Part 10: The Kenos

Episode 10: The Kenos



I've long waited to assault this place. Far beneath the earth the Empire has long kept our unholy prize a secret. You must break through their defences and steal back the Kenos, which will give you the powers once held by you and your kind… you will be as a god if you seize victory here.



The Arcane Fortress! Our objective is imprisoned here, beneath the surface, where the Empire hopes it can do them less harm…



You can almost taste it… The Kenos. The moment is now, Underlord. We must seize the artifact and move to end our campaign!



These Obelisks trap the Kenos beneath the face of the world. Destroy them… and our weapon will be ripe for the taking.



The Underlord Mira, one of our eldest, will help you crush the enemy's resistance.



Our triumph is close at hand, Underlord! Do try to enjoy the moment.

I don't know what the Kenos is, but I want it! This mission, we've finally made an Underlord friend who will actually do stuff. Mira will be assaulting the fortress from the north. She also has a really swanky dungeon design. Love that necro-cubism.

The Kenos is kept at the centre of the arcane fortress, protected by four inhibitors. There's no time to waste, so I use the vision spell to quickly scan the area around the dungeon core. There's a gateway to the west and plenty of buildable space. A very nice starting location.



I dig out a big room for all the usual starting buildings, as well as a small garrison.



To the west, I discover the ubiquitous gold shrine. The last mission was pretty rough, so I'm not going to pass on free gold this time.



Now that I have lots of money, I'm free to expand to bigger, more exotic room types. Big prison, big arena, and a little alchemy lab just for fun. The empty room will become a torture chamber, but torture chambers are really expensive, so I'll have to let the workers mine for a bit first.

Your ally's minions are under attack!



Mendechaus alerts me that Mira's minions are in combat. I am going to hear that line quite a few times this mission, and it's as annoying as you would expect. I don't know what he expects me to do about it, as Mira is literally on the opposite side of the map. Apparently a couple of Mira's oculi have discovered the northern entrance to the arcane fortress.



Since I'm already up here, I take a look at Mira's base. Mira has been really busy! Her base is a fair bit bigger than mine, and she is already testing the defences of the arcane fortress!



Not to be outdone, I dig to the southern entrance of the fortress and set up a line of siege cannons. Hopefully this won't provoke the heroes into attacking or anything.



Oh wait, they're all here.

The Empire's Arcanist is a powerful sorceress who channels the energies of the Aether into her formidable assaults. But she is pathetically frail, and should fall with ease. She's better off staying in the Archives with her books.

I don't think I like you, Mendechaus.



Luckily, these Empire troops are fairly weak, low-level units that are easily dealt with by dumping all of your guys on top of them.

The Empire's Templar is their core foot soldier, dim-witted and pure battle fodder for an Underlord - despite his training in the barracks.



Since we have the momentum after that fight, I press on against the front door of the arcane fortress. It's guarded by a couple of traps, but nothing too worrying, even for our low-level army.

Now that our assault is well underway, let's go and check on Mira and see if she's managing to keep up.



She's smashed down the front gates, seized the hallways and antechamber and already destroyed one of the four inhibitors protecting the Kenos.



I don't want Mira clearing the entire level without us, so I rush our army through the southern defences and into the inhibitor room. There's a handful of Empire troops defending the inhibitor. We outnumber them slightly, but unfortunately they're very high level.



Luckily, these particular troop types, the templar and the arcanist, are not very strong, so we manage to overrun them.



Meanwhile, our prison is filling up nicely with high level hero units. I plan to be converting heroes constantly throughout this mission, as I expect we will be getting many prisoners.



The last two inhibitors are to the east and west of the Kenos. I strike out to the east.

Your ally's minions are being attacked!

Yes, I know. Thank you.



The arcane fortress is very large, although the layout doesn't really make any sense. To the east of the inhibitor, I pass through this small torture chamber in the middle of a hallway. Heroes are weird.



North of here is the third inhibitor. Unforunately, there are also a lot of strong hero units.



Like, a lot of them. The fight goes poorly.



As a desperate gambit, I try sending in a bunch of workers to bring back our knocked-out units. If they can drag our units back to the dungeon, our army will be ready to fight again after a bit of rest.



This plan also goes poorly. They all die.



That's fine, though—we've got more fighters in the oven. The torture chamber is constantly pushing out new volunteers for our army.



Soon enough, we have enough soldiers ready for another assault. Fifteen traitors are supporting our army in this screenshot.



Where there are now more of us, there are fewer of them. The remaining defenders don't stand a chance.



Only one Obelisk remains! Tear this final idol down!



I immediately turn the army towards the western inhibitor. A few defenders show up, but nothing major.



Then something major shows up.



Your minions are being wiped out!



This mission has a certain rhythm to it. You make a breakthrough, a giant wave of heroes shows up to break your army, you rebuild, and then you try to make another breakthrough. We are like the tide, rising higher and higher each time the waves hit the beach.



We return again, renewed. Another thing that contributes to the pace of this mission is that once you have unleashed a giant force of heroes, they will spread around the fortress so you can defeat them piecemeal.



When we reach the fourth inhibitor room, only their level 10 champion remains. And although she's powerful, she can't stand against an entire army.



Solid work, Underlord! The Kenos is ours for the taking!

It's… Beautiful. That power… No! The Kenos belongs to ME!



Mira, what the hell are you doing? The Kenos is not for you, you impudent witch!



Underlord… You will be the implement of my justice. We will invade Mira's home realm, and take the Kenos back from her smouldering ruins! Now get to work, while I think of an appropriate punishment…



Another turncoat emerges! Enter her realm and send her the way of Marcus and Rhaskos… then claim what is rightfully yours.

We'll never make a real Underlord friend.