He died from embarassment

"Bah, I don't care what you guys do as long as I'm asleep," Kalla chimed in, completely privy to their conversation discussing sex. She didn't seem phased by it at all. On the contrary--quite interested! "Pft, I already know Vaien is like a beast when it comes to sex drive...you can go at it all night for all I care."

"....." Zhang Han could form no words.

"Shut it, Kalla," Vaien said, but his tone was half teasing. He made no real attempts to deny such a thing. It was true, after all.

"Hmm," Kalla hummed and had a coarse tone, "you liked to fuck all those girls that hung over you back at our tribe, too. How big of a harem did you have? I think it was three, four...no, six?" She cracked up. "So now poor Zhang Han has to bear with all your ruts...what a tragedy."

Vaien rolled his eyes and hugged Zhang Han against himself more securely.

What did a few flings in the past matter? They were all flimsy relationships based on power dynamics; he was above them, they were below him. In Red Mane tribe, Vaien was a powerful hunter with a pretty good attitude and appearance to boot, so people tried to curry him for favor. Although he would lay with them during the night, the relationships he had with these women always felt shallow and superficial.

Something was missing. Empty.

That was why he liked Zhang Han more. Liked that he was stubborn and willing to talk back to him? ...or maybe it was that Zhang Han tried to be his equal? Meh, Vaien didn't really know for sure what he liked that much. But it didn't matter. Whatever it was made him more affectionate without thinking, it made him feel hot and wanting when he touched his skin. Visceral reactions were a better tell than logic and jumbled emotions.

Thoughts somewhat sorted out, Vaien just hummed a dull note in response to Kalla's crude words. Zhang Han could feel the rumble of it against his back as they sat together.

Vaien finally replied, "I used to like doing it with them, and now I just like doing it with Zhang Han. I could let him fuck me all night long and not get bored…but then again, his stamina and body just can't withstand it. A pity."

Zhang Han eyebrows knit from even greater awkwardness. "C-Can you both stop talking..." he gave up on saying anything more, his tone a mumble. He could listen to these two ramble on about anything else but this.

Vaien snorted. "So shy."

Kalla grinned toothily and made a circle with her thumb and index finger, then poked a straight finger through it in a crude yet unmistakable gesture.

"What should I stop talking about? This?" she teased.

Zhang Han lowered his gaze to his feet, not daring to look up any longer as he felt heat sink into his very bones. It wasn't that he was just shy! This kind of talk was meant for the bedroom or brothel...which, he supposed, this planet had neither. He heard Kalla start to laugh even louder, it turned into a full guffaw.

"Whoa, I didn't think he'd make such a cute face!" she said between bouts. "What a contrast to his usual calm~"

"Don't look!" Vaien quipped, and Zhang Han felt two wide palms darken his vision, blocking Kalla's view of his flustered expression. Vaien whispered in his ear, "See, she doesn't care. She's fine with whatever we do, you don't have to worry."

"..." Zhang Han wanted to retort but the words were stuck in his throat. You two...are missing the point of why he finds this all so humiliating, you know?

Just openly discussing sex, and before Vaien had even described their sex positions to Kalla. Where was the tact?! He was even somewhat comfortable talking dirty if it was just Vaien and him, but not when it transitioned into a group conversation!

Vaien nibbled on his ear lobe, and Zhang Han tensed, preventing himself from making any strange sounds. He removed Vaien's palms from over his face.

After a pause, Vaien also relented. "I guess we should sleep early, so we can get going tomorrow."

"What?" Kalla sounded disappointed. "But what about the tribe? We need to start heading east if you plan to return. Right now we're going too far north."

Vaien's reply was short and a bit terse, "I said I'd listen to what you had to say, but not that I'd go back.

"Come on, don't be this way…"

"I'm considering it," concluded Vaien, and Kalla could get him to promise anything more.

Finally giving up, the three settled down for the night. Thousands of stars dotted overhead, as they did every cloudless night. A number of dark shadows like birds flew above as well, and the temperature had cooled from the hot day to a cooler, but still sticky humidity.

Zhang Han did not have trouble falling asleep even when Vaien insisted on keeping an arm looped around him as 'safety measures'.

…

When he awoke the next morning, Zhang Han sat up and rubbed over his face. They'd camped out under some sparse forest, Kalla was sitting a ways off on his right, looking out vigilantly over the surroundings. Her amber pupils were focused, thin and reptile-like, the same as her brother's.

She glanced over and met his gaze.

"Oh, you're awake. Just in time for dawn."

"Did Vaien go out to hunt?" Zhang Han asked.

Kalla nodded. "Yeah. Since it's easier to catch stuff in the woods than it is the grasslands. I think that's where he planned to head today, you know…" she trailed off.

Zhang Han's impression of Kalla was similar to that of Vaien's. At first both of them seemed crude and childish, but after speaking to them a few times, he learned that they also had keener sides.

"Did Vaien tell you why he left the tribe?" Kalla asked suddenly.

"He never brought it up."

Although, Zhang Han never bothered to ask, either. To him those were all personal matters, something that the two of them didn't discuss between each other. Just like how Zhang Han never explained to him why his ship crashed down onto this unknown planet, why he had random panic attacks, or how he'd lost everything.

Kalla gave a light sigh. "He despises remembering it. So yeah, I'm not surprised."

Zhang Han knew that Kalla was trying to get somewhere, especially when she'd chosen to discuss this when Vaien was out hunting, and just kept listening.

"I was hoping you could help convince Vaien to come back...?"

"Hmm..." Zhang Han gave it some thought. It wasn't as though he was completely against it, but at the same time, it could be at his own loss.

To say, with Zhang Han's gap in physical strength, it was indeed dangerous to be around any large number of these superhumans. Risk was unavoidable. All it took was for one to have bad intentions...Kalla, for example, had almost one-shot him just because she thought he was an intruder in Vaien's cave.

Still, the tribe presented a good opportunity for more knowledge about this planet.

More importantly, those flowers that Vaien mentioned, the ones said to make someone more powerful. Vaien refused to explain more, but that wasn't going to stop Zhang Han from finding out the truth.

He spoke in a measured tone. "Since I lived underground...I'm curious about the history here. How did people first appear on this planet, how did they change to survive among the rest of the wildlife? ...if I can learn about such things, I might be interested in convincing Vaien to return."

"Of course you can!" Kalla's face lit up. "A few grannies in the second generation know more than what they have time to tell. I talk to them all the time."

If they're so old, Zhang Han believed her that they'd know something of interest.

"All right. You'll have to tell me a little about why Vaien left in the first place, then I can try to think of a way to convince him."

Kalla fiddled with one of her blue feather earrings, wanting to get to the point quickly. "The reason my brother left Red Mane isn't that the others disrespected or betrayed him. It's...our Dad, he got led to his death by some bastard."

"...he was murdered?" Zhang Han repeated, a bit confused by the wording 'led to his death'.