Chapter Eighteen

As planned, the group encountered the outskirts of the ogre’s encampment just as the sun began to cast brilliant shades of red, orange and pink across the evening sky. The beautiful sight was, however, completely disregarded, as the ugliness of the ogre’s camp marred any potential beauty like an unwanted scar.

Nestled in a large valley between four easily distinguished hills, the camp itself was ramshackle, their ‘homes’ were little more than hovels of dirt, rock and mud with the occasional patchwork tent thrown into the mix. The state of the camp was not what Jay was most concerned with, however. While tetanus or hepatitis might be a possibility, what was a more prevalent issue was the obvious lack of reported ogres. Their group had killed many on the journey north, but not so many as to cause such an obvious lack of life amongst such a large gathering ground.

The second most concerning thing was the complete lack of any prisons, holding cells, cages; there were no indications of chains or even excessive amounts of rope to be found in any obvious context among the groupings of huts. That was until Jay noticed an unusual amount of activity on the north-western side of the camp.

Creeping to a better vantage point in the surrounding hillside, Jay eventually caught sight of the locus of activity – a large cave entrance nestled into a relief on the northern hill. Whatever operation was being run must have been operated out of that cave. The clan chief, dragon god, evil overlord, whatever it may be, was surely in that cave. Jay watched as the six ogres guarding the entrance swapped out with the new group that had just left the cave. It seemed that few of the outer ogres were privileged enough to have access to this area of the camp. It also meant that the cave was most likely a cave system, if the number of clan members living within even slightly exceeded the number of guards currently transitioning.

Despite the estimated number of visible enemies being much lower than anticipated, there were still a little over a hundred members loitering in various locations throughout the valley. Jay couldn’t help but let out a tired sigh. Weeks of slaughtering the dumb brutes had taken a mental toll but work still remained. He couldn’t help but think with a wry smile of the old adage ‘no rest for the wicked’ as he crept back down the far side of the hill. It would be a bloody night and their little group needed to prepare.

A while later, at the darkest hour, four shadows at the edge of the valley camp separated, each heading to a different location. Jay skulked through the darkness, making his way to the northern section. Each member of their group was to clean up as many enemies of their respective division of the camp as quickly and quietly as possible. Should the alarm sound, they were to reconvene in the southeastern corner of valley, directly opposite the heavily guarded, well-lit northwestern section. Of course, the only alarm that could sound would be yelling, therefore, assuming everyone was successfully stealthy, the massacre would proceed without a hitch.

Jay swept through the middle of the camp, lingering briefly in the darkest corner he could find as a patrolling sentry lumbered past. The goal of this first night was to cut as many of their number down as possible before assaulting the remainder and then entering the cave. This first night served not only as a means to easily reduce their vastly superior numbers, but also to psychologically terrify those who remained.

The lumbering giant passed Jay’s location, pausing briefly to let out a massive yawn, scratching its ass before moving on. Jay proceeded slightly further before entering the first hut of the night. Sounds of thunderous snoring could be heard within before suddenly being silenced. Jay’s shadow flickered back out, moving to the next nearest hut. The only marks of his passing, a few drops of fresh blood intermingled with flecks of pulverized eye and brain matter, which slid from the edge of his dagger.

The same scene could be found across the entire camp. The Drenz easily ripped out or crushed the throats of their victims, while Katie’s methods emulated Jay’s, a single dagger viciously thrust through the eye, scrambling the brain.

Three hours later, dawn was approaching, and over seventy ogres lay dead. The remaining thirty or so huddled together in the northwest quadrant, eyes filled with fear and confusion. More would have perished, however, Kara accidentally stumbled on a pair of mating ogres halfway through the night, not only traumatizing the giant cat, but alerting the few surviving members of intruders before dying beneath her claws.

After the alarm went out, Jay briefly stayed within the camp, ambushing lone or small groups of the remaining targets as they attempted to regroup, effectively terrorizing the survivors with the screams of their dead and dying. After surveying the escapees, he returned to the meeting point. Thirty-six remaining enemies, six of whom appeared to be more experienced warriors. Collectively, it was a slightly larger group than desired. At least, a direct confrontation was temporarily off the table.

A myriad of potential plans dashed through Jay’s mind as he sat on a stump, overlooking the camp once more; the Drenz and Katie lay resting behind him.

‘Explosives? None available. Rockslide? Plenty of rocks and boulders, but it may block off the cave in the small chance it succeeded.’ Jay hummed to himself as ideas rotated through his mind. ‘There are few issues that a good explosion can’t solve. Next time I’m in town, I’m purchasing several explosive runes. They may be expensive as shit but blowing stuff up is definitely the easiest way to get things done… this is has to be how America constantly feels.’

Jay sighed, staring at the huddled mass of oversized bodies. He didn’t regret often, but not having explosives was definitely wearing on him now. The best plan he could think of with their lack of equipment would be a bait and ambush, and simply hope the enemy was stupid enough to follow along. His eyes darted back and forth between the camp and Katie as a malicious grin crept on his face.

A few hours later, dawn had broken over the hillside, lighting up the interior of the valley to a scene surely taken straight from hell. It turned out Jay had sorely overestimated the ogre’s intelligence and using the ‘weak, vulnerable, attractive, tasty human woman’ as bait easily lured the angry, tired, stressed oafs back into the camp. She would string them along, losing a few of them in the mess of residences who were then promptly and systematically executed by one of the three lurking members of their party. The six guarding the cave entrance thankfully didn’t budge a muscle despite the hideous looks of anger sprawled across their faces.

It was only a matter of time before the thirty odd ogres had dwindled to half their original count, and Jay and the Drenz rolled through their confused mass, slaughtering and chasing down those few remaining.

The six guards at the cave entrance were all that remained, fury, hunger and a tinge of fear could be seen in their eyes as Jay and his giant cats strolled out into the surrounding open ground. Katie was hidden behind a mud hut, resting after her extended cardio session, but also preparing to support her companions with her bow. It was a brief standoff before Jay and the Drenz attacked. The warrior ogres refusing to move even during the massacre of their fellow clansmen already spoke to the fact they wouldn’t move unless directly assaulted.

Jay was in turn, glad that they had not intervened. These six were notably better equipped and handled their blunt weapons with significantly more finesse than any raider or outer clan member they had come across. The six split into three groups, two to each member of Jay’s team. This was Jay’s first real fight since the end of his training and he was looking forward to applying his skills to practical use.

Jay’s two opponents wielded a large wooden club and something that resembled a stone mace, while their bodies were covered in a hodgepodge of metal pieces intermixed with thick furs covering every inch of their bodies. His speed and flexibility were on full display as he dashed and dodged past flailing weapons and burly arms, striking and slicing openings, his black blade’s unnatural sharpness on full display as it cut through the thick leather and gouged long scores along the torsos and legs of his victims.

It was a slow and painful death for the two ogres as Jay slowly sliced away at their vitality, crippling their movements while slowly chipping away at their massive statures. A full ten minutes had passed when they finally collapsed from fatigue and blood loss. Jay mercifully ended their suffering with a blade pierced through the skull, lightly panting as he surveyed the battlefield. The Drenz had finished a few minutes earlier and sat cleaning the blood from their fur and claws.

The ogre warriors were vastly more formidable than the civilians and raiders they had encountered thus far. Their statures were slightly larger, taller and comprised of more muscle than fat. Accompanied by higher intelligence and familiarity with wielding weapons, they put up a much larger struggle in direct confrontation. If possible, quietly assassinating these groups would be a much more desirable approach. Unfortunately this wasn’t possible for these six, but this served as an excellent benchmark for Jay and his companion’s combat abilities.

After moving the bodies away, the group took a brief rest, eating a small meal and washing some of the blood from their bodies. The four soon moved towards the cave entrance. The six guard replacements had not shown up but it couldn’t be much longer before the rotation occurred. Jay wanted some preliminary exploration done for the entrance so the group had some knowledge of the terrain directly within the cave system.

Creeping carefully within, the four pairs of eyes quickly adjusted to the gloom and a medium sized cave, approximately fifty meters across, met their view. Torches were placed at regular intervals along the walls which slowly marked the way to the opposite wall where another large tunnel visibly descended into the earth.

Despite the obvious lack of life, Jay carefully surveyed this first room, noting several potential locations for traps which were even more carefully observed and then promptly dismantled. Jay couldn’t help but have a sincere sense of déjà vu. The set-up of this first cave simply screamed ‘dungeon dive’ within the section of his mind previously dedicated to his old world hobbies. It was also apparent, whoever was leading this ragtag group of monsters was certainly much craftier than any average ogre to employ such an indirect method like traps.

About half an hour later the sounds of heavy footfalls and scraping equipment echoed up from the far tunnel while Jay was in the middle of studying one of the traps, approximately three quarters of the way across the floor. The group quickly snuffed all the torches on their side of the room, the Drenz simply knocking them from their pedestals before stamping them out. With over half the room being primarily lit by the still rising sun, the four lay in wait for the ascending warriors.

The six replacements paused at the exit of the tunnel, the large stretches of darkness on the far side of the cave conspicuously suspicious. Nevertheless the group soon moved into the room, following a strange zigzagging pattern to avoid the traps, despite most now being inert. Two split off from the group to relight the torches as they passed them and on the third torch, both were quickly ambushed, their throats ripped out and necks crushed by the hulking black cats.

At the same moment, before the others could turn in response, Jay cut the Achilles tendons of two additional warriors, causing the collapse of the majority of their fighting potential. Arrows quickly flew from the darkness as Katie pelted the two remaining fighters, attempting to keep them off balance as she skirted the edge of the cleared room, firing at intermittent intervals.

Very carefully, and from an opposing angle, the two Drenz rushed the last warriors, barreling into them before their claws, reminiscent of multiple short swords, ripped through the ogre’s armor, disemboweling them as Jay carefully executed his previously downed enemies. The element of surprise was an immense advantage. The effort required for this fight was vastly reduced and the six fresh corpses were quickly dragged out of the cave and disposed of, the lingering scent of fresh blood the only indication a fight having occurred at all.