Maybe it was all in her head, but Astrid felt like the Wandering Trials were different from the Dungeon branches she had been in before. As she’d never entered the Dungeon proper, she couldn’t say if this was a feeling that also existed there, but she couldn’t place her finger on what this difference was. Maybe it was all in her head, but she looked around, seeing the cave system they wer...
2025-10-03 22:34:31 +0000 UTC
View Post
“Are you ready to submit to the Heaven Devouring Serpent?”
Raya’s repetition pulled TJ from his brief satisfaction. He snapped towards the origin of the voice as he hissed to Molly, “Take Luz.” He stepped forward, unwittingly pulling wind whipping towards him as he went to speak with Sven’s second in command. She stood maybe 50 feet away, and how she had managed to appear whil...
2025-10-03 15:28:44 +0000 UTC
View Post
Sorry, just forgot to post yesterday. My bad. Other chapter's up in a couple minutes.
TJ didn’t look at the further System notifications as he led the descent of his people back to the ground. He’d watched as the last of the thunderbirds attempted to flee, but with Storm Manipulation, he kept them from escaping. Slowed and prevented from anything but acceptin...
2025-10-03 15:27:51 +0000 UTC
View Post
The night passed quickly, with Astrid forcing herself to put the brief away and try to sleep not so long after sunset. Sleep avoided her for a very long time, but she couldn’t help the nerves and excitement, so she just tried her best to rest however much she could. At some point during the night, with darkness and quiet all around her, unconsciousness finally found her. Despite only falling ...
2025-10-02 23:28:16 +0000 UTC
View Post
Astrid didn’t know what she was expecting when she approached the other Bronze parties. Was she expecting to find old, familiar faces? No, and she didn’t. Was she expecting to be treated like a Barbarian infiltrating their ranks? No, well, maybe a little, but that didn’t happen either. Was she expecting him to be snubbed or in any way, shape, or form teased or something like that? Yeah, p...
2025-10-02 03:28:41 +0000 UTC
View Post
“It just had to be one of the days that I wasn’t one of those getting Awakening. This is a bunch of bull—“
“Sarah, calm down and shut up.“ Farid commanded, looking at TJ for confirmation. Once TJ motioned for the descendant of Shiva to continue while he himself continued rushing through the motions and chants of Ritualistic Transfer. “You can get up there without it, others ...
2025-10-01 18:09:02 +0000 UTC
View Post
I strode through the streets of Nievtra, my people bowing as I walked past, preparing to receive “visitors”. The first snows had fallen but still refused to stick, and the days were now finally shorter than the nights. I had expected the Misti Hawar to make their approach earlier in the season, especially knowing that we’d taken captives and they hadn’t engaged in any real talks as of y...
2025-10-01 04:48:08 +0000 UTC
View Post
Astrid shouldn’t have been surprised. Really, she shouldn’t have expected anything less than luxury as the Guild continued to throw things at her that tried to convince her that her years of experience with mediocrity were nothing but a bad dream. Regardless of what her expectations were, it also made sense that the packs provided by the Guild were also spatial artifacts. Each one could hol...
2025-09-30 22:55:10 +0000 UTC
View Post
Sorry forgot to schedule this.
Days and weeks passed, with TJ growing more and more acquainted with his Shaman Occupation and ritualism as a whole every day. He’d gained, across Class, Race, and Occupation, 39 levels in 35 days, over one a day on average. His Attributes continued to soar, and his three new Skills were helping him to continue to bolster his foll...
2025-09-30 19:14:36 +0000 UTC
View Post
Hey. Sorry for slowness on this. I've got a tiny bit of a backlog now, hoping to post every day this week. Sorry for inconsistency, it's just been hard to be motivated for this when there's much less interest in AR and SoK than PW. Then there's personal stuff, but you don't care about that. Anyways. Enjoy!
[Chjell POV]
There were dozens of ...
2025-09-30 06:42:43 +0000 UTC
View Post
“Yes, sir, we are all ready for the Trials.” Astrid smiled and nodded as she said it. “We are not quite as close to level 21 as we’d hoped, but we decided it was better to get a couple days of rest than to get a couple thousand more experience.”
“That is probably wise. The Trials are an exhausting experience, and taking the steps necessary to ensure that you will thrive while ...
2025-09-29 23:56:55 +0000 UTC
View Post
I can’t remember if I ever specified what Astrid’s shield weighs. Can’t find it, but if you know I did and find it, let me know. Otherwise, I’ll stick with what I’ve written here.
“It’s a crusher variant!“
The third time they cleared the Purcell Dungeon Boss, the party encountered a crusher variant for the first time. The troll still carried...
2025-09-26 22:45:22 +0000 UTC
View Post
Sorry for no chapters yesterday. The ADHD has been real rough, and I'll do a little mini-blog here to explain. Skip if you don't care.
I have my schedules, and keeping to them is what keeps me productive. Without them, I'm kinda prone to doing nothing. Nothing different from most people, I'd guess. But I've been working real hard getting a lot of thin...
2025-09-25 19:21:05 +0000 UTC
View Post
Immediately after saying it, TJ felt a surge of slight discomfort at calling these people his children. After all, though he was a grown adult in his 30s, many of these people were at least a decade his senior, so say nothing of the several elderly people like Gertrude that’d followed him after becoming disillusioned with Sven’s leadership. Regardless of any lingering discomfort, he’d cal...
2025-09-24 18:37:24 +0000 UTC
View Post
Despite the air of discomfort that descended over the party, they continued their delving without issue, though the stretches between fights were filled mostly with awkward silence. Astrid couldn’t help but notice every time somebody’s face shifted, every time their minds drifted elsewhere, nor could she stop letting her own mind run through dozens of possibilities of how this party, this g...
2025-09-23 23:44:00 +0000 UTC
View Post
Spending time with the excitable toddler was a welcome reminder of the fact that kids were forgiving to a fault, something that made the repentant man smile. TJ didn’t need to explain that he’d been focusing on other, probably genuinely more pressing things, and instead, he said, “I’m sorry, Luz. I should’ve been with you some more. Can I play too?”
The little girl, who had be...
2025-09-23 15:00:22 +0000 UTC
View Post
[Ruskil POV]
Through the forests near the pass where the true Alpha, he who would be the Zaaktif, led his people to freedom and glory, Ruskil led his pack. Every Saharliard except for four were Sik’Tal or Kha aspiring to the caste, and the pack moved in individual trios. The plans and strategies that he’d come up with while in the sand pits of Nievtra had found that s...
2025-09-23 08:11:38 +0000 UTC
View Post
Once they had three people who crossed the 100 in an attribute milestone, the delves started progressing much faster. That first time after reaching level 19, Astrid’d let loose and exhausted herself as well as every Skill she had, and now she kept that first fight as a fighter able to use mana as a sweet memory. Now, she was much more deliberate with her mana use, only using it when it could...
2025-09-23 00:13:19 +0000 UTC
View Post
TJ grunted as he lifted the collapsed stone off of the remains of the ruined ritual circle. The first time this had happened, everybody involved had fought but succeeded in keeping their patience. The second time, TJ was the only one who managed to keep from cursing the stupid thing out. The third time, he joined the others in their frustrations as they commiserated and raged. Now, three full d...
2025-09-20 15:00:14 +0000 UTC
View Post
After checking with my two companions, I learned that the ants were fairly non-responsive to any of the sneaky attempts that’d been made in an attempt to sway their opinions of us.
“The way their feelings function is different from ours.” Sybil explained. “I wasn’t able to change the way that they felt or perceived at all. Maybe it was stubbornness, maybe it was something else e...
2025-09-20 06:00:12 +0000 UTC
View Post
Five and a half weeks passed, and the party rarely, if ever, saw the natural light of day. Frequently, a full week would pass where, between five nights spent in the Dungeon and leaving to return to its clutches before sunrise only to return after sunset days later, even in the summer, there was no opportunity to see the sun. The party threw themselves at the monsters, the fifth floor of Purcel...
2025-09-19 21:09:33 +0000 UTC
View Post
Hey, no chapters today. Sorry, I was hoping to be productive, but the book launch is demanding more of me than I expected, and also, my mind cannot focus on writing. I'm gonna take care of some admin stuff that's been dragging me down, and maybe just spend time with the fam.
In case you're wondering, "What book launch?" here you go. Successor of Kukulkan (the one I call SoK here) is drop...
2025-09-18 18:50:08 +0000 UTC
View Post
There was no reason why the Boss couldn’t run away if it was losing. Of course it could, it was a damn bird. Yes, it could fly, and if the direction it wanted to fly was directly away from him, there wasn’t anything that TJ could do, especially considering how much faster it was than him. He’d run away from the Chindi forest back in the Tutorial and there was no rule or reason why a creat...
2025-09-18 15:00:21 +0000 UTC
View Post
[Maksulah POV]
“If you bow once, you’ll bow for your entire life.“ Maksulah’s sire had said that frequently as she’d grown. He’d been obsessed with never appearing weak and proving to every other creature that he was, in fact, Laarte the Unbroken. He told dozens of stories of how he got the name, none of them ringing of truth, or even having anything in common...
2025-09-18 06:43:51 +0000 UTC
View Post
“It would appear that you have now seen every option that is available to you. If you don’t mind, this old man might have some advice. Of course, only if it isn’t an imposition.“ Greely‘s voice cut through Astrid‘s musing, causing her to pull her head from looking at the ceiling to instead look at him. He didn’t say anything more, waiting for any response to come his way.
...
2025-09-18 00:20:32 +0000 UTC
View Post
With the storm boosting his Attributes, TJ sprinted forward, seamlessly becoming a coatl and slithering through the grass without hesitating. He could taste a foreign electricity in the air, not from his storm, but that of an interloper. The pride of ownership and responsibility demanded that he seize back the complete control over his Divine Authority. As such, the Storm Serpent didn...
2025-09-17 15:00:17 +0000 UTC
View Post
Just gonna put some stuff in here to push away those who don't wish to be spoiled.
Now. Do you think Astrid will choose Potentiation or Sublimation? I'd like to think that I made different boons, all of which have their own value. I'm nearly positive about what she's going to choose, but if someone can give me a good argument otherwise, then maybe she'll take it. Anyways. Enjoy!
2025-09-16 23:46:25 +0000 UTC
View Post
The hours moved slow, but the days passed quick, and with the notable difference granted by Skandr’s Skill selection and Magical Potency growth, the group's ability to clear through monsters spiked by nearly 50%. Since their mage was ripping through monsters like so much paper, Astrid found herself about to reach level 16 just a couple hours into the second day’s delve. Skandr himself was t...
2025-09-16 23:40:24 +0000 UTC
View Post
“That thing sucks.“ Farid said, glancing at Sarah as she opened her mouth to curse. She squinted at the other man and scoffed at his transparent attempt to keep her from swearing. For a long moment, they stared at each other, seeming to be deciding how to answer.
Finally, Sarah cocked her head in a slight admission of the point. Then she refrained from swearing as she agreed, “Yeah,...
2025-09-16 15:00:13 +0000 UTC
View Post
“We have been requested to eradicate your enemy. However, the Empire of the Saharliard has no pre-existing relationship with you, so there’s no reason for us to do as you commence without any incentive. According to the other ants that we talked to, we should be happy to do as you asked simply because your Queen would appreciate it if we did.“
She would appreciate it. Is that no...
2025-09-16 06:06:01 +0000 UTC
View Post
