The 'Hunt'

The captain still remembered the Witch Doctor once saying in the tribe that "herbivores that live in groups with fixed leaders have the potential to be domesticated."

Since that was the case, these big guys couldn't just be killed and hauled back.

Thinking of this, he beckoned behind him, signaling for his team members to follow.

After the other nine hunters quietly gathered around, he pointed to the forest in the distance and said, "We have to find a way to bring this herd back and let the Witch Doctor see if they can be raised."

The team members saw the creatures then, and one of them, seemingly the cleverer one, immediately understood the captain's intent.

"They're so big; if we kill them, there'd be so much meat. It would be great if we could raise them."

After he finished speaking with drool dripping from his mouth, the remaining hunters suddenly realized, recalling the endless food supply provided by the two types of livestock penned up in the tribe, and they all became excited.

"Right, right! You guys are so smart! Catch them! Bring them back!"

"Alright, our team isn't big enough for this. Swift Tusk, Fierce Fang, hurry back to the tribe and bring the news to the Chie... no, to the, uh, what's-it-called... the Administrator. Tell him to send more hunters."

"Understood!"

The two named Trolls acknowledged and left, quickly disappearing from the sight of the other Trolls.

The return trip would be much faster than the journey here; in a few lamp-hours, they would be able to return with reinforcements.

"We can't just wait; we must drive them toward the tribe as much as possible. Quick Tusk, take four hunters and circle around to the left, but don't attack. Just make some noise to drive them away. The remaining hunters follow me; we'll drive them from the other side."

"Remember, don't be too aggressive, just small disturbances. Don't cause too much panic; they're big and numerous, and if they get chaotic, we won't be able to stop them."

After the simple task allocation, the eight hunters split into two teams and began to circle around from both sides.

Not long after, movements began to emerge from the forest in the distance.

The big guys, who had been calmly chewing on branches and leaves, heard the noise and began to paw at the dirt uneasily in their panic.

However, even so, they did not flee blindly. Instead, they turned their heads toward the few companions who occupied the most lush food, as if waiting for instructions.

These individuals being relied upon were likely the leaders. They had exaggerated, large horns and shoulder heights that could reach up to 4.3 meters, making them true "giants."

Clearly, these leaders were not overly panicked. They raised their heads alertly, scanning their surroundings with eyes the size of fists on either side of their heads, and tilted their ears to listen carefully to the movements.

A moment later, the leaders stopped eating, stepped forward with small strides, and spread out to the periphery of the herd, vaguely shielding the large group in the center.

The big guys in the inner circle seemed to be pacified; their stopped mouths began to move again, and while chewing, they moved under the guidance of the leaders.

However, perhaps because the "danger" was not obvious, the leaders did not rush them too much, so overall, they moved quite slowly.

Rather than fleeing, it was more like a "polite" relocation in the face of a "low-risk unknown."

The pack of wolves, watching this scene with confusion, didn't quite know how to act and had to look to the Alpha Wolf, waiting for it to make a decision.

The Alpha Wolf observed quietly for a moment, carefully sizing up the behavioral patterns of the foolish, giant Trolls.

A moment later, it seemed to understand something.

The low bark from its mouth was like an instruction, and the pack scattered upon hearing it.

Since the wolves had been following near the captain, he immediately noticed the unusual movement and his eyes filled with worry.

He was afraid that the Wind Wolves would act on their own and ruin the herding plan.

The direction the wolves scattered was basically the same as the Trolls, but they ran to places much further away.

Soon, wolf howls could be heard coming from the outer perimeter.

As the howls continued one after another, there was no clear sense of a rapid encirclement; it merely created an atmosphere of a wolf pack foraging nearby.

With this, the big guys, who had been moving slowly and only occasionally shifting their feet for show, finally stopped their continuous eating and quickened their pace of relocation.

Seeing this, the captain suddenly realized that the wolf pack understood his intentions and was cooperating with the hunting team.

"A bunch of clever guys; they weren't raised for nothing."

The Wind Wolves were clearly better suited for this errand, and the main force of the driving soon became the wolf pack.

The hunting team withdrew from the "front line," shifting more of their attention to vigilance against threats from other directions.

For example, other wolf packs that felt provoked by the noise; or, for instance, other Troll tribes.

The former didn't matter; few wolf packs dared to openly hunt in an area so close to the tribe.

But the latter was not certain. Although this area was only about a day's walk from the tribe, since it was not their traditional hunting ground, some small tribes might notice this and occasionally come to pick up some scraps.

Fortunately, the worst-case scenario did not happen. Several lamp-hours passed peacefully, and as the sky grew darker, the large group of hunters from the tribe finally arrived.

Because they were unsure of the situation on the scene, the "main force" stayed a bit further away, and only Swift Tusk, who had returned earlier, led a few Trolls to find them by following the wolf howls.

"What's going on? What are the wolves doing?"

The few who came over were leaders of other hunting teams, looking with great surprise at the strange formation of "prey-wolves-Trolls."

"That guy is driving the prey. We're just seeing how far it can go. Maybe we'll cooperate in the future," the captain said, gesturing with his chin toward the Alpha Wolf, which was looking alertly in their direction after hearing the noise.

"Alright, then we'll take the team to the outer perimeter." After some observation, the later-arriving hunting captains also nodded in agreement.

Thus, after the captains discussed their respective areas of responsibility, they hurried away.

The former captain walked over to the Alpha Wolf, which was no longer on guard, and whispered, regardless of whether it could understand him or not:

"Put your back into it! Do a good job and you'll have a full belly every meal from now on!"

The Alpha Wolf snorted in utter disdain upon hearing this, yet its movements were exceptionally nimble; with a whoosh, it darted away.

Can it really understand?

The captain watched the direction in which it vanished, thinking with some uncertainty.

When Blade Tusk finished his daily meditation, the time was near dusk.

Stepping out from his conspicuously prominent treehouse, he discovered that living creatures were rarely to be seen on the 'streets' today.

"Today isn't a day for a centralized hunt, is it? Where has everyone gone?"

He finally managed to run into a Troll who was chopping frozen meat on the road and asked the question on his mind.

"Oh, I heard there's big game, so most of the hunting parties went to help, but they should be back soon."

"Oh? New big game? Which way did they leave from?"

After the Troll pointed out the direction, Blade Tusk looked at the sky and realized he still had some time before his next scheduled activity.

He nodded and headed toward the tribal entrance in that direction.

As luck would have it, just as he neared the entrance, he suddenly heard a commotion—wolf howls, the shouts of warriors, and, mixed in, an unknown, low-pitched screeching.

He quickened his pace, and after rounding a few houses that blocked his view, he saw the scene outside the tribe's newly built gate.

There, thirty or forty creatures that looked like the moose of his past life, yet several times larger than he remembered, were being tightly surrounded by nearly a hundred hunters and guards.

Among these 'moose', the largest ones with exaggerated antlers on their heads—seemingly the leaders—were roaring anxiously on the outermost edge of the encirclement.

They were attempting to soothe their panicked 'kin' while simultaneously obstructing the Trolls from closing in further.

On the perimeter, the Trolls formed groups by hunting squads, applying constant pressure from every direction and intending to push further to separate the leaders from the main herd in the inner circle.

Both sides engaged in a continuous tug-of-war at the squad level; the Trolls, unwilling to kill, and the 'moose leaders', unwilling to flee alone, found themselves in a stalemate.

Just then, a 'moose' even more robust than the other 'leaders' had a hazy red light bloom atop its head, and it launched a charge quite abruptly.

On its path forward stood half a squad, roughly six adult Trolls.

The transition from slow to fast seemed instantaneous; in the blink of an eye, it vanished from sight, only to reappear nearly thirty meters away, right where that half-squad of hunters had been standing.

With a series of continuous thuds, the fence surrounding the tribe seemed to tremble under the impact of the heavy weight.

Judging by the momentum, had it not been newly crafted from Steelwood, the creature would have absolutely punched a hole right through it.

Only then did the Trolls, finally reacting, look toward the sound, their eyes landing on several hunters sliding down against the fence.

Blade Tusk had no time to marvel at the 'moose leader's' immense strength, nor time to check the injuries of the Trolls who had been sent flying, for the red light was already glowing once more atop the 'moose leader's' head.