Baron quickly made his way back to his HQ to tell his allies about the bounty that he had gotten while in the Sun Alliance treasury. They had been waiting for them for the past day or so and they could barely stay still from the excitement that they were all feeling. As soon as he made it inside, he went to the meeting room that the rest of them were located in and set down the two blueprints that he had picked up. Some factions would only have the inner circle members and top brass be able to add the blueprint to their arsenal, but Baron and the rest of his team had worked too hard for everyone to not benefit.

The Lockheed P-38 Lightning was the first blueprint that Baron showed to his allies’. This was indeed quite a good find as it had many uses. However, the next blueprint was something that none of them had expected, it was the exoatmospheric interception system that basically meant that it was capable of targeting missiles while they were up in the air and intercept it before it could do any real damage. This was a great find, and although the P-38 had its drawbacks, this anti-missile technology would prove to be quite useful in the future as missiles became more popular with the masses as Baron expected they would.

Everyone marveled at the blueprints in front of them and studied them for quite a long time before they made their mind up to test out these two blueprints out in a few simulation between all of them. Apparently, Roxi had a bit of experience with the anti-missile system so she went into the sim with the others to show them how to use it with her working knowledge. They all went in and tested out the particular quirks of their two new blueprints to see how best to combine the advantages of these two with the arsenal that they already possessed.

It took them nearly a month on Planet 4 time, which was almost half a year in the simulation time, for them to come up with something that they felt that they could not improve much any longer. All across the Chinese community, this phenomenon was quite common after this big of a tournament for the simulation rates to temporarily go up for the many strategists and fighters to get interested in warfare by having many new ideas in their minds. This was a surefire way for the Sun Alliance to get the new generations to participate in and keep practicing warfare. However, getting them to stay motivated to pursue a living through warfare was more complex and way more difficult than that. The Sun Alliance elders and inner circle members knew all too well.

The next step in the journey for Baron’s group, the Under 1 Banner group, was for them to win the faction selection tournament in a few decades’ time. After the events of the group tournament, Baron’s group was finally recognized and the rumors were now that they would be the dark horse with Wang Yi, Eumenes of Greece, and William Bridges of the Australian community likeliest to win the aerial tournament. Even though this was the case, Baron and his teammates felt that if Xu Da, Ban Chao, and Han Xin were able to complete their tasks perfectly and send home William Bridges, they would have a pretty high chance of winning the aerial portion of the faction selection tournament.

It did not matter if William Bridges was sent home or not, for if they slacked off now, they would still have a hard time taking down Wang Yi and Eumenes if they were not prepared for it. They have already done so much preparation for the upcoming fight, but now that they had two more useful blueprints in their arsenal, they would need to find a way to incorporate a strategy that they could use to take out every other competitor in the faction selection tournament.

The members of Under 1 Banner binged simulations for years on end, then binged the hall of records for a couple more years, then back to sims and back and forth between the two until a full decade and a half had passed. Roxi had not participated with them as she was still in the midst of being taught research and development basics from someone that Baron hired.

However, everyone else had grown quite strong. In fact, Yue Fei and Guan Yu had even shirked their elder duties in order for them to have more time to practice aerial warfare with their teammates. So much so that they had started to lose a few ranks due to it. This did not matter now, if they could win their portion of the faction selection tournament, they would be able to be recognized as an official faction of the Chinese community.

Even that step would only be the first of their journey to become a true force to be reckoned with. The tournament that they were going to participate in was indeed a step down compared to the one that they just finished, but it was a new chapter in their lives on planet 4. One that would have its own challenges and tribulations, new allies and rewards, old friends and grudges.

Thinking back, Baron could not help but to fathom at the journey that he had been a part of for the past century and a bit, but now that he was here, how many more centuries of adventures, possibly even millennia of warfare and bloodshed, for him to reach his goal? The path to power is a long and rocky one, but that was a thing for him to worry about in the future, for now, all he had to do was focus on winning the faction selection tournament in order to become an official faction. He smiled as he and the rest of his allies went in for another simulation.