Malcolm Tent

A Novel Approach chapter 123

Wish upon the Stars chapter 959

Once we emerged from Callie’s soul space, I explained everything to my friends and family. Inner circle only, of course, under Murmur. Of course, everyone wanted to see Gossamer, and my wife was all too pleased to show off her new soul weapon. Even my mom was jealous. My dad, apparently, had his own ( the cane he tapped to summon his contracted souls), but they weren’t common below S-rank.

I had never even realized that my relationship with my staff was something so rare until they ...

Secret Ending chapter 94

Wish upon the Stars chapter 958

We came back to reality dazed. The first thing I did was check on Callie. “Cal? Sweetie? You with me? How’s your head?” I surged Zagan, flooding her body with life energy before she could answer, and she giggled and smacked at my hand.

“Wait til I respond, idiot,” she said fondly. “And I’m…good.” She sounded conflicted. But not in a bad way. I helped her sit up, smiling the whole time. I was just so relieved she was alright.

Everyone around us looked frantic. I g...

Secret Ending chapter 93

Wish upon the Stars chapter 957

I stared at the kindly man in shock. Or rather, I tried to. I couldn’t see him, really. My eyes were inexorably drawn to his, falling into the blue black abyss. He had the same eyes as my wife, but…more. An order of magnitude more. They were magnetic, hypnotic, whatever term you wanted to use, I couldn’t look away. Like they were pulling me into an endless abyss from which I’d never escape.

And then, they weren’t. “Apologies,” he chuckled ruefully. “I forget that happens...

A Novel Approach chapter 122

Wish upon the Stars chapter 956

Over the next eight or nine hours, we caught three more B-rank Void infiltrators. Not all of them were Vessels, sadly. In fact, only the first one, Faustryche, had been a vessel. Personally, I didn’t think it was so bad, we’d still taken down some Void worshippers, and even if they didn’t happen to be big bosses, they were still powerful assets we were denying the other side. Not to mention they still had bounties, which meant we’d still get points.

My parents though, looked dee...

Secret Ending chapter 92

Wish upon the Stars chapter 955

Reaching the tenth level wasn’t too tough. I wanted to go deeper, honestly, but Faustryche had been recently seen down here and we had a day or two before the next shift. In fact, we couldn’t have gone lower as a group anyway. The majority of our people didn’t have a Chronicle, even among the top percentage of our combatants, and hence they couldn’t stand the pressure too many levels down.

Even ten levels below the surface (and the staircase DID start at the surface, with the wh...

A Novel Approach chapter 121

Wish upon the Stars chapter 954

I stared down into the very large hole with trepidation. “Look,” I said slowly. “I feel like no one will take this seriously, and it might not even matter since we have to go down there. But I feel like it needs to be said. Literally NOTHING good has ever happened to any of us in a hole in the ground.”

Callie rolled her eyes. “Let’s be honest. Bad things have happened to us in almost every imaginable biome. I think pretty much the only ones we’re missing are the ocean and ...

Secret Ending chapter 91

Wish upon the Stars chapter 953

When we reached the house my parents had been staying at, I admit I froze. “I…was expecting something bigger.” We were standing in a small grass yard between two huge buildings. Packed into the intervening space was a small cottage, thatched roof and all. It was a warm brown color, with a blue painted door sporting a shiny brass knob. The windows had matching blue shutters thrown wide to reveal gauzy yellow curtains, and the path up to the door was brown cobblestone.

My mother bea...

Secret Ending chapter 90

Wish upon the Stars chapter 952

There was a brief lull before everyone lost it. Not a long one, mind. It seemed like everyone was so shocked they didn’t know how to react. On our side we were staring down twenty A-rankers, and on theirs a small massacre had played out among their charges. The first person to react was a particularly large figure on the left side of the parapets of the gate.

Before any of us could move, he was standing at the base of the platform, staring in at us. “What happened to Kent?” he dem...

A Novel Approach chapter 120

Wish upon the Stars chapter 951

The trip up the glacier was tense. I’d expected that, with all of us stuck together in a very small area (relatively speaking) and unable to leave. Given the rank of the planet, the distance to the ground, and the makeup of the rock at the bottom, for anyone who DIDN’T have wings, falling off this platform was going to be a quick trip to the morgue, assuming there was even enough left to bother burying.

Luckily, we were in a decent position. Roland and Delia were serious heavy hitte...

Secret Ending chapter 89

Wish upon the Stars chapter 950

“So, I have a plan,” I said as we stared up at the platforms to Arcadia. They nearest one to us was apparently the West gate. It was about a hundred miles outside of Veltheim. It had been a week since my duel with Benny (fifty six more scrolls put me at two hundred thirty two), and I had gathered most of my main combat force here, with the majority of the army inside Bethy’s domain.

Ellie, Felicity, Callie, Gabe, Chelsea, Benny, Bethy, Mel, Abel, Carmichael, Crell, Alanna, and Fad...

A Novel Approach chapter 119

Wish upon the Stars chapter 949

“That armor is badass,” Benny said enthusiastically as he studied my new suit. “I mean, obviously, but like…the craftsmanship is insane. In fact, it’s ALMOST as good as my new piece of gear. Well…pieces. I just finished my most recent project. Want to see it in action?” I’d called everyone together to tell them about Arcadia, but I had to admit, given how much time my best friend had spent on his newest project, I was excited to see what he could do.

Callie sighed. “Sh...

Secret Ending chapter 88

nsfw warning mind the tags

Wish upon the Stars chapter 948

The Seal was…impressive. Slipping into it was deceptively easy, for one thing. It looked bulky and imposing, and it was, but it was also fluid and surprisingly mobile. I was able to open it up and slip inside with no trouble. More than that, my wings slid free of the metal like there was a custom made slot for them, and once they did, I was able to move and walk with almost no resistance at all.

“The articulation on this is insane,” I said as I moved back and forth, bending and st...

Secret Ending chapter 87

Wish upon the Stars chapter 947

The interior of the metal temple was surprisingly cramped. Most buildings I’d seen were spatially expanded, and this one might have been as well, but if it was, it was expanded and THEN filled with an absurd number of walls and hallways, making every step I took feel like I was walking through a maze.

Normally, that would have been pretty immaterial to my interests…except right now I was exhausted and carrying an INCREDIBLY heavy box of metal bars. The bars were all B-rank, and Impa...

A Novel Approach chapter 118

Wish upon the Stars chapter 946

The rest of the raids went smoothly. We dropped in to help with two others, and to my complete and utter shock, we netted a cool hundred points for our efforts, two thirds of my entire haul up to this point. I was sitting at two hundred and fifty points total, and while I had no clue exactly how useful those would be, I knew from discussions with others that it was a high number for where and when in the competition we were at.

Sadly, there was no possible way to do more in just that ho...

Secret Ending chapter 86

Wish upon the Stars chapter 945

The ghosts fell on me like a pack of rabid hyenas. Probably. I wasn’t sure if hyenas retained the necessary presence of mind to form a pack after contracting rabies, but in a general sense, they were a group of very angry barely lucid monsters who definitely wanted to do me harm, so it was close enough.

They weren’t the strongest ghosts here. These were C-rank ghosts, not B-rank. I suspected the wish had somehow tweaked things to allow me to end up here, otherwise I’d have definit...