Holding a finger to my lips, I leaned the piece of scrap metal away from the wall, so the others could the small blue coin nested there. Maybe I was taking it too far, but in my mind, if they had location tracking, there was a solid possibility of audio as well.
I watched their...
2022-03-23 22:21:20 +0000 UTC
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I considered switching to <Born Nihilist> before I put on the mask. In the end, I decided against it. <Jaded Eye> was the tool for the job here, even if maintaining anonymity was paramount. I didn’t know what I was looking for. A white panel van wo...
2022-03-22 02:03:19 +0000 UTC
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It was reminiscent of times long past.
Even early on, I wasn’t great at making friends, but that didn’t stop my parents from trying. There was a never-ending series of play dates in my early childhood. Said encounters eventually gravitated from meeting schoolmates at McDona...
2022-03-21 02:22:33 +0000 UTC
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“Where the hell did you learn to fight like that?” Nick grabbed several cheap beers from the fridge, placed the bottle neck against the counter and then thought better of it, hunting through the drawers until he found an absurdly over-complicated bottle-opener.
“It looked...
2022-03-19 00:18:53 +0000 UTC
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As the figure dropping down from the balcony came plummeting towards my face, there was a split-second to decide how I was handling this. If I could get <Probability Spiral> off in time, it would be easy enough to fuck with their landing, potentially shattering...
2022-03-18 01:03:32 +0000 UTC
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Having secured Talia as a summon, I left the safety of the dungeon‘s cleared floors. I had no doubt I’d return here, but the Lithid sure as hell didn’t sound like an encounter I wanted to rush, not until everything else was handled. For the first time in a while, I found myself without a r...
2022-03-16 01:38:55 +0000 UTC
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“I am not your pet, and you will not treat me as such.” The wolf growled. She was as far from me as possible, though even with her newer, smaller form the elevator didn’t allow more than a single foot of distance.
“Only a fool would treat a sentient being as a pet,” I...
2022-03-15 08:55:14 +0000 UTC
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Every time I called Audrey, it felt like tearing my own hair out, a handful at a time. Between summoning and leveling, it had become abundantly clear that any significant gain would involve varying degrees of discomfort.
But this was in another league
If I were to attempt to put it ...
2022-03-15 08:45:21 +0000 UTC
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I discovered quickly that the marketplace was inaccessible from the dungeon lobby. Somewhat awkwardly, I replaced the <Allfather’s Mask>and stepped back outside to finish my shopping.
The <Arctic Wolf’s Pelt> and teeth fetched n...
2022-03-13 03:45:40 +0000 UTC
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Shortly after waking up, misplaced and confused, Nick found a system event called a Trial in the old underground Santa Fe Railroad tunnels downtown. According to him, while wandering around in a daze, he found a pair of gilded, thick doors. That was when the low-threat quest had popped. There we...
2022-03-12 05:59:53 +0000 UTC
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Chapter 41
I gripped the seat of my chair tightly. Nick had no idea how badly he was fucking me. This situation had gone from bad, to worse, to nigh unrecoverable in less than a minute.
It didn’t change the fact that his offer was, perhaps, the nicest thing that anyone had ever do...
2022-03-11 02:54:41 +0000 UTC
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Hi folks, as mentioned in the schedule post, I'm throwing stuff in my car and about to move to the snowy wonderland of Wisconsin. Daily posting will resume either on either March 9th or the 10th, depending on how long it takes me to get settled.
Also, we're doing char...
2022-03-07 04:39:39 +0000 UTC
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“Long time no… see,” I wavered.
The Nick I’d known had been relatively muscular. But this was something beyond simple post-athletic build. He was absolutely loaded with muscle, though the physique combined with his own natural looks created something of a Hollywood aesthetic. I st...
2022-03-07 04:08:01 +0000 UTC
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I played it up a little, nearly stumbling to the ground before I pulled myself up.
“Arthur, what the hell?” Sara shouted.
“That’s enough.” Tyler stood, furious. “Arthur, back off. You’re removed from this discussion.” Arthur swore under his breath and walked to the e...
2022-03-05 02:28:36 +0000 UTC
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I studied them all, struggling to keep my face emotionless.
Sara wore simple armor, not unlike my set, accented by a simple gray coverup. Short, shoulder-length blonde with a single red streak accenting her bangs. I relaxed my mind and let <Cruel Lens> take over.
<...
2022-03-05 02:27:02 +0000 UTC
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Hi all,
Thanks so much for reading. There's a lot of new names and I'm trying to keep track of them all.
Just wanted to comment real quick on the state of the schedule and backlog. I'm working hard to bring us up to the twenty chapters ahead--Should be on schedule to get u...
2022-03-03 03:48:06 +0000 UTC
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Five minutes. Every nerve in my body was tingling, every part of me on the verge of panic. I considered putting on <The Allfather’s Mask> more than once, but I wasn’t certain how it worked. It was something I felt safe testing, even with any of my allies. If I put on th...
2022-03-03 03:31:11 +0000 UTC
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<Urgent Quest Received>
Quest: Ignition
Primary Objective — Prevent an outbreak of violence at the Open Forum.
Personal Objective — Remain unidentified by other Users (excluding Kinsley, Merchant)....
2022-03-02 05:18:36 +0000 UTC
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Our City Hall had always struck me as somewhat pretentious. It had the feel of an upside-down ziggurat, with layered sections extending further and further out, the odd-looking architecture held together by three massive pillars. The somewhat sprawling, style over sense layout extend...
2022-03-02 05:17:31 +0000 UTC
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It was a quick trip down to the lobby to warm up, and back to the fourth floor. Much of the frigid bite of the floor itself had lessened after the clear, making the after-battle clean up far less complicated than it would have been otherwise.
I only received one text on my fres...
2022-03-01 03:15:35 +0000 UTC
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Imagine, for a moment, the feeling of a seatbelt kicking during an emergency stop. Now layer on another point of restraint, and another, constricting and growing tighter. And then by some miracle loophole of gravity, you slip free, plunging through the windshield, the shattered glass...
2022-02-27 04:25:27 +0000 UTC
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A bolt shredded through the wolf’s coat, leaving a line of red across its shoulder. A graze. Not nearly good enough. If my crossbow’s enchantment was going to have any discernible effect, I needed to start landing hits center mass. Which would be easier if the creature wasn’t so ...
2022-02-26 01:14:42 +0000 UTC
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I stared at the empty cage as I rose. The massive white wolf, big enough that its flesh and fur were practically bursting out of the bars, was gone. The creepy, black-silhouetted woman was still there, one tendril reaching out towards me again as the wolf was gone.
What? What the fuck? Ho...
2022-02-25 02:21:33 +0000 UTC
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<Would you like to form a guild?>
<Y | N>
Another complication.
I immediately hit no on the prompt.
It was impossible to be certain of how the guild screen functioned, god forbid if there was some sort of roster. If th...
2022-02-24 02:07:47 +0000 UTC
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Kinsley stared at my family, filled with sudden stage fright. Still, even after only a few hours out of the storehouse, she looked significantly less exhausted. A long awkward silence hung over the office room in the community center. She glanced at the whiteboard, still empty except...
2022-02-23 21:40:20 +0000 UTC
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Estrada’s first, somewhat unhelpful, recommendation was to quietly assassinate either Rousseau or Voltaire. After some back and forth, she conceded it was probably safer to kill both. When we moved on from the idea of murdering philosophers, the conversation became much more useful...
2022-02-23 02:42:08 +0000 UTC
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<Quest Received>
Quest: The Cradle of Civilization
Primary Objective — Form the Foundation of the Merchant’s Guild.
(1 of ???)
Secondary Objective — Achieve the Primary Obj...
2022-02-22 03:21:53 +0000 UTC
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I stared through the ring of the crossbow’s sight, keeping the pin trained at the center of the mess, waiting for the slightest movement, the smallest shift of paper. In the back of my head, I wondered if there was a chance Kinsley had intentionally misdirected me to the corner, so...
2022-02-21 05:03:32 +0000 UTC
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I offloaded almost everything. As tempted as I was to keep the <Tribal Gnoll Blade of the Undying,> the survivability buff only kicked in when the User was in combat. If anything, as a glass cannon-less cannon, it might be more dangerous for me to use....
2022-02-20 02:42:57 +0000 UTC
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From what I could tell, it started with a sign: Water - 500 Selve.
A gloomy off-yellow light projected from a nearby streetlamp that was flickering. At least we still had power, though there was no guarantee of how long that would last.
The ground was littered with crushe...
2022-02-19 03:28:08 +0000 UTC
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