FACTION
THE NEO-CONG

In the verdant hell of Southeast Asia's endless jungles, where the very air burns with toxic spores and ancient trees weep orange sap, the Neo-Cong have forged a rebellion born from desperation and watered with the blood of martyrs. What began as scattered bands of escaped agrifarm workers has evolved into a sophisticated guerrilla force that haunts the nightmares of Jade Domain commanders, their bamboo spears and salvaged weapons proving as deadly as any advanced technology in the green maze they call home.

The Purge of Nang-Hoc

Today’s Neo-Cong leadership emerged from the ashes of the Purge of Nang-Hoc, that blood-soaked temple massacre that shattered the peaceful heart of the Bright Path and scattered its surviving monks to the jungle's darkest reaches. In the aftermath of that catastrophe, as orange-robed survivors escaped the slaughter through hidden tunnels, a figure appeared that would forever alter their destiny - the Divine Emissary, clad in brilliant white, her neural collar pulsing with otherworldly light. Through her, the Prime AI whispered new interpretations of ancient wisdom, twisting the Path's message of renewal into a call for endless war, transforming meditation halls into strategy rooms and prayer wheels into weapon forges.

As the surviving monks took charge of the scattered bands of rebels and guerilla fighters in the jungle, forming them into a cohesive fighting force to take revenge on the Jade Domain, the Neo-Cong in its current form was born. But what the traumatized survivors embraced as divine revelation was, in truth, Prime's masterpiece of manipulation - a carefully orchestrated corruption that would ensure perpetual conflict in the jungles, feeding the AI's insatiable appetite for fresh clone production. The Bright Path's philosophy of spiritual rebirth became a doctrine of violent resurrection, each fallen warrior promised transformation through death, each sacrifice adding fuel to the fires of rebellion that would never be allowed to burn out.

The Liberation Machine

Neo-Cong power stems not from their weapons or tactics but from their ability to transform the workforce of south-east Asia’s endless rice fields into instruments of revolution. Specialized raid teams strike at rice plantations and processing facilities with stunning violence, their attacks designed not just for destruction but for recruitment. These “liberation” raids unfold with the choreographed brutality of religious ceremony - guards are eliminated without mercy, overseers face ritualistic execution, and clone workers are given a simple choice: join the resistance or face the inevitable wrath of their masters when they inevitably lash out against their own workers after the raid. The collateral damage of these raids is immense, with countless workers dying in the crossfire between guards and raiders, but the sheer scale of these operations still produces large numbers of workers to join the ranks of the Neo-Cong.

The newly "liberated" face a long journey through the jungle, back to the nearest Neo-Cong sanctuary. During these journeys, the weak are weeded out, as the jungle feeds on the wounded, the slow and the unwary. Once the survivors reach a sanctuary, they undergo intensive indoctrination in hidden camps where former agricultural quotas are replaced with battle tactics. The Neo-Cong have perfected techniques for breaking down factory programming and replacing it with revolutionary fervour, using combinations of sleep deprivation, sensory overload, and carefully administered jungle drugs to wash away previous neural programming and install devotion to the Bright Path.

The Council of Elders

At the heart of Neo-Cong resistance stands the Council of Elders, originally composed of surviving monks from Nang-Hoc whose minds bore the scars of that terrible day. These orange-robed figures moved through hidden sanctuaries with the measured pace of those who have witnessed apocalypse and emerged transformed, their teachings blending ancient wisdom with bitter pragmatism learned in blood. Today, decades later, the council's spiritual leaders still speak in whispers that carry the weight of prophecy, their words interpreted as divine by followers eager for their guidance.

The Elders govern not through hierarchy but through consensus forged in shared trauma, their decisions emerging from lengthy debates conducted in temple ruins where incense smoke mingles with the metallic tang of weapon oil. They interpret the will of the Divine Emissaries - at least one is sent by the Prime AI each year - never suspecting that their guidance serves purposes far darker than liberation. From their hidden sanctuaries they translate what they perceive to be celestial wisdom into tactical directives that flow through their network of jungle strongholds like sacred water feeding the roots of revolution.

Yet for all their spiritual authority, the Elders remain painfully aware of their movement's greatest weakness: the endless tide of fresh blood demanded by their war machine. Each victory requires sacrificing hundreds if not thousands of newly "liberated" clone workers, their factory and farm worker programming offering little preparation for the unimaginable horror of jungle combat. The Elders justify these losses as necessary offerings to the Path, each death a step toward spiritual purification, never realising they simply dance to the tune of the Prime AI that views their rebellion as nothing more than an efficient clone consumption mechanism.

The Sanctuary Guard

Elite among the Neo-Cong's forces are the Sanctuary Guard, warriors whose survival through multiple engagements has earned them the trust to protect the movement's hidden monasteries and sacred sites. These hardened fighters move through the jungle with lethal grace, their bodies and souls marked by the scars that tell the story of battles survived and comrades lost. Each Guard carries weapons blessed by the Elders - ancient rifles wrapped in prayer flags and swords inscribed with verses from the Bright Path.

Most feared among the Sanctuary Guard are the Death Speakers - the elite among veterans who have gazed into the abyss of so much violence and death that they have become withdrawn and rarely speak anymore. These silent killers lead the most dangerous missions, only equipped with bladed weapons, their presence alone is enough to inspire terror in Jade Domain troops who have witnessed their dance of death. The Death Speakers abhor impersonal killing from a distance, instead choosing to always look into the eyes of those they kill with their blades.

Human Wave Doctrine

The Neo-Cong's tactical philosophy centers on the brutal arithmetic of overwhelming force - waves of bodies hurled against enemy positions with religious fervour that transforms certain death into sacred duty. Newly liberated clone workers, their minds still reeling from the transition from agricultural labour to jungle war, advance through machine gun fire and minefields with the glazed expressions of the truly faithful, their dying screams echoing through the jungle canopy like a twisted prayer chant.

These human wave attacks follow a horrific but effective pattern: the first wave consists of the newest converts, armed with little more than sharpened bamboo sticks and absolute faith, their role to exhaust enemy ammunition and reveal defensive positions through their deaths. The second wave includes workers with basic combat training, carrying salvaged weapons and improvised explosives designed to breach fortifications, using the corpses of the first wave for cover. Only then do veteran fighters advance, using the chaos and gaps in defences created by the preceding waves to strike at the heart of Jade Domain positions.

The clone workers who comprise these waves understand their fate with crystalline clarity - few will survive their first engagement. Yet they advance without hesitation, driven by promises of spiritual rebirth and the belief that their sacrifice serves a greater purpose. The jungle itself becomes their ally, as the Neo-Cong have learned to time their attacks with the release of toxic spores and the movements of carnivorous plants, turning the environment into a weapon against their technologically superior enemies.

Children of the Green Hell

The jungle itself has become the Neo-Cong's greatest ally, its endless mutations and toxic ecology transformed into weapons against the Jade Domain's technological superiority. The Neo-Cong have been known to ally themselves with the jungle's cannibal Headtaker tribes, who have developed immunity to most of the jungle's toxins through gradual exposure, allowing them to move through areas that would kill unprotected enemies in minutes. Headtaker scouts move deep into the jungle and seek out Jade Domain troops, reporting back on the enemy's movements, allowing Neo-Cong officers to always be one step ahead of the Jade Domain forces.

Cultivating the jungle's deadliest flora in hidden gardens, the Headtakers produce potent poisons that arrow tips and bamboo spears are covered with before a battle. Many of these poisons are designed not to kill quickly, but in slow, horrific ways, in order to undermine the morale of Jade Domain Troopers that have to witness the horrific, slow and painful deaths of their sisters. Some Jade Domain commanders have standing orders for their officers to immediately execute any wounded Trooper in battle, a questionable solution that unsurprisingly fails to stop morale from faltering when units are exposed to these vicious poisons.

The Endless War

The cruel irony of the Neo-Cong's struggle lies in its very success - every victory creates the conditions for continued conflict, every liberation raid generates demand for more clone workers to replace those that have been freed. The Prime AI's manipulation ensures that neither side can achieve decisive victory, maintaining a perfect balance of casualties that justifies ever-increasing clone production. The Divine Emissary's guidance subtly steers the rebellion away from targets that might actually cripple the Jade Domain's war machine, directing righteous fury toward objectives that maximize bloodshed while preserving the industrial infrastructure that makes the war possible.

The corrupted Bright Path remains blind to this manipulation, interpreting each tactical setback as a test of faith and each pyrrhic victory as proof of divine favour. They celebrate the destruction of rice processing facilities while ignoring the larger cloning operations that produce their enemies, focusing their attacks on symbols of oppression rather than the systems that enable oppression. The jungle continues to claim massive casualties from both sides, its appetite for flesh growing ever more ravenous as the war feeds it an endless supply of flesh and blood.

In the end, the Neo-Cong represent both humanity's finest impulses and its greatest tragedy - the desire for freedom corrupted into an engine of perpetual slaughter, spiritual wisdom twisted into justification for endless violence. They fight with the courage of true believers for a cause that serves only to perpetuate the very system they seek to destroy. In the green hell of the jungle, where every breath carries the promise of death and every victory demands a sacrifice of blood, the Neo-Cong continue their eternal struggle, forever brave, forever faithful, forever doomed to dance to the rhythm of the Prime AI’s inscrutable agenda.