Cave Refuge

The effect of the pitfall trap for horses is very singular; it only affects those war horses that are in a charge. Once a hoof steps into the pitfall trap, not only is the horse's balance impacted,

More importantly, although the depth of the pitfall trap isn't very deep, it is very difficult for a charging war horse to immediately pull its hoof out of the pitfall trap due to the inertial momentum of the charge.

One might imagine a horse at full gallop suddenly having one leg fixed in place while the other three hooves continue to propel the horse forward in a charge.

Under such conditions, it only takes an instant for a charging horse that steps into a pitfall trap to suffer a fractured leg due to inertia, besides the leg that falls into the trap.

Because one leg is immobilized, the horse's body will instantly lose balance and fall over.

The rhinos faced the same situation; although the solidified phantom shades are impervious to most ranged attacks, the ground's pre-existing holes remain unaffected.

To confirm his own thoughts, Dong Tianyu first used his Divine Sense to examine the wounds on the rhinos, confirming that all the rhinos had leg fractures.

The subsequent verification was even simpler: with a sweep of his Divine Sense, Dong Tianyu could confirm that the rhinos' charging path was littered with pitfall traps of various sizes.

While creating pitfall traps is quite straightforward, Dong Tianyu casually inspected the surroundings and confirmed that the entire base was surrounded by pitfall traps of varying sizes.

If one knew in advance, the pitfall traps on the ground would pose little threat as long as one moved slowly and with caution.

After all, horses are not like robots, foolishly oblivious and capable of only fixed tasks, and they are not as fragile as people may imagine.

It should be noted that there are no smooth paths in the wilderness, so those holes and pits on the ground have no effect on war horses that are walking slowly and leisurely.

Stepping into a hole in the wilderness is a common occurrence, and as long as a horse isn't in the middle of a high-speed charge, even if it missteps, all it needs to do is stabilize its stance and lift its leg.

However, the rhinos, like the swiftly charging war horses, have no concept of slowing down or halting mid-charge, and thus when encountering pitfall traps designed specifically for them, unless the followers can move slowly and cautiously, the outcome will inevitably be the same.

Looking at the six-armed natives who had to descend from the city walls using ropes, due to the lack of a gate, to reach the ground below.

Owing to having six arms, this task was completely danger-free for them, so long as they did not suffer from acrophobia.

The rhinos that had suffered limb fractures, though not dead, posed minimal danger to the natives due to their injuries.

The natives jumped down from the city walls for a simple reason: to finish off the weakened rhinos. Even though the rhinos had little resistance left, the natives still approached cautiously and slowly.

The subsequent process of killing was very simple. Facing the rhinos that were immobilized and severely wounded, even without thermal weapons, the natives could easily butcher the fallen rhinos with cold weapons such as spears.

Only after all the rhinos were killed did the natives begin to butcher and process their bodies.

The natives displayed expert butchery skills, indicating that they had likely faced such scenarios numerous times recently.

Through Dong Tianyu's observations, it was evident that when the natives dissected the rhinos, they only kept the horns and two small pieces of meat from around the rhino's heart.

The remaining dismembered carcasses were left behind as they turned and walked away, as if they had never taken notice of this scene.

Zachary didn't pay special attention to them taking the rhino horns, knowing that even on Blue Star, rhino horns are considered very valuable commodities.

Moreover, in this Plane, after observing that the rhinos can cooperate with each other and that the summoned phantoms can turn into real objects, it's possible that the rhino horns have some functions that Dong Tianyu doesn't understand.

As for the pieces of meat that the natives specifically cut from the bodies of the rhinos, they are actually pieces near the rhino's heart.

Because the heart is always beating, the piece of meat close to it is constantly tempered by the heart. Therefore, after dissecting the rhinos, in addition to the horns, the natives also took away that piece of meat closest to the heart.

Watching the natives only take away these two things and leave the rest of the rhino carcasses behind without any care was quite surprising.

Even Dong Tianyu, who was watching from the side, felt it was somewhat wasteful.

After all, regardless of the taste, the flesh on those abandoned rhino bodies is still meat. Considering how areas outside of the base have turned into apocalyptic wastelands on this Plane, it's clear that meat must be a relatively scarce resource here.

Yet, even so, after dissecting the rhinos, the natives did not bother with the carcasses and decisively left the area.

At first, Dong Tianyu thought the natives might have left because they didn't like the taste of rhino meat and therefore didn't take any with them.

But recalling how hurried the natives were when leaving after the dissection, it suggested there might be other reasons unknown to Dong Tianyu.

For this reason, even though he was somewhat eager to take the rhino bodies, he restrained himself and waited to see if anything else would happen on the ground.

Without a long wait, not much later, the rhino bodies on the ground unexpectedly started sinking into the ground one by one.

It seemed that some kind of creature lived underground that possibly consumed the flesh of beings on the surface.

With his Divine Sense, Dong Tianyu naturally wasn't obstructed by the surface and could directly detect what kind of creature was hiding underground.

The creature hiding underground was cylinder-shaped, with a mouth full of sharp teeth at both ends.

As the creature moved underground, the mouth at the front would devour the soil, and after passing it through its body, it would expel it from the mouth at the rear.

It was because of this process that the creature left no noticeable trace on the surface as it burrowed through the ground.

Watching as the rhino carcasses were swallowed one by one by the underground creature, perhaps due to understanding, Dong Tianyu didn't feel any fear upon seeing the rhinos gradually sinking into the ground again.

After the underground creature finished eating all the rhino bodies, it didn't immediately leave. Instead, it extended tentacle-like appendages from its back, one after another.

Dong Tianyu was initially puzzled, wondering what this creature was doing since all the rhino carcasses were gone. The scene might be invisible to others underground, but Dong Tianyu, with his Divine Sense, could see everything clearly.

Yet Dong Tianyu could never have anticipated that the tentacles growing from the monster's back were actively digging pit traps.

Realizing this, Dong Tianyu seemed to understand that the natives trapped in the city were fishing with items containing a large amount of Plane Origin.

And the creature lurking underground was actually fishing using the survivors inside the base.

As long as the base remains unconquered, it will continue to attract creatures from other Planes to attack.

The creature hiding underground wasn't foolish either. It would quietly provide whatever assistance it could to the natives living in the base, help that was within its capacity and without compromising its own interests.