Once upon a time there was a greedy snake

"Calm down, don't you sense something's wrong?"

The Golden-Winged Roc frowned, its eyes gleaming with wisdom.

"Think about it carefully, whether it's you, me, or that lion, are these two elephant legs in front of us on our menu?"

"...Wait a minute?"

Upon hearing the Golden-Winged Roc bring this up, the Six-Tusked White Elephant suddenly came to its senses.

Thinking about it carefully, it seems to make sense. Whether it's the blue-faced giant lion or the golden-winged roc, even if they prey on mammoths, they always eat them raw, never cooked. As for himself, he is an elephant, so how could these mammoths possibly be in his hunting range?

However, these two elephant legs, which they should have had no interest in, aroused an enormous appetite in all three of them.

"Or...should we not eat?"

After a moment's hesitation, the six-tusked white elephant began to try to restrain itself.

However, the Golden-Winged Roc shook its head.

"Just look at him to see the consequences of restraining yourself."

Immediately afterwards, the Golden-Winged Roc raised its claw and pointed at the Blue-Faced Giant Lion.

The giant blue-faced lion's face turned pale and then green, and it hadn't made a sound for quite some time.

"What...what's going on?"

Although the six-tusked white elephant had looked down on the blue-faced giant lion on the way here, it was still quite startled to see its temporary companion, who had crossed the mountain from the west, suddenly go crazy with its eyes wide open.

"It was fine just now..."

He was trying hard to restrain himself.

The knowledgeable Golden-Winged Roc shook his head repeatedly.

"It's obvious that he also saw the problem and was trying to use his reason to overcome his desires... But if desires were so easy to overcome, they wouldn't be called desires."

The so-called overcoming desires is, in other words, suppressing oneself. Suppressing oneself before even fighting the snake is tantamount to admitting defeat before the fight even begins.

"This is probably the evil ancient serpent's attack on us."

The Golden-Winged Roc narrowed its eyes.

"Our opponents are quite capable; they actually managed to do this..."

“There’s actually such a saying?”

The six-tusked white elephant was stunned. He never expected that leaving only two elephant legs would lead to so many twists and turns.

However, seeing the blue-faced giant lion beside him still in a sullen state, the six-tusked white elephant felt that the things the golden-winged roc had summarized made a strangely reasonable sense.

And the more they thought about it, the more sense it made. It seemed to make sense, at least one thing was explained – the snake could have run away directly, but it deliberately left two elephant legs behind. Was it trying to make a move against them or was it planning to befriend them?

"Um……"

The six-tusked giant elephant pondered for a moment after thinking about this.

Then he turned to look at the Golden-Winged Roc.

You mean, eat?

"eat."

The Golden-Winged Roc nodded.

"The battle has already begun. If we don't eat them, we'll lose the battle in terms of momentum... Whether we dare to eat these two elephant legs or not is a test of our courage."

"It is also a test of our wisdom."

Upon hearing this, the six-tusked white elephant was even more confused. He truly couldn't see any wisdom required for such an act of eating meat.

But at that very moment, the golden-winged roc shook its head.

"You only saw two elephant legs, but you didn't see that there are three of us..."

"If it were you, how would you divide it?"

Chapter 96 The Taste of Mom

As it turns out, the Golden-Winged Roc was indeed extremely wise.

Two elephant legs, offered to the three of them to eat. Normally, someone would miss out on the elephant legs—from this point, the Golden-Winged Roc had already seen the ancient snake's wickedness; this was clearly a tactic to divide them.

Although the three of them have looked down on each other along the way, it doesn't mean they would be foolish enough to fight amongst themselves at this critical juncture when a formidable enemy is at hand.

At least the Golden-Winged Roc wouldn't; he would handle this problem properly.

Two cooked elephant legs were stood upright, while the Golden-Winged Roc flew into the air and then spread its wings at the two elephant legs—those golden feathers were far sharper than the bone and stone knives of the Hennu people, and they cleanly cut not only the meat, but even the bones.

Each elephant leg was cut into three equal parts by the Golden-Winged Roc.

Although none of the three of them got a whole elephant leg, they got more—the elephant legs in front of them were only two thirds, but one was roasted and the other was smoked, so they got both flavors.

"In that case, the ancient serpent's scheme will be useless."

Seeing that the six-tusked white elephant and the blue-faced giant lion had also received their share, the golden-winged roc slowly nodded.

"To think that the ancient serpent could defeat us before the battle even begins with such petty cleverness is nothing special."

Of course, that's what they say, but right now, the Golden-Winged Roc, and even the three of them, are facing an extremely serious problem.

That is, eating.

If they don't eat, they are suppressing their desires. Although they can indeed do it, suppressing oneself is not without its costs—the Blue-Faced Giant Lion's sudden withdrawal from the world is the best example. Once they choose not to eat, they have to spend extra effort to suppress the urge.

Just as the Golden-Winged Roc just said, this is tantamount to admitting defeat before the fight even begins, which undoubtedly causes great damage to morale.

But if they choose to eat...

What should we do if there's something wrong with this thing?

If there's a problem with what you eat, it can cause damage from the inside out. No matter how strong your body is, you can't resist this kind of damage from within.

Moreover, what if the opponent is a snake...

As is well known, most snakes are venomous.

Although there are many non-venomous giant pythons that rely solely on their powerful physical strength to strangle their prey, in most cases, when snakes are mentioned, the default assumption is that they are venomous snakes—and judging from the shape of the head of that ancient snake just now, it was definitely a venomous snake.

If this wicked serpent really did spit on the mammoth's leg flesh...

"hiss……"

Just thinking about that scene made the Golden-Winged Roc's appetite decrease considerably.

But it was only for a short while, not even a moment. When he smelled the aroma of the two pieces of elephant leg meat, especially the smoky flavor of the smoked elephant leg, the Golden-Winged Roc couldn't help but drool.

This made the Golden-Winged Roc even more vigilant. He knew that there might be something wrong with the two elephant legs, but he still felt hungry and his mouth watered. What kind of disaster could be hidden in such a fragrant bait?

"Huh? Aren't you going to eat?"

Just then, the blue-faced giant lion suddenly approached.

"If you're not going to eat it, you might as well give it to me..."

"I eat!"

The golden-winged roc instinctively raised its claws to protect its food.

It was at this moment that the Golden-Winged Roc, having regained its senses, saw that the two elephant legs that should have been placed in front of the Blue-Faced Giant Lion had long since disappeared, and there wasn't even a few bone fragments left.

Clearly, while he was still hesitating, the blue-faced giant lion had already finished eating all the meat.

"You...you're actually alright?"

Despite saying this, the Golden-Winged Roc had already torn off a piece of flesh from its claws and put it into its mouth.

It's hard for the Golden-Winged Roc to describe how he feels right now.

He remembered that it was a long, long time ago. At that time, he was not yet a roc, but a juvenile roc. His whole family lived on the cliff, which was also the favorite nesting spot for rocs and falcons.

Back then, the first thing he did every morning after waking up was to call out to the fledglings in another eagle's nest in the distance. At that time, they were fledglings who couldn't leave the nest, and this was their only form of entertainment. This directly led to how much they longed to grow up.

Until one day, they both finally grew wings. At that time, they planned to fly up into the sky like adult roc and eagle, to meet and chat. But having wings did not mean that they could really learn to fly. So, right in his sight, the little eagle that had just grown wings was thrown out of the eagle's nest.

It's fortunate that the eaglet didn't just fall to its death, but instead learned how to soar between life and death.

As for him...

"Fortunately, my parents are mentally sound."

He made that remark at the time.

As for the normal way he behaved, even though he grew wings, he wasn't just thrown off the cliff. His parents, the two strong roc birds, took great care of him, arranging every step safely, from how to flap his wings to how to glide. They also provided him with plenty of food during the training process.

Yes, that's the taste.

After a full day of training, when his wings were so tired he could barely lift them, his father brought back meat from afar, which had that same flavor.

Because they also had to take care of his training, the two adult birds didn't have time to hunt for food in the distance. However, they were lucky; a forest nearby was struck by lightning and caught fire, and there was plenty of meat inside to eat.

He still remembers the smoky, charred smell of cooked meat.

"This is it, this is it..."

As he ate, the Golden-Winged Roc even unconsciously shed tears.

The taste was familiar, but how long had it been since he had seen his parents?

At that moment, he even thought that perhaps it wasn't such a bad thing that the eagle was thrown out of its nest.

If you've never experienced the kindness of your parents, then after they pass away, you probably won't feel such pain when you think about it.

"I……"

At this moment, the Golden-Winged Roc had even forgotten about the evil ancient serpent and was simply stuffing meat into its mouth.

Du Yi, watching from a distance, witnessed this scene of eating while shedding tears.

Chapter 97 Look Behind You

A huge lion, a huge elephant, a huge eagle.

Watching the roc in the distance eating meat while shedding tears, Du Yi's mouth also began to water uncontrollably.

"I didn't expect such an unexpected bonus..."

At this moment, Du Yi only wants to thank nature for its blessings.

He originally came to the snowy mountain with the intention of capturing some mammoths, since there were no more animals left to eat on the mountain where he originally lived. But who would have thought that before he had even hunted a few mammoths, he would see an even larger target.

So he naturally chose to run away, leaving behind two elephant legs in the process.

As for why he ran away, it's because the logic of hunting is completely different from that of fighting—if it were fighting, there would be no need to run away; he could simply rush in and fight, since the other party would definitely fight him anyway.

But if we change it to hunting...

Prey can run away.

Looking at the three giant beasts in front of him—a giant lion, a giant elephant, and a huge roc—not to mention that all three beasts were on the slope while he was on the bottom, making it even more difficult for him to catch up, just considering the speed itself… two of them had four legs, and one had wings; if they really ran, any of them would be faster than him.

Normally, when encountering a giant beast that runs faster than himself, Du Yi would usually choose to throw stones directly. However, with snow covering the ground all around, there were clearly no suitable stones for him to throw—unless he wanted to make two snowballs for a snowball fight, but those things wouldn't be very lethal.

So, after a moment's thought, Du Yi simply changed his approach.

In other words, throwing in bait.

When he threw down the two elephant legs, Du Yi was still a little worried. After all, he couldn't be sure whether these beasts, which were obviously raw meat and bloodthirsty, would be tempted by cooked meat.

But as it turned out, he was overthinking it.

"The culinary skills accumulated over hundreds of years are still quite impressive."

Seeing that the three giant beasts were already engrossed in the temptation of the food, Du Yi quietly took a detour and went around them.

This is one of the advantages of being a snake. Although it can't run as fast as a four-legged creature because it has no legs, it also moves very quietly by crawling close to the ground.

If it weren't for his enormous size, the most suitable fighting style for him would actually be a silent ambush.

However, it's not too late to use it now.

In just a moment, he had circled around to the back of the three giant beasts.

However, at that moment, the blue-faced lion suddenly turned around.