Seeing the goblins still brawling after his speech, Marcus didn’t give another speech.
He waded in.
KRUMP!
He punched, kicked, and headbutted.
In two minutes, every single goblin and snotling was on the ground groaning.
The ones still standing were trembling.
The system dinged.
> [QUEST COMPLETE: DA BOSS’S SPEECH]
> You didn’t just talk.
You showed ’em who’z biggest.
Dat’z how Orks do it.
> REWARD: [Get Da Blood Up] – Unlocked.
+ Tribal Ability: [Krump Da Gits] – A good krumpin’ increases Tribe Stability by 20.
No cooldown, but it hurts.
The sun was gone.
The mushroom field behind him was a patch of glowing, stinking fungi the size of a basketball court, and the “tribe” was three lean-tos made of rocks, mud, and bones.
“Where do we even sleep?” Marcus muttered.
He dragged Iron Egg out of the mud.
“Where’s da boss’s hut?”
Iron Egg, missing a tooth now, limped ahead.
“Dis way, boss!
Old boss’s place!”
A hundred meters south of the fungus field, there was a hollow surrounded by boulders, covered with branches and cured squig-hide.
It was just big enough for Marcus to crawl in.
The stench inside was so concentrated it had physical weight.
Marcus chose to sleep outside, on the dirt.
The cold was nothing compared to the smell.
He fell asleep to the sound of goblins arguing over mushrooms.
“Boss!
Boss!”
Marcus woke up.
Iron Egg was holding a huge, pale mushroom the size of his head.
“Breakfast, boss!”
> **QUEST: MAKE IRONHEADS GREAT AGAIN**
> You iz da only Orc left.
A tribe of just Grots is an embarrassment to Gork and Mork.
Make da fungus field bigger so it spits out more boyz.
> **Objective 1: Expand the Fungal Layer**
> The fungus field grows when greenskins bleed and die on it.
Make the boyz fight, make them bleed on the dirt.
Or bleed yourself.
> **Reward: Old Boss’s Choppa – Good Quality, Rusty [Ork Immune: Tetanus is just extra damage to humies]**
Marcus threw the mushroom back.
“Call everyone.
Now.”
Half an hour later, the tribe was assembled.
Marcus tried his farming plan.
“Grots to da left!
Snotlings to da right!”
The goblins, slightly smarter, scurried left.
The snotlings just stared, drooling.
Iron Egg and two other goblins had to physically kick and herd the squealing snotlings to the right.
Marcus counted.
26 Goblins, 61 Snotlings.
Not 200.
That’s it.
That’s the whole Ironhead Tribe now that Grom took the real boyz.
He looked at the fungus field.
It pulsed faintly.
He could almost feel it.
It wasn’t a crop field.
It was a living, underground fungal network.
Digging it up would kill it.
“I get it now,” he thought.
“I’m not a farmer.
I’m a spore farmer.”
The Chinese way is build walls and stockpile grain.
The Ork way is bleed and brawl.
“Listen up, you lot!” he roared.
“Dis whole field iz our future!
If we want more boyz, we gotta give da ground a good watering!”
He pointed at the dirt.
“From now on!
Every day after eatin’!
YOU LOT FIGHT!
Right here!
On da mushrooms!
Da one who wins gets an extra mushroom!
Da one who loses…
bleeds on da field!
That’s how we farm!”
The goblins looked confused, then excited.
Fighting for food?
That’s an order they understood.
For five days, Marcus did nothing but enforce this.
Dozens of goblins and snotlings brawled on the fungal layer from dawn till dusk.
Green blood soaked the soil.
Marcus himself would walk into the brawl once a day and beat up ten goblins at once, his own blood dripping from his split lip.
He also scouted.
Iron Egg led him around.
His tribe was in a box canyon between two black, ugly mountains in what was probably the Badlands.
A sluggish, brown river cut through the valley.
Good.
Isolated.
No humans, no dwarfs nearby to instantly kill him.
A perfect starter base.
On the fifth evening, as he was watching two snotlings try to eat each other, the system dinged.
> **OBJECTIVE 1 COMPLETE: Fungal Layer Expanded (200%)**
> The blood has soaked deep.
New shoots are sprouting.
You will see new Snotlings within a week, Goblins within a month.
> **REWARD ISSUED: Old Boss’s Choppa discovered!**
Two goblins came dragging a monstrous piece of rusted iron, bigger than both of them combined.
“Boss!
Found it!
In da mud where old boss died!”
It was 1.4 meters long.
Not a sword.
A thick, crude cleaver made from a slab of iron, edge nicked, covered in dried blood and rust.
Marcus picked it up one-handed.
It felt PERFECT.
The weight, the balance – knowledge that wasn’t his flooded in.
His muscles knew this weapon.
> **WEAPON ACQUIRED: Old Boss’s Choppa [Good Quality]**
> **Passive: Rusty & DIRTY – 15% chance to cause infected wound to non-greenskins.**
> **SIDE QUEST: [LEARN DA CHOPPA] – Krump 20 enemies to master it.
No air-swinging, you git.
Orks learn by choppin’ somethin’ that bleeds!**
Marcus grinned, showing his tusks.
He slammed the choppa into the ground.
“Alright.
Field is bigger.
Now we need more mouths.”
The system popped up again.