Following Soren’s orders, out in the clearing by the mud storehouse, Kyle dragged over several coarse hemp ropes. He began sorting the orc corpses into piles based on the condition of their armor.
Nearby, Thorne led four men with wooden buckets, scooping water from the marshy puddles and splashing it over the dark, blood-soaked soil.
Inside the stilted wooden cabin.
Soren kicked aside a massive wolf-skin chair.
The Orc Centurion lay slumped across the floorboards. The fountain of blood pooling from his chest was already turning thick and viscous.
Drawing his dagger, Soren held the blade over a charcoal brazier, turning it until the steel glowed a dull, menacing red.
He crouched down. Without waiting for the Centurion to muster the strength to struggle, Soren pressed the red-hot flat of the blade directly against the wound piercing the orc's lung.
Sizzle!
Plumes of white smoke rose from the charred flesh.
The Centurion’s entire body seized, muscles bunching violently. His single eye bulged in pure agony as a horrific, rattling gasp tore from his throat.
The blood clotted. His life was spared, for now.
Soren shifted his grip on the dagger, pressing the tip directly against the Centurion’s remaining eyeball. He was just preparing to interrogate the beast about the Blackstone Clan's troop distribution in the swamp when—
Bzzzt!
In the shadowed corner of the room, a stone slab carved with crude totems suddenly vibrated.
Within the grooves of the slab, dried beast blood flared with a piercing crimson light, accompanied by an ear-splitting buzz.
It was a low-grade alchemical communication array, inscribed using bone dust and magic beast blood. It could only transmit sound.
Soren immediately stepped forward, grinding his heavy military boot against the Centurion’s jaw and pinning the orc's fang-filled mouth firmly to the floorboards. He turned his head, his gaze locking onto the glowing stone.
The red light began to flash frantically.
Suddenly, an orcish roar with a thick highland accent erupted from the slab:
"Trash! Why did it take so long to connect?!"
A communication array.
Unfazed, Soren lowered his voice. Drawing on deep chest resonance, he let out a coarse, grating tone identical to the Centurion pinned beneath his boot:
"My Lord! A few direwolves bit through their ropes and started gnawing on the slaves! I was dealing with the beasts!"
The tone was brutish and harsh, the ending syllables carrying the distinct rolled 'r's unique to the Blackstone Clan. Flawless.
The irritable officer on the other end snorted.
"Whip the beasts to death!"
"Listen here. Stoke all the braziers in your camp. Open the ale kegs and get the meat roasting over the fires! The convoy has already crossed the Black Mud Shallows. We will arrive at your gates today."
Soren narrowed his eyes. He continued in the hoarse, subservient voice:
"A convoy? The higher-ups' orders didn't mention any supplies arriving today."
The voice from the slab lowered slightly.
"Shut it! This isn't your standard supply train! A distinguished Lord is personally leading the unit, escorting these goods to the frontline camp. If your reception there has even a single slip-up, you can kiss your head goodbye!"
Soren roared back in standard orc fashion:
"Understood! The meat is already over the fire!"
The red light dimmed, and the stone slab returned to dead silence.
Creak.
The cabin door was pushed open. Kyle and Thorne stood beyond the threshold. They could only understand a little Orcish, but the roaring from the slab was more than enough to explain the situation.
"My Lord. . ." Thorne’s teeth chattered."More orcs are coming? A large force?"
Soren didn't answer. He bent over, rummaging through the Centurion’s belongings, and tore a horn token bound with a copper ring from his belt.
Kyle stepped into the room, his voice urgent.
"My Lord, let's fall back! We've already taken the camp. While it's dark and the fog is thick, we can grab their weapons and rations and dive into the deep water zone. They won't be able to find us. . ."
"Shut up."
Soren stood straight. He turned his head, and in his gaze, there was no fear. No hesitation.
What burned in his eyes was the chilling gleam of a predator spotting its prey.
"Retreat? A heavy supply convoy delivered right to our doorstep, escorting a target that even a high-ranking officer calls 'distinguished'. . . and you want me to retreat?"
Soren hooked the horn token onto his own belt.
"Listen well. I am going to swallow this entire shipment whole."
Kyle’s pupils shrank violently.
Leading a few dozen battered remnants, having just walked out of the jaws of hell, and now this leader actually wanted to set an ambush for a critically important, high-profile escort unit?
He was a lunatic.
But looking at Soren's utterly unfazed expression, Kyle swallowed hard.
"Give the orders, My Lord."
Soren strode out of the cabin.
"Kyle, Thorne! Take your men and throw all fifty orc corpses into the cesspit behind the camp. Cover them with dead branches! Drain the water from those puddles and pave the clearing with sand and dirt to smother the stench of blood!"
"Get the meat roasting over the fires! Roll the ale kegs into the center of the camp! Strip off your bloodied clothes, burn them, and change back into your old rags!"
Command after command hammered down.
Among the dozens of men who had just survived a brutal slaughter, not a single one dared to question him. Dragging, shoveling, igniting. Driven by an overwhelming, desperate will to survive, the entire camp erupted with terrifying efficiency.
Soren summoned Ein.
"Head toward the Black Mud Shallows and keep an eye on this convoy. I need their numbers, troop composition, and equipment."
Ein grabbed his longbow and bolted toward the marsh outside the gates. With a fluid flip, he dove straight into the muddy waters, sinking without making a single splash.
Noon.
The thick fog had finally dispersed slightly.
Outside the camp gates, the sound of splashing water rippled. Ein slipped through the wooden palisade defenses like a loach, shaking the duckweed from his hair as he rushed up to Soren.
He was panting heavily.
"My Lord! They're here!" Ein kept his voice low, using a dead branch to rapidly sketch in the dirt."Two supply wagons. The wheels are reinforced with thick iron plating, and the wooden carriage panels are carved with glowing purple runes. They're being pulled by four Kodo beasts."
"Troop numbers?" Soren stared at the lines in the sand.
"One hundred."
"Full-body plate armor. Black steel heavy armor that covers everything, even their faces! Every single one is carrying a long-handled armor-piercing halberd and has a heavy repeating crossbow slung over their back. Their formation is airtight. Not even a bird could fly through it."
As soon as the words left his mouth, the faces of Kyle and the others gathered around the cabin instantly drained of color.
One hundred fully armored black steel heavy orcs.
On an open plain, an elite infantry unit of that caliber could easily crush a five-hundred-man human infantry battalion head-on. If this ragged group of slave auxiliaries charged them with their trash weapons, they wouldn't even manage to leave a white scratch on the enemy’s iron plating before being chopped into mincemeat.
A direct confrontation meant certain death.
Soren dragged his boot across the dirt, erasing the sketch.
"If we can't pierce their armor, then we'll rot their guts."
He looked at Kyle."You grew up crawling through the muck of this swamp. I need a poison. Odorless, colorless, undetectable when mixed into strong ale, and takes effect within half an hour."
Kyle froze for a moment, his mind rapidly sifting through all the toxic flora and fauna he had encountered over the decades. Demon-croc saliva? Too fishy. Sap from the Wither-thorn Vine? It was bright green and would instantly burn the throat, raising alarms.
Suddenly, Kyle’s eyes lit up.
"Death-Sleep Shrooms!" Kyle pointed toward a gloomy patch of woods on the west side of the camp."Fungi that grow beneath the decaying corpses of magic beasts. If you dry them out, crush them into powder, and dissolve them in cold water, they become completely colorless and tasteless."
"Anyone who drinks it will just feel numbness in their limbs at first, like they’re drunk. By the time they realize something is wrong, their heart will just stop beating altogether!"
Soren tossed a short blade to Kyle.
"Go. Take anyone who’s fast on their feet. Within fifteen minutes, I want to see that powder dissolved into those three large ale kegs."
"Thorne, take your men and go roast the meat by the charcoal fires. Slouch your shoulders and put on that lowly, subservient look you had before!"
An hour later.
A muffled rumbling echoed from outside the gates. It was the heavy thud of massive Kodo beasts trampling through the muck. The creaking of wheels grinding against axles and the metallic clinking of heavy armor plates pressed down heavily on every human's heart.
Soren stood at the open gates.
He was draped in a massive direwolf-skin cloak, wearing a fully enclosed black iron helm he had pried from the head of a dead orc. He had padded the inside of the helm with thick cloth, forcibly boosting his apparent height by half a head.
Combined with the physical enhancements he had gained from the blood of the Son of Titan, from the outside, Soren looked exactly like a slightly lean half-orc officer.
The camp gates swung wide open.
Four two-story-tall Kodos, snorting fetid white steam from their nostrils, lumbered through the entrance.
Close behind them marched row upon row of black steel heavy orcs, moving in terrifying unison. A literal forest of heavy halberds. The suffocating aura of slaughter radiating from them hit the camp like a physical blow, making Thorne’s legs turn to jelly by the meat racks. He nearly fell to his knees.
The convoy halted in the center of the camp.
The heavy wooden door of one of the supply wagons was shoved open.
The figure who stepped down wore no heavy plate armor.
It was an emaciated orc, yet he radiated an oppressive pressure that demanded absolute submission. He was draped in robes woven from hundreds of raven feathers, the edges of the garment dripping with an eerie, dark slime.
His sunken cheeks were smeared with arcane runes drawn in bone dust and blood. Within his withered eye sockets danced a dark green, magical ghost-light. In his right hand, he leaned upon a twisted staff crafted from the spinal column of a magic beast.
The bone staff struck the ground.
Thump.
A ring of green ripples spread outward across the muddy earth.
Instantly, all the heavy-armored orcs dropped to one knee in unison, striking their right fists against their breastplates with a deafening crash.
An Orc Shaman.
Within the hierarchy of the Blackstone Clan, a Shaman who could command the elements held an incredibly revered status—entirely equal to a human Legion Commander.
Through the narrow slits of his helm, Soren’s gaze locked onto the High Shaman. He strode forward, struck his right fist to his left chest, bowed deeply, and spoke in the purest Blackstone highland accent:
"I salute you, Lord of Souls."
The Shaman’s glowing green eyes swept condescendingly over the 'orc officer' before him.
"Where is Kash?" The Shaman’s voice was grating and hoarse."Why am I being greeted by one of his groveling worms?"
Soren maintained his deep bow, his tone properly fearful and fawning.
"Quell your anger, My Lord! When the Centurion learned of your arrival, he felt the stinking preserved meat in the camp was unworthy of your status."
"He personally took our core brothers into the deep water zone to hunt that two-headed spike-armored crocodile that just birthed! He said he wanted to offer the beast's heart as a sacrifice for your staff."
"He left me here to watch over these human slaves, and to prepare bonfires and strong ale for you!" Soren pointed a finger toward the back of the camp.
The Shaman’s gaze passed over Soren’s helm and landed on the area around the meat racks.
Thorne, Kyle, and the slave auxiliaries were currently prostrated in the muddy water. They were trembling violently, their heads pressed tightly against the earth, lacking even the courage to glance up at the raven robes.
That overwhelming, visceral terror was a very genuine reaction.
The Shaman looked at these slaves—emaciated as twigs, covered in festering scars, and still wearing collars around their necks. His withered lips parted in a mocking sneer.
"That fool Kash. Still as fond as ever of useless flattery. Assigning a few broken slaves to watch the gate. . . He isn't even afraid these wretches might dirty my ale."
The Shaman’s gaze then swept the ground.
Freshly laid sand covered any bloodstains. Pine resin burned cleanly in the braziers, and the heavy, greasy aroma of roasting meat combined with the pungent scent of strong ale perfectly masked any lingering stench of slaughter.
With typical orcish arrogance, he would never believe that the few dozen ruined slaves groveling before him could have possibly slaughtered fifty regular, armed guards.
In that moment, his guard completely dropped.
The Shaman waved his pale bone staff.
"Brothers. Disarm, eat meat, and drink."
"Marching through this mud pit all morning. . . this damned miasma is making my bones ache."
Half of the heavy-armored orcs stood up, began unfastening their weapons, and walked toward the large wooden kegs brimming with poisoned ale.
However, the Shaman hadn't completely abandoned his vigilance. His glowing green eyes swiveled, pointing his staff back toward the two supply wagons near the camp gates.
"Thirty of you, stay by the wagons. If anyone dares approach within ten paces of the supplies, chop off their legs."
"And you green-skinned rats, keep your eyes peeled too!"
Following the Shaman’s command, thirty of the tallest, most robust heavy-armored orcs remained standing like iron towers around the carriages. They did not remove their armor, their visors remained coldly drawn.
At the same time, twenty wiry goblins, clutching poisoned crossbow bolts and blow-horns, scattered around the convoy’s perimeter like agile fleas. If anyone so much as showed a hint of hostile intent, those twenty goblins would sound the alarm in an instant.
Hidden beneath the iron helm, the corners of Soren’s mouth curled into an icy smile.
The plan would need slight adjustments, but the prey had already walked into the trap.
He took two steps back, turned around, and unleashed a ferocious orcish roar at Thorne and the others kneeling in the dirt:
"Didn't you hear him?! You lowly scum! Bring the largest slabs of meat and those three kegs of fine ale up to the Lords!"