“Hello, Nerin.”
Olive teleported us here without issue; oddly enough, I could just send her a mental image of the place through our bond and here we were.
The eldra grocer reacts the same as usual – by flinging whatever produce they were holding at the time into the air.
For some reason I can’t bring myself to care this time and let the round plant things land as they fell.
Why did I care before? I’m pretty sure I didn’t... Well, whatever.
“Nem...
It's a good question! I've been rereading the series from the beginning to make it easier to reintroduce old characters and so forth, basically doing the due diligence I should have been doing from the start.
don't worry, I'll have more chapters soon!
-em
Well, this is annoying. At least it’s easy to resolve I guess.
I dematerialize enough of my body to reach through it and grab the wrist holding the knife, then drag the offending human through to suspend them next to the spikey armored one. Then I wrap the two of them together side by side with more of my feelers.
The other two humans don’t seem particularly threatening, considering they’re both nearly paralyzed from the full-blast wave of my Auras they’ve already weathe...
“YOU MADE A WHAT!?”
Yeah, so Abaris is surprised again, but as usual it just turns into him ranting about impossibilities again.
So I just let him rant.
From what I actually bother to catch, a homunculus is apparently an artificial human, powered by mana. Kind of like a golem, I guess? Except they act as a soul receptacle.
Meanwhile, this priest has no idea who he is – apparently whatever I made his soul from didn’t have an ego, so he’s about as conf...
2024-01-08 21:03:56 +0000 UTC View PostAfter an interesting couple of hours in which Abaris and Nyx asked others and myself for observations about my personality and its seemingly random changes, we’ve come to a handful of interesting conclusions.
First, from Olive’s and Vivianne’s recollections, my more petulant and majestic personality subset is definitely consistent with Astraea’s personality, right down to how much she despised waiting and the nonchalant way she took her throne.
Second, the aggressive, dism...
2024-01-08 04:32:16 +0000 UTC View Post“Well, that was easy.”
Olive remains visibly disappointed that we didn’t return to the ‘manor’ she’s been maintaining for however many hundreds or thousands of years, but she’s just going to have to live with that. The human and former-human portion of my party at least seem much more at peace here in this small house than in the castle under the constant gaze of that other human.
‘Vivianne’, apparently.
We’ve been lounging in the sitting room (or sitt...
I turn to glare at Olive. “How did you do that?”
Smiling toothily in place of an answer, the fox spirit instead turns to walk dignifiedly down the carpet before stepping to the side and gesturing to the double doors with a bow.
I can’t help but sigh.
I guess I should have expected this.
I follow the same path while Izahne and Omorth both move to flank me, tension rippling across our bonds. It’s a good feeling to have reliable subordinates, and I channel the con...
2024-01-04 07:41:57 +0000 UTC View Post“And what of this one, her majesty? Does this one bring pleasure?”
Olive’s been showing me all sorts of overly fancy robes all morning. Not that anyone can tell it’s actually morning, considering the constant darkness.
I sigh a cloud of ash, which she frantically tries to whisk from the air with her tails before it can mar the ridiculously long clothing rack’s contents.
“No. These all belonged to Astraea?”
The fox spirit tuts. “All of this plane bel...
“So how exactly are you still alive after all this time?”
I’m sitting on an overly fancy chair with Izahne and Omorth standing at my sides while the ancient daemon kneels at my feet.
“This one survives only by the grace of her mistress,” she rasps back.
I can’t help but sigh. Almost everything I ask draws an answer like that.
Fine. I can play that game.
“Elaborate,” I say with a dismissive gesture.
She smiles without looking up. “Her mistr...
2024-01-04 07:28:44 +0000 UTC View PostWaiting.
Ah yes, very exciting.
There’s not really much more exciting to do, since Abaris’ grand master plan is to just, ignore the city for now? And search the plane for other towns like Darkwell.
And my kin are only so fast at clearing razorvines.
Izahne doesn’t seem to mind, considering she’s still on my lap and has gotten comfortable with just leaning into me.
My former Assistant has long since dematerialized again, since maintaining a body for h...
Yeah so, I unpublished the Mortal tier - nobody was using it and I keep forgetting to update perms so the two-weeks-out chapters were actually accessible, and this is just easier for me.
bygones <3
-Ember
2024-01-04 05:33:55 +0000 UTC View PostWe just stare at each other for a moment, with the quiet drone of my sleeping wife as a backdrop.
And then she looks at her hands in disbelief.
I can’t help but use Identify.
[Daemon of Envy – High Counselor to the Queen – System Assistant Emeritus]
Uh. Nyx?
(Yes, I know. I just looked.)
Status?
She nods, and then a moment later looks up at me.
(How long? How long has this... this...)
I have no idea, but. You’re fr...
2023-12-31 00:20:41 +0000 UTC View PostSo I realized tonight that I have a full month of buffer written, so I decided it was about time I actually did something with it here.
What do you think? I hope it works well and you all like it.
2023-12-30 02:32:10 +0000 UTC View Post“Well, so much for that idea.”
I’m drifting above the hostile city to test if the stone guardians can be bypassed by just going over them; it’s a plan Abaris suggested shortly after I appointed him the party leader.
The swarm of oversized automatons that promptly gathered when I crossed the city boundaries and are currently milling around below me is doing a good job of throwing out that plan entirely. Oh well.
It didn’t work, they’re following me. I’m head...
2023-12-30 02:17:34 +0000 UTC View PostHe accepted it.
I didn't think he’d just accept it.
Huh.
The party gasps almost in unison as the remains of his body shrivel, burst into a bright orange flame, and scatter into an airborne swirl of ash harboring two smoldering points of light.
And somehow, I remember exactly what I need to do now. My servant lacks a form.
I need only give him one.
I lash out a feeler, snatching his greatsword from the wall where it was abandoned, and launch it blade...
And that’s exactly what he delivers. He barely even gives Abaris and Pearl a chance to cast combat spells on him – some kind of strength boost and a skin toughening spell, respectively – before he charges headlong at the fully-reformed statue.
Meanwhile, Izahne circles around looking for an opening while rapidly forming her natural short sword. It’s clear to me from how she moves that this isn’t how she’s accustomed to fighting, but I’m not sure how I know that.
I al...
2023-12-30 02:15:06 +0000 UTC View PostSure, this city is big, but it’s not as big as the hive. At least the streets aren’t uniform here, so I’m sure it would be more difficult to get lost.
All of them seem to lead toward several city squares, most of them with some kind of large broken fountain in the center made of a long-corroded metal. Those all feature what was probably once a statue of a human, but none of them are in any kind of condition to be recognizable.
Somewhat offset from what looks to be the city c...
2023-12-30 02:14:14 +0000 UTC View PostSuffice it to say, the conversation didn’t get much better from there. It rapidly deteriorated into a mental shouting match, eventually resulting in Nyx sobbing quietly on the edge of my vision where she usually hides.
Despite all the unexpected knowledge and understanding showing up unannounced in my mind, I am still completely unequipped to handle this.
Humans are so damned confusing.
Another awkward seven hours of pretending I don’t see my Assistant later, Izahne y...
Well, now we know that cooking the razorvine fruit doesn’t turn it toxic, much to the delight of my party.
Also, we have a growing forest of the plant monsters surrounding the town. The only reason they haven’t occupied every bit of free space in town is that I’ve established a specialty task force of wraiths to handle them by finding and Consuming every single razorvine they can detect within its borders. They’re not strong enough to reduce them to dust, so dried husks are eve...
Abaris is right, I think. These plants are growing way too fast.
I’m outside the house we claimed in Darkwell, the empty town on The Husk.
In fact, I’m not going to call it that anymore. This is The Shadowed Plane.
My plane.
(Since when?) Nyx asks.
Since...
…
Wait, what?
My Assistant laughs at my confusion.
You know what, just...
(Just what?) she asks between her guffaws.
Nothing!
I’m just going ...
2023-12-30 02:11:27 +0000 UTC View Post“We don’t know,” Abaris answers me, a mild sense of worry in his voice.
I sigh. “When did she leave?”
“Two days ago,” replies Pearl.
Two days.
I was unconscious for five days.
Three.
Oh.
(Yeah, I think you know what happened,) my Assistant says.
“Alright, stay here. I’m going to go get her.”
I reach out to the wraiths I’d been controlling before... everything happened here and find that I’ve got approximate...
2023-12-30 02:10:14 +0000 UTC View PostSo apparently, removing the wraiths that were existentially draining the land’s mana allowed that mana to restore itself, which recreated the potential for spontaneous life.
At least, that’s what Abaris hypothesized and then explained over an hour and a half of talking very quickly and breathing almost as quickly. I half expected he was going to pass out at a few points.
It’s at least interesting to know that I don’t even have to do much to restore this plane. Basically ...
“Oh... kay?”
Yeah, that doesn’t make any sense. None at all.
(Well... maybe it makes sense for some of them... but...) Nyx says, trailing off.
“Then why are there so many wraiths on other planes? Or, don’t they just, appear from places with ‘dark emotions’ or whatever?”
“You see, that’s just it!” Abaris exclaims. “We don’t know for sure! But I do have a hypothesis – no one in the academic community ever considered that they might be a phenom...
2023-12-30 02:06:41 +0000 UTC View Post“Still nothing?”
“Nope, nothing with a Will anyway.”
Ever since Elobahn abruptly left the party we’ve been missing a scout or tracker of any kind. The closest we’ve come to filling the role is between me with my Will Detection and Abaris with his numerous detection-type spells. Unfortunately though, nothing here seems to have a will at all, assuming anything exists, and the mage’s efforts are dependent on his own mana capacity. He’s already run low twice today and ...
2023-12-30 02:05:37 +0000 UTC View PostI suppose that would have been embarrassing, at least if I were capable of feeling that emotion.
After a few tries and a few fumbles, I finally manage to find a combination of words that let me enlarge the individual rooms into something livable, even adding windows made of some kind of durable transparent material I produced from my own ash. I immediately claim one for myself – the far one. Or I should say, for myself and my wife.
Izahne promptly walks in and looks around the...
“You will rebuild what you destroyed.”
That is all headmaster Owyn said before he dumped me and my party in the remains of a deserted town on The Husk.
I’d had quite a few months leading up to now – between waking up in some lab, meeting Nyx, learning to Consume humans, finding out a lot of the humans aren’t humans at all, adopting a cat (who still hates me, by the way), accidentally getting married and joining a party, being forced into enrolling at the New Iden Charter...
2023-12-30 02:02:50 +0000 UTC View PostThe walk back to my lair is uneventful, but I’ve kept my Will Detection running the whole way just in case. After all, I’m getting tired of being surprised by knives in the back, even if they don’t actually do meaningful damage.
As we travel we pass through a marketplace kind of area. It’s something I typically don’t pay attention to, but I’m curious about a few things considering our most recent changes. More specifically, Izahne’s cha...
"Yeah, she's long gone.”
I even checked with Will Detection to be sure, nothing out there but goblins, kobolds, and slimes. There was a weird spot I couldn’t sense further back in the dungeon, but my death knight reassured me that detection Skills never work on the boss room until you enter it, so I guess I won’t worry about it for now.
What I will worry about is how she still hasn’t fed.
I’ve got the vitality of a freshly dusted ascendant c...
2023-12-30 02:00:16 +0000 UTC View PostTelling him was a mistake.
After a solid four hours of Abaris asking me stupid questions or whatever other brilliant ideas he had to test my Spellspeech, Pearl was the first of the remaining party to return to my lair.
“Woah, Izzy? Did something happen? You look different.”
Good to know she’s paying attention at least.
My paladin smiles at Pearl and says, “Nemesis made me theirs.”
Nyx cringes for some reason.
What?
(...
When we finally manage to rouse Abaris, he immediately starts holding his head and moaning. Also, it was definitely not because I poked him with Will Surge until he finally woke up. Absolutely, I didn’t do that at all.
(Asshole.)
Hey, what, it worked, shut up. Anyway.
Izahne is starting to prop him up when I instead scoop the mage off the floor with some feelers and deposit him onto an unnecessarily overpadded chair.
And he still says no...
2023-12-30 01:58:39 +0000 UTC View Post