Chapter 17

The villagers have sharp ears.

 Du Mingna and Ges did not deliberately avoid them when talking.

 Even the villagers who were still busy working could hear Du Mingna and Ges's conversation clearly.

 Some villagers seemed to be working, but they were actually just pretending.

 The meat pickers had already picked the meat off the bones clean and still refused to change; the meat washers had no change in color even after the river water washed over them, and they did not move on to something else; those rubbing animal hides and fur kept holding onto the piece of hide, and the actions of stringing meat and drying meat were slow.

 Everyone was thinking about what Du Mingna said.

 Could the village really be under attack by monsters? Their thoughts were similar to Ges's, both feeling that the number of wild beasts caught in traps should not be related to whether the village would be attacked by monsters.

 However, when they suddenly heard someone say that the village would be in danger, they became anxious and wondered if they should prepare in advance.

 As the representative of the villagers, Ges said to Du Mingna that the village had also had such a bountiful harvest before, but had not encountered wild beasts.

 Du Mingna furrowed his brow slightly, then relaxed.

 "That's not surprising.

 The monsters deeper in the mountains generally don't run outside.

 If they run outside, they will drive the wild beasts in the mountains out.

 If the monsters do not leave the mountain area, the deeper parts of the mountains will return to normal, and then there will be no monsters running out to attack."

"This..." Ges was at a loss.

 He was quickly convinced by Du Mingna.

 Du Mingna calmly looked into his eyes.

 "The number of wild beasts that traps can catch is limited.

 Some wild beasts that fall into traps may make noise, keeping other wild beasts away from the traps.

 So, just by looking at the number of wild beasts you catch through traps, you cannot prove how many wild beasts have come out of the mountains.

" Ges nodded involuntarily.

 Du Mingna was absolutely right.

 They often reduced their frequency of going up the mountain after a big harvest through traps.

 They truly did not know whether the traps would continue to catch a large number of wild beasts the next day.

 They waited a few more days before going up the mountain, and even if they saw that the traps on the mountain had caught quite a few wild beasts, they would think it was normal and attribute everything to the interval between their trips up the mountain.

 And if a monster attack happened next, their traps would be almost destroyed, and the wild beasts previously trapped in the traps would either be eaten by the monsters or escaped, leaving them completely unsure of their harvest.

 "Mayor Ges, how about this? Tomorrow, you go up the mountain again and see how many wild beasts the traps in the mountains have caught.

 If the number is still high, then we should prepare.

" After listening to Du Mingna's words, Ges nodded again."That's a good idea.

 If we can prepare in advance, maybe we can even kill some monsters!" Generally, the ones attacking their village were only first-order monsters, with the occasional appearance of second-order monsters.

 However, every time monsters attacked the village, there were many of them.

 The villagers were outnumbered and had little ability to resist, so they had to focus on finding ways to evade.

 Even so, after each monster attack, the village would be left with some monster corpses.

 However, these monster corpses were severely damaged, and the villagers did not know how to collect the valuable resources from the monsters.

 Most of the time, the villagers could only eat the monster meat themselves.

 When dealing with regular wild animals, they would try to wash away the blood residue in the meat with running water to reduce the gamey smell.

 As for eating monster meat, the villagers would not waste the rich energy-containing monster blood even if they found it difficult to eat.

 It can be said that the monster corpses left after monster attacks were also valuable resources for the villagers to improve their strength.

 Without them, the villagers' strength could not have reached the current level.

 In the past, the villagers did not know when the monsters would come, so they could kill fewer monsters.

 Once they were prepared... Other villagers who listened to Ges and Du Mingna talking were eager to try.

 If the rules Du Mingna mentioned were true, then they would make a fortune! Ges tried to suppress his excitement as much as possible and glanced at the other villagers.

 "Everyone, hurry up and work! If we really find a large number of wild beasts in the trap tomorrow, we will be even busier!" Immediately someone responded.

 "Alright!" "Village chief, don't worry!" "Ges, don't just talk, you will also have to work later!" The voices of the villagers were full of enthusiasm.

 Du Mingna also breathed a sigh of relief.

 Next, they would wait for the results after the villagers went up the mountain to check tomorrow.

 He couldn't help much here, and in the end, he was only given a lot of relatively tender wild beast meat and big bones.

 This was enough for him and Old John to eat for a few meals.

 The villagers handed it to him and stuffed it into Ges's hands, directly asking Ges to help carry it back to his house.

 Ges still shook the meat and bones and smiled, "Old John's cooking skills are great! The way we cook big meat soup now is all learned from him!" Du Mingna was delayed for a while here.

 As he walked home, he heard the system prompt.

 "Ding! Congratulations to the host for completing the special mission: hanging the plaque of 'Magic First School'! The mission reward has been sent to the host's backpack, please check it.

" This task was not like the main tasks, which had a completion rate.

 The system did not need Du Mingna to choose when to submit the task.

 At this moment, Du Mingna was still walking on the road and was not in the mood to check the system backpack.

 Since the items were delivered and not needed for the time being, it was okay to check later.

 He was still a distance away from his stone house when he saw that two wooden pillars had already been used to support the plaque of "Magic First School" next to the stone house.

 By now, the sky was darkening, and the ground in the distance had turned into a large mass of varying shades of black.

 The wooden pillars also appeared dark due to the changing light.

 The border of the plaque was almost merging with the background color.

 But the five words "Magic First School" were still very clear.

 The golden color in the text seemed to flow.

 Looking into the distance, Du Mingna was only amazed at the extraordinary quality of the system and had no further feelings.

 His companions, Daniel and Ges, behaved quite differently.

 The two of them almost forgot how to walk, just staring blankly at the plaque.

 Du Mingna took a few steps towards his home, but did not hear the footsteps that had been following him before.

 When he turned around, he noticed that Ges and Daniel were standing still, staring at the plaque.

 Du Mingna wanted to pat their shoulders.

 Unfortunately, both of them were too tall and strong, while Du Mingna was still a slender young man, barely reaching their shoulders, and patting them would not feel comfortable.

 Du Mingna raised his voice.

 "Village Chief Ges? Daniel?" At his shout, the two were startled and simultaneously woke up.

 While Ges was still amazed, Daniel couldn't contain his curiosity and asked, "Teacher, how much did you spend on this plaque? I followed you to the castle with silver heart grass when I was a child, but I have never seen such a magical plaque! It's, it's..." Daniel hesitated for a few moments, scratched his head several times, and finally found the right words.

 "It's flowing!" Daniel exaggeratedly moved his arms.

 "When I looked at it, I felt that the words on it, that golden color, were all flowing! I seemed to have seen something very magical, and now I can't say anything."

Ges exclaimed, "Flowing? Daniel, did you really see it flowing? I feel like I saw something like a mountain!""It seems like it's not a mountain, but something else..." Greg said, losing the confidence he had at the beginning.

 He also doubted what he saw when looking at the plaque.

 Daniel scratched his head even harder.

 "I don't know, I thought I saw it moving, but now I don't think so..." Saying that, Daniel glanced at the plaque again.

 Hmm, this time when he looked, besides finding the words on it very clear, he didn't feel anything else.

 "Magic First School." Five words.

 There was a bit of distance between each word.

 Even if he only remembered one word, he could now distinguish what each of these five words corresponded to by remembering the content on the plaque.

 Daniel shifted his gaze away.

 Just one look at the plaque, he didn't feel anything.

 But he had a feeling that if he stared at it for a while longer, he might get distracted like before.

 There were many things to do tonight.

 He had to study with his daughter and Montserrat, then work overtime to handle those beasts, and go up the mountain tomorrow...

 Greg was also calculating in his mind at this time.

 Wouldn't he want to learn from Dumina? Among his villagers, there were already self-conscious learners, as the village chief, he couldn't be worse than the villagers and refuse to learn, right? But he felt troubled.

 There were many things in the village that required his attention on a daily basis.

 He couldn't guarantee that he could meet Dumina's requirements for study time, so he didn't dare to directly tell Dumina that he would be a regular student.

 But if he couldn't come to study often, just occasionally listen in, he was worried about falling behind.

 He was also embarrassed to ask Dumina to teach him specifically to ensure he could keep up with the progress.

 Dumina's stone house was now in sight.

 Greg gave the meat and large bones to Old John.

 Old John had already prepared dinner by now.

 Dinner was still relatively simple.

 The food Dumina had brought before, prepared to eat on the way to the village, had not been finished.

 These foods were not very suitable for storage and should be consumed as soon as possible.

 If Old John needed to prepare dinner for two more people, he just needed to take out a little more of these foods.

 Old John observed Dumina's expression and tried to keep Daniel and Greg for dinner, but both politely declined eating at Dumina's place.

 Daniel was eager to go home, have dinner, and then come back to study.

 Greg watched Daniel leave, he was also about to leave, but after taking a few steps, he hesitated and turned back.

 Dumina had not entered the house yet.

 The moment Greg turned back, Dumina noticed.

 Facing away from Greg, he also turned back.

 After meeting Greg's gaze, Dumina turned around and smiled.

 "Mayor Greg, do you need something? Feel free to speak up."