Chapter Seventy-Nine: Ogre Tribe
There is a hidden rule in nature. If you want to claim ownership of a territory, you must defend it against attacks from other races. Only then will other races acknowledge your ownership of the land; otherwise, they may launch further attacks at any time. In other words, if the ogres want the other races to recognize their ownership of new territory, they must repel human attacks head-on, solidifying their dominion over the land with bl**d and d*ath. Otherwise, the struggle for this territory could continue for a long time.
There are many unclaimed lands in the wilderness.
If small nomadic groups wander through, generally no one cares, but once large groups migrate, it disrupts the existing balance.
Humans will not allow large ogre tribes near the roads unless they are frightened enough to actively avoid the territory, clearing out monsters from other areas to create alternative routes. Roads between cities mostly do not have groups gathered, as the large tribes that originally occupied areas near the roads have all been cleared out by humans over generations; this is how trade routes have been brutally established in the wilderness. Creatures in the wild remember this lesson; even if they migrate, they will avoid crucial road areas. The presence of ogres here is a challenge.
They must declare their ownership of this land to other races, and nothing illustrates power better than defeating humans.
After all, this is the wilderness, not cultivated farmland. If humans fail once, they are unlikely to engage endlessly in the struggle to drive them out, as there is no incentive for them to fight. At most, they will set up watchtowers on the borders. If it were cultivated land that has been farmed for generations, the conflict would become relentless, as humans’ determination to protect their cultivated land exceeds that of any other race.
Such situations have occurred many times.
Leaffall City was established by half-elves driving out ogres. They fought for over a hundred years to protect this land, facing attacks from ogres, orcs, and mountain dwarves. Only when all nearby races could do nothing about them were they forced to acknowledge the half-elves’ rule over the hundreds of kilometers around Leaffall City. Only when you have made other races too afraid to bother you can you truly claim ownership of this land and declare your ownership to others.
Otherwise, they will mercilessly mock you and attack your territory when you are weak or inattentive. Those humans living in wild areas, although they have established villages, can only be said to live in the wilderness; they cannot claim to be the masters of that land.
It is impossible to carve out territory in this world without paving the way with bl**d.
……
Soren saw the ogre tribe’s war banner in the afternoon of the second day.
To be precise, it shouldn’t be called a war banner; it was merely a stone circle stacked together with a wooden pole inserted in the middle, on which hung the bones of a humanoid creature.
This is a symbol.
It indicates that from here onwards is ogre territory; they have hunting rights within this land, and other races entering it would be considered invading their territory. Just like when Soren enters the range of White Horse City, he would see a giant stone monument marking the city, with the words ‘White Horse City’ engraved on it, and a warhorse emblem.
“It really looks like the ogre tribe,” Yas said with a serious expression.
Only formed tribes would engage in such land-marking behavior, using symbols to prove their ownership of the land. This acts as a challenge to other races; you can either drive them back or must acknowledge their dominion over the territory. From now on, this land belongs to them; if you enter it, they have the right to deal with you. In other words, in their view, human merchant caravans passing through their territory are merely food delivered to their doorstep.
Because this is their territory.
Dragons do the same before establishing their lairs; they leave their scent within their territory, causing other creatures to refrain from approaching casually.
“Cut it down!”
A figure who was clearly an officer from White Horse City shouted lowly. Although White Horse City had no strength to expand into the dangerous wilderness, it could not accept the ogres’ claim to territory. It would be fine in other places, but near White Horse City, it was equivalent to touching their sore spot. Expanding the wilderness requires not only strength but also cultivated land and warriors to protect civilians. Otherwise, random territorial expansion would mean you drive away a wave of enemies, only for your population to decrease for various reasons.
White Horse City took hundreds of years to expand from a territory of dozens of kilometers to its current hundreds of kilometers.
Even so, monsters still attack the edges of White Horse City, and within the territory, forests, mountains, and lakes still witness the activity of werewolves and other creatures, occasionally assaulting built villages. As long as there are places that cannot be cultivated for farming, wilderness creatures will continue to proliferate; if you k*ll a batch, new ones will be born, and if you drive away one group, others will migrate in. It takes at least twenty years to train a qualified warrior, and ordinary civilians have no advantage over monsters.
Bang!
The heavy flagpole fell to the ground as the army of White Horse City continued to advance.
Since the ogre tribe is marking territory here, they must also be establishing a large gathering place for the tribe.
In other words, a fortress.
The ogre tribe is different from nomadic ogre groups; their numbers are at least in the hundreds. Although they may not appear numerous, they are all first-class warriors. Moreover, the ogre tribe has its own legacy; they know how to forge weapons, make leather armor, tame wild beasts, and capture slaves on a large scale. Ogres capture a large number of goblins and gremlins as their slaves, to mine, forge, serve, and even as a food reserve.
An ogre tribe with a population of five hundred must occupy at least fifty kilometers of land to ensure sufficient food.
Because their main food source is meat.
Adventurers and the scouts of the army are all sent out, as large tribes do not wander around; they surely establish a gathering place.
It’s best to deal with them before they finish; otherwise, White Horse City will face a siege!
The expressions of all the adventurers grew serious. Originally a two-person team expanded to five; Soren teamed up with three other adventurers to form a five-person squad exploring the plains. Ogres are very dangerous creatures; their skin is incredibly tough, equivalent to ordinary leather armor, and they have thick layers of fat, making them immune to crossbow shots that can’t injure their internal organs. It’s best not to engage ogres in direct confrontation; it’s better to have someone work collaboratively in guerrilla tactics to wear them out before finding the opportunity to k*ll them.
The deeper they go, the more traces of ogres they find.
When Soren and the others see the traces of ogres, their expressions harden at what lies ahead.
It’s a camp built halfway up a mountain, already more than halfway completed. At the foot of the mountain, they can see tall ogres chopping down logs; these incredibly strong ogre warriors carry logs weighing hundreds of pounds up the mountain alone, then collaborate with other ogres to nail them into the ground. This group of ogres is entirely engaged in breaking ground; groups of goblin slaves are cleaning stones under the lash of whips, and in the distance, they see signs of a furnace where goblins are forging weapons for them.
Ogres don’t need intricate equipment; all they require are heavy iron weapons, which will soon become a terrifying threat!
“Look!”…
Yas took out a monocular and glanced, his face turning grim: “Look at those ogre warriors on guard over there.”
Soren took a look and also frowned, for he saw ogre warriors clad in armor, holding two-hundred-pound spiked clubs, with heavy armor on their shoulders and chests. This armor was not crafted like human armor; it looked more like something thrown together by second-rate blacksmiths who directly cast iron ore, with individual shoulder plates weighing twenty to thirty pounds, far too heavy for ordinary humans, but light for ogres.
“This is definitely the work of two-headed ogre wizards!”
Soren put down the monocular and said solemnly, “Ordinary ogres don’t have such high intelligence. They would be lucky not to have eaten those captives. Only ogres that have progressed to wizards know how to dominate and tame.”
The mountain camp is already more than halfway completed.
Using ogres as labor for construction is incredibly fast; although the entire camp looks a bit rudimentary, constructed of thick logs, it is very sturdy and solid, exuding a primitive and rough atmosphere. On the mountain wall, there are wooden poles stuck with the corpses of gremlins, goblins, lizardmen, and werewolves. Soren barely saw most of the intelligent creatures in the wilderness, captured as slaves in the village, working desperately under cruel rule. If they are a bit slow, an ogre with a sneer swings a whip, often inflicting grievous wounds that could cost half a life, and then they are thrown into a giant cage.
Inside the cage are reserves of food.
Near the edge, there is also an enormous beast cage, seemingly containing something.
There are many ogres!
Just from what they see before them, there are four to five hundred ogres, conservatively estimating there are nearly eight hundred ogres here. This is a large ogre group, likely with a lineage spanning hundreds of years; otherwise, there wouldn’t be so many. Ogres are an extremely exclusionary race; if they are not born within the tribe, ogres from other wilderness areas could easily become their food.
Some ogres from different tribes hold deep animosities towards each other and often k*ll one another when they meet!
……
