BOOK TWO
THE SEAL OF THE SPHINX
Flora’s scent was vexingly recognizable.
The memory of it pointed nowhere. But its familiarity remained.
Who is she? he asked Pietr.
I’m afraid I don’t know, my lord. But she seems quite taken wi...
2024-10-12 12:37:07 +0000 UTC View PostRedmane strode down the broad street leading from Church Town to Barograd Keep with his followers behind him.
There was the Justiciar Vella, her careworn garments and wild hair giving her the look of the beastmen she’d infiltrated. As she walked along behind Redmane she stuck her pinky in...
2024-10-11 07:03:22 +0000 UTC View Post—
Skill Evolved
Omnivore —> Devourer
Devourer
Bloodline Skill (Monstrous)
Rank 1 - Evolution Possible
Passive
Rank 0:
-The Monster derives sustenance from anything, and its digestion produce...
2024-10-11 07:01:01 +0000 UTC View PostCorpus: 4042
Half of that huge stock of vitality gone in one strike.
It was as he feared.
One more mistake and he’d be dead. Another corpse for the endless pile.
The Manticore took a few steps forward, until it loomed over him, opening its immense maw wi...
2024-10-11 06:59:28 +0000 UTC View PostRedmane stared at a huge portrait of Sencis Karalis, the First of His Name, King of the Stahlmen and the Omeni and the Tribes of Volos.
He saw a resemblance.
Their faces were identical, save a few important details. First, the King didn’t have canines like daggers. Nor were his ear...
2024-10-11 06:57:13 +0000 UTC View PostMagister Helmold had to be very careful.
He’d go in the dead of night, when no one was down in the kitchen. The castle undercroft should be entirely empty at that time, save for a peasant or two acting as temporary castle guards. Valtr and Vengarl and Letha had busied themselves the last ...
2024-10-11 06:54:43 +0000 UTC View PostPietr, High Priest of Kraal, stood a full head taller than either of the priests flanking him, perhaps eight feet tall counting the antlers. In the manner of all beastmen, his eyes had a wild gleam and his face had taken on a feral quality, pointed teeth and ears, wolfish features. Pietr...
2024-10-11 06:53:15 +0000 UTC View PostHe felt the pieces of himself in motion, drawing nearer as fast as their wings would bear them. Two were close already, the others had to fly over from across the river. While he waited for those, he used the two who were close to begin an aerial patrol of this end of the city, switching back and...
2024-10-11 06:50:27 +0000 UTC View PostWhen he came to, which felt like reluctantly waking from a long and comfortable nap, he blinked his eyes open and realized…
He was airborne.
The impact knocked him out, and bounced him up into the air like a ball.
Corpus: 6199
Redmane shook his ...
2024-10-11 06:48:56 +0000 UTC View PostDrusilla’s Font
It was a sphere of Gnosis which, once Irina cast it, floated in the air between herself, Redmane and Radovid at about navel height. The Font was roughly the size of the cannonball that struck Redmane in the gut recently, though this ball was more pleasant ...
2024-10-11 06:46:57 +0000 UTC View PostLaszlo and Stenn, Guardians of Brandis Bridge, Slain
Tasks Completed: 3/5
Level Up
Level 43 —> Level 44
Level 44 —> Level 45
Level 45 —> Level 46
<... 2024-10-11 06:45:29 +0000 UTC View PostRedmane rolled to his feet at the last possible instant before being chopped, clobbered and skewered at the same time.
To his sides, Radovid and Irina were engaged with the others. But he couldn’t pay attention to what they were doing, he had three foes right in front of him and they were...
2024-10-11 06:44:07 +0000 UTC View PostRedmane flew down the hill, ripping apart beastmen on his way and devouring their remains while they were still hot.
Corpus: 2132
The final team of them awaited him at the bottom of the slope, filling the air with the crackle of gunfire as they tried in vain to land a...
2024-10-11 06:41:57 +0000 UTC View PostIt took Redmane half the fight, and most of his Corpus, to get Agneszka the Stitcher to the point where she was emotionally compromised.
With Pavel it seemed he’d done so right away.
“What did you do to my wife?!”
His voice boomed, so loud it made the team of beastman can...
2024-10-11 06:39:29 +0000 UTC View PostThe woman was nude, and appeared to have fully grown to adulthood within the flower. She had light brown skin and blue-green hair, the color of spring’s first triumph over cold winter. Her face was as fair as her form, soft and refined, regal. Or perhaps divine. Long, pointed ears poked ...
2024-10-11 06:31:26 +0000 UTC View PostThe blow sucked the air from Redmane’s lungs.
Corpus: 1410
Bleeding (3)
Blood bubbled up in his mouth, flowed over his chin and down his neck.
He looked down to see Agneszka’s sword plunged all the way into his stomach, to the hilt. 2024-10-11 06:28:34 +0000 UTC View Post
A pack of six Stitchwork Stalkers flew at him. Two Spiders were not far behind. And bringing up the rear was a howling brute with great clubs of bone for hands.
Redmane sprinted at them, past them. His claws scored through stitched flesh, shredding it open. Like a knight jousting on horseb...
2024-10-11 06:25:59 +0000 UTC View PostRedmane’s feet hit the cobblestones on the tradesmen’s district in a dead sprint.
Evidently this part of town had become a battleground between two factions. Agneszka’s stitched horrors and Pavel’s black powder wielding beastmen. The townsfolk who hadn’t fled from this place had b...
2024-10-11 06:24:17 +0000 UTC View PostRedmane checked the description of the Skill to refresh his memory.
—
Spawn
Bloodline Skill [Monstrous (Gruu)]
Rank 1
Active - Variable Cost
The Monster is able to spawn smaller creatures out of its own flesh, which are commonly used as assi...
2024-10-11 06:20:03 +0000 UTC View PostCrossbow bolts whizzed by Redmane’s head as he sprinted for the watchtower.
The Stitchwork Spider climbed down the side of that tower to interpose itself between him and the guards posted behind and above. Unless Redmane found a way by, he’d have to contend with them all at the same ti...
2024-10-11 06:18:19 +0000 UTC View PostRedmane came to the outer wall of Barograd and looked up.
Dawn was close. The sky shone bright blue over the tops of the crenelations.
He’d come to this spot to scale the wall, begin with a good vantage point. Walking in the front gates would have been more direct, but he’d...
2024-10-11 06:16:04 +0000 UTC View PostRedmane’s body sailed free from the cone of flames. But the fire seared him deeply all the same, though he’d only been engulfed for a mere instant.
Corpus: 2586
That hurt.
It would be bad to be touched by the fire again.
Umber snapped at him an...
2024-10-11 06:12:45 +0000 UTC View PostWhile Wargs chased down the last of the brigands, Redmane, Valtr and Vengarl entered the chapel to see to the captive townspeople.
Many broke out into tears of gratitude. Some began helping release the others the moment they were free. A few simply sat, catatonic, even after their gags were...
2024-10-11 06:04:05 +0000 UTC View PostIn an instant, the quiet of the brigand camp had broken into the din of battle. Wargs tore into shouting beastmen. Somewhere above, Valtr and Vengarl sniped away at their quarry.
Redmane’s foes were right in front of him.
Two instead of one. How gracious of the gods to serve a side ...
2024-10-11 05:59:43 +0000 UTC View PostThe plan for the beastmen did not resemble the plan for the Gruu, but it sounded equally effective to Redmane.
They let night fall. Firelight took over the encampment in place of sunlight. Down by the longhouse they lit a big bonfire, a handful of brigands sitting around it, drinking ale an...
2024-10-11 05:57:09 +0000 UTC View PostValtr and Vengarl returned briefly to their campsite to pack it in, and then they set out in a southeasterly direction with Redmane, the trio walking along casually under the noontime sun. Or what passed for it in Midva Forest. Even at its apex the light didn’t quite make it through the thick c...
2024-10-11 05:54:42 +0000 UTC View PostThe chamber of Grandmother Gruu was round and high of ceiling, its walls pocked all over with the circular entrances to tunnels great and small, the whole area illuminated in red by patches of the glowing moss that had led him here. The Grandmother herself sat at the center, larger and taller tha...
2024-10-11 05:48:14 +0000 UTC View PostThe brigand camp lay some miles to the southeast, but according to Valtr and Vengarl there were so many Gruu burrows between here and there that there might as well be a host of soldiers standing in the way.
“Soldiers would be preferable,” said Vengarl. “At least they only come in one...
2024-10-11 05:46:42 +0000 UTC View PostThe Great Gruu stretched out its wings and took flight, and Redmane realized in an instant of alarmed clarity what it intended to do.
It was going to pick him up and drop him into that mass of Gruu below.
He fled from it, turning and leaping to the next tree limb that would support h...
2024-10-11 05:45:03 +0000 UTC View PostThe narrow road beyond the drawbridge of Häerz Castle, which wound a few miles in a southron direction through Barograd, was walled in on either side by dark trees. They were tall and thick of trunk, and the way they twisted against each other made Redmane imagine they were engaged in a savage b...
2024-10-11 05:43:37 +0000 UTC View Post