Lester Yong & Rosa Fontelera-Yong

CoESC Book 13-20.1: Return

The new fetus died even before it reached the same progress as the one before it. Edward stared at the remaining vial of essence blood, and he cursed loudly. His rage and desperation overcame his good sense, and by the time he shook it off, his steward was dead along with half of his staff.

He coldly ignored the mutilated bodies, though he did pause to admire some of the more twisted ones that were created by his powerful Affinity and spells. His favoured tactics of freezing an oppone...

CoESC Book 13-19.3: Seasons of War

“Another failure.”

Edward hissed as the mass of blood and flesh slowly withered. Temporal acceleration, his favourite trick, had failed him this time, and he had missed the point of no return, when the varied cells and energies were about to coalesce into an Anima. Instead, the disparity between the level of the two donors, not just in Anima strength, but also in Affinity, caused a cascade of failures that destroyed his work of several weeks. 


Ugh. He had first spli...

CoESC Book 13-19.2: Seasons of War

“No…no.” Edward moaned. “It’s wasted.” He growled at the…thing in the containment cylinder. It was a body, with golden hair and perfect features, but it was practically lifeless. If the spell circles inscribed in the device weren’t working, the thing inside wouldn’t even breathe, and its heart wouldn’t beat. 

“The sample is too identical to the original…” he muttered. On the desk behind him, a pen wrote on a notebook by itself, transcribing his words. The...

CoESC Book 13-19.1: Seasons of War

The vial of blood was carefully kept in an ornate, spellwoven box. Roland Turner vi Ishodir carefully took the vial, which was just about the length of his finger and peered at the contents. The glass was opaque and covered in runescript patterns, many of which involved his grandfather’s Time Affinity: Stasis Lock.

It kept the contents as fresh as though it had just been placed inside and because of that, it also prevented ambient Elemental Energies from affecting it. The contents c...

CoESC Book 13-18.3: Unexpected

The portal gate opened and two men stumbled through. Gunther Patrick winced at the pain on his left cheek, or rather, the fact that it wasn’t as painful as it should be. Burn wounds hurt worse than a goddess’s spurned anger, but the burning sensation was already fading. It wasn’t his self-regeneration spell either. A wound like that would have hurt far worse as it healed instead of fading away like that. His hand trembled as he reached up to touch the wound. That horrible, horrible feel...

CoESC Book 13-18.2: Unexpected

She could feel every moment, feel them extend, stretching every split second and making them feel like minutes. The fabric of reality slowly tore and a jagged void lined with something darker than black took its place. She felt her Anima split as the fabric was torn apart. Her Animakinesis was what kept her in the air, tiny hooks spread across her Anima clung to the fabric of reality to hold her in place. 


The air around her, the ground underneath, the water suspended in the a...

CoESC Book 13-18.1: Unexpected

The second border fortress, Featherwood Stockade, was roughly twenty leagues northwest-ish of Twilight Hold. Yuriko simply had to follow the edge of the Sodden Plains to get there. At the moment, she was sitting on her heels next to a stream. From what she saw above, it would eventually join the multitude of rivers to the Conflux. 

The sight of the Sodden Plains, even through the Elemental Mists, was breathtaking. The shallow waters reflected the light of the Radiant Sun as well a...

CoESC Book 13-17.3: Threats From All Around

Roland Turner vi Ishodir stood at the balcony of his palace’s highest tower. He gazed out and enjoyed the view of the Capital City, Ishoda, though he had a pensive frown on his face. The balcony was connected to a bedroom, though not his main one. It was the place he spent when he didn’t want to be bothered, by his people, or his thirsty girlfriends and concubines. 


The Eversoar River's flow was placid as it split across the island the city was built on. Small ships trawle...

CoESC Book 13-17.2: Threats From All Around

The humidity made sweat cling to Yuriko's skin as she waited behind a few trees. She had flown nearly fifty leagues east of the strip, on her first mission outside of sitting and waiting. After the last false alarm, she marched up to the fortress's leadership council and demanded they give her a mission to break from the monotony.

The beach on the lake was great, as was the service and beverages, but there was only so much laziness that she could take. And the fortress didn't have an e...

CoESC Book 13-17.1: Threats From All Around

“Accursed by all the gods and goddesses!” Edward swore as the scrying pool only showed empty hills and fallen trees. Yesterday, he scryed his clone and saw that it was about to engage the target. He’d hoped that it succeeded, but the emptiness of the scrying pool told him that his fears had been correct. He’d lost his clone and a part of his Anima that he inserted into it.

“Accursed fool. Arrogant bastard,” he muttered, meaning himself more than anyone else. The clone was ...

CoESC Book 13-16.3: Holding the Line

The Radiant Sun was at its zenith, casting warm rays down over the lake. The rhythmic sound of the waves crashing upon the shore, the beaches, was more than soothing and Yuriko stretched her legs out on the lounge chair. This one was made out of woven, water-resistant fibres and was long enough to rest her legs on. Her feet did stick out at the end, but that was fine. 


The beaches of the Great Erithmus Lake near Greyith Fortress were used as a leisure spot for the garrison, an...

CoESC Book 13-16.2: Holding the Line

“The Chaos is clashing with his body,” Yuriko observed, and she perceived Monica nodding behind her. She tilted her head and took his arm into hers. 


The man flinched at the contact. His scales were smooth but there were rough patches closer to his shoulder. The transition between the scales and skin was rough, with the latter somewhat chafed where the edges of the scales rubbed the flesh raw. 

He flinched when a mot of Chaos went up his veins and collided with...

CoESC Book 13-16.1: Holding the Line

The conference room was surprisingly light and airy. Yuriko could feel a breeze coming from the windows, and she appreciated the view of the lake towards the south, and the light coming in from the east and west. It felt as if she stood atop an isolated tower even though it was right in the middle of the fortress.

She soon recognised some of the runescript patterns that enchanted the walls to act as windows, though they were selective in what it allowed through. Nothing that was harmfu...

CoESC Book 13-15.3: Outmatched

The caravan took the rest of the day to travel about ten leagues southwards. The woman who commanded the company, Captain Nuria Mendez, directed them towards a campsite, one that looked well used by the  Bresian Army. 


Yuriko looked over the waystation with a critical eye. The spot was just around the bend, was protected on three sides by trees, or small hills, and had a well near the back. There was a small structure, just enough for four people to sleep inside, near the...

CoESC Book 13-15.2: Outmatched

The moment Yuriko stabbed the elusive magus in the head, she saw his expression and it chilled her to her bones. It wasn’t fear, worry, or even anger. She had expected a dying man, one beset by the pain of being burned head to toe. 

Or perhaps he wasn’t feeling much pain at all. She recalled that most of a body’s feeling of pain originated from the skin, and though she had experiences that said otherwise, such as when she forged her body with lightning, or when she tempered ...

CoESC Book 13-15.1: Outmatched

The barrier dome was visible for longstrides around and the strike force zeroed in on it immediately. Steelds flushed with Elemental energy kicked off against the ground, propelling itself and its riders several times faster than their normal speed. 


Dust kicked up from the pounding hooves hung in the air, and the riders at the back had to cast spells that filtered the air to stop themselves from coughing their lungs out. Above, the Ib’honara scouts flew in lazy circles, whi...

CoESC Book 13-14.3: Outnumbered

Yuriko looked at the falling mountain with not a little bit of consternation, as well as a hint of smugness.

‘If that rotter thinks this will defeat me, he’s delusional,’ Yuriko muttered to herself. The falling mountain came swiftly, but not as fast as her ability to burrow underneath the earth using her sunblades. 

Her thread to Fluffington pulsed as the wolf pup slaughtered the invaders seeking to capture her charge. She had almost fled to the caravan when she notic...

CoESC Book 13-14.2: Outnumbered

As the elemental mists around the Ishodir Battalion shifted away from concealment, sharp eyes above the clouds immediately spotted the difference. Hesitation lasted only for a moment before the Ib’honara scout flipped over and flew south as if all the hounds of the Abyss were after him.


__________

Eddie expected the woman’s flight spell to fail the moment she entered the range of the Control Ritual—he counted on it, actually, and had prepared multiple renditions of obs...

CoESC Book 13-14.1: Outnumbered

Edward Turner’s clone, or Eddie as he liked to think of himself, smiled with smug satisfaction when he saw the quarry flying a few longstrides away. Farsight gave him a clear view of her expression, and the satisfaction he felt when he saw her surprise, and what he imagined to be despair, crossed her face. It only lasted a moment before it was replaced with resolute impassivity. 

Why did she continue to resist anyway? He’d seen the future through his mind’s eye, and every pa...

CoESC Book 13-13.3: Itching to Fight

“What do you mean you found other Ancients?” Yuriko asked, barely parsing through Gwendith’s flood of words and emotions. The spell made use of the threads connecting them by widening the passage, and as a result, Gwendith’s thoughts and emotions, especially when they were this strung up, nearly overwhelmed the spell. 

Yuriko felt longing, eagerness, regrets, excitement, fear, as well as impatience and a host of other negative emotions that the other girl tried to suppress...

CoESC Book 13-13.2: Itching to Fight

Yuriko managed to return to the caravan after a few minutes, though she did have to fend off several obsidian arrowhead volleys. She couldn’t find the elusive Magus this time and she didn’t want to attack with her full arsenal lest the refugees get caught in the blast. So she moved away from the road and teased the attacks by moving slower than she normally did. 

Eventually, when the arrowheads ceased, she returned to her convoy, only to find them basically still stuck near th...

CoESC Book 13-13.1: Itching to Fight

The work to gather enough Elemental cores to exchange for a Tower Entry Token plus an Exit Token took weeks. Gwendith did the arithmetic. Elemental Cores averaged roughly ten merits each, and they needed forty thousand, one token for each group, and another three thousand for the exit tokens. Those needed to be exchanged per person rather than a group, and it was only now that she realised how much the city dwellers were fleecing the delvers. 

“Don’t think of it that way...

CoESC Book 13-12.3: ...Rescue

The next few days passed in both a blur and what seemed like a crawl. Yuriko spent them cooped up in the estate. The city was in turmoil, though she only watched from a distance. News was brought by Juan Carlos and his staff and it wasn’t anything good.

The girls she rescued, along with the ones she found in the sewers, had only been a fraction of those abducted. Practically every major household that had a smidgen of power and was aligned against the Scions of Virtalla had been hit....

CoESC Book 13-12.2: ...Rescue

Yuriko held herself ready, waiting for her wily foe to return. Her sunblades were ready to explode with all the Radiant energy they held. The the explosion and damage wouldn’t be as powerful as using Radiant Lance, it had the advantage of being easy to use, and there were dozens of sunblades at the ready. At the moment, there were thousands, and while her Intent and Will rapidly depleted, it was better than open herself up to attack 

Still, it wasn’t as if the sunblades ...

CoESC Book 13-12.1: ...Rescue

A heavy feeling of foreboding overcame Yuriko’s senses just as she flew closer to her target. She could see a small country manor through the light of the Half Moon and the twinkling of the foreign stars. The manor itself was about a third the size of the Abad family’s main house, and it had a hedged garden at the back. A gravelled road led from the main door towards the public road, which, up here in the north, was barely more than a hard-packed dirt road. The main road was wide enough s...

CoESC Book 13-11.3: Search and...

When the golden light faded away, the Golems had been blown away from the portal gate. The Metal Golem, Fire Golem, and Ice Golem were past her perception range, but the mocking trail across the undergrowth told where they ended up. The Earth and Wood Golems were still in the clearing, but both were in bad shape. The portal arch was burned and had numerous scratches and fissures, that were slowly, but visibly widening. The gate, an opaque mix of greyish energies, suddenly had red, green, and ...

CoESC Book 13-11.2: Search and...

There were roughly a dozen guardsmen scattered across the clearing, along with half the amount of carriages. 

‘Most of them must have gone inside already.’ Yuriko thought, since those carriages could carry four people comfortably, or six to eight packed in. ‘How many did they abduct, and what does the Ishodir Empire stand to gain?’

Or perhaps they just wanted to cause trouble. Considering that they have an armed force in the bordering Elemental Conflux�...

CoESC Book 13-11.1: Search and...

The clearing was filled with Steeld carriages, collapsed guards, and Magi. Yuriko didn’t think they were the ones using cooperative spells, as they were too far from each other. She ignored the guards on the ground but kept some strands of consciousness trained of those still able to move and those who were surreptitiously casting. Her perception, which she normally kept away from touching other people directly, she forced on them now. 

She could feel their muscles tense, ...

CoESC Book 13-10.3: Uprising

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the threads didn’t lead her directly to the city. Even more of a surprise, it wasn’t towards the east either, but closer to the north-northeast. The Radiant Sun had disappeared beneath the Veil… no, there wasn’t a Veil within sight here, it was a different term that the Bresians used. Horizon? Yup, that was it. The Radiant Sun had disappeared beneath the horizon of mists, yet the Luminous Moon had not yet risen. 

Her Radiant glow illuminated t...

CoESC Book 13-10.2: Uprising

The teens and younger kids looked at her with a mix of trepidation and hope, and when she spread her Tranquillity, the stressed and weepy faces eased into serenity. 

“Gather round and follow me,” Yuriko said, even as she removed her bodily restrictions. The Anima reach would be of better use in protecting the children. She surrounded them with golden light, to some gasps and ragged breaths, though those only lasted a moment before her Tranquil Mien soothed their anxietie...