Timewalk

Chapter 531: A Ring for a Lament

Malika

Malika bent backward, the arrow aimed at her throat missing by a hair’s breadth, and then she unleashed the graceful second form, punches that the Nine Paths described as ‘strike like a thousand vipers’. Unfortunately, they seemed to be blind and half-asleep vipers today – the gray-skinned Wight evaded all but two hits, dodging with uncanny speed before suddenly vanishing from sight the instant her left fist connected.

Fade. Ugh.

Invisible or not, M...

Chapter 530: Nendir, The Corrupted

Calen

Calen’s body trembled, a bone-deep, chilling shudder that gripped him from the shoulders and sank all the way into his boots. Yet, it was impossible to look away from the ghastly apparition that floated up from deep within the dense smoke. Transfixed, he found himself unable to tear his eyes away from the apparition, but it was not the waves of tangible power radiating from withered flesh, nor the ominously pulsing purple crystal impaled through his chest; it was the face:

Chapter 529: The Inner Ring

Aliandra

It took nearly all the remaining daylight to drive the endless hordes of undead back past the Ciradyl trees beyond the battlements. When Ali had informed Lyeneru and Vivian that the Avatar of Annihilation had respawned deep within the core of the Well of Corruption dungeon, the Guildmaster had switched to sustainable patrols and defense rotations for the guild, giving up on any further progress in the dungeon for now. An unfortunate setback, but recovering lost ground should ...

Chapter 528: The Vengeance of Mi’ir Valdanis

Aliandra

“Why are they here?” Ali asked, not truly expecting a ready answer. For certain, the undead were not known to explain themselves. Battle raged in the streets below, but Mato, Sabri, and Havok were all slowly advancing toward the breach in the wall, while deadly spells and arrows rained down in a deafening assault that had long left her ears ringing.

“It was only a matter of time,” Calen said, his arrows shining brighter than even the lightning.

“What do ...

Chapter 527: Siege of the Dead

Seyah

Seyah leveled her spear and charged. Her bare feet blurred as she shot across the smoldering carpet in the center of the guild hall, her ancestors’ footwork pushing her Spear Rush to incredible speed. She lurched to a sudden jarring stop, her arms absorbing the impact, burying her spear up to her grip through a decrepit zombie elf’s chest. Black ichor sprayed across Bronwyn’s unconscious form, where she lay face down on the ruined carpet, across her light leather armor, an...

Chapter 526: Just In Time

Aliandra

Ali screamed, “There are undead attacking Myrin’s Keep!” She could feel them approaching the town through the trees to the south, like ants crawling up her skin. Their foul unwholesomeness was like a rotten stench that hit her squarely in the mana.

“How many? Levels?” Lyeneru asked, her voice sharp with sudden urgency.

“I… don’t know. Lots, I can feel them in my domain.” She had been so concerned about the risk of being mind-controlled and puttin...

Chapter 525: Sneak Attack

Calen

“Ali, can you slow down?” Calen said. “I got less than a third of that.” It was late, and they sat in a crowded private meeting room with the guild’s best strategists, all exhausted after a frustrating day. There had been no lack of ideas, but none of them had shown any real potential, and after the first hour of discussion, they’d begun circling the same patterns, going around and around like a dog endlessly chasing its tail. We need a break.

Ali stop...

Chapter 524: Boot to the Head

Aliandra

Ali hovered above the raid group, the sounds of sober, quiet conversation drifting upward as they finalized their preparations. But her eyes – and the senses of all her minions – were fixed on the Avatar of Annihilation floating serenely above the dense magical energy pouring out of the rune construct below it.

It was a named Theuronic Crystal, just as Calen had said, a monster she remembered vividly from the fall of Ciradyl. It could fly and had powerful melee atta...

Chapter 523: Poking the Hornet’s Nest

Aliandra

Awareness came for her as it often did, suddenly, and without warning. Ali’s eyes flicked open to see the plain canvas of her little tent stretching out overhead. It was the same tent her friends had bought for her the first day she joined the Adventurers Guild, but her sight was not limited by something so plain and simple as enchanted canvas; Mato’s enormous Sanctuary aura pulsed with vibrant life, seeping into the air all around her and Malika sat keeping vigil outside...

Chapter 522: The Adamant Fortress

Mato

I hope Thuli has a little time for us, Mato thought as he made his way across town toward the muffled clanging of anvils and the sooty stench of forge fires with his two smaller companions. The whole guild had the day off, according to Vivian, and most of them had fled the building, rushing to visit their favorite crafters or the auction house to scour it for upgrades.

“What are you going to get, Mato?” Sabri asked, glancing up at him curiously.

“Mato s...

Chapter 521: How to Squash an Ooze

Naia

Naia squashed herself through the veil, emerging on the other side into the spirit realm echo of Ali-friend’s Grand Library Arcana.

The sounds of the people studying vanished as the uncanny silence of this realm pressed down upon her. She quivered momentarily, feeling blinded and vulnerable, but she managed to avoid turning into a rock as she always did when she was scared. Barely.

Instead, she turned into a small wooden side table. 

Azryet had chided her...

Chapter 520: Arcane Pylons

Aliandra

With only three Galdrone Tetrad clones remaining, Ali found it far easier to draw the disruptions with her ice mages. And so, she did: every time she could, she dismantled shields, exposing the clones to the full damage output from all the archers and mages with multishot skills. While most of that damage and the area spells and attacks were directed skyward to cull the swarms of elementals, now that the swarms were smaller, the additional time to target the main bosses resul...

Chapter 519: Galdrone Tetrad

Aliandra

Ali sat perched high up on a creaking branch broader than her entire body as the Malevolent Lirasian Oak slowly lumbered closer and closer to the melee brawl. From her clear vantage point, she studied the magic of the domain and the shifting elementals relentlessly, using every perception skill at her disposal, not simply content to rely on their plan – after all, who knew what surprises the boss had in store for them?

Mana flared, and five Arcane Blasts ripped throug...

Chapter 518: Mana Lock

Aliandra

Ali landed hard on the black marble floor in the center of the crowded locus, earning a painful bruise on her rump and surrounded by a claustrophobic crush of much larger adventurers crammed into the receiving room of the Novaspark Academy. The loud buzz of frustrated conversation, punctuated by the slowly fading groans and cries of the injured and wounded clamoring for attention, pressed in on her as the thoroughly defeated and disheartened raid group milled about, strugglin...

Chapter 517: A Bold Strategic Maneuver

Aliandra

Ali hovered beside her friends right at the threshold between her domain and the dark twisted corruption that lay beyond. The tangled barbed wire of the dungeon rage tore through her mind unceasingly, and yet she found herself able to bear the agony surprisingly easily.

Not quite as bad as Domain Withdrawal, she observed with a wry inner sarcasm. Perhaps practice really does make perfect.

The dungeon beyond the fragments of the shattered first ba...

Chapter 516: An Unexpected Confession

Aliandra

The barrier dome flickered with power as mana coursed through it. Runes flared in response to distant fighting, and Ali would only have been able to guess what was happening at the other battle locations if she hadn’t bolstered each of the raid groups with a couple of her minions to help synchronize everything.

“Aiden and Teagan’s bosses are down,” Calen announced, repeating the communication via the sending spells.

Ali studied the runes intently, noticing...

Chapter 515: Synchronization

Calen

It was hard to believe this place had once been the pride and home of the Wood Elves. Even the ground slowly drifting by below, illuminated by the radiance of his ethereal light-magic wings, was infested with corrupted mana, twisting and writhing in the strange realm-crossing sight he had earned for his class evolution. Whatever it was, this evil ran deeper than the mundane; dark, blindly reaching tendrils of corruption seemed to bore their way past the veil, hungrily consuming ...

Chapter 514: First Ring

Aliandra

The droning hum and the flickering of power faded as the semi-crystalline Calhedron exploded, shards clinking together as they bounced off the ground and each other.

Ali frowned as the magic flowing through her wings took her on a slow descent toward the remains of the elemental boss. Her eyes scanned the remains of the battlefield, taking in the carnage and damage that were strewn everywhere. Far too many of her most powerful minions had fallen to the cascade of arcane...

Chapter 513: Calhedron (Part 2)

Malika

Malika ducked, dodging rapidly, but the storm of purple bolts flying toward her was annoyingly persistent, even adjusting their trajectories to chase her down. Just like the Arcane Bolt skill Ali had begun with, only this time, the hail of bolts came from a veritable cloud of spawned elementals wheeling overhead. With her reduction to magical damage taken, the bolts themselves individually did very little damage to her, but the unpredictable impacts threw off her ability to dod...

Chapter 512: Calhedron (Part 1)

Aliandra

The towering pillar of arcanite crystal pulsed powerfully as it drew in the dark tendrils of corrupted mana that poured forth from the remnants of the Well of Souls in continuous waves. The energy within the pillar crackled violently, causing the hair on Ali’s arms to prickle as if she were somehow standing beside a bottled-up lightning bolt that had mysteriously failed to damage anything.

Suddenly, the energy dipped dramatically, and a transparent, floating form mate...

Chapter 511: The Rise of Cuddles and the Holy Fire

Aliandra

The vast purple barriers up ahead shimmered as their magical formations activated. Despite the mental impact of the inconceivable weight of the dungeon break bearing down upon her, Ali’s mind held steady, and her skills automatically analyzed it.

Why are they opening?

As the wave of banshees and ghosts shimmered through the barriers, the purple domes flickered, large segments vanishing from existence, and through the gaps, the zombies poured, their blac...

Chapter 510: Return to Ciradyl

Aliandra

Ali circled downward, feeling the air and void mana flowing across her great, black draconic wings. Her powerfully muscled back easily held her aloft upon the fickle and chilly air currents as she lazily circled Lyeneru, Calen, and Coria as they descended toward the blackened and dying ground below. For a moment, her goals, the mission, and her worries all vanished in the pure visceral thrill of the Scion of Azryet’s physical power and the joy of flying.

“This is a ...

Chapter 509: Shrine of the Ancient Grove

Aliandra

Looks like I’m done here, she thought. Ali had a group wanting to visit the shrine this afternoon, but she had a lot of her own shrine work she needed to accomplish before then, so she teleported right into the grove, bringing her guard minions with her.

She reached out a hand and touched her shrine, the cold dark stone offering a sense of stability in her otherwise chaotic existence. It was one of the very few things she could say had remained a constant pre...

Chapter 508: Cat and Mouse

Calen

“You made it,” Devan said, helping him up from the icy floor of the tunnel. “Fix your invisibility; it dropped.”

“The other two got out safely,” he told her, quickly reactivating Eclipse and restoring his invisibility. Without his ability to see the remains of their teleportation spells, there would have been no way to know Hadlis and Brielle had escaped to safety – his communication artifact had an unfortunately tiny range. “...