Homesteading in a fantasy world

Looking around to see who else needs immediate attention I found chaos. My commanding voice bloomed out to get everyone’s attention. First, I got everyone that was lying down wounded properly organized into straight lines because currently, they were just in a big mess.

It seemed that an old goblin couple and their daughter were the reason for this medical tent. They seem to be the healers of the goblin tribe.

At this moment I did not care who would listen and were willing to help. I gave a lecture in a booming voice so all can hear while helping the worst with the first aid skills I learned during the war.

The first thing to teach was the colour sorting green, yellow, red and black. We only had one black in the group of injured meaning no help will be able to save him. And next, we worked on the red ones as I constantly advise as I helped my own patient.

Everything went by fast, and I was quite surprised that we finished only an hour later. I was used to an endless stream of wounded but this was not like what I was used to.

What I missed the most were bandages, they only had a healing paste that we could put on wounds. But after we had done the critical injuries I was able to patch some wounds together with leather strips. I explained the use of bandages to the healers and the need to close wounds together as much as possible.

During my time helping the group of healers expanded, now having seven of them listening to every word I said. When it was all done it was time for me to go and listen to the reports, and hopefully information from the infiltrators on what was happening and why shamans were sent out.

It looks like four shaman groups were sent out. Thankfully two of the other smaller ambushing groups were mostly comprised of scouts and they were a lot better at noticing the elites and shamans. Thanks to that they were able to avoid a fight.

It looks like after I killed the shaman, soon they all withdrew. For more information, we need to wait but I also needed to speak with all the troops.

“Today we have made some mistakes, but we will learn from them. Troops that were under my command. Today you disobeyed orders and engaged the enemy.

“I could have most likely escaped and there was no need for the fight that we had, and your punishment will be the dead brothers we have lost today.”

“This was also in part my fault that led to today's failures. I should have also worked on your ability to notice different enemies. That would have helped you make better choices.”

The lecture went on a little while longer and then I gave orders for half of the troops to start packing their supplies up and be ready to move out tomorrow.

Their mission will be to bring the wounded to the dam camp and send back replacements. We need to start rotating ambushers so that everyone would get battle experience and a chance to get evolutions and abilities.

After that, I finally had an opportunity to get some sleep and to see all my notifications.

Class levels gained:

homesteader level 6 --> 7

true archer level 4 --> 5

heroic soldier level 4 --> 5

Ability levels gained:

penetrating slash level 1 --> 2

counterweight level 14 --> 15

silent arrow level 4 --> 7

heroic stand level 1 --> 2

shaped edge level 2 --> 4

piercing thrust level 1 --> 5

light load level 1 --> 3

sharp blade level 14 --> 17

extreme energy precision level 2 --> 3

heavy blow level 5 --> 9

tactical advantage level 3 --> 7

charged throw level 2 --> 3

splitting arrow level 2 --> 4

weapon enhancement level 1 --> 3

Skill levels gained:

basic architecture level 7 --> 8

basic engineering level 5 --> 6

basic cooking level 6 --> 7

spear level 1 --> 2

sword level 1 --> 2

archery level 9 --> 10

combat strategy level 2 --> 5

stealth level 1 --> 3

basic camouflage level 5 --> 8

throwing level 2 --> 3

basic battle presence level 5 --> 7

basic intimidation level 1 --> 4

basic awareness level 1 --> 5

energy manipulation level 6 --> 7

basic tracking level 6 --> 10

running level 3 --> 5

basic mental fortitude level 8 --> 9

basic first aid level 2 --> 7

basic mentoring level 6 --> 8

basic cartography level 1 --> 3

beginner body level 1 --> 4

Stats:

strength +14

dexterity +12

vitality +11

endurance +2

empathy +2

intelligence +2

perception +4

constitution +4

presence +2

New trait gained:

strength reaches 160 new trait gained wrapped muscles

perception reaches 20 new trait gained better movement tracking

constitution reaches 20 new trait gained copper skin

presence reaches 10 new trait gained intent spread

New skills gained:

basic organization level 1

basic command level 1

beginner energy emissions level 1

Skill increases basic tracking level 10 is upgraded to tracking level 1

Choose one of the following abilities

enhanced smell

tracking information

targets shadow image

Thank you, Richard. I know what tracking information is and it is incredibly useful giving me an area of effect where to my sight disturbances are pointed out. This is supposed to be an incredibly complex ability that can be pushed very far.

You have gained a new ability tracking information level 1

Gaining so many benefits so quickly was amazing, but I barely have the free time to test anything and work on improving new ideas. The ability to keep awake more than normal is excellent yet it does not give me more free time.

The next day information started trickling in and we were getting a better picture of what was happening. The enemy scouting parties were now at a minimum and didn’t leave far from the encampment. They also didn't compose of warriors anymore but simple goblins without much life experience.

Inside the encampment, the story was different as there was a lot of tension and even some killings started to happen. I gave the order for our ambushers to stop activities and only watch. I didn’t want to get the attention of the goblin leaders; I wanted them to focus on themselves and hopefully, a fight will break out.

We have been putting the hurt to the fire camp that hosts this army and now that they lost their shaman. The other encampments earth camp and wind camp are seeing the weakness and want to exploit it.

As I hoped the tribes are also being pushed to the back foot because they have nearly lost no warriors. If my infiltrator's information is correct the big forces are starting to think that the tribes and us have some sort of a deal.

This gave us a lot of breathing room, giving me a chance to make a trip back to the dam camp to see the progress and to help where I can. The dam itself was going quite well, although it was now 20 meters long. It was slowly being built up now so the water level will rise and create a barrier with only two possible places to cross to this side.

Now that we had some extra time, we slowed down the building a bit so the soldiers would not exhaust themselves and so I could see if some improvements can be made to make this place even more defendable.

My idea was simple. It was to make a small wall on this side of the river so the attackers will have to cross the dam to attack us. We could just keep throwing spears at them when they walk across while having the height advantage and a smaller opening for them to cross.

Of course, there needs to be an opening, but we could secure it easily enough with the shield carriers. Speaking of which their training was a bit different, but I was quite pleased to watch their demonstration.

The throwing practice seemed to be working as well, they were all getting quite good at it. I didn’t want to stay here for too long. I wanted to pay close attention to what was happening in the enemy encampment.

It took three days until a full-blown fight broke out and the leadership of the fire camp was killed off. The wind and earth camps were now in charge and while they did eye each other their strength were too similar and I didn’t think it would come to a fight.

Unfortunately, the tribes were able to stay neutral in the fight. It was a shitty outcome but still, a lot of elite-level fighters were dead because of the fight and that was good news.

Soon enemy scouting picked up again and increased in volume, but they changed tactics. They didn’t send their elites or shamans anymore but more and bigger groups with the non-combat goblins.

This gave us a lot more targets that we can hit but we also couldn't achieve any decisive blows anymore simply because of the number of enemies in each group.

Still, as days went by, we killed more and more, but they were also getting closer to our forward camp. Our biggest problem wasn’t the scouting parties but the experienced scouts that worked alone or in small groups similar to our dedicated scouts. They use the big scouting groups as a defence to escape us and to resupply so they could quickly find our locations.

I had to help our scouts two times to get rid of particularly troublesome scouts. After a week of this, we cleared out the forward camp and moved it backwards. We kept rotating troops so that everyone could have a chance to fight and for the others to rest as we continue to ambush them constantly.

By the end of the next week, we had lost 27 goblins to approximately 700 of theirs. If we could only keep this up there might not be a big fight, but news reached me that they finally are gathering up everyone and starting to form a marching group. Unfortunately, most of the enemies that we managed to kill were not actually warriors but young goblins that were mostly gatherers.

Then came even worse news. They also seem to bring along a lot of the weaker goblins and when they were finally marching, we were facing an army of nearly 4000. A number that I did not like. Although I also saw the weakness in what they were doing. They probably will never think that we might take this course of action but that was their mistake.

As the army marched out all the breeders they had were left in the encampment and now they were practically defenceless. As we retreated from the second forward camp, I quickly sent messengers back to bring up some more goblins for the raid.

In the 3rd and final forward camp, we organized a raiding party that was going to go around the army and raid the encampment to kill all the breeders and burn their food supplies that were being prepared for the army. That way they would be starving, weak and demoralized.