novel bin Chapter 32 Don't take advantage of others
Chapter 32 Don't take advantage of others
When we got back to where we were, the last rays of the sun's orange-red had already sunk below the horizon.
As dusk settled over the grassland, the light turned a grayish-blue, and visibility was still fairly clear, but the outlines of the grass at the edges began to blur.
The lion king, perched atop a raised platform at the highest point of its resting place, stretched out its limbs and held its head high, placing itself in an undisputed dominant position. Its mane billowed in the evening breeze, exuding an air of authority.
Chen Fei circled around to the west to reach his spot, and sat down about two meters to the side of the Lion King. He didn't sit directly opposite him or try to take his place; instead, he turned to the east, as if staring blankly at the patch of grass he had walked back from.
The lion king's gaze lingered on him for two seconds without uttering a sound.
Sail, Meimei, and Datou, their heads turned almost simultaneously toward the spot where Chen Fei had returned.
Sel's ears turned slightly towards him, its beautiful tail stopped wagging slowly, and its big head simply turned its whole body around, facing Chen Fei directly, completely disregarding whether the action was too obvious.
The Lion King's gaze swept over the reactions of Sel, Meimei, and Datou before finally returning to Chen Fei, pausing for an even longer second than before.
Chen Fei took this detail into his peripheral vision, but didn't move, continuing to stare at the east side.
[Host: Chen Fei]
[Identity: Sub-adult male lion]
[Energy Points: 527↑]
a little.
His daytime movements and constant heightened sensory alertness allowed him to squeeze out a small amount of information, mostly accumulated through long-term learning and judgment, and continuous analysis of the enemy and friendly situations, which he systematically recognized in a fraction of his knowledge.
He glanced at the number, categorized it in the "meaningless" brain region, casually turned it off, and continued calculating his own accounts.
The stray individuals in the northeast corner have stabilized, the new marker on the south side has been confirmed, the terrain of the westward migration landing site is usable, and the dark brown mane scent sequence has reached the end of the second step.
Only one step remains.
A roar.
He didn't know the exact moment it would be sent out—it could be before it got completely dark, after moonrise, earlier than he expected, or late at night.
But one thing he was absolutely certain of: the roar would come tonight.
The atmosphere at the resting place was strangely quiet. Even the stingy creature had woken up from its sleep, its limbs tucked in, sitting silently against Meimei, its round eyes facing east. It didn't understand what the smell meant, but it knew that everyone was looking to the east, so it looked to the east as well.
Big Head rested its head on its front paws, seemingly taking a break, but its ears remained erect. Every ten seconds or so, it would subtly adjust its angle to the east, aiming its most sensitive auricle at the depths of the grass. Hearing nothing, it would adjust back and wait again.
Chen Fei relaxed his limbs, his body weight evenly distributed on his feet, and his back straight. From the outside, he looked like a completely relaxed lion.
A heat was slowly rising from his fingertips to his shoulder blades, not the surge of unlocking, but a natural preparatory reaction of the system as it sensed the approaching battle. It was slight and continuous, like charcoal in a furnace, not lit, but already hot.
Then, it came.
From the due east direction of the territory, across the grassland, over the sparse forest, and into the gray-blue air of twilight, a roar was heard.
It wasn't a test, nor a warning; it was a declarative roar, a roar that suppressed all volume to the deepest part of the throat and then pushed outwards. It was low-frequency, long, and the sound waves spread across the grassland. All the animals around were silent for a second, and then fell into complete stillness.
A warm current flowed from Chen Fei's fingertips upwards and quietly across his entire palm.
The roaring stopped, but the grassland did not immediately return to normal.
This is a unique aftereffect of a lion's war cry.
The penetrating power of low-frequency sound waves can freeze all animals within an eight-kilometer radius in place, not because they understand anything, but because the vibration of this frequency band directly triggers the escape inhibition at the deepest level of the nervous system, causing all creatures to make the same judgment within a fraction of a second: Don't move, first listen carefully to find out where the threat is.
The birds are gone.
The insects are gone.
Even the slightest rustling of the wind through the grass seemed to be choked, as if someone had caught their breath in their throat and couldn't exhale.
Chen Fei stood up.
He didn't rush or hesitate; he simply stood up, landed on all fours, and steadily shifted his weight, changing from the relaxed sitting posture to a different state.
It wasn't a performance for anyone in particular; it was because there wasn't time to sit any longer.
The Lion King reacted before him.
The wounded old lion rose from the earthen platform, raised its neck, pressed all its strength into its dantian, and then pushed it outward, letting out a responsive roar.
The moment the sound came out, Chen Fei mentally made a rather impolite comparison between the two shouts.
The sound from the dark brown mane seemed to roll out from underground, low-frequency and long, the sound waves spreading across the grassland in all directions, giving a sense of something being compressed and heavy.
The Lion King's roar was unsteady, with a slight crack in the middle, like a taut string that loosened a little at the point where it needed to be full. It didn't break, but it also failed to maintain the necessary force, and it deflated prematurely at the end.
normal.
The wounded old lion, with less than 60% of its strength, was already pushing itself to its limits to roar this loudly.
Chen Fei didn't yell along.
It's not that it can't be done, it's that it shouldn't be done.
The Lion King was still there, so it wasn't his place to speak. But when he stepped forward and made a sound, it wasn't to help; it was to steal the spotlight and show everyone, including the Lion King, who the real responder in this territory was.
We shouldn't take advantage of this now.
He suppressed the thought, turned to the east, and aimed his ear at the direction from which the deep brown mane roared, and began to listen.
Big Head was diagonally behind him. The moment the roar came, it sprang up from its "pretending to rest with its head down" state. Its front paws instinctively dug into the ground, leaving four shallow marks. Its ears snapped forward at an extreme angle, and its eyes widened to almost twice their usual size. It scanned the ground, noticing Chen Fei was already standing and listening, that Sail was close to Chen Fei, and that Meimei was turned to the east—
Then it also faces east.
It tried very hard to prick up its ears, tilted its head forward slightly, looking completely focused, and its claws gripped the ground tightly, making the four shallow marks deeper and deeper.
Chen Fei made a mental note of it and didn't look back.
Sel came over at that moment.
Without making a sound, he walked over and stood to Chen Fei's left, his body facing exactly the same direction as Chen Fei's, his head facing east, his ears facing east, standing side by side with him, blocking the view to his left.
There are no complicated signals in this action that need to be interpreted; it's simply that a lioness has stood next to the position she believes she needs to be in.
Chen Fei turned his head, his gaze lingered on Sair's profile for a second, then looked away and continued listening.
[Host: Chen Fei]
[Identity: Sub-adult male lion]
[Energy Points: 527↑]
The numbers didn't change, and he didn't expect them to increase at a time like this. The system panel popped up, probably just fulfilling some kind of routine reporting duty.
He glanced at it.