For a shelter that would last years—rather than months—I had a few choices. Ultimately, though, it boiled down to what I had nearby. The three that seemed strongest were the Log Cabin, the Brick Hut, and the Stone Hut. The Brick Hut was the one I tossed out first. The ground in the area was sandy and rocky rather than clay. Making bricks was a nonstarter. I decided against the Log Cabin as well....
2025-03-05 17:00:19 +0000 UTC View PostI awoke the next day to sunlight streaming through the curtains and onto my face. I yawned and stretched. A good night’s sleep left me feeling well and truly rested. I dressed and wandered into the kitchen to say goodbye to Max. He was sitting at the table, picking at his food. His face lit up when he saw me. I sat down at his invitation.
“Good morning!” he said, cheerfully.
“’Mornin’,” I replied.
“You look well rested,” he commented.
...
The roads leading out of town were narrow and winding. The exact sort of roads that led to a large amount of accidents—though mostly against deer and not other cars. Blind corners were what I had to watch out for. Even with a stronger body, I didn’t trust it to handle tons of steel hitting me at speed. So I stuck to the wooded area just off the road for safety.
I picked my way through the trees. The road was always in my sight. I kept it to my left for when I found an opportunit...
I immediately canceled my Illusion. There would be nothing worse than to look like a flying bird the glitched forward as I walked. The last thing I needed was to have the cops called on me. I was trying to hide, after all. Looking like a teenager was the best defense I had—especially when I got away from the property I’d landed on and out into the street.
The first thing I had to do was get from the dock to that street. The dock had an impressive speed boat tied...
I sat down on the steps in front of Dad’s house. The tears fell for a long time. Dad came out and sat next to me, rubbing my back. That made me cry even more!
Just sitting there wasn’t making the decision easy to follow through with. It was time to pull off the band-aid. I turned to Dad to get his attention.
“Dad,” I said. “I need to borrow your phone quickly.”
“Uh, sure,” he said, giving me his phone.
I punched in Mom’s number. She picked up...
I woke the next morning to thoughts of what had happened the night before. A shiver ran up my spine as images of the dead bodies filled my mind. I reminded myself that what was done, was done. Even after I reset time, the only person who would remember what had happened was me—and only me. There was no reason why I should dwell on it too much.
Shaking my head, I went downstairs to see Mom watching TV while having breakfast. The news was showing the aftermath of the explosions in d...
I flew up the side of one of the ships. What I needed was information. I needed it quickly, too. The best way I could think of to have both of those things at the same time was to ask someone. A cursory look over the first ship didn’t reveal anyone. Nor the second. My heart raced faster with each passing moment. There! I saw someone on the forth near the ship’s bridge.
I flew to the man and landed next to him. His expression was one of complete shock. He’d seen me fly and land...
I arranged to meet with Mom a week later to go to the movies. That there was a movie theater across the harbor was lucky. It made my job easier and gave me a credible alibi. I didn’t think I would need one, but it was better to have one than not!
The movie Mom agreed to take me to was an animated movie that I’d seen a couple of times before. It was new—now—but to me, it was old hat. The only struggle was convincing her that we had to go to the theater by the port. That’s w...
Telekinesis was a strange spell. Unlike most others I’d messed with, it took continual effort to work. That meant I was continuously losing health—or blood, I reminded myself. Though the drain on blood was low, it was ever present. Using blood to power skills felt wrong in some way I couldn’t quite explain. It was something I hadn’t experienced with chi or mana. Still, that was what I had chosen to work with and test out in this life. I would deal with it so that I mi...
2025-02-14 17:00:17 +0000 UTC View PostWith Mom no longer preventing me from doing what I needed to do, I settled into my life. As much as I wanted to get on with the whole destruction project, I also wanted to find out which companies I could gain control of—especially those that would prove beneficial in my final life. That meant getting a good sized nest egg and doing the legal wrangling to get that money working for me. The time it took to make the money I wanted was only four months instead of three-quarters-of-a-year.
<... 2025-02-12 17:00:16 +0000 UTC View Post“Ah, don’t worry,” I said. “What I want to ask and discuss with you shouldn’t go against the oaths your swore. What I really want to know about is how to prepare the country—and the world—for the coming apocalypse.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well—to make a long story short—magic is coming to the world. What I can do, everyone else will be able to do, too. Which is great and all. The problem is that monsters will also be coming. Think really angry monke...
AN: Sorry I'm late again! Got distracted by work. I have two others already written and ready to go, but not loaded into Patreon yet. I will try to rectify that this weekend. Again, sorry!
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I started by getting what I could universally.
Universal Feature Unlocked: Free Quests Refresh III
Current Exp: 13,835,387
Universal Feature Unlocked: Skills II
Current Exp: ...
I woke with a headache so powerful it brought tears to my eyes. I sat up in bed and screamed. There was simply no holding it back—it hurt too much! My hands clutched my head when I heard stomps in the distance. It was Dad, rushing from the room next door. In his hands was a baseball bat. Upon seeing me, he dropped it and rushed to my side.
“What’s wrong, Milton?” he asked, rubbing his hand against my back.
“Head,” I choked out between the tears.
“Di...
You have finished your second life. Did you enjoy this one more than the last? Before evaluating your performance, let’s take a look at what might have happened if you had decided not to restart for more experience points…
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Louise awake to the smell of smoke. Her nose had always been sensitive. She could smell if someone had certain illnesses. It was a superpower of a sort, and one that was important the day she woke up. Smoke...
2025-02-03 17:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostThis needed investigating. I picked up my cell phone and called Gloria. While I usually communicated over email with her, this time I needed more information and much more quickly.
“Good afternoon, Eddy,” she said. “What can I help you with?”
“Can you see where all the money went?” I asked. “I expected to have closer to fifty million left, not the small amount in the report you sent.”
“Let me see… This might take a minute, forgive me.”
“Would you like some water?” he asked.
I shook my head.
“Ok. Please state your name for the record,” he told me. “And please speak into the microphone so everyone in the back can hear you.”
“Milton Edward Teller the third,” I said.
“Do you go by Milton or something else?”
“Eddy.”
“Alright, Eddy. I’m going to start with some background information. You were brought here today to answer some questions about ...
“So you need a suit?” Dad asked.
“Yeah. Or something formal. Suits suck.”
“I know kid, I know. But it’s just one day. You can suck it up for a little while, yeah?”
“I guess.”
“Well, let’s go see what we can find.”
So into the truck we went. Dad had to drive out of the small three town area we were in just to get to a store that sold formal wear in my size. It was a store filled with cheap suits that would give the appea...
It took a week to schedule a meeting with the new lawyer. She was in court for a case the week I contacted her. The inspectors had done their bit and left. The die was cast. Whatever was going to happen, would happen. I needed to be as prepared as I could be. She called me while I was in the equipment shed changing the oil in Dad’s tractor.
“Hello?”
“Is this Eddy?” she asked.
“This is.”
“This is Melissa, I was told to call this number. I...
Every month, I would go to the stream and dump a container of pesticide. Six months into the experiment, I was beginning to see a drop in experience. And it wasn’t just a small drop, either. It was precipitous. My solution was to change the pesticides I was using and to get then in greater quantities. That led to a surge in experience, but it, too, dropped off after a couple of applications of the poison.
At that point, it had become a sort of habit. I would dose the stream monthl...
AN: I totally thought today was Sunday (US holiday) and thus forgot to load the chapter. Sorry! Here's the end of the pumpkin race!
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The other side had floating docks where the pumpkin boats would line up for the race. On the shore was a gathering crowd. I was able to pick Dad out from amongst the faces. I gave him a wave before looking at my fellow competitors.
Unlike my plain S.S. Gourdiana, theirs were either painted or their captains wore costumes. Or both. I h...
“Is the owner of this pumpkin in the building?” the tall man asked, using a microphone.
I raised my hands and waved.
“Good, good. Can you come here? We’d like to get your picture with the pumpkin.”
Dad and I walked over. The crowd was now looking at us. I hated having the spotlight on me. That was definitely not my style. I preferred to stay away from that sort of thing. Here, though, I had a quest to fulfill, so there was no way around it.
...
AN: Whooops, forgot to schedule it. Here you go!
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A week-and-a-half later, Dad woke me early in the morning. I yawned as he roused me.
“Ready to go fishing?” he asked.
“Hmmm,” I grunted.
I yawned again.
“We’ll get going in twenty minutes, so take the time you need to wake up.”
I nodded, then yawned a third time. It was far too early in the morning to do anything like this.
I struggled to get d...
Thanks to laws where I lived, the police let me know when Daniel was released from jail a month later. I was apprehensive in case he made trouble. And he did. But it wasn’t the sort I had feared.
I woke up early one morning to a knock on the door. I yawned as I went to answer it with clothes I threw on quickly. The person behind the door was insistently pounding on it and ringing the doorbell. I opened the door to see a man in business casual. He looked like one of those Mormon do...
The wheels of justice turned slowly. But they did turn. Over the winter, Daniel was convicted of his crimes. The sentence was light—he was a first time offender—but he would be in jail for about a year. Less when considering the time he’d already spent there.
Just in case he got any bright ideas, I beefed up security around both the house and the farm fields as best I could. I made sure to keep the aesthetic consistent. It wouldn’t do to have a crash barrier of a fence l...
I promptly forgot all about the State Fair for three weeks. It wasn’t until Dad told me we were going in two days that I remembered the conversation. What that said about my excitement level towards the fair… well, it wasn’t great. I was looking forward to it somewhat, but I didn’t expect to be impressed by the sights and sounds. I’d been to big events before all the time shenanigans, and they’d never really done it for me. Maybe I would be surprised by the fair, but I wasn’t go...
2025-01-08 17:00:10 +0000 UTC View PostAN: this one is late as I expected. It's sooner than the last one as I'm beginning to catch up again. Getting into the rhythm is hard! I will be skipping Monday's chapter to realign with RR. That will give me some time to get a backlog and avoid being late if my son--who is a lovely kid--prevents me from getting the next chapter done over the weekend.
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Not a week after signing the contract with George, I found out that Jacob was not the arsonist. I learned ...
2025-01-04 03:31:28 +0000 UTC View PostAN: And here it is! I'm feeling much better today. Will start working on tomorrow's chapter as well. Not sure if it'll be on time, but it should be closer than a day late. As I said yesterday, I will be skipping 1 release in the next week to keep Patreon aligned with Royal Road (and so I can catch back up on my backlog).
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I waited until night. I turned invisible and took my phone with me. Using a mapping app and the tracker on Jacob, I checked the direction from sev...
2025-01-02 17:54:30 +0000 UTC View PostAs I said on Monday, I've been sick. I am recovering now and I got more than half of the next chapter done. I should have it up for you tomorrow. I will likely skip 1 chapter in the next week to realign Patreon being 15 chapters ahead of RR as RR is currently on break at the end of book 1.
2025-01-02 02:52:41 +0000 UTC View PostAN: I'm on a road trip and possibly a little sick. Christmas break right before this sapped my time so I'm basically through my backlog now. Sitting in s car all day has given me plenty of time to think and plan the next 10-15 chapters, but not enough time to write anything. All that to say that Chapter 72 may be late, but hopefully not.
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It took six weeks to rebuild the building and get the equipment delivered. That there had been a building on the same s...
2024-12-30 17:00:15 +0000 UTC View PostNot a week later, I was awoken by knocking on the front door. I blinked to get the tears out of my eyes and threw on some clothes. I yawned as I opened the door. On the other side was a cop with a flashlight.
“Hey kid,” he said. “Your parents home?”
“Yeah,” I yawned. “What’s going on? They in trouble or something?”
He shook his head.
“Nothing like that. Can you get one of them, please?”
I shrugged, then trudged to the bed...