New Residents
The orcs were among the races whose sacrifices and gains stood out with the clearest possible edges.
You did not need long observation to see it.
A frame a full head taller than a human's. Muscle rising so thick that the line between neck and shoulder blurred. Forearms as wide as thighs, and hands vast enough to crush stone. Fangs jutting long past the lips.
Looking at them, it was not hard to understand what they had been born for.
At a glance, they looked built to fight well.
At a glance, they did not look bright.
Reality was not far off.
Orcs had gained strength. In exchange, they had surrendered a measure of intellect. They were unaccustomed to crafting intricate rules or calculating distant futures. They lacked the patience to refine a single craft across decades.
When they hungered, they ate. When anger rose, they struck. When something displeased them, they smashed it. If someone appeared stronger, they charged first and asked later.
Yet few races dared mock that simplicity—because few lived long enough to finish laughing.
A single ordinary adult orc, axe in hand, could shatter three seasoned knights head-on. A race that trampled the techniques humans spent a lifetime accumulating with nothing but the body they were born with.
That was an orc.
So even the birth of one ordinary tribe was enough to set neighboring nations on edge. Ten of them moving in a single direction made patrols vanish. Word of twenty gathering locked the gates of border villages. Fifty marching under one banner sent lords scrambling for their knights. When reports claimed their numbers had passed a hundred, messengers raced for the capital.
For orcs, numbers were the measure of calamity.
Paradoxically, that very strength kept tribes from forming well. An orc could live alone. There was no need to call companions for the hunt. When a beast appeared, they ate it. When rain found them without shelter, they shoved a boulder aside and slept beneath it. They were not a people who survived by another's protection—and so they had little reason to take another's orders.
If a chieftain said east, someone would march west. If he called for a hunt, someone would sprawl out and claim it was too much trouble. If he ordered a fight stopped, the first to be shoved aside was the one trying to stop it. The moment a chieftain looked even slightly weak, challenges began that very day.
Among orcs, authority did not spring from wisdom. It did not spring from blood. It sprang only from strength. The instant strength faltered, authority ended with it. It was not rare for the chieftain who had led a tribe yesterday to lie bloodied on the ground by today.
Thus tribes could not easily grow large. Thirty gathered, and they fought. Fifty gathered, and they split in two. Near a hundred, and within days several bands scattered in different directions. The more powerful individuals there were, the faster the fracture.
The world feared the orcs. At the same time, it was reassured. They were strong. But they could not become one.
At least, that was true until the red banner appeared before Gargantua's storm.
The sky that wrapped the gorge mouth was always dark. Storm clouds swallowed the peaks and twisted without end. The wind born within them carved the cliffs; thick lightning, without warning, smashed the ground and split the rock.
It was Gargantua's will—a vast gate that barred uninvited feet from the land of dragons.
Lakia looked up from the hide she had been working, seated near the cliff edge. A short distance away, Gargantua crouched with his massive body folded, staring for a long while in the same direction. Ordinarily, whatever approached, he would raise a single gust, shove it back, and close his eyes again. Now his great pupils narrowed as he gazed beyond the storm. The tip of his long tail tapped the rock, slow and deliberate.
Thoom.
A low vibration rolled down the cliff face.
Lakia set aside the knife in her hand. She rose slowly and walked to Gargantua's side. Silver hair streamed long behind her on the fierce wind.
"Gargantua."
"Mother."
The deep, settled voice spread through the clouds.
Lakia stood beside him and looked beyond the storm. All her eyes found was slanting rain and gray clouds knotted together.
"Orcs, you said."
"Yes."
"How many orcs right now?"
Gargantua did not answer at once. His golden eyes remained fixed beyond the storm, unmoving. In those eyes a vast procession trudged through the mud—a red banner, countless footsteps, warriors shouldering axes and spears, wagons laden with gear, young orcs not yet grown and elders who had lost an arm. It was no war host of fighters alone. An entire way of life was on the move.
After a long silence, Gargantua spoke, slow and measured.
"...Of every orc Gulhaltio I have seen in my life, this is the largest."
Lakia's brows lifted a fraction.
In the tongue of humans it was usually rendered as tribe. But that single word could never hold the full meaning—those who sat before the same fire and shared meat; those who raised weapons against the same foe; those who buried the bones of their dead in the same earth and raised the children left behind together. A community that became one host when battle began, and one family when the long night fell. Among orcs it was rare—and therefore all the heavier a word.
Lakia looked past the storm and asked,
"And all of that listens to one of them?"
"So it appears."
The moment the words ended, the procession advancing beyond the storm halted as one. The countless footfalls that had been shaking the earth vanished in an instant.
The orc at the very front stepped slowly forward. He stood a full head taller even than the rest. Across his shoulders hung a pelt of deep red fur. Old scars layered his face, neck, and bare arms. In his hands he held a greatsword the size of a human torso.
He raised the weapon with deliberate care.
Blue-white lightning flickered between Gargantua's wings. The storm grew rougher still.
But the orc did not swing. He turned the edge downward. Both hands gripped the hilt. And with every ounce of his strength, he drove it into the earth.
KRAAANG!
Even through the storm the crash rang clear. Mud and stone sprayed outward. The massive blade sank nearly halfway into the ground.
The orc released it.
The one behind him stepped forward and planted a spear. Next came a mace. Then an axe. One. Two. Ten. A hundred. Countless weapons rose before the storm like a forest.
To an orc, a weapon was limb and hand. They kept it close even in sleep. On the day a young orc became an adult, they received their first axe. When a warrior died, the weapon they had used a lifetime was set upright upon the grave.
And that race was laying its weapons down of its own will.
It was a sign they had no intent to fight—a choice that offered their own lives first.
Lakia murmured low,
"They didn't come to fight."
Instead of answering, Gargantua spread his vast wings. The black clouds parted to either side. A path opened through the storm, narrow enough for a single person to pass.
Lakia descended the cliff as if walking on the wind. Silver hair fanned long behind her. The moment her feet touched the wet earth, the gazes of countless orcs gathered on one point.
The giant at the fore dropped to one knee first. The orcs behind him lowered themselves in turn. Hundreds of knees struck the ground together. The earth trembled with the weight of it.
Lakia looked up at the orc several times her size. The deep furrow between her brows did not ease in the slightest.
"What business do orcs have in the land of dragons?"
Her cold voice drifted through the storm.
Tualuktal did not bow his head too far. Neither did he try to dominate her by looking down. He left intact the pride a leader of his people must keep—and made equally plain the respect he held for her.
"I am Tualuktal, Gakeun of the Red Valley."
Gakeun was the title of the greatest among orcs.
"I didn't ask for a name."
Lakia folded her arms.
"I asked what you're doing here."
Tualuktal looked for a moment at his own axe, driven into the earth. Countless nicks scarred the blade. The haft was worn black from long years in a grip.
"Our valley has died."
The words were short. When they fell, a low breath stirred among the orcs behind him.
"The water dried. The beasts fled. The land no longer feeds our children."
Lakia's expression did not change.
"So you came all the way here?"
"Yes."
"There's plenty of other land."
Tualuktal glanced past her for a moment. Beyond the storm lay the deep gorge—paths the dragons had made, vast tunnels bored through the mountain. Land no one could invade.
"Strong land is not taken from us."
Lakia's eyes narrowed.
"Do I look soft enough to take you in?"
"You do not."
Tualuktal did not hesitate.
"You are stronger than we are. That is why we came."
Lakia's face grew harsher still. Yet Tualuktal kept his head slightly lowered and continued.
"Weak land does not last. Kings die. Banners change. The one who built a house yesterday is driven out today."
His voice sank low.
"We do not wish to flee again with our children. We have come only to the finest place an orc warrior once spoke of."
"Damn it. Kanefisara..."
He just has to make trouble.
Lakia said nothing for a long while. Wind passed between them. The wet red banner cracked hard in the gale. The orcs remained on their knees. With so many unmoving, the storm only sounded louder.
Tualuktal slowly extended both hands. Empty hands, holding nothing.
"Receive us."
Lakia's eyes narrowed further.
Tualuktal bowed his head deeper.
"We will not covet the sky. We will not touch the dragons' nests. The lowest land of the gorge is enough."
"..."
"Grant us a place to raise our children, and soil in which to bury our dead."
His voice cut through the storm and continued.
"In return, we will guard the land of this nation. The sky belongs to the dragons. Entrust the earth to us."
"And what do we gain?"
"If any come to harm this place, we will bleed first—before the dragons ever spread their wings."
Tualuktal kept his head bowed to the last.
"Receive our Red Valley."
Lakia looked down at him, face deeply furrowed. For a time no answer came. Her gaze moved past Tualuktal to those behind—young orcs, old orcs, wagons carrying the wounded, sacks of dried rations, and hundreds of weapons planted in the earth.
They had not come prepared for war. They were people who had not even decided where to go if refused—people who had come seeking a final home.
Lakia's lips parted slowly.
"...What a headache."
It was a small mutter. Tualuktal did not raise his head.
"The Free State of Liberia welcomes every race. Tualuktal. I'll leave the plain before the gorge to you. Build a village there."
Lakia spoke with a rare smile—voicing the hard-won experience of nearly a thousand years.
"As long as you don't do 'human' things, we'll get along fine."