Chapter 50: Multi-Tumor Giant Wood Club (Please keep reading)

"That's right, it's in these next few days. During the last three days of every ten-day cycle, Hou will definitely return," Gorse said with absolute certainty, scurrying along behind Gawain.

Compared to the roar, his memory of this date was even deeper.

Because these were the most agonizing days of every ten-day cycle; to feed Hou's massive belly, they often had to go hungry for several days.

"Alright then, no training today. You go collect the tributes as usual," Gawain decided on today's itinerary.

"Collect tributes?" The half-ogre scratched his bald head and shook it. "I'm not going. Their tributes are all trash, not tasty at all. Hou is already full. Uh... My Lord, you wouldn't want to drive Hou away, would you? Hou is loyal to My Lord; Hou won't run away, and won't collect tributes anymore."

The half-ogre's brain had rarely been this sharp, but he had applied it to the wrong thing. Thinking Gawain was testing his loyalty, he hurriedly beat his chest to declare his allegiance.

"The Lord is asking you to collect tributes, but it's not really about the tributes. It's for... well, the Lord must have his own profound reasons for doing this. You only need to do as the Lord instructs," Gorse guessed Gawain's intention to some extent, though he wasn't entirely sure.

"Really?" The half-ogre ignored Gorse's posturing and fixed his dim-witted gaze on Gawain.

"I do have my own plans for having you collect tributes. This time, I won't send you alone; I will bring people to follow behind you. You only need to follow the original route once, collect all the original tributes, and hand them over to us. If the tributes they provide aren't to your liking, just bring them back and let our cook process them. Once it's done, I will reward you with a barrel of ale," Gawain nodded, not intending to explain too much to the half-ogre.

Given the half-ogre's brain capacity, his plans were too complex; the creature likely wouldn't understand at all. He only needed to play his original role.

"Ale? A barrel?" Just hearing the word made the half-ogre's mouth water. He had tasted the drink during the night the Fangtooth Tribe arrived, and he had loved it from the very first sip.

However, when the ale was distributed, Gawain didn't divide it by physique. The same mug that was a large cup for a kobold became a tiny shot glass in front of him—hardly enough to even rinse his mouth, merely a taste.

If he had a whole barrel, he could truly drink his fill.

The half-ogre instantly perked up, beating his chest. "Let's go, collect tributes! I will collect a massive amount of tributes for My Lord!"

"This is your new weapon," Gawain said, pointing to an empty space nearby. "Try it and see if it feels right."

Hou's original weapon had long since been used by Gawain as firewood. That thing was not only clumsy and heavy but also reeked so badly it wasn't even worth recycling.

Lying in the clearing was a massive wooden club, fashioned from a thick branch of a Vanda tree. This type of burl-heavy conifer was famously sturdy, making it an excellent choice for bows and weapon handles; there was a small patch of them on a nearby mountain.

The newly made club was shaped somewhat like a baseball bat, only several sizes larger and longer. The specific characteristics of the Vanda tree's burls were perfectly embodied in this weapon, forming egg-sized protrusions. These would become the source of the club's lethality.

The club was polished very smooth. The rear half, intended for gripping, was tightly wrapped in linen to prevent slipping. The body retained the golden-yellow hue of the raw Vanda wood, possessing a unique, deformed beauty.

"This is prepared for me?" Hou asked, somewhat incredulous.

"What, you don't like it?" Gawain still vividly remembered the half-ogre's unique aesthetic.

"I like it, I like it very much!" The half-ogre nodded repeatedly. That deformed, ugly burliness was exactly to his taste.

"Test the feel. It's mainly about the balance." This weapon had naturally come from Gawain's own hands. It was a craft forced upon him during his previous life as a slave in the Zhentarim; many times, he had to make makeshift weapons from whatever materials were at hand, and a wooden club was undoubtedly the simplest and most brutal.

However, this was his first time making a weapon for such a large individual. Although he had personally tested it using the Enlarge spell, there was still a significant gap in strength compared to the half-ogre, and the sensation felt quite different.

"Good, good, good!" The half-ogre grinned widely, shouting praises as he swung the burl-heavy club, making it hum through the air.

Talking to him about "feel" and "balance" was like playing the lute to a cow.

The half-ogre had spent most of his life using crude tree stumps as weapons. Now that he had a custom-made weapon, it felt incredibly natural; what more could he ask for?

Even someone uninitiated like Gorse could sense that the half-ogre, now armed with his new weapon, had become even more terrifying.

The speed at which he swung the weapon had clearly increased by several levels. Dodging his attacks had become much harder; aside from Gawain, few people could likely dodge his massive horizontal sweeps with ease.

Having received his new weapon, Hou was in high spirits. He swung it incessantly as he walked, and the flowers, grass, and small trees along the roadside were unfortunate enough to be knocked askew by his passing.

Fortunately, the half-ogre cherished his new weapon and wasn't foolish enough to strike the large boulders by the road.

This had an advantage: Gawain and the others wouldn't lose track of him. By following the trail of flattened flora, they knew exactly where the half-ogre was heading.

By sending the half-ogre out to collect taxes, Gawain was killing multiple birds with one stone.

Finding the source of Spirit Crystals was only the first.

The second was to further utilize the influence of the half-ogre, Hou, in the surrounding area—especially regarding the kobold tribes. When encountering such tribes, Gawain and his group would wait for the half-ogre to finish his grand display of power before appearing alongside Gorse.

Then, they would perform a coordinated act.

Gawain would intimidate the half-ogre, maintaining the persona of an unfathomable, high-level expert.

Gorse, riding on the coattails of that authority, would then begin lobbying the tribes, persuading them to join the Black Well Tribe family through a mix of threats and incentives. He was a natural at this, requiring no formal training.

While it was unlikely many kobold tribes would join the Black Well Tribe on the spot, the message would have been delivered. In the coming period, they would certainly find ways to scout the situation of the Black Well Tribe.

As long as the Black Well Tribe continued its current rapid expansion, these tribes would be forced to reconsider Gorse's proposal.

The third goal was to squeeze the goblin tribes as much as possible. Although most of what they obtained from them was junk, even a mosquito's flesh is meat; small amounts accumulated would become quite substantial.

Most importantly, it was a matter of shifting power.

As the Black Well Tribe expanded rapidly, their range of activity would gradually increase, inevitably leading to conflicts with the surrounding goblin tribes. The likelihood of those goblins joining the kobold tribes was low; for the sake of living space, they would likely resort to force.

This was essentially weakening future enemies.

As the saying goes, "If you walk by the river often enough, you're bound to get your shoes wet."

Not even the half-ogre, Hou, nor Gawain himself expected that a routine tax collection would run into a snag.

The half-ogre was rejected outside a crude goblin camp, where a goblin shrieked, "Starting from today, we no longer need to give you tributes! We already have a new protector!"