After Surviving the Apocalypse, I Built a City in Another World

A/N: Thank you to everyone who has been supporting me so far! LOVE YOUUU!

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Althea, as she interacted with these creatures, found herself more and more eager to understand them. It was half the passion of a scientist, and another the instinct of a leader.

She had recruited a number of orcs into her region before, so she hoped to find out more about them. In retrospect, talking with the orcs of Quo Town back then wasn’t nearly enough to scratch the surface of understanding for another race. Not to mention, she had only stayed in Quo for a very short time.

”What happens when two tribes encounter each other?” she asked. Even if they rarely meet due to the massiveness of this area and the few orcs, there should still be intersections.

”They fight for the territory,” Ohara answered her frankly, telling her a few examples and cases. This was more or less in line with her impressions of them being war-like.

Wars were innately bloody, especially orc wars. They fought with their claws, feet, and other appendages, so their killing each other looked much more brutal than human wars that used weapons and armor.

In a sense, it was why people had such a strong impression of them as brutes, when in reality the accumulated deaths in orc wars weren’t even a percentage of the deaths in a few human wars.

It was quite ironic.

Not that these orcs had any idea of their brethren’s impression on the outside world, of course.

Furthermore, unlike most human wars that started in pursuit of power and excess, the orc wars were mostly just a fight for resources and survival.

For example, the war Ohara was currently telling her about was roused because of the latest extreme heat. The extreme weather affected the entire world, though naturally its intensity and effects could vary from region to region.

The trees and other plants on this side of the world were much larger and more resilient, so they didn’t shrivel to death like the plants on the other side, but they had all dried up, stopped producing leaves and fruits, rendering them inedible anyway.

Orcs could feast on beasts, as humans did, and they could defeat them with less risk than humans could, but their bodies...were not meant for such heat.

So...even if they were stronger than humans, the difficulty orcs had when fighting with beasts while the sun was up was not much different from humans.

Their physiques were either filled with thick muscles, fur, or feathers. Though some Terran mammals were furry—because the fur actually served as insulation—it certainly wasn’t enough to handle the extreme heat.

Like humans, the orcs also struggled with sustenance because of this.

There were only small patches of land with ’living’ plants, likely fed by underground water resources. This attracted a few tribes, and they ended up fighting each other, causing the population of all three tribes to lose at least a third.

The extreme cold was also not easy for them, but orcs—due to their heavy furs and thick skins—had higher survival rates in extreme cold than extreme heat. For the most part, tribes would just find caves and other places to hide. They could huddle together for additional warmth, as well.

This tribe was also lucky to have a consistent source of fire, so Ohara and the others were fine during that disaster.

Regardless of the cause, losses were inevitable in war, which further reduced the orcs’ already small population. It was also why they tended to avoid it themselves.

A living thing had the instinct of self-preservation—many of which related to the entire race. Wars, in the Orcs’ case, would be 100% a lose-lose situation. They weren’t even sedentary creatures; what were they doing losing people over a piece of land?

Not to mention, in normal times outside of the Extreme weather, the supplies were ample. Orcs generally never went hungry, so they didn’t have this instinct to fight to the death for a bite of food.

This was quite enlightening for Althea, who had her own biases. Even popular culture in Terran would show animalistic people as creatures who mindlessly killed others, just because that is their so-called ’nature’.

In the end, the term ’acting on instinct’ heavily depended on the environment and actual living conditions. Combined with their ’simple’ minds lacking excess ambition, the orcs actually lived decent lives.

So, although this race was said to be war-like with brutal fights, they rarely actively started wars.

Hence, outside of the extreme weather, if two tribes were to meet each other, it was unlikely they’d fight at all.

In fact, many orc tribes, if one leader was weak, would likely just integrate with each other. It was how big tribes like Feyun, which had nearly a hundred orcs, were formed.

Another good thing to note about this side of the world was indeed large, and they could just move around when they had to. The meat sources would follow them, anyway.

Even if they encountered strong monsters above level 30, orcs were strong enough to handle them as long as they worked together. Even if the entire tribe was mobilized, they could truly handle a super monster on their own.

Of course, though monsters above level 30 were much more common here than even around human cities, the majority of monsters were still the weaker ones. To the orcs, these were basically easy meat sources.

Speaking of monster meat, Althea learned something very interesting about its relationship with orc physique.

The orcs would hunt weaker monsters to eat, but meat here had other effects on orcs than just filling their stomachs. The effects were limited according to level, but it was still a very interesting bit of information for Althea.

Apparently, Orcs could recover their HP, MP, and so on by consuming monster meat around their level. Further, the amount varied not just by level, but also by the kind of monster (which was also an interesting tidbit). Some monsters would recover HP and heal well, while others could just give more stamina.

This was something exclusive to orcs. For humans, protein sources were just protein sources. The extra sped-up ’healing’ effects had to do with the orc physique and its ability to absorb nutrients in different ways than humans.

(Althea had to push down the inkling to ask the orcs to donate a cadaver to her to study someday).

Ahem.

Anyway, if the level was too far below the orc, the use would only be to sate hunger. On the other hand, eating a bit of meat of a beast of the same or a higher level could have more effects.

Orcs did not have things like potions here, so they were dependent on this method.

This was also why tribes would always aim to hunt powerful monsters, and there were ample amounts of them. This was also another reason why tribes were likely to join forces that fight to the death—dealing with strong monsters.

Anyway, the powerhouse orcs above level 30 were not too common, so even a single monster could feed and heal a few of them.

Speaking of which, the average level of monsters in this place was another thing worth studying. The orcs themselves didn’t know any other way and had no idea what was truly the world average.

When she peeked out the hill they hid in, making sure not to reveal herself too much and accidentally attract monsters, she had seen several ’giant’ monsters through the forest.

The trees here were large, so even the ’giant’ monsters weren’t necessarily taller than the trees, but the space between the trunks was wide to give way to the large canopies and root systems, so these large monsters were still visible from a distance. The density of the monsters, to be honest, made her shiver.

It also made her worry about her husband. During this time, Althea hadn’t messaged Garan yet. She hadn’t changed locations, and she had a feeling he was also recovering. She knew her husband well and knew how he’d react to her kidnapping.

Now, it had been two days since then, and she was heading to the walls again.

While it was good to have a community, she had to reunite with her husband first. The best-case scenario would be for the two groups to meet up.

She sent a message to her husband about her itinerary, and also mentioned some of the dangers he could encounter upon entering this side of the world.

The hunt for strong monsters happened once or twice a week. Lately, they increased to twice a week because they had a pregnant orc in the clan, and several powerhouses had been injured during the previous hunt.

She watched as the new hunters were about to head out and stood up, surprising Ohara, who was peacefully chatting with her a few seconds prior.

She went to the leader, an ox orc who was twice her size if one counted his upright horns.

”I am coming with you.”