The four of them stood in a street on the east side of the city, part of a district tucked away in a corner and so small Velik hadn’t even realized it existed. He’d thought Gold Town’s property was expensive—and it was—but it was nothing compared to where they were now.
It wasn’...
2025-03-03 14:07:28 +0000 UTC View PostFor Velik and Jensen, it was two weeks of boredom. Aria was being put to use as a scout. Torwin helped vet people with his extensive knowledge of the guild’s old guard. Even Sildra had a purpose, even if it was just to do laps around the city to confirm who’d been taken by monsters. Giller wa...
2025-02-28 14:33:45 +0000 UTC View Post“Black rot and damnation,” Nelspir swore. “How deep do you think this contamination goes?”
“You’d have a better idea than me,” Torwin told him. “You’ve been working with these people for years. How many of them have changed from how you remember them?”
“People ch...
2025-02-27 13:47:40 +0000 UTC View PostWas it too much to ask to just have a few hours to myself? Nelspir lamented when he’d noticed Reldin and Talimar coming toward him. They were retired hunters who’d reached silver before transitioning into admin work, and both were staunchly loyal to the faction Pevril headed up....
2025-02-26 14:33:31 +0000 UTC View PostNelspir was sure that what was left of his hair was going to fall out from stress. That [Vault Seeker] kid hadn’t folded like they’d all expected, and while Nelspir was secretly laughing up his sleeve at the whole situation and silently applauding the guy, he was still t...
2025-02-25 13:29:45 +0000 UTC View PostIn hindsight, Velik shouldn’t have been surprised at how easy it was to get back into the city unnoticed. He’d imagined some clandestine plot that had infiltrated every level of society with enemies and spies lurking around every corner. The corruption, if it even existed at all, wasn’t tha...
2025-02-24 13:12:09 +0000 UTC View Post“I take a three-hour nap, and you guys have a breakthrough in the mystery without me,” Velik said, annoyance creeping into his tone. “Off my kill, no less.”
The five of them—minus Aria—were gathered at the campsite they’d been using last night. She’d promised to catch up tod...
2025-02-21 13:07:32 +0000 UTC View PostFor the last two weeks of her life, Sildra hadn’t felt comfortable. She was far away from every place she’d ever known and every person she’d ever met, except for Jensen. He’d done his best in a sort of awkward but sweet way, but it was incredibly obvious that he was obsessed with his pro...
2025-02-20 12:51:42 +0000 UTC View PostTorwin instinctively recoiled away from Gorlath’s body. His skull had partially collapsed, the damage so thorough that even if Gorlath had somehow lived through it, he wouldn’t be physically capable of speaking. Whatever this thing was, it was able to use magic to overcome that ...
2025-02-19 12:55:29 +0000 UTC View PostThe two hunters stared down at the body, which was itself a crushed, bloody slab of meat. The [Beast Tamer] had avoided the worst of the damage with his magical barrier, but enough of [Dread Lance] had slipped through to kill him. Bits of skin were stil...
2025-02-18 13:43:44 +0000 UTC View PostThe man’s bracer crackled with power and a translucent pane of glass materialized in the air in front of him. Velik’s spear struck it, sending cracks spider webbing across its surface. They sealed back up as quickly as they’d spread, leaving the pane whole and almost invisible once more. 2025-02-17 13:35:45 +0000 UTC View Post
Meeting a bear that was twice his height and ten times his weight in a straight charge wasn’t going to end well. Regardless of any differences in their physical stats, Velik wasn’t going to check a creature that size with raw strength. As the gap between them closed and lightning crackled aro...
2025-02-14 14:08:11 +0000 UTC View PostIt wasn’t too often anymore that Velik worried about dawn coming on him in the middle of a hunt. Most days, whatever he was fighting wasn’t strong enough for it to make a difference. But in this case, with only an hour or two left and his prey’s strength still a mystery, he wanted every adv...
2025-02-13 10:05:25 +0000 UTC View PostIt should have been simple. Jensen was a [Vault Seeker]. He could literally close his eyes and point to unclaimed valuables just waiting for someone to come pick them up off the ground. But his father didn’t want him going out into the wild lands. It was dangerous there, with p...
2025-02-12 13:50:21 +0000 UTC View PostJensen’s brilliant decision was that Torwin and Velik would escort the mercenaries back to King’s Crossroad for imprisonment and trial, which was promptly shot down by all the more experienced members of the team. Velik wasn’t particularly interested in doing it in the first place, but it w...
2025-02-11 14:01:18 +0000 UTC View Post“You’re hurt,” Sildra said, her voice almost accusatory.
“It’s nothing,” Velik said. He was surprised she’d even noticed.
“Doesn’t look like nothing.”
“It’ll be healed up by tomorrow, and the cuts aren’t that deep.”
Giller, Torwin, and Jensen we...
2025-02-10 13:42:59 +0000 UTC View PostA few dozen more arrows rained down through the darkness, but before they could strike the half of the team that were just now groggily waking up, Gilder reached up a hand overhead. A surge of… something… pulsed out, detectable in every piece of metal Velik was wearing jumping in place, and s...
2025-02-09 13:39:33 +0000 UTC View PostIt took the better part of a week to reach King’s Crossroad, and Velik visibly chafed at the slow speed by the end of the second day. Neither Aria nor Sildra had invested anything—or in Aria’s case, not enough to matter—into physical, which meant they both wanted eight hours or more of sl...
2025-02-08 13:12:59 +0000 UTC View PostThe first fight didn’t happen until shortly after noon. Velik and Torwin were doing a wide circuit paralleling the road at Torwin’s insistence, something Jensen insisted was completely unnecessary but which both hunters had agreed they’d be doing anyway. Velik had the south side of the road...
2025-02-07 13:17:09 +0000 UTC View PostBy the time Velik and Torwin returned to Cravel, everything else had been taken care of. Supplies had been purchased, paperwork had been obtained, and horses had been rented for the group. Velik had declined his, not having the slightest bit of experience with riding one of the animals. Torwin li...
2025-02-06 13:44:40 +0000 UTC View PostTorwin let out a satisfied groan as he stretched out in the hot spring. The water was doing wonders for his sore muscles with each passing minute, and the only way the experience could be better was if he’d had a cool mug of beer to toss back while he soaked. Unfortunately, Heldsmouth wasn’t ...
2025-02-05 14:36:30 +0000 UTC View PostAria sat on one side of the table, a spread of sugary treats separating her from Velik. She idly picked at a pastry with a fork as she considered his request. “It’s a bit forward, don’t you think?” she eventually said. “We really don’t know each other that well, and what you’re prop...
2025-02-04 13:58:29 +0000 UTC View PostJensen was shown into Bertrim Nelspir’s office two days after Velik got his gold pin. He’d been eager for the meeting, as the expedition was planning to hire on twenty silvers, thirty bronzes, and three golds, maybe more if whatever area Jensen picked proved to be more dangerous than average....
2025-02-03 14:35:55 +0000 UTC View PostThe summons to appear before the guild leadership was every bit as miserable as Velik had expected it to be. He was harangued by various pompous instructors and department heads, praised for absolutely nothing, and had his abilities and tactics called into question repeatedly in an attempt to get...
2025-02-02 13:20:43 +0000 UTC View PostJensen walked past the cat house three times before he worked up the nerve to actually go inside. If anyone he knew had seen him entering Melon and Peach, he’d die of shame, but of course this was where Velik was staying. Somehow. Did he have something against a normal inn? How did he… 2025-02-01 12:34:24 +0000 UTC View Post
The two of them were in the carriage, riding back to Cravel and discussing the state of the guild, to which Aria would be giving her recommendation that Velik be raised to the rank of gold. Just because she’d evaluated him as ready to take on gold jobs didn’t mean it would actually happen, ho...
2025-01-31 14:27:40 +0000 UTC View Post“I cannot believe you pulled that off,” Aria said flatly while holding out a massive glass jar she’d pulled out of seemingly nowhere.
“I told you I could,” Velik said, though in truth having to find that particular organ blindly had been a chore. He’d pulled out… he wasn’t e...
2025-01-30 13:50:38 +0000 UTC View PostThe book learning portion of Velik’s training as an iron-ranked monster hunter hadn’t been especially helpful. It made sense that the bestiaries focused primarily on low-level threats, as those were what the trainees would be expected to handle upon their graduation to bronze. He’d dutifull...
2025-01-29 13:27:57 +0000 UTC View PostWhen he’d started his trip through the swamp, Velik had been essentially blind in the water. The smells were overpowering, the sounds were all new and unknown, and of course he couldn’t see a damn thing through the layer of scum coating the black water. Actually being underwater was even wors...
2025-01-28 13:59:10 +0000 UTC View PostThe bed was lumpy and it stank, which was actually kind of amazing when Aria thought about it. The whole damn village reeked with that particular rotting odor unique to swamps. Despite that, they’d somehow scrounged up the audacity to provide paying customers with a mattress that smelled so dis...
2025-01-27 13:57:16 +0000 UTC View Post