My first stop was, naturally, Truso the Genuda Military Contract Manager. I was expecting a sharp operator. What I got was a sack full of broken glass and lovingly knapped obsidian arrowheads. He didn’t have to do anything to give me that impression. He just stood there in off-white leggings, stout boots and a quilted red jacket. A long sword hung on his waist, a dagger jutted from his boot… and that was all he needed to look like the nastiest piece of work this side of the monsters.
<...
2024-12-21 16:00:03 +0000 UTC
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Traveling with the family tomorrow- headed up to Vermont for the Christmas school vacation. Should be nice- Southwestern Vermont is almost unbearably quaint at any time, and we are finally past stick season. Plenty of snow, with more expected, to turn it into a winter fairyland. And as with all fairylands, time will bend and be distorted. The usually scheduled chapter will be coming out in the evening EST.
The poll has been interesting. Leaving aside the werewolf thing (though I am re...
2024-12-20 02:18:23 +0000 UTC
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“Othai, can you still not tell me about Genuda?” I slapped my forehead. “Let me rephrase- do you have anything you do want to tell me about Genuda?”
“Not… really, my Lord. Although I can tell you that two hundred soldiers would not be remotely enough to conquer Genuda. Just the children alone would be enough to drown them in their spit.”
“So… an infiltration team? Reinforcements? First batch of a much bigger army that will...
2024-12-18 17:25:49 +0000 UTC
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My Toad milking operation was over before it started- the acid was strong enough to melt glass. Like sugar in water. The glass just vanished under the corrosive power of the acid. I had the Toads put down immediately, leaving only the captive Monsters. No sense risking an accident.
It was not all bad. Before I had the monsters harvested, I had the workers gingerly mark out new trenches, and drained the acid into them. I was taking a waste not, want not app...
2024-12-16 17:26:29 +0000 UTC
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The battle had reached a grinding phase. The tower had become the central shaft of a meat grinder, and the screw was Carousel and the Blue Roses. Around and around they go, and as the Final Revel descends into the moat, the monsters spin and spin until they die. They are already packed so deep the ones above have crushed the ones below. It is a very thorough extermination.
The Toads finally reached their effective range under the meat-shield of standard monsters. There ...
2024-12-13 17:04:56 +0000 UTC
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The training wheels were officially off- ranged units were now in play. We now had stealthy, explosive stealthy, thrown stealthy, speedy, basic, armored basic, armored throwing basic, armored heavy, and now acid spitting toads. Which, from the sound of things, looked like toads. That would be a change from the design language used by the monsters so far. I’d be interested to see what the enemy came up with.
Yes, interested. Not afraid. Because these acid spitting uggo...
2024-12-11 17:00:16 +0000 UTC
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I took a long look at Rache, trying to sort out what I was feeling as well as what I was thinking. Rache was willing to talk about things related to scouting, if I remembered correctly. She was a lot more alert than the Mikas, if “alert” was the right word for it. Responsive, maybe?
Two Relic Sites, and they were connected. What could it possibly mean? I thrummed my fingers silently on the microfiber of my throne. I had a lot of speculation, none of it with much bas...
2024-12-09 17:00:16 +0000 UTC
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The demons of Hidden Moon Mountain were, as I expected, more like Yokai than the denizens of Hell. Think… monsters and evil spirits. Like a three tailed cat that turned into a demon by drinking its owner’s blood and is now a goddamn certifiable homicidal maniac. Or a very, very, very long-necked lady who you would think would just be weird looking, but turns out to just live for violence. The impression Saito gave me was that she was less interested in who won,...
2024-12-06 17:00:16 +0000 UTC
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My new hat was big. Bigger than my biggest fedora. Not quite sombrero sized or the size of Carousel’s hat, but pretty big. Black, with a round brim and a bright purple ostrich feather sticking out of the hat band. The brim on the side of the hat with the feather was pinned up. Why, I don’t know. I read the description.
Cavalier Hat- Provides a +5% chance of Summoning Ranged Direct Damage and Sniper Awakened Souls below the Five Star Level. Increases the Star Level...
2024-12-04 19:10:09 +0000 UTC
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Arguably the single most unique piece of loot I had acquired from any of my adventures was the music box we got clearing Madame’s Bar in the Gradden March Floating Quarter. It was a complex mechanical job, or maybe magical. You opened the lid, and a dancer in a Blue Roses costume would spin around as the music played. Versai would play it over and over again. Hundreds of times in a row, if I didn’t stop her.
I understood why. She had always been trapped by the barri...
2024-12-02 17:04:59 +0000 UTC
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Every damn time I come in here, I read something that makes me upset. Every single time. Not to be all whiny, but what the actual Hell? Can the Devs just chill for once in their unnatural lives? Can’t they just emphasize the positive? Like, I could totally see a…
My imagination fritzed. I could not, in fact, think of any summons who has a happy background. In fact, I had long since decided that extreme personal bravery and actual tragedy were both mandatory factors for re...
2024-11-29 17:00:16 +0000 UTC
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The Tenth Wave… I could feel the game world unsubtly pulling its gloves off. Every Gacha gamer knows this moment. The game got you invested. It’s showered you with endless boxes to open and free junk which looks amazingly impressive to the newbies. They are into it. They have the rhythm now. And then the game changes the beat dramatically.
It’s the cliff. It’s what the game designer has been building towards this whole time.
Everything would tak...
2024-11-27 17:00:17 +0000 UTC
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“Funny. I thought we would get at least one more round of lightning out of it. Maybe we triggered a change when we killed enough of its mobs. Or maybe it resets after we beat the Hell out of it.”
The metal tree was twisting into a human-ish shape, but you would never mistake it for anything remotely human. If the Tree of Woe had been cast from metal and then turned into an Ent but still wanted to be in the crucifixion game, I guess it would look like this. Thirty feet of ...
2024-11-25 17:00:18 +0000 UTC
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“Pomoroi, shoot that damned thing.”
“Pomoroi, by Imperial Decree!” There was a blast, the cannonball sailed out, and smashed into a formerly invisible shield around the floating iron tree.
“So it’s like that, is it? But is it invincible, or can we break the shield with enough damage?” I muttered. I’d told everyone to take cover, and I followed my own advice. I was lying flat on my balcony. Best I could do. I still kept my eyes on the tree. Eve...
2024-11-22 17:00:21 +0000 UTC
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This is the spot for comments, feedback, what you liked and didn't like. The number one question for me, of course, is "Do you want to find out what happened next?" "Is this something you would recommend to someone else?" and, most of all, "Why?"
Thank you for helping out!
2024-11-20 17:30:01 +0000 UTC
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Mortimer didn’t consider himself a good person. He didn’t think he was a bad person either. He existed in a liminal corridor between unasked for life and undeniable death. Good or evil meant a choice was made. He was just wriggling through the tube.
Although he tried to keep a positive attitude about that. “Fake it ‘till you make it.” “Embody your success and manifest it into the world.” “Nothing changes until you make a change.” The cliches and mantra...
2024-11-20 17:25:01 +0000 UTC
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The bug slurped the bile up. Its chubby legs splayed out, letting it lower its body right down to the bright green mess. Mortimer wasn’t fooled. He could see the way the legs were bent at the knee. “Knee.” There were no joints in there. But they still moved with dreadful agility. The bug was slurping the vital essence of its former comrade up off the floor, but Mortimer knew perfectly well its...
2024-11-20 17:20:00 +0000 UTC
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No need to creep- those bug things were huge and dangerous, but they were deaf and blind. Given the way they poked their tubelike maw around, he wondered if it also worked as a nose. Maybe that was why it was so slow to find him- he didn’t smell like food. And it took time for smells to carry, of course.
Mortimer made a beeline for the bug. The critter was shifting right alo...
2024-11-20 17:15:01 +0000 UTC
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The thing flowed across the floor with alien grace. Like two bears fused by a hateful, alien god. Long and stout, eight stumpy legs ending in sharp claws and a chubby, almost fluffy exterior. Fatty, perhaps, the greasy filling restrained by a straining, leathery exterior. A short, circular maw was fitted like a pipe to the front of the thing and filled with stout, triangular teeth. No eyes. No visib...
2024-11-20 17:10:01 +0000 UTC
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Mortimer Snerd was driving the I-70 through western Kansas again. It was enough to break a man, and it did. Something in Mortimer snapped.
Mortimer shoved the gas pedal flat and yanked the wheel to the right. He hauled off the I-70 in Walker, abandoning it, swearing he’d never look back. He took the corner around the gingerbread St. Ann’s Catholic Church inadvisably fast, alread...
2024-11-20 17:05:00 +0000 UTC
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The rain muffled my ears and blocked my eyes. But the monsters always seemed to know exactly where the Tower was.
“Miyuki sees the snake hidden in the grass!”
I saw the white arrow fly out into the rain, and a new sound was added- the whistle that inspired terror in our enemies. The rain, the thunder, the roar of the artillery, and now the omnipresent whistling of Miyuki’s arrows. All pressing down on the howls and roars and now the screams ...
2024-11-20 17:00:19 +0000 UTC
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Slumrat was explicitly a satire on Xianxia novels. Weeaboo is doing game lit dirty, and generally making fun of tower defense/gacha games. So... what would you guys like to see me take on next? Click all that you would want to read, and please comment on why! Also comment if I missed something, I might just use your suggestion.
2024-11-19 19:45:23 +0000 UTC
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Synopsis: Mortimer Snerd is a mess. Drowning in debt, trapped in a job he both hates and doesn't understand, working for his old high school bully. No girlfriend, no hobbies, no will to live. Which is awkward when he gets abducted and forced to fight monsters to eat their delicious cores. The cores make him feel so, so good. And let him do... things. Things that he was quite sure were impossible...
2024-11-19 19:27:36 +0000 UTC
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“I want to congratulate everyone! I am congratulating everyone! We did it! We built ourselves an absurdly over-fortified gatehouse and wrapped our wall around the base of the Tower. We even included bastions for cross fire. We have even-even rebuilt and restructured the existing fortifications! Which, given the amount of concrete and rebar we had already used, only hurt my soul a little bit! Everyone, this cheer is for you.”
“Yaaay.”
“Good. Dismisse...
2024-11-18 17:00:14 +0000 UTC
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I clapped my hands together, then rubbed them for maximum effect. I was renewed by a divine night’s… an order times…
I was renewed by sleep! Time, as an illusion, was therefore less meaningful than waking renewed. Refreshed. Recharged. Ready to take on the day’s challenges. I still had four orders to play with too.
Hand rubbing time was over. I steepled my fingers together and leaned forward, pressing my fingers to my lips. Hmm. HMMMM!
...
2024-11-16 03:05:53 +0000 UTC
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The chapter due on the 15th will go up on the 15th, but it won't be at my usual time. Today just got utterly stomped into a hole in the ground in terms of getting things done, and tomorrow morning is going to be very nearly as busy. I'm bringing my dog back for his follow up check up after the summer's cancer treatments. He remains pain free and reasonably active for a twelve year old dog.
It is painful, thinking that if everything worked as well as it possibly could, he might see...
2024-11-15 04:19:26 +0000 UTC
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[[Author's note]] Apologies for the late post- family business ran into a doctor's appointment and then continued out the other side. 'Tis the season, or at least, it's coming fast. All the end of year crazy is starting to pile up. Ah well. It was ever thus, and other relevant clichés.
I was floating in an inky black void. I didn’t let that stop me from tapping my foot, though I admit the main effect was lost. Sometimes, you simply need to tap a foot to express...
2024-11-13 22:50:20 +0000 UTC
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It took a remarkably long time for my brain to start working again. What had been that monster at the end? What was that… skull-moon? Usually when there is a creepy skull, it’s a human skull. Not this time. I don’t know what the hell that thing was. Is. Christ.
Too much of this mountain felt… like something I shouldn’t be in contact with. Lord Welcome- whatever it was, it was far, far beyond some little cannibal ghost a wandering saint converted. The Woodcu...
2024-11-11 17:00:13 +0000 UTC
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I don’t think I’m stupid. You have to be a little smart to earn your own way in Manhattan. Got to have at least a bit of moxie, a bit of hustle and creativity. Or a lot of it. Usually a lot of it. So I don’t think I’m stupid. I will, however, admit that I don’t always think things through completely. That sometimes, rarely, I miss things.
In my defense, this was something of a black swan event. Not to mention that I had extremely limited experience in working ...
2024-11-08 17:26:41 +0000 UTC
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Day ten. And for my efforts, for having survived this long, and in no way a naked bribe to players to stay engaged with the game for longer, I would be rewarded with a new top-of-the-line Six Star summons. I tapped the calender. The day was marked with a circle, and a long crystal landed in my hand with a thump.
The crystal was beautiful. All shimmering rainbows and a faint heavenly sound coming from it. A Rainbow Clarion Crystal, and only the second one I had ever seen...
2024-11-06 17:00:12 +0000 UTC
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