The Invincible Overlord of Heroes.

The orcs were discussing countermeasures here, and Xu Lai was also very anxious.

He wished that the orcs would immediately transport all the cattle and sheep back to the camp.

However, if the orcs were to transport it back so easily, these guys would probably become suspicious again.

They have to pay a certain price before they will believe that this is something Xu Lai is really reluctant to let go.

Similar to what Parame guessed, Xu Lai did not have enough reliable men, so he did not dare to divide his troops.

But this does not mean that Xu Lai has no one to use.

On the contrary, Xu Lai could mobilize far more manpower than Aini and the orcs.

The grassland west of Wanshi City is not just a few hundred square kilometers. There are countless villages and wild animals living here.

If Xu Lai had to rely on himself to move and drive away all these people, he would be unable to do it even if he died of exhaustion. Even if he could do it, it would not take just one or two months.

In addition to appointing officials, what was more important was that he directly issued tasks in the mercenary guild and major taverns.

There were hundreds of mercenary groups, tens of thousands of mercenaries, and descending heroic teams, who went to every corner of the grassland to relocate and drive away the herdsmen there.

The losses of his own plan of clearing the countryside were much greater than those of the orcs. It was a method of killing 800 enemies but losing 1,000 of his own money.

However, this method did force the orcs into a desperate situation.

According to the experience of previous invasions, as long as they cross Pingfeng Mountain, they can get a lot of food supplements on the grassland, especially various kinds of meat.

At the very least, capturing a herd of bison would solve the food problem for all orcs for three to five days.

Besides, the Gobi Desert is the most barren land in the world, and the previous war consumed too much of it, so the Beast King cannot take out much food reserves.

So, when the orcs still did not touch the food the next day, Xu Lai was still not in a hurry.

He simply posted two more tasks in the Mercenary Guild and the Tavern.

One is a safer reconnaissance mission, and the other is a wanted mission with a higher reward, even much higher than the reward Xu Lai promised to the soldiers.

For the former, as long as you find any information related to orcs, you will get rewards if you report it.

Whether it's the location of the orc reconnaissance team, temporary base in the wild, or even the location of the base camp, you can get rewards.

The latter, on the other hand, harasses the orcs at all costs.

Whether it is a sneak attack, a murder, or setting a trap.

No matter which method is used, as long as one can kill an orc and peel off the unique tattoo on the orc's back, he can exchange it for a large amount of gold coins as a reward from Xu Lai.

Xu Lai is not a stingy person, this has been proven countless times.

Especially since this time a bounty mission is released, everyone who accepts the bounty needs to be responsible for it themselves.

If the mercenaries bring back the orc skins, they can exchange them for a large reward. If they fail to do so, they will get nothing and have to pay for their own travel expenses.

If they accidentally died outside, Xu Lai would not provide them with compensation, let alone take care of their family.

Therefore, compared with the soldiers, the rewards Xu Lai gave to the mercenaries were much higher.

But to be honest, if given a choice, these mercenaries would rather join Xu Lai's army, because at least there is a guarantee.

In addition, Xu Lai conquered the entire grassland, seized two-thirds of the nobles of the grassland, and accumulated wealth for hundreds of years, so there was no need to worry about financial resources.

Of course, they didn’t know yet that Xu Lai had reaped even greater rewards in the dungeon.

In the end, Xu Lai completed the mission issued by the Mercenary Guild, with the guarantor of the Mercenary Guild, and Xu Lai's own reputation was very good, winning the trust of many people.

Therefore, many masters on the grassland appeared in the area west of Wanshi City, either alone or in groups.

These people caused great trouble to the orcs, especially the orcs' reconnaissance troops.

There are still many creatures on the grassland. No matter how hard you try to drive them away, you can only drive away large groups of creatures, such as bison and wild horses.

However, carnivorous groups, such as wolf packs and lion packs, are small in number and still pose a certain degree of danger.

In addition, wild beasts also have fixed territories. Even if they are driven away, they will return to their previous territories soon.

The orcs were in extreme shortage of food, so they would certainly not let go of the meat. However, Xu Lai had taken great pains to fortify the city and clear the countryside, so it was impossible for him to allow the orcs to hunt these beasts at will.

The 9th-level knight Tahan and the mounted archer Yan Feng, each led their knights to hunt down these orcs based on the intelligence provided by the mercenaries.

And he, Xu Lai, personally led the Paladins and the Knights of Naaru to support the trapped mercenary groups.

The orcs' wolf cavalry were very troublesome, and Xu Lai had no interest in a decisive battle with the orcs at this time.

At this time, the orcs' morale was still quite high and they were not lacking in physical strength.

It would be better to wait for a while until the poison takes effect, killing a bunch of orcs and causing their morale to drop before doing anything else.

If Xu Lai wanted to avoid fighting, although the wolf cavalry could attack at a faster speed, they would not be able to hold out for too long.

Xu Lai, who possesses super speed, can easily get rid of these wolf cavalrymen by using attack acceleration and charge at the right time.

Mainly do not fight with the main force of the wolf cavalry, no matter how many troops the orcs send out, what level of heroes lead them, how many priests and high priests are in charge.

When they met Xu Lai, they were all destroyed like a whirlwind.

The charging Paladins and Knight Corps were an unstoppable and terrifying presence in an open area like the grassland.

Not to mention ordinary orcs, even if it was Behemoth or even a legion of Behemoth beasts, Xu Lai had the courage to charge forward without hesitation.

And Tahan, Yan Feng and others who separated from Xu Lai would not be at a disadvantage at all.

Although they are not even generals and only have the bonus of a captain, they are not afraid at all even when facing orc heroes.

Even with top-level defensive skills protecting them, when a 9th-level knight or 8th-level heroic knight charges at top speed, the damage bonus can reach over 300%.

The enemies they encountered could not be wiped out in one charge unless they were in huge numbers.

Even so, the cavalry, with their speed advantage, would be difficult to stop unless the enemy was in large numbers.

Xu Lai was very relieved about this. Both Tahan and Yan Feng were very stable people.

After clarifying Xu Lai's strategic purpose, he will not easily rush towards enemies that are not easy to deal with.

There is even less need to worry about Yan Feng, as he is leading archers, who are fast-moving cavalry.

The largest group of people on the grassland are herdsmen, and almost every recruit who signs up to join the army has a high level of riding skills.

You know, it is much harder to upgrade a normal person than to recruit a soldier, and the rewards for upgrading are much less. Recruiting archers will at least increase your riding skill by one level for every level you upgrade, but for ordinary people, it may take two or three levels to upgrade their riding skills.

The better the foundation, the higher the combat effectiveness will be after reaching the corresponding level and obtaining the corresponding attributes and equipment.

Therefore, the herdsmen on the grassland are most suitable for organizing into cavalry units.

However, Xu Lai distributed melee cavalry and horse archers in a ratio of 3:7, giving priority to incorporating them into the horse archer team.

Firstly, it is easier to recruit melee cavalry, and secondly, archers are safer.

People like Yan Feng carry a space ring with them when they go out. The arrows stored in it are enough for them to kill tens of thousands of orcs, so there is basically no danger.

Tahan and his men led the charge, which consumed a great deal of the physical strength of the horses and soldiers.

Not only can Yan Feng and his men kill without suffering any damage, but their physical energy consumption is not too high. The only thing is that their arrow consumption is quite alarming, but who can blame Xu Lai for his wealth?

Xu Lai was counting on these two teams to go out and accumulate experience and quickly improve their levels, so he naturally didn't care about the slightest consumption.

Faced with Xu Lai's aggressiveness, the orcs have always appeared to be extremely restrained.

Of course, they had no choice but to restrain themselves. Even though the wolf cavalry had more people, they could not compare with humans in terms of harassment capabilities.

Even if we don't count Xu Lai's three cavalry units, the tens of thousands of mercenaries are an extremely large and formidable force.

These mercenaries are scattered in number, and the largest mercenary group only has a few hundred people acting together.

Even if the mercenaries on the grassland don't have any combat skills, they can definitely lag behind in riding skills.

If the wolf riders wanted to hunt down a mercenary, it would be impossible without three or four times the number of wolf riders.

If the number of wolf riders is small, there is a risk of being killed in return, but if the number is large, the mercenaries will call for support from the mercenary group or even Xu Lai.

Mercenaries are warriors with strong single combat capabilities. Even though orcs are stronger, fighting alone or even two against one is very risky.

The constant division of troops also gradually dispersed the size of the wolf cavalry, making them more chaotic and difficult to command.

Anyway, after two or three days, the grassland became a mess, and human knights and wolf riders could be seen everywhere.

At this time, six full days had passed since the first group of wolf riders and flying legion crossed Pingfeng Mountain.

One more day and it will be a full week.

This week, in addition to losing tens of thousands of flying soldiers, the orcs also lost nearly ten thousand wolf riders.

It cannot be said that there was no benefit gained, the only thing being some abandoned villages and towns where there was no time to transfer all the resources, and nearly a thousand mercenaries hunted down and captured.

The casualty ratio of both sides, excluding flying soldiers, was as high as 1 to 10. This was the result achieved by the stronghold camp, which had deployed all kinds of experts and set up various ambushes.

The key is that as long as we fail to leave the bodies of these mercenaries behind and let them take the bodies back, we will be able to see these mercenaries again within two days.

Although Xu Lai's angels were not numerous, they had a strong resurrection ability and the intensity of the battle was not high. On the most busy day, only more than 200 mercenaries died.

There was no hope for Xu Lai and his paladins. Even the two knight armies without a hero leader could not be defeated.

If Ruda locks onto the opponent in the air, Xu Lai and the Angel Legion will definitely come to support.

It was also in that battle that Kenro Hag and Xu Lai had a small clash.

Not surprisingly, Kenro Hager was completely at a disadvantage.

Thousands of level 7 Paladins with Holy Shield rushed into the Wolf Riders camp, and the other side had no choice but to collapse, with no power to resist.

If it weren't for the fact that at this time, the orcs already had the long-range One-Eyed Legion to provide cover, and there was also Ruda's flying legion in the sky, Xu Lai really dared to pursue and kill them in depth.

This wave of charge killed more than 2,000 wolf riders of Kenro Hag, which was almost equal to the total gains of the mercenaries in the past three days.

The most helpless thing is that due to the continuous harassment from humans, the orcs have been unable to obtain that batch of blood food.

Although they have hunted dozens of wild animals of all sizes in the past few days, their food reserves can still sustain them for a while.

But food shortage has always been a sword hanging over the heads of all orcs, and no one knows when it will be chopped down.

Beast King Sachs could no longer wait. If he waited any longer, the morale of the orc army would be completely exhausted.

After leaving the base camp to the troops that continued to arrive from the rear, he personally led the 100,000 orc infantry that had been transferred and moved towards the Stone City.

As the beastman army approaches, there is less and less space to move around on the grassland.

The Wolf Cavalry Corps served as the vanguard and the Flying Corps provided support. Even if Xu Lai recalled all the cavalry units, they did not dare to attack the orc army of more than one hundred thousand.

Xu Lai's strategy of clearing the countryside and fortifying the city meant that the orcs could not get any food supplies, but it also saved them from wasting time and manpower on the periphery.

The remaining cities are either abandoned or in complete ruins.

The orcs sent out a large number of laborers to recycle the resources from these ruins.

Xu Lai did not dare to attack the hard laborers who were protected by a large army, and just kept confronting the wolf cavalry.

Prevent them from crossing the defense line of Stone City and harassing the transportation and supply routes behind Stone City.

This finally gave the orcs an opportunity, and they successfully drove away the tens of thousands of cattle and sheep that Xu Lai had hidden in the hiding cave.

After being trapped in the hiding cave for several days, hundreds of cattle and sheep still died even with the spell scrolls made by the priests.

These cattle and sheep, which had long died, were fed by the orcs to the big-eared monsters and the laborers.

The laborers and the big-eared monsters have no orc blood, so naturally nothing will happen to them.

The shaman also used magic to check, and the remaining ones were all living cattle and sheep, so the orcs were less vigilant.

There were 3000 cows and 5000 sheep. cows and sheep were slaughtered on the spot to supply all the orc warriors who needed to go into battle tomorrow.

The orcs' catapults and crossbows had not yet been transported here.

But among the orc infantry, there was a Cyclops force of 5000 people. They bombarded the city with rocks and no city wall could be destroyed by them.

However, it was these confirmed beef and mutton that caused extremely horrific harm to the orcs that night.

In order to make the poison as effective as possible, Xu Lai asked the poison masters to improve Aini's poison formula.

All poisons will not take effect immediately, but will be delayed for at least one hour, and will become more and more serious.

Of course, this will reduce some of the medicinal properties and also give the orcs more healing time.

But because of this, even if some chefs stole some of the beef and mutton, the majority of the orcs managed to eat it. (End of this chapter)