Chapter 37
Orcs were creatures of the daytime, and the war had precious little to do with the subordinate settlements ringing the Howling Tusk Tribe — their people were exploited and ground down the same as always, and tonight was a night like any other.
Settlements this weak didn't keep the kind of watch that would notice Lilith, Auriel, and Rowan coming.
A closer look at the cart confirmed it: sacks of raw meat, bound for the Howling Tusk Tribe.
What kind of meat, Lilith couldn't tell through the sealed hides.
It didn't matter. She laced the cargo with corpse toxin, quietly, and no one noticed a thing.
Come tomorrow's delivery, plague would walk into the Howling Tusk Tribe on its own legs and sow panic from the inside.
One shipment wouldn't be enough, though. The Elite-ranked Shaman understood undead power; he'd likely trace an outbreak to its source fast. Lilith needed the whole tribe in chaos before he got the chance.
"This can't be their only supply camp," she said. "We'll search the others."
Working off the Seer's map, the three spent the night circling the Howling Tusk Tribe, checking every subordinate settlement they could find.
It was exactly as Lilith had guessed. The Howling Tusk Tribe had subjugated the nearby clans completely — that control was what gave it the resources and manpower to wage war beyond the Barren Plains, and it had also created precisely the vulnerability she'd come hunting for.
A tribe that size needed a constant stream of supplies, and every settlement they reached was feeding something into it.
"Did you hear?" a thin Orc guard whispered to the younger warrior beside him. "The Orc Shaman's surprise attack on the Wood Elves failed."
"What?" The younger Orc's face tightened. "Doesn't that mean they'll squeeze us even harder?"
Neither of them cared a whit about the Howling Tusk Tribe's defeat. What they cared about was what it meant for them — a failed invasion meant harsher quotas and worse punishment.
"We should run," the younger one whispered. "There's no future here."
"Keep your voice down. Where would we even go?"
While the two of them talked, three concealed figures slipped into the settlement behind them.
This village supplied water. Contaminating it was the easy part; the hard part was getting the Orcs to drink without noticing.
"I can handle that," Rowan and Auriel said at the same time.
Lilith looked between them. "Oh?"
"Wood Elf nature magic can produce soporific pollen," Rowan explained. "Mix it into the water and the Orcs will sleep."
"If it's pollen, couldn't you just release it into the air?"
Rowan nodded.
Auriel's solution was considerably less subtle. "I can create holy water. For creatures as corrupted as Orcs, drinking it triggers purification."
Lilith and Rowan both turned to stare. "You can do that?"
Angelkin abilities really were brutally direct.
Their power was rooted in faith, and ordinary purification only worked on races steeped in corruption, bloodshed, or dark power.
Orcs qualified. So, for that matter, did the undead — while Wood Elves, children of nature, did not.
Which meant Rowan could drink Auriel's holy water without a care in the world, and Lilith very much could not.
"Then the water supplies are yours," Lilith said.
They pressed on. By the small hours before dawn, every subordinate settlement around the Howling Tusk Tribe had been sabotaged; all that remained was to wait for the unrest to bleed into the main camp.
Shortly before sunrise, they stopped outside the final satellite settlement.
"We're almost done," Lilith said. "One last step, and we head back to the Verdant Forest."
Auriel and Rowan had already guessed the shape of it: wipe out the settlement, raise every Orc as undead, and hurl the resulting army at the Howling Tusk Tribe. The attack would light chaos inside the main camp while pulling attention away from the tainted food and water.
Lilith looked at Rowan. "You've gained the least from this mission. Since you want Elite Rank, these Orcs are yours."
"All right." He nodded with total confidence, plainly eager to show what he could do.
The eastern horizon had begun to lighten, and several Orcs were already stirring — which made silent killing harder. For an ordinary fighter, at least. Rowan released a cloud of soporific pollen, let the wind carry it into the settlement, and the exhausted Orcs slid back down into deep sleep.
After that, the rest was almost routine.
He summoned his bonded bow and drew an arrow of condensed nature magic.
Green streaks crossed the dim sky like meteors, and the sleeping Orcs died without ever waking.
His arrows made next to no sound. One shot.
Another. Rowan never moved from his spot, loosing more than two hundred arrows until the settlement fell into absolute silence.
"It's done." He dismissed the bow and pulled up his System interface immediately.
"Well?" Lilith asked. "Any sign of advancement?"
His expression cycled from confusion through concentration before understanding finally dawned on him. "There are requirements. It's a staged advancement process." He read on. "The first step is obtaining an Essence Core. Completing that reveals the next objective."
"I see."
A flicker of disappointment — but at least Rowan had confirmed it: advancing to Elite Rank ran through a series of distinct tasks, not EXP alone. He'd still moved closer to his goal, and that was enough to keep his spirits up.
Dawn was closing in. Lilith set to raising the Orc corpses at once — more than two hundred of them, enough to cause the Howling Tusk Tribe serious grief. And this time she didn't limit herself to one Unit type. She built a mixed undead force, leaving out only the Gargoyles.
Most of the dead came back as Zombies. Among the Undead Faction, Zombies were the one low-tier race that converted their victims passively, without Lilith lifting a finger — if the Orcs failed to stamp them out fast, the undead count inside the tribe would just keep climbing.
She raised several Ghouls besides: hunched things that would rampage through the chaos, devouring corpses and growing stronger on every one.
Rowan watched the dead rise around them. "That ability is completely broken."
He finally understood why his mentor believed Lilith could change the course of the Orc war. Every enemy casualty, another soldier for her side.
Lilith waved off the amazement. "They're only expendable Units." She faced the newly raised army. "Move out. Attack the Howling Tusk Tribe to the east."
The undead obeyed, marching into the fading dark.
Lilith turned back to Auriel and Rowan. "Let's go. Time to head back to the Verdant Forest."