Chapter 812: Bartering with Weasels in the Valley

This was one of the exits from the Yellow Weasel family’s den—the very spot where, back in early February, the Balding Weasel led Xia Qing and Er to help deliver Little White Weasel when she was struggling with labor.

“Balding one! White Weasel! Are you home?”

“Balding one! White Weasel! Are you home?”

……

Xia Qing called out on repeat for over two minutes, sounding like a chanting monk, before any response came from the burrow. At last, a round white head with a patchy black beard poked out, its shiny black eyes fixing on Xia Qing.

“Little White Weasel, long time no see. I’m so glad you’re home.” Xia Qing beamed and placed a few pieces of freeze-dried meat in front of White Weasel. “This is my improved recipe—better taste and fresher for longer. Give it a try, see if you like it.”

White Weasel’s whiskers twitched as she edged out and nibbled a few pieces. Then she looked up at Xia Qing, as if to ask why Xia Qing had come.

And Xia Qing really did have a reason to visit. She smiled, pulling out a printout of a medicinal herb, and held it up for White Weasel to see. “Have you ever seen this herb before? Can you help me find some?”

White Weasel sniffed the paper, realized it wasn’t food, and stared at Xia Qing again.

Doesn’t recognize the picture? No problem!

Xia Qing took out her phone and played a video of the herb on loop, gesturing to explain. “I need this herb. You can trade it for freeze-dried meat like this.”

It seemed White Weasel understood. She turned and disappeared into the tunnel, then returned a moment later dragging out a dirty chunk of freeze-dried meat, setting it in front of Xia Qing.

No question about it—that was the freeze-dried meat Xia Qing had given them last time, stored away in their burrow. What was White Weasel trying to say? Maybe she didn’t need more freeze-dried, so she wasn’t interested in trading.

After holding the little brain-evolved weasel’s gaze for a moment, Xia Qing started pulling out other things to offer. “Want some roasted jerky?”

“How about bamboo shoot strips?”

“Pumpkin chips?”

“Roasted jerky?”

……

“How about a gold chain? You’d be dazzling in this—Queen and Crippled Wolf both love theirs.”

“A tiny mirror? Want one?”

……

After checking every item in her backpack, Xia Qing sighed. This was a wolf without any needs—not fit for bartering.

“Alright, White Weasel, I’m heading out. If you need anything, come find me in Section Three. Section Three is over there.” She gestured toward the location and started shouldering her backpack when a sound caught her ear from up the path.

Turning, Xia Qing spotted the Balding Weasel returning with a prize in its mouth. Two pale brown weasel pups trailed behind, each carrying small prey of their own. The Balding Weasel had nabbed a big rat, while the pups were dragging smaller ones.

The sight of Xia Qing startled the pups, their fur bristling with nervous energy. Worried they might release toxic gas, Xia Qing quickly backed up, hands open to show she meant no harm, and greeted them softly. “Balding one, taking the pups hunting, huh? They’re tough little guys—only three months old and already catching prey.”

Hearing Xia Qing’s familiar voice, the two puffed-up pups relaxed a little. They had spent a month living in the sheep shed at Section Three, so her voice was one they trusted.

The Balding Weasel, still trembling slightly, toted the big rat over. Its nose met White Weasel’s for a sniff, then checked out the freeze-dried meat, jerky, and bamboo shoots on the ground. After a moment’s hesitation, it actually left its fresh-caught rat at Xia Qing’s feet—then promptly ate up the treats Xia Qing had placed by their burrow.

Xia Qing…

I wasn’t trying to trade my snacks for your catch…

She could only watch as the Balding Weasel gobbled everything. Still, she picked up the dead rat and slipped it into a plastic bag—after all, she had technically bartered for it and shouldn’t let it go to waste. The snake back home would be pleased!

“Thanks for the catch, Balding one. You’re such a proper wolf. I appreciate you looking after the valley. If you ever need anything, just come to Section Three and find me.”

A whole bag of freeze-dried plus some jerky, traded for a single dead rat. By any normal measure, this was a failed deal, but Xia Qing wasn’t giving up yet.

She tacked her herb printout to the big tree outside the weasel’s den and called into the empty tunnel. “Balding one, White Weasel, if you ever spot this herb while you’re out hunting, please dig some up for me. I really need it.”

Her Idol had just sent her the request yesterday—she needed the wolf pack to track down the herb as soon as possible. Each plant was worth twenty thousand credits. Sticking the paper here, Xia Qing didn’t know when she’d get lucky, so she decided to ask the ultra-refined Crippled Wolf again once she reached Hill Fifty-Two.

Down the mountain, she caught up with Xin Yu and the two of them set off for Hill Fifty-Two on foot. To toughen up, Xin Yu had even left her Tamed Bird behind today.

After the Devastation Rain, the danger level of the Evolved Forest shot up. Unless someone had a mission that just couldn’t wait, most combat teams gave the mountain a wide berth for now.

But when it came to Xia Qing and Xin Yu—the former able to sense plant magnetic fields, and the latter attuned to animal ones—this bamboo-digging duo only found the ground wetter and the vegetation denser than usual.

Danger was something they felt in their bones.

The trail the Alliance had carved through here two months ago—chopping through brambles and tall grass to open a way—had now vanished completely, swallowed by a fresh tangle of shrubs, vines and weeds. They’d need to make their own path to the bamboo grove all over again.

The two moved in single file, taking turns slashing a way forward with the Black Blade. After two hours, when they were only about fifty meters from the bamboo grove, Xin Yu stopped. She dropped her voice and warned, “There are two evolved beasts up ahead—one is right behind that diamond-shaped boulder at the edge of the bamboo. They’ve noticed us and the hostility in their magnetic field is strong. Based on what I’m sensing, they’re both advanced evolutionaries.”

Xia Qing stared at the stone for a while and finally spotted their opponent. “Red foxes. Looks like they’re out here hunting bamboo rats with their kits. They’re probably seeing us as a threat, thinking we’re after their babies.”

Foxes weren’t that big, and they weren’t pack animals like wolves. Most times, they’d run from humans. But these two weren’t running. That meant they had pups nearby, pups that couldn’t escape quickly, so the adults had to stand and fight.

“Red foxes are on the no-provocation list, right? What do we do—fall back?” Xin Yu asked.

Foxes might not be true large predators, but they’d still been put on the official list of animals you shouldn’t provoke—every creature on that list had earned its place.

Red foxes made the list after that disaster in year four, when a small base near Baicheng with over five hundred people hunted foxes for their fur. In the end, two brain-evolved red foxes and an evolved tiger together led a beast tide during a snowstorm, killing or wounding over half the base’s population.

“Let’s fall back for now. Once they’re gone, we can search for bamboo shoots again.” Xia Qing gripped her Black Blade and, keeping back to back with Xin Yu, retreated more than a hundred meters.

Once they’d gotten far enough, Xin Yu couldn’t even sense the red foxes’ magnetic field anymore. They climbed onto a big rock, took a break for about ten minutes, and then Xin Yu asked, “Should we give it another look?”

In fact, Xia Qing could tell by listening that the foxes hadn’t left the bamboo grove, but her hearing skill was a secret from Xin Yu. So she nodded, and they set off together once more.

After a bit, they discovered the foxes were still there. Xin Yu frowned. “Are they treating this place as their core territory?”

Xia Qing shook her head. “There’s food here—bamboo rats and snakes—but we’re really close to Hill Forty-Nine. Normally, foxes wouldn’t choose a spot like this to raise their young.”

“So what do we do now?”