Personal statistics: Edge Vasher
Physical attributes (Values in parentheses are provided by your traits)
Power: 3 (4) Reflex: 1 Endurance: 3 (4) Perception: 3
Speed: 2 (3) Control: 1 (2) Durability: 3 (4) ...
2024-07-26 17:01:01 +0000 UTC View PostHalf an hour later, they came across a room whose entrance was partially blocked by fallen rubble, with a narrow gap running along one side where they could squeeze through.
The runes above the door were obstructed, but judging from the interior, it seemed like they’d found another one of the executive offices for the floor’s senior staff, like the room where Nick had found Kellen’s latest log.
They scouted a bit further ahead, then returned to the entrance to wait. Ten minu...
2024-07-26 17:00:03 +0000 UTC View PostEdge woke up late the next morning, catching up on the sleep that had been in chronically short supply since arriving on this world. He rose from his bed feeling remarkably refreshed, ready to face the day and the challenges it would bring.
As he looked out the window with a smile on his face, the realization broke over him that he had actually done it. He had survived the disaster and the ordeal that had followed in its wake. He was still breathing, despite the procession of predators ...
2024-07-25 17:01:01 +0000 UTC View PostAfter he left Ann’s, Edge walked back down Main Street. He turned right at the corner, then continued for a few more blocks, mulling over his options as he crossed into the commercial district. There were several places in town where you could rent a bed, and none of them were cheap.
He could have saved a few credits by renting a lot on the common green or staying at a hostel like the Tourist’s Rest. But tonight, he wanted something better. He was going to celebrate his surviv...
2024-07-25 14:29:55 +0000 UTC View PostListening to Ann’s words, Edge’s heart began to race. She had uncovered far too much of the truth in almost no time at all, just by studying the contents of his pack.
He had been in town for less than an hour, and he had already revealed far more than he’d intended. I should have sold half of the claws somewhere else and left the lanterns alone.
At this point, he didn’t have a choice other than to trust her and hope that revealing a piece of the story w...
2024-07-24 17:27:15 +0000 UTC View PostFive minutes later, Edge found himself standing in the shadow of his destination, looking up at a sign running along the top of the sprawling wooden building. A hand painted shovel and pickaxe were crossed over the name of the shop, which was written out in bright red letters.
The store’s full name was ‘Ann’s General Goods,’ although everyone called the place Ann’s for short. Everyone in town shopped at Ann’s from time to time. There were dozens of other stores in the ...
2024-07-24 17:01:01 +0000 UTC View PostThey waited until the constructs passed them by, then they moved to a room with a door they could close and a window they could peer through.
“Don’t use your darts on those silver-coated ones if we wind up fighting any,” V whispered. “The swarm adapts and creates specialized defenses to counter our abilities. The green shields are resistant to my acid, which was why I couldn’t take out those scorpions at range.”
“That sounds like a real pain in the ass.” Nick sighe...
2024-07-24 17:00:03 +0000 UTC View PostNow that Edge was feeling a little less overwhelmed, he slid off the barrel and rose to his feet. He was eager to complete a few quick transactions, stuff his face, and then sleep like the dead.
That was when he caught sight of his reflection in a windowpane. Damn. Is that really me? He looked like he had fought his way through hell and back, scaling a few mountains of garbage along the way. He stared down at his clothing with a critical eye, sighing at what he saw.
As soon as the hunters were out of sight, Edge sat down on a barrel and summoned his Guide, watching as the mote of golden light detached from his chest and went darting around his head.
He pulled up his menus with a command, the speck of radiance centering itself within his view before flattening to form a screen. He had wanted to check out his updates as soon as the battle was over, but it had been more important to get behind the walls as quickly as he could.
As he had be...
2024-07-22 17:01:01 +0000 UTC View PostBy now, Nick had activated arctic clarity to sharpen his focus. He was already in the middle of casting another spell, picking out his targets while gathering his will. Piercing ray.
It was the first time that he’d been able to cast a ray while sustaining mana darts, a clear sign that he was getting better at controlling his abilities. A ball of churning force mana gathered between his palms over the next three seconds. A raging vortex of kinetic energy with a rotating drill ...
2024-07-22 17:00:03 +0000 UTC View PostEdge approached the deputy on duty, a muscular redhead named Melenia who went by Mel. She was armed with a massive two-handed axe, which she could swing hard enough to shatter a boulder without using a skill.
He was a little nervous, since he didn’t have the credits to pay for his passage. However, he was fairly confident that he could talk his way in, given the value of the goods in his pack. When he approached the gate and raised a hand in greeting, he learned that his worries...
2024-07-21 17:01:01 +0000 UTC View Post“Please be careful not to disturb Lucky’s remains. I’ll pick them up on the way back. See you around, Edge.” Trapper waved and then disappeared into the tall grass, following Blue’s trail across the prairie. He had to admire the woman’s courage. Heading out alone after coming so close to losing her life took guts and nerves of steel.
She must care a lot about her beasts. He looked down at Lucky’s shredded carcass, feeling bad about his role in the creature’s dem...
2024-07-21 15:22:08 +0000 UTC View PostHey everybody. We made it to the end of the story's first arc! I hope that you have enjoyed everything so far, including the bonus chapters. If you haven't had a chance to follow and rate the story on RR, and would be willing to do it today, it would really, really help me out right now while I'm on my Rising Stars run.
And if you wouldn't mind taking a few minutes to leave a review (especially the longer version) it would give me an invaluable boost during this critical moment in the s...
2024-07-20 20:20:25 +0000 UTC View Post[Overdrive] cut off a fraction of a second after the reaver’s brain froze solid.
The searing power filling his chest faded away, and shadow step deactivated the moment that the mysterious engine stopped feeding it mana.
Edge and the reaver’s corpse materialized in front of Trapper’s crew half a heartbeat apart. He was relieved to see that the hunters had come together to finish off the last monster, overwhelming it with their skills while the big ...
2024-07-20 17:01:01 +0000 UTC View PostEdge sprang to his feet in a single motion, activating shadow step before his boots hit the ground.
His body transformed into flowing darkness, moving faster than ever before. The world faded away to silvery fog, except for Trapper’s crew, who looked washed out, and the reaver, which appeared completely solid.
He knew in that moment that he would be able to fight the monster. That since they were both ethereal, they would be solid to each other. That ...
2024-07-20 05:11:39 +0000 UTC View PostCongratulations.
Skill-Eater has evolved to stage [1].
Cycles required to reach the next stage have increased from [7] to [21].
Your core has gained the following powers:
Attribute points per cycle have increased from [2] to [3].
Your core has gained a new trait.
Trait: Devourer (unique).
... 2024-07-19 17:01:01 +0000 UTC View PostNick sprinted down the tunnel, his pounding pulse accompanying the slap of his boots striking the rocky floor below. He fought down the urge to burn stamina along the way, so that he would be ready to leap into the fight at full power the moment that he arrived.
He wasn’t sure what he would find when he caught up to the action, but he suspected that he was in for a challenging fight. His companions were all capable warriors. Anything that gave them trouble would represent a serious th...
2024-07-19 17:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostTo Edge’s astonishment, something grabbed him and began to pull.
It was the first time that anything had been able to touch him in this strange space. He thought that he was under attack until he realized that he recognized the sound it was making. By this point, he was intimately familiar with the metallic ripple of link sliding against link. No. That’s impossible. But what else could it be?
Sure enough, when he looked down, there was a pair of black chains fastened ...
2024-07-18 23:27:50 +0000 UTC View PostThe instant that Edge acknowledged the prompt, his consciousness was peeled away from his failing body and pulled inside his core.
He found himself standing in a place that he had begun to think of as the central chamber. Unlike many of the cores he had visited while [Extracting] a skill, his took the form of an enclosed space rather than a natural setting.
The room reminded him of a blacksmith’s workshop. It had a grey stone floor and a high, arched roof. There were...
2024-07-18 20:41:25 +0000 UTC View PostEdge had been hoping that the deputies would arrive in time to save them. But when he glanced in the direction of town, he still didn’t see anyone coming. Meanwhile, the reavers surged forward in a tide of living shadows, scissor-claws poised to strike.
Riller fired off a final poison arrow, scoring a glancing wound along one of the smaller monster’s arms before dropping his bow and drawing his knives, ready to meet the creatures’ charge.
The momentum of the battle had swung back in the monsters’ favor when the shadowreaver evolved, but the hunters weren’t going down without a fight.
Jumo had reengaged the poisoned monster after Lucky died, trading hits a few feet in front of where Edge stood. Taking Riller’s warning to heart, he moved to attack the stricken creature, looking for an opportunity to land a killing blow.
He realized that its movements were less coordinated than before. That the fiend had grown s...
2024-07-18 01:54:04 +0000 UTC View PostEdge had never witnessed a monster evolve until that moment.
It was one of the subjects that the System always censored on the feed. He had read plenty of firsthand accounts of the process though, often describing the final seconds of a tourist’s Prison World run. Even still, he hadn’t expected everything to happen so quickly.
Over the next three seconds, the reaver’s body continued to swell, bathed in an otherworldly glow that wasn’t mana or any other energy t...
2024-07-17 17:02:01 +0000 UTC View PostThe first test that Nick wanted to run was simple. He merely stood in place for the next five minutes, hidden behind the half-closed doorway, waiting to see if the constructs reacted to his spells. To his relief, they showed no sign of noticing the mana he’d spent and just kept gnawing away at the floor.
The second was a live test of his spell’s speed and precision. In addition to their newfound potency, he had gradually been gaining more control over his darts as he practiced using...
2024-07-17 17:00:03 +0000 UTC View PostTrapper reached behind her back, detaching something from her pack in a motion that had become smooth as silk through repetition. The instant that her attention was divided, the closest monster rushed in for the kill. It sent mana surging into its claws along the way, completing a skill combo as it closed the distance.
The reaver’s claws spread wide as they came up from below, mana congealing along their length as it activated the second ski...
2024-07-16 17:01:01 +0000 UTC View PostAfter surveying the battlefield, Edge knew exactly where he needed to appear.
He closed the last few feet of misty terrain while raising his claw-sword over his head in a two-handed grip. Then he deactivated shadow step, still running at full speed.
The world around him snapped back into focus, the colors crisp and bright compared to the muted tones he’d seen during his approach. The reaver was standing right in front of him, poised to end Sasha’s life i...
2024-07-15 21:49:34 +0000 UTC View PostEdge pushed his body into a burst of speed, adrenaline burning away his exhaustion in an electric tide of anticipation. He could see the walls of Puppet Town in the distance, the promise of safety so close that it made him ache for the end to his prolonged ordeal.
But that wasn’t the way he was headed. Right now, he was running toward danger instead of away, sprinting straight for the group of monsters he had spent the last two days struggling to avoid. He laughed at the irony w...
2024-07-15 21:49:11 +0000 UTC View PostSasha thrust her flaming spear at the monster’s face, driving it back so that it couldn’t lunge with its cruel yellow beak or disembowel her with its scissor-claws. It seemed to have an instinctual fear of fire, or she wouldn’t have been able to keep up at all.
The creature was fierce and far too fast to defeat with such a straightforward attack. But it pulled back long enough to circle around, buying her another few seconds of lif...
2024-07-15 17:28:00 +0000 UTC View PostEdge slept like shit that night, lost in memory and scattered fragments of dreams. Every cry in the distance, each gust of wind stirring the canopy, brought him back to full alertness with his heart hammering in his chest.
He was groggy and miserable by the time that the sun began to rise. But at least he’d recovered enough magicytes to use his skills if the reavers found him, improving his odds of surviving the next encounter by a fair margin. Investing in generation was really...
2024-07-15 17:27:01 +0000 UTC View PostThe sky turned black, then white, then both at once.
A clamorous roar filled his ears, like the world was breaking in half. Electricity buzzed in the air, the ground shook, and Edge was drenched in a tide of magic so thick that he could taste it even without a core.
Then, for just a second, he saw something inexplicable. A vision of the planet from far above the surface. He could sense that the world’s energy was being rerouted, as the immensely powerful spells that shielded Ord...
2024-07-15 17:26:01 +0000 UTC View Post