I leaned to get a better view of the chamber, and there they were, wriggling like maggots in a pool of blood and ash—the jailors that survived the chain explosions. The floor near them looked like a work of modern art, shit. Just a bunch of colorful splashes surrounding broken objects. The objects referring to their broken bodies and pieces of shattered armor covering the floor.
I heaved a sigh of relief and stepped inside. Their crazed gazes tore into me immediately, but there ...
2025-08-04 17:49:59 +0000 UTC
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“Wait! No, no, no!” I tried to stop what I had set in motion, but the runes were already forming to name my repaired wand anew.
Jackpot
Rank: Unique
Type: Remembrance
Description: Once the favoured weapon of a soldier whose wail of doom still echoes in the depths of its core, now the first step for a fledgeling shaper. Through the ancient art of embroidery, the shaper made the wand his own.
The wand can borrow the shaper’...
2025-08-01 11:19:00 +0000 UTC
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I swallowed, hard, and let my fingers brush against the ominously crimson threads of the weave. They flashed in response to my touch and I almost fell off the stool as I recoiled back, shielding my face with my arms. The threads didn’t explode like I feared. The flash was more like a warning than anything. A warning that they could blow me up if they wanted. But that would mean they were sentient.
I shivered and put the thought out of mind; it was too unsettling to even entertai...
2025-07-31 17:17:14 +0000 UTC
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I stood up and dusted off my pants. My clothes had held up remarkably well despite me exploding myself multiple times. Well, my pants and armor had in any case. One of my shirt’s arms had ripped clean off, revealing the entirety of my charred hand.
The more I got used to it, the less naked I felt when it was out in the open. I’m sure that would change as I returned to earth again. Unnaturally black arms weren’t very normal there despite Blessed becoming more and more common....
2025-07-28 15:07:16 +0000 UTC
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“Come out you fucking thing!” I hissed. “I’m in no mood for games.”
The statue was quiet, no rustling could be heard, no cracking, no sounds, no nothing.
Why can't anything in this place leave me alone?
I crept forward, once more climbing atop the statue’s shoulders and looking inside the broken face. Sitting perched on the shoulders was awkward, but I managed to hold on with sheer determination not to get ambushed again.
The skittering...
2025-07-25 21:06:10 +0000 UTC
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Hey ya'll. Just a quick update. I've got a wisdom tooth coming and it's gotten inflamed to hell so I've been struggling with keeping focus. Hopefully some antibiotics and painkillers will get me writing again from tomorrow onwards! Looking forward to picking up the pace again.
As always, thank you for the support and patience.
P.S. If any of you want to be more vocal about this story's and future ones direction I might be opening up room for some beta readers in the future.
...
2025-07-23 21:04:19 +0000 UTC
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I growled, pushing against the strain on my breast. “What do you mean?!”
No answer, again.
I weighed my options. Nine jailors, four seconds. That meant in the best case scenario I’d be locked against one in a close quarter fight. And I didn’t like my chances should that happen. I clenched my jaw and coated my arm in magic. The only way to avoid the close quarters fight was yet another gamble. One I was willing to make.
The veil’s electric warmth tickled...
2025-07-20 14:18:17 +0000 UTC
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“There’s no time for heroics!” Nea barked. We zoomed past my old cell. The others weren’t more than ten meters ahead of me, the jailors about twenty behind.
“There’s no other choice!” Samuel retorted.
Something had to be done. But without a way to safely detonate my dynamite threads I was shit out of luck. And the others didn’t seem to be overflowing with ideas either. I pulled a handful of threads from the veil and felt the limitations of my abilities ...
2025-07-15 14:47:03 +0000 UTC
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In hollow halls where silence weeps,
The Jailors tread, their vigil deep.
Chains of old and tongues of lies,
They bound the storm that scorched the skies.
The Wayward Daughter, flame unbound,
Walked alone, beneath no shroud.
Her voice was thunder, her wrath the sea,
But truth, it seems, breeds heresy.
They feared her rage, her woven fate,
Her dreams to break the marble gate.
So cloaked in scorn and soot-stained grace,
They crucified...
2025-07-11 13:38:42 +0000 UTC
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“What the hell!” Samuel yelped and staggered into the kneeling John. John moved like a whirlwind, turning to catch the teen before they both fell onto the corpse. He was the first person I’d ever seen with a speed blessing, and watching it made me feel… things. I had cool explosive strings, but John moved like the characters in a video tape when you fast forwarded it.
“Watch it!” John snarled and pushed Samuel back. He slammed against the wall and bounced to his knees ...
2025-07-11 13:30:27 +0000 UTC
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I glanced down at the others, Samuel and John clutched at their weapons like their lives depended on it.
“There’s no telling what we’ll see from here, be ready for everything,” I said.
The two nodded seriously while Nea feigned indifference. Her eyes darted around, the flush on her cheeks paled, her hands shook. She was nervous. I turned to hide my smirk.
You could cut the tension with a knife. I kept my eyes at the looming gates left ajar by the st...
2025-07-10 21:28:23 +0000 UTC
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I blinked to make sure I wasn’t seeing things. The description had grown, and by a lot. There was a lot to unpack. Firstly, the weaver seemed to be a lot more powerful than I had thought. Secondly, I still controlled the threads despite my blessing being changed to another thing altogether.
Shaper? What the fuck is shaper? I reached out my hand while channeling magic through it, feeling the electrical buzz of the veil brush against its fingertips. Nothing had changed. Only th...
2025-07-10 19:40:32 +0000 UTC
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As usual, Hugo was silent. He smiled and nodded at the passer-bys, but didn’t offer many words to them either. When we walked past Samuel, he stopped for a beat, and shared one of those handshakes by the wrist. Then Hugo pulled him close and said something only Sam could hear. He gave Sam a pat on the back and chuckled as we left him behind.
“What was that about?” I asked.
“He’s my mentee. I was merely offering advice.”
I raised an eyebrow. “I...
2025-07-08 17:41:55 +0000 UTC
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The doctor did not die.
That much was sure as soon as I woke up. My surroundings were kind of similar to the ones I had blacked out in, but at the same time, vastly different. For starters, there were no windows in this damn room, nor was I stuck to a bed in one of the cubicles. No. This was a cell. I knew it from just the smell of dank metal alone.
I tried to get up on my elbows, only to find that my hands and feet were tied down to the bed. I had some mobility left, ...
2025-07-07 22:53:51 +0000 UTC
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They had been killing people here. Our people.
I had no idea what kind of use the hospital served for them. All I knew for a fact was that these corpses were people from earth. They were blessed.
My grip around the weapons tightened. This was wrong, so very wrong. There was no rhyme or reason to the madness. Did the outsider brainwash them? What could be the reason for killing your own country men in a place where everything was already trying to kill you?
...
2025-07-07 13:43:37 +0000 UTC
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While I am focusing on Blessed wholeheartedly I often work on new ideas as well. Would you like me to post the "pilot" chapters of these future stories here?
2025-07-07 12:31:03 +0000 UTC
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His breath fogged up against the window as he leaned in close to peer through the rain of soot. The uppermost part of it ajar, so as to let him shoot without obstruction.
I pressed my cheek against the wand and magnified my vision. His patchwork grin came into view, most of his figure was obscured by the blowing curtain, but I immediately recognised him.
It was the cook.
Good cooking was the only amenity missing in the amphitheatre. It hurt to know that the...
2025-07-07 11:53:57 +0000 UTC
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John did a good job in diverting their attention away from the amphitheater, the horde followed him like a cohesive tail, trailing throughout the streets. He made sure to skirt the library and the plaza, so as to not draw any unwanted ire.
Even from where I stood, hundreds of meters away, I could see the flames burning in their eye sockets flickering like an ocean of fireflies against the stark contrast of decrepit walls.
I kept my distance, it would be a shame if I ru...
2025-07-04 22:19:44 +0000 UTC
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Joanna, Samara, and a man I hadn’t yet met sat opposite of each other at a round table, they all had a cup of something in front of them. I inched closer and had a peek inside Joanna’s. She studied my careful approach with a hushed giggle. “It’s just water.”
I scratched my neck and smiled sheepishly. “This is Hugo,” Joanna said. The man nodded a greeting at me. His youthful eyes stood in stark contrast to the mature stubble on his chin. She nodded her chin at an empty chai...
2025-07-04 13:44:04 +0000 UTC
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My heart raced, I glanced at the door left ajar. “Eh, are you sure?”
“I swear to God I’ll slap you.”
That meant a lot coming from a preachers daughters. I gulped and began the arduous process of climbing out of the armour, then unsummoned it. “Sorry.”
The veil around me shuddered and swirled. It caressed me with its electric touch, making the hairs on my arms and legs stand on end. The slow bleeding stemmed completely, as ambient energy flowed...
2025-07-04 00:24:10 +0000 UTC
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“That’s right!” I exclaimed.
“Uh, Cal?” he said nervously.
“What?”
“You look like a hobo.”
***
“Oh, and did you know that penguins in a nesting colony keep their neighbours at a very precise distance? Not close enough that the neighbour’s can flirt with their mate, but also not far enough that they don’t feel the security in numbers,” Charlie said, beaming.
His facts, although somewhat interesting, had...
2025-07-02 23:08:14 +0000 UTC
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The armour embraced me snugly, it was quite comfortable. I wasn’t sure about the look though. It made me look like I had just escaped a mental asylum, so walking around town with it on probably wasn’t going to happen.
Not that the day of my return felt like it was getting any closer.
I still bled from the stab wounds left from the nails, and I figured I would have to get them treated sooner rather than later. Sadly there were no supplies for stitching up wounds in ...
2025-07-01 23:45:12 +0000 UTC
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The hag’s body fell to the floor like a lifeless heap. Her head skittered across the floor, leaving bloody stains wherever it bounced, only to end up at my feet. It turned, slowly, to stop with its face turned to me. Her eyes had been closed at the moment of death, otherwise I feared I’d have to live with seeing her face every time I closed for a long time to come. This, this I would get over in a week.
I leaned my back to the wall and gave myself a lookover. I’d certainly s...
2025-06-30 23:27:50 +0000 UTC
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My lovely patrons,
I'm just writing this post to tell you that I'm making some changes to the early chapters on royalroad. I was made aware of a gaping plot hole that I didn't want to let rest. I literally let Cal sleep for a night when in the middle of a jail break.
The updates will be live in an hour or so. It will mostly impact chapter 2-3.
In the future I might even do some revisions to chapters 4-5, but editing and writing new chapters comes first, I haven't forgotte...
2025-06-30 09:04:59 +0000 UTC
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My knife was stuck neatly in the hags chest, lodged between the fingers of a hand fastened to her body. She was covered in them. They stuck to her like an armour of flesh. Her unnaturally long arms dragged across the floor as she staggered backward. Her luminously blonde hair slumped to the side, a pink hue peeking forward from underneath.
She threw an icy glare at me and bared her teeth, slowly pulling the dagger out of her chest. The wound spewed blood onto the floor. Silent scr...
2025-06-29 22:37:32 +0000 UTC
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It hadn’t been so apparent before; now the stench of iron stung at my nose. “Keep looking,” I urged Yusuf as much as myself. “There has to be something we missed.”
He kept dry heaving as he prodded around behind the dolls. I wouldn’t have fared better if I weren’t already fuelled by a life long hatred against the damn things. I never liked their dead eyes, or lifeless limbs.
They reminded me of things a child should never have to witness.
“H...
2025-06-29 00:21:14 +0000 UTC
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“Why?!” I exclaimed and stared at my feet. Piles of bones filled the room like eerie stone altars, the ones that vikings left. One side of the room had shelves with dolls. Bald ones. The other had wigs for said bald dolls. The wigs rested on white pillows with wine red embroidery.
I shivered and averted my eyes, staring at my feet.
Judging by the chaotic spread of bones near me, I concluded that the second thing I kicked was in fact not a rat, but one of the bone piles. <...
2025-06-28 20:49:34 +0000 UTC
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For the first time in forever I dreamt—not about hugs, kisses and roses, but of the damned jailor and his lagging footsteps chasing me through the streets of the abandoned city. I dreamt of faces staring lifelessly at me through windows lining the never-ending alleys, never helping despite my pleas. I dreamt of the first stumbler I killed, of Elana, Anna, my mother and brother…
I woke up with a startle.
“You alright?”
Yusuf looked down worryingly at me wi...
2025-06-27 16:36:02 +0000 UTC
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I coughed. “What do you mean?”
How the fuck did she know? Sera was supposed to be hidden, right? She never explicitly said that was the case, I just assumed.
This can’t be happening.
My throat dried up like a grape left in the sun. Then it hit me. Maybe my nervousness was her doing. She could have forced it on me to shake me up. Would she do that to an ally? Did she really trust me so little?
“You know what I mean,” she said and pop...
2025-06-24 13:21:19 +0000 UTC
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“What… what did you call her?” John asked. His expression softened with confusion.
I cleared my throat. “Eh, Mirror girl?”
“My name is Nea!” she growled. Colour streamed back to her face as his grip loosened.
“Great, well, I didn’t know that. I just damn well got here, and you’re not the most friendly person, you know?”
John’s eyes hardened. “You’re right. You did just get here. And everything went to shit as soon as ...
2025-06-23 15:23:43 +0000 UTC
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