Chapter Twenty-Four
53rd Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
“Hello, Sir Jorvin,” Viridian said with a wave. She and the others, including a re-headed Carnel, were moved off to one side while the Gentle Tidings and its crew got busy scouring the town for all sorts of things.
Teams of sailors were clearing the area out. Pushing trash aside, creating a...
2025-02-07 15:17:02 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Nine -
***
Class let up, and I took my sweet time making my way out. The prof, Rogers, actually came up to me and asked me if the lesson was to my liking and... yeah, it kind was.
It was a bit more philosophy over more practical shit, but I could see how that kind of way of thinking might actually apply to a battlefield. “I liked it,” I said. “Not sure I’d want day-after-day of philosophy, though.”
“That’s fine...
2025-02-06 18:30:46 +0000 UTC View PostHi!
Finally got around to making the February Index!
Index Link: LINK!
2025-02-06 09:00:37 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Twenty-Three
53rd Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
Maldrak watched the captain at work, though the entirety of the ship’s officer roster was out and in the full swing of things. They were approaching the piers of Shorefarm at a crawl, but that was likely for the best. The bay that the small fishing port was in was more than wide enough to accommodate the Gentle T...
2025-02-05 18:22:09 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Twenty-Two
53rd Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
The first thing to do was gather all of the serfs that were still alive into a neat row. That mostly required two of them to grabbed one by the armpits and ankles, then shuffle them into place. They were still very much knocked out, but just to be safe, Lazur was tying their hands and ankles together with rope they found...
2025-02-05 03:08:32 +0000 UTC View Post(Wrote this one on Friday and gave up part-way because I was getting icky. Anyway, it's finished~)
Chapter Twenty-One
“Carnel, this is a bad situation,” Lazur snapped.
“We will win,” Carnel said with confidence that Viridian didn’t quite feel herself. Especially not when Carnel was backing up to rejoin them while the villagers spread out.
There were seven of them before Viridian and her companions. Two of the villagers were trying to aw...
2025-02-04 12:54:03 +0000 UTC View PostStill sick, but getting better, maybe? idk, was stressing out about not wording, so I did this.
Interlude Lucy - School Days Part Two
The introductory class was really... okay?
Lucy felt, from the very start, as if she didn’t quite belong. For one, she was definitely on the younger side. Not by that much, but she’d estimate the average age to hover around the mid-twenties, and judging by the looks of the people in her class, they were def...
2025-02-04 09:28:39 +0000 UTC View PostSorry
Went to community center on Thursday, and a few of the guys were sick. I guess I took it home. Slept 18hrs yesterday. Feeling a little better, but my head is throbbing.
Anyway. I'll try to work on some easy stuff, but expectations should be low!
Chapter Four
Teddy knew, deep, deep down, that she wasn’t supposed to leave the hideout without the Boss’ permission. It was against the rules, and the rules were real important.
But... well, she was a villain, wasn’t she?
Normally she was okay with following the law and the rules as long as neither of them were even slightly inconvenient, but right now, Teddy was both bored and hungry. Worse, she was bored of the things that could stop her...
2025-02-01 04:52:19 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Twenty -
53rd Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
It was an hour before noon when the townsfolk began to gather.
Now that they were well-hidden and not in as much of a rush to leave the area, Viridian took some time to count the number of villagers remaining.
Based on the number of homes in this part of Shorefarm, she estimated--with Lazur’s help...
2025-02-01 01:46:50 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Fifty-Eight
Sharp yawned, and I found myself turning to look up to her for it. “How can you be tired? We had eight hours.”
“I dunno,” she said. “Just... still a bit sleepy. Maybe I need more than just that?”
“I suppose. You are growing... you are growing, right? It would be inconvenient if you weren’t becoming healthier and taller.”
Sharp smiled down at me, then scritched the top of my head. “Yup! At least,...
2025-01-31 14:10:14 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Nineteen
53rd Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
The little village by the shore had changed little in the day that they’d been absent. Perhaps that was the fog, obscuring any deterioration, or perhaps the town didn’t have any further to sink from the abandoned ruin it already was, but in any case, Veridian didn’t notice anything strange as they stalked along...
2025-01-31 12:34:36 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Eighteen
53rd Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
The shores of Yellowfield, The Sapphire Ocean, Draya Calyrex
The moon was just a thin sliver in the sky at the moment, but it was enough to see by.
They were gathered on the deck of the Gentle Tidings, the three of them bundled up with their gambesons and caps and now three backpacks sitting on their backs. The bags were on loan from the ...
2025-01-30 14:35:20 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Seventeen
Maldrak had had many enemies throughout his life, but the most persistent of them, and the one who always won, was time.
He was worrying about that foe now while looking over a map of the Yellowfeilds. The space was quite large. Enough to be a nation onto itself, albeit a small one. The Yellowfields were so named because they were covered in a sea of wheat for much of the year.
With dragon dung as fertilizer, the locals didn’t...
2025-01-30 05:37:51 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Eight
***
Professor Rogers stepped up to the front of the class, then narrowed his eyes as he looked across all of the students.
In the meantime, I moved to the very back and smacked the floor with the tip of my shoe. The desks were meant to fold in and out of the floor, along with the chairs. Obviously so that the floorspace could be used for other shit later on. There was a seat open for me next to Olivia way out at the front, and I sure as s...
2025-01-30 01:12:59 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Sixteen
52nd Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
The shores of Yellowfield, The Sapphire Ocean, Draya Calyrex
“Must be nice, not needing to sleep,” Mage-Knight Jorvin said as he climbed up the rear-most deck of the ship. He had a tin mug in one hand, a thin stream of steam coming off the top, under his other arm was a leather-wrapped bundle with several handles sticking out of it.
“Hello,”...
2025-01-29 13:24:47 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Fifteen
52nd Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
The shores of Yellowfield, The Sapphire Ocean, Draya Calyrex
“Can’t believe I’m working at this time of day at my age,” Artificer Woodbone said as he walked ahead of them into the laboratory in the lower decks of the Gentle Tidings. As he entered the room just ahead of Green, the mage snapped his fingers and a bracelet around his wri...
2025-01-29 04:14:24 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Fourteen
51st Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
The shores of Yellowfield, The Sapphire Ocean, Draya Calyrex
The ship’s watch noticed a glimmering light on the piers of Shorefarm just a scant few minutes after the sunset. Maldrak was impressed. He wasn’t even certain if the puppets would survive their first outing, and yet here they were, returning early.
He gave the go-ahead to the ship’s capta...
2025-01-29 00:45:05 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Thirteen
51st Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm Lighthouse, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
“E e e e e,” Red laughed as she slowly climbed back to her feet and picked up her short sword.
The light that had been blindingly illuminating the interior of the lighthouse was fading now, slowly returning to something more peaceful and ordinary.
The lighthouse keeper spun his mace a...
2025-01-29 00:44:33 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Fifty-Seven
Work the next day passed in a flash. We headed out to Boston Two, got to the courier’s office, then took off and got to work.
The day passed relatively quickly too. I rode in a side-car while Sharp worked on her Body stat by peddling the bike manually. We didn’t push too hard, of course. If we were going on a gig the next day, we didn’t need her to have sore muscles the entire time.
By the time early evening rolled around Sharp was ...
2025-01-29 00:43:22 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Twelve
51st Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm Lighthouse, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
They came up the hill to the lighthouse in the middle of the afternoon. The sun was directly overhead, casting a powerful warmth over the ground.
A field of wildflowers grew around the lighthouse, golden and red petals catching the light while within that same field, several large flowers stuck out fr...
2025-01-28 23:57:15 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Eleven
51st Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
“Hhhh,” Green started, then paused. There were some sounds that were going to take her a while to master, she figured. “Hhhheeello,” she said, very slowly.
Next to her, Red grunted a greeting of her own, and Blue remained quiet, her head slowly turning as she scanned the area around the little blacksmithy...
2025-01-28 13:48:24 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Ten
51st Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
Green rose from a crouch and resisted the urge to wipe at her face. Her siphon slowly retracted and clicked into place. She glanced down at her essence counter before it was locked away in her barrel chest. 298.
The three of them had initially hesitated over the four bodies they’d left on the road. Were they to...
2025-01-28 13:47:48 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Nine
51st Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
The shores of Yellowfield, The Sapphire Ocean, Draya Calyrex
Magus Maldrak watched as the small boat usually carried in the middle of the Gentle Tiding’s main deck was hoisted up. It was done with a set of four pulleys on a small cargo crane currently deployed from the centre of the ship.
A delicate bit of work, but nothing the crew couldn’t han...
2025-01-28 12:04:32 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Eight
51st Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
There was something very inhuman about crouching over the corpse of a dead dog, her chest opened up and siphon stabbed down and slowly filling with the essence of the thing they’d killed.
Green noticed her siphon no longer pulling anything and tugged it back. She hadn’t even been sure that they could all use theirs ...
2025-01-28 12:04:08 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Five Hundred and Twenty-Six
“I think I’m gonna miss Booksie,” I said. I was back in the dining room of the Beaver sitting down on the seat that had become, through repeated use, ‘my’ seat. Not that I’d mind taking another, but everyone seemed to go back to the same seats at mealtimes. Weird how we did that.
“We’ll see her again soon enough,” Amaryllis said. She paused to look at me, then at the thing in the centre of the din...
2025-01-28 12:03:23 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Seven
51st Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
Shorefarm, Yellowfield, Draya Calyrex
A pair of young men were at the front of the little boat, and a second pair just like them were at the rear. The four pulled on oars in time with each other, each heave pushing the little boat slightly closer to shore.
Sitting in the middle of the ship, with a shawl over her shoulder and a bubble of shimmering air aroun...
2025-01-28 10:46:04 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Six
51st Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
The Sapphire Ocean
Maldrak squinted at the shoreline. They’d approached it deep into the night, and he’d made the choice to order the sailors to work with as few lights as possible. The Gentle Tiding had approached without navigation lights and only the bare necessity on the main deck.
It had been a cloudless night with waning gibbous ...
2025-01-28 10:45:36 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Five
50th Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
The Sapphire Ocean
The green puppet shifted slightly. She’d seen lots of people, humans that was, gathering in one place before, but so many of them focused on her and the other puppets felt a little off putting. A click of her eyes to the side revealed the Blue was standing at attention, but was otherwise impassive, and a click to the other side showed Re...
2025-01-28 09:58:45 +0000 UTC View PostChapter Four
50th Day of Spring - Year 1758 of the Golden Era
The Sapphire Ocean
“Land ahoy! Land ahoy!”
Magus Maldrak glanced up from the tome he was reading. The sky outside of the porthole in his office was still the pale orange of early morning, having only just risen some scant minutes prior.
Standing, the Magus pressed a hand to the small of his back. He wasn’t an old man yet, but sometimes his knees ...
2025-01-28 09:58:20 +0000 UTC View Post