Chương 54: 54：Not a Single Soul Abandoned

As for those goblins... Soren's gaze swept across the ground below. The goblins huddled behind Old Cook possessed naturally frail bone structures. They simply couldn't bear the crushing weight of heavy iron armor. But Kyle had no intention of letting them become a weak link. The resilient beast hides they had captured were stitched together overnight by the village women into tight-fitting leather armor, encasing the goblins' scrawny frames.

Instead of wielding cumbersome weapons, they were equipped with blowguns loaded with paralyzing poison darts and sharp, meter-long short spears. Thwip! A faint hiss of rushing air broke the silence. Hidden among the branches of the canopy, a goblin blew sharply into a bamboo tube. Fifteen paces away, a tri-colored venomous snake slithering down a strip of bark was instantly pierced through its weak point, nailed dead to the trunk. Agile, monkey-like, and perfectly blended into their natural surroundings.

Soren had classified them as third-line soldiers. During peacetime, they worked bare-chested in the smithy, swinging heavy hammers and handling the grueling manual labor. But in times of war—or whenever anything stirred deep within the mist—these goblins became scouts, their senses sharper than a startled hare's. His forces seemed armed to the teeth, yet Soren didn't stop there. He led his men back to the expansive, hard-packed dirt training grounds in the center of the village.

"Thrust!"

"Withdraw!"

"Hah!" A synchronized—albeit somewhat weak and delicate—battle cry rang across the grounds, interspersed with the uncontrollable coughing of the elderly. Over two hundred people stood in formation. Aside from the able-bodied men and the elite soldiers, this comprised everyone else: the human women, half-grown adolescents, and gray-haired elders. As long as their hands could hold a meter-long, iron-tipped spear steady, no one was allowed to sit idle.

Each of them had also been issued a slightly oversized, cold-resistant beast-hide armor. It was a lifesaver—a crucial layer of protection capable of warding off the bitter winter chill as well as the fangs of wild beasts. Even the elderly clerk from the exile group was currently gripping a spear with trembling hands, keeping tight within the formation. An hour of basic military formation training every morning was mandatory. They weren't expected to charge enemy lines.

They only needed to know how to form a dense spear wall behind the barricades, establishing a basic defensive network of thrusting points. These two hundred people were designated as the fourth-line soldiers. Off the training grounds, they served as Greywater Village's massive logistical engine. They cooked communal meals for over two hundred people, foraged for dry firewood in the rear forests, stitched uniforms and leather belts for the frontline combatants, and tended to the newly sprouted Swamp Tubers.

Every single person was gritting their teeth, pouring their strength into this new sanctuary they called home. However, under the eaves in a quiet corner of the village, roughly a dozen people remained seated. They were toddlers, two amputees who had lost their legs, and a handful of elders so frail they could barely hold a bowl steady. One of the legless men watched the spirited training on the grounds, his eyes growing red. Beside him sat a little girl, no older than five.

"Eat... you eat it." The veteran took his own ration—a hot piece of flatbread slathered in a thick layer of minced meat—and pushed it into the little girl's arms.

"I'm a cripple. I don't have the strength to pull a plow, nor the ability to hold a spear. The Lord captured this food to feed his soldiers. I can't waste His Lordship's bread." The little girl swallowed hard, practically drooling, but she didn't dare take a bite. Large tears rolled down her cheeks, pattering onto the ground. Just then, a broad, calloused hand suddenly reached over from the side, firmly catching the flatbread. Soren had quietly arrived under the eaves, unnoticed.

"My Lord..." the legless man trembled in fright. Panic washed over his face as he struggled, trying to push himself up with his hands to bow his head to the dirt.

"Stay seated," Soren commanded. He took the flatbread and tore it cleanly in two. He forcefully shoved the larger half back into the veteran's hand, then placed the other half into the little girl's grip. Soren straightened his back and turned around, facing the hundreds of villagers who had frozen in place. His voice boomed like a massive bell, echoing across the entirety of Greywater Village.

"Listen to me, and listen well!"

"The moment you stepped foot into the muck of Greywater Village, your lives became mine!"

"And without my permission, no one is allowed to die! Especially not from starvation!" Soren pointed at the legless veteran, his piercing gaze sweeping over the women and able-bodied men alike.

"Here is the rule laid down by Soren: As long as there is a single grain of wheat or a single scrap of meat left in the storehouses of my territory, rations will be distributed in full! I forbid anyone from skipping meals to save food!" If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

"I will never abandon a single soul within my territory! Do I make myself clear?!" After a brief, dead silence...

"Understood!!"

"We are willing to die for the Lord!!" Hysterical roars of response erupted from the throats of these exiles—people who had once been thrown away like trash. In this dark era, where human life was worth less than weeds and cripples were treated worse than stray dogs... Soren's fiercely protective declaration hammered the loyalty, gratitude, and faith of these hundreds of people deep into the very marrow of their bones. With that, the armed forces of Greywater Village had been clearly divided and organized by Soren.

First-line: 64 elite Black-Iron Heavy Infantry. The main assault force. On call at all times, they followed Soren to execute special operations. Second-line: 83 able-bodied men. Acting as temporary Warg Cavalry and primary farmers, they were responsible for both tilling the fields and charging the enemy lines. Third-line: 85 goblins. Serving as scouts and blacksmiths. Fourth-line: 216 elders, women, and children. Tasked with logistics and maintaining the basic defensive spear wall.

Finally, adding in the 37 incapacitated—the severely disabled, the very old, and the toddlers... Greywater Village now stood at a total population of 485. Inside the stilted wooden cabin. Two people sat at opposite ends of a long table fashioned from a massive, cross-sectioned tree trunk. At one end sat Kyle. The rugged man was drenched in foul-smelling sweat, aggressively chugging down a jug of cold water.

"The second-line boys just snapped three of the warg reins. I had Cook splice them back together with iron chains," Kyle reported on the military situation, flashing a wide grin as he wiped the water from his chin with the back of his hand. He had single-handedly taken charge of managing and drilling all forces from the second line downwards, along with overseeing the progress of the Swamp Tubers. His execution and efficiency were nothing short of terrifying.

However, at the other end of the long table was a pale, slender hand clutching a stick of chalk charcoal. The black grime she had been covered in was washed away, replaced by a clean, tailored linen tunic. Fina, the newly joined noble girl, sat quietly in the dappled light. Her expression was cool and deeply focused, the abacus beside her clacking rapidly under her deft fingers.

"Iron ingot consumption has exceeded expectations by half a percent, but it won't affect the grand scheme of things."

"Yesterday, the fourth-line logistics team collected thirty carts of dry firewood. The communal meals consumed forty-six pounds of meat and seventy pounds of flour."

"Given our current food reserves, assuming we distribute full daily rations to everyone and account for the potential influx of new refugees over the next two months... we have enough for Greywater Village to weather the upcoming harsh winter. The reserves should perfectly bridge the gap until the first harvest of the Swamp Tubers." Soren stood quietly by the window with his arms crossed. As he looked down at the orderly, bustling, and vibrant Greywater Village, he still couldn't bring himself to relax completely.

"You've done well. But it's not enough." Soren turned around, interrupting Fina's notes to bluntly voice his concerns.

"These past five days have been a stroke of luck from the heavens. But the moment the heavy snows seal the mountains, or the situation on the frontlines changes, we will instantly face three major crises."

"First."

"As our soldiers' physical exertion increases, their need for water grows. Right now, we're relying on roughly filtering the muddy water from the stream. Without an abundant, stable, and high-quality source of fresh water, we won't even need an enemy to defeat us. Typhus, typhoid, and dysentery will cripple our army from within."

"Second..." Soren closed his eyes. His mind flashed back to their night raid on the Shatterbone Pass, where he had single-handedly popped the heads of over a dozen Orc officers with the Windwhisper Bow.

"We rely far too heavily on close-quarters combat," he murmured.

"If we ever go up against heavily armored Orcs hurling boulders and fiery oil from high walls, we lack both aerial dominance and ranged suppressive fire."

"We need archers. A fully structured, dedicated ranged unit!" Hearing this, the tip of Fina's charcoal pen suddenly paused on the parchment. She looked up.

"And the last point is magic, isn't it, My Lord?" Soren opened his eyes, giving the girl an approving look.

"Exactly."

"Even with our Black-Iron Heavy Armor, if we face that Shadow Priest, Zagar, after he recovers his mana and summons his corrosive acid rain... our conventional physical defenses won't last for even half a breath."

"If we truly want to become an untouchable force in this swamp..."

"A stable freshwater source, a ranged archer squad, and a way to counter magic. We must find these!"

"These three things are our absolute top priorities moving forward!"