THE MARTIAL KING - Season 9 Episode 4

In the human’s pasture, cattle and sheep were kept as livestock. They would be fattened up and then killed and cooked for food.

In the ogres’ pasture, humans were kept there like cows and goats, and they would be slaughtered when they were grown.

The immortal Mist had once said that this continent was extremely chaotic and humans were not the dominant race of this continent. It was not until this moment that Zen finally understood how weak humans were in this continent.

“Ahem!”

Zen suddenly coughed.

The two ogre envoys had sharp ears. They turned around, sensing that there was someone in the tent not far away.

“There’s one missing. Didn’t I tell you to summon everyone?” the ogre envoy said in an apparent tone of surprise.

The middle-aged man replied, “Sir, it is an outsider.”

“Outsider? Is he from another pasture?” One of the ogre envoys strode towards Zen.

As Zen lay on the mattress, unable to move, his eyes stared coldly at the ogre. Traces of killing intent began forming in his eyes.

In the Central Region, the world was ruled by humans. What Zen had fought against were humans in battles. But on this continent where ogres ruled, Zen suddenly felt a strong sense of human identity. “Those who are not our kin are sure to have a different heart.” Zen had never been as sympathetic to this phrase as he was now.

“Mm, this guy seems to be severely injured. Count him in too.” The ogre envoy flipped open Zen’s tent, took out a noose, and came forward, intending to wrap it around Zen’s head.

Just as that rope was thrown out, a wisp of soul suddenly shot out from Zen’s mind and probed into the ogre envoy’s mind. It tore apart the ogre’s soul and crushed his mind.

Everyone saw the ogre envoy grab the noose in his hand, but suddenly, his entire body shook. He then froze, standing there motionlessly.

The ogre had his back facing them. In fact, the crowd did not see that brown blood was flowing from his eyes. This ogre was already dead.

A gentle wind blew, causing the ogre to fall backwards. His tall body hit the ground with a heavy thump.

The other ogre envoy was shocked to see this. “What’s going on?” he said fearfully.

The humans also looked at each other, not knowing what had happened. How had the ogre envoy fallen to the ground without warning?

The other ogre envoy pulled out a 10-foot long spear and walked cautiously towards Zen. When he saw that his fallen comrade had died, he pointed the spear at Zen and asked, “Human! What have you done?”

A hint of mockery appeared on Zen’s face as he replied calmly, “I killed him.”

“You killed him?” Disbelief was written all over the ogre envoy’s face.

This human looked so weak! How could he possibly have killed an ogre?

Ogres were more powerful than humans; even a young ogre could easily tear a human apart. In the eyes of these ogres, humans were no different than docile sheep. The only difference was that sheep could not speak.

“Believe it or not, I don’t care. You can die too.” As Zen’s eyes glinted, his soul left his body again and strangled the second ogre envoy’s soul, just like he had done to the first one.

The second ogre envoy also fell to the ground with a thump.

Zen frowned as he looked at the two corpses that were lying on the ground not far away from him. There were close to eight hundred people watching these goings on and all of them were trembling with fear.

The middle-aged man in the lead gathered his courage and walked over. He looked at the two ogre envoys lying on the ground and said in a shaky voice, “I saved you, but why did you kill them?”

Zen’s eyebrows knitted as if he could not comprehend the question. “They were trying to eat us. Of course they had to die,” Zen replied calmly.

“Die? Why did they have to die? The ogres gave us large areas of pastures. So it’s right for us to sacrifice some of our own to repay them,” the middle-aged man said seriously.

Zen was struck dumb at this logic.

How could they still call themselves human if they thought like this? They might as well be reincarnated as pigs. If it weren’t for the fact that Zen was not the kind of person who recklessly killed the innocent, he would have already killed the middle-aged man by now.

“That’s right. The ogres treated us quite well, and they even brought us food in the cold winter. How could we disobey them?”

“The two ogre envoys are dead now. We’ll all be doomed!”

“Only five of us were supposed to die, but now several hundred will die. What should we do?”

The onlookers seemed to agree with what the middle-aged man had said. Zen’s eyebrows furrowed deeper. These people had been kept there for a long time and really thought of themselves as the ogres’ livestock. The problem was that usually, livestock didn’t have brains. But did this group of humans have no brains either?

Zen didn’t want to look at the helpless faces of these people, so he simply closed his eyes. He would rather focus on activating his meridians.

Someone stepped out of the crowd at this moment and said, “Dad, I think he’s right. Why should we allow them to eat us? Just because they own this pasture?”

Zen’s eyes flew open at the voice and came to rest on a boy who was standing before the middle-aged man and was holding a sharp wooden stick.

“Shut up! You know nothing. Our ancestors have lived here for generations, and we only need to contribute a few people during festivals so that we can live. How would we survive if we don’t give ourselves to them?” The middle-aged man lectured. As he looked at the lifeless ogres lying on the ground, he heaved a conflicted sigh. “I’m afraid they will kill us all, now that two ogres have died.”

“Haven’t you thought of resisting?” The young boy’s eyes were blazing with fury.
“Resist? Resist ogres?” The middle-aged man glared at him, “Isn’t that the same as courting death?”

“We are going to die anyway. Why should we be lambs waiting to be slaughtered?” The boy said stubbornly.

Zen felt slightly gratified at the boy’s words. Not all humans here were cowards, after all. There was finally one who had the backbone to stand up to the ogres.

These humans were livestock, reared by the ogres to be slaughtered for food. But humans were intelligent creatures. It was impossible for them to live like cattle or sheep which would only struggle when a knife was held to their necks. Someday, people would rebel.

Unfortunately, these humans were too weak.

“Boy, what’s your name?” Zen asked.

“My name is Craig,” The boy replied. His respect for Zen was obvious, probably because he had seen Zen kill two ogre envoys in the blink of an eye.

“I’ll teach you how to resist,” Zen said lightly.

“Really?” Craig looked excited and expectant, “Will you teach me what you did just now? That magic?”

He probably thought Zen had used some kind of magic to kill the two ogres since he hadn’t seen Zen move at all.

Zen chuckled and said, “No, this is not magic. This is strength. Will the ogres come again?”

“Yes,” Craig replied.

“Very well. You can watch when they come,” Zen told him.

The other humans didn’t know what to do. Their ancestors had lived in this grassland for generations, so they thought they were destined to be eaten up by the ogres. Although there were some people from the tribe who had thought of rebelling, they had been too weak and no match for the ogres. Such rebels usually died faster.

They could come up with no solution even after a long discussion and had no choice but to let it be. They all turned a blind eye to Zen.

On the other hand, it was Craig who stayed by Zen’s side and protected him with the sharp wooden stick in his hand.
During this time, Zen continuously expelled the power of space within his body.

Several hours later, Zen felt a tremor coming from the ground. He looked up and saw a group of ogres mounted on large horses galloping angrily towards them. These gigantic horses were nearly twenty feet high, and they had bloodshot eyes. They were clearly not ordinary horses.

“What’s going on? Where’s the leader?” There were a dozen ogres in the group. The one in the lead was wearing a heavy helmet and had spikes on his shoulders. He looked extremely intimidating.

“Save your energy. I was the one who killed these two bags of trash,” Zen said indifferently.

“You!” The leader of the ogres dismounted and looked at the two dead bodies in front of him. His ugly face looked doubtful. “Did you kill them?” Craig stood on high alert behind Zen, the sharp wooden stick in his hand at the ready.

“Yes,” Zen said, nodding. His head was the only part of him that he could move.

“How could these humans dare resist? This is interesting. Let’s capture him and take him back!” the leader of the ogre group waved his hand and said.

Following his order, the group of ogres behind him dismounted from their horses and came forward to surround Zen.