Strategy meeting

Inside the little egghead hut, there were no tables or chairs, so we had to sit on the ground or our beds if we could call it such. They were just blanket stacked one over the other.

Once everyone sat, they all looked at me with curiosity. In the past few years, Zala and I contributed a lot to improving the life of egghead resident's life. Thanks to us, there were more blankets for everyone. I taught them how to cook and how to make a fire. But the most impactful thing we did was restoring and improving egghead. It took us a total of two years. We first repaired the walls and the roof with clay and wood, then we built a little chimney. After the winter passed, we earned their respect as they realized the importance of the fireplace.

We also taught them how to stay clean. We started by washing their clothes and asking them to bathe with us in the lake. If they didn't want to, I would send Zala bugging them until they came. After a while, they ended up getting used to it and even started to appreciate them.

All the efforts made were rewarded when we saw the orphans starting to act less individually. Helping each other is not as much an innate orc behavior as it is for Humans. They are what we could qualify as introverts. They don't actively research to create new relations. However, those who make a place in their heart will forever be engraved on it. Besides, their culture is not helping at all. What primes is their individual strength. The weak are left on the side.

Thus young orcs create strong links and learn to help one another from their family, but orphans don't have one and are usually traumatized by their disappearance. And so it was my and Vaela's duty to teach them to become a big family.

I was standing before the fireplace, thinking about what I was going to say.

"Right now, Vaela is in the forest fighting for her life, confronting beasts we could never imagine. She fights for herself, for the tribe, and for Nuyam. I know she will survive and become a strong fiery orc warrior. But are you confident in overcoming this challenge ?" I saw the eldest shaking their head sinistrally while the young hesitated, not knowing what to say. Apart from Zala, as always, putting forward her chest, she was about to reply, but I didn't let her. "You are right. As you are now, you have little chance to come back. However, you are not alone. We are together in it. We will use our brains to elaborate great strategies that will give a hundred percent success rate."

The orcs looked at me with bewildered expressions.

"But Yal wouldn't it be painful to extract our brain to make 'strategy'" asked Vorl.

For a second, I was left speechless. But before I could explain, his brother Trosh said :

" I, Trosh, am not afraid of pain. I'll split my head and will get this strategy thing and become the strongest fiery wolf ever !"

Fortunately, Yurim intervened to put some sense into this big idiot :

"Are you stupid? You will die if you do it" She then added a level lower," but if you do it, I'll gladly use it."

Eeeh, I take it back. She is the craziest of them all.

"Wait, wait, wait, that's absolutely not what I meant."

" What did you mean then" she pressed, kind of upset.

Well kind of understand her. Torsh has a nasty habit of trying to scare people. He once put a big spider in my bed, and god knows I hate them. The worst is that no one frightens him. Even the chief can be his next victim.

" What I mean is, we'll create plans to make us stronger, plans to get more food, plans on what we should do during the trials. That's what it means to make strategies. And before you ask, a one hundred percent success rate signifies you'll be assured to pass it."

Realization struck them :

"Oooooh !"

" And what's the plan ?" Asked Burningsmile.

" Good question, What's the greatest weapon of war?" I asked them.

"Our fist," quickly answered Zala.

"No"

"Teeth?"

"No"

"Magic"

"Still No"

"Our brain ?" shyly said Shufa, unsure where I was going.

"No, it's information. Know your enemy better than yourself. If we learn what our best warriors did to prepare themselves, we'll know what to do. So our first mission is to get all this information".

I then told them how to proceed. Of course, not everyone was old enough to participate.

I set a deadline of one week to get all the pieces of information we needed. The next day, although we were still anxious about how Vaela was doing, we had an important task to accomplish and didn't have time to ruminate on it.

[Third POV]

The first week of Nuyarn's trial was usually calm, as young orcs weren't supposed to return before the second week's end. But this was bound to be a little different.

We could see several little orcs running everywhere in the village from the sky. They seem to all have a specific destination in mind. What was common to their behavior was that they were moving from house to house as if they wanted to meet all the tribe members. Some refused to let them in. Others did but then chased after them as if they had stolen their most precious good.

The elders were surprised to see these kids running everywhere, asking all kinds of questions like 'What was your favorite food when you were younger' or 'Did you ever fight before fourteen' or even 'Can you tell what your best friend is most afraid of ?', they concluded some sort of illness came to the village making the young orc going crazy. Fortunately, this strange illness quickly passed, and everything was back to normal.

The orphans took their mission very seriously. They tried their very best to get all the information Yalak needed to establish a good plan. Each of them used a different method. Yurim used her cuteness and acting skills. Wolfteeth tried to act as a businessman and exchanged information against a service. The less successful was Zala, who tried to threaten those who didn't want to give her what she wanted. And the most successful were Fashu and Torsh. Fashu didn't even have to try. Her calm, cute voice, innocent face, and kindness did all the work. As for Torsh, he demonstrated his ingenuity when he wanted some really specific information, but it was rarely the right one. Once he learned that one of the orc warriors was really afraid of darkness, after visiting several potions, he succeeded in getting the recipe for temporary blindness. So, of course, he made it and gave the drink to the warrior, telling him it was a night vision potion. The poor orc believed it and tried it at night. He became so afraid that he woke up the whole neighborhood. The next day, Trosh got the beating of his life and only escaped, thanks to the others threatening him from revealing his secret.

At the end of the week, they got all they needed to proceed with their plan.

...

Somewhere in the mountains, a young orc was resting in a tree. Her clothes were filled with holes blood stains could be seen here and there. It was Vaela who was exhausted and eating a green and tasty fruit. It has been a long week. She had fled from several monsters far stronger than her. She didn't cross anyone in the past few days. The trial was as complicated as she thought it would be, but she didn't regret her choice. She will become a great warrior like her mother she admired so much.

She closed her eyes for a second and thought of all the people who were waiting for her in the tribe. 'Yalak, Zala, all the other, dad, mom... I miss you all.'

She then suddenly opened her eyes, filled with determination.

'Let's go.'