Lux's Farewell

Just as one has to cross [-] miles of yellow sand from Vazuan to Mount Targon, one has to cross the towering Crampon Mountains from the Laxtak Plain to the Great Glacier, and then cross the Sea of ​​Ice.

For anyone who can't fly, this is a difficult journey - although the Crampon Mountains are not as famous as the Dragon's Back Snow Mountain, they are far better than the Dragon's Back Mountains in terms of altitude and harsh climate. Ridge snow mountain.

What's even worse is that many areas in the Ice Claw Mountains are where the Lost move. These Lost Shamans who believe in the old gods and have lost their humanity are more violent and dangerous than the most violent beasts, including the man-eating ice trolls. Compared with these losers, they would all be called cute.

The ice trolls face danger and may disperse in a hurry, but the losers are different. If they find an opponent that is difficult to defeat, these guys will not only fight to the death, but also try to summon the power of the old gods—— And once the Old God deems the opponent worthy, he will grant the lost the power of storm and thunder.

Therefore, no one is willing to cross the territory of the loser unless they have to.

If this is not a trial, Ashe actually has a safer path - she can go west out of the Nyuskara Pass, then northwest to the Rockefah Peninsula, then north into the Sea of ​​Ice, and cross the sea from here Big glaciers can also be reached.

Compared with directly crossing the Ice Claw Mountains, this route is undoubtedly much safer. Although it will also pass through some inaccessible areas on the road, it is also very likely to encounter enemies such as ice trolls and direwolves, but compared with the Lost , this is simply drizzle.

But this is Anivia's trial, and reaching the Great Glacier is also part of the trial.

Although the detour is safe, according to the Freljord people's judgment on wisdom, this does not meet Anivia's requirements!
Avoiding shame is useful but not wisdom.

Guests and hosts are welcome. As an outsider invited to participate in the trial, Lux naturally has no objections to Ashe's plan and route.

And others would be afraid of the lost, but Lux would not. After all, she had seen the abilities of these believers of the old gods as early as in Mithral City - they were violent and ferocious, and full of primitive worship. They were simply... Destroyer of civilization.

For Lux, there is no psychological burden in destroying the lost.

As for the Crampon Mountains climb itself…

Having already climbed Mount Targon, can the Crampon Mountains be more difficult to climb than Mount Targon?

In this way, after confirming that they would walk directly north of the mountain, Ashe and Lux, who were fully prepared, embarked on the journey to the Great Glacier.

Neither Tryndamere nor Kalya participated in this trial. On the stage of the trial, there were only two girls who were no longer young.

........................

Although Anivia did not give very precise trial requirements, Ashe, as a trialist, believed that she should show the greatest "sincerity" and complete this trial without relying on the power of the Avarosa tribe. .

Therefore, when they set out, they took nothing else except a Yukar sleigh for easy transportation.

Even this sled is only loaded with some necessities and a few tools and materials that are not easy to obtain on the ice field. Most of the loading space is still empty.

In other words, Ashe and Lux ​​need to obtain the food and fuel along the way by themselves.

Whether it's hunting, gathering, or logging, they have to do everything by themselves since they left Laxtaq City.

For Ashe, this reminded her of the days when she had just lost her tribe and met Sejuani, when their relationship had not broken down yet and they were still best friends.

But now, the person traveling with her was Sejuani's Terminator, which made Ashe a little reluctant to let go at first.

For Ashe, the sign of being unable to let go is silence. On the first day after leaving Laxtaq City, she just sat on the sled, mechanically driving Yukar, and said nothing in silence.

Ashe didn't speak, and neither did Lux.

This was not Lux's first trial, nor was it her first long-distance journey, so although the journey on the ice field was quite monotonous, she adapted quickly. For her, silence was not a torment. After all, she was in She was also very silent when she was in the Shurima desert, and Kalya was the one nagging all the time.

Now that Kalya was not around, she simply let her mind go for a while.

In silence, time soon came to evening. When dusk finally appeared on the horizon, the two people who had been silent finally realized that it seemed that today's dinner was not yet available.

For both Lux and Ash, missing a meal is not a big deal.

But having just left Lux Stark today, it was a bit embarrassing to have to go to bed hungry at night - especially when Lux and Ashe were not very familiar with each other yet.

Therefore, when the roar of Ernuk in heat appeared not far away, both Lux and Ashe's eyes lit up at the same time.

Ashe, who was driving Jukal, stopped the sled, intending to hunt a prey for food in the next few days, and use the Enuk's fur as material for subsequent climbs over the crampon snow mountains and across the ice sea.

But Lux's movement was undoubtedly a bit faster. The sled didn't even stop here, and she jumped out in a flash.

The next moment, there was a commotion among the wild Erniuk group.

When the commotion was over, Lux had returned dragging a large male Ernuk.

This was a rather unlucky guy. It had just lost the battle for a mate. After observing the state of the Enyuk group, Lux immediately targeted it as prey.

The reason is not that it was injured in the previous battle and is easier to take action. The main reason is that for the Enuk group, killing such a loser by a hunter will not affect subsequent reproduction.

In other words, if the fight fails, you will be injured and killed by predators. This is the natural law of the wild Enuk tribe. Only the strongest Enuk can obtain a mate so that their offspring can reproduce.

The performance of survival of the fittest on this frozen soil has always been so straightforward.

Lux's performance surprised Ashe - not only her choice of prey, but also the timing of her attack and subsequent handling of the prey.

Because as far as she knew, the warm-blooded people in the south obtained food by growing plants and raising livestock. Hunting was not a part of daily life, but Lux's performance looked like an experienced old hunter, whether it was Tracking prey or bleeding and skinning can only be accomplished with proficiency.

This kind of skillful skill would definitely not be possible without practicing with three to five hundred prey!What's even more astonishing is that she seems to have a good understanding of many Freljord-specific animals - this kind of understanding is not an encyclopedic understanding from books, but when skinning and decomposing prey, it's like The silky smoothness of Chef Ding's Jie Niu shows ease.

This is very surprising.

If proficiency in hunting comes from hunting experience, where does knowledge of the Freljord's big game come from?
Lux is not from the Freljord!

Ash, who was full of doubts, finally couldn't help but raise his own questions after Ash easily disintegrated a wild Ernuk.

"Ah, do I look very skilled?" Hearing Ashe's question, Lux was also stunned for a moment, "Maybe it's because... I hunted a lot of prey on the way to Newskala, right?"

"For that alliance?" Hearing what Lux said, Ashe soon had some clarity. "You didn't show yourself to them in person? I've heard about your record in Silver Nugget City."

"You're talking about Mithril City, right?" Lux smiled, "I'm not as good at archery as you. I can easily get the first place in every category. I'm better at magic, and in Freljord , spells other than frost magic are generally not well understood by people."

Ai Xi nodded after hearing this.

Although she doesn't understand magic, she can still understand what Lux said - in the Freljord, only the frost magic mastered by the Frostguard priests is "serious magic". As for other spells and spell-like spells, Means, in the eyes of the Freljordians, are the stuff of warm-blooded people.

If Lux takes the initiative to display spell types other than frost magic in the alliance, then I am afraid that the result will not attract the respect of other tribes.

In this case, directly using magic to hunt and then display the prey is a very smart choice.

While speaking, Lux had already used her broken blade to roughly divide the prey.

Ernuk's leather had to be left, and the raft needed to cross the ice sea would have to be wrapped with at least three layers of fur to be completely waterproof.

Most of Ernuk's meat was shaved off, and the other bones except the ribs were abandoned on the ice sheet. These parts could not be eaten by Ashe and Lux ​​in a short time. There will be more in the future. The Ice Vulture rendered it harmless.

After dealing with all this, Lux and Ash leaned on the sled and started today's dinner.

The taste of wild Elnuk is not very good, especially the male Elnuk that has not been gelded. Even if Lux bleeds immediately, the smell is still a little lingering.

But for the Freljord people who have lived on the ice sheet for a long time, they have a special way to deal with this fishy smell - Ashe skillfully found some clean soil and threaded the meat in large pieces. , smeared a thick layer on the surface, and then placed it on the flame.

Then, when Lux thought the meat was cooked and ready to eat, Ashe waved her hand.

"Wait a moment." She looked at the flames with a smile, "Now is not the time."

Although Lux didn't quite understand why Ashe said that, she still sat next to the sled and continued to wait patiently.

It wasn't until half an hour later, when the meat was completely burnt, that Ashe took off the "black charcoal".

"Well, just right!"

As he spoke, Ash took out the short knife from his waist and used a rather wild knife technique to cut off all the burnt parts of the large piece of barbecue.

When two-thirds of the barbecue was cut off, it finally showed a completely different side from before - it seemed that all the fishy smell had been cut away along with the burnt shell wrapped in soil, and the large pieces of barbecue became Taking a small piece of juicy deliciousness, Lux took the first piece that Ashe handed over and took a tentative bite. An astonishing aroma of meat instantly captured her taste buds.

Lux had never thought that Enyuk's meat could be so delicious.

You know, in the northern border of Demacia, although Elnuk has become a common livestock, it is mainly for materials such as fur and hoof nails. As for the meat of Elnuk, it is usually given to food Processing plants process it into things like meat floss.

Although it is very cheap, few people are willing to buy Erniuk's meat directly to eat - it is really unpalatable.

To make it delicious, the spices required for cooking are already more expensive than buying beef for eating.

However, now after Ashe's treatment, Ernuk tastes better than ever, which undoubtedly makes Lux's eyes light up.

"Not bad, right?" Looking at Lux's surprised expression, Ashe also smiled, "I always liked this way of eating when I was a child, but there were really not many opportunities to eat like this."

Lux nodded.

Although the Ernuk meat tastes good, considering the two-thirds cut off, any normal Freljord tribe would not be willing to eat it like this.

Waste is a shameful thing on this ice sheet.

That is to say, only trialists like Lux and Ashe, who cannot take away too much meat, are qualified to have such a luxury.

"A lot of things were very simple when I was young. I didn't have to think too much back then, and I didn't have to worry about gains and losses." Lux took matters into her own hands and started cutting meat. "In a sense, it was really pure back then."

This was entirely what Lux felt subconsciously, because compared to other children, Lux's childhood ended very early, and she had already begun to learn acting by the time she met Kalya.

After hearing what Lacus said, Ashe couldn't help but nodded - similar to Lacus, she was also a person who was "ripened". When the tribe was destroyed and when her childhood sweetheart betrayed her, she originally had no idea at all. Ashe couldn't hold the Zhenbing weapon, but she endured the pain and picked up Avarosa's longbow. On that day, she bid farewell to her childishness and matured overnight.

The dripping barbecue seemed to bring the distance between the two parties closer. Across the campfire, Lux and Ash started talking while eating dinner.

Different from the previous negotiations, the content of this dinner chat was more casual. For both parties, it was a process of getting to know their peers.

However, as they chatted, the dancing bonfire seemed to turn into a mirror - on both sides of the bonfire, Lux and Ashe looked at each other with a familiar feeling of looking into a mirror. (End of chapter)