The people of the Shellfish tribe were elated at their victory over the people of the Green Hill tribe. They began cheering, yelling, and smiling, as all of them were in a festive mood following their victory after they were done torturing the surviving members of the Green Hill Tribe.
Outside forces were naturally circling around them, and this victory would, without a doubt, be short-lived. However, for the time being - or at least that was how it felt - they were invincible.
"Finally, the Green Hill tribe got what was coming to them."
"Now our ancestors can finally live in peace, knowing we've avenged them."
"What do we do now?" someone with a bit more foresight than the others asked.
"What does it matter what we do later on? For now, let's enjoy!"
Even the monkeys who the Shellfish Tribe people had enslaved were in high spirits, having beaten many of the human prisoners to death. "Monkeys! Let's start celebrating. Bring us your most fancy wine!"
The Jade Eye Stone Monkeys hadn't made any wine while on Qing Mao Mountain, but that was because they lacked the ingredients to do so.
The monkeys had learned quickly enough using ingredients from around the Shellfish Tribe's territory to make wine.
Although the shellfish that they tended to eat had dried up, clams were still available around the area. It was through these clams and natural processes of fermentation that the monkeys had learned to brew a kind of salt wine.
When the humans discovered them, their ingenuity had refined the process somewhat, and many of the monkeys had become well-trained when it came to brewing the wine.
"Monkeys, more wine!"
The Shellfish Tribe's people drank to their hearts' content, cup after cup. The wine was salty and did not taste that good because it was slightly contaminated with seawater.
However, it was not in dangerous quantities, and it was quite strong. As such, the Shellfish people began drinking quickly, inebriated, forgetting about the recent fight and drowning both their sorrow and joy away within their drink.
"I can't remember the time when I felt so good."
"Neither can I."
"Hey, that girl over there looks kind of nice..."
"That's lady's at least eighty years old, how much did you have to drink?"
"Alright, everyone, watch me do a backflip!"
"Brother, don't go so close to the edge. You might fall!"
"What are you talking about-"
Crash!
"It looks like he broke his leg."
"Well, at least he drank the wine, so he won't feel it too much," someone commented. They went to go help their comrade, but as they were doing this, the monkeys had hatched a plan of their own.
Ordinarily, domesticated creatures would not rebel against humans. However, the monkeys had long memories and had not forgotten what the humans had done to them. Much like the Shellfish Tribe people had despised the people of the Green Hill Tribe, the monkeys also had grown to despise the Shellfish Tribe.
Now, they saw their own chance to take revenge!
Fang Yuan had feared that the surrounding tribes would take advantage of the Shellfish Tribe's weakness and loss of numbers in order to attack them. Instead, the Shellfish Tribe was undone from within. The monkeys gathered in great numbers.
"Ah, monkeys! What are you doing?"
The monkeys began shoving the humans off the cliff. Where they couldn't do this, they split the human's heads open, with crude tools or just their fists.
Many of the humans had put down their weapons for the time being, and those who hadn't were so drunk and stuporous that they could not even think of fighting.
The monkeys, in full force, managed to slaughter the remaining members of the Shellfish Tribe until not a single one of them was left alive.
Some of the captives of the Green Hill Tribe were ecstatic upon seeing this.
"Oh, look at that!"
"The dastardly Shellfish Tribe people are dead!"
"They freed us!"
"Quick, monkeys - untie us!"
They had suffered to a large extent under the cruelty of the Shellfish Tribe and thought that this was their chance to finally be free.
The monkeys, however, had something completely different in mind. They were not here in order to free the humans; they were here to free themselves. With their tools, they slaughtered the captured humans as well, not leaving a single survivor.
They then began yelling out as they were the uncontested rulers of this area, playing around with the dead humans' skulls.
With that, this area of the Fang Yuan Continent - which had been contested between the Shellfish tribe and the Green Hill Tribe - had been taken over by the Jade Eye Stone Monkeys.
Fang Yuan had placed them there thinking that they would help the Shellfish Tribe. As he saw this development he was shocked. He had not expected the Shellfish Tribe's people to be so inept that they would be undone by monkeys of all things.
This would cause a big headache for him now.
For one, it was a region suited to humans, not monkeys, and the Jade Stone Monkeys would no doubt proliferate.
A Hundred Beast King may even emerge among them. Because of this, it could mess up the integration formation, which was attempting to stitch together the human experiences within the aperture.
A small degree of contamination could be tolerated depending on what it was. A few drops of pollution in a river, for example, would not do anything, but if it reached too large an extent, life within the river would no longer be able to advance.
The reason why Fang Yuan was able to grow Emotion Lillies in his White Heaven was because it did not interfere with the human lives down below, and also was not big enough to change the nature of his aperture by much.
Fang Yuan had thought that placing the Jade Eye Stone Monkeys there would not cause too much of a disturbance and would be fine. Also, learning to tame other animals was a part of the human experience; after all, there was a tribe riding horses within the Fang Yuan Continent without much issue. Those horses were all ordinary beasts of course, with no beast kings among them, meaning they were much easier to control.
Enslaving monkeys could be thought of as an extension to that, so he had not seen any real problem with it. He had been curious to know how the Shellfish Tribe people would take advantage of it.
Instead, they had been slaughtered.
Now, Fang Yuan had to do something about it.
'Should I interfere?' Fang Yuan thought to himself. That was his main question. Or should he just allow the surrounding tribes to deal with the Jade Eye Stone Monkeys?
The problem was that if he interfered, that in itself could have unforeseen consequences later down the line depending on what he did. Fang Yuan's aperture environment was extraordinarily precarious, far more than any ordinary aperture, simply because of the necessity of powering the Integration Formation.
The monkeys might claim a section of the continent as their own home. The surrounding tribes had no real reason to go there; if the area was going to be filled with violent monkeys, naturally, humans would avoid that area completely. Much like they did in the outside world, who would go running into such a place? Fang Yuan Continent still had ample space in it. That would mean it would be filled with even more monkeys later on, different kinds of wildlife, and make the problem even worse.
The best result would be for the surrounding humans to find a way to slaughter the monkeys themselves. However, even when it came to this, Fang Yuan found that he had run into yet another unexpected problem.