tobiasbegley

The Effaced: Chapter Eight

“Hello, dearest sister,” I said, a hint of wry amusement in my voice. “Is locking me in an enchanted box with a thousand and one ways to kill me really the way you wanted to greet me.” 

“It depends,” Jessica said, no humor in her tone at all. I dropped my own quickly. ...

The Effaced: Chapter Seven

On the other side of the portal lay Mist. 

Lay my past. 

Before I was Axel.

But no, that wasn’t quite right. As much as I liked to pretend those days were gone and never coming back, it had taken me a long time to shed off who I was as Mist. This hadn’t been a big,...

The Third Gate: Chapter Eight

Watching the city of Delitone brought several emotions to mind. The first and most basic was nerves. 

If I was caught by the border guards, then I’d be looking at prison time, and who knew what would happen to the eggs? 

Past the nerves, there was some pride. 

I...

Vote o' Vote

The Third Gate: Chapter Seven

I stared into the space where Orykson had been, then sighed and tucked away the contract. I was exhausted, and my emotions were running all over the place. I could check it over in the morning, then with Meadow, and then contemplate signing off on it. Doing it now was just unduly rash. 

The Third Gate: Chapter Six

“Finally!” Elio roared as Orykson appeared over a battlefield. Orykson resisted the urge to roll his eyes. He did appreciate snark, especially coming from those who didn’t have the power to challenge him, like his young ex-apprentice, but he didn’t like it right now. 

Thinking ...

The Effaced: Chapter Six

“You’re free to go,” my attorney informed me as we strode down into the lobby of the constable’s station. “Well, relatively free?” 

“Relatively free?” I asked. 

“Until we get an innocent verdict, you’re not entirely free,” the attorney said. “You’re...

The Effaced: Chapter Five

I was slumped into the folding metal chair, the attorney that I’d called sitting next to me. Across from us, Captain Hunt and a constable sat, playing the classical act, where Captain Hunt would come in hard, and the constable would back up and play nice, but the attorney wasn’t buying it.&nb...

The Effaced: Chapter Four

When lunch came by, I was dry, and a constable brought someone else into my cell, a short, skinny teenager. He gave me a wide-eyed stare, and shuffled to the unoccupied cot. 

“What did you do?” the teen asked, and I sighed. Were the constables really trying to use me to frighten ch...

The Third Gate: Chapter Five

“It’s not becoming of a gentleman to cry when they ask for help,” a stern, yet gentle voice said from behind me. I turned and wiped at my eyes, looking up to see Orykson standing on the deck, his arms tucked in his pockets. 

I was relieved that he’d come. A part of me had been ...

Contract?

The Third Gate: Chapter Four

As we boarded the boat that was headed to Delitone, I was struck with how different it was, while also being similar. The one that had taken us to the Idyll-Flume was a pure passenger ship, with some standards for luxury. Less than a full, prince-of-the-ocean style cruiser, but it was still able ...

The Third Gate: Chapter Three

It took us much longer to reach the port town where we could take a ship to Delitone than it had taken for us to travel to Puinen, since we couldn’t speed our flight along with mana. Dusk suggested that she could use her dominion to forcibly move me with them, but Kene was quick to ban that –...

The Effaced: Chapter Three

“What?” I asked, then mentally slapped myself. Speaking while you were wrongfully under arrest wasn’t the right thing to do, but it had just slipped out. 

“We’re going to walk you back to the station,” the constable who had cuffed me said, then spun me around and started ma...

Fishing for Swords

This is something as a follow-up story to Fish Boi. It isn't needed to understand this story, but it can explain things a bit.
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When it comes to the study of ancient or powerful trees, there are many choices for a group of budding arborists to gossip about: 

...

The Effaced: Chapter Two

I wiped my brow as I released my concentration on the precision metal-warping spell I was holding, and the last rune on the support beam started sparking to life with the same minty color of the crystal core for the airship. 

I pulled out my pocket watch, then turned to the captain.&nb...

The Effaced: Chapter One

“… best in Airship Core Technology, brought to you by Elucidate Labs. Power, Performance, Perfection. Accept no substitutes.”

My hand slapped onto my alarm clock, and I sat up with a groan. My back was twinging slightly, my fingers, knees, and ankles were all stiff and inflamed, ...

The Third Gate: Chapter Two

Under a mountain, at the edge of the Beastgate Trial Trail, I met with a massive tortoise. 

“It is good to see you back on your feet,” Edgar said. “Your partner charged the array?” 

Dusk made a wet leaf patter, saying that she’d done some of it herself, and Edgar s...

Audiobook is out now! Sale on book one!

Hello everyone! Mana Mirror book one is now out on audible, and book one is on sale on Amazon. Thanks!

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If you can, please leave a rating or review. Even if there's no text, having the stars is super critical to the all-powerful algorithm. 

Amazon Link: 2024-07-30 14:03:39 +0000 UTC View Post

The Third Gate: Chapter One

Two weeks after I’d awoken in the guest bedroom at the edge of the Beastgate Trial Trail, Kene and I stood back in Puinen, where I was chopping firewood for Agnes, the old alchemist who was using Kene as hired help. 

There was still a long way to go before I’d be able to even think...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Eighty-Five

I stared up into the sky and screamed. The power was crushing me, but I wouldn’t fall. 

But I could feel doubt creeping in. 

I had done it, but it wasn’t enough. The pressure was too much, my soul and body were shaking. I hadn’t cracked like a dam yet, but I could feel...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Eighty-Four

“You have decided to detonate the stone, then,” Edgar said, watching the three of us as we strode into his lab. 

“I have,” I agreed. “It’s a risk, but I need to be strong.” 

In the end, Ed’s talk about the assassin had been what had convinced me. I needed str...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Eighty-Three

The Unlit Candle Feast was an old tradition, older than the founding of Mossford itself. I didn’t know where it originated, nor did anyone as far as I was aware, but I had always heard it was born from a need to push off the cold of winter, in the days where fire was the main method used to hea...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Eighty-Two

Surprise! I wrote so much that you all are going to get a chapter today, sat, sun, mon, tues, and wed!

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I didn’t pick my answer right away, instead turning to the wall of beast spells. 

“Do you mind?” I asked, gesturing. 

...

Update / Opinion Poll

Hello! I am now done with the planning phase of The Effaced, which is a book set in Elderglass in the same world as Evan's. It's going to be a duology murder mystery with some elements of OPMC and progression fantasy. I will be posting chapters here starting in August, but I'll likely not push t...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Eighty-One

Edgar’s lab, as it turned out, was located underneath one of the mountains, through a wall that he used some complex spell to unlock. I glanced around, interested to see what he’d have. Meadow’s small hut in Mossford just had a cauldron over the fire, but Orykson’s… wherever he brought ...

¿od tahW

The Twin Trials: Chapter Eighty

It was so late by the time I arrived that Edgar wasn’t there to greet me, but an older man that worked for Edgar picked me out of the snow. He was wearing thick, round spectacles and led me to one of the spare bedrooms in the house. It was warm, and the wood they were burning that gave off the ...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Seventy-Nine

For a moment, I considered simply cutting through the wilderness to save time.

If I’d been fresh and healthy, I would have given it serious thought, but… One of my arms was almost completely useless, and I wasn’t confident that using my Foxstep and Immovable Lock to navigate my way th...

Ming's Final Exam

Fun fact about Ming: For those who don’t know, I did martial arts for about 12 or 13 years, and got fairly serious with it. Ming is named after a student who came to study under my teacher at the time. She was 5th dan, and she knocked me around in every sparring match with ease.  2024-07-21 20:08:41 +0000 UTC View Post