Chapter 58
Our Discord Server: https://discord.gg/PazjBDkTmW
Chapter 58: Risk of Exposure
Perhaps the heavens couldn’t stand Luo Ji being in too good a mood and deliberately wanted to make things difficult for him.
The news brought by a reconnaissance team member who was on standby at the Black Rock Tribe caused the joy on Luo Ji’s face to quickly fade at a speed visible to the naked eye.
In the past few days he was away, the location of the Mirror Tribe seemed to have been discovered by people from other tribes.
Upon hearing this news, how could Luo Ji still be in the mood to spend another night at the Black Rock Tribe?
He immediately brought Luo Yong and a few other wolf warriors and left first, rushing back to the Mirror Tribe overnight under their escort.
Passing through the forest and seeing the tribal camp safely nestled beside Mirror Lake, Luo Ji breathed a slight sigh of relief.
It seemed the other party had not easily made a move.
After all, in this era, their Mirror Tribe was also considered a large tribe.
The population size alone was enough to make many tribes think twice before acting.
After returning to the tribe, Luo Ji immediately found Zhao Pan, intending to inquire about the situation.
And Zhao Pan, seeing Luo Ji, was filled with self-reproach at this moment.
“It was my negligence for not being able to deal with the intruders in time.”
Looking at the self-reproaching Zhao Pan, Luo Ji waved his hand.
“It’s not your fault.”
“Tell me the specific situation.”
Zhao Pan had clearly organized his thoughts long ago, and he spoke in an orderly manner.
This was exactly what Luo Ji admired about him.
Simply put, other barbarians had appeared around the Mirror Tribe, but the other party was clearly also cautious and did not take any further action.
After being discovered, they turned and ran away directly.
Zhao Pan had already sent a reconnaissance team member to follow their footprints, wanting to see if they could follow the trail and find the location of those barbarians’ camp.
Luo Ji nodded in approval of Zhao Pan’s response.
It would be too passive if the other party knew their location while their camp remained unknown.
“Has that reconnaissance soldier returned?”
Luo Ji asked subconsciously.
“Not yet.”
Zhao Pan shook his head.
“Okay, I understand.”
“You’ve worked hard these past few days.”
“Go back to your tent and rest early.”
Since making the animal hide water skins and dried meat, the time reconnaissance soldiers spent on missions outside had significantly increased.
Occasionally not returning for a night was not considered strange.
Luo Ji was not particularly worried.
After all, they were already experienced veterans.
Perhaps their individual combat ability was limited, but their ability to protect themselves in the wilderness was quite excellent.
Comparatively, Zhao Pan’s mental state worried him more.
Looking at those eyes that clearly had dark circles, Luo Ji knew in his heart that with something like this happening, Zhao Pan had definitely not slept well these past two days.
So, after understanding the situation, he quickly told Zhao Pan to go rest.
After Zhao Pan left, Luo Ji let out a long sigh.
He knew very well where the problem lay.
Their tribe only had eighteen warriors in total.
Three were guarding the Black Rock Tribe, three were guarding the Mirror Tribe, and the remaining twelve had all gone out on the expedition with him.
This directly resulted in the three warriors within the Mirror Tribe, including Zhao Pan, being simply insufficient to handle the patrolling duties.
With too few people patrolling, efficiency would decrease, and the security level of the tribe’s periphery would weaken.
Barbarians from other tribes might then stumble in by mistake and discover the location of the Mirror Tribe.
The solution to this problem was quite simple, but also really quite troublesome.
Their tribe needed to create an independent patrol team, just like the police in his modern society.
But they were short on manpower everywhere.
Farming had to develop, fishing couldn’t stop, coal was also an important resource, and defensive structures went without saying.
Considering this special situation, to save manpower, Luo Ji usually assigned the patrolling duties to the warriors in the tribe.
While one part trained, the other patrolled, maintaining a cyclical model.
However, under this system, if they needed to go on an expedition, the patrol team’s duties couldn’t be covered.
But to avoid this, specifically establishing another patrol team would be wasteful at this crucial juncture, given the tribe’s early development and severe manpower shortages.
He had to make a choice.
Should he sacrifice a portion of the labor force in exchange for more stable patrol efficiency and make the tribe safer, or should he preserve the labor force and let the tribal warriors continue to handle patrolling?
After all, they didn’t need to go out on expeditions often, and for the vast majority of the time, they could handle both.
He was a bit conflicted, but not too anxious yet.
After all, they had just returned, and the 30+ people they had just taken in hadn’t been integrated yet.
He didn’t plan to make any new moves in the short term.
At the same time, Luo Ji had already somewhat prepared himself for the exposure of the Mirror Tribe’s location.
With such a large tribe, they couldn’t possibly remain hidden forever and not be discovered by anyone.
Before, he was just dragging things out, holding the mindset of keeping it hidden for as long as possible.
Exposing their location was only a matter of time.
That was why he was so eager to build city walls and defensive structures, precisely to deal with this situation.
And now, it could only be said that the time had come.
Having just gone through the low temperature ordeal a while ago, at this time, every tribe was likely sending people out to find food or new settlements.
This also increased the chance and risk of various tribes discovering each other’s locations.
Luo Ji believed their tribe was definitely not the first.
Until the reconnaissance soldier returned to the tribe and reported the situation to him, Luo Ji could not make a further decision.
He could only first strengthen the patrol and guard around the tribal camp and respond to whatever came their way.
At the same time, he also didn’t forget to open his attribute panel and check the changes in various points.
Because he had previously established a ‘Surname System’ cultural project, every member of their tribe with a formal name had a chance to contribute one point of culture points every day, which was what he called self-production and self-consumption.
But this self-production and self-consumption project would cause the system notification in his mind to keep beeping when he was lucky, which was very annoying, you know?
Especially when Luo Ji was previously sick from the cold and feeling dizzy and disoriented, the feeling of the system notification constantly beeping made his head ache terribly.
So, he tried to turn off the system notification, and it turned out he could do it.
And after that, he didn’t plan to turn it back on.
At worst, he would check it every two or three days, or every night before sleeping.
Moreover, compared to the pain of slowly accumulating points one by one, he preferred the feeling of surprise he got when he remembered to check it after a while and suddenly discovered he had earned a lot of points.
For example, right now…
