Calen flew in entirely the opposite direction through the dungeon this time, directing them in a meandering path across the Forest Cavern, avoiding the known bosses and the larger packs of archers along the way around the perimeter until they finally reached the passage downward into the ruins of Dal’mohra.
Entering by the front gate of the ancient city was usually out of ...
2025-09-01 14:05:02 +0000 UTC View PostAli’s gaze swept over the tiny area she had been granted – her entire domain in the remains of the cathedral chamber. To be fair, it was a large chamber, but compared to the space she had enjoyed prior to her unwilling sojourn in the Abyssal Realm, it was small. Her benefactor had been absent for almost two days now, although she had no way to know the exact passage of time...
2025-09-01 14:00:19 +0000 UTC View PostAli allowed the strangely synergistic formation of holy and void runes projected on the ground to whisk her and her minions away from the now-empty, blood-splattered cavern deep in the demonic dungeon, suddenly finding herself back in the chamber where Azryet had offered his quest. The god of the dragon domain was conspicuously absent, leaving the enormous chamber feeling vast ...
2025-08-31 14:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostCalen scanned the surroundings from his vantage point high above the ground, searching for threats while he maintained a steady rhythm of drawing and firing into the Mana Eater below. They had pushed much deeper into the dungeon of rot – by his reckoning, they were approaching the middle of what had once been Ali’s forest cavern, and a broad expanse of twisted trees and fungal...
2025-08-30 14:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostAli hunkered down under her golden barrier umbrella, struggling to save her minions as a veritable storm of hellfire and blood rained down throughout the cavern. The giant Pit Lord thundered his triumph as he channeled the ludicrous spell.
I need to get out of here. Ali reached her mind to the small number of minions she had left in the safety of the cathedral ch...
2025-08-29 14:00:08 +0000 UTC View PostMato stood before the cavern entrance, his sharp senses picking out the unique scent of the fungal creep that was growing within the passage as the last remnants of the light of the day began to fade. It was hard to believe Ali had blown this hole in the cliffside to release the lake into the goblin hordes that had besieged Myrin’s Keep so long ago. It was a barely used hole unde...
2025-08-28 14:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostAli looked down from above, gazing upon the chamber of the Eye of Agnor she had been sent to kill. It was nearly twice as big as the others she had encountered, hovering there with restless eyes that searched all about and guarding the exit that the scout told her led deeper into the true heart of the Demon God’s Lair.
It was incredible to her that all this power and va...
2025-08-27 14:00:08 +0000 UTC View Post“I’ll get dinner ready,” Mato said, walking over to the campfire and summoning his pots from his storage ring.
“And how, exactly, are you going to do that?” Calen asked, just as the pot materialized in front of him and the stupid mace got in the way, knocking it right out of his hands. Everyone stared as the pot clanged against the ground.
“Ugh, this is stup...
2025-08-26 14:00:10 +0000 UTC View PostA/N: 2 of 2.
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The broad chamber just up ahead was a dark and cavernous hole, nothing more than a hollowed space in the rock, lit – if it could be called that – by hanging hellfire-affinity plants that draped from the ceiling, burning with black flame, and split by a river of what could only be blood. Ali wrinkled her nose in sympathy, reacting to t...
2025-08-25 14:05:01 +0000 UTC View PostA/N: Let's start the week with a bonus chapter: 1 of 2.
Happy Monday!
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Ali lowered her flightless minions to the chasm floor, the graveyard of the gods, and flew down under her own power, alighting beside them on the ground. The vast chasm shook with the distant detonations signifying Azryet’s broadscale assault. Down here, though, the flashes ...
2025-08-25 14:00:13 +0000 UTC View PostCalen crept across the open street, his feet leaving no trace even across the fungal creep. He wrinkled his nose as he took cover against a tall, gnarled tree that sprouted from a pile of rubble that had once been a merchant’s shop near the marketplace and sneaked a peek around the corner. This dungeon stank. It was an odor like a compost heap that had been left to rot and feste...
2025-08-24 14:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostAli inspected her minions, making minor adjustments to the allocation of gear for her trolls. She had all her usual stalwarts, and she had even asked Azryet for permission before summoning her demons in his domain. He had reluctantly given it, but his mood seemed to improve dramatically when she had summoned two Frost Dragonets and an Armored Drake, rumbling his approval of her...
2025-08-23 14:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostAli stumbled as she appeared somewhere new, but it was not the disorientation of the teleportation spell that caused her to be unbalanced. Dense mana slammed into her like an ocean wave breaking over her head, pressing down and searing her lungs. Her ears and mana sight were assaulted on all sides by the roaring crash of battle on an unimaginable scale. The subtle holy pulse of...
2025-08-22 14:00:08 +0000 UTC View PostMato had no time to dwell on the surprising healing effect spawned in the wake of his strike, as the second Dark Druid ripped into his flank with vicious, raking claws, an Ambush from the shadows, and he recognized the Panther Form blurring and shifting as it stalked beside him. He blocked the bear with a shoulder check, backing up carefully to try and avoid the flanking position.<...
2025-08-21 14:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostA/N: 400 is such an auspicious number!
Enjoy :)
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“So, you have a quest for me?” Ali asked, staring up at the enormous, flaming eye of Azryet, the Calamity himself. She sat on the tiny spear of white stone that was all that was left of the cathedral floor, on the tiny patch of moss that was all that remained of her dungeon domain. She didn’t kno...
2025-08-20 14:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostAzryet [The Calamity] – Ancient Abyssal Dragon God – level ???? (Void / Holy)
Ali trembled and shook on her knees before the might of the dragon god. The Calamity. Eyes of implacable anger transfixed her soul as his cavernous maw opened and his mana gathered. A raging torrent of void so powerful it tore at her mundane hearing and sight as she...
2025-08-19 14:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostThree things happened almost simultaneously. The Abyssal Dragon released its breath weapon, a sphere of light-devouring blackness that sizzled and crackled as it shot downward, aimed directly at the barrier Ali cowered behind. The Baelok Descrier teleported into harm’s way, appearing right beside her. Tol’brekk roared, leaping into the air in a mist of blood red rage, both ...
2025-08-18 14:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostVivian entered the clearing and stopped. Someone had encouraged the nearby trees to weave their boughs into a gazebo stretching across the clearing. A large wooden meeting table seemed to have sprouted from nowhere, complete with several beautiful chairs, all incongruously set out in the middle of the forest among the bustling chaos of their refugee camp.
I guess t...
2025-08-17 14:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostWhere is everyone and everything? Ali was honestly stumped. She had been wandering around in this godforsaken dungeon for hours, following its endless maze of perfectly straight corridors and spotless chambers, and yet nothing had jumped out to attack her. Her nerves were beginning to fray from mounting anxiety without any outlet. It was as if everyone had simply check...
2025-08-16 14:00:07 +0000 UTC View Post“What is your will, Master?”
The Baelok Descrier’s dry, demonic voice echoed strangely within Ali’s mind as the giant eye turned to regard her. She wasn’t quite sure she entirely liked being called ‘master,’ but the thing was a demon – it was probably the only title it respected. She was also unaccustomed to having her minions think their...
2025-08-15 14:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostSeyah staggered over toward the campfire, her muscles aching from hours of drilling the ancient forms over and over. “Hi, Sabri,” she said, greeting her daughter and plopping herself down on the ground beside her with a groan.
“Hi, Mom,” Sabri said, smiling, but then she returned to her conversation with the strange necromancer boy and the dragonkin blacksmith. S...
2025-08-14 14:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostAli peeked through the tiny crack in the rock, peering down into the gloomy passage below. To say that she looked was a little incorrect – she was looking, but using the enhanced dark vision of her kobolds rather than her own natural but much weaker vision.
The sounds of talons clinking off rock and the draconic chirping of unfamiliar kobolds carried to her ears, strang...
2025-08-13 14:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostMalika sprinted back to the camp with her heart pounding, hopping over roots, sprinting up tree trunks, and dancing along the fresh, verdant branches already sprouting new leaves in defiance of the blight that had once held this forest in its deathly grasp. Her footsteps barely rustled the leaves, and she relished the sensation of crisp, clear night air rushing across her cheeks,...
2025-08-12 14:00:07 +0000 UTC View Post“This is the last of them! Fall back.”
The voice came to Malika from high up and behind her as she unleashed her radiant punches and kicks into the woody flesh of the Sylvan monster before her. She shifted onto her left foot, dodging the whistling dagger strike and lashing out with her right, her foot taking two divergent paths, simultaneously striking the monster’s h...
2025-08-11 14:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostThe jangling howl of a psychic scream tore through her. Words of power in a demonic tongue lashed her mind, banishing all rational thoughts to a dim memory. Ali crawled along the ground, desperately trying to escape, while warm amber blood leaked from her ears. Most of her minions were on the ground writhing in pain from the assault, but Ali had no way of countering the spell.<...
2025-08-10 14:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostAli swayed on her feet, her vision blurring as her mind threatened to succumb to sheer exhaustion. She might have been fighting for hours – or days – she could no longer tell, but as she eked each hard-won rock or stone of this cavern, desperate to secure her domain, more and more demons poured through that tunnel, drawn to the surging source of fresh mana.
She needed...
2025-08-09 14:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostMalika stared anxiously at the teleportation locus, all the calmness of her meditation a distant memory.
That was her! That was definitely Ali… There was no doubt in her mind that the failed teleportation attempt had been Aliandra, and now, as more and more time passed, it was becoming just as clear that her friend could not use another recall potion for some unf...
2025-08-08 14:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostOne should never resort to violence. But when you must, strike with all that you are.
- Kamari Ren, Elder of the Ahn Khen, legendary master and inheritor of the Ninefold Way: Fists of Coherent Integrity.
The Lich’s laughter faded as he stood unharmed behind the legendary Ahn Khen martial shield technique.
Rezan’s mind snapped back to the first t...
2025-08-07 14:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostMato roared in anger and frustration as his stomach lurched like he’d leapt off a cliff, and his void claws were suddenly digging furrows in polished marble instead of the rock and dirt of the rift chamber. The acrid odor of smoke magic faded, and he slowly shifted himself back to normal, barely noticing Malika arriving within the teleportation locus moments later, his mind obses...
2025-08-06 14:00:10 +0000 UTC View PostA/N Bonus two-parter today. 2 of 2
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As soon as Inspiration had regenerated enough mana for her to use her ring, Ali retrieved a mana potion and downed it, reactivating Inspiration afterward while shifting her barrier constantly to counter the dodging and maneuvering of the warg. But the warg was not stupid, and after a few rounds of this, it simply sat bac...
2025-08-05 14:05:01 +0000 UTC View Post