The Giant of Africa (1)
A half-day by car from Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, then switching to an off-road vehicle for several more hours — that was the distance to this expedition's destination.
"Ugh, the sun is too hot."
"Even though the sun's already sunk that far, it's still this sweltering… The humidity near the floodplain is medicinal."
When Han Suha and Professor Park shielded their faces from the blinding sunlight, Professor Hamilton let out a featherlight laugh and handed them both large straw hats.
"Ha, you'll get used to it. Still, wear the hats — you'll regret it later if you don't."
Saying that, he unconsciously ruffled his own hair, and Professor Park's group hurriedly flipped their hats around to put them on. Hamilton laughed again, big this time, at their fumbling.
He guided the two of them to the excavation site.
The excavation site, where preparations were in full swing, already had several people pitching tents and stacking various equipment inside them. Among them, however, there were figures that looked out of place.
"…Professor, those people over there…"
"What are you talking about… Ah, you mean the mercenaries?"
"Mercenaries?!"
The people Han Suha was pointing at were none other than mercenaries wearing body armor and carrying assault rifles, wandering around the perimeter.
At the sight, Professor Park nodded and explained.
"If you want to set up shop in Africa and do something, you need mercenaries as a half-essential. The security's not great, and there are plenty of bandits."
Hamilton added lightly to Professor Park's words.
"On top of that, Kenya's government forces are fairly solid, so it's not too bad — but depending on the situation, you might have to hire local warlord mercenaries or else they'll keep giving you trouble for the entire excavation."
"…Africa is hard in so many ways."
"On the plus side, it's a paradise for us paleoanthropologists. After all, it's where humanity originated."
Professor Park lifted the brim of his hat and looked around. The horizon stretching into the distance was nothing like the mountains of Korea. A wasteland of red earth, and beyond it, grasslands that spread endlessly. Acacia trees dotted sparsely here and there. And beyond that, a sky bleeding red.
If you looked at the scenery alone, it was beautiful. But that beauty did not mean safety.
"Professor, is that over there…"
Han Suha carefully pointed somewhere with her finger.
Several hundred meters away, there were a few enormous shadows moving slowly. At first, she thought they were rocks. But those rocks were slowly moving their legs, and now and then they raised their long trunks to sniff the air.
"Elephants."
Professor Park's voice dropped low.
Han Suha swallowed involuntarily. These were nothing like the elephants she'd seen at the zoo. They weren't the lazy creatures chewing grass beyond iron bars. The African elephants standing way over there pressed down on the surrounding air just by existing. Massive bodies. Flapping ears. Thick, pillar-like legs. And tusks flashing white in the sunlight.
"Wow… They're really big."
"It's different from seeing them in photos, isn't it?" Professor Park said quietly.
"But, it looks like this happens to be within their herd's territory… This is going to be a problem…"
He muttered as much, but Han Suha was staring at the elephants with wide, fascinated eyes.
Then Hamilton lightly grabbed Han Suha's shoulder.
"It's better not to stare too openly."
"Yes?"
"Especially the males. If that group becomes aware of us, it could become troublesome."
Han Suha reflexively lowered her gaze. Hamilton then gestured skillfully to summon one of the mercenaries. The mercenary surveyed the elephant herd through binoculars, then nodded.
"We're fine for now. The wind isn't blowing from this side toward them either."
"…Do we really have to be this careful?"
Hamilton pointed toward a tree in the distance with his finger. The tree was so thick that several adults standing together could barely wrap their arms around it. But near the base, it was bent at a strange angle, and branches were broken halfway, lying scattered on the ground.
"That tree — the elephants knocked it over yesterday."
"That tree?"
"Yes. They strip the bark to eat it."
"……"
At those words, Han Suha looked at the tree again. A massive trunk that would take not just human strength but even heavy machinery to move had been broken in a wretched heap.
Then a vehicle sounded its horn and began slowly approaching the vicinity of the elephants. The mercenaries had judged that the elephants, who continued to linger in place, posed a threat. They honked their horns, sprayed repellent, and began slowly pushing the elephant herd back.
While Professor Park's group watched that scene for a while, commotion suddenly broke out from the excavation site.
"Profesa! Kuna kitu hapa!!!"
The workers' loud voices made Professor Park furrow his brows and look back at Hamilton. The only one here who could speak Swahili fluently was him.
"What's going on?"
"Something's come up, they say. Let's go take a look."
When they arrived at the excavation site, they saw a hastily laid tarp with a strong impression of being slapped on at the last minute, and next to it, workers and a few researchers lying on the ground carefully digging something out.
"What on earth did you find?"
A researcher who had been carefully scraping earth with a small shovel pointed at the ground in response to Hamilton's question.
"There's a bone."
"A bone? Surely not! Is it a paleoanthropological bone?"
Hamilton asked in an excited voice, but the researcher shook his head.
"No, it's not that. But I think you'd better see it directly."
He said that and quickly peeled back the tarp that had been laid down to prevent weathering.
What was revealed to these curious archaeologists after ages of time was—
"!!"
"This can't be."
"Wow…"
The massive skull of an elephant. Right there.
"Why are the Earthshakers acting up? They're gentle and wise. They wouldn't go wild for no reason."
When Mother asked with worry, Father shook his head.
"I don't know. They say they've been going wild for several days now."
"Has anyone died?"
"Not yet. But it won't hold for long."
Father's face was rigid.
"The Earthshakers are blocking the hunting grounds. Apparently, if they so much as spot a person, they charge right at them."
"That can't be…"
Mother sucked in her breath low.
At their words, I recalled the elephant I had seen before. A massive frame. Long, curved tusks. A presence like a small mountain walking slowly. What I had seen was probably not the same species as modern African elephants, but that didn't mean they were any less dangerous. In fact, they could be more so. In this era, there were creatures even larger than modern elephants. I couldn't say exactly what species the Earthshakers we called elephants were, but at least one thing was certain — they were not yet a creature a human could face head-on.
Mother had taught me that if an elephant looked bigger than your thumb, you should turn your back to the wind and run. If you were any closer than that, you had to be careful not to let the elephants see you as an enemy. And if that day the elephants were in a bad mood, you were supposed to pray that they'd kill you in one blow.
"…If we can't go hunting, it'll be a big problem. There won't be enough food."
"That's why I came to tell you. Gather as much food as you can and stash it away. Until the Earthshakers calm down or disappear, foraging will be difficult."
"So…"p>
Mother's expression grew serious again.
The place we were in now — the unfailing land, Arti — was a floodplain. That meant most of the grasses growing here were not long-lived trees or shrubs, but tender grasses that couldn't survive a full year, and such plants generally didn't bear much fruit. We could eat the grass if we pulled it, but we weren't Paranthropus. If we tried to make such fare our staple, our stomachs would turn first. In the end, the food we could obtain was limited. Fish caught in the lake. Animals that came to the water and tender grass. And the meat and offal from hunting those animals. So the inability to hunt wasn't just about going a day or two hungry. If we caught fish, we could manage — but the population of Arti, all added up, reached nearly ten thousand. If that many people all rushed to the lake at once to catch fish, the fish at the lake's edge would surely run out of spawn before long. At least, fortunately, drinking water was still plentiful.
"So don't go near the grasslands. Don't wander alone, and always keep fire with you."
With those words heavy with worry, Father returned to his own group.
Mother remained silent for a while after that. Instead, she began quietly disassembling the provisions Father had left behind. She skinned the hide, removed the offal, discarded the offal at a spot a little removed from where they slept, and salted the flesh and bones. Bones with lots of marrow, like leg bones, she charred only the outside and buried them beneath the mud. She sliced the meat as thin as possible and roasted it over the smoke.
Before we knew it, we were preparing for a future that might never come.
I watched the fire, making sure the meat cooked evenly over the flames.
Sitting crouched before the fire, I organized the situation in my head. The people of Arti were strong. They lived in groups, and every one of them knew how to handle fire and stone. Among them, some could throw things like stone slings. On top of that, thanks to the techniques I'd spread, they'd begun making tools with handles and stone-tipped spears that looked like they belonged to the future.
But that didn't make us the rulers of this era. The masters of this world were not yet human. The night belonged to predators. The rivers belonged to crocodiles. And the paths of the grasslands were made by the Earthshakers.
If those massive beasts blocked the hunting grounds for days on end, it wasn't mere inconvenience. It was a disaster.
'The question is — why did they suddenly start going wild?'
Elephants were dangerous. But they were also intelligent. They weren't mad beasts that charged at everything around them for no reason. At least as far as I knew, elephants were not animals that wasted energy without cause.
'Is it mating season…?'
I'd heard that male elephants in musth became extremely aggressive. Testosterone surged explosively, their territorial instincts sharpened, and they saw everything around them as a rival. If that were the case, the fact that they attacked anyone they saw would make a certain kind of sense.
But.
'It's not just one or two — the whole herd is going wild. That changes things.'
Father had said "Earthshakers." That meant not a single mad bull, but the entire herd was going wild.
I considered other possibilities.
'Has the herd been threatened?'
Occasionally, seasoned lion prides or fearless hyenas would bother elephants. Usually they targeted calves or stragglers separated from the herd, but if the herd had lost some of its members to such creatures before, an overreactive panic response while going wild would be understandable.
But if that were the case, there'd be no reason for them to attack us specifically. They'd go after the lions or hyenas instead.
'Or…'
I didn't even want to imagine it, but there was one scenario with considerable probability.
A calf had died. And not just died — but died by our hands. In front of the very eyes of its parents.