Chapter 167 – Poison
Translated by Joycelyn
The old man scanned the surroundings like he was preventing thieves, then he quickly went into his house and packed up his stuff. He called out ‘gu gua’ twice; the originally silent frogs squatting in front of his door step hopped away individually. Some went towards the woods, while some went towards the river.
After finishing packing, the old man then pulled Shao Xuan in another direction. While he walked, he also softly explained to Shao Xuan, “You want frog poison, and of course you would want the most toxic ones as well. My grandson can help you get them, any type you want, there will be.”
The old man was afraid that Shao Xuan would change his mind and turn away; therefore he repeatedly kept talking to Shao Xuan.
He was also afraid that Shao Xuan would think it troublesome and visit other stores to buy them instead. After all, in the Pu tribe, quite a few people sell frog poison. Many of the Drumming tribe members liked weapons that were coated in poison; when they were buying them they would just wrap them up, throw them into their rattan basket, and pay with water moonstones.
However, what the old man wanted to do now was to bring Shao Xuan to collect them at their habitat. Compared with the others, it was a little more troublesome.
But in fact, Shao Xuan was not annoyed, as long as he could get what he wanted; being a little troublesome was nothing. Also, when he saw the thing that the old man scrapped off, he was curious about it.
Previously, in the Flaming Horns tribe, when they went out hunting, the warriors would also like to use stuff that came from the animals. They liked using the poison to smear onto weapons such as spears, bows and so on. Among them were also different types of poisons, frog poison was the more common one.
And how the Flaming Horns tribe collected frog poison was that they would first kill the frog, then bake it with fire. When baking it, the poison would slowly seep out from the frog’s glands.
After the frog’s poison came out, all they had to do was just have the weapon rub against the frog, back and forth. The poison was then smeared onto the surface, thus achieving the desired result. For those frogs with more potent poison, the warriors only needed to wipe a little frog poison on their weapons and they could already go hunting. Generally, the beast that got struck with frog poison would die almost instantly. As for those more ferocious beasts, although they wouldn’t die, it would still cause an impact on their actions.
“We’re almost there, don’t worry.” The old man hurriedly said.
Shao Xuan was in no hurry, but rather, the old man was more anxious. He led Shao Xuan to a river nearby, looked at the river full of huge lotus leaves and shouted, “Yu, you there?!”
The lotus leaves on the river’s surface floated along with the wind, the frogs in the river were calling out, but there was no voice from a human.
The old man started getting angry, his beard trembling, he shouted out once again, “Come out, I’ve already seen you!”
But there was still no response.
The old man took a deep breath, and hollered, “Get out! I know you’re here!”
Finally, a response came from a lotus leaf not too far from them, “I’m here. Grandpa, what do you want again?”
A silhouette jumped up from a lotus leaf, after hopping onto a few more, he then reached the river bank. His vision swept past Shao Xuan, then turned to his grandpa, “Grandpa, what you want to sell you can go and sell, why did you call me? I was still sleeping!”
“Sleep, what sleep!” The old man’s eyes bulged out almost to the point of dropping out anytime. “Come here. This young man from an outside tribe would like to purchase frog poisons.”
“The tribe has so many other poison frogs, you can get them anywhere. Grandpa, I still remember your house still has a few bottles.” Yu said while yawning.
The old man breathed in and mumbled. His arm reached out to the root of the lotus leaf and bent it over, “You come down! Sleeping all day, are you rushing to sleep past winter?!”
Yu had no choice and jumped down from the lotus leaf. His eyes, that were half opened and looked like he had never slept before, turned to Shao Xuan, “You want to buy frog poison? What is it for?”
The old man swept a slap over, then turned back full of smiles to Shao Xuan, “Young man, what kind of frog poison do you want?”
Shao Xuan thought it over and said, “Can I see the frogs first?” He did not know if there was any difference from the frogs here and the Flaming Horns tribe’s.
“Of course, of course!” The old man did not wait for Yu to answer before rushing to reply.
Yu grumbled under his breath “troublesome”, then jumped up onto a lotus leaf, drummed his cheeks for a while, continuously giving off ‘gu gua’ sounds, afterwards he jumped back ashore.
Not long after, Shao Xuan saw some frogs successively come from the forest. There was some coming from the river too.
These frogs were bright and colorful, but there were also some that were not conspicuous. Either way, they all came together.
Each one was no bigger than a palm. After jumping over, they stayed around Yu, not running away, just sitting there. Sometimes, some would use their hind leg to kick away any dirt that was on them, maintaining their clean moist skin.
“These are all of them, some of these frogs can relieve pain, the results are superb. I’ve used them on the beasts in the mountain before.” Yu explained.
“And then?” Shao Xuan questioned.
“Died.”
Shao Xuan was speechless.
“Used too much, even if it could be used as medicine, in the end it became poison.” Yu explained.
If poison is used well, then it will be medicine. On the contrary, if medicine is badly used, then it will become a poison. Shao Xuan naturally understood this logic.
“This, this and this, their poison is not bad, a little could kill each beast in the forest.” Yu introduced a few to Shao Xuan, and then asked, “What degree of poison do you need? Poison to blind? Poison to mute? Or paralysing the whole body? Or the decomposing ones?”
Yu only stopped and looked at Shao Xuan after asking all the questions at one shot. He usually did not like going to the trade fair, it was always his grandpa bringing people over. He had to attend to them dutifully, or the trade would not be completed and his grandpa would nag at him when they went home.
Shao Xuan mused over this series of questions. When he was in the Flaming Horns tribe, he had used quite a few poisons, but had never divided them that specifically. It looked like the young man in front of him was a professional.
Seeing Shao Xuan staring at those frogs and not uttering a sound made the old man anxious, “If you don’t know which to choose, how about just buying a few of each to try them at home.” When he was finished speaking, he then turned back with a face of a tiger, “Hurry up and make a poison sting!”
Yu scratched his head and helplessly said, “Alright.”
Yu headed towards the forest after replying, while the old man determinedly pulled Shao Xuan to keep up, “This brat of mine might be a little lazy, but his knowledge towards poison, this old man won’t dare to say he is the first, but definitely ranked at the top in the tribe.”
Shao Xuan followed them further into the woods. These two did not have any bad intentions, and they were not like the other Pu tribe traders with a belly full of little extra motives swimming inside. Also, Shao Xuan wanted to see what kind of method the Pu tribe used to extract the poison from the frogs.
The understanding Yu has for poison, Shao Xuan believed. The area surrounding Yu’s eyes were bright yellow patterns, this was similar to one of the frogs who jumped away previously. What hobby they had, will be what kind of pattern they would have. Through this point, Yu’s love for poison frogs could be seen, naturally he would know more about them too.
When walking through the woods, they would occasionally pass by some long thorny plants. Yu broke off some of the thorns, continuing until his hands were full of these hard sharp thorns. The old man then chopped some wood using the stone knife he brought along. He split the wood into half and placed them on the ground; Yu then called out ‘gu gua’ a few times before some frogs came over. He then took a thorn out using his index and middle finger to hold onto it, and smeared over the body of a blue patterned frog closest to him.
Transparent glands started seeping out from the frog’s body; this was a poison that could bring down a whole deer.
The long hard thorn was smeared entirely with poison, and the process did not harm that frog in any way.
After smearing, Yu twisted his palm, with it facing down towards the previously split wood, and shot out his hand like lightning.
When he pulled back his hand, the poisoned thorns had been firmly nailed onto the wood. The sharp tip of the thorn was sticking out of the wood, just like a nail. When hammering in a nail, the end that would be sticking out of the wood from the other side would be the sharp tip, this was just like that.
This series of movements showed that Yu was very familiar with it, like he had done this quite a few times before.
One after another, the thorns that were smeared with poison were hammered into the wood securely. Five thorns each were smeared in one type of frog poison. After one type of frog poison was done, they would continue on to another frog, smearing their poison on.
“This kind of frog poison may not be able to kill people, but its main effect is this.” Yu used a hard thorn to wipe it off on a deep blue frog, then used the poison spread on the thorn to wipe it on a piece of leaf on a plant.
Only hearing a ‘chi’ ringing, the leaf that was smeared with poison immediately had a hole corroded through it. There was still smoke coming out. Smelling it may sting the nose a little, however, when smearing on the poison before, there was no smell.
It was hard to imagine that such a poison came from a frog that was no larger than a human’s palm.
Yu’s method of collecting poisons involved using the hard thorns; this is because the thorns had a not so visible layer that could keep the corrosion out.
Yu continued applying poison on the hard thorns then hammered them into the wood. He waited for the poison on the thorns to dry before plucking them out. He then wrapped the thorns up, so that the poison could use it whenever he wants, all he needed to do then was just take them out. Dried poison would not decrease its potency; the only limitation was that the longer it was kept, the weaker the poison will be.
Shao Xuan looked at how Yu had each thorn applied with poison then hammered them into the wood, he knew that many frog poisons could only work when in the blood stream. If it was not a scratch, then the poison would not have much effect, there were many that would only make the fingers have rash, it was not fatal. The Flaming Horns tribe, when carrying poisonous animals, would always take protective measures
But now, there were a lot of frog poison that could have an effect directly through skin contact, there was no need for a scratch. But he was handling that poison on the hard thorns very calmly, without using any protection for the fingers. If he slipped a little, he would have a hole in his hand or be poisoned.
Especially when throwing the thorns into the wood, many would worry that the poison on the hard thorns would slide onto the fingers. But Yu would always pull back his hand before that would happen, so that not even the slightest poison could touch him.
What surprised Shao Xuan was when there was no more space available on the wood, Yu held the remaining thorns directly in his mouth, biting on the non-poisonous end. If his lips came into contact with the poison, he would definitely suffer.
This was quite dangerous, but the old man next to him wasn’t surprised in the slightest, he had seen it quite a few times and wasn’t worried.
Once the smearing and drying of the poison on the hard thorns was finished, Yu pulled out the thorns from the wood. Of course, not with his naked hand, but with the help of leaves.
He handed the thorns properly smeared in poison to Shao Xuan and said: “All right, you can try these, if you like them you can come again and just find the old man, I’m going back to sleep.”