Basil
Basil shivered at the sound of the enormous Pit Lord’s booming laughter as he taunted the sea of monsters that assaulted him. His ugly black pitted warglaive whistled through the air, reaping treants like wheat before he detonated his hellfire-empowered stomp attack yet again, setting some of the larger ones alight and knocking a half dozen rock beetles flying.
“That blast wave of hellfire is decimating those treants,” Malika observed.
“Yup,” Mato said. “...
2025-10-26 14:00:10 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
It’s busy, Aliandra thought, casting her mind ranging outward through both the eyes and ears of her monsters, and through the very domain itself, sampling the foreign mana wielded within her dungeon.
The prickle of lightning, the chill of ice, and the searing burn of fire played delicately through her awareness and sympathetically across her skin as groups of adventurers contended with her monsters, seeking treasure, experience, and growth. From the novices c...
2025-10-25 14:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Malika
Calm welled up from deep within her, slowly radiating from the core of her body out through the energy pathways within her chest and abdomen, slowly circling, ever expanding. It flowed, building gently, but inexorably, down the length of her arms and out through her fingertips, spreading into the stillness of the Grove. The slow, soft pulsing of her energy matched the measured beat of her heart, and the steady rhythm of her inbreath followed by outbreath, drawing in air and the...
2025-10-24 14:00:11 +0000 UTC
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Mato
Mato sat enjoying the heat beside the forge and the anvil while the blacksmiths worked their craft, honestly not minding the wait in the slightest. It had been a good fight, smooth, almost routine. But that’s not what was on his mind.
I met a god.
Azryet was a dragon – it was a fact he had known ever since Havok had chosen him as his patron. He had seen dragons, and even fought against them, and so he knew just how enormous and powerful they could be. Or ...
2025-10-23 14:00:10 +0000 UTC
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Ryn
Oh, Ali finished! Ryn thought as she flew down to the circle of study tables in the Grand Library Arcana to find the neatly stacked piles of copied books waiting for her there.
She spiraled down rapidly, alighting on the pretty green and gold carpet she had found on sale in the marketplace a few weeks before the town had been destroyed. Somehow, it had survived the disaster, emerging unscathed from the recovery of the library. Identical book towers awaited her, arra...
2025-10-22 14:00:10 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
“What do you mean, you don’t know?” Ali demanded, glaring at the ancient, stubborn troll with frustration. “You lived through it, didn’t you?”
She pushed the giant scale-bound draconic tome away from her in frustration, and it bumped into a pile of precariously balanced books, making Ryn squeak as she caught them with a flare of her unique magic.
“Sorry, Ryn,” Ali said. She had been searching for hours through the books Azryet had lent them, but us...
2025-10-21 14:00:10 +0000 UTC
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Grelda Flamebellows
This must be the place, Grelda thought, staring at the burnished steel sign and the heavy doors. She didn’t get along too well with Adventurers, not trusting their information, but she certainly knew how to find the best blacksmith in town: ask the best geared tank in the guild. The quiet girl who had directed her here had been wearing some of the best plate armor she had ever seen. And that shield, wow! She just hoped it wasn’t someone with too much m...
2025-10-20 14:00:30 +0000 UTC
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Azryet
“This encounter seemed very productive,” Tiraza said, already deep into the pile of books Aliandra had left.
“Indeed,” Azryet said, reviewing the meeting once more in his mind. Truly, it was far more valuable an encounter than he had ever dared to hope. When Aliandra had effected her own escape from the Abyssal Realm, he had despaired of ever seeing her again, but somehow, he had been fortunate enough to have found a person who was true to her word.
The dung...
2025-10-19 14:00:04 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
If it was just her, Ali would have teleported straight there, but it turned out that surprisingly many people wanted to meet Azryet, and so she decided to walk, or at least fly, most of the length of her dungeon. It wasn’t as if she were in an enormous hurry, especially considering she had to take the time to teach most of them draconic first – fortunately, the bonuses to learning from both her domain tithe and the library had made this a relatively easy task.
I...
2025-10-18 14:00:12 +0000 UTC
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A/N: 2 of 2
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On the other hand, the Trolls generally believe a person – even one from the lesser races – comes from beyond the veil through the Well of Eternity – a place of non-existence, nothing, an emptiness. Once they set foot in this world, they are granted a soul from the Well of Souls, which allows them to walk the path of the living until they ascend through what they believe to be the gate to the afterlife, the Well of Divinity, shedding their morta...
2025-10-17 14:05:07 +0000 UTC
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A/N: 1 of 2
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Julian Hartley
Julian was going to die.
He had been told some people saw their lives flash before their eyes in moments like this, but for him, he just felt an overwhelming sense of frustration. This was not how it was supposed to be. He had been so excited to finally reach bronze rank and earn his guild ring, and when Maddie and Hix had found this quest on the guild quest board, he had known for sure he was past the hump. He could earn mone...
2025-10-17 14:00:10 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
“I lost.” The gigantic Carnage Berserker hung her head in shame, kneeling before Ali in the center of the large arena and restoration runic circle. She was much stronger than Tol’brekk had been when he had defeated the Crimson Blade in this very spot, but Ali had high hopes for her even after watching her defeat. “I don’t deserve to be your minion.”
In the darkness beyond the giant troll, two Gates stood, glowing with white space-affinity runes that contrast...
2025-10-16 14:00:07 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
“I’m convinced,” Ali said. The last Sandwyrm had been killed almost entirely single-handedly by Maalgaroth, and she was now certain that her rift guard boss could keep the entrance secure. Provided, of course, they didn’t double-team him, but then, Naia had made a pretty terrifying slime Champion right on the other side of the rift.
Ali made a note to remind her Pit Lord to let some of the smaller monsters through on purpose, so that Naia could ga...
2025-10-15 14:00:13 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
Ali reappeared within the rift chamber in time to see the adventurers setting up a perimeter around the rift itself. The chamber was already clear of all monsters, even the corpses had presumably been eaten by Naia’s voracious horde or raised to serve Seth’s army. Calen and most of Seth’s army were nowhere to be found, presumably already on the other side of the rift.
“Ali, you’re back?” Seth asked.
“Yup. New shrine seekers,” she answered, explaini...
2025-10-14 14:00:11 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
Ali entered the final chamber behind her minions and the rest of the raid group. Finally, we made it. It was not a particularly long trip from the top to the bottom, and she had done it far faster in the past, but the sheer number of monsters that kept pouring from the rift and choking up the tunnels and caves had slowed their progress down to a crawl. What should have taken a day at most was now more than a week of continuous streams of creaking treants, crawling be...
2025-10-13 14:00:07 +0000 UTC
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Grelda Flamebellows
Grelda stomped her way through the mud and puddles on the way to the Smoky Pint, ignoring the grime and dirt that was soiling her old leather boots.
I hope they all get what they deserve, she thought. And stub their toes on an ingot, she added, uncaring for how spiteful it sounded. She may have lost her temper back there. She may have thrown the logistics and procurement officer out of her forge, making him land on his ass in a pudd...
2025-10-12 14:00:07 +0000 UTC
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Moira Sangrey
Moira glanced up, staring at the closed door to her office as the sound of footsteps running thumped along the hallway outside. There was a loud bang, a yelp, and then the door was flung open, crashing against the wall. He charged in, red-faced, breathing hard.
Of course, it’s him, who else could it be? she thought, frowning over the rims of her enchanted glasses at the intruder into her peaceful domain.
“What is it this time, G...
2025-10-11 14:00:07 +0000 UTC
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A/N: 2 of 2
Donella Novaspark
Donella flew over the still mostly barren expanse of Myrin’s Keep, her sharp eyes taking in the various construction projects along the way. Most of the residential districts were still empty fields of grass, interrupted only by occasional trees and patches of yellow daisies. The slum districts would probably be the last to be rebuilt, but already they were strewn with tents and markers as people attempted to reclaim their former properties. It ha...
2025-10-10 14:05:01 +0000 UTC
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A/N: 1 of 2
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Gromm of Drak
Gromm gathered the dark woolen cloak around his broad shoulders and raised the hood. It twisted and pulled uncomfortably, draped over the axes on his back, but hiding his face from casual notice was far more important.
He stepped forward, approaching the guarded gate at the north end of Myrin’s Keep. His skin prickled strangely as he crossed an invisible threshold, but it was the unmistakable scent of dense mana that made him ...
2025-10-10 14:00:08 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
Ali teleported directly above the pristine front gable that crowned the outside face of the brand-new guild hall, almost complete now, with the crafters simply needing to put the finishing touches on it. Her main contribution had been creating several tons of various types of stone for the crafters and installing the guild’s teleportation runic circles, reconnecting it once again to the Grand Library Arcana.
Having her domain encompass the entire space of the town and...
2025-10-09 14:00:32 +0000 UTC
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A/N: 2 of 2
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Ryn
Ryn flew along beside Ali, admiring her new golden wings, mostly to keep her mind off the gloomy and sinister forest, and the obvious damage from extreme combat that littered the area Lira had once called her home. Bookwyrm had his talons firmly gripped into the padded shoulder of her shirt, and his tail wrapped around her neck while he took a nap.
But as they approached the Grand Library Arcana, and the giant tree came into view, it beca...
2025-10-08 14:05:02 +0000 UTC
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A/N: 1 of 2
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Aliandra
“Halt! Switch out.”
Lyeneru’s commanding voice cut clearly through the din of combat, and Ali was quite honestly relieved to hear it. Her minions were tireless, fueled by her reserved mana, but she most certainly was not. It was with a profound sense of relief, and a small twinge of envy, that she watched the raid group of fresh adventurers charging past to engage the swarm of monsters with an abundance of energy and vigor....
2025-10-08 14:00:09 +0000 UTC
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Calen
Calen’s eyes scanned the infestation of plants and monsters that crawled and crept within the broad expanse of the gloomy cavern. It was barely recognizable from the first time he had seen it, back when it had been the first chamber of Naia’s real dungeon below the fake one she had maintained to preserve her appearance as weak and subjugated.
Wrapped in the twisted illusion of his Eclipse skill and blurred by Mirage Armor to conceal the traces of his mana, he shivered ...
2025-10-07 14:00:09 +0000 UTC
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Calen
“Excited?” Ali asked, glancing at him, her tiny golden wings humming softly as they descended through the trees.
“Very,” Calen said, grinning. His own wings rippled lazily in the air behind him, diaphanous ripples of white light that contrasted against Ali’s golden glow without overwhelming it. “That battle pushed me over the threshold, I think.”
“I can’t wait,” Ali said as they both alighted on the ground near the familiar tent in the middle of t...
2025-10-06 14:00:20 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
“What is it?” Naia said, exploring the shrine with her infinitely stretchable body. “Strong mana.”
“This is my shrine,” Ali said. “You can use it to unlock your evolution, and then you can earn experience and levels again.”
“How can I get one?”
“I don’t know,” Ali said, frowning. She had inherited her shrine, presumably when her father had died, and so she didn’t exactly know how dungeons normally got their shrines. But she knew s...
2025-10-05 14:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
“Naia?” Ali called, searching in vain for her friend. The ooze dungeon domain mana was still woven through her own, so she had to be alive. Didn’t she?
“Here.” A small pile of sand, a few meters in front of Ali, shivered softly and suddenly turned blue.
“Naia!” Ali exclaimed. “You’re ok! I was worried about you.” She reached out and wrapped her arms gently around the softly glowing blue squishy bubble that was her friend. “You’re quite the ...
2025-10-04 14:00:07 +0000 UTC
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If void magic doesn’t solve your problem immediately, you’re not using enough.
- Azryet, Dragon God, Harbinger of Chaos, Herald of Havoc, The Calamity.
Aliandra
“This is a disaster,” Vivian said. “We should leave.”
“It is a world boss,” Lyeneru said. “I, at least, have an obligation to kill it so it doesn’t wipe out another town.”
“What exactly is a world boss?” Ali asked.
“A monster strong enough to match the most po...
2025-10-03 14:00:08 +0000 UTC
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Mato
Getting eaten by a giant Sandwyrm was not high on the list of experiences Mato wanted to repeat ever again. He had felt the attack with Survival Instinct, but the danger had seemed to come from every direction, and he had hesitated, not understanding how to react. He had never expected a giant wyrm to attack from below, and his snap judgement had been woefully inadequate when it came to the reality of the size of the monster’s maw.
The fangs snapped shut high above, cutti...
2025-10-02 14:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
A flock of tiny, violet-throated birds chirped incessantly in the branches overhead, trying their hardest to drown out Vivian’s voice as she addressed the fully assembled guild in the clearing beside the towering golden wall that had served as a temporary battlement. It was a small thing, the birds, but the sound of the song changed everything. Only a skeleton crew manned the defenses now, and not a single sound of battle could be heard – not even from the ruins of Myrin...
2025-10-01 14:00:12 +0000 UTC
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Aliandra
It’s over.
The clearing had grown quieter with most of the adventurers having returned topside. Ali sat, mostly not really knowing what to do with herself. Ever since they had forged their way down through the Blooming Rot to the strange rift at the bottom of Naia’s dungeon and accidentally drawn the attention of Nevyn Eld himself, she had not had a moment’s rest. Everything since had been a cascading torrent of rapidly unravelling emergencies and a mad s...
2025-09-30 14:00:09 +0000 UTC
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