Cthulhu Gonfalon

Attacking the camp of the ogres was undoubtedly very dangerous. But the benefits were colossal.

Being able to gain a firm and stable rule was already an immense reward, not to mention the ogres often had many collections. Things that the dragon did not fancy might not necessarily be worthless to Baron Dahl.

And if he could capture these ogres alive, whether for the purpose of training them to become soldiers or for the purpose of selling them away, either could bring great benefits.

If it was the former, so long as he had tamed two or three ogre soldiers, Baron Dahl would have the guts to make a move on the other lords around him and expand his sphere of influence. If it was the latter, at least he was able to earn a large sum of money. He could even make use of this opportunity to establish good relations with some forces that he had long wanted to get connected with.

Even if the ogres were dead, their corpses were just as valuable. Many body parts were good material, especially the famous "Ogre Gloves," which could greatly enhance the strength of an ordinary human to become a beast with a human form.

Baron Dahl did remember that this newly hired consultant was a mage talented in alchemy and enchantment techniques. If there were enough ogre materials, he could combine those and make a few pairs of Ogre Gloves. That wouldn't be a problem at all.

Whether to keep them for one's own use or to sell them for money, treasures like these which could produce an immediate effect in enhancing strength were both equally good choices.

As for the danger, he had considered that too. After all, the ogres were robbed by the dragon, and even their Shaman was dead. Even if there was some danger, it was not impossible to take a risk.

Thinking about this, he made up his mind.

Of course, this time, he would certainly not be going up the mountains. Whether the attack was a victory or not, he should never put himself in danger.

For this, he made a solemn promise. If the attack was successful, no matter how much revenue was gained, 70 percent would belong to the team that went up the mountains to carry out the attack. And even if the crusade against the ogres were to fail, he would also take out a large sum from his own fortune to pay remuneration.

But he was tight-lipped on any pension-related matters.

This was not because he was reluctant to pay if the money was meant for their pension. It was because he knew that at this juncture, he should only mention the benefits and not the risks. He had to bluff his way into everyone's heart and make them envious and fired up so that they would want to covet after the gains. This was the only way to make this successful.

As for whether people were going to die? How many would die? At this point in time, he was no longer bothered.

So long as he was not one of the dead ones!

Since Baron Dahl had made up his mind, after the knights had a discussion among themselves, they too agreed with him.

No matter what, attacking the ogres was always a meritorious contribution that one could boast on for many years down the road. And if they were afraid to provoke a bunch of losers, who were all beaten up with injuries after being robbed by a dragon, would they even have the face to sit astride high, mighty horses and parade through town? They should just go home earlier to their wives and children!

Not to mention, this adventure would fetch rather satisfactory returns. It was worth it!

The clergymen from the Church of the Void Mask did not even hesitate. For them, so long as there was enough hope, defeating evil and eradicating demons and monsters were definitely important matters of course. This was the so-called, "I'm the soldier, and you're the thief," situation, so was there even the need to consider so much?

As for whether this would benefit Baron Dahl… No matter how mean he could be, Baron Dahl was a human being after all. He was a lord at that, so the least he could do was to shoulder the basic responsibility of a lord—for example, sweeping his territory for demons and wiping them out well. Just like in the Europe of this world where Sui Xiong had traversed to, there were elites whose minds were clouded by the White Left perspective, and who were otherwise known as Holy Mothers. Unless there was something fogging the baron's mind, otherwise, would he find demons more dependable than humans?

The decent and upright ones were bad guys, while the ones with magic were, on the contrary, very righteous. That was just a nontraditional romantic story that should not be taken seriously!

But they were still in discussion. They were discussing whether or not they should fight this battle and how they should fight it.

According to Bishop Kabbalah's opinion, it was best to carry the altar up the mountains. Of course, he would be following the expedition up as well. This way, he would be able to use his trump card at the most important moment. But the crowd was not agreeable and raised a unanimous objection.

They did not find carrying the altar up the mountains toilsome—that altar was made of wood. To the mid-ranked Sacred Warriors, who were capable of hauling raging bulls and handling ferocious tigers, this altar was nothing. But they refused to let Bishop Kabbalah go with them.

The swords had no eyes, especially with their opponents being the dangerous ogres. If something were to happen to their Bishop, what would they do!

Both parties quarreled for a while. Eventually, Bishop Kabbalah made use of the fact that he was of high rank to pressure the crowd into submitting to his terms. That put an end to this matter.

Therefore, they went up the mountains together. Walking slowly along the steep mountain road, they arrived at the camp of the ogres.

Indeed, there was chaos inside the campsite. The ogres had just sorted out the corpses; one by one, the dead lay on the floor. They had not even held a funeral. And the sentries were not even worth mentioning—two sentries had been directly hit by the dragon and fell off the cliff. Even if they were not dead, at that moment, they would be struggling to stay alive at the foot of the mountain as they slowly approached death. How could they possibly come back?

Speaking of which, the attacking team came at the right time. In this battle against the dragon, many ogres had been directly hit and sent flying beyond the cliffs. At this moment, a few healthy and strong young ogres were just walking down the mountain slope along the steep road, trying to find if there were any lucky survivors who escaped death. Those who remained in the camp, other than the old and weak and the sick and disabled—there were only a few injured members.

But these few injured ones also caused great trouble for the attacking team.

A group that could exchange blows with the dragon and still managed to stay alive; would these guys be easy to deal with!

These injured members were all impressive ogres that had advanced levels, and even the weakest one was already an ogre warrior—this was more than enough to defeat a majority of the adventurers who had yet to step into the mid-rank level during one-on-one fights. The next in rank was the ogre vanguards—if it was a mid-ranked Sacred Warrior, without any injury fighting alone against them, his chances of victory would at best be 70%; there might even be a two-headed ogre to tackle.

Oh, a "former" two-headed ogre.

Because one of its heads had been torn off by the sharp claws of the dragon.

Fortunately, it had lost one of its heads. Otherwise, if the attacking team were to meet with this ogre, then whether they had come to subdue demons or come to deliver themselves like goods to the doorstep of the ogres, who would have known!

The fact that all should know was that the strength rating for a two-headed ogre could be said to have just scraped through to an "advanced" level.

The two heads of such ogres were able to think separately. During battle, they were extremely agile. What was even more frightening was that one of them would tend to become a wizard. In other words, during battle, it was an equivalent of an outstanding soldier who was coupled with the ability of a wizard to cast spells freely at any time it wanted to.

This was simply like playing foul, was it not!

This two-headed ogre happened to lose the head that could become a "wizard." So from being a dual-core superman with a combined ability of magic and martial arts, it was directly beaten back to its original form to become a burly ogre that walked in a somewhat inflexible manner.

Because it was short of one head now, it was still unable to adapt to its new form for the time being, so it still bumped and stumbled about as it moved.

"I hope it will learn its lesson in its next life, or better, he should be reincarnated as a good child," said that burly and bearlike Sacred Warrior with a hearty laugh. He had slain the two-headed ogre and was standing by its corpse without paying heed to his seriously injured left shoulder. It seemed to be shattered quite severely.

Soon, he would not be able to laugh because the young ogres who went out to look for their fellow ogres who fell off the cliff had returned.

The battle that followed was extremely intense. In the end, almost every Sacred Warrior was seriously wounded. The priests exhausted all their power, while one of the two paladins even lost one of their legs to become disabled.

Fortunately, this glorious victory earned them the appreciation of His Majesty, the Void Mask. He bestowed them God's Grace with great benevolence to restore all the injured ones back to health.

Including those who did not believe in him.

When the warm holy light was erected like a column of light within the campsite of the ogres, this winter's clean-up operation of Dahl Hill had finally come to a victorious end.