Chapter 415: A Blog With Mentions
Dom awoke, the sky still dark outside his room in Kai’s Manor on the Central University Campus. He removed his headset and sat on the side of his bed for a few moments, his mind still thinking about Meritamen’s comments. He shook his head for a second, part of him thinking that if Meritamen was on his Aunt’s list then his choice would be much easier. He listened to the silence outside, neither Kai or Andrew making any noise themselves.
He looked at the time and saw that it was 2:00am, he had five to six hours until he had to wake up, but he was already feeling refreshed. He knew that GoldenSun’s blog wouldn’t be live yet and decided that he would try and sleep regardless for a few hours. He lay with his eyes closed, a strange feeling that he didn’t have the comfortable headset surrounding him.
Dom thought thought about the last couple of days and the Battle of Mycale that he was involved in, he knew that he had a great kingdom growing, but part of him regretted not trying to persuade Leotychides to join him. He also couldn’t believe the size of the Kingdom that he was founding, but with every day of growth a new problem arrived. They had enemies to the south with the Papaver, enemies to the west with the Type 3’s and who ever else was in that area. The only place that was currently calm was the north, and even there he had the two cities of Fort Bronze and Santa Bronce that lay on Tongpai Lake.
Soon he fell asleep, a short time passing before his eyes snapped open, more in shock that he had fallen asleep than anything else. He found it strange, he dreamt, a dream he hadn’t dreamt in a long time. He had been stood outside a familiar cottage, with ivy climbing the walls and a small plume of smoke escaping the old chimney that sat atop it. The grass was freshly cut, with flowers in full bloom. Butterflies and bees flew around, whilst the sound of birds could be heard in a tall tree that had been in the ground for hundreds of years even before the cottage had been built.
His mother was waiting for him, her recognisable smile and the same mouse brown hair on her head that Dom had. She wore her Military Uniform, the last thing he saw her wearing as she stood watching him from beneath the open porchway.
His father was also there, tall and imposing, his face still hidden by a branch from the cherry blossom tree that stood near them, a much younger tree that his mothers father had planted in his own youth. Dom felt his hands being squeezed tightly, seeing that this time he had Meritamen beside him on the left and Sun Shangxiang on the right, both wearing modern clothes that he would see many of the women wear around the campus.
"If only." He mumbled to himself as he checked the time. It was now 6:00am and he decided he would get up, bathe and sit down stairs and wait for the other two. He headed to the shower and raised his arm to move the shower head slightly, as it was currently facing against the white tiled wall, rather than in the centre as he wanted. When he lifted his arm though, a slight shooting pain could be felt, it was only minor but when he looked at his shoulder it looked fine.
"Phantom pain?" He thought to himself, after having an arrow wound in the same shoulder in the game. Dom had read about other players experiencing similar things and hoped that it wouldn’t be something that lasted. He knew that Andrew had met DragonKnight123 who had died a few times during the game now and wondered how he felt after those incidents.
After bathing, he put on a set of new clothes that he had ordered, a plain white shirt and black pants for his first day. He also wore a black belt and black shoes, trying to put a good impression in with his new lecturers. After dressing, he headed downstairs where he was surprised to see that Kai was already sat, eating some food and reading from a book.
"Morning Dom." Kai said with a tired smile, noticing his arrival. Kai was always the first up, normally followed by Andrew with Dom way behind. However, since the game had been released and their bodies slept whilst they played, his time keeping had improved.
"Are you doing ok?" Dom asked, seeing Kai’s expression and was expecting him to be more jovial after his success in game.
"My brother was at the Battle of Lize and died." Kai began, "Obviously it wasn’t a real death, neither did he or any of his men die as they were all returned home after the battle. However, my mother has messaged and he supposedly logged out and was screaming. He felt like he had actually died, he had bled out on the battlefield amongst his men and thought it was the end."
"It’s a very realistic game." Dom agreed, his shoulder still aching.
"It is, but at times a bit too realistic." Kai nodded in agreement as he looked back at his device. "Thankfully we won, by a lot. It seems GoldenSun’s blog has just been posted as well."
"We did Kai, with the three of us, we make an excellent team." Dom reassured, as Kai seemed to be having a moment of doubt about something that Dom didn’t see to be able to understand. He walked to the cupboard and grabbed himself a box of cereal, before pouring it in to a bowl and filling it with milk from the fridge. He then sat beside Kai and opened his own device and scrolled to GoldenSun’s Blog.
[GoldenSun here, with a blog full of surprises.
Obviously, the first big shock is the game shut down, which meant that I had a few extra hours to compile all of this information together. However, what the shut down is for is leaving many guessing.
Some have assumed it could be for maintenance as the game is so large and has been running none stop since launch, others say a big update is coming that is going to expand the map and unlock new areas. One of those areas could be the Southern Continent which is still hidden away by the giant wall, but I doubt we’ll see that just yet.
Regardless, the game has been so much fun and the recent battles proved it. The Battle of Lize, Battle of Plataea, Battle of Mycale and the Clash with the Veii have all lived up to their expectations from what I have heard and seen.
I wanted to start with the Battle of Lize as it seems to have been the biggest Battle of the four, however the rankings from the four battles were released and as many of you would have seen, their is a clearly confusing stat. So confusing, and from the accounts we have received, impactful.
The Top Player at both the Battle of Mycale and the Battle of Plataea is the same person, Lazarus! Now Lazarus is currently the top Lord Class Player and ranked Third in the overall Rankings, however I am sure after these top places that may change. Now how does one Player become the top Player at two different Maps?
Well, Mycale and Plataea are geographically in the same area, I have done some research and it is possible that the Map could have been connected to be at both battles. The key question here is how did he have an impact in both? So I have reached out to the key Players at those battlefields that I have spoken with before. GeneralSlaughter says that he didn’t meet Lazarus at the Battle of Mycale, but some of his forces had been captured by him, so Lazarus was at Mycale. Where as DragonKnight123 who came third in the rankings at Plataea said that he didn’t see Lazarus, but he did meet an NPC General who served Lazarus.
I asked DragonKnight123 who the NPC was, but he has refused to tell us as the forces that helped him were fair and he wouldn’t want to betray a potential future allies support. What was interesting though was that DragonKnight123 did say that the second placed Player Black Hawk was also working for Lazarus. Now Black Hawk was very low in the previous rankings, even though he was ranked which is an achievement of it’s own, so how did his rankings in this battle jump so high, above much higher ranked players. It is also probably a good sign for other Lord Players to recruit other Players to work for them.
DragonKnight123 explained that their forces were extremely organised and that they seemed to have the ear of the Greek Alliance Commanders. The NPC General supposedly orchestrated an ambush of the Player Cavalry, which turned the whole battle in the favour of the Greeks at an early stage. He hasn’t gone in to too much detail, but you can tell that even if Lazarus himself hadn’t attended, his forces had and that was enough. But, this also means that he must have split his forces upon arrival at the Battle he chose and even with that he still won at both.
I tried reaching out to the second place Player at the Battle of Mycale Hungry Dragon, however I have had no luck. None on the Persian side saw him, but I have had some feedback from some on the Athenian side. Upon arrival, Lazarus had his General Crassus purchase ships from the Players. I need to explain three parts of this. The first part is that Lazarus had two ships, a Trireme and a Quinquereme, both which were equipped with Ballista. This makes these terrifying ships more technically advanced to what most people have got so far.
Secondly, they purchased ships and from the sound of it, they had a lot of gold to do so. Every Player who fought on the Greek side at Mycale has come back richer than when they left, if they were involved in the fight or not. The pockets of Lazarus sound deep and I wonder if he’ll be interested in buying some of the tools I have recently made in my Blacksmith Apprenticeship in Nineveh
Thirdly, this is the first Hero of Lazarus we have heard the name off, Crassus. For those that do not know, Crassus is most likely Marcus Licinius Crassus the Roman Senator. Crassus has to be at least an A grade based on his influence on history, but he was also one of the richest men in history. This isn’t just a Hero that can lead men or help his government, this is someone that can change the whole flow of an Empire.
Now, I did get a message from the third place Player GiantWrangler, who refused to tell me any more information about Lazarus, other than he was an exceptional Leader, his forces were immense and that if they ever come across each other on the battlefield he will surrender immediately, and advises that anyone else does the same. GiantWrangler explained that after a tactical Naval Battle that was won overwhelmingly, they rested before attacking the Mountain Fort at Mycale from three directions, using the terrain to their advantage and a fire attack to cause confusion in the camp. He also said that whilst Lazarus has GeneralSlaughter’s ship, he has his armour if he wants to try and take it back.
I am not sure who Lazarus is, but from what we know, not only are his forces vast and skilled, he himself has his own strengths. It will be interesting to see the next set of Rankings and if he is still third, I worry about how powerful first and second are.
The Clash with the Veii was as we expected, very much a Player vs Player battle, which was between the Roman Fabii Family and the Etruscan City of Veii. However, due to the number of Players on both sides and the historic knowledge, the Etruscans won and defeated the Roman’s. I believe that the First place Player at that battle, Prince Dong Cheng made some successful recruitments, with other top Players BiscuitLover212 himself also making his way in to the top three.
The biggest Battle, both with numbers of Players and NPC’s was the Battle of Lize. The Battle of Lize was the clash of Yue vs Wu, where Yue demolished the Wu forces and eventually soon after this battle were able to conquer Wu in totality. Some key Players were on the Leaderboard, with RisingMoonQueen, Dawn Destroyer and VladInvader96 all taking up the top three places. The only Top ranked five Players that wasn’t seen in any of the top rankings were Golden Lion and Dragoon.]
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