In the southwest corner of Yi Di, where the Lulu clan originally settled, the density of bears is very high.
Similar to the law that creatures get bigger the farther north they are, the lighter the fur color of bears, the bigger they will be. The white bears living in the northernmost area are 3.5 meters tall when standing on their feet and weigh an average of 600 kilograms. They are the largest terrestrial bears known to mankind. When facing these behemoths, Even Suomir's snow tigers and dire wolves could only run away with their tails between their legs.
The bears in Yidi are all brown bears, and their coat color is between dark and light. Their bodies are also moderate. But even so, the smallest adult individuals can weigh more than 200 kilograms.
Similar to humans, male bears are larger than female bears.
Not only that, the male bear's aggressiveness and territorial scope will also increase accordingly. Creatures like bears attach great importance to their own territory. Not only are they targeting their own kind, but human intrusion can also cause conflicts between the two.
Therefore, most of the settlements of the Yi people are located in the plains, separated from the high-altitude mountainous areas where bears live.
In most cases, the two live in peace with each other, and they only interact when humans go hunting in the mountains.
But there are exceptions to everything.
This bear is obviously a male bear, partly because female bears give birth to cubs during hibernation, but there are no smaller footprints of cubs next to the footprints; and partly because of its considerable size.
The sage, who is one hundred and ninety-five centimeters tall, has a pair of large hands commensurate with his physique, which are 22 centimeters long from the fingers to the wrist. But even when he put his hand on the ground and compared it with the 15 centimeter-long footprint of his claws alone, he looked smaller.
Bears' claws cannot be retracted like cats, which is one of the key points that hunters use to identify tracks.
The approximate body shape can be estimated from the size of the footprints, but the footprints are a bit shallow compared to what a body of this size should look like.
Bears don't tiptoe, and even when they do the snow doesn't lie to you about your weight, and the lighter weight combined with the fact that it's still winter, makes it obvious that this is a sleepless bear awakened by hunger.
As a result, their situation became critical.
The territory of an adult male bear can range up to 200 kilometers, and the distance between this hillside and the longhouse is less than one percent of that number. It shouldn't have come here, and it was obviously driven by hunger and headed towards the realm of human influence.
The bear's sense of smell is very keen, even several times stronger than that of the hounds that humans trust so much, so it is likely that it followed the smell of food being cooked in the longhouse.
And since it has come so close, there is no doubt that the place it will go to next during the winter when the mountains are covered by heavy snow is the only human village with food.
A hungry but not stupid bear, even if the wooden door of the longhouse can withstand the impact, it will lie in wait at the corner of the bushes and houses waiting to attack when someone goes out to use the toilet at night.
This is a visible threat in the future, but more important than that is——
The three of them had entered the bear's territory.
In order to save fuel and fresh water in the cold winter, human bodies have not bathed much. Even they themselves can smell the smell of sweat on their clothes, not to mention the brown bears whose sense of smell is far superior to humans.
"Hurry up and get ready, the sled is lost." The sage made a decisive decision, and Lulu next to him had already taken out the mountain knife at his waist, and then quickly approached and grabbed a dead tree nearby. Thick and small trees were cut down, and the excess branches on them were quickly cut off.
Then he removed the wooden handle of the mountain knife with a "pop" sound, revealing the cylindrical hollow iron pipe stem inside. He quickly cut the tree trunk, put the knife on it, and then put it on a big tree. Hit it several times to make sure it is tight.
In more than 3 minutes, she quickly converted the mountain sword on her body into a short spear. The speed of her movements made our Luoan girl stunned.
There was an ax used for logging on the sled, which they brought all the way from Aurora. It was somewhat rusty due to the sea breeze during the boat ride. In addition to the Western-style daggers that the two of them also carried, this was all their equipment.
Like Lulu, Henry and Mira also tied the daggers in their hands to sticks to make spears. Because they were not professional hunting knives, they had to cut a notch and tie it tightly with a rope instead of putting it on directly. This took some time, so that about ten minutes had passed by the time they were ready.
Three spears and two axes, and the obstructive sleigh was left behind. They have made all the preparations they can at present, but this weapon is only for emergency use at best, and may not be of ideal use when facing brown bears with rough skin and thick flesh.
This is the time to slowly retreat and distance yourself. Without armor or a truly powerful weapon, there is not much chance of winning against a huge male bear.
Therefore, the best plan is to keep vigilance, and the three of them work together to make the target bigger and look more scary, and then steadily retreat to the longhouse before making plans.
It is impossible to outrun a brown bear by running. Bears can run almost twice as fast as humans, so they can only retreat slowly and pay attention to the wind and grass next to them.
The entire hillside is quiet, and even the "rustling" of the trees on a windless sunny day is non-existent. Snow covered the tree crowns, and a lot of it was on the rough bark, but the relatively narrow field of vision here allowed them to take off their blindfolds without worrying about being dazzled.
The endless blue sky and the sparkling sun make everything around you see clearly. If you don't know anything about the situation, you will probably find it all beautiful.
Ignorance is bliss. Looking at the surrounding scenes, perhaps to relieve her tension, Mira began to think wildly - but the steady voice from her teacher brought her back to reality in the next second.
"It seems that the other party is not planning to let us go."
Henry said this. Since he was not speaking the language of the Moon Country, Lulu glanced at him, but her attention was quickly drawn back by the huge thing jumping out on the left side of the road ahead.
It was covered in snow.
The coat color lacks luster, and is unevenly black, brown and light brown, making it look very haggard.
The outline of a round bear that people usually think of does not exist. It can be seen that the face and body are so hungry that the skin and bones fit together.
It was blind in one eye, and there were claw marks and scars on the side of its body that could not be concealed by fur, but the scars on the eye were obviously not caused by another bear.
It was a straight old wound, and it looked like some sharp object had stabbed the lower part of the eye socket and penetrated it, blinding it.
"Alagami" Lulu's voice was a little trembling, and she said a word. Neither the sage nor the Luoan girl were familiar with this word, but they could understand that it was the name of this bear.
This is almost the worst case scenario, a bear that has fought with humans and tasted human flesh and blood, and it even exists in the records of local barbarians.
"I didn't expect it to be alive, what a disaster." Lulu looked very nervous. Henry and Mira did not share this fear because they were not familiar with the legends of the Yi people, but they could still judge a lot from this information. detail.
Strong wild brown bears are indeed terrifying, but beasts also measure threats. For creatures like humans that are vindictive and have a dominant position in large numbers, most bears take the initiative to avoid rather than attack.
This sense of mystery and distance was what allowed them to escape unscathed, but this bear had already fought against human hunters, and judging from Lulu's tone, it might have been more than once.
In other words, it has no sense of mystery or distance from human beings, and it is even hostile to humans because of its scars.
A wise, powerful and cunning male bear appeared in front of them.
This is already a point of no return.
It began to approach slowly, with a seemingly exhausting pace, but no one took it lightly.
"Get your spear ready." Henry said, and the two people behind him placed their spears in response to his movements.
The nearly two-meter-long makeshift weapon pointed at the huge male bear named Arakami under the clear sunshine. It stopped in its tracks. Having been injured by this weapon many times, it understood this kind of thing. The horror of it.
It seemed a little hesitant, which made the Luoan girl breathe a small sigh of relief - but Lulu next to her still looked cautious: "Be careful, it is very cunning!" She said this in the local language. Mira could understand this simple vocabulary - and at that moment, the brown bear that showed signs of retreat lowered its head and ran towards them.
"Roar!!" It roared loudly, sending the snow flying everywhere, and then ran towards this direction with its skull in a position where it couldn't see the road.
"Get away!" Lulu shouted loudly, and as she shouted, the sage dropped the spear in his hand, grabbed one with one hand, threw the two to both sides of the road, and then rolled on the spot.
"Bang!!" Snow was flying around, and the brown bear, which had jumped away, grabbed the ground hard with its rough claws, then turned around and charged towards the largest Henry again.
In just ten seconds, it showed extremely high intelligence.
Using feints to deceive, trying to make humans relax their vigilance, and then pounce forward. As a newbie in dealing with bears, Mira is still unclear, although she also understands that facing the impact of a heavier opponent, even if the spear array can kill The opponent himself will also suffer heavy losses.
So it was necessary to avoid it just now, but my teacher was fully capable of throwing the temporary spear in his hand and killing it before everything happened - what was the teacher thinking?
She quickly shook off this doubt, then climbed up from the snow and began to look for the fallen short spear.
Henry on the other side once again dodged Alakami's attack, but he was gradually forced to have little room to move.
The reason why the sage didn't throw his spear was very simple. First, the bear sprinted too fast. He only had a very short time to react. If he chose to attack, he would have no chance to escape.
Secondly.
This guy lowered his head at the risk of losing sight of the road as he sprinted, and it wasn't out of fear.
The bear's skull is the thickest part of the body, and even the heavy winch armor-piercing crossbow of the Rigar people will be deflected when it is shot at it.
It is impossible for a short spear to penetrate it, and it is impossible to cause fatal damage elsewhere.
This old bear indeed has both wisdom and strength.
"Bang-bang!!" Because the knee-deep snow was extremely obstructive, even though the snowshoes had been torn off, Henry's movements were still slow. He fell into the snow, and Alagami directly gave him a claw. Scanned over again.
"Hiss!" The sage rolled on the spot and dodged the attack again, but this time it was not so perfect, because all the clothes on his body were brutally torn apart by the claws.
The cold snow water melted by body temperature and sunlight poured in through the gaps and soaked the clothes. Because he had been rolling on the snow, his neck and limbs began to feel cold.
He stood up decisively and then jumped and rolled to the other side to create a small distance, but Arakami still stared at him, the most threatening target.
"Wha—" The escape and chase continued, even though our Mr. Sage could only dodge and escape when faced with this situation.
The terrain and environment are very unfavorable, and the opponent is stronger than him in terms of physique and attack power, and even has outstanding intelligence. No matter how Lulu and Mira act next to it, it always ignores them and only stares at Henry.
Even the ax on his waist has been delayed until now. However, the portable ax can only cause some pain and minor injuries to the tough bearskin and strong muscles.
The vital part of the head is protected by the thick skull. Even if our Mr. Sage has amazing strength, he is not holding the indestructible Claymore.
It is impossible to split the head open with just this small axe.
The snow water seeped into his clothes. Even though he was directly exposed to the sun and his body was moving, standing in the knee-deep snow, his limbs gradually became cold.
If you wait until the stiffness of your hands and feet becomes inconvenient, it will be too late.
"Ha-" Henry breathed out, and then the brown bear pounced again.
eyes.
A blue light came on.
