Chapter 92: Can’t Eat It All, Simply Can’t Eat It All

Chapter 92: Chapter 92: Can’t Eat It All, Simply Can’t Eat It All

Zerev returned to Ten Thousand Beasts City and sat quietly alone in his room.

Ophelia’s angry expression played on a loop in his mind. The disappointment and fury in her eyes made his heart feel as though it were being squeezed by an invisible hand.

After a long while, he tapped lightly on the table, and a Beast Servant appeared in the room. "Young Master, you asked for me. What are your orders?"

"Go back to the Holy Capital and fetch some linen and clothes. Get the best quality, meant for a little female."

The Beast Servant felt a bit confused but knew better than to question him. "Yes, Young Master. I’ll get it done right away."

After the Beast Servant left, Moye walked in through the door, a hint of curiosity on his face. "Young Master, why do you suddenly need more linen? Are you running out of clothes?"

Zerev remained silent, not answering immediately. He stared down at the table, seemingly deep in thought.

Finally, with a touch of hesitation in his voice, he asked, "Moye, do you... do you know how to coax a little female and make her happy?"

Moye paused for a moment before realization dawned on him. "Ah, so you’ve upset the little female, Ophelia. Why is she angry, then?"

With a calm expression, Zerev recounted the day’s events to Moye. As he finished, he recalled Ophelia coldly asking him to leave, her gaze icy.

"I see. The little female is angry because she discovered you were hiding things from her, and your secrets could very well put her in danger," Moye said.

"With me here, I will never let her be in danger," Zerev replied, his brows knitting together at Moye’s words.

Moye shook his head. His master could be swift and decisive when it came to major matters, but he was completely clueless about how to handle these delicate nuances. Or perhaps, given his status, he had never needed to bother with such minor details before.

"Young Master, you can protect her today, and you can protect her tomorrow, but what about the future?

"You can’t stay by her side every single moment. Once you catch the mastermind, you’ll return to the Holy Capital. What is she supposed to do then?

"Can you guarantee that you’ll catch every single one of them? If even one slips through the cracks, she’s just a little female with no ability to defend herself."

His master’s actions had undoubtedly tied Ophelia to a sinking ship, surrounded by peril.

"I didn’t think that far ahead," Zerev admitted.

Moye sighed. "Young Master, what exactly are your intentions with Ophelia? Do you just like her cooking?"

Zerev merely maintained his silence.

"Let me rephrase that. Do you truly like Ophelia, or do you just find her unique and want to play around with her?" Moye asked. He posed the question because many noble males in the Holy Capital enjoyed toying with the feelings of little females, only to abandon them without ever forming a formal bond.

Zerev pursed his lips, not answering immediately. He lowered his gaze to the table, his mind constantly flashing back to every little moment he had shared with Ophelia.

She had a gentle and considerate personality toward males, yet her head was always brimming with the strangest ideas. She didn’t rely entirely on males for everything, but occasionally, she would act coquettishly with her mate, always teasing that Dragon Beast until he flushed crimson. She was so vibrant and full of life; her every move tugged at his heartstrings.

"Young Master, feelings aren’t something to be played with," Moye said.

For a long time now, Moye hadn’t been able to make sense of his master’s behavior. If he liked her, he never took the initiative to get close, nor did he engage in any overly intimate actions. But if he didn’t like her, he was always eagerly running off to the Fu Clan and bringing her novel trinkets.

He was completely in the dark, unsure of how he was supposed to help.

Zerev remained silent. He didn’t know the answer himself. But he liked being with Ophelia; even just sharing the same space as her felt good. He wanted to be able to see her all the time.

The next morning, Ophelia finished cooking the meal. Everyone gathered, but Zerev was nowhere to be seen. Remembering how he had kept things from her the day before, she waved her hand in annoyance. "Let’s eat!"

Lam and Sail hadn’t left the previous day. The weather was currently warm enough that sleeping outside wouldn’t leave them feeling cold. Besides, as merchants who constantly traveled back and forth, they were long accustomed to braving the elements.

When they were mostly finished eating, Lam asked, "Ophelia, what are the requirements to join the Fuzu Tribe? How much prey must be handed over each year?"

Ophelia pondered for a moment. The members of the Golden Dragon Clan had to submit ten heads of prey to the tribe every year, and other tribes had similar quotas. However, the Fu Clan had just been established and was at a critical juncture for recruiting talent, so the conditions couldn’t be too harsh.

"Nothing is finalized yet, but I can confirm that there’s no need to hand over any prey for the first three years," she replied.

"No need? Not even for purchasing land?" Sail asked in surprise. He often traveled far from his own tribe to barter for goods elsewhere, yet he still had to hand over ten heads of prey every year. To think the Fu Clan wouldn’t collect any prey for three whole years.

Lam knitted his brows. "If you don’t collect prey, how will you run the tribe?"

A tribe always needed "surplus food" to ensure the survival of its people during years of disaster. For instance, because the Golden Dragon Clan had ample reserves of prey, the recent prolonged rainy season hadn’t caused much harm to their tribe. In contrast, the Snow Wolf Clan had insufficient reserves. Many males starved to death during the rainy season, and they even had to trade away ten little females just to obtain medicine for the sick.

"I’m raising livestock," Ophelia explained. "The eggs you’re eating right now were laid by the chickens I raise. Those chickens can lay eggs every day. Chickens lay eggs, eggs hatch into chickens... in the future, we’ll be able to fill our stomachs just by eating chicken."

Ophelia’s mind drifted to thoughts of fried chicken wings, fried drumsticks, and chicken tenders.

Lam looked at the egg in his hand; it was twice the size of the wild eggs he usually found in the forest. If things were truly as Ophelia described, she indeed wouldn’t need to rely on her tribemates handing over prey.

"So these are the eggs from your own chickens. No wonder they’re so big!" Sail chuckled innocently, not overthinking the matter.

Samo shoveled a large piece of green pepper scrambled eggs into his bowl and mumbled through a mouthful of food, "Eggs are nothing. She’s raising piglets and rabbits, too." He had no idea what was going on with those piglets and rabbits, but in the mere ten days since he had arrived, the piglets had already grown noticeably plumper.

"Pigs, too?"

Lam suddenly lost his appetite for the meal. He grabbed Sail, eager to go see the piglets immediately.

Ophelia smiled at his impatient demeanor. She wiped her hands and began to carefully explain her setup.

Beside the pigpen, a five-square-meter chicken coop had been built. The chickens had been caught from the mountain (though they were actually mature egg-laying hens from her farm space). Ophelia had asked Tyler to clip the inner flight feathers of their wings early on, so they couldn’t fly away. Plus, with food provided every day, they had no desire to escape and obediently laid eggs day after day.

Next to the chicken coop was the rabbit enclosure. Knowing that rabbits liked to burrow, she had paved the entire floor of their pen with green stone slabs, leaving them no place to dig holes.

"These piglets are growing quite nicely! They should be ready to eat in a few months, right? I wonder how they’ll taste," Sail said, practically drooling as he stared at the plump, pink pigs.

Tyler stood by with a taut face, remaining silent.

The truth was, all the meat the elderly males had been eating lately was pork from the pigs raised in the Princess’s space. A new batch matured every five days—sixty pigs at a time. It was simply impossible for them to finish it all.