The orcs of the mountain tribe gathered around Songshan. One of them, watching their chieftain frantically drinking soup, said with some concern, "Chieftain, eat slowly. The priest told me yesterday that he had to keep an eye on you. If you eat until you're stuffed and vomit on the ground, he won't let you go back to the tribe."
Upon hearing this, Songshan looked up, a piece of seaweed still clinging to the corner of his mouth. "Did the priest really say that? Then can I live in the Wood Tribe?"
He knew that the Wood Tribe had a special place outside that city for the orcs of various tribes to sleep, what was it called again...
“No, the priest said you are the clan chief and cannot live in the workers’ dormitory.”
Yes, the workers' dormitory. Matsuyama remembered the name, but also heard a disappointing answer.
“I know we can’t stay in the workers’ dormitories.” Songshan’s gaze swept over the mountain tribe members. “Who will be the one to go back and report to the priest today?”
Before the orc who was supposed to go back and report with him today could even step forward, Songshan pointed at the orc who had told him to drink less meat soup and said unreasonably, "No matter who it is, you must come back with me today."
If I can't stay in the staff dormitory, you can forget about staying there too!
The orc who was called back to the mountain tribe today stared wide-eyed, refusing to eat meat or drink soup.
He just went back yesterday! Is he going back again today?! He hasn't slept in his beloved wooden bed for two days!!
However, the thought that he would be able to sleep on a wooden bed tomorrow brought him some comfort. He slurped up a mouthful of fragrant meat soup and said listlessly, "Yes, clan chief."
A note from the author:
The information about wild prickly pear is from Baidu, so there might be some inaccuracies. It's all for the sake of the story, so please don't take it too seriously.
Chapter 77
hill tribe
As dusk fell and the orange-yellow light of the sky shone through the wood tribe, the orcs' shouts echoed, "Time to rest!"
Before long, groups of two or three orcs appeared at the gate of the Wood Tribe's city and left together.
An orc patted Niu Qi, who was walking slowly, and said, "Hurry up, or there won't be a place to take a bath!"
Niu Qi forced a smile, his face a picture of misery. "It's nothing. I'm going back to the tribe today. You should hurry up, or you'll miss dinner again."
The orc asked in confusion, "Didn't you just go back yesterday? Didn't we agree to catch two fish while taking a bath and cook them in a clay pot for dinner?"
Niu Qi replied softly, "We really can't work together today. My seasoning is in the small cabinet; you can take it."
The other party wanted to ask more questions, but after glancing at the orcs behind Niu Qi, they shut their mouths, said, "Your chieftain is here," and then disappeared.
"What are you talking about?" Matsuyama asked curiously. "What seasoning?"
Niu Qi straightened his back. He wanted to say it was nothing, but he didn't dare. After hesitating for a moment, he finally told the truth: "I was rated first in 'internal affairs' for seven consecutive days, and this was a reward from the Mu tribe. A small bamboo tube of chili powder and salt."
"Chili powder? You mean that red powder that makes meat taste so good?" Matsuyama's eyes lit up. He loved spicy food. "How much do you have left?"
“There’s just one more thing. I promised my bunkmate that we’d eat it all today.” Niu Qi added, worried that Songshan might not understand what the bunkmate was: “My bunkmate is the orc I was just talking to, Sheep Four from the Grass Tribe.”
Songshan didn't care whether Niu Qi's lower bunkmate was Yang Si or Yang Wu. He grasped the key point in Niu Qi's words, "From now on, you don't need to go back to the tribe to report. All you have to do is keep getting first place and then give me some seasoning."
Matsuyama emphasized, "There should be more chili peppers."
Niu Qi thought their clan leader was going to take it all, but he didn't expect to get some left for him. It just so happens that he doesn't particularly like spicy food; although it's delicious, his mouth and tongue always hurt after eating it, feeling like they weren't even his own.
He said happily, "Yes, chieftain, I will definitely do a good job in housekeeping from now on, and I will give you all the chili peppers I get."
Matsuyama grinned for a while before asking, "What is domestic service?"
Niu Qi explained, "It means cleaning your own bed, animal hide, cabinet, and yourself. I was the cleanest one in our dormitory for seven days in a row, so I got the reward."
Songshan had visited the workers' dormitory outside the Wood Tribe City, and he still can't forget that scene.
A long row of wooden houses, beautiful in color and sturdy. Each house contains four items, with two floors. A long wooden table is placed in the middle, and each person living inside also has a small cabinet for storing their belongings.
Sunlight streamed in through the open wooden window, making the room clean and bright. There was also the unique fragrance of the giant tree, which smelled wonderful.
While Niu Qi wasn't looking, Songshan glanced at his clean fish-skin vest and straw sandals. Then he looked down at himself. He was also wearing a fish-skin vest that exposed his arms, but his vest was covered in mud, and his straw sandals were worn crookedly, with even his big toe sticking out.
No wonder Niu Qi was the cleanest for several days in a row.
The weather is getting hotter every day, and there's a slight breeze in the evening that helps to dissipate a lot of the heat.
When the two returned to the mountain tribe, Songshan wrinkled his nose and asked Niu Qi, "Niu Qi, do you smell anything that smells bad?"
Niu Qi held his breath, "Chieftain, this is the stench of our tribe..."
Songshan stood in front of the tribe without going in directly. Niu Qi thought he wanted to get used to the stench before entering the tribe, so he also stood in front of the tribe without moving.
At this moment, Songshan looked at his tribe and thought about what the Mu tribe was like. The earthen houses of the Mu tribe were neat and clean, and the ground was paved with smooth bricks. Even at the hottest time of day, there was no foul smell in the Mu tribe.
The mountain tribes lacked clean and tidy earthen houses, and the ground was not covered with smooth bricks, but rather endless filth. In summer, even at dusk, a pungent stench permeated the tribes.
No wonder the tribespeople living in the workers' dormitories of the Mu tribe don't want to return to the tribe.
Songshan sighed, entered the tribe, and headed towards the cave where the priest was located.
Niu Qi gradually caught up, and when they were halfway there, Song Shan, who had been silent all along, said to Niu Qi, "You don't need to see the priest today. I will speak to the priest myself."
“Yes, clan leader.” Niu Qi nodded in response.
The mountain breeze wasn't inside the cave. It was very hot, and he was sitting at the cave entrance, looking at the earthenware pot boiling water over a small fire in front of him. "You're back? The meat is in your cave. Go and eat."
Songshan didn't leave; instead, he sat cross-legged opposite Shanfeng. "Priest, why did you send me to work in the Wood Tribe?"
"Didn't I tell you from the beginning?" Shanfeng got up, scooped out hot water with a clay spoon and put it in a clay bowl, then put it on the ground to cool. He replied, "Because you eat too much, as long as we send you to work in the Wood Tribe, and the tribe sends some level one or two beastmen, the food that the hunting team hunts will be more than enough to feed the rest of the tribe's people."
Shanfeng looked up at Songshan and laughed, "We never dared to imagine that our tribespeople would ever have enough to eat."
This was the second time Songshan had heard this answer. The first time was when Shanfeng asked him to work in the Wood Tribe. He asked the same question as today and received the exact same answer.
But this time Songshan didn't believe it. He seemed not to hear Shanfeng's reply and said to himself, "Two tribes joined the Wood Tribe. One is the Water Tribe, which we know, and the other is a tribe that I heard is far away, called the Black Mountain Tribe. I don't know what the Black Mountain Tribe was like before, but Priest, do you know what the Water Tribe is like now?"
Shanfeng still had a smile on his face. "I didn't pay much attention when I was in the Mu tribe, so I don't know."
I don't know...
Songshan repeated softly, his expression unusually serious, "Then today I'll tell the priest what the Water Tribe is like now. The brick-making team has something very powerful called a brick kiln."
When mud is put into a brick kiln, it can be turned into flat and hard stone. The orcs from our seven tribes can only help the brick-making team outside by throwing mud blanks, while the orcs from the Water Tribe can go inside to fire the bricks.
The children of the Water Tribe are all exceptionally strong; even before their awakening, their physiques are indistinguishable from our tribe's first-tier orc warriors. Our tribe's children, on the other hand, are like sickly cubs, unable to run or jump, their bodies devoid of flesh, their bones clearly visible.
Shanfeng didn't take it seriously. "The Water Tribe joined the Wood Tribe. They can get close to the brick kiln, and their children can eat very well. Isn't that normal?"
“Yes, that’s normal.” Songshan felt he was unusually clever for once, and he said almost with certainty, “So, the priest sent me there so that I could see with my own eyes what the orcs of the Water Tribe are like now? Do you also want the Mountain Tribe to be like that?”
Songshan always felt that the priest in front of him had changed after returning from the Wood Tribe. Before, the priest would talk to him about how to make the tribe better and how to ensure that the tribespeople had enough to eat.
But ever since the other party returned from the Mu tribe, all he does is stare at that earthenware pot boiling water. He doesn't mention a single word about improving the tribe or ensuring that the people have enough to eat.
Finally, he was also asked to have the chief of one of his tribes go to the Wood Tribe to work with his tribe. At first, he really believed what the other party said, in order to ensure that all the tribesmen had enough to eat.
But at this moment, Songshan became increasingly convinced of his guess. Their priest, Nanfeng, wanted the Mountain Tribe to join the Wood Tribe as well. In order to persuade him, he sent him to work in the Wood Tribe so that he could see for himself what the Wood Tribe was like.
If he hadn't lived in the Wood Tribe before, he would have refused outright, but now he's really finding it hard to choose.
Seeing Songshan's resolute yet conflicted expression, Shanfeng couldn't help but laugh out loud. "You've been smart this time. But have you forgotten that if a tribe has a priest, and the priest still possesses the abilities of an orc, they cannot join another tribe. Unless the priest who joins the other tribe chooses to die."
Yama-kaze said firmly, "I will not choose to die."
Matsuyama paused for a moment; he had forgotten...
"So, you mean that the Water Tribe's priest, Lu Shuang, lost the ability to awaken the beastmen, so he led the Water Tribe to join the Wood Tribe?" Songshan stroked his chin. "No wonder the Water Tribe didn't participate in the beast tide sieges several times. So that's how it is."
The mountain wind sullenly asked, "Is this the time to talk about the Water Tribe?"
Songshan shook his head and said no, then asked, "Then what do you want to do, priest?"
Shanfeng said directly, "The reason why Beast City is so powerful is because many large tribes have chosen to pledge their loyalty to the High Priest of Beast City and swear an oath to the Beast God to protect the High Priest of Beast City. Each of them is an independent entity, but they also belong to a whole."
"The priest wants to pledge his loyalty to the Wood Tribe and protect it?" Songshan was somewhat astonished. "Priest, you should think this through. Once the pact is made, there's no going back. If the Wood Tribe treats us like cannibals in the future, the only path left for the Mountain Tribe will be annihilation."
Shanfeng corrected, "It's not about protecting the Wood Tribe, it's about protecting the Wood Tribe's priests. I formed a pact with the Wood Tribe's priests as a priest, so if you sense anything is wrong, you can simply find another priest, and the tribe won't be implicated."
Matsuyama: ...Priest, do you think it's so easy to find a priest for a tribe?
Knowing that their priest was determined to do this, Songshan said no more. Although he had said those things before, Songshan knew in his heart that the priests of the Wood Tribe could not be like cannibals.
This is the orc's keen intuition.
“However, our tribe’s orc warriors are really too weak... In the end, I’m afraid it will be the Wood Tribe protecting the Mountain Tribe, rather than the Mountain Tribe protecting the Wood Tribe.” Mountain Wind said worriedly, “I think the Wood Tribe priest might not agree to form a pact with me.”
Songshan's eyes darted around as he thought about how dirty and smelly his tribe was. The priest of the Wood Tribe really had no reason to form a pact with their priest.
What's the point...?
——
Marginal tribes.
After drinking wild prickly pear infusion for two days, Wolf Cliff's body began to slowly recover. This filled everyone in the outlying tribe with uncontrollable excitement; for them, it was as if a curse that had plagued them for hundreds of years had completely vanished at this moment.
There were still some wild prickly pears in the deer-water beast-skin satchel, but not many; judging from the situation at Wolf Cliff, they would need more. Therefore, he had to lead the Cliff tribe's orcs back to the Wood tribe as soon as possible and bring back the wild prickly pears he had left in the tribe for the Cliff tribe's orcs.
Knowing that Lu Shui was going to take the orcs of the Cliff Tribe to the Wood Tribe, the chieftains and priests of the various outlying tribes gathered together to discuss the matter for a long time.
They ultimately decided to go together, and decided to attend the market organized by the Mu tribe and exchange some salt stones for other things.
Because they had to participate in the market, each tribe had to prepare a lot of things, so it took two more days.
During these two days, Lu Shui was also busy. The priests of the border tribes left all the affairs of the tribe to the chieftain, while they surrounded Lu Shui in the cliff tribe, asking him about the curse.
Lu Shui patiently explained, even taking out a wild prickly pear to demonstrate, telling them that it was not a curse but a disease: "If you only eat meat and not fruits and wild vegetables, you will get scurvy."
This conclusion was hard for the priests to accept at first. In the minds of orcs and priests, meat was the most powerful thing, and eating meat was a symbol of power.
Only orcs who lack the strength to hunt and priests who lack the ability would pick fruit and dig up wild vegetables to eat.
But faced with the reality, they had no choice but to believe and accept the fact that they would have to eat fruit and wild vegetables from now on.
Chapter 78
Can I be your partner?
After the Water Tribe and the Black Mountain Tribe joined the Wood Tribe, Shen Nong had been thinking about how to arrange the orc warriors in the hunting teams of these two tribes.
The orcs in the hunting party are the strongest orc warriors in the tribe. Their job is to hunt and provide enough meat for the tribe members so that they don't starve.