When I finally woke up, I was sore.
Given my recent less-than-optimal sleeping conditions, that wasn’t too abnormal. Quickly, however, it became clear that this was no mere muscle stiffness.
As if to drive that understanding home, the first thing I noticed on opening my ...
2024-07-04 12:00:18 +0000 UTC
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This should not prove overly difficult, yes? As Tess flew off into the distance, Verin took stock of their situation. While she would not deny feeling more at ease with Tess around, her absence did not overly worry Verin. If anything, with how little Tess had let her contribute to fighti...
2024-07-01 12:02:40 +0000 UTC
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Throughout the entire palace, not once had I let the others help with the fighting. While there’d been some cursory attempts on their parts to help out, I’d shut them down quickly, not willing to take any chances. It was, after all, partly my fault we’d ended up here for going along with th...
2024-06-27 12:00:15 +0000 UTC
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I couldn’t, in full honesty, say that sinking through the sand ranked on my top ten worst experience list, though that wasn’t for lack of trying. I could only be thankful for the small number of levels I’d picked up in Breath Control last semester which kept me from immediately suc...
2024-06-24 12:11:00 +0000 UTC
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Given that all of my experiences in the desert thus far had been fairly brief, there was something that I hadn’t fully appreciated up till now.
The desert was hot.
A simple fact on the surface, although the more I thought about it, the stranger it felt. It wasn’t as if there was a...
2024-06-20 12:00:14 +0000 UTC
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Our grand excursion into the desert was agreed upon and set in stone, but rather than jump into it immediately, we decided to prepare a bit. And in this case, by “we,” I was strictly referring to Cal.
For all the rogue had spent her time wandering about, she still hadn’t fully explore...
2024-06-17 12:00:26 +0000 UTC
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Sand. I’d never been a particular fan of the stuff, and that was when I’d visited pleasant, summertime beaches. When it came to monster-infested deserts, my dislike of the gritty substance was only intensified.
Of all the four surrounding biomes, the desert was the one I’d least expec...
2024-06-13 12:00:10 +0000 UTC
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It was hard to say when the exact moment I woke up was, if only because my waking state wasn’t all that far off from being asleep. Much as I’d feared, the utter cessation of stimulus was enough to send me nearly back to square one, leaving me lying there on the cold cave floor. It was only by...
2024-06-10 12:00:12 +0000 UTC
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The day after my outing, Verin cornered me to float the idea of group monster fighting. With how easily I’d dealt with all the gryphons, she imagined if the other two accompanied me, it would be a steady source of experience for all of us.
While there was something calming about fighting ...
2024-06-06 12:00:08 +0000 UTC
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Up until now, the only time I’d seen new class skills was when I’d grabbed the skills leading up to them. To that end, I’d expected maybe one new option for my recent purchase of Status Resistance, but that was it.
That was, however, not what I was seeing now. Sitting there o...
2024-06-03 11:57:15 +0000 UTC
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Having expected some level of pyrotechnics already, I wasn’t disappointed when cracks and fissures formed along the massive block, all of them emitting the same eerie purple glow I’d come to associate with mental mana. As the cracks spread with an accompanying frightening din, I couldn’t he...
2024-05-30 11:44:51 +0000 UTC
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Building a house, in the end, was not an overly difficult task. Or, at least it wasn’t depending on the type of house. Had I needed to adhere to local building codes and wire in electrical lines and figure out a plumbing system, things might have been a bit tougher. In fact, even had I been try...
2024-05-27 12:00:13 +0000 UTC
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As time slipped by, the following days came and went. It would have been nice to say that I suddenly gained a great burst of energy, cheerfully chatting up the others. In truth, even the thought of holding any reasonable conversation exhausted me. Still, I made sure to spare Cal and Verin from th...
2024-05-23 12:00:19 +0000 UTC
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Ascendant
You have surpassed the limits of a standard, non-enhanced member of your race in every dimension. Your body and mind have been baptized in and reformed by mana. You are on a path scarce few ever tread: A path to something greater.
2024-05-20 11:59:47 +0000 UTC
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Sensation crashed into me all at once, the unfamiliarity of it sending pulses of terror through my body. A glimpse of an unfamiliar man with unnatural reddish skin. Who was he? I squirmed away from his grip with a guttural, inhuman cry.
Two women, grabbing me. Catching me. They felt...
2024-05-16 11:56:32 +0000 UTC
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The room, or perhaps more aptly, holding cell, that Sett found himself in was nothing if not boring. Large, sure, but outside its ridiculous size and the spell circles etched into the granite floor, there was absolutely nothing of interest.
It thus was quite notable, then, when the space in...
2024-05-13 12:00:17 +0000 UTC
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AN: By all rights, this should be today's basic tier chapter, but it seems to already be marked as available, so I unlocked chapter 4 instead. Did I unlock this on Thursday, or has this been unlocked for much longer? Unsure! Sending out an email for it in case it's been unlocked for a whi...
2024-05-09 12:00:08 +0000 UTC
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The underground tunnel was everything one could ask for when it came to spooky old wizards. In fact, even to call it a tunnel did it a disservice. Sleek unblemished granite covered floor, wall, and ceiling alike, broken only by the occasional imposing column interspersed with some blue mage light...
2024-05-06 11:46:15 +0000 UTC
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Hi hello, all. We're back!
Can't say how lovely it is to be off of my hiatus, and a big thank you to everyone who's reading along after all this time.
Happy to say that tomorrow will be my last day of work which means Friday will be the first day that I'll be writing full-time. Woohoo...
2024-05-01 12:00:17 +0000 UTC
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In a strange and unforgiving land where few had ever tread before, the landscape shifted with every step. One moment, hard rock shot into the sky in the form of a cold and unforgiving mountain; the next, sand threatened to swallow any foolish enough to dare traverse it. Dark forests abutted flami...
2024-05-01 12:00:17 +0000 UTC
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Hi all! Incredibly happy to say I'm still here and still writing, and apologies for going AWOL for two and a half months. Life has kept me a bit busier and more stressed in the past few months than I anticipated, mostly for good reasons, partly for bad. I'd hoped to come back on January 1st, but ...
2024-03-17 14:00:09 +0000 UTC
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Hi hello, all! Book 3 is now complete! Woohoo!
I hope you’ve all enjoyed reading it even half as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it and getting to share it. When I set out to start the Sylum arc, I expected the entirety of books 2 and 3 to fit into a single book. Clearly, that didn...
2023-10-27 01:56:25 +0000 UTC
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AN: And that's it! Book 3 is now done!
~~~~~~~~
“Hey. Heyyyyy.”
A bothersome and incessant voice did its best to cut through the fog of sleep which clung to Verin. When it failed to rouse her, a firm poke to the side soon followed. As obnox...
2023-10-27 01:08:26 +0000 UTC
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AN: One more chapter after this until B3 is done!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“A rather dreadful turn of events, is it not?” Barb sat close to the fire, heating up a lentil stew to share among him and the others. The ingredients had been one of the few things he’d mana...
2023-10-23 12:35:33 +0000 UTC
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How in the name of all that’s holy did this become such a spectacle?
Archmage Xander’Calis went through the exacting motions of preparing the ritual he’d be using to visit his master, laying down the spell circle directly into the earth beneath him. Even that much had taken s...
2023-10-19 10:02:00 +0000 UTC
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Three days passed in Emer’Thalis as Tess continued to lie in bed.
The war, as fiercely as it had raged, was no more. With the threat of death very literally looming above everyone in the form of the archmage, not even the most battle-hungry warrior had the guts to keep at it. When the ord...
2023-10-16 23:51:58 +0000 UTC
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Hi hello, all.
Just a quick post about delays in writing. Doing my best to get these last ~3-4ish chapters of book three out with minimal delays, but work-work just picked up dramatically, so I'm struggling a bit! The callout over in 2023-10-10 16:26:47 +0000 UTC
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Hovering high in the air above Emer’Thalis, Archmage Xander’Callis had to admit that he was having a particularly frustrating day.
At first it had been the normal things. His research was going nowhere. The latest batch of theses out of the academy’s magic students was all drivel. He...
2023-10-07 02:30:58 +0000 UTC
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Realizing that they were brandishing their weapons at their kingdom’s one and only princess, the king’s honor guard and the many soldiers surrounding him all started to lower their weapons, only stopping when their king shouted out an order to the contrary.
“Hold! My daughter would ne...
2023-10-02 13:35:51 +0000 UTC
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Nadja was feeling great. Great!
Each stretch of earth vanished beneath her feet as quickly as it arrived, her legs moving faster than they ever had before. Was this how people with higher stats felt all the time? She loved it! Nadja sincerely hoped there was a lot more of the wine to go aro...
2023-09-28 14:04:45 +0000 UTC
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