Three days and three nights of ceaseless pouring of water onto the walls had transformed what had originally been earth-block ramparts into a thick wall of solid ice. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief; some, exhausted past endurance, simply lay down where they were and fell asleep…
"My lord, you should go and rest. You've not closed your eyes in three days." Nos came up beside Lorist, his manner extremely respectful.
If Lorist had not led his men to the central town and devised the idea of pouring water to build the ice wall, then caught completely unprepared by such a massive beast tide, the central town of the sixth district might well not have held. The lives of more than thirteen thousand people would have been ground to dust beneath the hooves of the beast herd.
Lorist's eyes were slightly red. He shook his head and said, "It's all right, I can hold out a while longer. I want to stay a bit and see how the beasts below react to the ice wall…"
Closest to the wall now were the Giant Magical Yaks, two or three meters tall. These great brutes, weighing well over a thousand catties, were the most ill-tempered of the Magical Cattle — huge, covered all over in coarse dark-brown hair, with thick, sharp horns. They were widely acknowledged as among the hardest magical beasts to deal with. Apart from the defensive ballistae, only Gold-rank knights or swordsmen could inflict any real damage on them.
Most of the land near the central town had already been roughly cleared, with little of the lichen and moss that these plant-eating beasts favored, so the herd around the town was not too dense. Even so, the defenders on the wall could see those Giant Magical Yaks pawing through the snow to nibble on the winter wheat seedlings beneath…
"Ah, the winter wheat we planted is finished. These brutes have ruined the lot of it…" Nos was utterly dejected.
"If the winter wheat is lost, we'll find a way to plant something else — potatoes, millet, broomcorn millet, they don't need to overwinter. What's important is that we mean to put down roots here, and that means finding ways to wrest territory from these beasts. This year the beast tide caught us off guard, but next year it won't be so easy. They've ruined our winter wheat — then let's keep the meat off their bones as our compensation…" Lorist said savagely.
A Giant Magical Yak fully three meters tall ambled up to the foot of the ice wall and very contentedly began scraping its body against the icy surface…
Lorist and Nos were left speechless…
Past midday, the Giant Magical Yaks near the central wall moved off, and Lorist could relax. He ate a little something and went off to rest.
His sleep was very sweet, but even so Lorist was shaken awake in the middle of his dreams. He opened his eyes to find Pat's anxious face filling his vision. "My lord, my lord, wake up quickly! The beasts are on the walls!"
What? Beasts on the walls?
Before Lorist could quite take it in, Els, sprawled on the bed across the room and groggy from sleep, opened bleary eyes. "Talking nonsense — a seven-meter wall, no siege ladders, how could the beasts climb up?"
Pat went over, hauled Els bodily up, marched him over to the window, and carefully cracked it open. "Now open your eyes and look properly. If those things on the wall aren't beasts, what are they?"
A blast of cold wind rushed in through the opened window, and for a moment everyone shivered, jolted into alertness. From next door,
Lorist laughed. "Nothing strange about it. These beasts are called Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep, and they're the best at scaling cliffs and crags to escape predators. Our wall is only seven meters high — for them it's child's play. Get dressed and let's head out. There's fresh mutton today, mutton delivered to our door — it would be a waste not to take it. And by the way: watch out for being rammed by these sheep. They say that when one of them can't escape a predator, it often chooses to charge straight at the predator instead, taking the predator over the cliff with it in a mutual death…"
"Are they easy to deal with?" Jossk asked; he had never seen this kind of magical sheep.
"On flat ground, a Bronze can handle three or four of them." Lorist replied.
"Tch. You scared me. Just a flashy little thing with no real bite, only good at scaling walls…" Pat felt rather sheepish — he had woken everyone up just for these. Had he known, he would have gone up alone.
"Never mind. Are you all ready? Let's go and hunt sheep." Lorist was the first one out the door.
Day had not quite broken, though it was not very dark either. The wooden house Lorist and his companions were staying in was very close to the city wall, and the moment they stepped out, they attracted the attention of the Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep on the wall. A chorus of bleating rose up.
"Don't go up. Just stay here on this open ground, and light the torches." Lorist ordered.
Sure enough, as soon as the torches were lit, the bleating from above grew more urgent — one could almost hear the anger and agitation in the Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep.
A clatter of rapid hoofbeats rang out, and a great mass of dark shapes came rushing down along the ramp from the wall, charging straight at the few men in the open. Pat, gripping his shield, met the first sheep with a crash. He stood rooted to the ground, motionless, while the sheep was sent tumbling head over heels.
"Start killing." At Lorist's single command, in a moment some thirty Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep lay dead on the ground.
"These things are so weak and they're still attacking us — I don't even know what to make of these sheep." Els remarked.
Lorist laughed. "Weak as they are, they're still magical beasts. Don't you see their eyes are red? They attack any human they see. Out on the wild plains, these Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep are known for being timid — they flee very fast at the sight of predators. We can head up onto the wall now; there are more up there. Everyone be careful."
Up on the wall, looking out, they were all left gaping. Below the wall — even clinging to the icy face of the wall — Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep were everywhere, and the ones up on the wall were simply following their habit of seeking high ground to spend the night. Every now and then one more would climb up onto the wall.
But the moment these Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep noticed Lorist and the others, their eyes went red and they came charging in fiercely — only to drop dead on the wall in short order.
Going round the wall once, they killed no fewer than a thousand Magical Sheep. By then they had also roused the guards in the town. Nos came charging up onto the wall with his men, joining the fight against the steady stream of Magical Sheep climbing up.
They kept killing until full daylight. Only then did the Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep, their numbers cut in half, finally regroup into a large herd and leave the central town.
Lorist and his companions were soaked in sheep's blood; the top of the wall was strewn with the frozen-solid corpses of Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep.
Nos too was covered in blood, and came over with a look of shame on his face. "My lord, this is my oversight — I shouldn't have left no one on watch on the wall last night…"
Lorist waved a hand and laughed. "It's nothing. What we're facing here are magical beasts, not enemy besiegers. And I did tell you not to let the guards disturb the beast herds below. Posting no night watch is perfectly normal, and besides, after three days of toil everyone needed proper rest. Look at these Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep — fresh meat that delivered itself to our door. Have everyone get up and tidy themselves; I've heard the meat of these sheep is wonderfully tasty. Today we're all in for a treat. Haha."
The catch of more than five thousand Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep brought smiles to everyone's faces. Nos had a dozen great pots set up in the town's central plaza and threw mutton offal, sheep bones and the like in to simmer endlessly. Anyone who wanted some broth was free to scoop up a bowlful…
Lorist was enjoying some delicious little mutton ribs. The cook in the central town of the sixth district was no slouch — the little ribs were grilled tender and dripping with juice. Beside him, Els had already wolfed down six in one go, his belly stuffed to bursting, yet was reaching for another.
Lorist himself was working on his fifth rib when he suddenly remembered something. He quickly told Nos to instruct the cooks to set aside all the mutton ribs for him — he had a use for them — then asked for the layout plan of the central town and began to study it in deep thought.
Jossk strolled over to Lorist with a grilled leg of mutton in hand, chewing as he came. "Now what — what scheme are you cooking up?"
Lorist replied, "I'm thinking about whether to let some magical beasts into the town…"
"What? Have you gone mad?" Jossk gave a great start.
"You're the one who's gone mad! What I mean is, whether we should set traps inside the town — as we did today, lure some plant-eating magical beasts into the town so we can deal with them. Look — these past two days everyone in the town was on edge, the whole place felt dead. Today, after we killed all those Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep, you see that everyone is in good spirits, the town is full of life. What I'm worried about is that if all we can do is hunker down and defend the town, it will fill people with fear and despair of the beast tide. But if, as I said, we deliberately lure some beasts into the town and trap them, then in the future everyone will treat the beast tide as a hunting opportunity, and no one will fear the arrival of the next tide." Lorist quickly explained his thinking.
"You gave me a fright." Jossk said sheepishly. "My lord, if you're confident, then go ahead. I don't understand the larger principles — in any case, I stand with you."
Nos walked in, carrying in his hand a fresh Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep rib bone, with quite a bit of meat still on it. "My lord, you wanted this? How would you like it — grilled or boiled?"
Lorist took the rib bone, picked up a small knife, and trimmed the meat off it; then with the small knife he sharpened both ends of the rib to a point. "Bring me a basin of hot water…"
Hot water was quickly brought. Lorist placed the rib bone, sharpened at both ends, into the hot water, then slowly bent it into a circle. He drew it out and instructed Pat to bind the two sharpened ends together with a length of cord; he then wound the trimmed-off meat around this rib-bone ring, and tossed it onto the snow.
Everyone looked on, baffled. Lorist explained, "What I just made with this rib bone is a trap — designed specifically against carnivorous magical beasts and ferocious beasts."
"My lord, you're not joking, are you? This single rib bone is going to deal with those fierce carnivores and predators?" The others did not believe it.
The rib-bone ring had already frozen solid. Lorist had it brought back in.
"You see, when carnivorous magical beasts or ferocious beasts find this on the ground, they'll swallow it down in one gulp." Lorist removed the cord. The rib-bone ring, now frozen, kept its shape.
"Think about it — the inside of a magical beast's belly should be warm, just like this basin of warm water." Lorist tossed the rib-bone ring into the warm water.
Before long, the scraps of meat frozen to the rib bone thawed and floated free of the ring. Then everyone watched as the rib-bone ring began to slowly change shape, soon straightening out and finally returning to a slightly curved bone with two sharp points at either end.
"If a magical beast has a rib bone like this opening up inside its belly — heh, then no matter how fierce the magical beast or ferocious beast, it's a dead beast walking. Everyone understand now?" Lorist looked around with a smile.
"Wow, my lord, you really are a genius. To deal with carnivorous magical beasts and ferocious beasts this way takes no effort at all." Pat and Nos praised.
"That's our Loke. Only you would come up with something this nasty — I love it." Els picked up the rib bone in praise.
Lorist's brow twitched. Hey, Els, that's supposed to be a compliment?
"That's not right," Jossk said with a frown after thinking for a moment. "My lord, those carnivorous magical beasts would normally bite at something like that a few times before swallowing it. With how sharp their teeth are, this rib bone of yours would be ground to splinters in no time and wouldn't work at all."
Lorist clapped his hands. "Jo, you're absolutely right. Just now I had nothing on hand, so I had to wrap the meat scraps around it. For the real trap, what you use is mutton fat. As you know, mutton fat — no matter how hard it's frozen — melts in the mouth. So those magical beasts and ferocious beasts will swallow it down in a hurry, without bothering to bite."
"This isn't a trap I thought up — it's an idea from the greatest adventurer in history, Cameron Pritt, a hundred years ago. He was once stranded on a deserted island for two years, and during winter he used this very sort of trap to catch two magical beasts. That carried him through famine until the day he was rescued. The ribs of the Coiling-Mountain Horn-Sheep, because of their mountain-climbing habits, are exceptionally elastic, which makes them the ideal material for traps of this kind."
Lorist glanced around at the others in the room. "In another two days the beast tide will leave the sixth district and head for the fifth. Bringing up the rear are the carnivorous magical beasts and ferocious beasts. These carnivores are not like the plant-eating beasts beneath our walls — the plant-eaters only attack what they see, but the carnivores will scent us out and come hunting. Although we have the ice wall protecting us, we cannot afford to be careless. So make a good number of these traps — be prepared, just in case."
"Yes, my lord."
"And one more thing. I'm also wondering whether we should open the gates and exploit the way these plant-eating beasts attack on sight to lure some low-threat creatures — Magical Sheep, Magical Deer and the like — into the town, so that we can stockpile even more fresh meat. What do you all think?" Lorist asked.
"My lord, I have no objection. I'll follow your orders." Nos said.
In the last two days of the beast tide, Lorist seized the moment and opened the gates twice, luring inside a mixed herd of Great-Horned Wild Sheep and Single-Horned Magical Sheep, and also a herd of Magic-Patterned Spotted Deer. The first time, however, he failed to time the closing of the gates well, and rather too many of those two kinds of Magical Sheep poured in — close to twenty thousand head in all. The whole population, shouting and shrieking, kept at it until well after midnight before they had finally dealt with all the Magical Sheep careening through the town. Nearly a hundred unlucky souls were rammed and injured by the sheep, but fortunately those joining the hunt were iron-armored garrison troops and family soldiers, so with proper protection there were no fatalities.
The atmosphere that day was wildly festive. The hunters dashed through the streets and alleyways — sometimes chased by Magical Sheep, sometimes chasing them — and it often happened that a group of soldiers would be chasing a few sheep down the road, only to find a larger herd ahead, at which they would turn tail and run, with the sheep now in pursuit, only for another group of soldiers to come pouring up from the other direction, cut down the herd, and then turn to chase the remaining Magical Sheep…
Townsfolk not taking part in the hunt crowded at every window, and even climbed onto the roofs to shout and cheer, watching with great glee, raising cheers without end. It got to the point where, by the time only a small group of Magical Sheep was left, no one bothered cutting them down anymore. Instead, people grabbed shields and went out to ram them head-on — those who lost the ram-off slunk away in shame, while the winners were heroes, earning the applause and cheers of the crowd, and blown kisses from the women…
Lorist would never have dreamed that his "let the beasts into the town" plan would become, in years to come, the locale's grandest festival — the "Ram-Ramming Festival." To protect these hard-won Magical Sheep, it was even decreed that no weapons could be used: participants could only take up a shield and meet the Magical Sheep head-on, until every last sheep was knocked senseless…
After the trouble with the first gate-opening, Lorist hadn't wanted to try again, but to his surprise the crowd, by then thoroughly worked up, unanimously protested.
Lorist could only bow to popular will and open the gate one more time, luring in a few thousand Magic-Patterned Spotted Deer to let everyone enjoy the spectacle again.
The Magic-Patterned Spotted Deer were already the tail end of the plant-eating beasts. Behind them came the great mass of carnivorous magical beasts and ferocious beasts that followed the beast tide as predators. The most common were the various winter wolf packs.
From the wall, Lorist saw one of the largest winter wolf packs — close to a thousand of them. He gave orders that all the finished rib-bone ring traps be thrown outside the wall, planning to go out in a couple of days to gather up the corpses…
… (To be continued.)
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