In the days of surviving in the fairy forest

Looking forward to Rick continuing to tell the story of Yangcun, the gourd baboons cheered in unison.

They surrounded him cheerfully, threw Rick into the air, caught him in a hurry, surrounded him to the tree stump in the open space, and sat down obediently in a row.

The gourd baboon king sat at the front, holding the squirrel in his arms, waiting with the same excitement.

The trees in the grape grove were full of birds, crowded and piled together. A few hedgehogs slowly crawled out from the grass not far away, and quietly came to the tree stump.

Rick cleared his throat.

……

By the time the story was finished, the sky was completely dark, and the round moon hung on the treetops, like an oversized crystal grape.

Rick and Ali did not go back to the tree cave, but stayed in the mountain grape forest, sleeping in the cave with the gourd baboon king, and did not pack their things and prepare to go home until the next morning.

Just after walking out of the cave, a gourd baboon wobbled past the tree, obviously sleepy, but still humming unconsciously.

"Don't look at me as just a sheep~sheep's intelligence is unimaginable~"

The squirrel, who was rubbing his eyes in a daze, shuddered, and subconsciously 'slapped' the fox with his big tail.His face turned red with anger, and he pointed his paws: "You, you, you! You are too bad! How could you not finish the story yesterday!"

At that time, Rick was talking about the most important part of the story, and everyone pricked up their ears, wanting to know how Pleasant Goat escaped from Big Big Wolf's pursuit. They didn't expect Rick to change his voice, lazily yawned, and said with a smile: "How about the follow-up, we will continue to talk next time."

Squirrel/Gourd Baboon/Birds: "!!"

If Rick had a good relationship with the gourd baboons, the excited gourd baboons would pull the fox fur to tell the next story.

"What's more addictive than digging a hole and not filling it," Rick triumphantly picked up the squirrel, and explained vaguely as he walked out, "Now, even if it's just to hear the next plot, None of the animals in the forest will let the wolves do to me."

He walked cheerfully, took a lot of grapes, nuts and dried bacon stuffed by gourd baboons along the way, and patted his chest to promise that he would come to the mountain grape forest to tell stories in a few days after other things were done.

This dried bacon is also another food storage technique that Rick taught the gourd baboons.After learning, the gourd baboons came out of the nest, hunted back three fat and strong wild boars, and smoked wild boars that filled half of the cave.

Rick and Ali also shared a large piece of pork knuckle, and moved it back to the tree hole to make pork jerky. The leftovers were grilled deliciously, and they ate several delicious meals.

After the twists and turns caused by the storytelling were over for a while, the fox and the squirrel returned to the tree hole and began to pack up the big package for the long trip.

Taking advantage of the less danger in the forest in autumn and enough food for the winter, they decided to go to the volcanic forest to catch turkeys.

The volcanic forest is to the east of the forest farther away from the grape grove, and two high mountains need to be crossed. In addition, the two weak cubs Rick and Ali can only travel during the day, and they have to walk for at least a whole day to reach it.

But the risk makes sense.Because eating the meat of fire chicks can significantly increase the flame strength of fire attribute creatures.

"The fire chickens live in the volcanic forest. They radiate hot flames and are difficult to get close to. But other than that, the fire chickens have no other means of attack," the gourd baboon king told them, "it is very suitable for growing up fire-attributed creatures to exercise their perception of flames."

After the gourd baboon king suggested that Rick go to the volcanic forest to exercise his ability, Rick and Ali sat face to face in the tree hole seriously, discussing whether they should go to the volcanic forest or not.

"Don't worry about the stored food for the time being, and the pottery burning experiment can be postponed later, but we really need to improve our combat ability. Catching fire chickens in the volcanic forest sounds like a good exercise opportunity." This is Rick reason.

"Huozhiji, the meat is very tender and delicious just from the name!" This is Ali's reason.

All in all, the two little ones quickly reached a consensus.

……

The temperature in the grape grove is already very hot, but when passing through the vine forest and climbing towards the towering mountains to the east, the scorching sun made Rick clearly realize that the journey ahead might become more and more difficult.

As a fire creature, he adapted well, but Ah Li couldn't bear it anymore. The whole squirrel hung under the fox's belly to hide from the sun, and kept stuffing cold grapes into its mouth one after another.

He didn't complain, but Rick felt a little distressed. He stroked the squirrel's wimpy tail and asked hesitantly, "How about—"

"No or no! We've come here, do you still want to go back?" The squirrel saw what Rick was going to say at a glance, swung his claws to interrupt him, and jumped onto the stone beside the fox. A tall man jumped up, retracted back on the fox, pouting and blowing on his hot red paws, "Just go faster, I can overcome this little difficulty!"

Rick didn't argue any more, but his speed increased a lot, and he deftly crossed the dead wood and shale in the mountains, even shortening the rest time.

Perhaps because the temperature here is too high, most animals seldom survive here for a long time, and even the plants are gradually becoming scarce. When Rick climbed the first mountain, all he could see before his eyes were large pieces of dry, chapped On the brown land, odd-looking rocks are scattered all around, separated by dozens of meters, three or two thin saplings are growing tenaciously.

The fox's sensitive perception made Rick realize that the temperature here has exceeded [-] degrees, which is almost the maximum that the squirrel can bear.He frowned, looked down at the squirrel slumped under him, and decided to return immediately.

It is impossible for the squirrel to adapt to such a high temperature, not to mention that there will be more unknown dangers in the future, it is better to let Ali go back to the tree hole first, and he can come back when he finds time.

Regardless of the squirrel's weak resistance, Rick turned around and was about to go back. He never thought that before he took two steps, he heard a thin voice in his ear: "Fox boy, I have a way to make your friend adapt to the high temperature. I want to try it." for a while?"

There was desolation everywhere, and there was silence everywhere. Rick was very sure that there were only two creatures, he and the squirrel, within at least a hundred meters around him.He suddenly jumped up when he heard a strange voice, and jumped to the top of a small tree that was rare and straight beside him in twos and threes. The ball of flames surrounded him, his eyes were extremely vigilant.

"Who are you? Don't play tricks, come out quickly!"

The voice was silent for a moment, and then said again: "Hey, hey, you little fox, you are too heavy! Get off the old man!"

"!"

Rick was stunned for a moment, and hurriedly jumped down from the tree, staring at the tree in front of him in astonishment.

This small tree was slender and fragile, and the trunk was so thin that Rick could hug it with both claws. It swayed back and forth as he jumped off the tree, as if it could be snapped in half at any time.

Rick looked at the appearance of the young sapling, and thought about the "Old Man" that the voice called himself. Apart from doubts, he couldn't help feeling a shock.

Traveling so far, although I know that all the animals here have strong thinking and learning abilities, and can also master various surreal and wonderful abilities, but because Rick himself is also a little fox, he has adapted well to this—but, why now? Can plants even talk? !

The fox had a very serious face, patted his paws on the ground, and cautiously stayed away from the unknown tree, saying politely, "Hello?"

"Don't be surprised, the old man just accidentally awakened his racial skills, so he can communicate with you without barriers." The branch swayed, and the voice came again, "Little fox, have you heard of sand fruit?"

Of course Rick hadn't heard of it.Instead, the squirrel, dizzy from being baked by the sun, managed to get out from under Rick's belly, climbed to the top of Rick's head, and looked at the little tree with his hips akimbo.

"It's not as simple as a coincidence that a plant wants to possess intelligence and meet the skills of an awakened race," the squirrel said calmly, seemingly questioning the little tree, but in fact it was to quickly explain the tree's origin to Rick. Dangerous, "Not only is it at least 1000 years old, and it is nourished by treasures around it, but it also has to consciously absorb the flesh and blood of countless animals and plants."

He spoke emphatically, emphasizing the word 'conscious', apparently to imply that this was different from the plant's normal behavior of absorbing nutrients.

Rick's face changed drastically, and the flame ball condensed again.

How can a plant that has consciously absorbed the flesh and blood of countless animals and plants be a kind person?

"I didn't lie to you, it was really a coincidence," Xiaoshu said helplessly, "It happened to coincide with the eruption of the volcano, and almost all the animals and plants nearby died, and the volcanic ash just rushed them to me."

He paused for a moment, seeing that the fox and the squirrel were still on guard, and he didn't know whether he believed it or not, so he continued: "Little squirrel, have you heard of sand fruit? It can make any animal immune to fire attacks." Magic fruit."

Ali's paws scratched lightly near the fox's ears.Rick understood what Ali meant, and the tree was indeed right.

"The old man's racial skill is immune to high temperature. The fruit that grows every 30 years also has this effect. Because the fruit was given to the animals along the way, many animals called the old man's fruit the sand fruit. Later, the number of animals passing here gradually decreased, and the old man no longer wanted to deal with them, so the sand fruit gradually became a legend."

Rick's eyes widened. At first he couldn't believe it, but after thinking about the age of the tree, he thought it was quite reasonable, so he didn't interrupt, and continued to listen with his ears up.

"If you want, the old man can give you a sand fruit."

Rick and Ali looked at each other.Instead, he became more vigilant.

No matter how courteous they are, they are rape or stealing, not to mention that they have never met this big tree, and this big tree suddenly showed affection and gave them a precious sand fruit, no matter how you think about it, there is something wrong.

Rick's hind legs moved back slightly, his ears tilted back, ready to run away at any time, and then he said cautiously: "Give it to us? What do you want us to exchange?"

"There is still one small request." The thin and weak voice suddenly rose.

Rick and Ali tensed up and listened intently.

"It's the story of Yangcun, can you tell me the whole story?" Xiaoshu's tone was a little more shy and excited, "There are too few birds that rest here, and the one who is willing to tell a story The good-hearted bird only talked about half of it, and just arrived at the part where Pleasant Goat is chased by Big Big Wolf."

Rick/Ari: "Huh?!"