World Conquest Online

Dom received the small package from Gan Ning and quickly opened it up, inside was a chunk of metal armour, burn marks stained it’s surface and the initial glean had faded. It was clearly an older piece of armour, and due to the fire damage this piece had easily been snapped from it’s original wider self. Dom passed it to Subutai, who also had a look at the item.

"I pulled this from the body of one of the burnt corpses that had armour on like you asked, we found another three bodies similar. With one in particular wearing a better set than the rest, that corpse was very close to the Town Centre and I believe it was taken down by a falling building." Gan Ning started, "We have brought a collection of bodies back and gave them to Hua Tou to look through, Xun You has been assisting."

"You have done well." Dom commented, "Were you able to have a thorough search?"

"We were able to check a lot of the Town, but some areas are too dangerous. We had a couple of close calls." Gan Ning laughed, "Personally I would rather not return there for a long time, the scenes inside are horrific. Xun You has another surprise for you."

"Where is Xun You?" Dom asked as he looked around, not seeing the Strategist whilst everyone had gathered in the Town Hall. His main higher grade group now taking seats at the tops of the tables, loud chatter from everywhere as they all excitedly spoke in groups. Some of them meeting for the first time.

"He’s there." Subutai said as he pointed at the doors, Xun You had just walked in, a package in his hand and an exhausted look on his face. He made his way past the Elite Villagers that were taking seats a bit further down and pushed past his cousin Xun Yu who was still chatting with Crassus.

"Hey Xun You, Are you ok?" Dom asked as Xun You reached them, releasing a big exhale as he did, his eyes dark from a clear lack of sleep.

"I am, we went through as many bodies as we could and realised a pattern." Xun You began, as he handed Dom the package in his hand, "We have clearly discovered at least three class types from the enemy. Those with armour are definitely the leaders and held items on their person, we found a map similar to the one in the forest on one of them. On the second leaders body, which was severely burnt, we found some human trophies, I’m not sure you want to hear more about them. The third one had these items on him, and we believe he is the leader."

Dom opened the package and felt the small cube shapes inside, his eagerness to look was paused as he allowed Xun You to continue. Subutai glanced down at the package in Dom’s hands and his eyes widened, followed by a large smile on his face.

"The second group we believe are the warrior class, these were mainly the archers, and a handful of more trained warriors. They were more slender and they had better muscle definition than the third group. Their clothing was slightly better and it was clear they fed better, primarily they had much better razor sharp teeth. We believe the one caught in the Silver Forest is off this type. The final group is the group that held a wide range of weapons, their clothing was worn and they seemed to fight with very little intelligence, more like a wild beast." Xun You continued, "Our thoughts are that the first group are the Leaders and Heroes, the second group are the Warrior class and the third would be the Civilian type class."

"Not a third type of Warrior class?" Subutai questioned, his eyes leaving the cubes in Dom’s hand.

"No, I don’t think so." Xun You replied, "If you look at a group of Ants, all of the Ants can fight, but you have your Queen, your Soldiers and your Workers. The Queen or the Heroes in this case are the intelligent ones, the Soldiers are the Hunters who have some form of intelligence. The Workers are the final type, who follow the trails of those in front and have very little in the form of intelligence."

Dom thought back to the earlier battle, his mind flashing back and thinking of how the different enemies had attacked in different ways. The armoured Warrior had stayed back, the Archers clearly taking their time to target Riverside’s forces and those that did attack using other weapons blocked and defended themselves, whilst the final group attacked recklessly and swarmed.

"It makes sense." Dom stated, as his mind was thinking, "We definitely need to do more research in to these. I’ll leave that to you and Hua Tou though!"

"Please do, we are confident the weapons for the third group are scavenged. This is a worry thought though as that is a lot of weapons gathered." Xun You concluded.

Dom agreed with Xun You’s conclusion, they would need to thoroughly search the Forest, and hopefully find the other Town that was marked on the enemies Map they had found originally. He pushed those thoughts from his mind for now as he finally looked down at the cubes in his hand, surprised and excited by what he saw. There were four Green Cubes, which were used as building spawners. Unlike the usual ones that Dom had collected, either through missions, conquest or finding them, these ones all had varying levels of damage. He suspected the damage was from the fire, but he wasn’t confident. Dom quickly checked their stats.

Green Cube - Building Spawner - Town Centre Spawner - Grade C - Minor Damage

Green Cube - Building Spawner - Beast Hall

Green Cube - Building Spawner - Warriors Hall - Serious Damage

Green Cube - Building Spawner - Prison - Serious Damaged

"Have you looked at what these are?" Dom asked Xun You, surprised by the items that the enemy had carried with them.

"No, but I suspect that these are either rewards of their own, or a trophy, similar to the human remains that the other leader carried with him." Xun You replied honestly.

"The items are a Beast Hall, Warriors Hall, Prison and finally a new Town Centre!" Dom exclaimed, rather loudly so that some of those sat down turned to see what was being discussed. "But all but the Beast Hall are damaged."

"That would mean that my earlier hypothesis that they have three types would make sense." Xun You said excitedly. "The Leaders and Villagers from the Town Centre and the Warriors from the Warriors Hall. We didn’t see any Beast related units though, so that is a worry. I am unsure on the benefits of a Prison."

"Maybe they used the Prison to store their captives." Subutai replied, "Possibly a holding pen if they saw us as a food option. We’ll need to add Beasts as something to look out for when scouting."

"If that is the case, why did they take the buildings with them?" Dom questioned seriously.

"Maybe they are nomadic?" Gan Ning questioned, "There are plenty of nomadic tribes."

"Or they could be running from something far worse than themselves?" Subutai joked.

"Can we use these Building Spawn cubes, like we did with those from the Underground Ancient City?" Gan Ning asked seriously, changing the conversation quickly, hoping that there wasn’t anything worse than these. Other Humans were hard enough, let alone strange human like creatures.

"I hope so!" Dom replied, also happy to move the conversation on, as he asked the System.

[Town Centre Spawner is usable, however it will be downgraded from C to D due to the damage level.

The Beast Hall is useable, would you like to spawn it now?]

"No thank you!" Dom replied to the system quickly, which caused Subutai, Gan Ning and Xun You to look at him questioningly.

[The Warriors Hall is beyond repair and is unusable.

The Prison is beyond repair and is unusable.

Would you like to merge unusable spawners, to create a new spawner?]

"Yes please!" Dom replied, some positive having come out of this. He wondered what would happen with the Warriors Hall and the Prison merging together.

[New Building Spawner has been placed in Players Chest]

"The Beast Hall is usable, as is the Town Centre!" Dom exclaimed. "The others aren’t, but we have other rewards to check."

"That means, with the Tongpai Town Centre Spawner and this one, we have two new Towns that we can create!" Xun You replied happily. "This is great news and allows us to progress our strategies."

"Something to add to the discussion list then." Subutai stated, equally as happy as Xun You. Subutai then directed Dom to his chair as everyone was now looking at him, as if waiting for a speech. Dom folded the cubes back in to the pouch and headed towards his seat. He was surprised to see that Meritamen hadn’t sat in her seat beside him, but was stood with Hatshepsut and Shang Yang instead.

He proudly looked down from his seat at the Heroes and Elite Villagers of Riverside, who together had helped him get to this stage of the game in a short period of time. Not only was he the number one Lord Player, but he felt that with the success of this campaign, they could grow from strength to strength.

"Thank you all for gathering." Dom started, looking at Lucius who was giving him positive encouragement from his seat beside Crassus and Xun Yu. "We have come from a huge victory, Riverside’s first large scale excursion, where we have rescued the residents of Tongpai Town from an impending doom, and strengthened our own enterprise in doing so."

Dom turned and looked towards the surviving Tongpai Leadership that had joined Riverside. Da Qiao who was sat with Thucydides and a couple of people he didn’t recognise from Tongpai Town. She smiled at him in thanks, where as those beside Thucydides seemed impressed to be sat in the grandness of the Great Hall.

"With this, we have turned a page in the journey of Riverside. We will count our rewards and rest our troops. Our next step is to settle our new residents, strengthen our borders and make Riverside in to our own Region within this huge world." Dom continued. "Please raise a glass of the lovely drinks brewed by Peruda and drink in celebration of this victory."

The guests did as ordered, taking a sip of Peruda’s special drink, a proud look on her own face as she sat amongst some of the other Elite Villagers such as Herpatya and Helena. Further from her, Key Villagers such as Wang Shu and Lars gladly drank together, proudful smiles beaming on their faces as the first Villagers to join Riverside, their families instrumental in it’s quick construction. Closer to Dom he watched as his Centurions, who had arrived whilst he had been speaking with Xun You, proudly stood together. Alexander, Banas and Octavian at the front of the Centurions, the original leadership within his military ranks.

"My final word to you all, is Thank you." Dom said honestly, pride in his own heart at what they had created. He took a sip himself, the flavour warm and fruity as it rushed down his throat. He would spend some time with them, before checking his Rewards and getting some sleep. After his next log in, he would have a very busy few days both in the game and reality.