Chapter 299: Coming of Age Ceremony
At night, as everyone gradually drifted off to sleep, Zi fashioned an eyepatch for herself using rope and animal skin to cover her right eye, which could not open.
This action filled the tribe with even greater awe towards Zi; everyone believed this was the will of the Invisible King.
In her sleep, Ace attempted to communicate with Zi again. This time, he did his utmost to restrain his own information flow.
Zi felt herself entering a strange dreamscape once more. Her feet stepped on cold marble slabs, each one inscribed with a ringed hexagram pattern.
Zi lowered her body and touched the hexagram pattern with her hand; it seemed to carry a slight burning sensation.
She raised her head to look straight ahead. A massive, pitch-black silhouette loomed there. Unlike the body of light and shadow she had seen last time, this pitch-black giant figure invited exploration and lacked those maddening whispers.
“Are you… the great Invisible King?”
Zi prostrated herself on the ground. The young girl’s healthy and graceful figure displayed perfect lines. She performed a primitive priestly salutation, then rose from her prostration and began to dance.
Zi’s dance was filled with wildness and mystery, as if stepping to the beat of a drum, extremely rhythmic. After the dance, Zi prostrated herself again, moving forward on her knees. Her hands were raised high as she gazed feverishly at the pitch-black giant silhouette.
“I believe you are my Lord, the great Invisible King! Thank you for saving us from peril. We lack strength; we cannot fight against the giant beasts, and even tigers can bully us at will.
“Great King, please open your eyes, have mercy on us, and save your lamb!”
Zi moved forward on her knees step by step, striving to get closer to the pitch-black giant silhouette. Time passed bit by bit, yet she did not get any closer to the giant figure.
Ace looked at Zi, who was as small as an ant, and attempted to convert information into content she could understand, transmitting it to her carefully.
Zi sensed the whispers. She tried hard to listen, but only became dizzier, eventually falling into a coma.
Over the next few days, Leaf led half of the adult tribe members to gather berries, while Deer stayed in the cave to craft stone spears, stone axes, and slings.
In the evening, the tribe members returned, but Leaf did not. She had been attacked by a tiger and died.
The atmosphere in the cave gradually became heavy. In just ten days, after escaping from the giant beasts, they had been driven to desperation by a single tiger.
Duan found Deer, somewhat agitated.
“We can’t wait here to die. We must find a way to kill that tiger. Please give me a spear!”
Deer looked at the young Duan and refused him.
“You aren’t an adult yet. You cannot participate in the hunt. Tomorrow, I will lead all the adult males to hunt the tiger. You stay home and behave!”
Zi watched this scene numbly. Deer had already consulted her, and she had been noncommittal.
In fact, Zi’s brain could barely think. The excessive information—the whispers—brought her close to madness. If not for her exceptional talent as a Witch and her mental strength far exceeding that of ordinary people, she might have already gone insane.
After several failed attempts, Ace finally determined the bandwidth of information flow Zi could receive. He packaged the improved “Blood Food Transport Method” into the information stream, preparing to teach it to Zi in the form of whispers.
In the dream, for the first time, Zi understood the whispers of the Invisible King.
She watched as images of humans walking, sitting, and lying down appeared before her eyes, oscillating between illusion and reality. There were various postures, and most importantly, the method of Blood Food.
“Consume the hot blood and cooked meat of fierce beasts, absorb the Blood Qi within, merge it with the body, accumulate it deeply, and release it slowly.”
The so-called walking, sitting, and lying postures were summarized by Ace as specific fixed movements capable of stirring human Blood Qi. As long as one strengthened oneself through the Blood Food Method, filling the body with vitality, it was possible to trigger Blood Qi bit by bit through the continuous Transport Method (the fixed postures).
When the Blood Qi was fully activated, a person could mobilize their inherent vitality power—a power possessed by all living things—to achieve feats unattainable by mortals.
At dusk, the hunting party returned.
Three men had died, but they dragged back the dead tiger.
Zi stared at the dead tiger, walked up to Deer, and spoke in a calm tone.
“I want the tiger’s blood and heart!”
Deer was both exhausted and excited. Hearing Zi’s words, he did not refuse and obediently offered the blood and heart to Zi.
From that day on, for every prey the tribe hunted, the blood and heart had to be saved and offered to Zi. Using the knowledge taught by the Invisible King, Zi instructed the tribe members on how to build earthen kilns and fire pottery.
The situation of the entire tribe gradually improved. Others, seeing Zi perform strange fixed postures while walking, sitting, and even dancing every day, followed suit and mimicked her movements.
As time passed, people found that these movements had no practical use. After the initial enthusiasm faded, they gradually stopped persisting. Winter slowly approached.
The tribe had only thirty-five people left: ten adult males and nine adult females.
Duan’s height had exceeded 1.6 meters (approx. 5.25 ft). The tribe was holding his coming-of-age ceremony. The whole tribe was excited; every additional adult meant a bit more recovery of the tribe’s vitality.
As the tribe’s highest religious leader, Zi naturally became the host of the coming-of-age ceremony, even though Zi herself was not yet an adult. She was only fourteen, and her height hadn’t reached 1.4 meters (approx. 4.6 ft), so she didn’t count as an adult.
According to tribal rules, a male was an adult at three cubits (approx. 1.6m), and a female at two and a half cubits (approx. 1.35-1.4m).
Although Ace resided in Zi’s right eye, weaving dreams and sealing himself within, he could observe the outside world through Zi.
The flow of time in this world was extremely fast. He felt that half a year had passed here, while only half an hour had passed for his main body. He didn’t feel any aging either; it seemed that in this world, his existence held an extremely high status/rank.
So Ace believed he had plenty of time to sow seeds slowly and wait quietly for them to bloom and bear fruit.
Zi stared at Duan, smearing green plant dye and white lime on his cheeks and forehead. She danced around Duan using the fixed postures of the Blood Food Transport Method.
The people were accustomed to this, thinking this dance was the latest sacrificial dance, and jumped along with Zi. Duan, surrounded by the crowd, had a complex expression. His eyes fixed on Zi, and his lips moved slightly.
Zi’s dancing gradually stopped. Although she wasn’t tall, her figure was the best in the tribe. She walked gracefully to stand before Duan, placed her hands on his shoulders, and signaled for him to kneel.
“Pray to the great Invisible King. Beg for the Invisible King’s grace to protect our tribe and protect Duan. We will devoutly believe in the Invisible King; You are the only Savior.”
Duan did not kneel. His expression was conflicted as he looked around at the crowd and said:
“I experienced that whisper. I cannot deny the existence of the Invisible King. But, will He truly protect us? Or is it that we only need to pray to gain the Invisible King’s favor?
“I believe the Invisible King is great, but we should win favor through our actions, not through prayer.”
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