Edward felt confused. This water was clearly fresh water that even these savages could identify that according to what he had taught them.
At this point, he did not know where the mistakes had occurred but he had to comfort everyone and raise their spirits:
"That..... we will rest at this waterside tonight. Tomorrow we will look around again. Gather some hay and make a fire."
After a short break, Edward calmed down and thought about the situation at hand.
Regardless of this, this fresh water like bottled water like the one from his world. At least, this water would allow them to resupply and stay here for a few days. However, even if the information is rumored but there can't be this much of a difference. The old patriarch had told him the description of the special water he found when he was young and that was exactly the saltwater he was describing.
As Edward was lost in his thoughts his hand was suddenly tugged from the side by Roc. Roc whispered in a hurry:
"Light bro, look at that animal across the lake!"
From the gap between the reeds what Edward saw was a sheep. To be more accurate it was an antelope drinking water.
'That solves the food problem'
"Roc quickly shoot it down!" Halfway through Edward's command, Roc had already drawn his bow and arrow and aimed it towards the antelope.
"Whoosh", an arrow flew out!
"Thud..."
The antelope crashed down by the water's edge. The four-legged hoof trashed a few times but to no avail. After a few twitching, the body no longer moved!
The two smiled and ran along the lake to the other side.
"Hey, light brother! I have never seen this kind of animal before!"
Roc couldn't close his mouth. He licked his lips after looking at the long legs of the antelope and dragged it back to their camp.
"So heavy!" Roc called out.
"This is called Antelope, Roc. You, boy are a natural archer. If you were from my tribe, you would have been selected to participate in the Olympics."
Roc titled his head at the mention of Olympics. Sensing his confusion, Edward explained:
"It was an event amongst men to find who was the best in their field. I think you would be the best archer out there!"
Roc nodded with a hint of pride in his expression but quickly resumed his task.
After hitting such a large prey, the tiredness of long journey and the disappointment of not finding the water disappeared. There was no trace of it.
In a short while, each of the six subordinates came back with a large bundle of hay. The night fell, the bonfire rose, and the hot water burned with clay pots. Edward said to everyone:
"Brothers, we couldn't bring too much meat on the road. So I haven't had enough food these few days. Now we have whole fat meat, everyone is open to eating as much as they want! Hahaha. ..."
Nothing of noteworthy happened during the night other than joy full laughter and merry making.
On the following day, the eight people searched along the southwest direction and finally found the legendary saltwater lake about 7-8 km away. Edward felt that this was a salt water lake, but it was only three football fields large. It was just water gather at the lowest point of the piece of terrain.
"Light bro, this lake does not seem to have much water?"
Standing on the edge of the lake, Roc threw his water bag and the large piece of antelope meat on the ground while frowning.
"Oh, no the water is good, I still can't wait to dry this water!"
Edward took a bit of water with his fingers and tasted it. His eyebrows rose up and he shouted:
"Salty! Great!"
After doing the work, Edward found a flat place by the shore. By looking at the traditional method of drying salt on documentaries, he created a wide flat enclosure near the lake about 100 square meters and then let everyone dump saltwater inside it until it was somewhat full.
Edward and his group had previously collected wet mud from by the previous lake and used it to roughly flatten their enclosure with their hands to prevent the salty water from seeping.
Eight people did this work, and it took about three hours to get it done. Looking at this test field, Edward was very satisfied.
Today the sun was very bright. If everything goes as normal, crystallized salt will be available by tomorrow.
Salt extraction was a sure fire method so there was no suspense of failure for Edward. By noon the next day, the salt water poured into the salt field had evaporated.
Looking at the thin layer of white salt in the salt field, Edward shouted in delight.