The Systemic Lands

Chapter 358: Day 775 (2) – The Sacking Of New Beijing

Chapter 358: Day 775 (2) – The Sacking Of New Beijing

“Um, who are these people?” Fu Ge asked as he nervously got up. The soldiers were wearing uniforms, but a mix of brown and green to better blend into level 2 zones, where they would primarily fight.

“Soldiers from the nation of Purgatory. My nation,” I replied and Fu Ge looked a bit shell shocked at this development. “Wake up Qi Ji Long for food and water, we are leaving soon.”

“Sure,” Fu Ge nervously said and leaned down next to the child who was still sleeping on the ground. I leaned against a nearby tree while I waited for them. Captain Mitchell has his people rest and form up a perimeter.

He then came up to me. “That child is the VIP, right, Champion Michael?” he asked.

“He is. He also has no stats and must be treated with extreme care and protection,” I replied.

“I thought you would have someone like the Master Fleshcrafter or the Inquisitor. If I can ask, whose child is he?”

“He is the child of Divine Empress Hei Long. That is top secret. He cannot be allowed to be recaptured alive or risked in any way.”

“You plan to bait her?” Captain Mitchell asked.

“No. He is being taken to the Avatar. Make sure that is what is understood. No speculation or gossip.”

“Understood. But if it was leaked, the Divine Empress is more likely to find out the information,” Captain Mitchell replied.

“Once she has you within visual or sensory range, there will be no escape. Even if all ten of you tried to run in different directions at the same time, it would be useless. If there were a hundred people. One or two might escape and that is a big might. When she returns, she is going to go on a rampage killing everyone she finds to get answers. If people know you know…” I trailed off.

“Then she will come right for us. I got it. Keep our mouths shut about the kid. The other nations?” Captain Mitchell asked. I explained to him about the assassin and the Avatar’s forces.

“As far as I can tell there are now four or five political factions. Purgatory, the Divine Empress’s forces, rebels against the Divine Empress, the Avatar’s nation, and possibly the assassin who might be from the Dragon Empire. The Divine Empress is missing, but once she returns everyone will fall back into line. That is why we need to kill as many people in her Empire as possible before that point. So she no longer has an empire and has to waste time building it back up,” I said.

“Or she could go on a rampage as a one-woman army,” Captain Mitchell said. I let out a sigh at that.

“Which is probably what is going to happen. But the less support she has, the better. We won’t be able to beat her with attrition, but we can make it so she has to grind up her own stat points and she can’t be everywhere at once.”

“So wilderness living then,” Captain Mitchell said.

“Until she is dead, yes. The risk is too great otherwise. Tracking down people in the wilderness would be an exercise in futility across the sixteen known cities and the few more that are probably out there. Assuming twenty cities, with 250 people each every 10 days, she would need to kill a person once every 3 minutes, not counting people who are already here or travel time to match the new arrivals.” Captain Mitchell gave me a weird look at that.

“If you say so, uh, sir,” he replied.

“At a certain point, it comes down to numbers. I was thinking about if she could wipe out an entire nation, or nations. There is a possibility she could do it. But it would be exhausting and tracking all those people down,” I shook my head at that. “Still, she could do a lot of damage.”

“I see. It is possible at that level?” Captain Mitchell asked.

“High level fights are not something that are easily understood. Even more so high level stats. The Divine Empress is a powerhouse of epic proportions. She has leveraged more than just points as well. Her combat ability is quite high, or at least the control over her stats.” As much as I hated to admit it. Her strike, blowing through my chest and ease of movement around me was all the confirmation I needed in regards to her personal combat ability.

I refused to lie myself or make up stuff about how skilled she was. It would be all too easy to say, it was just her stats, or she isn’t that talented. That would be a mistake. Anyone who reached a high number of stat points were serious threats. The higher one climbed the more seriously they took combat.

That was how she maintained control was through her personal strength. She had to be able to leverage those stats well. With two meta-points she had gone beyond even her stats and I was still stuck with a big zero.

I was going to beat a meta-point out of the Avatar once I saw her again. While she wasn’t on the list to kill on sight, or do everything I could to kill them. The Avatar was almost on there. Just borderline.

“I think I should send a runner back up the road. To bring in reinforcements, with your approval sir?” Captain Mitchell asked.

“I will leave that decision in your capable hands. But since I have your team, I can leave Qi Ji Long in your care while I clear the city. Once I take the South gate, you should follow along behind towards the plaza. I should be done by the time you catch up. Then I will push onwards to the North gate. Take that, and your team can wait there for back up, does that make sense?” I asked.

“That should work. I can dispatch a runner then, so they don’t have to go around the city. If we have the gate and wall, we should be able to hold. I doubt they will mount a counter attack. Should we hold if there is one?” Captain Mitchell asked me.

“I will leave that to your discretion. But capturing a city to use as a supply point on this side of the Systemic Lands would be huge. But any long term forces should hide out in the mistlands. Fairly deep.”

“Alright then, that sounds like a plan. Just wanted to add, thanks for shattering their armies. It was real slog for us out there,” Captain Mitchell said.

“It is my nation as well. But that is the new nature of combat in the Systemic Lands. Strong people do much better countering other strong people or moving independently. At my new combat level, there is nothing anyone else could reasonably help with but staying out of the way unfortunately.”

“I won’t ask your stats. But there are a lot of bets about the amount. If I said over ten thousand, would that be safe?” Captain Mitchell asked.

“I will let the bets happen but won’t answer any information. That is like asking for the possible specs on key military equipment. I am the nuclear deterrent and only combatant against high level people. So, I prefer to leave it as just rumors and idle gossip, understand Captain?” I asked.

“Ah, yes sorry about that sir.”

“Anyways, let’s get going. It looks like everyone is about done,” I said. I pulled the handcuff out of the tree to wide eyed stares and put it back on my wrist. I wasn’t going to let the kid run off. Even with soldiers it was too much of a risk. Whoever got the kid was getting the cuff. Probably Captain Mitchell.

He seemed to have a decent head on his shoulders, but it was still a risk to leave the kid with him. Crushing the evil empire more quickly would remove the Divine Empress’s support structure and ability to just sit on her throne and inhale stat points.

It was honestly a bit unfair. Even for me the champion of unfairness thought it was ridiculous. But that is what you get when you rise up and become the leader of an empire. All the wealth flowing to a single person to empower them.

The situation made me think of cultivation stories about how there were a few people at the top and they scrapes to the people below. I always thought it was unfair, but there was something about having the strongest person who could crush everything in their path being on your side that impacted your mentality.

I guess it was a short coming and mental blind spot I had from growing up in America. I never really thought about how having a lesser military would impact the mindset of a nation on a national perspective. In the Systemic Lands, powerful people were nations.

Earlier I had said my nation, and I wasn’t thinking about me being a part of it. But that it was an extension of myself. That is why I didn’t mind commandeering these soldiers.

I thought it was acceptable. I put the kid in my front pack and then Fu Ge went piggyback style. It was embarrassing, but there was no other way he could keep up. The soldiers packs were quite full and they weren’t trained how to carry a person without injuring them.

A key part of that was having over a thousand in the Body stat to adjust forces. We went back to the road and set off. I let Captain Mitchell set the pace. It felt incredibly slow to me, but it was quite fast for all these people.

I took the time to observe their running form. It was decent and they seemed to have developed a good kicking style off the ground. It was all in the ankle and foot angle. That was key. You wanted to tap your foot down to generate horizontal momentum at a steady pace.

That was why the roads were so nice. I didn’t have to think about the rhythm I needed to maintain a certain speed. So while I was going much slower, it didn’t really annoy me that much.

We made good time and reached New Beijing. “Alright, you are getting the kid.” I put Qi Ji Long on the ground and pulled off the cuff. “You are getting cuffed to him. That way he can’t wander off.”

“Is it really necessary sir?” Captain Mitchell asked.

“Yes. Everyone better be dead if the kid is gone. This will ensure that even if you are distracted he can’t run away,” I explained.

“But my combat ability will be limited.”

“You men can fight. You are keeping the Qi Ji Long safe, understood Captain Mitchell?” I asked him pointedly.

“Yes sir,” he replied with a salute and then held out his left arm when I gestured at him. I slapped the cuff on his wrist. With that done, it was time to sack a city.

I charged the South gate, melting everyone in my path. I then cleared the walls and the towers near the gate. The unit moved in as I set off for the plaza, there seemed to be no issues. Some people had scattered, but I didn’t pick up anyone nearby.

One thing I did note, was that the walls were easier to see through compared to the Forbidden City with my Sense stat. Probably related to the city level. The general toughness of everything increasing was no surprise.

I outraced any of the people fleeing towards the plaza and began a massacre of everyone. No one was spare as I went from building to building, hunting people down. It was distasteful work, but the city needed to be purged for my forces to control it. That was what total war meant, killing everyone and everything in your path.

There was no point denying that the Divine Empress and myself were in a state of total war.