"How is he?" Shire asked.

"Still hasn’t woken up, but his fever’s gone," Bai Mao said, setting down a wooden bowl.

Nine-finger lay on the ground, still unconscious. His entire left arm was gone from the bicep down. The stump was wrapped in a layer of cloth strips, which were soaked with blood.

Shire nodded. After driving off the Fearsome Claw Bear, he had immediately used the Blessing of the Evil God on his subordinate. Then he had applied a poultice and bandaged the wound, managing to save his life. But the goblins had no Priests, nor could they perform advanced Magic like reattaching a severed limb.

"If only someone knew a Healing Spell. Even a few Healing Potions would do," Shire sighed. He knew this was a luxury for goblins.

"Take good care of him." With that, he left the cave chamber.

"Be careful," Bai Mao called out as he caught up to Shire. The latter nodded, then led his subordinates out of the cave with their tools.

「Nearing noon, Shire and his subordinates arrived at their destination.」

In front of the Bang Bang Forest, several goblins stared up at the canopy, which was 30 meters high.

A straight trunk stood before them, so thick one person couldn’t wrap their arms around it. It was practically impossible for a goblin to climb it without tools, and right now, Shire had no tools.

’The threat of the Fearsome Claw Bear is imminent. We must replenish our weapon supply as quickly as possible. If everyone had a few Bang-Bang Fruits, we wouldn’t have to fear the Fearsome Claw Bear for the time being.’ Shire knocked on the thick trunk. "Let it out."

A goblin threw the pack from his back onto the ground. Something inside moved about, making whimpering and squeaking noises. Then, a furry head poked out.

It was a monkey. Shire didn’t know what species it was, but today, they would have to rely on it to climb the tree.

While hunting in the forest, the goblins often encountered monkeys. These annoying creatures lived in the canopy, leaping about, and would occasionally come down to the ground to forage.

Goblins didn’t eat monkeys. For one, monkeys didn’t have much meat and were hard to catch. For another, monkeys held grudges. Catch a few, and their entire troop would remember you, attacking you whenever you passed through their territory.

Early that morning, Shire had led his men to the monkeys’ territory and set a trap: a rope snare and a small, woven vine cage filled with wild fruit.

They waited for a monkey to reach in, at which point the snare would tighten around its paw.

Sure enough, they had successfully caught a large monkey.

Several goblins pulled the monkey out of the pack and untied the ropes binding its limbs. Then they grabbed its four limbs and stretched it out. Shire looked at the monkey with its innocent-looking eyes, smiled, and tied one end of a rope securely around its body. Then he grabbed the monkey and tossed it at the tree. "It’s all up to you, Great Saint."

Suddenly free, the monkey scurried up the tree. After climbing nearly 10 meters, it stopped, looked down at the goblins on the ground, and let out a loud cry.

"Is it mocking us?" Shire laughed. He and his subordinates picked up things from the ground and threw them at the monkey, which climbed a little higher.

Shire looked up at the monkey. "It’s a bit too far to hit from this distance. This monkey’s too clever; it’s stopped climbing."

He turned and ordered, "Red Eyes, you throw something at it." As the strongest in the group, they could only rely on Red Eyes.

"You got it, Chief." Red Eyes nodded, then pulled something from his bag and hurled it with all his might at the monkey in the tree.

"BANG."

After throwing it, he puffed out his chest, jutted his chin, and looked around smugly at the other goblins, a look on his face that screamed, ’How about that? You still have to rely on me,’ and ’Chief, praise me!’

"You just threw our last Bang-Bang Fruit," Shire facepalmed. "I told you to drive it away, not blow it to smithereens!" 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦

’We’ll have to start all over again,’ Shire thought, full of regret. If they caught too many monkeys, the rest wouldn’t be so easily fooled.

WHOOSH! The rope in front of him was being pulled taut. Shire immediately looked up.

’Great! It wasn’t killed by the explosion; it was just scared by it.’

The monkey, terrified by the sound of the explosion, scrambled frantically upward and soon disappeared into the canopy of the Bang-Bang Tree.

"Dig a pit. Keep setting the trap," Shire ordered.

The plan now was to set another trap to lure the monkey down. That way, the rope would be looped over a branch up in the tree, and in the future, the goblins could just pull themselves up the rope to climb it.

The trap was soon ready. The group of goblins hid off to the side, all of them staring at the monkey, waiting for it to grace them with its descent.

CHIRP CHIRP... The sound of insects filled the forest, occasionally punctuated by the sound of a distant "BANG."

The goblins stood under the tree, watching the monkey leap about in the canopy.

CHIRP CHIRP... The insects continued their song.

The goblins sat on the ground, craning their necks to watch the monkey in the canopy.

CHIRP CHIRP... Two insects flew together, one climbing onto the other’s back.

The goblins lay on the ground, picking at their feet out of sheer boredom.

"Great Saint, will you please stop with the divine antics," Shire said, his face crestfallen and frustrated. "Just come down already!"

But the monkey paid them no mind and remained huddled in the canopy.

Just as Shire was growing impatient and about to lead his subordinates away, the monkey plucked a Bang-Bang Fruit from a branch.

It had been caught that morning, and after all the shock and fear, it was now starving.

The monkey held the dark-colored fruit, looked it over a few times, then bared its teeth and bit down hard with its canines.

"BANG!" An explosion rang out, and the monkey fell straight out of the canopy.

The explosion in the canopy also affected the nearby fruit, setting off a chain of seven or eight more explosions.

When the noise died down, Shire led his men forward. The monkey was already stiff.

Shire gave the rope a hard tug. It was secure. "You, come here."

He called over a short goblin, tied the end of the rope around him, and then attached an additional safety rope.

Then, everyone pulled on the rope together, hoisting the goblin into the canopy as if he were being lifted by wires for a stunt.

A few minutes later, they slowly lowered him back down.

"Chief." The goblin handed over a pack containing more than ten dark-colored, ripe Bang-Bang Fruits.

’Success! We can mass-produce grenades now,’ Shire thought, his eyes shining.

’What if we wrapped it in a thin layer of sheet metal?’ He picked up a Bang-Bang Fruit the size of a melon. ’It creates smoke when it explodes, so what if we added a layer of oil on the outside...’

Shire felt he had just found a way to upgrade the Bang-Bang Fruit. ’I’ll draw up the plans when we get back and have Little John find someone to make them.’

Against the Fearsome Claw Bear before, there was only the sound of the explosion, with very little actual damage. But if they added shrapnel or an incendiary effect, it would surely give the Fearsome Claw Bear a world of hurt.

In the future, they would tie rope ladders to every Bang-Bang Tree, making it easier for the goblins to go up and down. This entire forest could provide him with a stable supply of Bang-Bang Fruits.

Originally, he had wanted Nine-finger to be in charge of this, but his loyal subordinate had been severely wounded by the Fearsome Claw Bear and was still unconscious. Shire had no choice but to handle it himself.

’We don’t have enough skilled people,’ he lamented.

For now, all they could do was their best to race against time, gathering enough fruit before winter arrived to deal with the impending danger.

"Let’s go. We’re going to catch more monkeys," Shire ordered his subordinates.

The group marched mightily toward the monkeys’ nest.