The ploy was successful. Minotaurs are good at an open field and direct clashes, but they are not good at hunting hidden prey. They can kill a wild boar running at them. But they are not good at tracking a rabbit hidden in its hole.
Finding Sam and his two teammates turned out to be the latter case.
They would have to nail down the whole forest in the surroundings.
But if they did that, the Dwarves will crush them.
Anyway, now the battlefield changed completely there is only a few tens of meters of distance between two troops and the Dwarves have a way to retreat and Minotaurs have no choice of retreat.
They can only clash ignoring and Sam and his group for now.
They also realized that except for the weird behavior of the Minotaurs the water and lightning attacks are not really attacking them severely with any considerable damage.
But their concession caused them to pay a price.
For the day, the Dwarves and Minotaur continuously clashed and the dwarven and some human archers stood on the wall as they provided cover.
The best help still came from Sam"s team, they are continuously hindering the Minotaur troops with their attacks.
Sam"s undead attack is completely ruthless. He collected around thirty corpses in the Prana Village and he used them well.
The decaying flame turned out to be more useful than they originally thought. In this way, without even directly partic.i.p.ating in the battle, they are creating chaos in the Minotaur troops.
The battle went on like that for two days.
Sam and his team are just sitting ducks in the forest as they witnessed. After their initial interference on the first, they didn"t need to interfere on the second day. They left the battle to the dwarven troops.
They are easily taken care of and by the end of the second day, Philip, Jack, and Watt returned with what they wanted.
Now the crisis for the crops is also over. From what he heard currently the harvest in this town is still going on as the Medium grade corps take a little more time to mature than lower-grade ones. The time is not exactly a lot. Just a few days.
But that delays the process of harvest by a few days too and they also had to focus on the war. So, the harvest was slower than usual. The Minotaur"s plan is to mix whatever solution this is into the water and spoil the soil to temporarily spoil the land and make the yet to be harvested crops useless.
Then they will wait for a few more days, to clean the land as the water is flowing stream and the influence of the liquid will be gone soon. They would once again start farming. Anyway, the war is destined to be dragged on for months and even a couple of years. Their true benefits lie in long-term plans. Losing some crops to get to the fields is acceptable to them.
But since, their plan is revealed, Sam and his group decided to take advantage. They want to enter the dwarven society and they can enter is more easily if they can do some favors to them and this was the perfect chance.
So, the trio went to intercept and gained whatever liquid they wanted to use and also reduced some forces for Minotaur.
Now that they helped all they can to turn the tables, that would do for now. If they are even more capable, the dwarves wouldn"t be welcoming and become suspicious. So it is better for them to tone down their involvement.
They waited for the dwarves to deal with the rest of their enemies.
To their surprise, the dwarves actually subdued some of the minotaurs. They brought some shackles that are bound to the necks and limbs of the minotaur and connected a chain as they dragged them like they dragged cattle.
This is something they didn"t expect.
After everything was over and they are cleaning up the battlefield and Sam came out with his teammates.
The dwarven commander looked at the team and greeted them.
"Thank you for your help. We really needed that."
"It"s okay. We couldn"t take them on completely anyway. We can only be of some small help. And here this is the liquid they are going to mix up. We ambushed the team that is bringing it here. They are actually not that guarding over this as they thought this is a tight secret."
Sam said and took out the large Barrel from the storage.
The barrel has a lot of death energy. It is a Black liquid and it is devouring the surrounding vitality.
But one look and anyone with experience or contact with death energy will know that it is extremely diluted to the extreme.
Generally, the death energy can be negated with life energy and vitality. If there is enough vitality in a place, the death energy will try to absorb it, and soon it would turn neutral.
With this liquid mixed in the flowing stream, the current harvest would suffer and after that, the land would soon return to normal.
The dwarves took the liquid away to investigate further. Sam already kept a barrel for himself, so he didn"t object.
"Please follow me. I will take you to the Town head and we can talk there."
Sam nodded and followed them.
He was extremely refreshed by the atmosphere in the city. The residents of the town are all celebrating the town"s success in defending. He could also see the Minotaurs that were captured and they seemed to be led to the fields.
Sam and the team are curious about what they are going to do and the commander seemed to have seen him and said.
"The capture Minotaurs will be used for agricultural purposes. They are good at carrying heavy stuff and their brute force can be used to do the hard things like plowing, digging, and so on. After some time, we will sell them away for ransom from their tribe or sell them to some orcs in exchange for some beast pelts, metals, and so on.
It is harvest time, we could use some extra help from them."
"But currently, the war is going on. Is it really possible for you guys to exchange them for ransom?"
"Not really, but the orcs are still considered a possibility. They like eating Minotaurs, but hunting them is not possible.
There are some mines and resources in the Orc"s territory, so we exchange them for those resources if the ransom is really not possible. But from what I know this time exchanging for ransom is impossible. Minotaur tribe has too much fertility rate for the past few years and they have too many members.
They can barely feed themselves. They couldn"t possibly exchange them for resources. They might even feel relieved."
Sam nodded in understanding. He is more interested in the shackles on the Minotaur than the creature itself. But it is not good to ask too much at the moment. He can learn slowly.
Soon, they reached the Town head"s mansion and met with the person.
"Nice to meet you. Thank you for your help."
"Nice to meet you too. As for the help. You don"t have to thank us. It is just small favor."
The town head looked at the group and asked.
"You are strong for your age. From what you said you must be from one of the human tribes. I didn"t expect the human tribe increased this much."
"No, they haven"t. Our strength was due to the circ.u.mstances. Humans are not good at staying still and maintaining peace, there are too many conflicts between us. We are forced to grow strong to survive and we couldn"t take it anymore and escaped." Sam replied with a wry smile.
"You must have suffered. So, what do you want to do? You said that you would like to integrate into the community, then what exactly do you want to do now."
"We would like to open a tavern for now if possible and we will see how it goes. My friends will also try to find another job if you give us permission."
"Giving you permission is not a problem. The main problem is the price. The business capital and such."
"No problem at all. We have some resources we obtained in our journeys. We have some rare metals. I think we can manage."
Sam took out some metal samples and placed them on the table. They are some metals from his home planet and Naga Loka. The Dwarves wouldn"t be in contact with these things, so they can sell them for a decent price. At least trade them for the place to stay and for the shop.
The town head looked at the metals for a second and said.
"It seems like you are prepared enough. Then, my attendant will lead you to the possible places where you could rent or buy a place. You can make your preparations and if you have any problem ask him. We could help you get a discount, but the war is a bit more problematic so we have to tighten our resources and the prices might be more than normal. Please adjust a bit."
"No problem, thank you for your help."
With that, an attendant led the six of them away to look at the possible places.