Translator: ryangohsff Editor: Nora
Chapter 818 – Satellite City Battle
Jianye, Snow-War Rose Mercenary Group Headquarters.
Similar to Shanhai City, Jianye was in a holiday mood. During the Lantern Festival, Gaia also pushed out events to liven up the mood.
After all the festivities, not just the square, even the streets were littered with garbage.
Although there were no people on the streets, there were many lanterns leading the way. Ouyang Shuo and his men walked out of the teleportation formation and smoothly arrived at the base of Snow-War Rose Mercenary Group.
Three thousand odd men walked the streets, bringing with them large amounts of equipment. Despite their load, they travelled in total silence.
As tomorrow was the Satellite City battle, the Snow-War Rose Mercenary Group was in a tense mood. The moment Ouyang Shuo and his men arrived, they were seen by the guards who immediately reported their arrival.
When she saw Ouyang Shuo, Lin Jing was astonished, “Little Shuo, it’s so late, why are you here?”
Ouyang Shuo looked out at the streets and said quietly, “Let’s talk inside!” On the way here, he could feel that there were people monitoring the headquarters.
This served to further prove Ouyang Shuo’s conjecture.
Noticing Ouyang Shuo’s unusual expression, Lin Jing immediately knew the severity of the situation.
Entering the base, Lin Jing arranged for people to welcome the Divine Martial Guards and Personal Guards while she led Ouyang Shuo to the office. Xie Siyun also came after getting the news.
“Little Shuo what happened?” Lin Jing asked.
Ouyang Shuo did not know where to start. After all, Silver Hand going up against them was his personal conjecture, and he did not have any proof.
“You are all going to war tomorrow, so I brought a batch of equipment over.”
Lin Jing felt that something was up, “Are you okay? Sending equipment so late at night?”
Xie Siyun smiled to dissolve the awkwardness, “Where can we find such good stuff?”
“What equipment is there?” Lin Jing asked.
Ouyang Shuo said, “100 Three-bowed arcuballistas, five thousand God-arm Crossbows.”
Lin Jing smiled too, “Rich!”
It was not convenient for him to stay for too long, so he said directly, “I received intel that in the battle tomorrow, people will target you. You must all be well prepared. The opponent is difficult, and they might be targeting me.”
Lin Jing and Xie Siyun exchanged glances, seeing the solemnness in the other’s eyes.
Jokes were jokes but they were extremely clear that Ouyang Shuo was not a person who would randomly spout things. This late night visit definitely meant that things had reached a truly dangerous level.
To make the current Ouyang Shuo worry, how strong was the enemy?
Lin Jing nodded seriously, “Ok, since it is not convenient for you to say it, I will not ask. With this batch of items, we have another layer of reserves. No matter what schemes they try, we will win.”
Ouyang Shuo got up, “Then I’ll take my leave.”
He had reminded them of what he could. What happened in the battle tomorrow would depend on the two of them.
The Battle of the Satellite Cities was one that Lords could not directly interfere in.
Leaving the equipment, Ouyang Shuo brought his men and hurried out of the camp.
…
In one of the small alleys, right next to the headquarters, stood two men dressed in black.
Seeing Ouyang Shuo walk out of the gates, one of them sad, “That’s right, it’s Qiyue Wuyi. What is he doing here so late at night?”
“How would I know?” the other person said.
“Then did he find out about us?”
“That’s not possible. Maybe what happened at Dali made him suspicious, so he wanted to remind them. Based on Di Chen’s words, he is an old fox.”
“Then should we take the chance to take him out?”
“How? Can’t you see that there are so many guards beside him? Even if we ambush them, we cannot keep them here. This person is really careful, coming out so late and still bringing so many guards.”
“What careful, he just does not have guts.”
“No matter what, let’s just not alert him. Let’s go!”
After a short while, the two of them disappeared into the darkness.
************
Gaia 4th year, 2nd month, 14th day.
9 AM, the nine imperial cities made an announcement at the same time.
“Imperial City Notification: to split up the players for the exploration of the mysterious underground world, a Satellite City will be released. Anyone who obtains the token and stabs it into the Lord’s Manor meeting room will obtain the defending rights of the city. 24 hours later, the other guilds can attack the Satellite City. If one can defend the city for the 24 hours, they will obtain the permanent rights; if the guild destroys the stone steele, similarly, they will obtain permanent rights.”
…
Along with the notification, a golden light shone outside the nine imperial cities. Like the mushroom cloud of a nuclear bomb explosion, the golden light rushed into the sky. Even if you were thousands of miles away, you would be able to see the light clearly.
When the golden light passed, nine new cities stood in the wilderness.
Each city was tens of miles wide. Be it the city walls or the buildings inside, they were simplified versions of the imperial cities. Even so, they were brilliant and majestic cities.
Many Lords could not help but drool when they saw these cities.
Many prefecture grade cities in the wilderness could not even reach the standards of the Satellite City.
Just one city was worth tens of millions, so it was no wonder that guilds would go crazy over them.
Of course, based on the details revealed by Gaia, the guild defending the Satellite City would only have the rights to use and lease the city and not all the rights.
The guardian guild of the city was like the manager, and they would be in charge of running it and could earn profits through rent, tax, and the like.
Furthermore, half of the profits must be handed over to the imperial city. Of course, the imperial city would not just take the profits for free, and they had the duty to protect the safety of the Satellite City.
If wilderness Lords chose to attack a Satellite City, it would be like attacking the related imperial city.
Hence, it first increased the security of the Satellite City. If not, it would be a dangerous piece of meat and the Lords would risk everything for it.
If that was the case, no guardian guild would be able to defend it.
Speaking of which, as the winner of the Satellite City Guardian position was permanent, and since it was already the 4th year, whether or not the Guardian had all the rights did not make too much of a difference.
There were two reasons behind Gaia setting those rules.
First, as guilds did not have all the rights to the Satellite City, Gaia would not include it in their assets when the game ends.
That was normal. After all, if a guild was able to obtain a city like that from one battle, not only would other players be unhappy, it would also be unfair to the Lords.
Which Lord territory was not slowly built up from nothing to something?
Secondly, the guilds would not have the rights to use the city as collateral. Hence, the guild would not be able to pass the city on to others or use it as collateral to earn loans.
Hence, it prevented players from playing tricks.
As the battle for the Satellite City had not begun, Gaia had not revealed anything regarding the underground world. Who knows whether it was a teleportation formation or an actual tunnel?
If it were an actual tunnel, would situations where the monsters inside attacked occur?
Who could enter the underground world was not revealed either. Would one need the permission from the guardian or could all imperial city players enter? Would there be entrance fees or the like?
All of these matters would be slowly revealed once the dust settled.
…
Based on what was revealed, the battle would be split into two stages.
The first stage would be to find the token and break through all resistance to stick it into the meeting hall of the Lord’s Manor to become its temporary owner.
After which, all players who were not from the guardian guild would be teleported out.
The defending guild had a day to prepare and form up their defenses. At the same time, the city would spawn NPCs to help them defend the city.
Of course, there would not be too many of these NPCs as the main force would still be the guild players.
The second stage would be the intense war.
One guild defending, while the others attacked.
The guilds that lost in the first stage would have lost the initiative. Hence, in the second stage, they would go all out to attack to try and grasp that last chance.
What matters now was strategy.
The defending guild would want to gather allies and ask them not to attack. As for asking them to help defend, Gaia did not allow that.
To the seining guilds, it was even more complicated. Not only did they have to cooperate with other guilds to siege, but they also need to be wary of one another or come to agreements, even signing contracts.
After all, even if they took down the Satellite City, only one guild could destroy the stone steele. Facing such a huge temptation, one would not know what would happen till the end.
At the same time, due to the uncertainty of the first stage, the siege of the nine cities would not start at the same time. Hence, Gaia would confirm the guilds participating in each city and seal all the teleportation formations.
During this battle, wanderers that were not a part of the involved guilds could not join in the first stage or the second.
Hence, they would be able to restrict the number of variables. Gaia did not wish for the overall standard of the wilderness to drop because of too great an intense of killing.
At that very moment, another notification sounded out.
“Imperial City Notification: Satellite City Token will spawn into a random player’s hand. Player cannot put the token into their storage bag. If the player holding the token dies, the token will definitely drop. Every 10 minutes, the system will automatically reveal its coordinates.”
…
At this point, the most brutal battle of the New Year had begun.