Since entering Zhangzhou, as the geographical location has become closer to Southern California and the mountains have become shorter, the surrounding vegetation has also begun to change compared to Taizhou.
The straight and towering coniferous forests are mostly replaced by shorter broad-leaved plants. Most of these trees with a height of less than ten meters have wider leaves, which appear deep green in midsummer and block large areas of sunlight.
And even in areas where trees are sparse and therefore sunny, shrubs with berry and thorns are densely populated. In the entire forest, except for the auxiliary roads opened by Kazuto, there are almost no roads to walk on. Everything you see is green. Although it is full of vitality, it reveals that it refuses human involvement.
Unless mission requirements are unavoidable, the more experienced adventurers are actually more inclined to follow the well-established path.
There are many risks in rashly entering this vegetation-covered wilderness. First, it takes a lot of time to open a path while moving forward. Not to mention that in a dense forest, the vegetation is all the same, and it is easy for people to lose their way.
Secondly, you never know whether the place you step on is just a ball of fluffy grass or solid soil. The possibility of accidentally stepping off the cliff and falling off the cliff is not low. Or the small branches you reach out to grab in panic are poisonous or ant nests covered with sharp thorns. In an instant, your palms will swell and spread to the whole body, causing pain and abnormality.
Coupled with the various venomous scorpions and snakes lurking under the dense shrubs and rocks on the forest floor, the hot weather in summer awakens these cold-blooded creatures, and they are now aggressive due to hunger. Although human-sized creatures are not usually prey of snakes and scorpions, they are not shy in using their venom to repel these intruders that are dozens of times their own size.
Even reaching for a tree can get you killed. This is not alarmist. It is basic common sense not to touch or touch in such a dense forest full of vitality. Which things are harmful and which roads are unreliable? If you rush into uncultivated areas without enough knowledge, the best result will be to get lost and need to wait for others to rescue you.
Fortunately, there are not a few people in this advance team with field experience. The sage used his dagger to cut off a dead branch, then trimmed it slightly to remove the excess branches, and used it as a walking stick to explore the road. After that, the group tried to find a place with a wider field of vision. When they encountered dense branches and leaves that needed to be penetrated, they would first use a one-handed knife to clean them.
Suomir's one-handed sword of moderate length is quite suitable for use as a multi-purpose tool. Its thick back without tapering can bring heavy chopping, and it is like a large hatchet when held in the sage's hand.
He raised the knife and dropped it, and the originally dense forest suddenly became clear. The field of vision was broadened and the ground was repeatedly solidified. Henry used amazing efficiency to open up a solid path for the following members, and they only needed to follow him, without paying more attention to other people under their feet. The energy is used to observe whether there are traces of water sources around, as well as potential threats.
"Swallowing the Starry Sky: Sign in to Become a God"
The auxiliary roads in Zhangzhou extend in all directions. As we mentioned before, except for the national highways which are run by the Beijing government, in fact, the roads in various places are mostly used by people for convenience.
Except for the re-opening of some sections of the auxiliary roads, most of them are just the re-reinforcement and utilization of the original roads.
So even if it is called Auxiliary Dao, this is just the term that people today are used to. It is not as neat and standardized as the national highway. In fact, it is a system composed of a series of interconnected roads that are even abandoned in many places. Therefore, a more official term should be a auxiliary road system. But since people have become accustomed to using this term, it continues like this.
The first step for Henry and his party was to walk up the road to get a wider view, but the main part of the auxiliary road was to relieve the pressure on the national highway, so they changed their direction midway and headed south.
After deviating from the more commonly used parts, you often need to stop and search for the rest of the road, and use a one-handed knife to open up the work.
The quality is not great, but this one-handed knife is still usable. The small country of ice and snow on the northern east coast is rich in high-quality iron ore. Just like what cooks like to say, "Anyone can make the best beef extremely delicious." The quality of the raw materials is so high that any blacksmith can handle it. It must be solid and durable.
Just sharpen the blunt ones. As a mercenary and an adventurer, various repair tools such as whetstones and maintenance oils will basically never leave your body. Adventurer-related stores of all sizes will always sell whetstones cut into palm-sized pieces. This portable size is perfect for carrying around in a leather bag. It is usually a very fine finely ground stone used to repair normal wear and tear on sharp edges.
But if you have experienced bloody battles or abnormal use, for example, it is common for novices to aim at the opponent's weapon - rather than the body - and attack the blade causing chipping and curling, or an idiot uses his sword as a hammer against his body. The toughest part of the armored opponent's body was pounded indiscriminately. With this level of damage, you can only replace it with a new one, or hand it over to a professional blacksmith for repair work.
Of course, a sword with a jagged blade that looks like jagged edges is still deadly enough. Although it is not as efficient, it can still be used to continue fighting in an emergency.
——To return to the original point, experienced adventurers like our Mr. Sage and the Luoan girl usually carry some essential small items with them, in addition to large items such as spare clothes and bedding that are stored at the camping site.
A simple fire sickle and quartz combined with carbon cloth only take up a space the size of the palm of your hand; a hemp rope cut into little finger length and dipped in melted beeswax can be used as a good kindling and temporary candle wick as long as it is kneaded. In addition, add a sewing kit and a sharpening stone for repairing sharp blades, and prepare some first-aid supplies such as herbal bandages. Pack these into a waterproof waist bag with beeswax baked into the gaps and surfaces to form an inseparable set. Carry-on suit.
Experienced adventurers have their own set of equipment, which is usually combined with a dagger and dagger. The portable long sword can be additionally mounted through a detachable hanging buckle or belt buckle. This design is so that you can temporarily remove the long sword when you enter the room and sit down, or you can take it off and wrap it up in some places where it is prohibited to carry swords and weapons openly.
After all, even shorter swords are usually about one meter long, and are really in the way when people sit down - this is also true when a group of people are walking in the forest.
Lao Qiao and Yajiro, who were born in the northern domain, had no idea how dense the forests were in the south. Even though the sage led the way and they only carried a long-waisted sword, the scabbard still fell from time to time when walking through the forest. Hit the tree branches.
Kazuto's sword scabbards are as exquisite as works of art, and the surface of the wooden core sheath is usually treated with lacquer to be as smooth as a mirror. But the more perfect something is, the more glaring its flaws are. After walking through the forest for a while, Yajiro began to look back at his scabbard again and again, and frowned deeply.
The samurai's weapon maintenance is almost ritualistic and sacred. For any samurai, it is shameful for the sword to be rusty. The same is true for the scabbard. A scabbard full of scratches, bumps, and peeling paint is regarded as a disqualified person who is lazy, careless, and does not abide by the ways of the samurai. Yajiro, who has always pursued becoming a perfect samurai, naturally finds this intolerable.
It's just that he has grown a lot along the way. If it had been back when he was still in Qingzhi, or even just after he set out, he would probably get angry because of something like this, or even leave everyone else behind and go back alone.
It is very immature to put the overall situation first and skimp on such details under such circumstances. While the young master adjusted his psychology, the sage leading the way also stopped.
"The road condition here is quite good. There are still some remaining buildings. It seems that we have reached a village." After climbing for a short distance, we walked down for a while. The clear spring in the mountains that we imagined has not yet appeared, but But there is another better goal.
No matter where you are, people's needs are always similar. Since there is a settlement nearby, there will probably be water sources such as wells there.
Even if there is no well, considering that the mountain road is difficult to travel, most people here will have a fixed place to collect water, so first go to the village to explore and then decide what to do next. The broad concept of the valley area was suddenly narrowed down to the water source of the village. Even though it seemed to be just a small thing, Henry's style remained unchanged. Determine the goal step by step, act vigorously and resolutely, but also have a clear concept, and will not dwell on meaningless things.
There is a word in Crescent Continent called winding paths leading to seclusion. Words that can express similar meanings include winding paths and sudden enlightenment. This is the word that Yajiro and others almost want to blurt out.
The village located in the mountain forest is small in size, similar to the size of the village where Hayabusa lived before. But it looks like it has been abandoned for a long time.
The abandoned farmland is overgrown with weeds, and some of the surrounding houses are dilapidated. Looking at this scene, and then thinking about how the nobles over Ziyun were living and drinking, one was speechless for a moment.
The Moon Country, which has almost no exchanges with foreign countries and occupies an entire continent as a country, is basically a country based on farming.
The scene they saw in Taizhou was very admirable, but the details the group saw after entering Zhangzhou became increasingly worrying.
Is the samurai class really still the glory of this country?
The Chinese despised the warriors and thought they were freeloaders; the people also felt that these aggressive guys were dangerous, although they would not say so openly.
Yajiro, like many young warriors from the Moon Country, was born and raised with the ideal of becoming a perfect warrior. However, everything he encountered along the way was full of imperfections and compromises.
To him, the class he belongs to now looks more and more like the legendary demon sword that sucks the life of its owner.
The huge warrior class gnawed away the vitality of the country, and the cultivated land was abandoned, the villages were dilapidated, and the people did not know where to go.
Only the warriors with swords in their waists and dressed in fine clothes were still showing off their power, shouting about how important their creed, rituals, dignity and everything else were.
Did they not see what they saw, or did they choose to turn a blind eye to it?
"I saw a well." Henry's words interrupted Yajiro's thinking, and a group of people who were observing on the hillside walked straight towards it after confirming that there was indeed a well in the village.
