Section 39 Challenges

The moon is bright tonight.

The figure of the tribal camp loomed, and he had not yet left. In the quiet of the night, the painful groans of the dying could be faintly heard. I don't know why he's not dead, but I guess it's because he wants to use his wail to continue to put more pressure on the people in the camp.

The moans eventually died down. This is quite normal, and it doesn't take much time for humans to bleed too much and lose consciousness (and eventually die).

"Let your leader, Atolian, come out!" the voice outside shouted again shortly after the groan died down.

Indescribable oppression and terror hung over the entire camp at this time. After a long time, someone finally shouted outside the camp. "Lord Atolian hasn't returned yet. ”

"It's useless to hide, Atolian, and it's useless to let your men come out as substitutes for the dead!" the voice ignored the answer, still shouting. "You can hide for a day, can you hide every day?"

In the center of the camp, several people gathered together, frowning. After a brutal and bloody battle, the Qajar tribe finally defeated their long-standing enemies and neighbors, and roamed the Hunter tribe. Originally, this moment should be the time to celebrate with the crown and everyone sing, but unexpectedly, things will be reversed. First, the leader of the tribe, Chaos Lord Atolian, led a small group of men and horses to search for the remnants of the wandering hunters, and they have not returned.

Well, considering that Atolian is a Chaos Lord, it doesn't matter that he left the Horde like this for a while. Because there is no longer any nearby existence that can threaten the Qajar tribe. As mentioned earlier, the land is relatively isolated, with only two tribes living next to each other (and therefore a feud). Now that he has defeated a strong enemy, and since he has dominated one side, it is understandable for Artolian to go out for a few days to distract himself and hunt down the survivors of the wandering hunter tribe.

But no one expected that a bad star would suddenly come tonight.

This evil star arrived at the beginning of night. He came to the gate of the tribal camp and claimed that his name was Sag, because he heard that the leader of the Qajar tribe, Atolian, was a newly promoted Chaos Lord, so he came to challenge Atolian.

In other words, this man named Sag is the typical wandering warrior who chooses to wander alone in the wilderness in order to please his god. Such people are generally very strong and difficult to provoke - it is easy to deduce, if nothing else, how can a weak person live alone in such a wilderness?

At first, because Artolian was not in the tribal camp, the Qajar tribe sent a man to loudly declare this to the challenger on the outer wall of the camp. But this Sag is clearly a strong-willed person who will not be shaken lightly. He didn't believe this answer at all, but decided that Artolian was stage frightened and didn't dare to come out and fight him alone. In reply, Sag roared outside and threatened that if Atolian did not come out to fight him, then he would go up every night and kill people until Atolian Ken came out to duel him.

The following thing is quite normal: there is no shortage of people in the Chaos Tribe who are confident in their own power. So, several people came out to fight one after another. The outcome of the battle goes without saying: Sag is still threatening outside, and the dying moans of those who go out to fight have died down.

"Atolian, don't be a shrunken turtle!" Sag's voice still echoed outside. "Do you hide your head like this every night?"

If it had been daytime, the Qajar tribe would have come out in droves to wipe out this daring guy. The so-called ant bite the elephant to death refers to this situation. But it was clear that Sag was also guarding against it. First of all, he chose the time of night (and he also made it clear that it would come at night in the future). In the darkness of night, it is undoubtedly difficult to find a person in this flat wilderness. Secondly, he is not far from the choice. It is not completely invisible to oneself, nor does it expose one's body to ranged weapons or magic. Finally, there was a clear threat in his words, if Atolian dared to use the method of siege, then he would come every night and kill people every day until the whole tribe was killed.

This is also an unwritten rule in chaos. If the Qajar tribe is so closed, then Sag will come to challenge every night, and will not sneak up on the old and weak, women and children. At most, it's a lone warrior to go head-to-head. But if the Qajar tribe tries to besiege him and fails, then he will really kill people regardless of whether he sees anyone in the future, and he will do everything to sneak attack and plot.

If there is really such a single wandering warrior who opposes the tribe, the consequences will be very severe. Besides, the Qajar tribe didn't see this as an unsolvable problem, and in the hearts of the tribesmen, Artolian was invincible - at least a Chaos Lord of his caliber to pose a threat to him. The trouble now is that Atolian is indeed out and has not returned.

"Lord Atolian is really not here. Finally, an answer was heard from inside the camp.

Sag didn't pay any attention to this explanation, only shouting in challenge every few moments. It wasn't until near dawn that his voice disappeared.

The people of the tribe came out in horror and found the bodies of the few people who had gone out to fight last night. A total of five people went out to fight, and all five of them were God's chosen warriors, and their results were the same. All five had their limbs cut off and died of blood. From the scars on the corpses, it can be seen that there is a huge disparity in the combat effectiveness of the two sides. Sag defeated these fighters with great ease—and he was able to retain his strength even in such a life-and-death duel, not with a single blow, but with a single several, to cut off the limbs of each other one by one.

This wandering warrior named Sag is supposed to be a Chaos Champion.

However, there are many kinds of Chaos Champions - not only Chaos Champions, but also Chaos Lords. As mentioned earlier, this appellation carries a double meaning. One is the actual position, and the other is the class among the Chaos Believers. For example, the actual status of the Atolian is that of the head of the Qajar tribe, with a tribe and a corresponding area of domination, and can be considered a "lord". On the other hand, he is a member of the Chaos Lord. Therefore, it is easy to understand that since there are veritable "Chaos Lords", there are naturally "Chaos Lords" who are not worthy of the name, and the same is true for Chaos Champions. There are veritable "Chaos Champions", those who master an army. There are also unworthy "Chaos Champions", who are alone in the wilderness.

It can be reasoned very lightly that when the evil god promotes his own believers, it is based on the person's comprehensive ability and past achievements. This is not a sprint race, just a speed, but similar to those races that do not have a fixed judging standard, such as dancing, etc., depending on a variety of factors, including dance steps, body movements, musical rhythm, etc. Of course, different gods have a special preference for certain abilities (e.g., a preference for force in the face of sadism). There are Chaos Champions who are promoted because they have won enough battles with their troops, and there are Chaos Champions who have been promoted because they have won enough battles alone. There are Chaos Champions who are promoted because of their brains, and there are Chaos Champions who are promoted simply by brute force. Of course, it is more common to be a Chaos Champion who is also smart, has strong skills under his hands, has no special expertise, and meets the standard of comprehensive ability.

In short, this wandering warrior named Sag should be a Chaos Champion Samurai, but his combat power (especially the ability to fight alone) cannot be simply regarded as an ordinary Chaos Champion. On the other hand, although Artolian is a Chaos Lord, he is a Chaos Lord of the kind who is a comprehensive (although he is a master god of abusiveness). Sager's challenge to Atolian should have been carefully considered rather than impulsive.

However, this trouble can obviously only be solved by Atolian himself. Because there are no Chaos Champions in the tribe at this time. The former Chaos Champion Artolian has been promoted to Chaos Lord.

After examining the body, the tribe's presiding wizard made a quick decision. Several of the most experienced senior scouts of the tribe were sent out to find Lord Atolian, who had not yet returned. To ensure that they move quickly, the wizards have specially selected excellent horses, and they are two horses for one person.

The wizard believed that with such an arrangement, Atolian would be able to return within two or three days.

The next night, Sag came again. As yesterday, he was in a suitable position and loudly challenged Atoryan. But that night, no one responded to Sag's challenge.

The same goes for the third night. This time, because no one responded to the challenge, Sag had escalated his speech from the original level of "provocation" to the level of "insulting".

By the fourth night, Sag had openly threatened to take "decisive action" to get the tortoise out of its shell.

On the fifth night, Sag had just arrived, and even had his first challenge, when someone in the camp shot an arrow in this direction.

This is not an arrow shot to attack the enemy, because the opponent is simply out of range at this point. By the light of the moon, it was possible to see that what had been shot was a letter arrow with a piece of vellum attached to it, on which a rather rough sketch was drawn. If you look closely, you can see that this is a rudimentary map. There is a prominent red mark on the map. Next to the marker is inscribed: Tomb of Atolian.

After the arrow was fired, there was silence outside the camp, and there was no sound of a second challenge.

......

All around, members of the entire tribe were busy setting up new camps.

Setting up a camp is not a simple matter. For safety (there is no shortage of danger in the realm of chaos), it is necessary to dig trenches, build camp walls, and set up the necessary fortifications in case of invasion by strong enemies or sneak attacks by beasts. Well, with the size of Asowen's small tribe, they can't actually stop any strong enemies, but they can resist a little bit by relying on fortifications.

It was also the first thing Claire did after becoming the temporary leader of the tribe.

As mentioned earlier, the leader of this tribe, the wizard Asowen, is not the kind of strong leader who says everything. It is the tribal council that really decides the affairs of the tribe. Therefore, although Claire temporarily replaced the seriously injured Asowen, due to various previous events, her voice in the parliament was obviously far less than that of Asowen.

However, unexpectedly, Flint, the star of tomorrow in the tribe and who is considered to have a great chance of becoming the champion of Chaos, actually has an extremely respectful attitude towards Claire. No one knows why Flint, who had always been arrogant in the past, suddenly changed his personality. Regardless, thanks to Flint's support, Claire did become the leader of the tribe and not be overthrown.

"This place is about safe. While the others were busy setting up camp, Flint stood on a hillside farther away and spoke to the man in front of him.

"Almost. "In front of him, of course, is Ashrufat. "Now, even if the Qajar tribe finds Atolian's body, they won't have time to pursue it. ”