Mercenaries and Adventurers

After crossing an invisible border, there is a settlement of goblins. The last time Zhao Ji came here, the ground here was still clean, and the entire settlement was full of goblins in ambush.

But this time, when Kiel and old Domu came over together, they found that the situation in the goblin settlement was very strange.

The ground is full of uncovered potholes, and the originally clean and tidy ground is scattered with all kinds of sundries that goblins need in their daily lives. At the exits of some large potholes that Zhao Ji discovered before, a lot of things were scattered at the exits this time, and the ground was full of messy footprints.

Blood was also scattered where the footprints were dense.

I don't know what happened, the feeling of the goblin settlement at this moment is very different from the last time.

Last time, although it seemed that the goblin settlement was empty on the surface, Zhao Jineng could feel the hostility against him everywhere, and the clean and deserted settlement was like a bait to invite people into the trap. At that time, Zhao Ji had expected it a long time ago, so last time he knew that there should be hidden goblin warriors everywhere in the seemingly deserted settlement.

But this time was very different.

The last ambush failed, and this time the goblins wouldn't think they could succeed with the same trick again, right? Moreover, based on what he and old Domu observed outside, the chaos in the settlement did not seem to be faking.

Unlike Kiel who has no experience, the old Domu has a lot of experience in his life. He whispered to Kiel: "It's not a fake situation. Hey, it seems that a chaos broke out in the goblin settlement. Look there .” Old Duomu pointed to a place behind a big tree.

Zhao Ji leaned his body up a little, and found a dead goblin with his back against a big tree.

The difference is that the goblin's head is still there, and it died with its hands and feet bound.

What binds its hands and feet are vines from the forest used by goblins.

"That goblin was beaten to death by other goblins. Before it died, its hands and feet were bound, and it used the vines used by goblins." Zhao Ji told Lao Duomu his observation.

"That's right, there must be a chaos erupting inside the goblins. Do you think they will be the same as those big nobles, and will also erupt power struggles because of the ruling power?" Old Domo snorted. muttered.

"Ah? What?" Zhao Ji didn't hear what old Domo muttered, "Should we go in and investigate, or follow the previous plan and investigate around the goblin settlement?"

Beware of traps, Old Domo finally insisted on walking around the periphery of the settlement to find the main target of their trip—the altar and the statue.

-----

Zhao Ji and Lao Duomu scouted around the periphery of the goblin settlement, and they found that the area of ​​the goblin settlement was beyond their imagination.

The area of ​​the entire settlement is not even much smaller than that of Doral Forest Village. Considering that goblins live in shallow underground crypts, and the living space is three-dimensional, the population of Goblins in this settlement may be more than that of Doral Forest. The population of Lam Tsuen.

Old Domo saw this judgment, so he complained that they had underestimated Goblin before. If such a large number of goblins really attacked the village, they would definitely suffer a lot.

In this regard, Kiel comforted the old Domo. "Don't look at the large number of goblins, but their combat effectiveness is not good. Their fighters don't even have a piece of metal in their hands, so they can't do much damage. We humans are much bigger than goblins, even if a peasant woman is as big as a goblin Fighting against each other, as long as you are not afraid, goblins can't even win."

"It makes sense. They are only half the height of the village boy. They have slender arms and legs. They really don't have much strength." Looking at it this way, Lao Duomu felt relieved, thinking that even the worst before In this situation, humans are unlikely to be defeated by goblins.

Occasionally, in the messy settlement of goblins, a few dead goblins can be found. Looking from afar, both of them could roughly judge that the death was at the hands of Goblin himself.

This made their judgment on the chaos inside the Goblin even more certain. But here comes the problem. Kiel and Old Domo walked around the goblin settlement for a long time, but they didn't find any signs of recent goblin activities in the settlement.

where are they now

They certainly didn't all go directly to attack the human villages. The nearest human village here is the Doral Forest Village in the north, but that's where Zhao Ji and the others came from, and there were no large groups of goblins nearby on the road. signs.

So the goblins didn't come out of the forest and headed north. So where did they all go.

After thinking about this question for a while, Lao Duomu had an answer.

"Kiel, do you still remember what I told you once, when we were young, under the leadership of my eldest brother, we once attacked the Goblin settlement at that time?"

Zhao Ji nodded, he knew about it: "Yes, I remember that you defeated the goblins, but in the end you didn't find the goblins' settlement, which was in the forest."

Old Duo Mu shook his head: "It's not that we didn't find any goblin settlements, but we found several goblin settlements at that time, but we haven't been able to completely wipe out the goblin settlements."

"What's going on? Tell me in detail."

The two talked while advancing: "The number of goblins was not large at that time, but there were still a few difficult enemies. After we attacked into the forest, we found their settlements on the outskirts of the forest. But Goblins are very good at escaping, and when they face an opponent they can't win, they just evacuate directly."

Zhao Ji understood as soon as he heard it. He pointed to the messy settlement nearby and said, "So after I defeated the goblin fighters a few days ago, these goblins withdrew?\

,""It should be like this. At that time, we chased the goblin's evacuation route all the way and smashed several temporary settlements of goblins. We didn't evacuate until they hid deep in the forest, in the mountain range to the south. Although we chased them all the way, we actually failed to kill a few fleeing goblins when we chased them later. Those little things were running faster in the forest than we were chasing them."

Speaking of this, the two coincidentally discovered a large number of goblin footprints and traces of dragging on the ground.

These obvious traces gathered from the settlement, and then moved forward from the settlement in one direction, extending to the darker depths of the forest.

"Kiel, can you judge the line of defense here? Which direction are they going?" Old Domou tried to find the north-south direction, but he gave up after trying, he didn't know how to do this.

Zhao Ji licked the corner of his mouth, but he had a way.

"Let me try."

He took off one glove first, then put his index finger into his mouth and licked it.

Sweaty fingers are salty.

Well.

Taking out the pinched finger, Zhao Ji stretched it up into the air and felt it quietly.

Fingers dipped in saliva and stretched into the air felt a little cold, but soon, Zhao Ji sensitively found that one side was slightly cooler than the other.

After making a judgment, Zhao Ji told Lao Duomu that the goblin settlement was in the north where they were standing now, and the direction of the left goblin was going south.

Old Domo obviously felt miraculous. He tried Kiel's method, but no matter how he poked his fingers in the air, he couldn't use it to judge the direction.

Looking at the expression of old Domu looking at him curiously, Zhao Ji still explained to him, and I don't know if old Domu can figure it out: "It's actually very simple, just put your hand in the air and see which side of your fingers is more It’s cooler. Whichever side is cooler is the north side. On the other hand, the other side is the south side.”

Old Duomu tried again, this time he could feel which side was cold and which side was not. And also came to the same position judgment as Kiel's before.

Afraid that old Domo would use this method in other places, Kiel hurriedly gave old Domo a solid understanding of the deeper principles.

"Don't use this method indiscriminately. This method can only judge the north-south direction in this place. It won't work in other places."

Old Duo Mu looked puzzled: "Why? Why can it only be used here?"

Zhao Ji had to explain further: "There are two main reasons. The first is that the mountains in the south face north and south, right?"

"That's right. That mountain range runs due east and west."

"So, that mountain range blocks the wind from the south. We have a northerly wind here, and a large area to the north, all the time. It could be from the northwest, from the north, or from the northeast, but it's North wind. You may not feel it, but in fact, there is always a very weak breeze blowing from north to south in the sky. Therefore, when we stretched our wet fingers into the air, the finger that was blown from the wind was cooler Some."

Old Duo Mu suddenly realized: "So that's the reason."

Zhao Ji shrugged, but the movement of the armored body was not obvious: "There is another reason, these big trees around us and the ground under our feet also have an impact on the wind blowing from the north."

Stepping on the leaf-decided ground under his feet, looking at the big trees around him, Old Domo didn't quite understand how they affected the wind blowing from the north.

Knowing that the other party didn't understand, Zhao Ji explained: "In the northern wilderness, although the winds are all blown from the north, they are actually affected by the hills, and the winds are actually a bit chaotic. But when the wind from the north blows into the forest Finally, these big trees straighten out the wind from all directions into a neat wind. Just like a wooden comb."

This metaphor made Lao Duomu understand that the surrounding trees sorted out the chaotic wind into a neat and consistent wind.

"Then, what about the ground?"

Zhao Ji stepped on his feet: "This is even easier, because the ground under our feet is sloped."

"Huh?" The words that the ground is slanted confused old Duomu, he couldn't judge that the ground was slanted, it was obviously flat land.

Zhao Ji explained to him that the land under their feet is actually an extension of the southern mountain range. It seems to be flat land, but in fact the altitude has been slowly increasing.

This can be seen from the types of big trees. The periphery of the forest is still the kind of common broad-leaved trees, but the closer to the inside of the forest, the big trees are getting bigger and bigger, and the trunks are getting thicker and thicker. All are different kinds of big trees from the trees in the outskirts.

At the same time, there were some common flowers and plants in low-altitude areas on the ground, but here, these flowers and plants are gone. Among them are the effects of light and fallen leaves, as well as the reason why big trees compete for nutrients, but the most important thing is that the common flowers and plants in wilderness and hilly areas can only grow in those low altitude places. They are sensitive to growth height, Zhao Ji also discovered it before.

There was a very tall hill in the hilly area before. Zhao Ji discovered that some common flowers and plants grew everywhere, but did not grow on the top of the hill.

The hill was only about 100 meters high, and the common flowers and plants did not grow on the top.

Turn the subject back.

After the ground rises, the wind from the north becomes drier due to the uplift of the terrain, and the moist water vapor gradually stays on the tree trunks and the ground outside the forest. This also led to the fact that where he and Lao Duomu were standing, the breeze that ordinary people could hardly feel was actually blowing neatly from north to south.

Zhao Ji told Lao Duomu about this, but the more he talked, the more confused Lao Duomu was. In the end, Old Domo gave up trying to figure out why.

"So, those goblins all fled to the south, no, they evacuated. What shall we do next? Are we still acting as planned?" Zhao Ji asked Old Duomu. The opponent is the main leader of the team, and all actions must be arranged by him.

Old Domo squatted down and checked the footprints left by the goblins when they evacuated.

"The footprints have been around for a long time, at least three or four days ago. Judging from the time, they should have gone through the chaos and cleared up after the fiasco against you, Kiel, and then evacuated from their original settlements."

"so?"

"It can't be ruled out that there are still a few goblins in the settlement who are unwilling to give up. Hey, this is actually a good thing, let's act according to the plan. Let's go around the entire goblin settlement and find the altar first. Nia told me that the altar is definitely not small, and with the possible existence of countless animal heads, we can find the altar at a glance."

"Could it be that the altars and statues that Nia Shepherd said were taken away by the evacuated goblins? After all, there are so many goblins." Zhao Ji was a little worried, he was afraid that they would pounce on one this time. null.

"How is it possible? Goblins hunt and kill animals for a living. In such a large settlement, how many animal heads have been killed over the years. Can they take so many heads away together? Give them ten donkey carts. No. If they really brought the altar and those heads, wouldn’t they bring anything else? Goblins have the habit of being precious even if they have a bone, and they can give up the things they have inhabited all these years I'm already surprised by the mature settlement."

Having said that, there is no need to say any more. The two continued to circle the periphery of the goblin settlement, and after a while, they did find a different place.

That place is not within the goblin settlement, but it is still closely next to the goblin settlement. The place was not small, and the goblins actually built a big wall with fallen trees and large branches they collected.

From their place they could not see into the wall. But on the edge of the wall, there were actually a few goblins standing guard.

Those goblins were also different from the goblins that Zhao Ji had fought before, not because of their different heights and shapes, but because they had many animal head paintings painted with white and black paint on their bodies. Their skin seems to be a piece of canvas or the trunk of a big tree. Wherever it can be painted, it is covered with various large and small skull symbols.

When Zhao Ji and Lao Duomu were observing those goblins, those goblins happened to find them too. After all, the other party was standing on a higher wall with a better view.

After discovering the two, the goblins rang the two sticks in their hands. After the dry wooden sticks collided with each other, there was a loud sound, and the chattering goblins yelled from inside the wall, and a few goblins also ran out of the crypt in a part of the settlement next to the wall.

Old Domo wanted to evacuate first, but Kiel, who had fought goblins many times, signaled Old Domo to wait first.

Zhao Ji simply stood up from behind the hidden big tree, and observed the goblins who appeared from the settlement next to the wall.

He found that those goblins were all old goblins, and they couldn't run fast after receiving the warning, and there were not many in number, only about fifty or so.

And there were not many goblins with black and white heads painted all over their bodies that came out of the wall, about ten of them, and these goblins could be stronger, with bone spears and sticks in their hands Under the instruction of the goblins standing guard on the fence, they are forming a team.

Seems to want to defend where they came out.

Needless to say, both Zhao Ji and Lao Duomu realized that the inside of the wall made of wood and branches and mud should be where the altar that Nia Shepherd said was located.

Unexpectedly, they didn't evacuate. Some goblins who presumably served that existence full-time even organized a group of old goblins to defend their "great" "god".