The Great Thief

Currently, there were eight plots of land available, but none of them were new.

The eight plots were being held by several clubs throughout Dawn – Ruling Sword, Drizzle Court, Gale Legion, Glory Capital, Grand Hegemony and Peerless City. With the exception of Grand Hegemony, these were basically the most powerful clubs.

Ruling Sword had several successes in defending their Stronghold along the Black Sea Coast. Their Grey Valley had also faced several battles. It wasn’t that these Strongholds were impregnable, but it was definitely not easy to attack them.

The main point of competition was for the new Strongholds.

The Hillsbrad Hills, Stonetalon Mountains and Tanaris had been the target of a number of raids.

Sorrowless had once again intended to keep Tanaris by spending lots of money on it. This bug in the System didn’t look like it was going to be fixed, which suggested that it was something that the Game Company implicitly approved of it.

However, the results were very unexpected this time. Seventh Heaven seemed to have a lot of money, even more than Glory Capital, and they managed to successfully bid for the right to attack Tanaris.

One of the world’s top billionaires had purchased Seventh Heaven for 45 million dollars when Dawn first began. However, the guild had rapidly expanded since Dawn’s runaway success. Now, even if he was offered 4.5 billion, he wouldn’t sell the club.

With the backing of such a rich investor, you could really make a difference, even against the number one guild.

After gaining the rights to attack, Seventh Heaven actually managed to take Tanaris. Gale Legion wasn’t that much weaker than them, but they weren’t prepared at all. The main forces had been stationed at Glory Capital’s two other Strongholds to help with their defence.

Tanaris was a point of strategic importance and had changed hands many times. It was likely that it would continue to be a point of competition.

The Hillsbrad Hills were the most recent Stronghold to be released, and were occupied by Grand Hegemony. They were also the focus of this new wave of attacks, and even Lu Li tried to get himself involved.

When Lu Li just entered the game, his relationship with Grand Hegemony was good. Grand Hegemony’s Northern Tang Dream had even invited him to join them, but he ultimately rejected this offer.

This didn’t affect Lu Li’s relationship with them in friendship, business or joint operations. However, these things were fickle, and if Ruling Sword had the opportunity to take the Hillsbrad Hills, he wouldn’t hesitate to do so.

By the same token, Grand Hegemony had tried more than once to capture the Black Sea Coast and Grey Valley from Ruling Sword.

Unfortunately, the gold coins that they bid weren’t enough to earn them that right. The winner was Blood Red War Flag. The last Stronghold they held was the Barrenlands, which was new at the time.

This time, they were making a comeback and took aim at the very popular Hillsbrad Hills.

In the end, these veterans were not considered as such for no reason. They also weren’t the kinds of veterans to have gone downhill like the Gangnam Royals. After a fierce battle, Blood Red War Flag had successfully acquired the Stronghold of the Hillsbrad Hills and kept up their reputation as a top guild.

The new Stronghold in Stonetalon Mountains was a must-try for many clubs.

Unfortunately, Peerless City had seemingly abundant resources and allies like Drizzle Court and Ruling Sword. There was no way they were going to allow their new Stronghold to be taken away.

In fact, when the Stronghold just came out, no one paid much attention to it.

This was until Ruling Sword started to operate the Grey Valley Stronghold, which brought together Trade Skill players and became a business hub for all sorts of items and materials. There were many casual and combat players that hoped to create an ideal home in that Stronghold.

The Black Sea Coast had become a casino in the game, of which there were none in the real world. Any kind of entertainment that was not completely prohibited could be found there.

It was a town where you could get lost in your drunken stupor.

These bustling towns brought great popularity and benefits to Ruling Sword, and were a signal for more to come.

The development of Grey Valley and the Black Sea Coast gave everyone an idea of the broad development prospects of these Strongholds. It was only then that everyone started to pay attention, and the bidding prices clearly reflected the demand for them.

Ruling Sword probably wouldn’t be able to expand for some time.

The best time would be when there was a significant power struggle amongst the clubs. Ruling Sword could then swoop in to claim some Strongholds. However, clubs like Glory Capital only had two Strongholds. Drizzle Court and Peerless City had one each, but were supported financially by the female tycoon.

There were also a lot of other clubs that hadn’t received anything.

In fact, since Glory Capital had lost so much equipment, Lu Li was determined to take one of their Strongholds, in the same way that Grand Hegemony had taken the Hillsbrad Hills from Blood Red War Flag.

But eventually, Lu Li gave up on that dream because he concluded that he wouldn’t be able to keep it.

For example, Tanaris was forever stuck at the most basic level because it kept changing owners. There were also no bugs that he could make use of, so Lu Li didn’t think he could hold the Hillsbrad Hills Stronghold.

He simply had to let it go, and wait for the right time to show his strength in fighting for the Strongholds.

When the Donghua Cup reached the top 16, they had just started the month of September.

This was already the second Septhember since Lu Li’s rebirth, which meant that he had been reborn for a full year.

A lot of things had happened this year, some of which he had expected as result of his hard work – such as his healthy and lively sister. However, some was outside of his control, such as Ruling Sword and Water Fairy. Even so, he didn’t reject those things just because he couldn’t control them.

After all these things had happened, his mentality had also changed.

Fortunately, everything was moving in the right direction.

Despite the difficulties of the future, Lu Li would never look back to the way things were. For the sake of his sister, Water Fairy, and those who looked up to him, he had to keep winning.

In this month, the new event of the game was Brewfest.

Brewfest was one of Dawn’s earliest and most popular events, and it was designed to celebrate the alcoholic beverages in the game.

This would never be publicly acknowledged, but Brewfest was likely a major reason for Dawn’s national success.

In the past, games had set up various festivals and they would often coincide with real events, for example, Christmas and Valentine’s Day. They provided rich rewards, but they were still just games at the end of the day and didn’t affect anything in reality.

However, Brewfest was different. From the 20th of September to the 3rd of October, players would spend a ridiculous amount of time playing the game.