The Lord of High Mountain Keep was determined to recruit the Ogre Shaman.
Richard had noticed the disdain in Nehru's descriptions of the Ogre Shaman every time, yet Nehru always added that it was easy for Ogres to become Shamans and that their witchcraft was powerful. However he put it, it always sounded faintly sour.
There was no love or hatred without cause in this world. The more contradictory someone's attitude was, the more likely it was to reveal a problem. In Richard's view, the Ogre almost certainly possessed a unique talent in witchcraft.
Given the Ogres' pitifully poor learning ability, the fact that they could comprehend witchcraft after birth was itself the best proof of their innate talent.
In their natural state, their muddled minds limited the power of their spells.
But was low Intelligence a problem for Richard? Of course not!
With the system, as long as he recruited the Ogre Shaman as a hero unit, he could invest Attribute Points into Intelligence every time the Ogre leveled up. Building a mind comparable to an ordinary person's certainly wouldn't be difficult.
Richard didn't know how powerful the Ogre could become, but it would definitely be far stronger than Nehru.
Actually, the Kobold Shaman's strength couldn't be considered weak. If he were human, he would have no trouble qualifying for a guild rank as a low-level mage.
Given how rare and sought-after spellcasters were, even a penniless Pioneering Noble who couldn't produce five hundred gold coins would dream of recruiting a magic apprentice and wake up laughing.
If the Kobold Shaman hadn't talked too much and given Richard the idea of cultivating the Ogres, making him more particular in his standards, he wouldn't have treated a Shaman capable of using two kinds of witchcraft so harshly.
The depressed Kobold Shaman might never learn that the reason his fate had been so difficult was entirely because he had dug his own grave.
The order Nehru ultimately received was to cast a spell once a day in front of the Ogres.
Richard believed that all intelligent lifeforms were naturally curious about unknown things. Since the Ogres possessed potential, perhaps this curiosity would become the catalyst for their awakening.
Nehru dutifully carried out the Lord of High Mountain Keep's order, but as it turned out, Richard's idea had only been half right.
Most intelligent lifeforms were indeed fascinated by this, such as the residents of High Mountain Keep. This era was desperately short of entertainment. Every evening, when it was time to cast witchcraft, at least half of High Mountain Keep's population would noisily run over to watch the magic show. Women and children especially loved it.
But the Ogres happened to belong to the steadfast minority. They weren't interested in Nehru's spells at all, focusing only on throwing their limited lives into the limitless endeavor of gorging themselves. There wasn't the slightest sign of awakening, leaving the herding supervisor sighing all day long.
This result left Lord Richard both amused and exasperated.
High Mountain Keep didn't support idlers. Since construction was currently being carried out on a grand scale, Richard simply sent all these dullards to the work site as laborers.
There had originally been a wooden watchtower made of logs on the hill. Such a building wasn't suitable for a Pioneering Territory in the wilderness.
It was too tall and difficult to conceal. It consumed too many construction materials to meet the needs of the steadily growing population. Furthermore, the wooden walls had tiny gaps that made it difficult to withstand the biting winter winds of the wilderness.
The pioneers who had originally built this place had clearly cared too much about appearances, choosing a form that looked good but was extremely impractical.
Now that Richard had been able to take over this precious territory, it meant he had already swallowed the bitter fruits of failure. Perhaps that was precisely why.
Pioneering in knightly novels might be a grand and stirring heroic epic, but pioneering in reality was nothing more than shamelessly clinging on through petty struggles. The last one standing was the winner.
Richard had planned to rebuild the place long ago, but he hadn't had the time or inclination until now.
His plan was to dismantle the wooden tower and use the salvaged timber to build semi-subterranean Earth Dwellings. Such buildings had stood the test of time in the Great Northwest and were perfectly suited to the wilderness from a practical standpoint. Their only drawback was that they looked crude and soil-covered.
Everyone had now moved out and temporarily settled in tents, while the slaves dismantled the wooden tower bit by bit.
Although the Ogres weren't very bright, they had plenty of strength. They were well suited for this sort of unskilled labor, snapping the logs off one after another as easily as breaking sugarcane.
Whenever they did something wrong, the soldiers serving as overseers would lash them harshly with whips. Ogres possessed a deep capacity for empathy with one another. When one of them was beaten, the others would cry out as well, and thus the entire hill was often shrouded in a mournful chorus of long wails.
To escape the noise, Richard took Hert and Gunther to the riverside to slack off.
A few days earlier, he had found time to make a deck of cards from mulberry paper. After teaching Gunther and Hert how to play, the two of them had visibly become more addicted by the day and insisted on playing a few hands whenever they had the chance.
Men couldn't play cards without something at stake. Since all three of them were poor wretches whose pockets were cleaner than their faces, they gambled with the hair on their heads.
The two rookies had just started learning and were at the height of their addiction. They also played honestly, knowing neither how to steal cards nor cheat. Before long, some old hand had nearly won them bald.
"Lord!" Nehru shouted as he ran all the way down from the hill on his short legs. "The Ogres have awakened! The Ogres have awakened!"
"No more playing, no more playing. Let's talk business. What happened?" Richard grinned as slyly as a cormorant and casually tossed a terrible hand into the pile.
Gunther had thought he was about to win this round, so the happy smile on his face instantly froze.
"Lord, two Ogres were beaten with whips by the overseers while dismantling the house. Then they suddenly awakened Shamanic Power," Nehru said, panting heavily.
"Were any of the overseers injured or killed? What witchcraft did they awaken? Can't you say everything at once?" Richard hadn't expected nothing to happen until it did, only for him to get a double blessing in one go.
This proved that Lord Richard's idea was correct and Lord Richard's leadership was wise—the Ogres' talent was even stronger than he had imagined.
All they needed to do now was level up with them. Then High Mountain Keep would gain two proper spellcasters!
"The overseers weren't injured. They awakened earth-elemental and air-elemental spells respectively." Nehru suddenly became somewhat hesitant.
"Earthquake and Wind Blade? Not bad." Hert carefully straightened the cards and put them back into the iron box.
"Actually, fire-elemental spells would be the best. In terms of battlefield lethality, they're far stronger than the other schools." Richard glanced around at his subordinates, smiled, and spread his hands. "But nothing can be perfect every time. Earth and air are fine too. We should be satisfied."
"Lord..."
"Hmm?"
Nehru scratched the back of his head and said cautiously, "They awakened Stone Skin and Obscuring Mist."
"What?" Richard vigorously dug at his ear.
"Stone Skin and Obscuring Mist..."
Richard, the Lord of High Mountain Keep, son of a marquis, owner of the system, and transmigrator who had lived two lifetimes, swore to the heavens that he had genuinely almost been angered into blacking out at that moment.
Stone Skin increased defense and reduced pain, while Obscuring Mist distorted light through the atmosphere to make one nearly invisible—these two spells were obviously witchcraft the Ogres had desperately forced out after being beaten.
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