“The controls!” Ashtoreth said. “Go!”
Frost, Kylie, and Hunter grouped up where they stood in the flames beside her, then warped away. She did a quick check through the telepathic bond to see where they emerged: a dark room lit by the illusory red script of various control consoles. The control room for the rift generator.
We need a fakeout, Ashtoreth had told them during the planning phase. We need to make them think we’re after one thing when we’re reall...
2025-04-23 02:52:04 +0000 UTC
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Kylie’s [Runic Warp] dumped them in the middle of the air at the far outer edge of the bastion, just far enough into the circular metal superstructure that they were near the rift generators while still being as distant as possible from the central tower and the command crew.
We’re in, Ashtoreth told Dazel.
“There!” she said, pointing at the nearest of the tall, two-pronged rift generators and then diving toward it. She’d already told them the n...
2025-04-23 02:50:48 +0000 UTC
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It was a surprise to Ashtoreth when she woke up and found that none of the humans tried to kill her in her sleep.
It didn’t make much sense to her, given that they hadn’t tried to kill her during the previous day of fighting, either.
As she saw it, there were two possibilities. The first was that the human governments weren’t willing to order a morally dubious killing in order to advance their interests. Considering this possibility only made Ashtoreth laugh a little. Of...
2025-04-23 02:49:44 +0000 UTC
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{You cannot consume any more of your held cores. Their power is too low to advance you.}
{DING! You gain 41 levels. You are now level 345.}
{You gain 492 DEX, 492 STR, 738 VIT, 574 MAG, 287 PSY, 287 DEF}
{Reaching level 310 has granted you advancement. Choose one of your progression paths other than [Hellfire].}
“Looks like I landed at 345,” she told Dazel.
“Not bad, but not a huge game-cha...
2025-04-20 03:45:46 +0000 UTC
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“By the way,” Ashtoreth said. “Don’t think that I’ve forgotten that you knew who that angel was.”
She was lying on her cot inside the house in HQ. Dazel was flying around and inscribing runes on the walls that would function as simple alarm spells in case the humans came to kill her in her sleep.
“What?” said. “No.”
“Yes, you did,” Ashtoreth said. “You saw a level 300 made of question marks, one who looked human and was dressed like a creature from ...
2025-04-19 04:23:23 +0000 UTC
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Hours later, Ashtoreth and Dazel warped in above the moonlit city, then drifted downward to find Kylie.
She’d spent her day taking out more bastions and closing even more rifts. Things with the military were tense, but they either they weren’t opposed to using her as an asset or they knew she’d simply say no to them if they asked her to refrain from fighting. She’d said as much, after all.
Dazel had helped Kylie replace some of her spells with defenses that would trigger i...
2025-04-18 04:24:01 +0000 UTC
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{You absorb: [Conquest Core]
{Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! You level up 4 times! You are now level 304.}
{You gain 48 DEX, 48 STR, 72 VIT, 56 MAG, 28 PSY, 28 DEF}
“Well that’s just plain underwhelming,” said Ashtoreth. “I coulda got that from eating cores when we got here.”
They’d had an enormous stock of cores that were around level 300, after all. Once they’d arrived on Earth and the limits of her deal with ...
2025-04-17 04:44:14 +0000 UTC
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Ashtoreth sighed.
Look, said Dazel. I know you want them to like you. But this makes a lot of sense, from their front.
I know.
If someone loyal to Hell wins the monarchy, it’s an instant loss for Earth.
I know.
Everything you’ve done for them—destroying the bastions, helping their leaders, giving them pointers for the use of magic—it’s all a worthwhile trade if it gets them to trust you as a ringer in the...
2025-04-16 05:20:25 +0000 UTC
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Almost as soon as she’d conjured the hellfire novaheart into the air, Hunter teleported them back out onto the rooftops above them.
Immediately, she felt the rate at which her [Bloodfire] pool was replenishing to slow. She was still replenishing it by eating the flames generated by burning her buff, but something else was draining it.
She looked up and saw Famine floating in the air above her. He must have had a resource-draining aura that she was counteracting ...
2025-04-16 05:18:56 +0000 UTC
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A legion of spectral gryphons, drakes, and flying serpents dove down toward where the four horsemen were arranged in front of the rift. Kylie fell with them, sequestered in their midst.
All of the horsemen charged upward, going after Kylie.
All of them, that was, save for War. He and Ashtoreth both knew that he was the best match for her among his teammates; the spellcasters and spellsword were too vulnerable to her spell-eating fire. As the others charged into the sky, his horse ...
2025-04-15 03:26:06 +0000 UTC
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Famine was a black-robed figure who rode a black horse and held a small set of metal scales out before him.
Death, however, rode a ghostly horse, pale blue and so translucent that it was difficult to see in the light of day. He himself had the appearance of a skeletal shade: a smokey blue-grey color that was just a little darker than his horse. He wore torn, tattered robes, and held a plain farmer’s scythe.
Quickly, Ashtoreth pointed.
“Oh no!” she cried. “It’s the ...
2025-04-14 04:10:44 +0000 UTC
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War launched his sword at her a split-second after she saw his charging horse, and though Ashtoreth managed to twist herself to one side and raise her own blade at an angle to deflect the oncoming weapon, she was still knocked bodily backwards as it connected with her blade and detonated, burning her skin and peppering her arms with shrapnel as the air around her was filled with crimson flame.
She rolled across the cracked roof of the apartment complex, trying to visualize the position ...
2025-04-13 03:51:48 +0000 UTC
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Ashtoreth leapt back and conjured her sword as Conquest let out a howl of rage and rushed toward her.
He’d underestimated her, and both of them knew it. Even when his arrows hadn’t outright killed her, she’d made it seem as if he’d had her on the ropes with just his bow, no horse included.
If she were being honest with herself, he almost had.
She had no doubt that he’d called for reinforcements when it became clear that she’d tricked him. She also had no doubt th...
2025-04-12 02:47:42 +0000 UTC
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Conquest’s hands nocked his first arrow and drew back his bowstring with startling speed, his motions difficult to track even with her enhanced vision.
Ashtoreth conjured her scythe as he moved, and when his arrow streaked forward a moment later she launched herself straight downward in a pencil dive, using both her own motive force and gravity to throw herself as fast and far as possible out of the path of the arrow.
The arrow sped over her and into the air beyond, but she cont...
2025-04-12 02:33:02 +0000 UTC
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“Well met, daughter of the Lightbringer,” the man below her called out. He tipped his head to her in a respectful nod. “I hope your conquests fare well.”
Ashtoreth’s heart raced. An angel? Why have human-shaped ears, then?
But there were more questions buzzing through her head, questions that couldn’t possibly have comforting answers. The Authority of Heaven didn’t invade worlds. What were they doing here, on Earth?
“You’re sure?” she said to Dazel.
2025-04-11 03:37:53 +0000 UTC
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“I was hitting my targets as usual,” Hunter said a moment later. He was seated backwards on a swivelling office chair, arms hung over the backrest. Military officers, including General Matthews, were all around them.
“Then I was struck by an arrow—one that had been launched with enough force to pierce through a nearby wall and enough accuracy to hit me even though I’m a fast-moving target. I got a glimpse of the person who launched the arrow, and then I left.”
“Well ...
2025-04-10 00:42:13 +0000 UTC
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Come back, Ashtoreth.
Ashtoreth swept her scythe through the air, harvesting the hearts of dozens of infernals who lay dead in the streets below her, her eyes fixed on the rift in the sky ahead.
It was night here, but she didn’t know what that meant anymore, which continent she was one.
You’ve been fighting almost non-stop for more than 30 hours, the voice said. I know you’re trained to deal with sleep deprivation… but you’re too vulnerab...
2025-04-09 02:08:06 +0000 UTC
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All right, Ashtoreth said to Frost through the telepathic bond. We’re coming down.
We’re ready, Frost said.
“You look nervous,” Dazel said, burning a circle into the floor of the grand hallway outside Set’s massive chamber.
“These are basically going to be the first humans I’ve met in a year,” Ashtoreth said, fidgeting. “Do you think Frost told them about the shard, and everything?”
“If you’re asking whether ...
2025-04-08 01:56:50 +0000 UTC
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“What do we need a bastion for?” Dazel said.
“What do you mean?” she asked. “For one thing, we can route through it to attack the others.”
“But that’s not necessary,” Dazel said. “Every other bastion we want to attack is already within range of Earth. You’re just going to make the [Runic Warp] slightly faster.”
“We can also attack the bastions that are closer to the inner realms.”
“The ones with increasingly higher-le...
2025-04-08 01:35:00 +0000 UTC
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[Theft of Boons] was limited in how much power it could hold, and the enormous buff that Ashtoreth had stolen from Set was probably going to bleed out in less than a minute… which meant that she’d have to either steal it again, or kill her sister in that timeframe.
Somehow, she doubted Set would be incautious enough to let Ashtoreth land a shot with her cannon if the boon ran out.
“I see you’re still—”
But Ashtoreth simply raised an eyebrow ...
2025-04-07 03:01:13 +0000 UTC
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A sphere of light collapsed inward and enveloped her sister, and a split-second later Set shot into the air above Ashtoreth, spreading her wings.
Her skin was glowing, now: ripples of white light shone and fluctuated beneath it.
Ashtoreth saw her and knew what had happened immediately. Set had empowered herself using a life harvest spell. It was the same sort of spell that the devil Gethernel had used back in the tutorial.
She’d seen it more times since then, of course, bo...
2025-04-07 02:45:35 +0000 UTC
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“Hello?” Ashtoreth shouted as she flew through the metal buildings of the nexus bastion.
She’d warped in almost a minute ago and began to head toward the center of the vast, artificial complex. Strangely enough, she hadn’t seen a single infernal. The bastion should have had armies upon armies worth of guards, but instead she found only empty streets and shadowed, quiet windows.
“This isn’t good,” Dazel said.
“They probably figured out I was coming,” said As...
2025-04-07 02:24:49 +0000 UTC
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Yama looked down at the old building beneath her with her fingers steepled before her, thinking.
The building itself was unassuming. It was a town hall, a center of some form of power or another. Its main entrance was adorned with a few pillars, and a dome formed the roof near its center, but for the most part, it resembled a large office building.
She couldn’t figure out what was special about it. Why were the humans using it for what, in her judgement, was the most crucial ele...
2025-04-07 02:14:56 +0000 UTC
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Set lay floating in midair with the back of her head resting in her hands, looking up at a glowing arrangement of glamours that conveyed information about the ongoing invasion.
The vast chamber that she occupied was in complete darkness except for the light of the runes, figures and diagrams that floated and shifted above her, each of them the product of an enchanted crystal that was socketed into the ground dozens of feet below her, covered by an inch-deep layer of perfectly still wate...
2025-04-07 02:10:54 +0000 UTC
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I am become death, Hunter thought to himself as he sped through the city.
He didn’t know where he was. Dazel had given his teleportation spell what were basically coordinates, dropping him in the middle of a strange, old-looking city with a lot of ugly apartment buildings.
He knew he was only the other side of the world, because it was night, but otherwise it didn’t matter to him. Dazel had also loaded his compass with targets, and now he sped toward them, flying and ...
2025-04-06 01:42:46 +0000 UTC
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“Sadie!” Hunter called out as he ran through the school halls. “Sadie!”
She hadn’t been in her history class, which was her first period, but nobody had been. They’d come back from the tutorial and apparently all left.
She hadn’t been in the cafeteria where a lot of students and staff were gathering, either. Now he was running through the halls, tracing the path from her locker to his, from her class to his, hoping that he must have just missed her.
He...
2025-04-04 23:30:26 +0000 UTC
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Taking in the sights, Kylie answered as she looked down on the city below her.
The presence of rifts all over the world had resulted in an enormous amount of interference when it came to warping long distances, and so Kylie had no set order of states she was visiting, but rather a versatile shopping list. From America, she was trying to make her way into Asia to secure contact with the most populous countries.
But the rest of the UN security council were also priorities, ...
2025-04-04 00:52:06 +0000 UTC
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Infernals swarmed through the sky toward her, already reaching the platform of the tower below and landing there. Lightly armored, winged devils. Tall, bony skygorgers. Massive, four-winged goregliders with their overlong snouts, each accompanied by a swarm of shearbats.
Ashtoreth floated above them all, making sure that most of them saw her before she conjured a glamour of a megaphone and spoke into it, amplifying the sound to carry across the entire top of the tower.
“Okay, ev...
2025-04-03 00:13:17 +0000 UTC
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Ashtoreth fizzled into existence in the air above the bastion, looking out at the familiar hazy, red-tinged air of Hell.
Unlike one of the system’s tutorials, the bastions were small slices of reality built specifically for the purpose of bringing war to other worlds. Everything was artificial, so that the whole thing resembled a mix between a military base and a city that had been built onto a massive platform of dark metal.
Structures rose up into the distance, higher and high...
2025-04-01 23:57:21 +0000 UTC
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So, there were no updates yesterday, either on this story or my other story, Primeval Champion.
The reason for that is because the area I live in was blasted by a pretty bad ice storm and we lost power.
I live in an area with a very high water table, and the weather (nonstop rain and freezing rain) combined with the sump pump being out of commission (it uses electricity) mean that my whole living space (a basement apartment) was flooded very badly.
I did a lot to mitigate th...
2025-03-31 21:30:11 +0000 UTC
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