World Conquest Online

Dom headed downstairs, seeing that both Subutai and Shang Yang were sat waiting for him, having a conversation of their own. Dom didn’t think he had taken that long changing and checking his rewards, but seemingly he had taken longer than he thought.

"If I had thirteen thousand Horse Archers I would feel more comfortable, we have a lot of land to cover and our forces aren’t fast or mobile enough. When ten thousand of our forces march on foot, it is not possible to react." Subutai complained to Shang Yang, as Dom paused on the stairs as they continued their discussion.

"Yet, we do not have enough people creating food to support the population we currently have, let alone more warriors who eat even more than the standard man or woman. You gained another two thousand horses from the recent campaign, use them as you see fit but you can’t recruit from the general populace at the moment." Shang Yang replied to him, the two of them having a high level of respect for each other, but Dom seemed to have walked in on a conversation he wasn’t expecting.

"I have already tasked Masistius to work with Centurion Phillip and the Biaotian Cavalry that they brought back, to train some of the Hoplite and Persians that have arrived. Hopefully we can have a thousand light flanking Cavalry with a spare horse each as a fast reaction group." Subutai continued, almost ignoring Shang Yang’s disagreement with him. "But that leaves us with a couple hundred heavy Lancers, around a thousand of Zhao Yun’s White Riders and nearly a thousand Horse Archers after Banas’s recent outreach with Crassus."

"I understand Subutai, but you will need to wait for the daily allocations or until we have both enough food production and enough spare Civilian capacity." Shang Yang stated, his tone surprisingly friendly as he turned towards the stairs. "How long are you going to stand there?"

"I didn’t want to interrupt." Dom replied with a shrug as he could see a sly smile on the side of Subutai’s face signifying that he had also been aware of Dom’s arrival but had wanted to get his words out so Dom could hear, whilst Shang Yang had been aware and had allowed it to continue. It was a strange experience as he noticed their was a dynamic behind the scenes that he wasn’t aware of.

"You are never interrupting." Shang Yang explained, "You asked for us to meet you here, which must be important with the celebrations about to commence below."

"I did, I did not want to tell everyone at once but a few things have changed for us since the Kingdom has been founded. Firstly we can manage daily spawns centrally and re-allocate them as we wish. We can also give better control to Governors on their area management. I haven’t done much research yet but I can look in to it later." Dom began, but Shang Yang paused him for a moment.

"Give some of the responsibilities to Lucius and let him try them out." Shang Yang recommended before looking to Subutai who seemed to want to say something.

"We can move the Noctus allocation away from it, that makes our secretive side of it easier to manage. We had farmers arrive there the other day and they had to be moved to another Town. Whilst the Kingdom is aware of Noctus, we still want to keep the inner workings quiet." Subutai explained, with both Dom and Shang Yang agreeing.

"We also received a large amount of rewards, some resource cubes, an Elite Unit and four Animal Husbandries. We also received a new perk that upgrades Husbandries." Dom began as Shang Yang and Subutai listened to him. "We also received two Building Cubes, one specified it was Legendary. We also received two Golden Tokens and an Agricultural Hero Cube."

"Whilst all of that is great news, especially the Agricultural Hero, I feel all of these could have waited until after the Celebration Dinner, so what is the reason you called us?" Shang Yang asked, reminding Dom of the reason he was panicking slightly earlier.

"Eruthros will be attacked in five days from the west. Who ever is attacking us is someone new and not related to our previous Battles I believe." Dom explained as Shang Yang and Subutai looked at him in surprise.

"So it is not Papaver or the Type 3’s?" Subutai asked him as he looked to the ceiling and closed his eyes.

"As far as I am aware, supposedly they have been watching us for a while." Dom explained, as Shang Yang stroked his chin.

"How much they have watched is a question though." Shang Yang replied calmly, "If their sight is only on Eruthros then it is a smaller risk, as a smaller force could take that City at the moment. If it is on Eruthros and Riverside then it is medium risk, Riverside is large and well defended so they will be confident in their forces but most of our army is elsewhere and they wouldn’t have seen it. If their sight is on our North in totality then it is a large risk, mainly as they will be aware of our Naval Strength and if they are confident against that then we need to put measures in place."

"But, if they are aware of our entire Kingdom, both North and South, then the risk is high." Subutai said, finishing Shang Yang’s point as he seemed to be thinking the same thing. "If they have the confidence after seeing our army fight, then we need to reinforce the border immediately."

"I also received a quest to learn about them before they attack. I agree with you both, if it is the last option then we may need to look at preparing the Underground Cities for partial evacuation for some of the residents." Dom replied, also worrying about the situation. "If they have known about us for a while, they could have infiltrated us."

"Possible but doubtful." Shang Yang replied seriously, "Every new arrival is counted and registered straight away. This has been dealt with seriously so as to not risk a Bagoas type of infiltration. The only time we have brought people here outside of that were when we took Tongpai Town and the prisoners in Noctus. Everyone else is from the Quests or Battle Map."

"The people from Tongpai are unlikely to be spies, and if they are then they were playing an extremely long game and their intelligence is unmatched." Subutai added, before a reassuring tone appeared. "Those from Noctus have been monitored closely since arrival, if they are spies they went through a very risky ordeal and made a wild assumption that we would rescue them on that specific day."

"They could have sent many through Noctus and only needed one to survive to infiltrate us, but I do agree, the chances are very small. It is most likely viewing us from afar." Shang Yang agreed as he pondered for a moment. "Ling Tong has had ships exploring the second path on the Calm River to the West, they haven’t reported anything as of yet."

"We haven’t explored the land to the west much, we expanded south a lot faster than anticipated because of the Papaver attack. Otherwise we were mainly on exploration mode." Dom added as Subutai stood up.

"I will pass messages to our Generals. Cheng Pu can send some of his men under Sun Ce to Eruthros, Ling Tong can borrow Su Fei’s Louchuan as weapons platform beside Eruthros. I will also have Zhao Yun bring most of the Cavalry from the Southern Units with Liao Hua’s Infantry to as well." Subutai said, his plan coming out of his mouth as he thought it up. "I will also deploy Huang Zhong’s army, he is the defence army for a reason. I need to speak with Xun You, but I am sure he has already prepared tactics in case of a Western Assault on Eruthros"

"Xun You has a defence plan for most of the Cities in place." Shang Yang agreed, "It is a good opportunity for the new Generals to see how we fight. Thank you for passing the warning on so quickly, I will speak with Xun Yu and have him send enough food, arrows and other essentials for a potential siege."

"I would rather defeat them on the field than hide behind the walls, but I agree we should be prepared." Subutai stated as he made his way towards the stairs, "We should also evacuate any non essential Civilians from Eruthros as well."

"It’s Ling Tong’s Town, so I’ll let you pass that message on." Shang Yang agreed as he also stood up, looking towards Dom. "Come, we have guests to meet and a meal to have!"

.....

Dom entered the Hall at the Palace, where several long tables had been placed, with a top table waiting for him. Dom recognised all of his available Senior Heroes, some with their partners, as well as some of the Elite Villagers or Important Ones. Some of his Centurions were also seated, with the majority of the tables mixed, so that Civilians, Heroes and Military were all sat together. Andrew, Kai and Astrid were also sat down, with his two friends grinning at him as he entered.

The Top Table had Dom’s space in the centre, with Meritamen and her guests on his right, as well as some of the Senior Heroes, and Sun Shangxiang and hers on the left. Dom wasn’t sure if this was the formation of factions as Heroes such as Tomoe and Hatshepsut were sat near Meritamen, however Zhou Yu and Sun Ce were sat near Sun Shangxiang. Dom knew he needed to speak with all of them at some point, but for now he just wanted to rest after an emotionally long day and not think about anything else political related. He also wanted to let Andrew and Kai know about the upcoming Battle and to see how their conversations had gone with with the other Players that were in Riverside.

He took his seat, with Meritamen patting him on his leg as he sat down. Sun Shangxiang was in a wild conversation with Sun Ce about something, with Lu Su sat near them laughing in response. After he was seated, Ban Jieyu ordered the staff to begin serving the food, which ranged from spit roasted boar to wild birds and an array of vegetables and salad from the Riverside and Tranquillity farms.

"You did well today Husband." Meritamen praised him, her brother Khaemweset sat beside her as he looked at the crowd himself, and then down the table to a recognisable former Egyptian Pharoah.

"Thanks Meritamen, we have achieved what we had set out to achieve." Dom replied, holding in a slight yawn that was forming. Meritamen smiled at him, but her brother interupted them.

"Is that really Pharoah Hatshepsut?" Khaemweset asked them both, some awe in his voice.

"It is, she is in charge of the Cities growth across the Kingdom." Meritamen replied with a grin.

"You do realise that she died nearly two hundred years before father was born?" Khaemweset explained. "They tried to remove her from records but I found a lot and have restored most of it. Father was saying we should respect all of our predecessors and I have been trying to respect their legacies."

"You see that man over there." Meritamen said to her brother, pointing towards Ptolmey who was having a conversation with Xanthippus and Pausanias on one of the other tables. Dom thought it ironic that the Persian and Greek Heroes had been seated together. "He is the Pharoah nine hundred years after father!"

"This place is ridiculous." Khaemweset exclaimed as General Tau beside him took another sip of his wine, shaking his head at the conversation around him.

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