N-M Chapter 60 [The Flame and the Iron Flakes]
Chapter 60 [The Flame and the Iron Flakes]
The awakening brought panic.
The naked people sat up from the grass, their eyes filled with confusion.
A woman was the first to feel cold; she instinctively hugged her arms, and fine goosebumps appeared on her skin.
Hunger followed, like a fire burning in my stomach, and my throat was so dry it felt like it was sticking together.
She is not the only one.
Dozens of people in the same state were anxious because of these physiological needs.
Their consciousness is a blank slate; only instinct drives their bodies.
A dark-skinned man seemed very close to the ground beneath his feet.
He ignored the chaos of the crowd, his eyes scanning the surroundings before finally settling on the river not far away.
He then stood up and staggered toward the riverbank.
This action attracted several other people who were also feeling thirsty.
They followed this man, who would later be called Terra, to the riverbank.
Terra knelt on the ground and scooped up river water with her hands, swallowing it in large gulps.
Others followed suit, temporarily alleviating the threat of death.
Tara didn't stop; he searched through the bushes by the river and, by instinct, found some edible red berries.
In the crowd, another slender woman subconsciously comforted those who were crying out of fear.
The movements were very gentle, using simple gestures to signal everyone to gather together.
She prioritized distributing the fruits of Terra's harvest to the weak, and the most basic order was established under her organization.
She was known to later generations as Anya.
There was also a taciturn man whose gaze kept wandering among the surrounding rocks and withered trees.
He seems to have an innate, inexplicable urge to build and construct.
He silently carried stones and dry branches, trying to build a makeshift shelter in a sheltered, gently sloping depression.
He was known to posterity as Mason.
The real test came as dusk fell.
The temperature plummeted, and the night wind carried the howls of wild animals from afar.
This plunges humanity, which had just gained a little peace, back into fear.
They huddled in the shelter built by Mason, shivering.
In the distance, pairs of green eyes appeared, signifying that death was approaching.
People huddled together even tighter, and some let out low sobs.
Just then, Terra stepped forward.
He picked up two dry sticks from beside the shelter, and under the puzzled gazes of the crowd, he stood one upright and began to drill rapidly with the other.
This was an instinctive action, and he himself didn't understand why he did it.
Sweat dripped from his forehead, and his arms ached from the high-speed friction.
The first wolf appeared in the moonlight outside the shelter.
Its muscles tensed, and it growled in its throat.
A suppressed scream came from the crowd.
Just then, a wisp of smoke rose into the air.
Terra accelerated—Mars burst forth!
He carefully brought the sparks close to a handful of dry grass.
"Whoosh—" A small sliver of bright yellow flame shot out.
A roaring campfire quickly rose, its orange-red light dispelling the cold and darkness.
The loitering wolf, faced with this unfamiliar sight, growled reluctantly before finally tucking its tail between its legs and retreating into the darkness.
The campfire drove away the wild beasts, and also ignited a spark of fire in the eyes of the newborn.
........
That unique moment attracted the attention of the gods in the heavens.
For deities who hold power, even the slightest change cannot escape their perception, let alone after being blessed by the Heavenly Way.
Apart from her routine examinations, the goddess of magic, Thea, devoted herself entirely to developing new magical theories.
In her mind, the terminal that combined magic and the Dao, modeled after the computer operating system from her previous life, popped up a red notification...
[An unidentified intelligent group was detected; their beliefs are unregistered; they are primitive but possess extremely high potential for development.]
Thea stopped her deductions and pulled up the specific source of the information.
Flames, order, collective will to survive... these mixed primitive elements form an interesting beginning.
A faint smile appeared on her lips as she extended her finger and marked the coordinates of that tribe:
High-potential investment targets
On the other side, the Black Tide Monarch caught a whiff.
Fresh, brimming with the fighting spirit of primal life.
It was faint, not even as faint as the prayer of any orc tribe in Ashem, but it was pure enough.
"Another batch of fresh firewood," he remarked with interest. "Let's see how long it burns."
Meanwhile, Lynch, the god of forging, exercises his authority to maintain the current material cycle of the four mortal realms.
When Mason of the mortal realm picked up a stone and struck another stone in search of a more sturdy tool, the action resonated with Lynch's authority.
Lin Qi's divine sense stirred slightly, but he immediately dismissed it as meaningless noise within the Heavenly Dao Network and paid it no heed.
The resonance was too faint, fleeting.
......
Assam, months later, in the Central Valley.
Under Terra's guidance, humans learned to fish and gather resources.
Anya then organized them and established a family.
Mason also led his men to build a simple village out of wood and mud.
But a new crisis followed.
The stone shards they collected were very dull and difficult to use.
Wooden spears made with this tool cannot even pierce the fur of wild animals.
Their inferior weaponry caused them to consistently suffer losses in their struggles against nature.
Most deadly of all, the forest's animal herds, after experiencing initial fear, gradually adapted.
They no longer retreated easily, but gathered more and more around the village, their green eyes watching this piece of fat meat with predatory intent in the darkness.
The pressure of survival once again weighed on the shoulders of this nascent civilization.
"We need harder stone," Mason said to Terra and several of the strongest men, holding a stone axe that had broken in the process of chopping.
This was the most direct solution they could think of.
In search of harder stones, Mason, accompanied by several strong men, ventured for the first time into the unknown depths of the distant mountains and forests.
After walking for most of the day, just when they were about to give up, Mason accidentally discovered some traces in the ravine that did not belong to nature.
A pile of extinguished campfire ashes, and a few gnawed animal bones.
Following the trail, they carefully parted a thicket of bushes.
The sight before them left their minds blank.
It was a small, makeshift camp.
In the center of the camp, a burly creature with a full beard sat on a rock.
He was wearing leather armor and holding a black-glowing axe, repairing an iron pickaxe of the same material.
Beside him leaned an iron axe.
The man seemed to feel the cold, took out two small stones from his leather bag, tapped them together, and with a "crack," sparks flew, igniting the dry branches.
Mason and his companions, who only knew how to smash rocks with rocks, were greatly shocked to see the dwarf prospector's leather armor, iron pickaxe, iron axe, and the way he easily lit a fire with a flint.
They didn't know what it was, but they instinctively felt that the black thing was full of power.
That's the power to easily split trees and easily crush the skulls of wild beasts.
Mason and the others held their breath, remaining motionless as they lay hidden in the bushes.
Their eyes no longer held fear, but rather a longing for those iron tools.
They yearn for that power.