Chapter 17
Chapter 17 – Fresco
Translated by Sunyancai
Since he was able to come over and be responsible for the teaching, naturally he was not some idiot who only knew how to count from one to ten at his age. What’s more, some old hunters like himself were all experts in counting, even though they perhaps did not know much about other fields. It was because counting was one of the basic skills required for a hunting mission, and the competition among different hunting teams also required that one knew how to count.
Knowing that the children in the cave could skillfully count from one to thirty, the old hunter felt quite happy and content, aside from being surprised and shocked. He liked to teach others, but unfortunately up on the mountain, no kid needed him to teach.
With this rare and precious interest, the old hunter paid extra attention in teaching and he enjoyed it as well.
Since they could learn more numbers, the cave quieted down and they stopped talking about changing the teacher, instead every whelp was listening closely with full attention. Shao Xuan mainly focused on the letters in the tribe, while other kids were eager to learn more numbers. Caesar, who was lying on the straw bed, sleeping, was the most bored one in the cave.
When it was the time for the old hunter to leave, he became quite attached to those kids already, and he felt like that he had more things that he wanted to share. In the past, he would only come here two or three times. Now that the situation had changed and he enjoyed teaching them, he planned to visit a few more times, for after all, he was not capable of getting down the mountain every day. After serious consideration, the old hunter left a roll of animal skin. Not that first one he had taken out, but a larger one with more letters and more numbers written on it. He asked Shao Xuan to keep it and whoever wanted to read may go to Shao Xuan.
All the vents in the cave were already blocked up by straw, so no light could come inside. During wintertime, it was the same darkness in the cave no matter day or night. Also they could not afford to keep the fire all day long. The firewood stored in the cave was brought by the warriors, but still, they could not afford to keep the fire going all day.
Shao Xuan was quite curious, for other stone walls in the cave were not like that. He bent and observed closely, and then found out that it seemed that on the stone walls in the stone room, there was a layer. It seemed to be painted with special stone powders.
He had seen people in the tribe use similar ways to paint wood to prevent the wood from being infected by insects. But it was in the cave, why would anyone use this method to paint a stone wall? And, judging by the situation, it was painted years ago in ancient times.
If newly painted, the powders should cover the wall fully and tightly. However, now since it had been a long time since everyone in the tribe lived here, the layer of stone powder came loose and in some places, the layer fell hard if one swiped it with his hand.
Shao Xuan took out his stone knife and scratched on the wall to remove the stone powder layer. With the light coming through the vent, Shao Xuan saw that there were some pictures carved on the wall where there was no layer.
A woman was carrying a pot. The pot had a wide mouth and tight bottom. On the pot there were also some decorative patterns. Shao Xuan had never seen anyone in the tribe using this kind of a stone pot, for all the people in the tribe valued practical usage instead of beautiful appearances when it came to tools.
“Perhaps those living up in the mountain might have those kind of pots in their homes,” Shao Xuan thought.
When he wiped out another part on the stone wall, there were about ten warriors, chasing game with bows and arrows.
Shao Xuan remembered that Lang Ga had told him that few warriors in the tribe were able to use a bow. Because no materials were fine enough to be made into a bow that could bear the strength of a totemic warrior. The bow and arrows now were made to set up a trap, or help the hunting by driving away the game, instead of for totemic warriors’ use. However, in the picture on the wall, every warrior was holding a giant bow!
Shao Xuan intended to use his knife and scratch more stone powder down, to see other carved paintings on the wall. But after some thought, he dropped the knife, fetched some water, and carefully used a piece of animal skin to wipe the wall. He believed that the frescos on the stone wall inside this stone room, might tell him a lot of interesting things that he had no clue of before.