Chapter 9: Explosive Expansion

TL: A_Passing_Wanderer

ED: Chrissy

"Spearmen, advance!"

"Advance!"

Strong Archer's roar came to an end, signaling the spears to jut out from the gaps between the towering shields. It was too late by the time the warriors of the allied tribes noticed what was going on.

Because their front ranks had almost reached their enemies by then. They couldn't escape even if they wanted to.

"Heo-urhk!"

"Uwaaahk!"

Stab! Staaab! Staaaaab!

A wretched massacre instantly unfolded before their eyes. Countless allied tribes' warriors got impaled by the Creek spears and lost their lives right there and then.

The numerical advantage, you say?

It didn't matter in this case. Due to the nature of the terrain, only a finite number of opponents could threaten the phalanx formation at any given moment. Besides, the weapons of the allied tribes' warriors weren't good enough to break through the Creek tribe's battle line, anyway.

"Kku-waaahk!"

"Stop pushing me! I said, stop pushing me, you bastards! Keo-hurk!"

Utter pandemonium.

Even though the melee hadn't started all that long ago, corpses of the warriors began piling up in the frontline of the battle.

"H-how can this be...!"

"That... That's a weapon of the devil! We, we need to evade them!"

Not too long after they began engaging in the close-quarter melee, the warriors of the allied tribes realized the horrifying truth.

...That this was no longer a battle.

No, it was a massacre. As it turned out, they never were the Creek's opponents, to begin with.

"T-this wasn't what I've been told! Look at them! What makes you think they are weaklings?!"

"I, I can't die a dog's death like this!"

The ranks of the allied tribes' warriors began to disintegrate rapidly.

"No! D-do not flee! Man your positions!"

"Get out of the way! I said, get the hell out!"

By now, the allied tribes' Chiefs' chain of command had completely broken down, too. The warriors began scattering urgently, all hoping to get away from the horrifying calamity unfolding right in front of their eyes.

This was an overwhelming victory of the Creek warriors.

And this was the moment of the huddling Creek tribe finally waking up and spreading its arms earnestly towards its surroundings.

*

The war was basically over by the end of the first engagement.

Out of the enemy warriors numbering fifteen thousand, about 1,500 died during that first battle alone. Even more than that number tried to flee, only to get hunted down and die.

It was difficult to believe that only two thousand or so warriors managed to achieve such a result.

The Creek tribe had perfectly succeeded in their defense, in other words. However, the warriors of the tribe, including Kim Gi-Wu, were not satisfied by this.

"Find and drag all the remnants of the enemy forces here, everyone. If anyone resists, you can deal with them any way you see fit."

Kim Gi-Wu's decision led to the creation of a military expedition. Two thousand warriors immediately set off to the headquarters of the enemy tribes that dared to invade them.

The enemy combatants that managed to flee from the battle had already returned there but, by now, they had lost all of their will to fight against the Creek warriors.

Many of the villagers in the affected villages evacuated far away to escape the Creek's invasion, but the others who failed to do so in time had no choice but to surrender.

And so...

Strong Archer 'arrested' the surrendering tribespeople of the four tribes and dragged all of them back to the Creek tribe. This was almost on the level of mass migration at this point.

The number of captured tribespeople easily went past sixty thousand, which was two, even three, times the number of the Creek tribe's original population.

"All of you harbored malicious intentions and dared to invade the sacred land of our people, the Creek tribe. Do you confess to your crimes?"

"...Yes, we confess. It was all our fault."

The head of the Choctaw tribe's Ritual Chief, Charging Bison, faltered powerlessly. He didn't display any desire to resist at this point.

Kim Gi-Wu swept his glare over the countless defeated warriors kneeling on the ground before loudly saying something. "The sins you have committed can easily be judged as grave and unforgivable. However, I do not wish for the fetters of bloodshed to continue anymore. As such, I am thinking of reducing your sentences."

Charging Bison raised his head after hearing that declaration and stared at Kim Gi-Wu. A flicker of uncertain hope flashed on the Ritual Chief's expression just then.

"However, that does not mean we will not hold you accountable for your crimes. We shall forgive your crimes only under the condition that every single one of your tribespeople will serve the Creek tribe for the next five years. How about it?"

Charging Bison mulled it for a little while before asking a question. "What will happen after five years?"

"I swear by my name that we shall accept you all as our own fellow tribespeople and treat you equally as any one of us."

In other words, they would be absorbed under the banner of the Creek tribe. In essence, all four defeated tribes would cease to exist from that moment on.

But from the perspective of the completely-conquered tribes, this condition was very favorable. Even Charging Bison understood this.

"I see. In that case, we shall abide by your ruling, Lord Spirit Chief."

And with that, the Creek tribe's population expanded figuratively in one breath. Of course, it was nothing more than absorbing other tribes through force, so the overall situation in the tribe was still quite unstable.

From that day on, many more villages were constructed anew within the Creek tribe's territory.

In the past, the tribe mainly subsisted on hunting and gathering, causing the tribespeople to scatter over a wide area to make their living. But with the tribe changing into an agriculture-focused society, it became possible for them to live in a cluster.

One shouldn't forget that, excluding the necessary manpower to farm, the rest were valuable human resources that would get mobilized in various industries. Of course, the sudden increase in population would mean that, for the time being, the tribe would have to focus primarily on agriculture.

Kim Gi-Wu continued to expand the scale of the central Creek village and turned it into a sizeable city in no time. He accommodated many of the tribespeople there.

*

Two years flew by since then.

In other words, it had been over five years since Kim Gi-Wu arrived in America's past. He decided to call the year he arrived in the past as the advent year one. Which meant that this year would be the advent year five.

Currently, the tribe had finished with this year's harvest. Most of the additional manpower was deployed in agricultural sectors. This helped with stocking up a massive supply of food in storage facilities for the past couple of years.

Without a doubt, the impact brought on by the selectively-bred seeds was incredible to behold.

Even the number of chickens had grown explosively as well, which in turn made the dishes involving chicken meat and eggs a commonplace in the tribe.

The food supply had become abundant, and almost everyone in the tribe possessed at least one set of clothing for their upper and lower bodies, as well as a pair of shoes.

'Finally. Now this place more or less resembles a proper human habitat.'

Of course, the residential buildings were still lacking in so many aspects. They still had to be upgraded, that's for sure.

But Kim Gi-Wu still thought that, excluding the houses, it was far more pleasing to see the state of the tribe compared to the past.

The population, meanwhile, had gone past the ninety thousand to close in on the hundred thousand mark.

This increase accounted for childbirths and the reduction in infant mortality rate but, more than anything else, it had a lot to do with many small tribes in the surroundings voluntarily choosing to submit themselves to the Creek tribe. The abundance of food had played a vital role in this development.

However, how could Kim Gi-Wu be satisfied by merely this?

After several lengthy discussions, the top executives of the tribe agreed with the idea of raising up an army.

Honestly speaking, no one really objected to Kim Gi-Wu's idea. By now, he had taken over the Creek tribe and exercised complete control over it.

So much so that he had to move up from the previous position of the Spirit Chief to a newly-created position of Great Chief.

"Great Chief is making his entrance!"

Upright Tree shouted loudly, causing the village's plaza filled with people's murmurs to quieten down quickly. The young Creek warrior had completely become Kim Gi-Wu's aide by now.

Clack, clack.

Every step Kim Gi-Wu took, the shoes made out of steel, and his flashy steel armor issued loud clacking metallic noises.

He climbed up a dais built out of wood. This allowed him to take in the surrounding sight of the considerably-large plaza.

'So much has changed.'

Houses here were used to be built without any rhyme or reason. In the past few years, though, he did his best to separate different districts.

And according to his wishes, a market district was created, while industrial zones centered around the furnaces were created next. Finally, residential areas were created. This massive-scale plaza was constructed in the center of those districts.

Countless many tribespeople gathering in the plaza were all staring at Kim Gi-Wu, waiting.

The original Creek tribespeople were among them; even those conquered by the Creek warriors and those who voluntarily submitted themselves could also be seen.

Kim Gi-Wu scanned them all for a while, then loudly spoke up. "For the last few years, we've achieved an unprecedented level of speedy progress. This could only happen thanks to every one of you present here today, and all the men and women still working hard in various industries even now. Are you all satisfied with our progress?"

"Yes! We're satisfied!"

"All this was possible thanks to your great wisdom, Great Chief!"

"Yes, that's right!"

"Woo! Woo! Woo!"

Thud! Thud! Thud!

Everyone was smiling away. Kim Gi-Wu could easily recognize the meaning of those smiles: 'hope' for the future that things were getting better.

Those expressions could only be made by humans embraced by the warm glow of that hope.

They had to work like dogs every single day, but all of their hard work ensured that they wouldn't go starving. Even most of the people from the subjugated tribes were satisfied with their current situation, too.

However... Kim Gi-Wu poured cold water into this warm, happy atmosphere. "No! I am not satisfied at all! What I'm saying is that things are very unsatisfactory!"

The plaza was plunged into stunned silence. But that was understandable since palpable rage could be sensed oozing out from Kim Gi-Wu's voice and his scowling face.

He didn't waste time and began spitting out the rest of what he wanted to say. "We were able to progress so much faster and in a better direction than ever before! But we have not been able to do so for a while now!"

"T-that is..."

"Mm..."

The tribespeople were overwhelmed by Kim Gi-Wu's impassioned shout and could only swallow back their gasps.

"How? What did we do to reach this result, everyone!" Kim Gi-Wu paused briefly to build up tension, then resumed his impassioned shouting. "There can only be one answer to this!"

"What is it, Great Chief?"

With perfect timing, someone in the crowd asked back loudly.

Kim Gi-Wu spat out the 'answer' he had been thinking of to his fellow curious tribespeople. "It's simple, we just do not have enough people! Every single one of us, including myself, has been working tirelessly every day! Some of us even have to do extra work with the help of torchlight after sunset, too!

"However, even though we're making all these sacrifices, many of our industries still suffer from the lack of workers, causing their productions to get delayed further and further! How bitterly lamentable this is, do you all not agree?!"

The increase in population certainly improved things compared to the past but, as it was mentioned earlier, the tribe had no choice but to focus more emphasis on agriculture rather than manufacturing for the past two years.

To put it simply, they were still so busy that no one really had a chance to catch their breaths. And the village as a whole still suffered from the critical lack of manpower.

"As such, we shall wage war once more! This time, it won't be to prepare against the invasion of other tribes, but for us to enter their territories!"

When he finished declaring that, several unhappy faces could be spotted among the crowd.

Kim Gi-Wu stared straight into their eyes and shouted. "Some of you must be thinking this way! Our lives have improved so much like this, so why is there a need to invade other tribes? Why can't we just continue living like this? However, my thoughts are different!

"This isn't merely a war of invasion and conquest! No, we won't steal or pillage the food supply of other tribes! We will distribute ours to them, instead! What I'm saying here is that we shall accept them as one of our own and treat them equally as our brethren!

"That will solve the critical shortage of workers in our tribe. And this will lead to many more of us growing in abundance, eventually transforming our Creek from a little tribe to a noble and great nation!"

That was sophistry. Blood would get shed at the end of the day, after all. What he proposed was, without a doubt, a war of conquest. But the justification he spewed out was more than enough to set fire to the hearts of the tribespeople.

"Wuuu-aaaaaah!"

"Yes, for the great and noble Creek!"

"And for our noble Great Chief, for our Lord Divine Spirit!"

"Woo! Woo! Woo!"

Thud! Thud! Thud!

Their roars and thumping feet were so raucous and loud that it almost felt like an earthquake had broken out in the plaza.

"Hear ye, oh sons and daughters of Creek! Resolutely shake off your fears and reservations, stand tall, and follow me! I swear to give you full bellies and even more fulfilling lives!"

The advent year five. This was when the signal flare indicating the start of the tribe's expansion had finally gone off.

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