one go and earning a huge sum of money, while greatly closing the gap towards becoming a Tier Three beastmaster. Of course he’d hope to repeat that success!
Moreover, this wouldn’t be a wasted trip for Zhang Che, even if there were no more Elephorses deep in the basin.
If there weren’t any Elephorses, there would still be other exotic beasts.
As long as the exotic beasts he encountered were those he could win against, he’d just continue forward. He was able to see the attributes of the exotic beasts, anyway. There wouldn’t be any cases of him mistaking powerful exotic beasts for pushovers and getting the tables turned on him.
Galloping all the way, Zhang Che was soon only several kilometers away from the safety zone. He saw a number of beastmasters on the way, relying only on their legs to travel miserably, causing him to sigh with sorrow.
Speaking of which, he really had to thank Wang Dong, that miserable fellow. If it wasn’t for him, he would probably be like the other beastmasters right now, travelling on his own two feet.
Zhang Che didn’t notice it, but when he rode past a party of beastmasters, the group of five’s gazes toward him were a little doubtful.
“Why do I feel that this person who just rode past us looks a little familiar?” a ‘shamate¹’ man asked his companions, his head tilted.
“Mm, I got this feeling, too,” a short-haired woman from the party nodded. She suddenly thought of something, and said, “Oh, isn’t that the guy we saw in the safety zone, who returned with Ding Feng Corporation’s Zhang Yujie and his men?”
Another woman from the group asked, a hint of deep thoughts in her eyes, “Did you guys notice? I remember when we met Zhang Yujie and his lackeys two days ago, they weren’t riding Elephorses, yet they returned with this man riding them. Doesn’t this imply that…”
The ‘shamate’ man’s eyes lit up, “Sister Mei, you’re saying that they probably discovered a Elephorse herd in the wild?”
The woman with a simple ponytail nodded, “That’s right. I suppose that man is heading to where they found the herd to in advance to arrange things. Perhaps Zhang Yujie will lead a big group over shortly.”
The reason why this ponytailed woman dared to make such a assertion was because they had researched similar exotic beasts to Elephorses. She knew this kind of individually weak exotic beast liked to gather in groups. With only Zhang Yujie’s small group, they wouldn’t be able to deal with a herd of them, for sure.
Then, it would make sense to speculate that Zhang Yujie’s group must have ambushed a small group of Elephorses, obtained a couple of beast cards, and quickly returned to gather people, before taking out the entire herd in one go.
“Then, Sister Mei, should we follow him to take a look?” the short-haired woman immediately suggested with a glint in her eyes.
Sister Mei nodded heavily, “Why not? Zhang Yujie needs some time to gather his men, anyway. Although we don’t dare to go against Ding Feng Corporation directly, it’s not a problem to drink a little of their soup when they’re having meat.”
The rest of the group all revealed eager looks on their faces.
It was the mount-type beast Elephorse; although their combat potential was worthless, it was a useful tool for travelling. Who wouldn’t want one?
Seeing as the rest had agreed to her decision, Sister Mei turned to an ordinary-looking man with a scar on his chin and said, “Old Lu, get your baby to follow him. Make sure to keep an eye on where that kid from before is going.”
Old Lu nodded silently, as a three-star bronze-quality beast card suddenly appeared in his palm. Tossing it into the air, the card transformed into a white-headed falcon with a wingspan of over two meters. It beat its wings and flew off, giving chase in the direction Zhang Che had disappeared to.
——
Zhang Che had no idea he was already being silently spied upon.
Riding the elephorse, he sped through forests and crossed ravines, and soon returned to the foot of the mountain range, entering the long, narrow basin from the familiar route.
In his view, the grass plains ahead were still a desolate sight, as if there were countless ghosts of elephorses that had died unjustly, recounting Zhang Che’s brutality.
Zhang Che didn’t stop. The beast galloped past, leaving this harvested land in the dust and went deeper into the basin.
The ride went on for another several tens of li.
The basin’s terrain started becoming more hilly, and a few of the stronger exotic beasts Zhang Che discovered were too much for him to handle. As such, he could only get off the elephorse and travel on foot, sneaking around them.
Suddenly, the scenery before him opened up to a wide panorama. An area of truly endless hilly grass plains entered Zhang Che’s eyes.
The grass plains was backed by a mountain range that rose high up into the clouds, extending into the horizon. He could only see where the sky met the earth at the extreme distance, like a black straight line.
“There are definitely elephorse herds in this place!”
Zhang Che immediately grew excited and patted on his elephorse to enter the open grass plains without any hesitation.
As expected, Zhang Che only travelled about five kilometers or so into the grassland before he discovered a huge herd of elephorses ahead. They were so numerous that it left him with his mouth agape.
“This is a freaking huge firecracker; it could explode with the slightest spark!”
Looking at the herd of elephorses numbering at least a thousand, Zhang Che couldn’t help but be dazed. There were so many of them! This was definitely an existence he couldn’t afford to mess with. If they were to stampede over, wouldn’t he be crushed into fine powder?
Fortunately, herbivorous exotic beasts like Elephorses would rarely attack others on their own initiative. Zhang Che was prepared to go around this huge herd and continue forward to scout, to see if he was lucky enough to discover a smaller herd.
However, just as he was going around this huge herd, Zhang Che saw a scarlet elephorse that was extraordinarily majestic, leaving his eyes wide open.
“Damn, it’s actually at three-star gold-quality! It’s definitely a horse king!”
______________________
Translator’s Note:
1: Sha Ma Te, Chinese subculture of young urban migrants, usually of low education, with exaggerated hairstyles, heavy makeup, flamboyant costumes, piercings, etc (loanword from “smart”)