Calista stared at the painting a moment longer. She wasn’t sure she liked this old woman, but then again, what choice did she have? She turned to Lefty. “What makes you think we can trust her?”
The mage shrugged, “She’s a woman trapped in a painting. She’s obviously in distress and we’re meant to help her.”
Calista gave Lefty a stern look. “I think we have different comfort levels with distressed women. That is not some maiden being held by an evil wizard. That i...
2023-06-16 17:00:05 +0000 UTC
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Sable Unlimited is a game world based on a rules system that I have been working on while writing the story itself. I'm doing this so readers who like those crunchy stat blocks and see just what the characters are and how they're progressing. I think that's important to good character development in a LitRPG novel.
So today I decided to spend a little time creating character sheets for my the two central characters in Book I: Lefty & Calista.
As you can see, I'm wo...
2023-06-14 23:04:22 +0000 UTC
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Listening, Calista picked up a trio of squeaky voices ahead of them. So she signaled Lefty to halt and hold still. Silence followed. After a long moment, Lefty finally whispered, “What did you hear?”
“Probably just a few kobolds,” she whispered back.
“Why don’t we just blast them?”
She shot him a look. “Why would we bother killing the kobolds?”
“I dunno,” the mage shrugged, “for the XP, I guess.”
Calista shot him a look. “I don’t thi...
2023-06-14 17:00:05 +0000 UTC
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Just as Calista unlocked the latch, the kobold in the privy appeared at the other end of the barracks room and so they rushed through the doorway. The light disappeared as she shut the door and set the lock.
“Are you listening?” She asked the mage.
“For what?”
“For something that wants to kill us.”
“Who wants to kill us?”
“I don’t know, that’s what I’m listening for.”
“But what about the sandwich and the turnover?”
Calist...
2023-06-12 17:00:09 +0000 UTC
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The snores of the invisible monster faded behind them as they passed down a hallway and entered another room. Here, a long dry fountain sat at the center of the room while paintings of animals and monsters adorned the walls.
Lefty, tapping his staff, inspected the fountain. “So now that we’ve established we make a pretty great team, let me ask you, just what brought you down into this dungeon?”
Calista had been hoping this topic wouldn’t come up. The memory of the hooded f...
2023-06-09 01:13:47 +0000 UTC
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“Thank you, my mother gave it to me.”
“Robert, just how long have you been in this room?”
There was a long pause as they waited for Robert to think about this. “Today I think I’ve been in here for around twelve hours.”
“That’s quite a long shift,” Calista said with some sympathy.
“Not really. I quite like it in here.”
“So is this your room then?”
“No, this is the spare bedroom.”
“Ah, I see. It’s quite the place.”<...
2023-06-09 00:51:38 +0000 UTC
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The door slammed itself shut as a set of iron bars fell over it. Calista rubbed her eyes. She wanted to log out and take a break but was afraid that if she did the entire dungeon would reset again. As she drew her hands away, she found herself surrounded by darkness.
This dungeon was already exhausting. Typically, a dungeon had a pattern you could pick up on. A theme even. Something you could get used to. But with this one, it was like every other room had something new and terrible in ...
2023-06-09 00:42:49 +0000 UTC
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“Sotorum Intorok!” The mage said and a wall of stone covered the doorway. Going to one knee, the young man caught his breath and stuck his hand out. “Hey, the name is Shenza din’Hooba, former court magician of the Kingdom of Rhukayeen, but all my friends call me Lefty.”
“Calista, delver extraordinaire.” She shook the hand. “Look, I just straight up saved your life so we’re not doing any fifty-fifty crap, okay? Eighty-twenty or I leave you behind the next door I find th...
2023-06-09 00:33:29 +0000 UTC
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She brought her sword around in a neat arc that struck the sand golem directly in the neck, splitting him in half. As the grains of white and brown collapsed to the floor, she spun to face two more golems who had sneaked up behind her and her sword flashed twice as she cut each of them down.
What in the blazes have I gotten myself into now, she thought as she jumped over a pile of sand. Jogging through the sand, another golem rose but her Emberblade caught it in the belly. ...
2023-06-09 00:26:28 +0000 UTC
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She returned to the fork in the hallway where she took the other turn. Following the torches, she found a dead end. Why is there a hallway here with no doors? She activated her [Dungeon Sense] ability and clicked open her mini-map. If this was an altered version of the floor that she had started on, then she was still somewhere below the second level. Then her [Dungeon Sense] alerted her that something hidden was nearby. A few moments of searching th...
2023-06-08 23:09:54 +0000 UTC
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As the two trolls turned right down the hallway, a shadow peeked out from a doorway, scurried forward, and then stopped in the shadowy part between two torches. The trolls, unaware of the shadow, stopped to light the next torch and then continued on.
Calista waited, holding still and silent as the voices faded. When finally she could no longer hear the trolls, she crept forward to the next intersection and looked right. Shadows flickered against the stones, but none that took the shape ...
2023-06-08 22:50:46 +0000 UTC
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“It’s like I said, the women in this game have an entitlement problem.”
“What do you mean they have an entitlement problem?”
“They always think they can get what they want, from whoever they want, whenever they want it. I log on and there are all my friends. We hang out. It’s fun. We run a dungeon, maybe raid a few newbs over along the Azurian border. Shit like that. The moment … the stinking moment … one of the women in my guild logs in and suddenly I d...
2023-06-08 22:28:46 +0000 UTC
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She shut the door carefully behind her, working the door handle so the latch did not click, and as she let go, the sound of grinding stone disappeared. All was quiet. Standing very still, she listened as her eyes adjusted. The faint glow of torchlight flickered around the bend, shadows danced against the stone, and voices whispered against the walls.
She knew right where she was. She was in the hallway where she had first encountered the dragon. The same hallway where she had begun. She...
2023-06-08 22:05:19 +0000 UTC
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Still standing atop the stairwell, she leaned out the doorway to look outside. She was standing in a doorway that stood right inside the broken gazebo. In that moment, it was almost as if she were looking at a portal to another world, a world that stood parallel to the dungeon below. However, as she looked out at the vines hanging over the broken stones of the gazebo and the stars that hung above them, she thought of the mysterious man she had met at the Hanging Dragon and the secrets he had ...
2023-06-08 20:21:25 +0000 UTC
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There was the usual snap of light as she changed back into Calista, but as her eyes adjusted she was no longer in the room with the bar and the imp. Instead, she was standing on a stony floor half covered in moss with vines hanging from the walls. Thin beams of light shot down from the ceiling as they shone off the bits of mildew hanging in the air. Water dripped off the walls and into tiny puddles. She looked up. The room was tall, three or four stories tall by her guess, and there was a pil...
2023-06-08 19:09:26 +0000 UTC
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Calista narrowed her eyes at the imp. “You know for an NPC bartender, you seem to know a lot about system admins and developers and stuff.”
Inujack just smiled at her as he began cleaning another glass.
That one’s not even dirty. She glared as she finished her whiskey and set the glass on the counter with an audible clank. “You also seem a little too moral for an imp.”
Inujack continued to smile. “I’m just a humble bartender, ma’am.”
“I sup...
2023-06-08 19:07:30 +0000 UTC
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She took the hint and pulled out another ten-piece. He refilled her glass again. This time, she decided she would sip slowly. She would have to pace herself if she wanted her character to stay sober enough to escape this wretched place.
She swirled the glass and listened to the ice clink. “So, about the kobolds …”
“Yes,” Inujack grunted. “There’s about four or five dozen. Depends. Their numbers vary depending on what kind of adventurers make it through the place. Pop...
2023-06-08 18:44:34 +0000 UTC
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She took a long sip. The whiskey tasted rich and dark. She gave it a swirl in the glass as she swished it in her mouth. That’s far too good for a simulated environment. They must have really upped their game this last patch. She took a second, shorter sip. That’s nice.
Accessing her H.U.D, she looked through the many mods she had equipped and found the one that allowed her to look at an NPC’s base stats.
Imp (minor fiend)
size...
2023-06-08 18:37:04 +0000 UTC
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Calista stayed tucked behind the bar for a long while. Minutes passed as the torches went out one by one. Soon the room was as dark as it was empty, but still Calista didn’t move. She had no intention of wandering out into a hallway that could at any moment expand to fit a dragon that, for whatever reason, seemed intent on finding her.
The Emberblade stayed in her hands. Did the dragon want her to have it? Or was it searching for her for some other purpose? She didn’t know. All she ...
2023-06-08 18:23:36 +0000 UTC
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And with that, the message box whirred to a halt. Great, Calista thought as she rubbed her eyes. An up-jumped amateur with an ego it is. She could hear it now. “Behold my creation!” Every time. Letting players run their own dungeons was the worst idea Concept ever had. However, she needed to keep investigating. Five secrets and five keys and I already have the one. I wonder what the first secret was? Perhaps the glamour? Does that count as a secret? Spying i...
2023-06-07 02:21:15 +0000 UTC
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She activated one of her abilities – Dungeon Sense – which gave her an augmented Perception check for anything perilous in her immediate vicinity. Activating it with but a thought, she waited to see what was there. Nothing. She was safe for now.
Sitting on one knee, Calista reached into her knapsack and pulled out a tiny metal box. Made of nickel and pewter, it bore the shapes and figures of nymphs running through the woods. Calista had never cared much for the design – she suspec...
2023-06-07 02:18:25 +0000 UTC
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She needed to use a little magic. She’d never been in a place like this before, a dungeon that could change its own shape. However, she knew she needed to cover her tracks first. Reaching into a belt pouch, she pulled out a tiny magic pebble and tossed it up at the ceiling where it blinked and turned into a wall of stone that sealed off the hole in the ceiling. Dungeon or no, she had no intention of being found while she figured out what exactly was going on. She was a professional Delver a...
2023-06-07 02:15:26 +0000 UTC
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There was only one way to approach this problem.
The Voorlock crowed as it heard the leathering wings closing in on them and Calista reigned her steed to a halt. Hopping down from the stirrups, Calista reached into a saddle bag and pulled out a small green vial. The wings were just behind them now, rounding the last corners before it would come into view. She pulled the stopper, dropped a dab of the green liquid on herself and her Voorlock, and with a soft – WHUMP! - they bot...
2023-06-07 02:10:37 +0000 UTC
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As the light faded behind her, Calista hefted the scabbard onto her back and mounted her Voorlock. The feathered bird let out an excited shriek before it launched itself down the darkened hallway. Tapestries, stony windows, and long cold torches raced past them as the Voorlock’s talons scrabbled across the stones. Behind them, a rumbling signaled that their exit had not gone unnoticed. Whoever had locked the sword in that chest atop the dais had not spent top dollar on their locks or
2023-06-07 02:07:43 +0000 UTC
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