"Be quick with your hands and feet."
"Tie up the prey properly. The City Lord is waiting for the disaster relief grain we bring back."
"Hurry up!!!"
A team of 20, led by a sturdy middle-aged man in his early forties, was busily moving corpses.
The middle-aged man would inspect the prey first before storing it in his spatial bracelet.
"Uncle Ali, guess what we found?"
A few young men and women in the distance, their faces lit with excitement, ran up to the middle-aged man. From their rings, a pile of wheat stalks, cut with sword blades, appeared.
"Wheat, where did you get it?"
The sturdy middle-aged man recognized it at a glance, and the girl with a beaming smile also smiled brightly.
"We went out to see if we could still find any beasts and hunt more prey. While looking for prey, we found a field of wild wheat and just collected it all."
"Not bad, not bad."
The middle-aged man's eyes also revealed a smile.
"If we thresh the ears of wheat and grind them into flour with a millstone back in the city, we can make a lot of bread and alleviate our city's food shortage. How much wild wheat did you collect?"
"Heh, guess." The girl's eyes sparkled with a smile.
Knowing that these people wanted to take credit, the middle-aged man didn't want to dampen their enthusiasm. He deliberately didn't guess too high, rested his chin on his hand, and after a moment of thought, he tentatively said.
"200 catties?"
He knew himself that for these young people to be this excited, it must be more than 200 catties.
It wouldn't hurt to motivate the youngsters a bit.
"How could it be so little? You think too little of us." The smile in the girl's eyes didn't diminish. "Guess again, and I'll give you a small hint: you can guess as high as you can."
"Oh?"
The middle-aged man's eyebrows were accompanied by a smile, and he pretended to ponder again.
"500?"
"Uncle, I told you to guess higher." The girl pouted and frowned. The middle-aged man looked at her and smiled, "It couldn't be 1000 catties, could it?"
1000 catties of wheat was no small amount.
The city was out of food, and mouths were crying out everywhere for sustenance. In order for the city's people to have something to eat, the City Lord had specifically ordered them to go hunting.
Although hunting could provide a lot of meat, it had obvious drawbacks.
That is—
Only meat!
While eating meat was better than starving, eating only meat had considerable effects on a person's body. Moreover, the meat they hunted wasn't all from herbivores; many were carnivores or omnivores. These meats contained many parasites internally, and one had to be extremely careful when eating them.
Therefore, during their hunting trips, they would also explore surrounding treasure chests.
Collecting some wild food.
But their most bountiful harvest was 500 catties of rice. This time, harvesting 1000 catties of wheat was considered a super bountiful harvest.
"1000 catties?"
The girl crossed her arms and snorted.
"Uncle, to tell you the truth, we collected at least 3000 catties of wheat on this trip, and we didn't even collect it all. Considering you have to return to the city, we specifically came to hand over supplies. We'll go back to collect the rest later, and we estimate we can get about 10,000 catties."
Reporting their harvest, the girl proudly raised her head, awaiting the middle-aged man's praise.
"What?"
Unexpectedly, upon hearing this, the smile on the sturdy middle-aged man's face instantly vanished, and his brows furrowed tightly.
Noticing the middle-aged man's furrowed brows, the young people looked confused.
"What's wrong, Uncle Ali?"
"How could you possibly get so much wheat?" The middle-aged man Ali frowned deeply. "Wild wheat, collecting a few hundred catties would already be a good harvest. Ten thousand catties of wheat, and it's wild… do you think that's possible?"
"It is wild."
The girl's eyes were filled with seriousness.
"If you don't believe me, ask A'ben."
"Dad, it's really wild wheat." A young man with a bare chest walked out from among the youngsters. "We looked, and there are no settlements nearby. This definitely isn't wheat from a farmer's field that we picked. It's wild. These wild wheat plants are growing in contiguous patches..."
"Contiguous patches, wild?" Ali's eyes widened.
What kind of joke was this, defying all reason?
Wild wheat, if not growing in clusters here and there, could grow in contiguous patches? He had lived for decades and never heard of such a thing.
"Why don't you believe me?"
Being questioned, the girl's expression was somewhat displeased.
"It's not that I don't believe you. Being able to obtain the most scarce food, you are all commendable. It's just that wild wheat simply cannot grow in contiguous patches as you say, let alone allow you to collect tens of thousands of catties." Ali's brows were tightly knit, and he said, "This much wheat must have been planted by someone; otherwise, such a situation wouldn't occur."
"Dad, there really are no settlements."
A'ben spread his hands helplessly. The middle-aged man, however, remained silent. After about half a minute, he suddenly widened his eyes.
"Oh no, we must have wandered into the territory of the Cave Dwellers. The wheat you collected is not wild at all; it was planted by the Cave Dwellers!"
"Cave Dwellers?" Everyone was shocked.
"Did you leave anyone there to continue harvesting?" The middle-aged man's eyes widened. A'ben licked his lips. "Big Brother and Second Brother are still there..."
"Run!!!"
Suddenly, before A'ben could finish speaking, anxious shouts came from the direction they came from. Everyone looked and saw several young people in their early twenties being pursued by giant monsters holding wolf-tooth clubs, with imposing heights of over three meters.
"Damn it, it's Cave Beastmen."
Seeing this, the middle-aged man's face changed drastically, and he yelled at the surroundings.
"Go and support them."
Almost the moment the middle-aged man finished speaking, he was seen gripping his steel saber and charging towards the giant monsters behind the young people, leading the way. The others also grabbed their weapons and moved forward to support them.
Half an hour later—
"Dad, I don't think we can escape anymore."
The team, led by the sturdy middle-aged man, was surrounded by giant monsters wielding wolf-tooth clubs. The other members of the team were also severely injured, and many had lost the ability to fight.
"We can't complete the task the City Lord assigned us."
Uncle Ali sighed dejectedly. In an instant, his eyes widened again, and he tightly gripped his weapon.
"No matter what, we must bring the grain back. A'ben… when the time comes, you young people break through the chaos and run. Scatter and run. Save as many as you can. You must bring the news back to the City Lord, so the City Lord can send another team to hunt. As for us..."
"What is this thing? How did it get so big?"
Suddenly, a gentle, curious whisper came from not far away, followed by a clear girlish voice.
"Cave Giant Monster, a common monster species in the caves."
"Monster, how rare," a flippant voice followed immediately. "Can this thing be eaten after being cut? It doesn't look like it can, right?"
"You want to try it too?"
"Forget it, let's just cut it. I don't have such heavy taste. Who among the three of us will do it this time? Rock-paper-scissors?"