First, as Lan had suggested, the group all made their way to the northern area. While from a distance, the towering city wall gave the impression of, "Wow, so tall!" upon actually reaching the base of the wall, the feeling was more like looking up at the wall, which was dozens of stories high, and exclaiming, "Holy crap! It's unbelievably tall!" So, the first challenge was this city wall.
However, this city wall posed no difficulty for Lan, Sir Xia Na, and Livia-san.
Lan could instantly teleport by submerging into shadows, while Sir Xia Na and Livia-san both possessed Flying Magic. Arute and the Uncle both had their own flying amulets.
This left only Ellie, the ground-bound princess who couldn't fly. Although, if Ellie truly wanted to get up, she could use her brute strength to directly embed ice pillars into the city wall as footholds and jump up.
However, according to her persona, she was a novice Healer and shouldn't possess such terrifying physical abilities. So, Ellie could only ask Sir Xia Na to carry her up again, just like last time.
And so, under the cover of night, the group successfully flew over the city wall. What lay before them was indeed just as Lan had described earlier.
A vast expanse of land, entirely enclosed by towering city walls, with no entrance. Within this large area, there were also many smaller walls dividing it into several sections. Even though it was night, Ellie, with her True Ancestor physique, could see the situation below with perfect clarity.
Just as Lan had said before, the humans were all naked and confined in cages—vast expanses of wooden cages. It was evident that these cages had been there for some time.
Not to mention Ellie, even a normal adult could probably kick them apart with one foot. Yet, the humans imprisoned inside were all sitting or lying on the ground, looking dazed and bewildered, completely devoid of any desire to escape, even in many places where there were no Beastmen or Dragonkin guards.
Since it was night, they didn't see the scene of slaughter Lan had mentioned earlier, but the strong smell of blood continuously filled Ellie's nostrils.
Although Ellie had already smelled a faint scent of blood in the air while outside the city walls, upon ascending the wall, the bloody smell, mixed with various strange odors, became incredibly strong.
The others were momentarily stunned by the horrifying sight until Lan reminded everyone to quickly get down. Then, they continued to move, floating directly down with the help of flight. Indeed, there were almost no guards within this large area.
Due to their transparency and aura concealment, the people in the cages did not notice that Ellie was already beside them.
"Ugh... cough... cough... This is too tragic!" Livia-san couldn't bear it and immediately covered her nose, gagging. Because they were within Sir Xia Na's barrier, even speaking wouldn't be heard by the outside world. This barrier was indeed very convenient.
The others also placed their fingers over their noses, as the smell was truly unbearable. After all, here... what lay before them could no longer be considered normal humans, but "livestock"... so various foul odors permeated the area.
"Can such humans truly be saved?" Even Arute couldn't help but murmur to himself upon seeing such a sight.
Ellie had deliberately insisted on coming down to let them see firsthand the tragic state of humanity, to stir their compassion. Of course, compassion alone wasn't enough. One had to know... the current rulers of this world were the Dragon Race. Before the Eight Greed Kings made their appearance to purge the Dragon Race, they were the strongest and most formidable existence.
Therefore, acting impulsively out of compassion and freeing these people would be utterly meaningless. The guards they had just seen on the city wall could easily be crushed, but what good would crushing the guards do?
Judging by the scale of this Ranch, there must be at least tens of thousands of humans being raised here, which is no small number. Moreover, the one thing that worried Ellie the most, and the reason she insisted on coming down to confirm this time, was to ascertain whether the current humans could truly be called "humans."
One must know, in the original work, it only stated that before the Six Great Gods saved humanity, they were treated as livestock by the Dragon Race, and nothing else was mentioned.
Therefore, Ellie highly suspected that humans at this time were like "livestock" without intelligence. So... Ellie came down precisely to confirm this point.
If these "livestock" had not yet evolved into "humans" with self-awareness and self-consciousness, then saving humanity would be a baseless claim. Ellie didn't believe that this group of people had the ability to lead a bunch of "livestock" to resist the Dragon Race.
Now, seeing the humans confined in cages at such close proximity, completely devoid of any will to resist, or even the will to live, like walking dead, Ellie felt a bit troubled. It seemed that the time of her transmigration was a bit too early? How was she supposed to save such a group of "livestock"?
Just as the group was quietly walking past the cages holding many "livestock," observing the situation...
At this moment... Ellie, with her exceptional hearing, heard a very faint speaking voice coming from a nearby cage. From the childish and weak tone, Ellie could immediately tell that the person speaking was a confined "human"!
Ellie immediately ran towards that cage with joy, almost running out of Sir Xia Na's barrier. Sir Xia Na was quick-witted, or perhaps she also heard it, and instantly grabbed Ellie.
"Miss Bai Xia! What are you trying to do?!" Arute naturally noticed Ellie's unusual behavior.
"I heard someone speaking! Over there! Hurry!" Ellie said anxiously. This was the key of keys! She couldn't let it go.
"Besides groans, I haven't heard any other sounds," Lan said quietly.
"No... I'm sure it's a human voice, and they're speaking words we understand! Come with me quickly!" Ellie naturally wouldn't give up and insisted on going over.
So, everyone could only follow the direction Ellie pointed.
"Mom... Mommy... where's Daddy? Daddy's been gone for days, didn't he say he'd come back?"
As they got closer, everyone heard it... such a sentence. Although the words were weak, everyone clearly heard the incredibly tender voice of a Little Girl. So, they all quickened their pace and ran directly to that large cage.
"Child... child, Daddy can't come back, and he won't."
"Waaahhh... Daddy..."
Following the crying, everyone saw... a mother and daughter huddled in the corner of the large cage. The mother held her daughter in her arms, stroking her head while gently comforting her daughter who had lost her father.
Seeing this scene, Ellie felt as if she had seen hope. Good... since what was before her were "humans" and not "livestock," then this was much easier to deal with.
"Wait! Don't be impulsive yet!" Arute grabbed the Uncle, who was about to kick open the cage.
"Let's... leave first!" Ellie turned around and said to everyone with a solemn expression. Except for the angry Uncle, everyone else nodded.
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