Malcolm Tent

A Novel Approach chapter 87

Wish upon the Stars chapter 869

Seeing my great grandparents together among those black volcanic mountains was…odd. The two of them were so innocuous. Young and relaxed and elegant, standing beside each other like a couple from some royal portrait. “They remind me of Shane and Callie,” my sister said quietly. “I’ve never seen great-grandpa look so…young. He’s usually got this ageless quality about him, like he could be a million years old.”

My grandmother chuckled. “They bring out the best and the wo...

Secret Ending chapter 40

Wish upon the Stars chapter 868

Black Sorrow didn’t look even slightly uncomfortable with her position between us and enemy god who had been expecting her. Raxus, to his credit, didn’t look any more intimidated. He looked young, actually. Eighteen or nineteen, pale with sunken dark eyes and floppy hair. Very delicate. He looked like a really morose poet. In comparison, my great grandmother’s razor sharp features made her seem like an evil princess. Noble and malicious.

“Black Sorrow,” said the god of decepti...

Secret Ending chapter 39

Wish upon the Stars chapter 867

The cleanup took less time than expected. Of course, that might have been partially because my head was swimming the whole time it was going on. I might have blacked out a few times. My first discovery after the end of my little rampage was that I had DRAMATICALLY underestimated the toll it would take.

Namely, the fact that my fucking Chronicle was CRACKED. I hadn’t noticed it while it was happening, because the constant pressure it was under had actually held it together, but after t...

A Novel Approach chapter 86

Wish upon the Stars chapter 866

It felt like it went on for eternity. The moments dragged, somehow spawning from between each other, stretching seconds into minutes. The staff was starting to flag, I’d asked too much of it too quickly. But I had to keep going, had to hold it just a bit longer.

This was the plan. It was all on Crell, really. His power was the fulcrum on which we were balancing this entire raid.

We’d talked about it while we worked on the formation diagrams, helping Chelsea sort them all out, ...

Secret Ending chapter 38

Wish upon the Stars chapter 865

We arrived at the doors to the exit chamber about forty minutes later. We kept having to move along the hallway to do our calculations because the energy flows were pushing us, but apparently Skartaris had decided to be sneaky and ended up shooting himself in the foot, because the progress was very gradual.

When we reached the entrance, Crell stopped us. “Everyone knows their places?” He asked quietly. “C-rankers up front, along with the ten strongest D-rankers, and the rest of yo...

A Novel Approach chapter 85

Wish upon the Stars chapter 864

We headed for the exit straight away after combining the groups. Once we were all together, I could see a change in Crell. His previous easygoing snark melted away, and his eyes started to shine with a feverish intensity. Anyone who could hide as deeply and work as hard for a cause as he had must be someone of supreme determination, and I could see that in him now. When his victory was at hand, he seemed almost like a sword, drawn at last to free his edge.

“I have to ask,” I finally...

Secret Ending chapter 37

Wish upon the Stars chapter 863

There were a lot of people surrounding us. Our group was a hundred and fifty people, and they had us outnumbered two or three to one, at least. I grimaced. Someone had sold us out. But the weird thing was, I didn’t FEEL any danger. Even now, my Danger Sense wasn’t going off. I could see the threat, but I didn’t feel threatened.

Of course, I wasn’t stupid enough to assume we were safe. Maybe they had a way to block my danger sense, but at the very least I felt a bit less panicked...

Secret Ending chapter 36

Wish upon the Stars chapter 862

The first thing I did the next morning was create and distribute my scrolls. I ended up asking all fifty of the C-rankers to try to offer Creation stats. It wasn’t a commonly used stat for most Ascendants, and mine was laughably far behind the rest of my stats at this point. Once that was done though, we officially split into groups, getting ready to head out on our assault.

Delilah, who was going with the other group, gathered us all up to go over our entry points before we left, jus...

A Novel Approach chapter 84

Wish upon the Stars chapter 861

The next stage of the conclave was much less mysterious. We’d left behind the basement full of stone pillars and had retired to a large golden ballroom. The walls were white paneled with gold trim, and the floors were white marble inlaid with gold. Weirdly, despite being similar material to the city outside, this place looked much more refined.

Among the golden trim, the white paint and marble created a sense of restrained wealth and complex elegance, as opposed to the garish “we du...

Secret Ending chapter 35

Wish upon the Stars chapter 860

The conclave took place in the bones of the tower. It was different than the other towers we’d been to. This was missing Veldran’s cute little complex, underneath this tower was something different. Emptiness. Miles and miles of it. 

We came down a small staircase into a colossal chamber. The roof was maybe three hundred feet above us, but we couldn’t see any of the walls, just darkness that seemed to stretch on for eternity. The roof was being held up by huge stone pillars, ...

A Novel Approach chapter 83

Wish upon the Stars chapter 859

Five days went by in a blur. Forty more scrolls put me at ninety two, just one day short of a hundred (not counting the three emergency scrolls my friends kept on hand), and I wasn’t any less nervous because of the excess. Bethy had been working with Callie and I the whole time, and we’d mostly come up with a stable method of training we were PRETTY sure would help.

Which was what we were doing now. Stacking our influence as we tried to prepare for the conclave. It was starting in a...

Secret Ending chapter 34

Wish upon the Stars chapter 858

Meeting up with the others the next day was pretty amusing. I woke up, stockpiled my scrolls, and then headed down to see the reactions to my wife’s new trait. Most of them were pretty blown away by Callie’s changes. Her gorgeous blue black wings and new eyes highlighted her costume pretty well, though we’d had to send her coat to be adjusted for her wings.

Unlike Sammael, Callie couldn’t turn her trait OFF, which meant that she had wings all the time. Adjusting her costume to s...

Secret Ending chapter 33

Wish upon the Stars chapter 857

The changes of the fruit started to appear before Callie woke up. Specifically, my Master Paired Duelling skill changed to become a completely new skill. Master Angelic Bond. It was a Skill I’d never heard of before, nor had anyone else with us. This was especially notable because Serah and Holly came from an entire faction of angels, and they would be exactly the kind of people to know about a Skill like that.

I held Callie through the changes, keeping her from hurting herself. I ha...

A Novel Approach chapter 82

Nsfw, mind the tags.

Wish upon the Stars chapter 856

When we got back to the room, Callie and I called everyone, letting them know not to disturb us, and then settled in to begin the real work. Deciding the best place to do said work was the library, we sat in the living room together, linked hands, closed our eyes, and then I pulled her through the bond into my inner world.

We arrived in the library without much fanfare. Callie blinked in shock as she looked at the Ten Demons Tome. Namely, at the giant ass spectral TREE that now floated ...

Secret Ending chapter 32

Wish upon the Stars chapter 855

The next day, after making my scrolls, I met with Dirk, the humanized Bull. I had to admit, I was pretty excited. I’d met plenty of beasts, but none of them had taken human form. I’d been told that most animals had no interest in assuming a human shape on rank up, and it could only happen after D-rank. Theoretically, it could happen ANY time after D-rank, but when an animal spent its whole life ranking up into a higher level form of beast, it took a big mental shift for it to change its s...