I stood before the massive guild hall and couldn’t help but be impressed. I’d seen my share of stately buildings back on Earth, but this one had by far the best landscaping. The actual guild hall was neat, but was nothing truly special.
The main building was in the center of four of the tree...
2023-12-08 22:56:12 +0000 UTC
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It cost 30 silvers and about ten years of my life to go those 20 minutes. Gloria dropped us off right at the sidewalk in front of the guild hall and it was all I could do to not jump onto the ground and start kissing it. As it was we got well away from the cursed street and its damnable four lane inte...
2023-12-06 22:34:51 +0000 UTC
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I had been lied to, or maybe I lied to myself. Clearly, my beliefs as to what Otherworld was capable of was wrong. I was expecting some sort of medieval village tucked away in a renaissance faire. I stepped off of the elevator at the fully constructed elven mast and into a bustling airport.
<...
2023-12-04 14:40:13 +0000 UTC
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The shadow was bored, so very bored. It was almost used to the boredom now, but the time spent down here was just unappetizing. There was nothing to kill.
The foe was keeping her waiting, and the behir was glaring daggers at her.
Fortunately, she wasn’t very tasty so the massive creature j...
2023-12-03 23:57:20 +0000 UTC
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I exhaled, my white breath vanishing through the open windows the moment I breathed. The icy chill blasted over me and for a moment I forgot where I was when the entire airship bucked, and I was lifted off my ass and then dropped back down.
"This is terrible,'' I groaned, watching Shade who had not mo...
2023-12-01 23:56:53 +0000 UTC
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“This vacation is going to be awesome,” I said.
“It will be better than that, we are going to eat all the food and paint the town gray,” said Shade.
“You paint the town red.”
“Red and gray are the same color to a dog,” said Shade.
“Then let's paint the town gray!”
2023-11-29 20:42:44 +0000 UTC
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The ancient castle stood tall, built in the ancient style that predated even the legendary Dominion. It had withstood assaults, from within and without and through it all preserved, like the elven spirit. It would last forever.
King Rogen’tal’Kithold, King Rogen to his supporters, told himself tha...
2023-11-28 04:44:08 +0000 UTC
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The inside of the dungeon looked surprisingly like it did back on Ordinal. The entrance and exit both fed through the same area, but the exit was typically closed unless someone had defeated the dungeon recently.
Which was not the case here, I glanced at the wall where the exit should have been and Shart started w...
2023-11-26 23:41:49 +0000 UTC
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Everyone stopped at the entrance to the lizard’s cave. Spivy was working her magic on Shade, who seemed to have a few minor cuts. I pulled out one of our precious healing potions and downed it. It tasted like cough syrup, but my wounds instantly sealed. Painfully in one case where the ri...
2023-11-24 19:20:04 +0000 UTC
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(notes, the Flash Skill was redefined as a spell so I could explain how those work, long and short, spells work outside your essence bubble while skills rapidly fade. Flash is technically a charm, which is a simple spell that closely follows its element (light).)
We stood just outside the secret back entr...
2023-11-20 18:55:05 +0000 UTC
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“Puma Check, quadrant two,” cried Shart, blasting the area with magical darts. A limb shattered and one of the drop pumas slammed to the ground where Badgelor pounced.
“That makes 89,” yelled Badgelor.
“Ha, that was totally my kill,” replied Shart. “You just got to dispose of t...
2023-11-19 22:56:37 +0000 UTC
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You could tell it was noon from the sunlight streaming in from the small holes in the roof. I'd been asleep for less than 4 hours, probably much less, but somehow that was enough. I yawned mightily and reached over for my temporary bedmate.
Kailee was not the most attractive woman I'd ever bedde...
2023-11-17 20:26:35 +0000 UTC
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A bleary eyed Eggard frowned at his incompetent assistant, “You said it was lightly guarded.”
“Yesterday it was,” Savina replied hotly. “I was just here and there wasn’t a goblin in sight.”
The elf warrior stared down at the dozen goblins guarding the entrance, several of whom had ...
2023-11-16 02:41:26 +0000 UTC
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Even with the essence reinforcing my mental fortitude, I was exhausted. Killing rats, which is what we were doing to the small ones, was tedious work when all you had was a spear and a dog. Shade yawned and continued walking next to me. He sported a minor limp that strangely Spivy couldn’t fin...
2023-11-13 18:22:23 +0000 UTC
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“Wake up, dum dum,” said Shart. I jostled awake. Sleeping on a Shadow Whale was strangely comfortable if I had to be honest. The flesh of the creature was kind of spongy, and the wind whipping by your head was relaxing.
The view was pretty spectacular as well assuming you liked horror mo...
2023-11-12 22:56:48 +0000 UTC
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We went back in through the sewer in a particularly stealthy manner.
“You don’t need to carry me,” said Shade.
“I have boots, you have paws. I don’t want you getting an infection,” I said as we crept closer to the hole in the wall. Initially we thought about going back in throu...
2023-11-10 22:40:26 +0000 UTC
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The street was in the middle of town and there were a number of decently sized buildings all around me. Most looked residential, and a few looked like they might have been apartments or bunk houses. Spivy pointed to two things.
A brighter than usual street lamp and the guy who repaired brighter ...
2023-11-08 19:36:00 +0000 UTC
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Spivy, for all of her many, many faults, was the adventuring coach I should have always listened to. She quickly and competently assessed the situation and started putting everything to right.
“First off, let’s heal that paw,” she said and used a nearby rain barrel to wash the wound. After...
2023-11-06 23:28:47 +0000 UTC
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“It’s yours by default, you are going to have to wear it,” said Julia uncomfortably.
Fenris looked at her, “I’m certain I misheard you.”
Julia sighed, looking down at the suit of black armor longingly for a moment and then shook her head. “That is the armor of the Commander of the Ar...
2023-11-05 23:33:20 +0000 UTC
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The inn was two stories of solid timber with a country flair that I found entirely comforting. It looked so in place in this tiny rural town, that it just screamed come in here and drink. The smells from the kitchen were great and the short innkeeper greeted him warmly as he entered the room.
Be...
2023-11-04 02:06:18 +0000 UTC
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Structurally, I'm dividing this book into parts like I did with Fifth Era. That's mainly to keep everything easy to reference, but it also allows me to put book ends on the parts sort of like Crabby. So my vision here is that I'll have a Part that has an intro, an intermission and and ending, and those sections w...
2023-11-01 18:23:16 +0000 UTC
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(This is a shorter chapter setting up part 2 of the book. Also Shadow got renamed to Shade because him having a shadow core and a shadow form was getting confusing, so Shade) (Plus I named him after a friend of my wife's dog and I got the name wrong which is really embarassing).
The adventuring guild was ...
2023-10-31 02:18:29 +0000 UTC
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“Ready,” I yelled and Shart continued waving his hands around.
“Not yet, air currents are going to be a bitch,” he yelled.
“Hurry up, those shadow chickens brought friends,” said Badgelor as he blasted away another bird.
It was Link to the Past all over again.
If you told me my p...
2023-10-29 23:00:44 +0000 UTC
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As we approached Darven the land started looking a lot more settled. The open forest gave way to well tended fields. Fields full of crops I did not recognize. For someone from rural Ohio, that was annoying. I won’t pretend to know all of the things that are grown by farmers across the Un...
2023-10-27 23:50:24 +0000 UTC
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So Sarah's condition was untreatable a few years ago, but modern science laughs in the face of things like kidney failure and she's got maybe 10 years to live. There is a treatment path for Sarah that has a very good chance of success, in about 6 months. In the mean time, she will be recovering so editing will be ...
2023-10-26 03:53:57 +0000 UTC
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We left the warrens and emerged into a forest that looked like it could be right out of anywhere in America. We ran downhill until I was about to collapse, and Shadow was panting so heavily that I thought my poor doggo was going to throw up.
Everything around us looked normal, until it didn’t.
2023-10-26 03:51:39 +0000 UTC
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"What are you? Public enemy number one?" I yelled as we started running through the caves. I had no idea where we were going but the tunnel I was sure led back to earth no longer existed.
"I'm not number one, don't be ridiculous. I'm more like number five," replied Spivy. "Possibly four, t...
2023-10-23 18:40:29 +0000 UTC
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He let the last one suffer, feeding it too much mana but not quite enough to cause it to explode. The bug wasn’t stupid, just conditioned. The bugs needed mana to survive. This one was getting to the point that any time it sensed mana it would flinch before going towards it, but that wasn’t what Charles ...
2023-10-22 22:26:59 +0000 UTC
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So it turned out talking dogs were way higher on my weirdness scale than goblins.
“Since when can you talk,” I yelled, scrambling back as best as I could with one lame leg.
“I’m just as surprised as you are,” replied Shadow, sitting there patiently wagging his tail.
“How can you talk...
2023-10-20 01:32:08 +0000 UTC
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(Author's note, so I have to drive Sarah to the dialysis clinic 3x a week and it gets real boring there. When I get bored, I write. I'm not in a good headspace at the moment, but I'm just going to post a few chapters while I'm there... for the next several months, minimum)
Sometimes in life you had ...
2023-10-19 02:22:27 +0000 UTC
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