House of Vladaminsky's Story

A couple hundred kilometers away from Duraquai stood a large, synthetically flat-topped mountain. On top of the mountain stood a large temple, built completely of stone and marble, steps followed down one side of the mountain, carved completely out of the stoned sides of the mountain. It consisted of about 10 massive, decorated pillars on each side. Holding up the solid stone roofing which was also decorated in a variety of colored gems. The front of the temple contained a large, house sized diamond worked into the roof, shining in the nearly setting sun.
Around the base of the mountain stood the magnificent city of Shadopolis. On top of a very small hill (compared to the mountain) stood the great "Castle of Weilacca". A massive European-like castle stretching across the whole of the hill, the only difference was that the five spires were built with so much support that they seemed to float while only touching the walls. Around the mountain and hill stood many wooden and thatch housing, built in a way to make the whole city form a circle centered at the mountain. Many stone barracks and engineering huts were dotted across the city to make up for the high amount of soldiers and war equipment. The city itself was surrounded by a massive circular wall, large towers were spaced around the wall at equal distances from each other and were equipped with large scale fixed ballastae and mangonels. All together, the city had a great diameter of two miles.

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Inside the castle stood similar small scale pillars to the temple, large tapestry hung from the top of them each showing a different story. One tapestry was located behind the large wooden thrown showing the symbol of the Vladaminsky. The throne itself was carved and shaped to look like a dragon's head. On the nose of the dragon head sat the Lacca (king) of the Vladaminsky, Weilacca Vladaminsky. Dressed in black baggy trousers, a black tight sleeveless shirt with two leather straps on the torso shaped together like an X. On his left side stood his sword, struck into the ground in front of the throne, his left arm was bandaged from the elbow to his palm.
Weilacca's head hair was styled in a peculiar way, his left eye was covered by his fringe. The back of his head held hair flowing down to the bottom of his back and the left side of his head stood naturally spiked hair, all spiking horizontally. The rest of his body was well shaved.

"Agh, I'm bored!" Weilacca called out, interrupting the recruitment adviser from his speech. "I don't care that our army has reached over a million. What I want to know is if the surrounding towns are still well defended. I'm not like my bastard father who only cared about the capital. If the towns and villages aren't defended, then we have no means of feeding the population should they be attacked by those tribes." He sighed after his moaning. "Look, if you guys have no good news about the development of the outer settlement's defenses then leave. Now."
Weilacca's demand caused the 3 adviser's to slowly stand from their small wooden seats located at the bottom of the steps to the throne. Without word, the advisers saluted by slamming their fists to their chests and turned around to leave.
"Wait." They all stopped in their paths, one shaking out of fear. This happened before, and the previous economic and recruitment advisers were killed. The three turned to face their Lacca.
"You pricks are useless." One of the slaves hidden behind one of the pillars ran towards Weilacca and handed him a crossbow. He sat, holding the crossbow facing the three advisers, loaded. "Hmm... I'm feeling nice today. Get some damn representatives over to each settlement to collect reports on the development. You have a week." He threw the crossbow across the large room, causing it to hit one of the slaves which was cleaning the stone wall in the head. It did not speak, instead it continued, allowing another to pick up the crossbow and run off with it.
The advisers nodded, trembling with fear they ran out of the castle.

---

"Damn this pathetic war! Why can't we just peacefully get rid of that tribe instead of defending against them? It's been a week now and they still won't fuck off!" Domakeo shouted at one of the armored generals. He was dressed in full metal armor, holding a shield but refusing to wield a sword.
"The Lacca's orders are to defend the town of Dergat. Can't you see that the trebuchets are ripping them apart?" The general replied, in a calm but agitated tone.
"They may be, but every now and then those fuckers keep getting here. If we dealt with them peacefully, then we won't be risking the farmer's lives! We may even have time to complete the wall."
The general stood speechless, it was usual for Domakeo to think of peace, especially when his sister was out on the front lines.

The town of Dergat was a simple farming town, consisting mostly of massive fields of wheat or cattle, there were also housing located at the center of the town, surrounding a larger town hall. Around the perimeter of the town stood massive trebuchets, built of wood and consecutively firing large stone boulders. Some were slowly being reloaded by lowering the arm, others were firing, swinging at great speeds they threw the boulders into the crowd of thick clothed tribal warriors. There were also wooden towers built around the town, equipped with bowmen and ballistae, they were also firing into the enemy, trying their best to miss the Vladaminsky soldiers.
The tribal warriors themselves were being held back, not just by the constant bombardment of boulders, arrows and ballista rounds. But by the Vladaminsky soldiers that stand before them. The Vladaminsky were obviously at an advantage, their soldiers were equipped with full metal armor, shields and spears/swords, but the Vladaminsky forces were dwindling, not many died but the town itself was poorly defended.
However, the vast amounts of tribal warriors were still meeting their doom. The only thing that kept them fighting was their stubbornness.

Night had fallen over the grand city of Shadopolis, however, it was still bustling with life as the high class citizens celebrated birthdays, weddings or were getting drunk simply for the fun of it. The whole area behind the great stone walls was lit with hundreds of thousands of fire torches, each burning a large amount of oil.

---

Weilacca sat inside his bedroom located in one of the castle spires. Paper was scattered across the room, each with strange drawings and plans, some papers showed flying machines with massive crosses scribbled over them, others showed weapons which fired metal balls again with crosses scribbled on them.
On the wall hung a large piece of paper, it was a full sized plan of a suit of armor. However, it was different, it had a variety of weaponry attached to the arms, it was noted that a spring system would be attached to allow the weapons to be switched freely. There was a strange device on the back with piping leading to a crossbow attached to the arm, it must be an idea to automate crossbow fire. There was signs of the invention being remade, replanned and renamed due to the amount of scribbles. But the final name seemed finalized; "Gaylepian" (Ancient language for "super soldier").
Weilacca was seen sitting on a wooden chair at a wooden table, drawing and planning what seemed to be a cannon, but he was constantly sighing with every new thing he noted down. Screwing the paper and throwing it across the room only to grab another piece and try again.
Finally, Weilacca dropped his quill and leaned back on the chair giving off a massive sigh. "This is impossible. No matter what I do, this weapon will need a large amount of power to throw the metal ball. The explosives I have are still a work in progress, it's hard to control the explosions and sometimes it just won't work." He looked back down at the drawing, "But, using steam sounds like it would work. I'll test it out when I have time." He stood and clicked his back, throwing himself into a crude bed and closing his eyes to sleep.

---

The battle for Dergat was at a pause, the nightfall had caused the tribal attackers to fall back into the woods. This gave the defense a chance to regroup and replan. The trebuchets were reloaded and ready to fire, the ones located on the other side of the town were turned back to face outwards, in case the town was flanked. The towers and the perimeter were the only parts of the town which was lit up by torches. The rest was left in darkness, where the citizens were asleep.
"Right, Domakeo, you are the tactical genius here. Don't bother with peace, just give us a plan." The general ordered Domakeo, knowing he was far out of authority to order the Lacca's son. Domakeo did not answer, he just leaned back on the support beam of the trebuchet, thinking.
"We need to scare the shit into these guys. There are many ways to do this; 1. Arm the civilians and send a full out charge. 2. Find and attack their settlement now. 3. Bombard the fuck out of those guys with explosives." Domakeo listed his separate plans, not making a choice.
"Explosives! That's suicide!"
"I don't care, it's a last resort. This battle has gone on for too long now, it's only a matter of who can last the longest now. These guys are most probably going to send everything they have as soon as the sun rises, it's what they do. They are trying to scare us into submission. If we prepare the explosives and set the trajectories, as soon as we see them emerge from their hidey holes then we blow them up. Only then will they shit themselves and run off. Then we need to get into completing this wall, otherwise you guys will be shot by your Lacca."
The general replied with a groan and considered the choice, before he could answer, a voice called out from behind him;
"I'm with brother. That plan will work. The only bad side is that the explosives would not explode. We should just load every trebuchet with a gunpowder barrel, light the fuse and lob it over to them." She explained Domakeo's plan in a more simple way, lightening the general's face as he finally realized what Domakeo wanted. This only brought Domakeo's expression to a more irritated one, how could this idiot not know what he wanted?

It took about an hour, but the trebuchets were unloaded of the boulders and had a gunpowder barrel placed in each, a robe fuse attached and ready to fire. "Now, we wait." Domakeo spoke out as he dropped himself to the cold floor and rested his hands behind his head as he stared toward the sky. The two moons were beautiful, the stars were even better. Maybe he should just fuck with the tribe while he can, only a few words would cause them to fight each other to death.