NOVEL FROG Chapter 95 – Sun Palace
The Palace of the Sun, a grandly decorated complex of multiple connected palace wings, tower chains, side keeps, annexes. A city within a city.
Strangers’ architecture made the palace look like a brutally practical fantasy fortress from the outside, but the interior was like a luxurious mansion combined with Piranesi’s Imaginary Prisons: beauty and imagination combined with horror and strangeness; an embodiment of the aesthetics of sublime.
The corridors, halls, doors, gates and staircases were deliberately confusing, built in weird angles and lavishly decorated with ormolu garniture to the point of gaudiness.
There were spiral staircases leading to tiny hatches on the ceiling; witch windows that were nothing but recesses; fake doors painted on walls; massive tapestries that were actually hidden doors to small rooms; high 3D domes painted on low, flat ceilings; narrow passages for slave servants to crawl inside the walls, and so on.
This wondrous trompe l’œil was both an attempt to outmaneuver possible attackers who managed to reach the palace interior – the defenders would have the advantage of knowing where to hide and where to retreat, while enemies wouldn’t even know which stairs to take to get to the second floor – and to keep the slave workers in constant state of awe and fear under the oppressive atmosphere of High Hats and Strangers.
In short, Sun Palace was a grand otherworldly monument where every intricate detail stood as a reminder for common people of their inferiority; a labyrinthine gigachurch of Strangers cult.
Or to make it even more compressed: Sun Palace was a navmesh nightmare for sidekick pathfinding.
The palace was not completely built by Strangers like the city walls, by the way. It was mostly built by tens of thousands of human slaves over multiple decades to mimic Strangers and their brutal designs.
In my world of birth, it used to be a common hoax hypothesis that some ‘ancient aliens’ built the pyramids and other great monuments around the world. Most of the modern proponents of this trash didn’t even understand the inherent racism of it – the implication that the ancestors of the darker-skinned natives who lived in the area were too primitive to build something so great, so it must have been some white-skinned outsiders who did it. First they decided that these white-skinned outsiders came from ancient Atlantis. Then they invented the idea of six pure races featuring Aryans. And then they started stanning for pale-skinned space humanoids. Any crazy idea was better than the simple truth that the same people who lived around the monuments were the same people who built the monuments.
...What was I talking about again?
Right, Sun Palace. A multilevel boss labyrinth full of hidden enemies behind fake walls and movable mirrors. Player had to map a way to the top floor while fighting against sudden swarms of armed guards and then face the final boss Caliph Tze.
I made a separate map for this labyrinth, of course. I even made a scale model of the first two floors, marking all the stairs and hidden passages and guard ambushes, including the “special rooms” where slave servants had to routinely punish themselves by eating tree bark and whipping their backs.
There was a strict protocol and structure for everything that slave servants did in Sun Palace, whether it was drinking a sip of well water or lamenting for the dead in an alcove. Any deviations from the rituals led to harsh punishment, usually torture or death, so the palace slaves who survived to adulthood were both submissive and obsessive-compulsive. They followed designated paths from birth to death while waiting the return of Tze-sus.
And for everyone just tuning in, welcome to my stream! And for old hats, welcome back! It’s your humble warstreamer Qwerty Uozewe again, bringing you this violent revolution live from the unnecessarily large hallways of Sun Palace! Yes, we’re running Sun Palace stage with my top crew Rain, Crys, and Kimono. That’s right, it’s not a solo run, it’s an alternate timeline casual difficulty co-op, a brand new category. We’ve been dry training for this for a while now, several months on and off, and we’re going for hundred percent clear if possible, so incredibly exciting stuff coming up! Make your bets in the chat how many enemies we’ll see in the next guard room!
Now that we’re outside the Flame Tank, we need to take a more methodical approach.
If this were an actual speedrun, I would’ve already dash-jumped up the walls and flash-stepped on the railings to save time, but this wasn’t the game, and I wasn’t playing as Ivorythief, so we just ran up the stairs normally.
Then we took a short break to listen audio cues before rushing in the hallways. I took off my earplugs for a moment and turned my head, trying to hear shouted orders, doors opening, rifles being loaded, boots on floor tiles.
I couldn’t hear anything alarming. The soundproofing in these parts of the palace was top notch. High Hats didn’t care to hear the lamentations of slave servants from downstairs or from neighboring rooms. They didn’t know what was going outside the palace and they didn’t care. Not their job, not their slave routine.
“As expected, even our theatrical entrance wasn’t enough to trigger the second floor guards from their midday siesta. Continue as planned, Rain. The elites here use Scarab carbines and Palatzar revolvers, same as the twins. Feel free to grab them instead of reloading.”
“Sure.” (Rain)
The first target was a big guard room on the left; a room with three exits, including an exit to the next guard room.
Rookie runners often went for the most direct line here because it seemed like the fastest route, but that directness was an illusion: it gave the palace guards an advance warning and enough time to take defensive positions along the hallways, which meant you were forced to fight through every enemy spawn. Choosing an indirect route through the backrooms before the enemies had time to grab their guns seemed slower, but was faster in the long run.
By the way, clearing these guard rooms would’ve been even faster and safer in the game using corner column clips – no one expects a flying flagstaff to stab you through a solid wall, after all. But that strat wasn’t possible here.
Also, because I was co-op running with multiple mains instead of bot sidekicks who had the habit of getting stuck in corners and/or completely losing their pathfinding routines during wallclips, the basic routing with room clearing tactics was enough.
Rain went in first from the middle, Crys went to the left side. I aimed for the right side and Kimono watches our backs. Simple team tactics.
Based on my teachings, everyone in the team knew the basic palace guard behavioral patterns. Since palace guards were slaves to their daily routines and practically unable to improvise in unexpected situations, attacking with fast and unexpected ways gave us an upper hand both in enemy reaction times and reaction patterns after activation. Even if their expected behavioral patterns didn’t occur, we were able to drop eccentric improv and keep them confused.
Compared to the three muscle memory patterns of Sultanate soldiers, Caliphate soldiers were higher level enemies with up to six attack patterns. Their attacks were harder to counter, but one thing was common with Sultanate mooks: they signaled their attacks with starting stances like low-level martial artists.
Rain kicked the guard room door open and locked her gaze on the first guard sitting at the end of a table. At the same time, I peeked in the room and saw the guard stumble down from his chair and taking an unnatural step back while trying to draw his revolver.
“Pattern two.”
Rain shot the first guard. The second guard stood up and took a step back before trying to draw his revolver for a quick hip shot and Rain shot him. The third guard tried to go for a hip shot as well; Rain took a step forward and shot him.
Crys went in after Rain and stepped to the right side of the room, shooting guard number four. Rain shot the fifth one. Sixth guard broke the expected pattern and tried to turn around (maybe to run to the side door), but Rain shot him in the neck.
Two seconds and six guards done.
“Clear.” (Crys)
“Hell yeah, let’s go.”
The guards were so predictable that it looked like they were reacting in slow motion. For Rain’s special ability, they were practically stationary targets.
“Since this was two, expected pattern in the next room is three.”
The next guard group probably heard the revolver shots, so they on their guard. However, their expectation was on the level of “boys will be boys” instead of real enemy attack.
Rain kicked down the next two doors.
Just to be clear: Rain didn’t actually need any of these additional boosts and team tactics. I just forced them in as additional cherries on top of her overpowered skill advantage cake.
Because even the tiniest timesave counts for me.
We saw some more resistance after the chain of guard rooms, but Rain and Crys took care of most of it.
I expected more gunfire in the hallways, but the overall atmosphere in the palace was more disorderly than in the game or the anime. Guards and servants looked unmotivated and tired of their life.
Why would that be? A complete mystery, he said with a sarcastic tone.
In Soviet Union, people were just numbers. In Caliphate, people weren’t even numbers. Their families and names were erased when they became palace servants. They became background extras in their own lives.
Sun Palace had no tragedies, no graveyards; not a single person fell ill or died, not a single guard doubted their place as a small cog in a wheel. There was only happiness in slavery. When you died, no one remember your name or face.
“...We surrender! We surrender! Do not shoot, we surrender!” (palace guard)
Unexpectedly, a group of five young guards threw their weapons on the hallway when they saw our group coming. They kept their bodies behind improvised barricades, but waved their arms showing that they didn’t hold any weapons.
Rain and Crys slowed down a bit, probably suspecting a trap.
“Are they someone you know?” (Crys)
“Surrender, huh. That’s a rare pattern in the palace... Hey there, do you know who we are?”
“You’re the rebels! We surrender, spare our lives!” (guard)
“Alright, we accept your surrender! Walk backwards down the hallway with your hands up!”
The young guards quickly stood up and climbed over the barricades, shuffling backwards towards us with their arms high in the air. Very unlikely enemy AI pattern in the game.
“Stop there and turn around slowly!”
The guards followed my orders. I looked at their faces for a moment while Rain and rest of the group moved past them.
These were all just teenagers, yet they looked too healthy to be normal palace guards. Maybe a fresh batch of some lower High Hat’s adopted cousins sent here to learn some etiquette and real world skills.
“Nope, I don’t recognize any of you. Kim-chan, go ahead.”
She appeared behind the guards like a wraith and quick-stabbed the unarmed teenagers in the neck.
Just some light war crime in a world where the Hague doesn’t exist.
“Sorry, guys, no surrenders today. Were on a tight schedule. Feel free to send hatemail.”
We continued over the furniture barricades.
After a few turns, I heard fast footsteps from a hallway to my left: half-sabatons pinging floor tiles, one palace guard running in a straight line.
It’s strange how accustomed to faint audio cues I have become even while wearing earplugs.
Crys and Rain sensed a lone guard coming as well, but they continued forward without turning back.
“Hey, guys, you’re not going to... Kim-chan, are you taking this one? Or should I get some blood on my hands too?”
Kimono went ahead without answer.
“Okay, just this once. I’ll do it myself just once.”
After two years of working together, she trusts that I can take care of a single guard – or she doesn’t care, whatever.
Right then, let’s shoot once instead of saving bullets.
A quick tutorial: ready your revolver on the correct height for a headshot and wait behind the corner, but don’t hug the corner; leave some space between you and the wall, just in case the enemy is actually smart and tries to surprise you with a cornershot or jumpshot.
Well, those tricks are mostly for PvP.
And he’s coming around the corner – boom, headshot.
The young guard dropped on the stone floor.
Minus one. Learn how to zigzag from cover to cover, bro. These low-level guards really acted like bots on tutorial difficulty. If you run straight like that in an echoing hallway in the middle of a deathmatch, you’re just asking to get camp-ambushed.
Ignorant and incompetent like the Russian toilet troops in Ukraine back in 2020s and pretty much for the same reason: brainwashed NPCs with slave mentality. Mindless meat puppets running in a straight line following irrational orders of a braindead tyrant.
No more footsteps? A lone scout?
Peak around the corner to make sure no one is camping. Looks clear.
Reload revolver after one shot. One more round can make a difference.
Check the loot. Regular mob; slave guard with a trash rifle. No loot.
Catch up with the main party.
“Guys, wait for me! Matte~!”
When we crossed a dried-up artificial garden in the third floor, I spotted a line of slaves tied to long poles near a partition wall, with chains on their wrists and ankles.
Like miniatures in a tabletop soccer game. This was how slavemasters traditionally transported slaves: just chain them together and let them slowly shuffle onward.
This transport line had been abandoned here while the slavemaster had ran away. The slaves couldn’t walk or sit down properly because of the poles so they just had to stand and try to support each other.
I stopped to shoot the poles and release them. I shot twice to break the poles in a way that allowed them to slide their chains off. They barely flinched because of the gunshots.
“Cut yourselves free and run north. Aim for the northeastern gate.”
I gently tossed a knife to their feet. The slaves just stared at me with empty eyes. No one picked up the knife.
They had lost their will to fight or escape long ago. This was how it was back in the game as well. Most NPCs in the palace were so broken and brainwashed that they didn’t even eat or drink without a direct orders.
I can’t help these people more than this right now. We’re on a schedule.
Crys and Kimono had their familiar ‘told you so’ look on their faces.
“Guys, there might be exceptions. It was worth a shot.”
Usually during revolutions you could expect some type of support from dissatisfied local citizens living in squalor, but that’s not how things rolled in Reignland.
In a way, these slaves were the lucky ones because they had all their legs and arms still attached.
We saw many slave citizens with one or both legs amputated, hopping with improvised crutches or dragging themselves forward just with their hands.
Every citizen born in Sun City had the same slave tattoo on their shoulder blade. If a citizen managed to escape the city, they were easily recognized and caught outside and sent back for punishment. The standard punishment for runaway citizen was a forced amputation of one leg or both legs, depending on circumstances.
On top of that, there was the added communal punishment to discourage further escape attempts: a lottery was held and one random citizen (man, woman, or child) was sentenced to death and publicly hanged while the legs of the escapee were guillotined on the same stage.
This was just one of the many cruel laws implemented by Caliph Tze.
Another unreasonable law was the so-called Lame Hundred Humiliation law, also known as Loose Parts law: when the Caliphate army went to battle near Reignland borders, a lottery was held among sick and injured citizens. Even if you were born with a congenital disease (being disgracefully guilty of the crime of not being born normal) or had lost a limb in an accident (being shamefully guilty of the crime of failing to stay normal), you were part of this lottery and equal to those who had tried to escape out of their own will. If you couldn’t do your slave work in full capacity, no matter the reason, you were ‘stealing production value’ from the Caliphate and thus criminal in the eyes of the state.
Hundred numbers were drawn and hundred disabled citizens were sent to the front lines. A long row of log benches were arranged just behind the Caliphate troops heading to battle. The disabled had to sit on these seats as an audience and loudly cheer their support for the soldiers. Before and after the battle, the soldiers were allowed (and expected) to berate and harass the crippled for being crippled and unable to fight.
As you would expect, both of these laws were applied simultaneously. If your legs were amputated according to the law and a random citizen was executed as supplement, further insult to injury was added because you were now permanently part of the lottery to be sent to the front lines to be publicly humiliated and bullied by able soldiers – and obviously also in danger of being killed by the enemy, if the Caliphate soldiers were to lose the battle.
In the game, these Lame Hundred groups were often seen as a passive audience during a melee tutorial minigame when you started the campaign for the first time. They were also briefly seen during the final arc of the anime, but since their presence wasn’t explained yet at that point, fans speculated endlessly why there was this surreal audience of disabled people sitting around on benches watching the final battle unfold and clapping their hands.
“There are more here.” (Rain)
“More slaves?”
In a side room pointed out by Rain, I saw a group of naked young women with tight ropes around their necks tied to each other and also on iron rings on walls.
Since these women had the characteristic markings of artificially induced alopecia – all body hair removed and eerily thin white skin – I could make an educated guess about their origin even without their precious silk clothes and accessories.
“Courtesans from Tze’s harem. Nobles or guards probably brought them here.”
“Where are the men who took your clothes?!” (Rain)
The naked women flinched by Rain’s sudden loud voice. No one answered. Their eyes were as dead as those of other slaves.
“I’ll cut their restraints–“
“They’re all pregnant...” (Rain)
Oh, right. All the women in the room were in various stages of pregnancy. Rain seemed very disturbed by their bulging bellies.
Kimono cut the women free, but they still stayed in the room huddled together like frightened children.
In their eyes, our group was probably as scary or even scarier than Caliphate soldiers.
“Rain. they won’t survive outside. It’s better if they stay here until Korryndin arrives.”
“All of you, stay here until Korryndin arrives!” (Rain)
We continued to the next floor and even deeper into the inner palace.
The smell of burning bodies and burning wood had already faded behind. My nostrils were hit by strong stench of incenses and perfumes.
While going through a hallway of carved columns, I counted seven columns from the entryway, pushed a secret button that opened a compartment on the wall.
The compartment contained a cylindrical metal safe with a mechanical combination lock. I quickly spun the five-number code in – five right, two left, five right, three left, six right – and opened the safe full of small red bags.
“Anyone need extra krúricks?”
No takers; we didn’t need petty cash. I raised my thumb in approval – keeping inventory slots open for extra ammo was the Mu-Ur way.
I left the safe open for Korryndin’s troops.
Opening the safe wasn’t part of the plan, I was just showing off.
There were similar cash caches on every floor of the palace. According to lore, keeping hidden bags of krúricks in different locations was a tribal tradition from the times of ancient Reignland.
Hidden money caches on the way to the final battle. Useless. Can’t even convert them to victory points or anything.
It was pretty clear that our prolonged starve-the-beast strategy had worked better than expected.
The city was weak and tired. The palace was empty and desperate.
The empty hallways felt like we had missed a major enemy spawn trigger.
All thanks to Crys’ off-screen efforts. He had been softening Reignland behind the scenes by creating crop failures in the western territories and causing starvation, circulating fake krúricks and smuggling fake goods, provoking mineral merchants and ironworks aristocrats against each other, selling defective weapons and substandard armor, bribing nobles and assassinating the family members of those who refused to take bribes, instigating small-scale rebellions to keep Death Squads busy in remote areas of Reignland, and so on.
Long ago, young members sneaked in the Sun City in disguise and created rumors about a large scale attack coming from the north while planting some small firebombs – while no attack actually came. So people should be used to constantly repeating rumors about an attack and treat it as a routine joke. Who would be stupid enough to attack the strongest fortified city in the world? And when the wold actually comes, no one believes it.
On top of that, we had encouraged our sub-gangs on both continents to commit burglaries in noble mansions and summer houses – eroding local High Hats trust to authorities when the local governors and sheriffs couldn’t protect their properties – while at the same time raising our status at the peripheries with targeted Robin Hood missions to small towns and penurious communities.
This kind of thing goes completely against the typical Japanese isekai protags – destroying fields instead of growing new crops with modern agricultural methods; advertising substandard equipment instead of crafting modern compound crossbows.
It’s all means to an end. You must dismantle old systems before you can create new systems; patch and sand before adding new paint.
From their perspective, we are cruel rebels and villains.
From our perspective, this is actually quite peaceful and merciful. Crys could have done much worse in much shorter time, if I hadn’t been there to speak some sense into him.
For example, Crys wanted to send street junkies with toxic gas canisters at the city gates, but I vetoed that plan – and many other even nastier plans, like slowly poisoning the groundwater supply with deviant drugs to turn the population into addicts and then suddenly cutting everyone off cold turkey, which would propel them into berserk rage.
“As you said, any beggar from the street can be useful for something; any fool can clear a dungeon trap once.” (Crys)
“Please stop using my out-of-context quotes to justify junkie berserkers. Do not combo my own spells against me, I’m not a conjurer of cheap tricks.”
Communication usually fails, or gets twisted to fit listener’s biases. Maybe this is how Nietzsche felt when Nazis appropriated his philosophy to promote fascism, or maybe how Darwin could have felt when the theory of natural selection was misunderstood to be a corpo-capitalist road map and justification to bully the weak.
That how it often goes with progress. Ignorant maniacs find scissors and run around thinking it’s a new, innovative quadruple-edged sword.
There were still so many nastier plans Crys deviced. Like sending people small in stature to attack the city through sewers – a classic route in games and movies, but pretty horrible idea in real life. Everyone going through the Sun City sewers would probably get infected with some flesh-eating plague from rat mites.
And there was also that old drug dealer trick: use a fake informant to send trigger-happy Death Squads in aristocratic houses and have them kill some noble families. This would decrease the reputation of Death Squads in aristocrats eyes and make Caliph Tze’s men look like incompetent fools. Undermine their authority and make nobles hate them.
Or kidnap children of key aristocrats to use as collateral.
Or sell tons of cheap paints or cooking oils laced with poisonous substances.
If any modern weapon systems existed – autonomous drone airburst cluster shredders or HADACS or whatever – Crys would have already autocannoned everyone in the Sun City without any care for underage civilian casualties.
Yes, this burn-the-city plan was heavy compromise.
My responsibility was to veto Crys’ over-the-top cruel ideas and come up with more humane alternatives.
Were not in such a desperate position that we'd have to resort to chemical and biological warfare. We hold the strongest cards (Rainwoman, Flame Tank, airship, and dynamite) so we have the luxury to think about the ethics and public relations.
A complicated compromise between somewhat humane and completely inhumane; innocent civilian casualties, sure, but at least they would have a chance to hide or escape.
And there won't be as much long-term health hazards and social problems down the road.
Crys spent lots of time sending secret letters and envoys to the Mu aristocrats (with the help of my Canon Knowledge) to persuade, blackmail or bribe them to our side, or at least stay neutral. Even if the old system nobles do not help us directly, they won’t oppose us either in the end, if we concentrate our attacks against Caliphate new system nobles. When king Korryndin is installed as the new emperor of Reignland, old nobles can (mostly) keep their previous positions and their family wealth. They might even gain some new land from the uprooted Caliphate nobles. In exchange, they have to accept the new emperor and readjust to some radical cultural and social updates.
That is to say: it took a long time to lay the groundwork and flip the odds so decisively to our favor.
We heard gunfire from the right side of the floor. Crys immediately recognized the sounds of the weapons they were using.
“Spider group.” (Crys)
“Right on time.”
After the gunfire stopped, we waited. The members of the Ninja Spider Rat Group soon came up and noticed us standing in the hallway, but still used the code phrase to make sure.
“Who’s farming over there?” (Woodeye)
“We’re streaming live!”
Woodeye and Fox Laughing (or Woody and Foxy, as I called them) appeared with the rest of their masked team: Double Shadow, Virtuoso, Ragdoll, Siren, etc.
Woodeye was wearing a zoot suit made of various patches of expensive fabrics and covering half of his face with his signature vertical half-mask with six droplet-like red eyes. This unsettling, colorful wood mask was his warface in the anime and a rare skindrop in the game.
Fox Laughing was wearing his grinning fox mask. He also had my hand-drawn map of the palace hanging from a string on his neck. He looked like a cosplaying orienteerer. Every member of the team carried a copy of the palace map.
“Rat Spider, no... Ninja Spider Rat Group reporting! East wing is clear! No casualties on our side – No, I almost forgot! There was one casualty! Crooked Blade fell down from the east palace wall and broke his legs, so he cut his own throat afterwards.” (Woodeye)
“Okay, ouch. Crooked Blade is gone then. One casualty?”
“Yes, one casualty.” (Woodeye)
“I guess that’s pretty good. What about the slave warehouses?”
“Yes, we opened a few cages and told the sanest-looking ones to open the rest, and then told them to escape northeast.” (Woodeye)
“Good. That should do for now.”
“Seer, why are there so many slaves here just sitting around and doing nothing? Why aren’t they working or anything?” (Foxy)
“Well, that’s just how free market works without oversight, I guess. If you sell something everyone wants for low cost and without restrictions, rich scalpers will hoard all of it and try to resell it for a higher price.”
“...Eh?” (Woodeye)
“I mean, due to our aggressive campaign to hard-cancel all slavemasters, keeping slaves as a workforce has become a much riskier business for northern hats. So slave traders in Reignland have been buying slaves from the north wholesale and are waiting for the demand and price of their stock to go up again.”
“So it was something like that...” (Foxy)
“Yep, slave scalpers exist. It’s a sick sad world. Anyway, good job overall reaching this level. Next stop is the throne room area and the secret weapons room.”
“Yes, seer!” (Woodeye)
“I assume there were no problems on the west side either?” (Crys)
“No problems, lord Crystal! They were weak and desperate!” (Woodeye)
“...Wait, who were?”
“The kids!” (Woodeye)
“...Right.”
There were always child soldiers on the west wing training grounds.
It’s either kill or be killed when a young Janissary with empty NPC eyes comes at you with a bayonet.
Technically speaking, we used teenagers as soldiers as well. But we don’t force them to become war-slaves. We don’t brainwash them to believe that this fascist slave state is the greatest and holiest country in the world. So we’re still the good guys, relatively speaking. We’re like Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters fighting against mutates of Genosha.
“Don’t let your guard down, Woody. Cornered rat bites the cat.”
“Yes, Seer! I will bite anything!” (Woodeye)
“That’s not what... Forget it, let’s go.”
On the move, I repeated the instructions I had given them back when I briefed them on their mission.
“The throne room area guards usually camp the stairways behind columns. Throw firebombs over the parapet to force them out of cover, keep aim just above the floor line for early hits and push in when you hear them retreating. Also, take down all Caliphate flags and break all the flagstaffs as a precaution. We don’t want any sudden deus ex machina plot twists. And remember to yell your attacks out loud so that we know what you’re throwing and where.”
“Yes, Seer!” (Woodeye)
Naming your attacks in a big party battle is important. If you don’t yell “grenade” when you throw one, you might kill friendlies.