The Great Worm Lich

Even though the worn jeep looked like it was about to be scrapped, the sound of the engine was still loud and powerful.

A skinny young white man started the car and stepped on the gas pedal. Under the glaring sun, it set off a series of choking dust sounds as he sped it up towards the bearded man and chuckled strangely. “Boss, I’ve driven the car here for the customer!”

“Then why don’t you get down from the car right now?” The bearded man, who was secretly watching Zhang Lisheng’s facial expression, roared and pulled his subordinate down from the jeep. Then, he apologized to the young man, “Sorry, but I can’t be your driver. I’m a man who loves freedom so I’m not used to having a boss above me. Here, take a look at your car, young man. You can pay me if you feel satisfied.”

Zhang Lisheng smiled silently and patted the hood of the jeep next to him. “There’s no need to try anymore. I know it’s good when I hear the sound.”

Then, he took out a credit card from his pocket.

“You have good judgment!” The skinny young white man snatched the credit card from his hand and ran to the shelter made from rows of black plastic cloth in the corner of the parking lot. After he had swiped the card, he used the receipt to shade himself from the sun and strode back to Zhang Lisheng. “Sign here, buddy! After you’ve signed your name, this ‘little baby’ will be all yours.”

Zhang Lisheng nodded and signed his name on the bill with no expression, before entering the jeep and driving away.

Watching him drive slowly out of the parking lot and disappear, the skinny young white man looked up to the bearded man and asked strangely, “What’s wrong with you, boss? It’s that kid! I’ll never mistake him for another guy! It’s him who’ll always spend several dozens of thousands of dollars to buy new cars on the island all by himself every few weeks! Every time, he’ll never bargain as well…”

“Torres, stop it! I’ve tested the kid just now and it’s either he’s a bluff or a decoy to distract us. If he’s a bluff, then he’d never waste his money at such a sh*tty place.” The bearded man violently spat on the ground. “We’re merely seeking money on this island, so there’s no need for us to take risks. There are many baby cows that we can trick so why should we bother to catch a bison with sharp horns?”

“Bison? I think he’s a sheep that is pretending…” Torres muttered, unwilling to give up.

“Oh shut up, idiot! Are you the boss here or am I the boss? Go remove the useful parts of the scrap car I received yesterday! If you continue to talk nonsense, I’ll twist off your head!” The rebuttal of his subordinate made the bearded man roar angrily. As he was roaring, Zhang Lisheng was carrying the boxes of medicines used to formulate the stabilizers to the jeep from the cold storage that he used as a warehouse to place his experimental materials.

After loading them up his car, he started the car and drove out of the warehouse. Following the crowds and traffic flow, he drove out of the city gate and left the human gathering place of Shrimp B1 Island. When he had entered deep in the jungle, he destroyed the newly bought jeep with his transformation power and sat on Ghostface that had regained its huge body size, before heading towards Tudenan tribe loaded with his reagents.

The wizard gu swiftly coursed through the jungle up and down as the surrounding trees flashed across his eyes. Only the sharp wind sound by his ears could follow Zhang Lisheng’s speed with great difficulty.

Less than two hours later, as he looked at the front from the back of Ghostface that was on the canopy of a giant tree, a large, urban-like aborigine tribe appeared in front of him.

From afar, he could see thousands of red-browed warriors wearing tough leather armor, made from seven to eight layers of soft tanned beast skin that were layered together and sewn densely on the corners, riding on giant spiders that were covered with fine light purple hairs as they held a spear that was three to four meters long, which was made from a hardwood rod and a one-foot-long prismatic metal spear head in one hand, and a curved long iron knife in another while they patrolled around the tribe with a cold face to and fro for safety.

Beside them were countless bark houses arranged in a circular structure from small to large in a dense and neat arrangement. There were around 100 tree houses or so on the outermost periphery, with a spacious, flat road lying between every few wooden houses in the innermost.

On the giant square at the end of all the roads stood a striking totem pole, that had a large diameter carved with patterns of fighting spiritual monsters and beasts, along with a huge wooden frame that had hundreds of huge and small pulleys in a well-arranged manner.

All of the pulleys on the wooden frame were connected through a thick purple rope. More than ten four-limbed monsters that looked like giant apes with silver backs were pulling the rope under the wooden frame using their two large arms. The other end of the rope continued to pull up an uninterrupted number of hollowed-out log carts that were tied together from a dark deep cave that was laid with wooden rails.

On the wooden carts, hundreds of small-scaled eyeless big fishes were struggling and leaping with all their might as they were pierced with sharp wooden prongs by the countless surrounding aborigine women, before having their guts sliced and air-dried on the ground.

“F*ck! These aborigine craftsmen have actually created a semi-automatic animal-powered skid wagon to transport the catch in the underground river. This is really, really…” Zhang Lisheng muttered to himself in astonishment. He was so dumbfounded that he could not find any suitable word to describe this.

At this time, the chief warrior, who was patrolling outside the tribe, inadvertently saw his figure sitting on Ghostface looking at them from a bird’s-eye view. With a shudder, he quickly jumped off his ‘partner’ and kneeled on the ground to make a ceremonial worshiping.

Very soon, the devout action of the chief warrior spread out to the entire Tudenan like a wildfire spreading out in dry grass. In a period of time that was absolutely unimaginable to undevout believers, more than 100,000 aborigines who remained behind in the tribe kneeled on the ground.

“Great Raider! We offer you piety, you’re the living legend of Tudenan, you’re the living faith that walks on the ground…” Words of praise filled the air.

Of course Zhang Lisheng could not just turn a blind eye to such scenery. Amidst the sudden countless prayers, he commanded the wizard gu to slide along the colorless silk into the central open space of the Tudenan tribe from the air.

The tribal headman, who had already been kneeling on the ground, hastily rushed towards Zhang Lisheng on his knees to kiss Zhang Lisheng’s instep. “Great Raider, you’re back!”

“Yes, I’m back, Tugra! Looks like all of you have done a lot of good changes when I was gone. I thought that it would take at least several dozen days for the abruptly expanded Tudenan to become one whole entity but it has never crossed my mind that I’d see such a surprise.”

“Great Raider! The reason we can give you such surprise is also because it’s all thanks to you that Tudenan became the hegemon that has no rivals in the surrounding forests. Not only that, but you’ve also imparted countless valuable knowledge to the tribal craftsmen, but has never asked for any offering from the tribe before, inspiring countless Tudenan people! First, Sotulu and Dubuki contributed the secret of domestication of Lohlos to us and after that, Vakuku also voluntarily contributed to the secret of breeding giant millispiders, allowing us to finish building several tens of thousands of tree houses and breed enough partners after we’ve just selected our elite warriors in such a short period of time.”

Upon hearing Tugra’s words, Zhang Lisheng was dumbstruck for a moment. He knew that in the Hellfire tribes, the craftsmen who mastered the knowledge of iron casting, large tree house construction, and the animal trainers who mastered the ‘partner’ domestication method were all generations of heritage. By relying on the skills of these ancestral legacy, they had no need to risk their lives hunting and could enjoy the status of honor in the tribe.

In particular, the animal trainer who mastered the warrior ‘partner’ breeding secret method, their positions could be said as lofty. According to tradition, their skills were something that not even God could spy on. For this reason, he really could not understand why the young man, who acted wantonly and was even intimidated by him last time, would actually actively contribute the precious secrets passed down from generation to generation.

“Vakuku actually contributed the breeding secret of giant millispiders? Send a man to inform him to see me. I’ll grant him three feathers and let him serve as the leader of all the animal trainers in Tudenan!” Unable to think of the reason no matter how he pondered over it, Zhang Lisheng no longer wracked his mind and just gave out his command directly.

“Yes, Great Raider!” Tugra stood up and waved to the warrior beside him to call for Vakuku. At this time, Zhang Lisheng added again, “That’s right, Tugra! Is there any other small tribes around Tudenan?”

“No more, Raider. It’s impossible for a small tribe to exist around a newborn Hellfire tribe that has hundreds of thousands of tribesmen. The tribes that survived the ‘glorious night’ have long since disappeared!” Tugra answered with confidence as he shook his head.

In the eyes of the Hellfire men, the so-called ‘newborn’ meant revenge, expansion, and aggression. In the face of a tribe that was newly born to hundreds of thousands of tribesmen in a very short period of time, unless the tribe had similar strength, almost all of the tribes would choose to take a great risk of having their vitality greatly injured to dodge as far as possible. This was also one of the tricks for the survival of these weak Hellfire tribes.

“They’ve all run away…” Zhang Lisheng frowned. “Then how about those empty hunting grounds? Can you use it as a bait to attract some… Ah, forget it! The Hellfire people are not so dumb. From what you said just now, I think there should be no small tribes that are willing to move to Tudenan’s side in a few years.”

“It’s not a few years but several decades, Raider,” Tugra said respectfully. “According to the usual practice, no small tribe would dare to covet their eyes on the idle Tudenan hunting grounds for one whole generation.”

The Tudenan’s headman implied that after several decades of stabilization, if Tudenan continued to progress in a stable manner, then it would be able to occupy all the surrounding hunting grounds and become even more prosperous. On the other hand, if Tudenan maintained its current situation, then it would no doubt mean that the tribe had lost its dash of expansion and had become stabilized. By that time, there would naturally be other tribes that would come take up some of the idle hunting grounds.

The third possibility would be through people gradually declining. This possibility was the most common in newborn powerful tribes. In that case, the consequences were naturally self-evident, with the tribe being able to only maintain hunting grounds of comparable strength.