Starting Off Survival With A Small Treehouse

Xu Xin didn’t linger by the lake for long.

Some beasts by the lake were scared away by the crocodiles in the water. He circled the lake and found no new advanced materials, so he continued focusing on hunting.

The current coordination between Xu Xin and the Silver King was impeccable. With the map’s hints and Keke’s guidance, the beasts’ positions were untraceable, and those small animals hiding motionless in the grass were actually easier for Xu Xin to hit than moving targets.

His efficiency was unmatched by other survivors.

Before dark, Xu Xin had already hunted eighteen wild rabbits, seven wild cats, two wild boars, and various other animals.

He didn’t provoke the wolf pack for now, mainly because taking the Silver King to hunt wolves always felt like it might rebel, and facing a large wolf pack head-on was not an easy task.

Xu Xin held a black blood-bladed knife, separating the tusks of the wild boar in front of him from its body.

The wild boar’s tusks were like tofu under the altar knife, Xu Xin didn’t even need to exert force to separate them.

Then his eyes lit up.

[Boar Tusk Sacrifice (Blue): One of the advanced offerings used to sacrifice to the ’god’.]

Advanced offering!

However, he was somewhat disappointed that of the two tusks of this wild boar, only one was a blue-grade offering.

This was the third wild boar Xu Xin had hunted. The previous two also yielded four tusk offerings, but they were all green-grade.

After dismantling the boar’s body and putting it into his backpack, Xu Xin looked up at the sky, where the sunset in the west heralded the approaching night.

"Better sacrifice these offerings first."

Riding the wolf to the altar, the Silver King still dared not enter. Xu Xin had it wait outside the altar while Keke jumped onto his shoulder.

"Crack."

As he stepped onto the altar, Xu Xin heard a slight sound again. This time he heard it more clearly; the sound came from below the ground.

"Is there some mechanism under the altar?" Xu Xin squinted his eyes.

At the sacrificial table, Xu Xin first took out a [Rabbit Ear Offering] and placed it on the sacrificial table.

An even colder chill than when he placed rabbit meat before spread out from the sacrificial table. This time Xu Xin didn’t retreat but stared intently at the changes on the sacrificial table while paying attention to the stone pillar with the rabbit statue on the side.

The patterns around the sacrificial table began to move.

Under Xu Xin’s watchful eyes, those blood-red patterns did not slowly creep towards the offerings like before but shone brightly, rapidly spreading to the center of the sacrificial table, enveloping the entire offering.

The blood packet deflated within seconds, and in Xu Xin’s peripheral vision, the blood-red color at the base of the rabbit statue stone pillar quickly spread upwards, with the ordinary pattern being stained with blood red.

Just one offering stained over twenty centimeters of the entire stone pillar with blood red.

And the patterns on the stone sacrificial table retreated slowly to the edge with dimmed lights.

Xu Xin had hunted eighteen wild rabbits, totaling thirty-six [Rabbit Ear Offerings]. He pondered for a moment and decided to place all the remaining thirty-five on the table.

The cold wind roared, and blood red spread; soon, all the offerings disappeared, and the rabbit statue stone pillar was completely dyed red. Even most of the rabbit statue was covered in red.

Blood-red patterns covered the rabbit statue, looking eerie yet with a strange beauty.

The stone pillar emitted intense heat, and after the coldness of the sacrificial table faded, the heat from the stone pillar hit Xu Xin, making him feel like he was taking a sauna.

The patterns on the stone pillar reminded him of the underworld’s vines, those tendrils all covered with blood-stripe-like patterns.

His eyelids twitched, and Xu Xin had a bad feeling.

"Could it be..." He was unsure about his guess.

Looking at the statue with only a small part left un-stained, Xu Xin gritted his teeth, took out all the rabbit meat from his backpack, and placed it on the sacrificial table.

Blood red spread once more, slowly this time. Xu Xin backed away from the central sacrificial table and the stone pillar with the eerie rabbit carving, keeping a keen eye on the last un-stained section.

On the statue, blood-red patterns slowly crept upward, and finally, the rabbit statue was entirely covered with the pattern.

"Ying ying ying!" Keke suddenly became agitated, its little paw pointing at the rabbit statue on the stone pillar, constantly tugging at Xu Xin’s clothes.

"Danger?" Xu Xin asked, keeping his eyes fixed on the rabbit statue.

"Ying!" Keke nodded vigorously on his shoulder.

"Damn it! Don’t tell me I guessed it right!" Xu Xin retreated, backing all the way out of the altar to where the Silver King was, nervously watching that statue.

Several seconds, tens of seconds, a minute passed... Xu Xin held a crossbow, not daring to act rashly.

Apart from the constant heat emitted by the stone pillar, the inside of the altar was extremely quiet.

Just as Xu Xin heaved a sigh of relief, thinking nothing would happen, a sudden change occurred.

The blood-red patterns on the rabbit statue stone pillar suddenly flared up, and Xu Xin heard the cracking sound of stone breaking. The blood-red light followed the patterns, emanating from the statue’s interior and bathing the entire altar in a red glow.

"Damn it, so it’s like this!" Xu Xin cursed silently.

From the moment he saw the blood-red patterns start appearing on the statue, something felt amiss. He had a premonition that once these patterns fully enveloped the statue, it would transform into a monster.

These red patterns were closely connected to those in the underworld, possibly some mysterious force or a special virus or bacteria mutating ordinary creatures.

Xu Xin immediately pulled out his blue-grade iron armor from his backpack and put it on. For a higher hunting success rate, he had been wearing leather armor all along.

The cracks on the statue widened, and the blood-red light shooting out from inside became more intense.

Suddenly, Xu Xin’s watch vibrated. He glanced at it; it was a message from Ji Chaoyang.

"Xu Xin, don’t offer sacrifices to the altar, those stone sculptures will come to life."

What a coincidence.

Ji Chaoyang was indeed a well-meaning expert, but unfortunately...

Xu Xin smiled bitterly, gazing at the slowly fracturing statue, and spoke into his watch: "You’re too late; it’s already alive."

The statue’s fragments fell from the stone pillar, revealing patches of red and white fur. Finally, with a loud explosion, the rabbit statue shattered completely, and a rabbit as large as a pig, identical to the statue, stood on the stone pillar.

Honestly, seeing the rabbit’s size slightly calmed Xu Xin’s initially panicked mind.

Though the Blood Pattern Rabbit was much larger than an ordinary rabbit, it was only bear or wild boar-sized, perhaps even smaller. Xu Xin felt he could still handle it.

On the map, the brightness of the Blood Pattern Rabbit’s red dot was just a bit higher than that of a black bear or wild boar, not reaching the brightness of brown bears or tigers.

The Blood Pattern Rabbit turned its gaze toward Xu Xin, its red eyes flashing with eerie light, its mouth slightly open, emitting a sharp, unpleasant grinding sound.

Strike first!

Xu Xin raised his hand and fired the already loaded ordinary crossbow bolt!

Just as the bolt was about to hit the rabbit, the rabbit suddenly kicked off the pillar, leaping into the air with incredible speed like a missile launching from the ground.

The crossbow bolt passed through where the Blood Pattern Rabbit originally stood, disappearing into the forest.

"This..." Xu Xin’s pupils shrank as he quickly drew a poison bolt from his quiver and loaded it.

As soon as he finished loading, the rabbit descended from mid-air.

"Boom!"

With a loud thud, the rabbit landed mere meters in front of Xu Xin, its upright body about one and a half meters tall, its red eyes coldly locking with Xu Xin’s, issuing continuous, piercing grinding sounds from its mouth, and its sword-like ears stood erect, seemingly ready to slash down at any moment!

And as the rabbit landed, Xu Xin immediately aimed the crossbow at the rabbit’s head and pulled the trigger!