The Shop, continued
Dec. 9th, 2008 02:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
avevale_intelligencer I waited numbly for the next shot. It didn't come. I looked over at the bandit camp. Nothing was happening. Bits of the weapon that had been glowing before were dark. As I watched, they started to glow dully again. If it had been mine, I was prepared to bet I would be seeing a progress bar over it right now.
It needed time to recharge!
Far be it from me to waste a reprieve when I get one. I set to repairing the wall, and sent my army and my catapults in to the attack right away. The bandits, being bandits, helpfully swarmed out from behind their walls and charged screaming at me, and I quickly detached two squads to man the catapults, set them up and let them loose.
Glowing boulders, obviously crystal-enhanced, smashed against the enemy's walls, and down they came almost as quickly as mine had. There was a fortified outpost in there: I detailed three squads of bowmen to attack it, and left the rest to deal with the foot soldiers. My numbers were going down quite dramatically, so I created as many new soldiers as I could and sent them straight in.
The weapon discharged again, and another section of my wall collapsed, but now I was fairly sure I could handle this. Rebuild, and on with the assault. The catapults wouldn't attack the weapon itself, but I reckoned if there were no bandits left to run it it would stop firing at me. The bandits in the outpost had made mincemeat of my three squads, but as far as I could see there was only one of them left, so I sent another squad to take care of him and torch the place. More soldiers emerged from my barracks and were duly dispatched to the front lines. The body count here was going to be tremendous, and I still hadn't got close enough to burn the tents yet.
The bandit outpost collapsed, and that took care of the rest of the walls. I aimed the catapults at the bandit tents, and sure enough one enhanced boulder each was more than enough.
"Sire!" The hermit was trying to attract my attention. I was a bit busy, but I detached the knight and sent him back to town, just as the weapon fired again. Damn, I thought I'd won.
"I have ascertained that the weapon is not being controlled from this camp!" he blurted. "You will need to locate and destroy the remaining bandits to neutralise it so that I can study it!"
And also so that I could actually stop being shot at, I thought. I should have known it was too easy. There were still bandits fighting around the thing, but it was pretty clear that I had won this battle, albeit at a horrendous cost in soldiers. I was almost out of iron as well. I would just have to put up with the wall damage for a while, till I could re-man and find the other encampment. It would probably have walls as well, so I built two more enhanced catapults with the last of the iron and sent a geologist to the mine to see if he could find me any more. A quick bit of housekeeping--the taverns were out of mead and the populace weren't happy--and back to exploring. The entire eastern half of the map was still fogged up.
Liliana came in, looking almost like her usual self, and asked how it was going, and I brought her up to speed. The weapon fired again as I was explaining, which helped to illustrate the problem.
"I suppose claiming the territory wouldn't help?" she said.
I hadn't thought of that. I tried it. The outpost duly went up, but the weapon did not become mine.
"Okay," she said. "I'll see what I can do. Go and have a break."
"You're sure--" She looked at me, and I stopped talking.
"I'll be fine," she said. "Go on with you."
"Okay," I said, and left her to it.
This was the fifth mission of six, I thought as I found a bench. Apart from the fourth one, they'd been getting harder and harder. Most missions in the shop were quite slack by comparison, and also quite slow: I'd known some of them to last two weeks. What was so special about these? And what on earth was the last one going to be like? I remembered Zoltan-hound-of-Dracula's peculiar tenseness when he'd watched me playing the other day, and the fact that he'd actually helped me once. Did these missions have some importance above and beyond the need to keep the bread and woolly shirts coming?
I got up and looked around for the inevitable recycling bin. There was one just outside a jeweller's shop across the way. I headed for it, paper bag screwed up in hand. This jeweller's also offered those china knick-knacks, painstaking replicas of thatched cottages and cute little statuettes or figurines or whatever they were called, and as I was turning away having disposed of my refuse, one caught my eye. It was a small green dragon, dressed in sort of Roman-soldier armour, clutching a short sword and looking cutely pugnacious. The sleeves under the armour were royal blue.
When I got back to the shop, Liliana was battling bandits. She'd found the other camp. It was behind three layers of stone walling, and there was, besides the usual scatter of tents, another outpost and a type of building I hadn't seen before.
"I think I've found them," she said, as the knight teleported back to the castle and the last of her army expired. The weapon fired again as she spoke. "Ready to take over?"
"As I'll ever be," I said. I hefted the small square box in my hand as she slipped out of the chair and I slipped in. "Um...Liliana?" I said, as she headed for the door.
"Yes?" She turned, smiling.
"Oh, nothing," I said, hiding the box behind the computer.
It needed time to recharge!
Far be it from me to waste a reprieve when I get one. I set to repairing the wall, and sent my army and my catapults in to the attack right away. The bandits, being bandits, helpfully swarmed out from behind their walls and charged screaming at me, and I quickly detached two squads to man the catapults, set them up and let them loose.
Glowing boulders, obviously crystal-enhanced, smashed against the enemy's walls, and down they came almost as quickly as mine had. There was a fortified outpost in there: I detailed three squads of bowmen to attack it, and left the rest to deal with the foot soldiers. My numbers were going down quite dramatically, so I created as many new soldiers as I could and sent them straight in.
The weapon discharged again, and another section of my wall collapsed, but now I was fairly sure I could handle this. Rebuild, and on with the assault. The catapults wouldn't attack the weapon itself, but I reckoned if there were no bandits left to run it it would stop firing at me. The bandits in the outpost had made mincemeat of my three squads, but as far as I could see there was only one of them left, so I sent another squad to take care of him and torch the place. More soldiers emerged from my barracks and were duly dispatched to the front lines. The body count here was going to be tremendous, and I still hadn't got close enough to burn the tents yet.
The bandit outpost collapsed, and that took care of the rest of the walls. I aimed the catapults at the bandit tents, and sure enough one enhanced boulder each was more than enough.
"Sire!" The hermit was trying to attract my attention. I was a bit busy, but I detached the knight and sent him back to town, just as the weapon fired again. Damn, I thought I'd won.
"I have ascertained that the weapon is not being controlled from this camp!" he blurted. "You will need to locate and destroy the remaining bandits to neutralise it so that I can study it!"
And also so that I could actually stop being shot at, I thought. I should have known it was too easy. There were still bandits fighting around the thing, but it was pretty clear that I had won this battle, albeit at a horrendous cost in soldiers. I was almost out of iron as well. I would just have to put up with the wall damage for a while, till I could re-man and find the other encampment. It would probably have walls as well, so I built two more enhanced catapults with the last of the iron and sent a geologist to the mine to see if he could find me any more. A quick bit of housekeeping--the taverns were out of mead and the populace weren't happy--and back to exploring. The entire eastern half of the map was still fogged up.
Liliana came in, looking almost like her usual self, and asked how it was going, and I brought her up to speed. The weapon fired again as I was explaining, which helped to illustrate the problem.
"I suppose claiming the territory wouldn't help?" she said.
I hadn't thought of that. I tried it. The outpost duly went up, but the weapon did not become mine.
"Okay," she said. "I'll see what I can do. Go and have a break."
"You're sure--" She looked at me, and I stopped talking.
"I'll be fine," she said. "Go on with you."
"Okay," I said, and left her to it.
This was the fifth mission of six, I thought as I found a bench. Apart from the fourth one, they'd been getting harder and harder. Most missions in the shop were quite slack by comparison, and also quite slow: I'd known some of them to last two weeks. What was so special about these? And what on earth was the last one going to be like? I remembered Zoltan-hound-of-Dracula's peculiar tenseness when he'd watched me playing the other day, and the fact that he'd actually helped me once. Did these missions have some importance above and beyond the need to keep the bread and woolly shirts coming?
I got up and looked around for the inevitable recycling bin. There was one just outside a jeweller's shop across the way. I headed for it, paper bag screwed up in hand. This jeweller's also offered those china knick-knacks, painstaking replicas of thatched cottages and cute little statuettes or figurines or whatever they were called, and as I was turning away having disposed of my refuse, one caught my eye. It was a small green dragon, dressed in sort of Roman-soldier armour, clutching a short sword and looking cutely pugnacious. The sleeves under the armour were royal blue.
When I got back to the shop, Liliana was battling bandits. She'd found the other camp. It was behind three layers of stone walling, and there was, besides the usual scatter of tents, another outpost and a type of building I hadn't seen before.
"I think I've found them," she said, as the knight teleported back to the castle and the last of her army expired. The weapon fired again as she spoke. "Ready to take over?"
"As I'll ever be," I said. I hefted the small square box in my hand as she slipped out of the chair and I slipped in. "Um...Liliana?" I said, as she headed for the door.
"Yes?" She turned, smiling.
"Oh, nothing," I said, hiding the box behind the computer.
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no subject
Date: 2008-12-09 06:25 pm (UTC)Hrm, I wonder why the dragon figurine was mentioned...
no subject
Date: 2008-12-09 06:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-12-09 09:51 pm (UTC)[NODS] Right move. Too soon, boy, too soon...
...
...
...(Says the man who demonstrably has no idea what he's talking about. =:o\ )