Chapter Forty: Conspiracy on Land

“Don’t! It’s only three years old and doesn’t understand anything yet. How can you hit it?” With a pained look, Chu Tian glanced at the creature, then grabbed a jar of wine and ran over to the mammoth’s trunk. “Here, uncle will give you some wine!”

“Haha! Thank you, uncle!” The mammoth grinned innocently, not realizing its laughter would make Chu Tian’s ears ring. Then it extended its trunk, even thicker than Chu Tian himself, and wrapped it around the wine jar.

“No drinking!” Basten, driven mad with anger, unleashed another burst of battle energy. With a thunderous crash, the mammoth and the wine jar were sent sprawling to the ground, the earth trembling three times in succession. “Wuuu! Wuuu!” The mammoth whimpered with tears brimming in its eyes. “I just wanted some wine!”

Seeing the mammoth knocked down, Chu Tian hurriedly took out a heap of medical supplies and devices from his ring and rushed over. “Hang in there, uncle will heal you!” All these medicines and instruments were Chu Tian’s own creations, modeled after those on Earth but enhanced with magical potency. He’d originally intended them for the Dragon Emperor, since at the upcoming medical conference, he would need to present something impressive or else become a laughingstock across the continent.

Chu Tian’s medical skill and ritual magic were worlds apart. After applying a few bottles of magical ointments, the bruises on the mammoth’s body vanished instantly. “Thank you, uncle! You’re amazing! In the past, when my master hit me, it always took the tribe’s priest several days to heal me!”

“Now I believe you’re qualified to be compared with Prophet Ron!” The orc’s straightforward nature was fully embodied in Basten, who bluntly spoke his mind. For wounds from eighth-level battle energy to heal instantly—this was the standard of a ninth-level holy priest! “But now I have one more reason to kill you. Anyone who might challenge Prophet Ron must be eliminated!”

“Heh, Basten warrior,” Barbossa suddenly chimed in with a sneer. “If you don’t dare drink the wine I poured, would you dare drink wine poured by a dog?” As he spoke, Barbossa picked up Little White and held it up for Basten to see. “Just this ordinary dog!”

“What’s there to be afraid of?” Basten’s pride as a strong warrior had been challenged, and he had to respond. He examined Little White carefully, ensuring it was just a regular pet dog. Then, tempted by the wine and Little White’s harmless grin, he agreed, though he still sneered, “I’ll drink the wine, but only after I kill you all...”

“Praise the Goddess of Life!” Chu Tian pointed to Little White’s collar with feigned surprise. “You should know that nothing can be retrieved from a spatial collar without its owner’s consent. If you kill me, my pet will never hand over the wine!”

Hearing this, Little White played along, raising its head in a pose of unyielding defiance.

“Very well! I’ll drink the wine before I kill you!” Basten understood the rules of the spatial collar just as Chu Tian said. Still, he was cautious and shot Barbossa a glance. “While I drink, you all must leave!”

“Fine, no problem! We’ll all leave!” Chu Tian answered for Barbossa, then pointed to the wolves surrounding them. “Then have them move aside first!”

“All of you, fall back and keep watch from a distance. Just don’t let them escape!” Basten commanded, and the wolves dispersed. Chu Tian immediately led Carter, Barbossa, and AK47 far away, leaving Little White alone in the midst of the wolf pack.

Little White put on the purest smile, using its small body to shove aside all the wine jars on the ground, indicating: If you’re worried, we won’t touch any of the wine brought by Barbossa. Once the jars were all pushed away, Little White patted its collar, and a heap of fine wine appeared. It jumped onto a jar, pried open the lid with effort, dipped its little head inside, and took a sip—demonstrating its trustworthiness: see, I drank it myself.

After a while, seeing that Little White suffered no ill effects, Basten couldn’t resist any longer. He grabbed the jar Little White had tasted, and gulped it down. “Ah—delicious!” Basten exclaimed, then glared at the mammoth, who was sticking out its tongue, and threatened with his giant blade, “You’re not allowed to drink!”

Basten remained vigilant. He was here to ambush Chu Tian, bringing only a thousand fire-tailed birds, fifty gargoyles, and several hundred third-tier dire wolves. The fire-tailed birds and gargoyles had been almost wiped out in the earlier aerial battle, leaving him with just the wolves. That’s why Basten forbade the mammoth from drinking—if the wine was poisoned and he collapsed, there’d still be an eighth-tier beast to deal with Chu Tian. If the mammoth went down too, a few hundred dire wolves wouldn’t even be able to stop AK47.

Basten’s capacity for drink was enough to make Chu Tian sweat. Soon, empty jars were piled high as a hill, but each one was first tasted by Little White. As he drank, Basten noticed something amusing: Little White could really hold its liquor! He had downed dozens of jars, and the wine-tasting Little White had consumed several as well, yet the little fellow still seemed unsatisfied, licking its lips and gazing at him pitifully. Thus, things took a subtle turn: Basten, drinking alone at first, was now sharing drinks with Little White, the two looking like old friends reminiscing over wine.

“Ugh—” Basten was getting tipsy, and his tongue grew loose. “Back in the day, the first time I tasted wine like this was...ten years ago. I killed three sixth-level swordmasters in a single day at Red Earth Gorge, and the Orc King, pleased, rewarded me with...”

“Woo woo—” Little White feigned admiration, passing him another jar, gazing up with longing as Basten recounted his past glories.

“Right!” Basten found the little drunkard so much to his liking that he said, “After I kill Vladino, you’re coming with me! There’ll be plenty of wine for you!”

Little White barked happily, as if celebrating finally finding a worthy master, though deep down it cursed: The dead one isn’t decided yet!

“Awooo—” Basten, frothing at the mouth, suddenly burst into tears, tossed aside his weapon, and began to complain to Little White. “We orcs are so poor! Life is so hard! Even a prince and chieftain like me can’t afford such fine wine...”

Little White nodded in sympathy and handed him another jar, counting silently: five, four, three...

Thud—As Little White finished counting, Basten collapsed. Chu Tian’s plan had worked!

When confronted with such an organized attack, Chu Tian had realized at once that someone had leaked his route. Since Basten knew the route, he surely knew Barbossa’s true identity as well. Thus, the first few jars of wine Barbossa produced were genuinely harmless. The real poison was slipped into Little White’s collar when Barbossa handed the dog to Basten for inspection. After that, Little White tasted every jar, lulling Basten into a sense of security while also distributing the poison. Even the cleverest would never suspect that a slightly smarter-than-average dog could pull off such a scheme!

From afar, Chu Tian cheered when he saw Little White succeed. He drew Dracula’s Wrath and rushed over, shouting at the wolves and the mammoth, “Don’t move! Your master is only drunk. I’m going to help him sober up!”

At first, when Basten collapsed, the wolves and mammoth were ready to spring, but hearing Chu Tian’s words, they settled down. The mammoth, believing the uncle who gave it wine was a good person, couldn’t comprehend the concept of poisoning at its three-year-old intelligence level. Since its master had fallen on his own, it stayed put. The wolves, seeing the mammoth unmoving, dared not act rashly. Even magical beasts have their own rules—if an eighth-tier doesn’t budge, how could third-tier dire wolves dare misbehave, especially with a menacing seventh-tier AK47 nearby?

“Uncle! Since my master is out cold, could you sneak me a little wine?” the mammoth asked Chu Tian innocently. “Just a little, please!”

Good child! Chu Tian’s eyes crinkled as he casually pointed to the pile of jars pushed aside by Little White. “Those are all yours! If it’s not enough, I have more!”

“Yay—” The mammoth cheered, bouncing over to Foster, its leaps making the unconscious Basten bounce along the ground.

“Boss, what do we do now?” Barbossa asked Chu Tian, pointing anxiously at the hundreds of third-tier dire wolves around them.

——

Sorry, there was heavy snow all day here, making the roads nearly impassable, so this chapter is late. Starting tomorrow, there will be two updates daily during the Sanjiang event—around noon and 8 PM, with no more than an hour’s delay.