A Taste of Primitive Life (2)
While I stood there in a daze after sending my friends off, a shrill cry broke the quiet.
“Piya! Piya!”
“Hm?”
The marten was making a racket. In the blink of an eye, the herd of oxen had come close enough to see clearly.
“Whoa? Those really are oxen!”
Massive black bodies with thick, sturdy legs—and horns sharp enough to punch a hole through just about anything.
“Hmm. Kind of scary, actually.”
I slipped quietly toward the river. They wouldn't come splashing across the water, right?
Splash!
“Hm?”
Something plunged into the water, and my throat suddenly felt lighter. Apparently the marten had leapt straight into the river. Paddle, paddle—it poked just its head out of the water and swam off with effortless grace.
Whoa? That little guy is an amazing swimmer!
“Hey! Where do you think you're going all by yourself?”
It sped into the distance. Was it trying to make it on its own out there? Ahehehe. Before I knew it, it was gone. Was I... a little sad about that?
Fwap fwap fwap!
Whoa! The oxen were charging into the water too, and honestly, it looked incredible—like watching an SUV plow through a raging current.
“Wow~ hmm? But wait? Why do they keep heading this way?”
I was standing right in the river. The water rose past my chest. Should I just fly?
I waited there, awkwardly rooted to the spot, and thankfully the herd thundered right past me, heading downstream. Apparently they had no intention of crossing. What a relief.
“Hmm? But how many of them are there, exactly?”
Curiosity got the better of me, and I floated up into the sky for a better look. Several dozen? A hundred-some animals, at least. They passed by me, gradually slowed to a stop, and began grazing and drinking from the water's edge.
“Should I go take a closer look?”
“KRRAAANGH!”
“Whoa~ why is an ox roaring like some kind of predator?”
Up close, they were genuinely enormous. The top of my head came up to about where their legs ended. Their heads were so big one could fit my whole skull in a single bite, and their horns—good grief—looked longer than my entire body.
Still, I wandered boldly between them, taking in the sights. Most were black, though every now and then I spotted ones streaked with brown fur.
“Why are oxen this huge?”
One hit from these guys and it's over. Good thing I sent my friends away earlier.
Thud!
“Ugh!”
It barely bumped me and I went sprawling.
“Jeez. Watch where you're going, buddy.”
“Mrrgh.”
“Huh? You're a brown one, aren't you?”
The one that had knocked me over turned out to be something special—its coat was entirely brown. Judging by the herd, this was clearly the main culprit behind all that brown mixed into the black.
It was a touch shorter than the others, though. Just a touch.
Shnk!
Suddenly it was jabbing at me with its horns!
“Uh? Uh-uh-uh??”
It wasn't goring me—it was flipping me up like a hotteok pancake and tossing me into the air!
“Wheeeeeck!”
Spinning round and round made me so dizzy I could only let out weird shrieks as I flew through the sky.
THUD.
“Kuh!”
Where I landed was the broad, broad back of the brown ox. It hurt, slamming against that hard spine, but what a massive back it was. Look, I stuck the landing without falling off!
Bumpity-bump. It walked far more smoothly than I'd expected—the ride was actually pretty comfortable.
“Thanks for the lift!”
“Krrhng!”
The oxen had scattered here and there to graze and drink, but none strayed far from the herd. Even animals this big apparently had predators to fear.
How on earth was I supposed to catch one of these and raise it? Maybe lure them with food?
“They eat grass, so maybe they'd like potatoes too?”
Tuduk. Tok. Hududuk.
Worth a shot—I dumped a pile of potatoes onto the ground.
“Sniff sniff? Chomp. Chomp.”
Wow. With a mouth that big, several potatoes vanished in a single bite. It ate better than I expected. Strangely, though, the black oxen didn't touch them.
Naturally, only the brown ones—or the ones heavily streaked with brown—gathered around me, a few at a time.
“Are the black ones and brown ones different species?”
Before I knew it, four oxen had collected around me. I guessed that was every potato-lover in the herd. One of them was on the small side—not a calf, more like a gangly teenager still growing.
“What if I just... casually take you guys home with me? Heh heh.”
I kept pulling potatoes out, giving them the distinct impression that if they followed me, this feast would never end.
“Aww, look at you eating so well~”
By the way, how was I going to meet up with my friends again? No phones or anything out here. If they were alive, I could just meet them back at the village, right?
Oh. Had I unknowingly picked up a primitive man's mindset?
The herd seemed to have eaten its fill too, and one by one they began settling down around me. Apparently they planned to sleep right here. With bodies that size, they ate an astonishing amount of grass—the stalks that had reached my knees this morning were now cut down to half their height.
Just how many potatoes did those brown ones eat?
I wondered if I could raise them properly if I took them home.
“Haaah-amm!”
“Piya!”
“Huh?”
The traitor had returned. I'd assumed the marten had swum off to the far side of the river alone, but here it came looking for me.
“How did you even find me? Can you smell me or something?”
Sniff. Sniff.
It was sniffing me all over—and honestly, I didn't smell dirty at all, despite not having bathed. The little guy kept scenting different parts of me, and I seemed to give off some inexplicable floral fragrance?
Wait, since when have I smelled like this?
“So you tracked me by scent, huh? So this smell is called a 'fragrance,' is it?”
Leopards, snakes, rabbits, deer, martens, and now oxen—the blessing didn't care whether an animal was predator or prey. There was definitely some kind of nature-friend's blessing at work here.
Mage, designer, zookeeper... my list of possible future careers just kept growing.
Tonight I'd just sleep among my animal friends. Fleas and lice won't hitch a ride, right?
.
.
.
Today marked day three with the herd. The grass around here had been practically scorched bare. I had a feeling they'd move on soon, so I was keeping watch.
I'd trained the brown ones well with potatoes. If they stayed behind, we could just head back to the village together.
“Please, oh please. Pretty please.”
Even one or two staying behind would be nice...
“KRRAAANGH!”
The one that stood a full hand-span taller than the rest—the apparent leader. Its call boomed louder than anyone else's, and at its summons the whole herd readied to leave.
Thud. Thud.
As the herd gathered and began to walk together, the slightly smaller ones took up positions in the middle. They were protecting the weak and the young, in their own way.
“MoooOOO!”
Dududududu—
The herd thundered out across the plain. But weren't these guys fools? There was plenty of grass even a short distance away. How far did they intend to sprint at full speed?
“Kind of curious, aren't you?”
Three remained at my side. They'd eaten the potatoes well enough, though they had plenty of black mixed into their coats—and in the end, they'd chased after me anyway.
“Alright, let's head home. See that big tree over there?”
The tree of our village. According to my friends, it had sprung up the same day I appeared. It was so enormous that unless you wandered very far afield, you could always find your way home by it.
“Let's go home, shall we?”
Tap tap.
I patted my thigh, but no response. Hmm? I don't actually know how to train animals, do I?
Slurp. Slurp.
“Ugh!”
It was licking my face with its tongue, as if to say, hand over the potatoes. So damp—my, what a lot of drool you have.
While I was preparing a meal for my new friends, a familiar voice called out.
“Haneul! Are you alive!”
Puhaha. Are you alive. That's got to be the standard greeting of the Stone Age.
“Yep! Alive and well!”
“Ooooh!!”
Wow, they'd heard me from quite a distance away, apparently?
My friends came running in no time—and boy, had they been through it. Their faces were gaunt and haggard.
“You guys haven't eaten?”
“Uh... couldn't catch anything.”
Figures. Of course. This was exactly why farming societies came to be—everybody who lived by hunting alone starved to death.
First things first: feed my friends some potatoes too.
“Here, eat these potatoes. Then let's go home.”
“Haneul, you're amazing. How did you catch them?”
“Skill?”
I mean, I didn't exactly catch them? But hold on—how does one train an ox, exactly? If it took a dislike to me, it seemed like the type to go flipping people around like hotteok pancakes, man or otherwise.
Still, oxen seemed important. They were pretty fast—couldn't we use them as mounts?
“Ah? Wait, do oxen eat too much to be mounts? Eh, we'll figure it out.”
Moving the oxen turned out to be anything but easy. They did not move as planned.
“Nrghh!”
“Push harder!”
“Grraaaah!”
We figured a good shove might do it, so all three of us strained our hardest—but the weight class was simply different. Even a casual glance told you that one ox outweighed the three of us combined.
“Sniff!”
The brown ox just stared at us three, as if to say, what on earth are these creatures doing? Brown coat or not, I'd named it Nureongi. Something about it just felt endearing.
“Uaaaagh.”
The ox shifted ever so slightly, and all three of us toppled over.
“This is a problem. How do we take it home?”
“What if we... h-hit it?”
“You're going to do that yourself?”
“...”
Beating it? Wasn't that a bit reckless? Thankfully he seemed to realize it too, and quietly shut his mouth.
Guess it's my turn to step up.
“Come on, Nureongi, let's go~ If you don't follow me, I'm leaving you behind?”
These were the ones who'd followed me in the first place, after all. Worst case, they'd come along even without the potatoes.
I was a little nervous they might not follow, but plod, plod—the oxen trailed right after me.
They were so tall that no matter how fast I strutted, they caught up in a couple of strides.
Somehow... this felt like losing.
We led the oxen back to the village in triumphant glory. It was a truly monumental achievement—after all, we'd brought home animals bigger than people.
No lie: if one of these things had actually decided to fight back and we'd come without weapons, it could've smashed the entire village to rubble on its own.
The black oxen were even bigger. How had we ever planned to catch a mere four of them bare-handed? There weren't even any calves around to speak of.
“Haneul!”
“Oh. Garungda, long time no see~”
“Are you hurt anywhere?”
He fussed over me like a mother watching her kids play by the water. As if I could get hurt.
“You worry about everything.”
“Still, you've done something incredible!”
“Oh, this is nothing. Though these guys sure eat a lot of potatoes—we'll need to plant a lot more.”
“Haha. Potatoes are nothing to worry about.”
With oxen around, we could expand the fields enormously, couldn't we? They earned their keep, at least—no wonder humans had been raising them since ancient times.
They really ought to breed soon. Hm? Wait. Please tell me we didn't end up with three females and zero males. Or three males and zero females.
“Alright, ox friends! You'll be living here from now on! Lots of people around, so play nice~”
“Mrrgh~”
Nureongi took a liking to the village's potato barrel and wandered straight over to it.
“Haneul? They're eating a monstrous amount of potatoes!”
“Yeah, I fed them plenty on the way here—they really put it away.”
Would our potato stores start running low now? Something was always rolling out of the potato warehouse whenever I walked past it.
“Won't we run short on potatoes?”
“We'll just plant more. Don't worry—there's plenty of land left to farm.”
“Really?”
Well, I suppose the potato fields hadn't looked all that extensive, now that I thought about it. They'd figure out the balance themselves.
I'd thought the wild boars we'd brought home at the start were huge, but one kick from an ox would probably send a boar flying.
“Hmm, but isn't the pen too small?”
Free grazing seemed like the better option. Was that doable?
“That's why we're going to build a much bigger pen.”
“You mean let them roam free and raise them that way?”
“Exactly.”
The idea wasn't bad... the problem was the predators.
“I'm worried other animals will come snatch them.”
“Then we hunt them.”
Their eyes gleamed. So my friends could fight, too? It looked like they were planning to wage war on the beasts of the wild.
Even so, apex predators weren't opponents to be taken lightly.
Especially the ones bigger than a man—tigers, bears, the like. Hmm? Hold on, speaking of which—weren't there real apex predators out there?
“People are going to get badly hurt.”
Strength and senses beyond any human. What humans had in their favor was only this: they moved in groups, and they used tools and weapons.
“Nothing to be done about it...”
They knew it too. They knew exactly how dangerous this would be.
I briefly toyed with the idea of building a wall around it all, but fencing off land this vast would be a pointless gesture—it could never be maintained.