It was full dark when they finished dressing and left the Irondown Burrows behind, trading in heated water and comfy beds for biting mosquitoes and the gloomy shadows engulfing the Forest of Chlorophyll Chaos. Arrow was disgruntled and Dizzy seemed to be on the hangry side of things—Ve...
2021-06-03 16:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostSam dismissed the sword with a thought and an effort of will, then took a quick moment to survey the battlefield.
Dizzy was busy bludgeoning one of poor unfortunate droids into the ground with her war maul, though she looked decidedly worse for the wear. She was limping badly, and one arm h...
2021-06-01 16:00:08 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey everyone excited to share this awesome cover with y'all! The final cover in the main VGO series, Empirical Endgame! What do you all think?
2021-05-29 16:01:01 +0000 UTC View Post“Well, is it warded?” Dizzy asked.
The team crouched at the top of a short descending staircase which ended at a set of impressively large bronze double doors, studded with rivets. A simple lever, protruding from the wall on the left appeared to be the activation mechanism, but no one w...
2021-05-27 16:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostThe sun was hanging high overhead and sweat was streaking down Sam’s face when they finally pushed through a swatch of bushy ferns and hanging moss. The trek through the Forest of Chlorophyll Chaos had been exactly as difficult as Sam had envisioned. The second they crossed over some mystic bar...
2021-05-25 16:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostTet let her scarab drop to the ground and it started to grow and didn’t stop until it was a massive monster, covered in hard black armor, with curved swords instead of mandibles—actually, they were massive khopeshes, swinging back and forth in front of the tank-sized scarab.
At the same...
2021-05-24 16:01:02 +0000 UTC View PostThe next two weeks raced by in a series of grueling days of classes and even more brutal nights, spent tucked away in the Library or cultivating and strategizing inside the walls of the Coliseum. But by the end of it, Logan and Tet were as ready as they were ever going to be. Hopefully, it would ...
2021-05-21 16:01:03 +0000 UTC View PostSam wrapped up his work, bound the final set of pages into his Fire Shuriken Tome, then headed over to the campfire where the rest of the team was milling around in a rather leisurely fashion. Surprisingly, Arrow was up, though he looked more than half-asleep—purple bags under his eyes, his hai...
2021-05-20 16:00:08 +0000 UTC View PostLogan and Tet stood in the inner sanctum of the Tartarucha Cells.
Logan again apologized for getting such an intimate look into her life. <Can I look really quick into what might have happened in the Submerged Hell?>
<Yes, please,> the cat woman replied. <I’m curious ...
2021-05-19 16:01:03 +0000 UTC View PostSam blinked his eyes open, which felt all wrong since he knew without a shadow of a doubt that he was asleep—passed out on his bedroll in the Wolfman outpost. With a grunt he gained his feet and took a long gander around. The yurt was gone, so was the dancing fire, and the wooden palisade walls...
2021-05-18 16:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostThat night, Logan climbed up the Ladder Hole and knocked on Inga’s door.
A second later, Logan heard her voice inside his head. <Why, hello, Logan. Did you survive the dressing down you received from Professor Zantho?>
<Yeah, and it wasn’t as bad as you’d think. It was ...
2021-05-17 16:01:04 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey everyone! Here's the Shadowcroft Year 2 Cover Reveal! I love how bright it is and I think the artist nailed Marko. Totally spot on. What does everyone else think?
2021-05-15 16:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostThe holidays passed, the new year began, and Monday morning, Logan found himself at his Offensive Dungeon Design class with Melvin, the First Cohort, and the Ninth Circle cohort.
Professor Zantho had them assemble in the Golden Serpent Hall, which was strange, but no one was going to say wo...
2021-05-14 16:01:04 +0000 UTC View Post“Greetings, whelps,” Yurij BrightBlood snarled, opting to use the human tongue instead of speaking wolfman. Although Sam spoke the language of the People almost fluently, the rest of his pack members weren’t quite so far along. And although Bill knew every word, he couldn’t properly speak...
2021-05-13 16:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostIt took Logan a week to get used to his new body, and it took another couple weeks until the other faculty, students, and staff stopped looking at him funny. A lot of the cores at the school simply didn’t recognize the tall, dark, and handsome mushroom man strutting his stuff all over campus. 2021-05-12 16:01:03 +0000 UTC View Post
By the time Sam and his crew got back to the wolfman outpost of Narvik, the sun was lingering just above the horizon, threatening to disappear at any moment. Not that Sam had to worry about the setting sun the way the rest of the human-aligned players did. Sure, the threats that roamed t...
2021-05-11 16:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostLogan had to throw the weary minotaur a bone. “It’s okay, Treac. I’ve basically made up my mind already. It wasn’t easy, though. Here,let me show you where we’re at.”
&nbs...
2021-05-10 16:01:03 +0000 UTC View PostA bird chirped off in the distance, its shrill cry cutting through the gentle rustle of grass and the whisper of the wind. It wouldn’t be long now, Sam knew. He reached up and swiped a hand across his forehead, obliterating the sweat trickling down his face. It was hot out here on the plains, w...
2021-05-07 16:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostHey everyone, sorry it's been quiet around here for the past few weeks. Things have been a little turbulent over at Shadow Alley Press. Our former Operations Manager, Kelly, left us. She's a great lady and is going to stay on as one of our editors, but she had to leave due to family circumstances...
2021-05-06 18:01:05 +0000 UTC View PostLogan stood in front of a full-length mirror in Treacle’s room, which was part machine-shop and part steampunk mad scientist’s laboratory. Little mechanical creatures marched here and there, and every so often, a fork of lightning would erupt from some contraption somewhere.
However, th...
2021-05-06 14:09:22 +0000 UTC View PostLogan had no choice. The Boundless Wheel technique couldn’t handle the energy flowing through him. In desperation, he switched to the Radiant Serpent Under the Glowing Moon Technique. He pressed his eyes shut tight and envisioned his core. It was a perfect marble of jade and gray energy, shot t...
2021-04-08 16:31:00 +0000 UTC View PostThe next day Logan and company limped out into the Akros Coliseum. They hadn’t gotten much sleep. There had been more honey-covered fried foods, and Melvin and Inga talked spoons, but they didn’t talk about Melvin’s cookbook. Also, after Treacle made sure Logan was okay, the minotaur left V...
2021-04-06 16:31:00 +0000 UTC View PostInga’s antennae were tight against her head. “Something is wrong with Treacle, and he won’t talk about it.”
Marko was clueless. “Maybe he’s just not feeling well? Like he said. Bad grass? The cud not sitting well in his third stomach? Or maybe he needs to be milked?”
“...
2021-04-01 16:31:00 +0000 UTC View PostDays later, Sunday evening, Logan and his friend emerged from the Dungeon Interchange of Entrances, or the DIE portal outside the Bone Vaults, the most undead of Arborea’s undead dungeons. The Bone Vaults had a massive necrotic entrance made of interlocking bones a 164 feet high and 148 feet wi...
2021-03-30 16:31:00 +0000 UTC View PostLogan stood at one the windows in the Golden Serpent Hall that faced the Akros Coliseum. He was wondering if Rainsap was going to have their class outside. He hoped so. That chill rain would make cultivating difficult, and Logan wanted a challenge for once.
Like that would ever happen.
<... 2021-03-25 16:31:00 +0000 UTC View PostThat night, Logan headed down the spiral staircase that led to the school’s library—he had his friends had a study session tonight. Originally, they’d planned on an extra training session in the arena, but after what had happened in the Mines of Madness Logan could hardly walk. It had taken...
2021-03-23 16:31:00 +0000 UTC View Post“Keep my Guardian form safe, Noddle Doddle,” he said before sending his consciousness into the overgrown centipede floor boss. This was the ace up his sleeve. His symbiosis ability. Both his minions and Ingas had previously been infected with Braincap mushrooms. Those green fungal growths wou...
2021-03-18 16:31:00 +0000 UTC View PostLogan and Inga moved forward, a little worried about what this psycho fairy would do to them. Professor Zantho had been made for boot camp movies—she was the stereo-typical drill sergeant in miniature Amazon armor.
Lady Elesiel also stepped from the ranks.
“Good luck, Logan!” Me...
2021-03-16 16:31:00 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey everyone! Finally got in the art for Shadowcroft 2. No title treatment yet, but man do I love this one. Bright and shinny and awesome, plus it's great to see Marko and Logan together. Marko is exactly the way I envisioned him. Fun and easy going and perpetually drunk. What do you guys think? ...
2021-03-14 18:00:03 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey everyone, me and my buddy Aaron Michael Ritchey are doing a little Youtube show thing. Just once a week where we kind of chat about books, or writing, or (mostly) popular media, like shows and movies. I'll post these here on Patreon. If you have comments or questions, drop them below! Hope yo...
2021-03-13 19:31:19 +0000 UTC View Post