Read Novel Full Chapter 452: Strategy Discussion [I]
Chapter 452: Strategy Discussion [I]
Alexia was hunched over the grand stone table I had set up in the hollow heart of Ebony Castle.
Stomach clutched, she was making these breathless wheezing sounds that made me roll my eyes at her for the fifth time in as many minutes.
“I can’t!” the blind girl gasped, a dumb grin plastered on her face as she pounded a fist on the obsidian tabletop. “Someone really said, ‘We’re your maggots!’ Bwahaha! Oh Monarchs, I can’t! I knew you were a magnet for attracting weirdos, but you literally birthed a cult!”
She started laughing again. More hysterically this time.
“The funny thing is that he was trying so hard to be intimidating!” Michael roared, wiping a tear from his eye that told me he was equally amused by my psychological torment.
“Can you both please fuck off?” I growled, pinching the bridge of my nose as the echoes of their annoying giggles bounced off the cavernous walls.
“I wish Vince was here,” Ray chimed in with a chuckle, lounging on the steps leading up to the matte black throne. “I have so many merchandise ideas. He’d already drafted the copyright forms for ‘Samael’s Maggots: We can crawl, we can fly!’ It’s such a missed business opportunity!”
I grabbed my hair and realized I would have to kill them. I would have to kill these fools and side with the Spirit King.
Michael must’ve read the look on my face. He raised both his hands in mock surrender. “Hey, don’t look at us, Lord Tyrant. You’re the one who told hundreds of emotionally impressionable teenagers that you wanted to use their bodies!”
“I meant meat shields!” I yelled, wanting to strangle this guy.
“Same difference to a zealot,” Kang muttered from the far end of the table. Even his stoic face was straining to maintain a straight line.
His eyes, though, were studying a rough replica of the entire Simulation Isle I had carved into the stone from memory.
It was nowhere near perfect, but after hours of scouting, Kang had helped me fine-tune the details of at least our side of the river.
I let out a long, suffering sigh, forcing my pounding headache down into a small, dark corner of my mind. We had exactly eighteen hours left before the game officially went live.
“Okay, enough,” I said, firmly.
Alexia finally stopped, though her shoulders were still shaking with a few residual snickers and the ghost of a smile was yet to be wiped off her lips. She straightened up, her sightless eyes looking at nowhere in particular.
“Where is Julia, by the way?” Michael inquired, also sobering up as he leaned over the stone map.
“She was talking to some scouts,” I answered, unsure if it was her excuse to avoid me. The girl hadn’t even looked me in the eye since the night at Ray’s party. “She said to continue without her and that she’ll catch up later.”
“Okay, then. I’ll start by giving the layout,” Kang got up and dragged a callous finger along a thick groove on the map. “This is The Great Divide. It’s a big fucking river. The current is fast enough to easily capsize a standard transport boat. Crossing the waters without using the bridges means high-tier wind or water ability. Anything less won’t cut it.”
He tapped three distinct points along the groove where the carved river narrowed.
“The causeways,” Kang continued. “The only solid ground connecting the two halves of the island. A plane would fly along the length of the river and drop supply crates precisely in the dead center of these three bridges at noon every single day.”
Michael’s lips curled in distaste.
I shared the same sentiment.
Asking kids to fight over food and medicine like we were rabid dogs in a pit was a special kind of twisted.
But it guaranteed a bloodbath.
Which meant it guaranteed a massive spike in viewer ratings.
“As for the jurisdiction,” Kang nodded to bring our focus back. “The sectors for each piece are laid out in an alternating pattern along the riverbank. On our side, it goes as Rook, Knight, Bishop from east to west. Then the pieces repeat. Lady Thalia’s side mirrors ours perfectly, which means the territory of our East Rook directly faces the territory of her West Rook across the water.”
So it basically looked like this:
______________
[EBONY CASTLE]
(R1) (K1) (B1) (R2) (K2) (B2)
===================
~~~|| ~~~~~||~~~~ ||~~~ ← [GREAT DIVIDE]
===================
(R2) (K2) (B2) (R1) (K1) (B1)
[IVORY CASTLE]
______________
“Okay,” Alexia squinted. “I’ve never seen a chessboard, but this doesn’t sound very accurate.”
“It isn’t,” said Michael. “The alternate pattern is to ensure that if a Medallion is captured and a sector is claimed by the enemy, we can’t just quickly send in forces from an adjacent zone to flush them out.”
Alexia looked a little confused. “I don’t get it.”
Probably because she couldn’t study the map, it was a bit difficult for her to put together a picture in her mind.
So I explained, “If our East Rook (R1) falls, our West Rook (R2) can’t personally step into R1’s territory to help. Only the specific Pawns assigned to a Rook can cross into that sector. It completely isolates the frontlines.”
“So if I’m a Knight, and the Rook next to my territory is getting absolutely dog-walked by Thalia’s forces, I can’t just hop the fence and punch them?” Alexia asked, her finger tracing a meaningless circle in the air.
“Exactly,” I nodded, my leather-gloved hand resting on the carved stone. “On our side of the river, your Pawns can walk over to help them. They can move anywhere. But you, the Officer, are hard-locked by the forcefield. And if the enemy captures that Rook’s Medallion, they can gain access to that entire sector on our side. The only way to kick them out is to send the Rook Pawns to retake it, or wait for Phase Two to start when map restrictions are down.”
The blind girl blinked, scratched her head, and sighed. “I have decided I don’t like chess.”
•••
Kang continued to discuss the finer details of the geography, his rough fingers tracing the battlefield model every so often.
He talked about the dense rainforest that blanketed most of the island, where visibility dropped to only a few dozen meters unless you climbed up the trees.
Massive buttress roots and tangled undergrowth made large-scale troop movements slow and predictable, but offered endless opportunities for ambushes.
He also pointed out the elevated ridges overlooking each of the three bridges.
They acted as natural firing positions that could dominate the approaches if properly fortified.
Then he made us take note of some of the scattered clearings throughout the jungle where the terrain opened just enough for large-scale engagements.
Many smaller, thinner tributaries branched off from the central river.
They weren’t nearly as deep or tumultuous as the Great Divide, but they were still wide enough to break up formations and funnel advancing forces toward a handful of choke points.
“I wouldn’t underestimate these rivers. You can cross them,” Kang said, tapping many different locations. “But they’ll still dictate movement. If a few dozen people try forcing a crossing under enemy fire, they’ll bottleneck themselves. I’m assuming it’ll be the same on the other side.”
I was genuinely impressed by the mutt.
I knew he was one of the best scouts in the Academy, but to gather all this in mere hours was still astonishing.
Nodding, I was about to comment when there was a knock on the door.
They creaked open. A sheepish young man peeked inside. “U-Um, Lord Samael?”
“Oh, for the love of— Are you kidding me?!” Alexia grunted, clearly vexed. “Another one?! What do you want? Let me guess. The Officer position?”
“I–” the boy flinched, clearly not expecting such a hostile greeting. “N-No, Lady Zynx. I just… Well… Y-Yes.”
“Get out,” was Alexia’s sharp reply. “And tell everyone out there not to disturb us again. If they do, I will break their legs and yours.”
The boy blanched before immediately skittering off.
And people called me a tyrant.
“This reminds me,” Ray said, “there was this girl who wanted me to ask you if she could become your Bishop.”
I slowly turned my head toward him. “…And?”
“And I told her that if she wanted an Officer position, she should talk to you herself.”
“Good.”
“But then she started crying.”
I blinked. “She started crying?”
“Yeah,” Ray shrugged. “She has some family drama and is on the verge of being disowned. So she really wants a position that’ll put her in the spotlight, blah blah blah.”
“What’s her innate ability?” I asked.
Ray seemed like he had to hold back a chuckle. “She can manipulate the weather—”
Oh! That piqued my interest. I was about to ask her name, but it turned out Ray wasn’t yet done speaking.
“—but only within a five-meter radius.”
My interest vanished.
I stared at Ray, indignant.
Ray stared back, grinning.
“A real legendary powerhouse, huh?” I spat. “I guess she can make herself slightly more comfortable during a picnic.”
Ray coughed into his fist, failing miserably to hide his amusement. “Hey, don’t underestimate her. Five meters is a very important distance.”
“Is it?”
“Absolutely. Imagine standing five meters away from someone you hate and suddenly making it rain exclusively on them.”
I kept staring at him angrily.
He stared back shamelessly.
Finally, I gritted my teeth. “That is the most useless superpower I have ever heard. Tell her she deserves to be kicked out by her family and that if she wants the spotlight, she can go stand under a street lamp!”
My outburst ended just in time for another knock.
This was the tenth one already.
No matter how sternly we warned them, we kept getting interrupted by Cadets requesting Officer positions or tactical assignments that would give them the best possible angle to catch a camera drone’s attention.
Not that anyone knew where any of the camera drones were. They were all invisible.
Regardless, even my patience was running thin now. I turned toward the doors and shouted, “Get the fuck out—”
It was Juliana. Standing in the doorway, one hand on the heavy frame and the other resting on her hip, her eyes went wide at my furious display before narrowing in amusement.
“My, what a warm welcome,” she purred.
Ah.
Kill me, kill me, kill me. Just kill me!