Ch39 – Bear Stroking

After classifying Xiong Mao as a bear, the priest picked up the immature panda and petted it, “This little bear looks pretty good!”

Xiong Mao was shy from all the petting and curled back into a small black and white ball of fur.

Zhou Ji felt that the Big Bear Tribe’s priest wasn’t very reliable, but he quite liked this open-minded priest. As for the little panda in the priest’s arms, it really did look pretty good.

However, it was enough just to look at it. He wasn’t interested in touching it or getting close; he still preferred Xiong Ye’s animal form.

With this in mind, Zhou Ji glanced at Xiong Ye and discovered that Xiong Ye was looking at the panda in the priest’s arms with an eager gaze.

He really hadn’t expected that Xiong Ye would actually fuzzy little animals like these...

Xiong Ye indeed really liked these fuzzy little animals. Of course, the most important factor was that Mao’s animal form was too cute.

However, people in the tribe generally wouldn’t allow others to touch their animal forms.

Xiong Ye took a few more looks and then planned to leave. “Zhou Ji, I’ll go and find you some fruit to eat? The gathering team picked some fruit and brought it back.” How come Zhou Ji hadn’t awoken? How great would it be if Zhou Ji could awaken into a little bear just like that one! If he didn’t awaken into such a cute little bear and was a little mouse instead, he still wouldn’t abandon him!

Some mice were actually quite cute!

Xiong Ye felt that way and glanced at the priest.

Zhou Ji didn’t notice Xiong Ye’s expression and said, “Wait a bit.”

Another child was awakening, and the priest placed the newly awakened Xiong Mao onto the ground in order to oversee the other child.

Children couldn’t change back into their human forms immediately after awakening their animal forms. The little panda wandered around on the ground and used its little black eyes to peer over at Xiong Ye.

Zhou Ji picked it up by the fur on the scruff of its neck and placed the panda into Xiong Ye’s arms, “Here you go.”

Xiong Mao was a little confused about being suddenly picked up–although it wasn’t painful to be held up like this, Zhou Ji’s actions seemed a little unfriendly...

Did Zhou Ji dislike him? Would his elder brother also dislike him?

Although Xiong Mao and Xiong Ye hadn’t had much contact with each other, he had always admired this half-brother of his. Only, he had been too embarrassed to approach him.

He felt that his heart would be shattered if Xiong Ye hated him.

While he was still caught up in this matter, Zhou Ji had already placed Xiong Mao into Xiong Ye’s arms.

The little panda was shy and rolled up again, burying its face against its paws, then exposing its damp little eyes from between his claws as he peeked at Xiong Ye.

Xiong Ye couldn’t help but pet him a few times even as he asked Zhou Ji, “You... why did you give him to me?” He had never held such a little thing like this before...

“So that you can bring him to go eat.” Zhou Ji said. The little black bear that had awakened first was already eating, and the little panda would probably also be hungry.

“In that case, we’ll go and eat together.” Xiong Ye cuddled the little panda and went to grab another piece of millipede meat before coming back, placing the meat in his hand so that the little panda could eat some.

The soft, fuzzy little panda ate slowly, and Xiong Ye could feel an itchiness in his palm. He couldn’t help but pet the little panda a few more times.

Xiong Ye was delighted. Zhou Ji saw Xiong Ye like this and also had a small urge to feed Xiong Ye while he was in his animal form.

While Zhou Ji and Xiong Ye were feeding Xiong Mao, Shi Li had already come back to his senses.

He now knew why Xiong Mao had awakened as a different animal form from his last life. It must be because he had eaten a piece of the knotted millipede.

He’d really gotten a good deal!

With this in mind, Shi Li also wanted to get some knotted millipede meat for himself, but it had already been eaten clean.

He could only get something else to eat.

At the same time, Yang Su looked at Xiong Mao who was being held in Xiong Ye’s arms and was beside himself with rage.

Although Xiong Ye used to come to his place frequently, he had never treated him like that.

Why wasn’t Xiong Ye his elder brother? Why was it Shi Li instead?

Yang Su shot Shi Li a resentful look. Shi Li had been ignoring him and their mother completely these days, and he had grown more and more disgusted with Shi Li.

Although Xiong Ye really liked Xiong Mao’s animal form, he let him go after hugging him for a while. He even said to Xiong Mao, “I’ve checked your claws and teeth. In the future, your fighting ability won’t be too bad. You have to train well so that you can become a powerful warrior!”

The little panda nodded earnestly, appearing extremely well-behaved.

Even Zhou Ji couldn’t help reaching out to pet its head at that.

However, after petting it once, Zhou Ji retracted his hand and went to touch Xiong Ye’s hair instead.

Xiong Ye looked at Zhou Ji disgruntledly.

Zhou Ji laughed, “I still like your animal form better.”

Xiong Ye suddenly felt a burst of joy in his heart, “I’ll turn into my animal form so that you can touch it as much as you like when we go back to the cave.”

He used to feel quite envious when he saw people in the tribe play with each other’s fur and hair after they had partners. Although Zhou Ji didn’t have an animal form for him to pet, he could still let Zhou Ji pet him.

Xiong Ye’s face was full of anticipation, but Zhou Ji on the other hand felt that–was Xiong Ye implying something?

They had just gotten married, and tonight would be their wedding night. Perhaps in this tribe, the courtship rituals were to first stroke their fur, and then...

When Zhou Ji thought of this, he had originally thought he wouldn’t really want to do any of this. Unexpectedly, it was the opposite, and he was actually quite looking forward to it.

When he first agreed to form a mated pair with Xiong Ye, he had thought that they would just put on an act together whenever it was required and then become mates in name but not in truth. However, his thoughts had changed quite a lot after the past few days.

He didn’t dare to say that he had already fallen in love with Xiong Ye, but he didn’t feel any rejection towards the idea of something happening between him and Xiong Ye.

There was just the question of top and bottom...

Zhou Ji had lived in the modern era of explosive availability of information and certainly knew how it was done between two men.

He had never liked any men before Xiong Ye, and although he now felt that Xiong Ye was very good, he still found it a little unacceptable to be the one on the bottom.

However, Xiong Ye didn’t appear to be a bottom either.

If they really couldn’t figure it out, he could pretend to feel ill. He would need some time to adapt first.

While Xiong Ye and Zhou Ji were talking, the priest, who had already finished overseeing the awakening of all the children, came over.

After the priest came up to them, he first looked at Zhou Ji in amazement and asked, “Zhou Ji, are you truly alright?”

“I’m fine now.” Zhou Ji replied.

“What happened to you yesterday?” The priest continued to ask. He was committed to understanding every illness he encountered so that he would have a reference if something similar ever happened again.

“I ate the wrong thing yesterday.” Zhou Ji said. In fact, he wasn’t actually a reckless person. If that messy, chaotic situation hadn’t come up yesterday and that fruit wasn’t such a trap, after he brought that fruit back and had given it to Xiong Ye, he definitely would’ve split the fruit between the two of them and eaten it slowly based on the state of their bodies.

But that fruit just had to be such a tricky thing!

Now, all the energy had ended up in his body, and not only had he lost his wedding gift to Xiong Ye, it had also caused Xiong Ye to be worried for such a long time. Zhou Ji actually felt quite guilty.

“You ate the wrong thing? Didn’t I say that you can’t just randomly eat things?” The priest hadn’t even spoken up, and Xiong Ye was already angry, shooting Zhou Ji a discontented glare.

Xiong Ye had said something like that before... Zhou Ji touched his nose in embarrassment.

The priest added, “Many plants are inedible. You must pay more attention in the future!”

“I will.” Zhou Ji agreed.

The priest suddenly thought of something, “Do you like plants a lot?” He often saw Zhou Ji eating ‘grass’, and not only that, according to Xiong Ye, the miraculous herb that could make people sleep and help their bodies recover had been discovered by Zhou Ji.

“Yes.” Zhou Ji nodded.

The priest asked, “Would you like to come and learn how to identify herbs with me?” Zhou Ji hadn’t awakened an animal form and there was no way for him to go hunting. As for gathering... He was very much not a team player and had already been rejected by the gathering team. He probably couldn’t do a good job there, either.

The priest was quite concerned about Zhou Ji’s life in the future..

However, if Zhou Ji learned how to identify plants from him and learned how to plant them around the tribe, he would have a skill that could help him make a living.

The priest was actually someone who was very willing to teach, but unfortunately, there were some people who simply couldn’t be taught no matter how hard he tried. Others could be taught but didn’t want to become priests. He was quite worried about the situation.

Zhou Ji’s interest was piqued when he heard the priest’s words.

Previously, he hadn’t wanted to integrate into the tribe and naturally hadn’t wanted to expose his plant abilities. Instead, he had tried his best to hide them.

Because of this, he wouldn’t eat plants that shouldn’t appear during the current season, and the plants he normally brought back for Xiong Ye to eat were all plants that the vast majority of the people in their tribe also ate.

This was actually quite troublesome, and now that he had married Xiong Ye, he would have to join the tribe sooner or later.

He didn’t want to hunt and didn’t want to do troublesome things, but he didn’t mind acting as a doctor for the tribe. That would be good for Xiong Ye, and it would also help him improve goodwill and allow him to lead a more comfortable life.

And if he wanted to become a doctor, he naturally couldn’t just go up and be one. He might as well learn a bit from the priest first.

With all this in mind, Zhou Ji looked at the priest and agreed, “Alright.”

“In that case, come and study with me tomorrow!” The priest said. Zhou Ji, as someone who had such an adventurous spirit and dared to try everything, was really well suited to learning how to identify different plants!

“Alright.” Zhou Ji nodded again, then suddenly recalled one of his speculations, “Priest... Grandpa Priest, why do the flame flowers all bloom on the same day?”

The scene of the large flame flowers blooming all together was extremely beautiful, but he didn’t know how it had been done–when the flame flowers began to bloom, he had still been focused on absorbing the excess energy in this body and hadn’t used his spiritual powers to look into it.

“The flame flower is made out of the Beast God’s blood, and when the Beast God sprinkles water from the sky, the flame flowers will bloom.” The priest spoke earnestly, “As to why they would blossom today... The flame flowers blossomed when we devoutly watered the flame flowers and prayed to Beast God.”

Zhou Ji helped the priest sum it all up and concluded that it was probably... Sprinkle some water, and the flame flower would bloom.

It turned out to be something like this!

“What if it rains before the Beast God Sacrifice, and the flame flowers bloom ahead of time?” Zhou Ji asked again.

“The flame flowers won’t bloom with just a small amount of rain. If it rains hard, and they bloom... Then the Beast God came to visit our tribe early, and we will hold the Beast God Sacrifice ahead of time.” The priest raised his head to look up at the sky, “This is the Beast God’s affection for one of his tribes.”

It turned out that they could do it that way... Zhou Ji continued to ask, “Is the time of the Beast God Sacrifice fixed?”

The priest replied, “After holding a Beast God Sacrifice, we will count down for three hundred and eighty seven days and arrive at the next Beast God Sacrifice.”

“Is it the same for other tribes, too?”

“I don’t know.” The priest said, “But my teacher said before that the Beast God visits every tribe at a different time, so if some tribes are further apart, they would hold the Beast God Sacrifice at different times.”

.

Zhou Ji: “......” The so-called ‘Beast God visits every tribe at a different time’... should refer to the way the flame flower bloomed at different times based on different climates and environments, right?

These people were quite impressive. They could justify their beliefs no matter what.

Zhou Ji felt that he could use this as an example and learn from this in order to fool people if he had no choice but to use his abilities in front of others in the future.

For example, he could tell others that he was the Beast God’s messenger or something like that.

As an atheist, Zhou Ji didn’t believe in the existence of the Beast God, but he quite enjoyed chatting with the priest.

The priest was a rare knowledgeable person within the tribe.

Even if this knowledgeable person was illiterate and needed the assistance of twigs in order to count.

On the night of the Beast God Sacrifice, the tribespeople spent most of the night in revelry.

Zhou Ji wanted to go back early to rest, but Xiong Ye obviously liked the lively scene outside and wasn’t in a hurry to go back at all.

Seeing the situation, Zhou Ji could only wait.

The Beast God Sacrifice finally ended after midnight.

Xiong Ye returned to the cave together with Zhou Ji and looked at Zhou Ji by the light of the moon that had penetrated into the cave, “I was really happy today.”

Although he had been very worried and scared this morning, Zhou Ji had made a recovery later on!

He and Zhou Ji were now a mated pair, and he was now someone who had a mate!

The more he thought about it, the happier Xiong Ye became.

“I was very happy today, too.” Zhou Ji said.

Xiong Ye heard him and leaned over to kiss Zhou Ji on the mouth before adding, “We are mates now, and we can show affection like this.”

Zhou Ji looked at Xiong Ye and was just thinking about whether or not he should pretend to feel uncomfortable and put off what was to come next when Xiong Ye spoke again, “I’ll let you touch my fur.”

As he spoke, he shifted into a big bear.

Zhou Ji laughed and sat down on the floor to slowly brush out Xiong Ye’s fur. He rather helplessly discovered that Xiong Ye was shedding.

Brown bears would shed their coats when summer arrived. Not only that, the color of their fur would change as well.

Zhou Ji removed quite a lot of fur Xiong Ye’s was shedding just like this.

Xiong Ye obviously felt very comfortable. He snuffled and crooned endlessly, and after a while, fell asleep.

Zhou Ji: “......”

Xiong Ye, who had still been jumping and leaping around during the Beast God Sacrifice, had actually gone and fallen asleep on their wedding night?

Didn’t he want to do anything?

Or was it because he was too tired?

Thinking of how Xiong Ye had spent a sleepless night taking care of him yesterday, Zhou Ji felt a little distressed.

The energy in his body hadn’t been completely absorbed yet, and he now slowly sent it into Xiong Ye’s body...

The energy he sent over was clearly beneficial for Xiong Ye’s body. Xiong Ye fell into an even deeper sleep, and the pace at which the fur on his body shed and changed suddenly sped up.

He was such a large bear and had so much fur...

Zhou Ji spent an entire night stroking and brushing but didn’t manage to finish the task. He had a basket of Xiong Ye’s fur saved up next to him; he even felt that he could make a small blanket with it.

Of course, he was busy all night and did more than just sort out fallen fur.

He had started sending Xiong Ye energy ever since he began living together with Xiong Ye. Although Xiong Ye couldn’t absorb it completely, he had still absorbed quite a lot. He had taken in even more of it last night, and as a result, the crystal core in Xiong Ye’s body had turned slightly yellow.

As for himself...

Over the course of the night, Zhou Ji had finally absorbed all the energy in his body into his crystal core. The purple crystal core contained within his body had become perfect and complete, and it contained very powerful energies.

His entire body was brimming with strength, and he was completely able to pick up Xiong Ye’s animal form with ease... In fact, he had used his energy to ensure that Xiong Ye continued to sleep well and turned Xiong Ye over so that he could brush through the fur on both sides of his body.

Dawn had already arrived, and a new day had begun, but regardless of whether it was Xiong Ye or the rest of the tribe, everyone was still snoring and sleeping soundly.

The day after the Beast God Sacrifice was a day where nobody would do anything. They could all sleep as much as they wanted.

Zhou Ji first produced some plants for himself to eat, then set the water to boil as he cut off a chunk of wood from the tree he had directed Xiong Ye to bring back a few days ago and began to make a comb.

It would be much more convenient to brush Xiong Ye’s fur with a comb.

As for bowls, chopsticks, and the like, he hadn’t had time to make them before, but he could also make those now.

There was also an assortment of various seasonings that he should produce as soon as possible.

There were so many delicacies in this world. He couldn’t just let Xiong Ye eat boiled meat and roasted meat every day. He himself also wanted a change in flavor.

Zhou Ji was even beginning to think about whether or not he should develop some sort of livestock breeding program.

Although they couldn’t raise pigs, sheep, or cows and so on, they should be able to raise some chickens, ducks, or elephant birds, right?

While Zhou Ji began to make plans for the future, the Beast King Xiang Tian finished attending the Beast God Sacrifice in the Beast God Temple and then unrelentingly headed straight for the wild forest.

xiin: Panda! Panda! Panda! Panda! Panda!

Juurensha: Awwwww Xiong Mao is so cuute. And dundundun, what’s up with Xiang Tian???