I am a Primitive Man
Chapter 109 – Let the Deers out to pasture
The matter of raising the height of the wall was not as fast as imagined. This was not only because increasing the height required scaffolding, mud pulling, and a series of other tasks but also due to a major reason—the group of deer.
When the population was small, it was inconvenient to do anything, even raising deer.
If it was just one or two, feeding them posed no major problem for the Green Sparrow Tribe. However, now there were more than twenty.
Not to mention other things, just the daily fodder consumption was not a small amount. It required at least seven people to harvest grass for them every day to fill the stomachs of these big eaters.
And it had to be a diligent task.
For the current Green Sparrow Tribe, this was undoubtedly a significant burden.
Even though, under Han Cheng’s orders, the Eldest Senior Brother and others used small rapeseeds to lure an old deer out and secretly killed it for meat, the pressure on the tribe to provide grass for the deer did not decrease.
Moreover, after the lethargic rabbits from the winter started getting excited in spring due to increased activity, each one opened their appetite. With the continuous birth of rabbit offspring, the demand for grass also increased.
This further increased the burden on the people in the tribe.
After the grass near the tribe was harvested, they had to go to more distant places if they wanted to harvest an equivalent amount of grass again.
This meant more effort and a significant increase in encountering dangerous situations.
Han Cheng was also helpless about this matter. He didn’t expect that what was originally a very good thing for the tribe would turn out like this.
Regarding letting them roam freely, he had considered it, but he had been hesitating all along. He had worked hard to coax and deceive the deer back to the tribe. Moreover, the deer pen was built better than where the people of the Green Sparrow Tribe lived. If he released them now, they would gallop away without looking back, leaving behind an empty deer pen, and Han Cheng couldn’t find a reasonable explanation for it.
After careful consideration, Han Cheng ultimately chose to yield to reality and decided to release the deer.
However, he took a compromise approach. He tied ropes around the deer.
Initially, they were tied around their necks, but Han Cheng quickly changed this practice because it was prone to loosening, which could result in the rope falling off. If tied too tightly, it could affect the deer’s breathing.
The deer looked discontentedly at Han Cheng, and Han Cheng looked back at it.
It looked at Han Cheng’s hand holding the rope, and Han Cheng looked at its nostrils.
The puzzled deer was infuriated by the attempt of this small two-legged creature to try and bind it. It extended its tongue to lick its nostrils. Perhaps finding the taste unpleasant, it angrily sneezed twice and shook its head.
After thinking about it, Han Cheng decided not to touch the deer’s nose.
Apart from the small gap between its two nostrils being too small for a nose ring, another important reason was that piercing the nostrils would be too painful.
After such a long interaction, Han Cheng developed feelings for this spiritually sensitive deer. He didn’t want to treat it with such cruel methods.
After much thought, he could only approach it from the top of its head.
Rather than directly using a rope to make a loop around the deer’s head, which could easily cause bloodstains on its face, considering that the deer also relied on its appearance for food, Han Cheng opted for a method known as a “clamp board” in his hometown in his previous life.
This thing was originally designed for cattle.
As the young calves grew, a clamp board would be used to tether them to prevent them from going to the fields and eating crops.
As for nose rings, usually, only cattle that were certain to stay and be trained as plow oxen would be pierced with them. Calves sold for meat typically wouldn’t wear nose rings.
Making such a clamp board was quite simple. You just needed to split a wooden stick about twelve to thirteen centimeters long and two to three centimeters in diameter in the middle. Then, drill a hole at each end with a hand drill to thread a rope through.
When using it, the two wooden pieces would be threaded with a rope and then placed on the deer’s face—one on the left and one on the right. Once secured, another long rope would tie around the clamp board.
As long as you pulled on the rope, the deer would follow you.
This way, various drawbacks could be avoided while ensuring control over the deer. It also prevented them from getting hurt and protected their beautiful appearance.
Once again deceived by Han Cheng with his wife’s milk, the Deer Lord would occasionally shake its head, lower it, and twist its buttocks to scratch its face with its hind hooves, trying to get rid of this troublesome thing.
Unfortunately, its hooves were only split into two parts and couldn’t move freely. The deer couldn’t remove the thing Han Cheng tied.
The deer looked at Han Cheng resentfully, constantly rubbing its face against Han Cheng’s hand, wanting him to remove this uncomfortable thing. But Han Cheng hardened his heart in the end and didn’t untie it.
After about two days, the deer gradually adapted to this contraption.
Han Cheng, Tie Tou, and a few others released the deer.
Only Deer Lord was tied. It was the leader of the deer herd, and as long as it was controlled, the rest of the deer would follow.
Han Cheng realized he was wrong. He shouldn’t have come out to release the deer. Damn, this was not releasing the deer; it was the deer releasing him!
It was pure revenge.
Gasping for breath, Han Cheng, whose feet were dragged by Deer Lord, wanted to burst into curses.
Deer Lord was in a great mood. First, it finally got to leave the deer pen where it had lived for half the winter and run freely outside, breathing freely. Second, it could finally retaliate against this annoying two-legged creature.
The deer lowered its head and took a few bites of juicy grass, then turned to look at the breathless two-legged creature holding the rope. Its tail swayed, and it elegantly ran away with its long legs.
Han Cheng couldn’t stop it and was dragged along again.
Fu Jiang, the silly dog, thought they were just playing and completely ignored Han Cheng’s requests to stop Deer Lord. It ran around, frolicking joyfully from all sides, infuriating Han Cheng to the point of wanting to eat dog meat for dinner.
After running for a while, Deer Lord stopped, wagged its tail, and leisurely ate grass. Its mood was as pleasant as can be.
It now thought having a rope tied to its head was not bad. At the very least, using it to walk the two-legged creature was quite enjoyable.