ddwebb

4.28 In Which the Dark Lord Finds a Familiar Face

Dhinell began to hyperventilate.  For once I wasn’t enjoying her discomfort; I had my hands full managing my own brain.  While Rhydion stepped over to the priestess, placing one hand on her upper back and speaking softly, I furiously pondered this situation and its implications, finding I had slipped automatically into my performance mindset just to maintain outward calm.

Okay.  I’d been here once before.  But that was different.  It had been done by a Spiri...

4.27 In Which the Dark Lord Falls For It

Rhydion was across the room and through the door before any of us could react.  By the time we thought to so much as follow, his voice was echoing from the hall beyond.

“Wait!  Please, I wish to speak.”

We only avoided another doorway pileup because some of us (myself and Harker) had the presence of mind to hang back and not create one; Aster charged right through because that was the correct action given her role in the formation, and Dhinell did so because...

4.26 In Which the Dark Lord Terrorizes the Help

The hall Rhydion picked was on the ground floor—or I guess the second floor, with the actual ground being below us.  Good, that put the party two stories separate from the Yomiko shrine I didn’t want them to see.

The downside was that it was…a hall.  Clean and silent, with polished akorshil floorboards and decoratively carved akorthist lining the walls, with occasional doors.  Everything was eerily spotless, but there was nothing to see—literally nothing until I s...

February '23 AMA, Izarite edition

I'm very sorry for missing the AMAs last month.  It was a really bad time in terms of brain problems and I fell behind on a bunch of stuff.  Trying to catch up now.  By way of apology, I'm suspending question limits for February.  For one month only, every question asked in every tier gets an answer.

4.25 In Which the Dark Lord Intrudes

We discovered a new property to the gunk in the windows now that our backs were to them: rather than filtering the light amber as it seemed they should, those cobweb-honeycomb structures inside seemed to gather and amplify sunlight, filling the chamber with a clean white radiance that seemed even stronger than if the sun were just allowed to stream in normally.  It thus made some sense why something so apparently brittle was in these windows, as this was a room that needed to be well-lit...

4.24 In Which the Dark Lord Has His Ups and Downs

It’s interesting how scenery alone can tell a story.

Approaching the vampire’s manor, getting a progressively better view of the house itself and its surroundings, was like unrolling a scroll, gaining more and more understanding of what had happened here from the last Dark Crusade to the Inferno.  Not in any degree of detail or nuance, but the broad shape of it came together with every new piece of perspective we found.

Rhydion took us on a course that swung to the north ...

4.23 In Which the Dark Lord Sponsors a Team-Building Activity

We all stared at the slime.

I made an unnecessary hand gesture and directed it to slither out from the pieces of the corpse, causing everyone else to retreat a few steps.  I couldn’t blame them; even aside from the visible filth and decay swirling in the slime’s interior, its neon green color screamed “poison.”  I didn’t need the weakened connection from the spell, which was barely giving me a mental hold on it compared to normal slimes, to let me know something was ...

4.22 In Which the Dark Lord's Expertise Comes in Handy

“And what is a vampire, exactly?”

We were back on the ground and on the move at dawn, Rhydion and I being in agreement—albeit for separate reasons—that it was best to respect our hosts’ terms strictly and not impose on their hospitality any further.  As such we had had a quick breakfast from our own supplies rather than suggesting they should feed us again, and lingered only long enough to have someone unroll a ladder for us and be escorted to the periphery of th...

4.21In Which the Dark Lord Makes His Case

“I will not step on the leader’s tail,” Vylkher said suddenly when we were halfway across a rope bridge over a terrifying gap I was fully occupied not thinking about, “but you should know that you have…sympathy, here.  The healing you granted has helped, but even before that.  Even though our lives are less perilous than those of the wolf and cat tribes, there are many here who are eager for the kind of change you represent.”

“I think,” I said, speaking as care...

4.20 In Which the Dark Lord Knows Who's Been Naughty or Nice

Well, she sure called it.

“You have been offered hospitality for the night, and our word is good,” the squirrel chieftain stated minutes later when we were brought before him.  After all the exertions of the last day I was finally slightly winded; climbing what amounted to three stories up a ladder was a rough use of different muscles than I’d been habitually exercising.  “You shall have food and a warm place to sleep for the night, and peace, so long as you respect th...

4.19 In Which the Dark Lord Tells the Truth

Vylkher and the squad really knew how to apply pressure without overtly doing it; I loved watching professionals at work.  In fairness, most of it was taking advantage of the golden situation we’d handed them.  All they had to do was just walk in formation surrounding us in calm silence, responding to any attempts at conversation with noncommittal monosyllables or nothing at all.

Our part bore up under this pretty much exactly as I expected.  Rhydion remained inscrutabl...

Failure notice

Incredibly frustrating development.  I was making good progress finally, but I ended up having to backtrack because what I managed to write pushed the story into a corner that cut off important future developments.  I had to toss out part of what I'd already written and now I have to take more time to retreat to the drawing board and re-plan.

The timing couldn't be worse.  I was trying so hard to catch up on the update schedule for Avenist chapters and now I ca...

4.18 In Which the Dark Lord Gets His Way

As planned, our eventual campsite was well within what Harker informed us was squirrelfolk territory.  He also claimed the squirrels probably had scouts watching us by now, but so far they hadn’t seen fit to introduce themselves.  They also hadn’t shot anyone with a poison dart, so it wasn’t all disappointment.

We settled into the hollowed-out husk of a dead khora rather like the one in which the cat tribe’s Spirit was housed; Dhinell commented that such a huge quantit...

4.17 In Which the Dark Lord's Good Mood is Spoiled

There’s just something about knowing things other people don’t.

Not like the fact that I’m secretly an uber-powerful Dark Lord walking discreetly among the populace; that kind of secret is a burden, carrying as it does the risk of being swarmed to death by every armed force on the planet if the wrong people found out.  But hiking through the woods in a group of people who all believe us all to be alone and out of our element surrounded by enemies, while I ha...

Dec '22 AMA

Joe ? asks:

"So do Ephemeran elves have super hearing or not? Sometimes it seems like they do, sometimes it seems like they don't."

OVDT elves are a different offshoot than TGAB elves, and much less OP.  They're not immortal and don't have the enhanced senses or preternatural agility, nor are they as physically fragile and slow-healing.  Much closer to humans with pointy ears and their specific built in magic, either glowing or stealth depending...

Schedule update!

The Avenist chapter I just posted will be my last one of the year as I've decided to go on my monthly writing break following this.  It's an odd time, I know, but it does encompass Christmas and New Years, and after the mess covid made of my November schedule I ended up taking the break across the month gap that time, so it has been a month.  And I appear to be due, to judge by the increasingly difficult time I'm having pushing through brainfog and stress to get my chapters out....

Bonus 15: In Which the Gears Begin to Turn

It was all so gratifying, and never ceased to be no matter how many times he had experienced it.  The roar of the crowd as the handful of Blessed adventurers scampered around the enraged khorodect, their magic permitted only within the arena itself.  And, above all, his own place on high, overlooking it.

“I did not expect to be disappointed, but you impress even beyond expectations, your Excellency,” said Ambassador Iritius from his right.  “Even in Novarum we rarel...

Dec '22 AMA, Izarite edition

One question per person per month, please!  Five questions from this tier will be answered!

Bonus 14: In Which the Captain Treads Lightly

Security at Caer Aelthwyn was tighter than on the city walls or the Kingsguard’s headquarters itself, but Norovena still walked right in.  These were, after all, his men on duty.  His best men, because enemies and criminals getting through the city gates was just a cost of doing business, but if the Archlord’s peace was disturbed even momentarily, heads would roll.  At the palace’s front entrance, one of the elite guards saluted him while the other opened the doo...

Bonus 13: In Which a Queen Wields a Blade

“Uh, ‘scuze me?  I got a question.”

“Yes, Nekko?”

The goblin winced, averting his eyes for a moment, and Velaven took note of the need to train him on poise.  A shadow scout’s arts were not and could not be restricted to the field; the kind of self-control that enabled one to manage the perceptions of others also manifested in overall emotional control.  Still, it was his first day.

“I, uh…  Actually, boss lady, while I am uncerta...

4.16 In Which the Dark Lord Gets Told

When I found my voice, it was quiet, controlled, with a low-key menacing quality which I’d perfected over the last few months and which I strongly suspected did not impress him much.

“Blackmail seems like conduct unbecoming a paladin.”

“When confronting a putative bandit lord of significant power and uncertain but surely grand ambitions, I suppose you think I ought to kill him on sight,” Rhydion answered in perfect calm.  “Is that not what you would do, Lord Seiji...

4.15 In Which the Dark Lord is Thwarted

“Let’s not overreact,” Aster urged.  “It was a snowball.  If that’s the worst thing anybody wants to do to you, you’ve made an unusually positive impression.”

“Biribo?” I demanded.

She sighed, but obligingly positioned herself such that Biribo could poke his head out of his pocket nest in her coat and remain hidden from view by both our bodies.

He did so, flicking his tongue out at me.  “It was Hadder, the groom from the paddock back there....

4.14 In Which the Dark Lord Feels a Chill Run Down His Spine

“There’s an idea, where I am from,” I began, positioning myself with my back to the fence and subtly adjusting my stance and body language to take on a lecturing demeanor.  “The belief that…let’s see, how did they put it…  All men are created equal.  The notion that everyone has certain, for lack of a better term, human rights.  Every person entitled to basic dignity and equal protection under the law, no one able to abuse or impose upon anyone else....

December break week

It only occurred to me just now, as I was sitting here at midnight hyped up on caffeine amid the ruins of my destroyed sleep schedule and still recovering from covid, that I never did take my usual week off in November.  Of course as you'll all recall, I ended up taking more than a week off due to being sick as a dog for a while.

As I had cause to mention in the context of depressive episodes during last month's AMA, sick time is not the same as rest time.  I really w...