100. Meddling with Time

I unlocked an old, rusty gate. The gate groaned, rust flaking off it as I pushed it aside.
Alessi’s smile greeted me. She was wearing a beanie hat that I had designed fo...
2022-11-20 19:30:18 +0000 UTC View Post

I unlocked an old, rusty gate. The gate groaned, rust flaking off it as I pushed it aside.
Alessi’s smile greeted me. She was wearing a beanie hat that I had designed fo...
2022-11-20 19:30:18 +0000 UTC View Post“She seems… mad,” Voltara whispered, staring at the distraught Amber.
“Yeah,” I replied, “She’s mad alright. How fast can you move?”
“Very fast if I focus on it and burn through my Vitality,” the maid replied.
“If she tries to attack us, utters even a singl...
2022-11-18 18:44:32 +0000 UTC View Post“Soooo?” I smiled at Amber as she finished the pastry.
“So, what?” She asked disdainfully. “Do you think I’m going to be your friend because you gave me a tart?”
“Yes,” I nodded. “I do believe that’s how this works.”
“Do you think I’m stupid?” Amber...
2022-11-15 00:05:51 +0000 UTC View Post“You good?” Agatha said. “Licor is calling me. He probably wants to…”
“We good sis,” Emerald replied. “Go have fun with your fiance.”
I nodded.
Agatha nodded back at us and departed.
I pulled my favorite satin, red sheet out of Saccy and threw it over the...
2022-11-14 20:13:05 +0000 UTC View PostAfter a long, heart-pounding moment, Nemendias reached out with her own hand and clasped mine.
Her hand forged from magic felt real, warm, like she was a human, like she was alive on the same level as me.
“Thank you, Yulia,” she said softly. “Your offer was... unexpected. I did ...
2022-11-13 05:08:49 +0000 UTC View PostWith smol, purple-eyed Captain on my shoulder and my two besties behind me, I attempted to navigate the gothic, black-marble halls of Nemendias to find and exterminate the girl with the pocket watch.
The ghost-chasing quest had turned to be a lot more tiring than I had presumed, as th...
2022-11-12 23:53:31 +0000 UTC View PostMy answer was the deep silence of the catacombs.
“Nemendias isn’t conscious,” Agatha said, staring at the body of Saint Innocentai with a morose look. “This is just an old skeleton.”
2022-11-11 01:34:00 +0000 UTC
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“Oh no, you got me,” I said sarcastically at Licor. “Guess I’ll have to go to detention or whatever it is that happens to students at Nemendias when they go below a hundred.”
I opened my mouth in a wide grin and started to laugh, while looking up at the number.
As I did, the...
2022-11-10 01:41:35 +0000 UTC View PostI excused myself and pretended to go to the bathroom. Instead of going into the stall, I stopped at the hall and tilted my chimera ears like little radar dishes focusing on the conversation of the four teenagers sitting behind the table.
“Licor,” Triss said. “Are you certain that we c...
2022-11-09 21:03:35 +0000 UTC View Post“You’re… really going to take over the Empire?” Agatha asked. “I thought that you didn’t want power for the sake of power.”
"I was going to take it nice and slow, but Georgia's bomb forced a far more ruthless side of me to come forward," I replied.
"Fair enough," s...
2022-11-09 05:37:16 +0000 UTC View Post
Lambert thrummed his fingers on his desk in the tower of Lomb when I was done retelling the story of my doomed life to my friends.
“So,” he said with a thoughtful look. ...
2022-11-08 18:15:17 +0000 UTC View PostUndertown was always a mess. The Undertown of the war-torn Illatius was simply a very… dead, desolate mess. I paid no attention to the bodies piling the streets covered in black mold and crumbling, silent favelas.
My destination waited for me.
I did not remember where the Shog...
2022-11-06 19:40:45 +0000 UTC View PostAmadea climbed atop of the table.
Her hands gripped at and started to pull the metal frame that bound my ossified body to the wall. The metal groaned, warped under her fingers, twisted away. The awful construct that had constrained, bound me for so long finally came apart, broke as if...
2022-11-06 02:21:07 +0000 UTC View Post“This is Undertown, huh?” Voltara asked as we stood upon a basalt outcropping, looking down at the ocean of colorful, lopsided favelas. “The place we’re planning to fix?”
“Yeah,” I replied. “This is it.”
“Smells pretty, um, bad,” she commented, inhaling with a wi...
2022-11-05 01:24:54 +0000 UTC View PostA sharp ruby gemstone glittered in my hand as I scratched deep, sparkling groves into the wooden table beneath me, focusing on keeping my lines on course and sticking my tongue out.
Voltara, who sat beside me, glanced over at me.
"What are you doing?" She asked.
"I'm planting Ba...
2022-11-03 04:26:57 +0000 UTC View PostTime passed quicker than I had anticipated, my days filled with organizing the chimera villagers, teaching them meditation, Basq language, human customs, rules and laws.
In the mornings I did basic excersizes with the Princesses, getting Grogtilda's body and my two besties into shape. After...
2022-10-31 16:17:21 +0000 UTC View PostI awoke to my father smiling down at me and shaking me by the shoulder.
"Come, my little arch-cendai," he said, looking over me with eyes like molten gold. "The tribe needs your guidance and blessings."
I stretched and followed him out of Galissi. The glider was parked inside one of t...
2022-10-26 01:32:47 +0000 UTC View PostHaving concluded my discussion with Agatha about my theoretical understanding of the life, the universe and my potential patron Infi, I leaned back on the seat and closed my eyes.
We were slowly flying back to Lomb with chimera hunters trailing behind us so there was plenty of time for me t...
2022-10-25 05:30:33 +0000 UTC View Post
"Must be nice to have a dad," Emerald commented, tears glittering in the corners of her green eyes. "Or any sort of parent who actually gives a damn..."
"C'mere, you," I smoth...
2022-10-22 17:37:00 +0000 UTC View PostJust a few moments ago I felt elated, felt that I could finally rest. Now I could hardly take a single breath without pain lacing through me.
All of the armored maids were standing upright now.
“Erase the last thirty minutes from the minds of the constables,” Amadea told them.
... 2022-10-21 00:47:39 +0000 UTC View Post"Do you think that the crystal hair of the entire chimera tribe will be enough to fix the dragonheart engine?" I asked Antoine who sat across me within the leather interior of Galissi Seven.
"Power-wise... maybe?" Antoine mulled. "The issue isn't just lack of power - too many hexagrams burn...
2022-10-20 04:10:11 +0000 UTC View Post"That looks like an arcane... Astral-Phantom-Barrier hexagram," Agatha squinted at the sketch on the page. "Instructor Rozaline showed it to us during an excursion to the catacombs beneath Nemendias. It supposedly blocked Phantoms from reaching Illatius. Thousands of these were inscribed into the...
2022-10-19 02:45:45 +0000 UTC View PostI tried to stay awake, but my body was failing me and my eyes were closing. My eyelids and hands felt like they were made from lead. Too much magical power had gone through me and far too much experience had been absorbed by my soul due to the explosive obliteration of the arch-cendai’s soul ga...
2022-10-18 14:52:46 +0000 UTC View PostI slammed into the top of the column that my workshop stood on with a yelp, nearly breaking one of my legs. The fight with Eunice took everything out of me, drained me like a sponge.
“H-help,” I groaned as I started to slide sideways across the rocky outcropping.
Isahcs rushed to ...
2022-10-09 05:11:52 +0000 UTC View PostI stared at the gold sand beneath my feet and past it in the Astral, identifying everything about the structure of the cliff beneath me, identifying the boundary between the garden of the arch-cendai and the cliff's edge.
With every step taken, with every exhale, I was identifying the physi...
2022-10-08 04:44:02 +0000 UTC View PostI choked, nearly biting my tongue off. The nightmarish memory of my acid-burned flesh being converted into clouds of sparkling nanites shaped like snowflakes was pulsating in the forefront of my mind.
The croissan'wich fell from my hands, bacon spilling across the fancy, Art Nouveau t...
2022-10-07 18:29:33 +0000 UTC View PostI entered into the ornate, massive skull as a metal-encrusted, circular door swung open for me. My father and the rest of the chimera hunters stayed outside. I felt their gazes digging into my back. I was far too hurt and tired to resist them, too weak and broken to fight against whatever was com...
2022-10-06 17:55:38 +0000 UTC View PostI took about twenty minutes to redo the princesses’ faces and my own with makeup.
Using the back tunnels we relocated to a small, rooftop cafe that belonged to Nemendias. The cafe was mostly empty. I saw a few students in Nemendias uniforms sitting behind tables, drinking coffee and discu...
2022-10-06 15:11:19 +0000 UTC View Post
I was moving towards the stairwell up to Diamondias when I noticed something odd shimmering in the corner of my eye.
I paused and turned, observing the strange, distinctive p...
2022-09-30 04:50:40 +0000 UTC View Post
“What's all this, then?” A bulky man in a gray constable’s uniform pushed himself through the crowd. “I was told there’s a debitor out and about in my…”
He sudden...
2022-09-23 02:37:39 +0000 UTC View Post