The Great Thief

The key locations of Grey Valley were undoubtedly secured.

Glory Capital’s Stanglethorn Vale Stronghold would naturally have no problems. The group attacking was Gale Legion, which was the equivalent of attacking themselves.

Drizzle Court’s West Wilderness region was secured with great difficulty. Although the loss was significant, they still managed to defend their important Stronghold. Adding on Ruling Sword’s securing of the Black Sea Coast amounted to four secured Strongholds.

Peerless City’s Tanaris was taken by the Wings of Dawn, a result that shocked many. After all, they were evenly-matched – there was no one who would now consider Peerless City a sub-branch of Drizzle Court. Since Wings of Dawn had become the occupiers of six Strongholds, it was clear that they were the clear winners.

Gale Legion had also lost its Stronghold. In recent times, it seemed that Glory Capital and Ruling Sword were extremely successful, and that people had underestimated the Blood Red War Flag.

They were usually not showy, even though they were very powerful. Blood Red War Flag’s core elite group was second only to Glory Capital. Compared to Gale Legion that depended upon Glory Capital, their power was much greater. Even at full force, Gale Legion still lost their Stronghold.

Ruling Sword still controlled two Strongholds.

The four remaining Strongholds were controlled by Glory Capital, Drizzle Court, Blood Red War Flag, and Wings of Dawn.

Peerless City suffered the most loss, then Glory Capital. Although they invested so much money, they still failed to take the Black Sea Coast and also lost the Barrenlands. It seemed that Sorrowless was at his breaking point.

However, Lu Li was expecting that Glory City would be battling itself. Compared to not taking the Black Sea Coast, or losing the Barrenlands, this was more of a serious problem.

What type of place was the Barrenlands? The Barrenlands were next to Orgrimmar, a place where players would often train. It was nicknamed as ‘The Horde’s Most Popular Destination’, so it was expected that Sorrowless would try to take back this land next week, regardless of the cost.

Additionally, next week was the start of a new month. According to custom, there was likely to be an official declaration of a map containing new Stronghold.

Ruling Sword single-handedly controlled two fortresses and were in the limelight. However, Lu Li’s inner state was in a state of despair. Holding the statistics of the losses they had suffered – a list that Sky Moon had created – Lu Li couldn’t help but feel that a whole chest of gold had grown wings and flown away!

The battle this time was far too brutal and they had lost a ton of equipment.

Although the gold they won from successfully defending the Stronghold could be used to cover the equipment losses, it still wasn’t something that they could immediately convert to usable items.

The quality of their equipment had fallen by a notch. What were they to use to attack the Princess of the Black Dragon, Onyxia?

However, this was just the nature of the battle for Strongholds – it was all about backup resources. Every single Stronghold battle required a minimum amount of ten or so equips. If they were lucky, they could craft more equipment, but if they struggled while fighting, they simply needed to shoulder the losses.

An established Guild was powerful precisely because they had the resources.

Ruling Sword’s current elite group players contained 400-500 people. The number of Glory Capital members that could participate in the Molten Core’s Nightmare level exceeded a few thousand, if not tens of thousands. This was the result of an accumulation of over ten or so years of experience. Were it not for Ruling Sword successfully taking so many First Clears, they could never have had the qualifications to compete with the established Guilds for Strongholds.

It was true that the equipment they gathered from a First Clear was much superior to other instances, but this could still not match the farming rate of the others.

Ruling Sword could only barely farm from the Molten Core on ten occasions. In the same time, Glory Capital could farm from it up to 200 times.

As for farming the lower-levelled Bosses in the Molten Core, the Ruling Sword could not match Glory Capital. For this reason, Sorrowless had abandoned his equipment without a blink of an eye.

The land reclamation group was lacking in equipment.

Lu Li was desperate and had no choice but to make a public declaration.

“Let me borrow the Level 60 Epic equipment from those Level 60 guild members that have completed the Molten Core, and I will return them to everyone as soon as I’m done.”

He really had no choice. If he had requested equipment from the inner headquarters, this would result in the deterioration of everyone’s confidence levels. If he needed to borrow equipment so desperately just to fight for one Stronghold, what was he going to do in the future? Plus, it wouldn’t be long before many people would know about this, which would result in other Guilds targeting Ruling Sword’s vulnerability.

This was not something Lu Li was prepared to do.

As for borrowing equipment from the Water Fairy, that was also not viable. One couldn’t borrow equipment in such large quantities. In order to retain their hold over the Western Wilderness, Drizzle Court had also lost a significant number of equips.

There were going to be new changes to the Stronghold system and restrictions on chariots. The defender of the Stronghold could only buy half the number of chariots as the party attacking.

In order for the defenders to prevail, they needed to suffer greater losses to their resources. This was the reason why everyone was so enthusiastically prepared to attack the Strongholds of others. Some guilds, however, still attacked Strongholds despite knowing at the time that they would have no chance of taking them down.

Lu Li knew what he had to say. He needed to ensure that the inner group had full confidence in the guild.

“Speaking of this battle, we truly suffered a significant loss, but the losses of Glory Capital were even greater.”

“The red cannonballs they used in battle would have costed them more than what we lost in equipment. Additionally, they also lost a lot of other items. So much for calling themselves the Top Guild – they still got defeated. We now have two Strongholds. We are the true Top Guild!”

“We have only been running for half a year, and lack only time. They are all older-generation guilds. We must have faith in ourselves”.

Lu Li often attended university lectures. There were two classes, one of which was titled ‘The Art of Speaking’, and another, which was titled ‘Public Speaking and Oratory Skills’. Regardless of what they were specifically called, the courses could all could be considered lessons on articulation. After listening to these classes, and frequently practicing, Lu Li was becoming even more and more articulate.

“Boss, I have three Epic equips on me. If you need, you should take them”, one of the guild members volunteered.

“I have one Level 60 Epic equip. Its attributes are relatively okay. See if anyone in the land reclamation group can use it. Don’t even worry about returning it”.

In a state of passion, no one had the brain cells to calculate the financial worth of their Epic equipment.

Now that people had begun openly offering, it would no longer be awkward.

One by one, they all gave Lu Li their equipment. After assessing the status of the equipment, Lu Li chose twenty or thirty of them out of the hundreds on offer.

The cumulative power of the land reclamation group’s new equipment was even greater than what they possessed in the previous week.