Mount and Blade System: Start from Pioneer Lords

Heating, forging, quenching, grinding, and then wrapping the axe handle with cowhide to prevent slipping, the Fedde blacksmiths were experienced and methodical when it came to forging weapons.

Weighing the hand-forged double-bladed battle axe, apart from its lack of exquisite craftsmanship, Li Wei felt that both its weight and feel were almost identical to the system's.

Zat also gave a fair assessment, stating that there was little difference between the two.

However, Zat was a hero unit, and the system did not plan standard template equipment for heroes, so his feelings were not enough to prove the conjecture.

Li Wei handed the battle axe to the Burning Legion's orc warriors, letting them experience the difference between the system's standard template equipment and the hand-forged one.

These rough and burly men gave an astonishingly consistent evaluation.

Everyone loved the system's template equipment, believing it felt excellent, as if it had merged with them and could be wielded as easily as their own limbs. Of course, they weren't saying the hand-forged one was bad, but it always felt a little off, like a foreign object.

Simply put, even though the double-bladed battle axes were almost the same, when the orcs used the system's, they could leave identical cuts on the wooden stake with every swing.

But once they switched to the one forged by the Fedde blacksmiths, this terrifying control disappeared without a trace, and the cuts they made were no longer consistent.

This difference couldn't be explained by feel or state; it was entirely due to the system's influence.

Li Wei guessed that the system not only granted the soldiers improvements in strength and martial skills upon advancement, but even these template weapons carried the system's power. Once the two were combined, it created an effect greater than 1+1=2.

This discovery made Li Wei both surprised and frustrated. The overall strength ceiling of the system's soldiers was even higher, but the equipment upgrade became a problem again.

After all, every time the system's soldiers leveled up, they had to update their equipment.

Even mountains of gold and silver couldn't withstand such consumption.

The system's template equipment cost even more than what he could forge himself.

The system charged around eighteen gold krones for a double-bladed battle axe, but forging one himself, including labor, materials, and time costs, would cost at most four or five gold krones. The premium was too high.

After comprehensive consideration, the lord decided that the low-level units from Tier 1 to Tier 4 would use weapons made by High Cliff Fortress according to the system's template equipment.

And the high-level units above Tier 5 would be armed with template equipment purchased from the system.

This would not only ease High Cliff Fortress's financial strain but also improve its military strength.

Of course, the top priority was to have the Fedde blacksmiths build ballistae according to Mill's blueprints. These things were truly massive.

Having ballistae and not having them were two completely different things; the difference was comparable to nuclear weapons in his previous life.

If High Cliff Fortress placed dozens of them on the city walls, it would be enough to deter most evildoers.

However, including apprentices, there were only fifty or sixty Fedde blacksmiths. Faced with the endless stream of iron ore that the slaves were digging from the Fedde tribe, manpower was severely insufficient.

Li Wei began to form a slave-catching team, personally leading the team to capture trolls and ogres alive whenever possible.

No one understood why. Although trolls were somewhat intelligent, they were unruly, and ogres were complete idiots. Even deformed children were smarter than these creatures. What was the point of capturing these two species alive? Wasting High Cliff Fortress's food?

No one knew, but the lord didn't plan on doing anything democratic anyway.

In this technologically backward place, manpower was the primary productive force.

The powerful trolls and ogres were excellent labor for mining or blacksmithing, and the lord would naturally not let them go.

Besides, the lord hadn't yet avenged the last time the trolls gathered a wilderness coalition to attack High Cliff Fortress, and the ogres and wilderness bandits robbed iron ore!

This time, he would make them atone for their sins by working for High Cliff Fortress for the rest of their lives.

The failure of the dozen or so troll warriors last time didn't deprive the troll tribe of all its young and strong members. Therefore, after the troll tribe, which was uneasy and afraid of High Cliff Fortress's revenge, saw that no one came, they completely relaxed and continued to live in this fertile pasture.

After all, migrating a tribe was not a simple matter. It would not only easily lead to conflicts with other tribes, especially since winter was approaching, and they could not spend time on migration. They were spending this time trying to store as much food as possible.

Male trolls went out hunting, while female trolls grazed cattle and sheep.

And when a team of orc guards wearing uniform bull-horned helmets appeared here, the outcome was already doomed.

After easily taking down two or three resisting male trolls, this troll tribe with seventy or eighty members also became one of High Cliff Fortress's vassal tribes.

As for the ogres, it was extremely comical. When the High Cliff Fortress warriors found them, these idiots were lying in the mountains sunbathing.

After the lord jumped down from above and chopped off half of an ogre's body with a sword, and a dense crowd of people emerged from behind, these nineteen ogres kowtowed and worshiped, perfectly demonstrating the lord's style of conquering people with virtue.

The troll tribe was arranged to take root in a leeward position under a hill. After learning that High Cliff Fortress was just driving them to serve as vassals, the trolls felt much more at ease, but they felt a little awkward in their hearts.

In the past, they had become the suzerains of other weak tribes. When had they ever become vassals and supported others as suzerains?

As for the ogres, these guys were kept like livestock in the downwind of the hill. They ate and drank heartily as if they had arrived in paradise, which worried the peasants in charge of feeding them.

The appetites of these gluttons were too good. Even if they were fed mud mixed with fodder, the fodder in the territory was declining sharply.

Finally, Old Neil learned about this and proposed that he had a solution. Just when the lord was expecting him to have some Zhang Liang-like plan.

This guy said that goblins often died from exhaustion or because they didn't survive after being castrated, and they could be used as food for the ogres.

The main idea was to make the best use of waste and squeeze the value of the goblins to the limit.

Good fellow, I thought you were Zhang Liang, but you are Cheng Yu.

Li Wei felt that he was already considered a radical, but now he felt that Old Neil, this conservative, was too radical.

To this, Li Wei advocated not agreeing or refusing, letting them decide for themselves.

After all, he was already a boss, and he naturally couldn't take the blame for things that were not conducive to unity.

But from the bottom of his heart, Li Wei didn't dislike it very much.

After all, do goblins count as people?

Moreover, this was a phenomenon in the wilderness. Why do some powerful suzerain tribes bring goblins, who are so weak in combat, when fighting? It's to serve as rations when there is not enough food.

Although the meat of this creature is smelly and not tasty, it is filling, at least it keeps people from starving to death. The most important thing is that this kind of guy, who has a vitality as tenacious as weeds, is everywhere.

With the food source solved, the pressure on High Cliff Fortress to raise these gluttons was also much less.