tobiasbegley

The Twin Trials: Chapter Thirty-Five

I turned and headed down the path of courage. 

Elio had told me it was better to die a happy fool, so courage seemed the right choice. It wasn’t like I wasn’t some wise old sage, and as Dusk happily burbled to let me know: I’d never made wise decisions. Why would I start making them now? 

The path led in a straight line for some time, before finally emerging in the mouth of  yet another cavern. In the center of the cavern stood yet another statue, this time of...

The Archmage: Chapter Eight

It was slow work. I had to hide my sheets each time a guard came to give me good – the quality of which had actually improved slightly, presumably thanks to my cooperation. 

The worst part was when I smeared a line, and was forced to wash it out of the sheet. It meant I had to redo hours upon hours of work. It wasn’t as if blood and a finger was especially well known for being exceptionally precise either, so I wound up having to redo sections more than once. 

But as...

The Archmage: Chapter Seven

I was woken up some time later by the sound of footsteps, and I dragged myself out of bed, dusting myself off and starting to make the bed – at least as much as it could be made. 

“I see you’re awake,” a calm voice that I recognized as Edward Elide said. I turned and gave him a smile that was full of all the confidence that I didn’t have. 

“Mister Elide,” I said, flicking open my third eye. That, at the very least, wasn’t able to be blocked by the wards, ...

The Archmage: Chapter Six

We dashed towards the entry, absorbing our familiars back into ourselves with streaks of power, and I let my divination spells spin. Again, I didn’t try to break the spell, just alter it. 

Creating a doorway sized hole in a dome was harder than shifting the wardlines, which had defined parameters I could tweak. This was just force, though, and as my abjuration prepared to rip a hole in it, I had a horrible realization. 

We wouldn’t all fit.

My cloak was impress...

Mana Mirror: Final(?) Ebook

Hello to all my wonderful patrons! As a part of your tier, you get access to the full, completed, edited ebook before it's release! With Neo Cihi beginning the audiobook reading process now, this SHOULD be the final version!

As a reminder, the book is up for pre-order now: https://www.amazon.com/Mana-Mirror-First-Tobias-Begley-ebook/dp/B0CYHQG7L4

While there is zero ...

The Archmage: Chapter Five

As the force thundered down on me, I realized why Edward was considered to be a good candidate for becoming the next archmage.

But so was I. 

I swept the power of my cloak out around me, running the divination spells on full blast until… There! With a surge of power, I engaged my abjuration functions. 

The spell shattered, reforming under my power, and the hallway exploded as force ripped outwards at Edward. I cut the spell off quickly – Tara was still holding ...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Thirty-Four

Octavian didn’t bother to respond, though, instead dropping the multiple layers of forged mana and rushing in to help Travis and Liz.

The duo had done an excellent job wearing down the drake on their own, but with Octavian, Roh, and Araceli joining the fray, it didn’t take long for them to force the drake to surrender its key.

I didn’t even do much. Apart from the odd overcharged Fungal Lock spell, and Dusk casting her hands spell, we mainly just sat back and watched.

...

What do?

The Twin Trials: Chapter Thirty-Three

Kene wandered around the garden, connecting to various trees to slowly recover his life mana, and then settled down next to the marigolds and spiritbalm. Before he began to overflow his gates, however, he removed the apple that Mallory had given him, and took a bite. 

He slowly chomped away at it as his mana built, and I felt the power sliding out of physical space and into him. 

Then, as gently as a spring breeze, it finished. Third gate magic began to slowly swirl out ...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Thirty-Two

“Give him back his crystals,” I said. 

“I grabbed the hudau–” 

“Not that one,” I cut the thief off. “The recording crystals you stole. Stealing someone’s musical collection just because they’re rich and can afford to replace it? That’s just rude. It isn’t some grand statement of rebellion, it’s just petty.” 

The thief blinked. 

“So you’ll let me take the actually valuable stuff, but you’re going to make me return hi...

The Archmage: Chapter Four

“So, let’s discuss the problems,” Draven said, laying a map down over the table. “Edward Elide owns and operates a small manor-house in Avignon, and it’s well defended.” 

“I’ve snuck past the barriers to a noble house before,” I said neutrally. 

“With their inactive defenses,” Draven said, shaking his head. “With both the old king’s death, Roark dying so recently, and the previous Elide being crippled by our lovely archmage of charms, there’s ...

The Archmage: Chapter Three

“Hi dad,” I said softly as I entered the tailor shop. It had been far too long since I’d seen Aldvarri. With the craziness of the faerie party the year before, we had missed being unable to come to the capitol to see him, and school had occupied my time during the actual year.

Now, though, I had time. Six weeks until I had to be back at Yesgol to begin lesson planning, and about three weeks until the array was charged. I didn’t know if the weeks in between would be safe enough f...

The Archmage: Chapter Two

There was a gentle wind that swept across the ritual circle, and a moment later, a tear in the fabric of reality opened. I leaned up and gave Osheen a quick kiss on the cheek, then stepped into the rift, appearing in the now familiar halls of Awell Meddal’s court. 

Halls… wasn’t the most apt description, though. They had no roof and no walls, and not even floors, merely grass underfoot. The only reason I could tell that this was an actual structure was the pillars of intricat...

The Archmage: Chapter One

Nearly a week after Draven had agreed to help me keep myself human, I found Osheen, Oracle, Bridgette, Draven, Tara and myself all sitting in the depths of Yesgol, studying the spell array.

Draven’s vaults had contained almost all of the components for the ritual that were needed, so while Osheen, Tara, and Oracle worked on repainting the massively complex array, Draven hunted down the few that weren’t, and I worked on fixing Tara’s archmage-level spell bottle.

Technically, ...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Thirty-One

Foxstep was not a spell built for medium or long distance travel. It was a short ranged teleport, one that had been designed that way through thousands of years of evolution. It drew on the life energy in my muscles to do a lot of the heavy lifting for the movement, something I wouldn’t have been able to accomplish without Magister’s Body. It was tied to the senses, at first using the eyes to locate where I was going to teleport, and now using my mana senses, or at least being linked to t...

What do?

The Twin Trials: Chapter Thirty

People were shouting, spells were flying – mostly detection spells, but also attacking spells. 

What kind of idiot was letting loose attacking spells?! 

Then there was a resonating clap, and a surge of powerful mana rippled over the room. Everything twisted and spun. 

Was… Was that Bohn? 

To my surprise, the massive spinning and ripping effect actually helped. Sure, for a moment, it made everything more chaotic, but once the spells that people h...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Twenty-Nine

The inside of the auction house was broken up into a general assembly, with boxes for any team who’d collected at least three hundred points, and luxury boxes for those few who’d collected over a thousand.

The basic box that Kene and I were assigned was nowhere near as fancy as the one that Orykson had brought me to, with chairs made of magically shaped stone and thin pillows, but I was frankly just impressed that the Delitone group had built it so quickly. 

Kene and I ch...

Mana Mirror: Chapter Onne

This parody chapter takes place at the beginning of Mana Mirror. It is COMPLETELY non-canon.

-

Malachi placed his hand on the crystal, and watched as one of the fourteen crystals lit up. Then another. Then another.

Before long, the entire array was glowing. Malachi had all fourteen mana types!

“Nice,” he said, humbly.

“Primes!” shouted the woman, her chest heaving up and down. “How…? The odds of that.”

“Eh, ...

Schedule Update!

Beginning this upcoming Monday (April 1st), there is going to be a schedule shift, to allow me to focus more on writing, while also having a stable day off.

Mana Mirror Chapters will release on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday now.

The Archmage chapters will release EITHER as 2 chapters on Thursday and 2 on Friday, OR as one chapter on each Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

What do?

Sorry, sorry. Left an option off by accident. That's what I get for doing it on my phone lol

The Twin Trials: Chapter Twenty-Eight

Kene used a quick solar spell to dry me off, then looked at the orb once I summoned it, turning it over. 

“What is it?” I asked. 

“Looks like a recording orb natural treasure,” Kene said. “Recording crystals were based on these, actually. They’re able to record your thoughts, or even visual or audio recordings, but over time, they’ll slowly erase everything. They also scan to a specific person, so if I was to use it, then you were, it would scan you and era...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Twenty-Seven

It took Kene half an hour to finish the repairs on my wrist and hand, but when he finished, I downed a healer’s heart imbued potion, and was really feeling much better. 

More importantly, I was feeling confident in my choice to flee. I wanted to go back, but I wanted to do so better prepared than I was now. Maybe with an ally, too. Octavian seemed to be something of a dragon whisperer, maybe he’d be willing to help? Liz and Travis would be a good choice too, as would Kamal or A...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Twenty-Six

“Let’s explore the caves!” I said, rotating my arm that had been broken the day before. It was slightly… off, but it seemed fully operational. I wasn’t entirely sure how to describe it, actually. Sore, but deeper than muscle soreness. 

“Alright,” Kene agreed. “When do you want to go? Also, is your arm okay?” 

“Just a bit sore,” I said, and Kene frowned. 

“Bone is telluric and life, so while I’ve repaired the damage, it won’t be comp...

The Twin Trials: Chapter Twenty-Five

I staggered back into Dusk’s portal and all but collapsed into the ground. I was absolutely exhausted, wrung out like a towel that had been soaked in water and then… Wrung out a bit.

I was too tired to think of any good analogies.

I didn’t intend to pass out, but when I came too, Kene and Dusk had dragged me into the cabin, and I was clamped against Kene like a barnacle to a ship. Dusk was asleep on their chest, curled up like a cat. The fox-bird was curled up on the small r...

What do?

Rusted River Gates

Since there were more than ten votes for both a meme and a look at other projects, I went ahead and decided to do both. A parody chapter will be put up on April Fools, but in the meantime, here's an intro to a book that I... have no idea if I'll ever touch. It's a decent quality, though, and maybe some day.

But I already have way too many projects, lol, so don't expect it!

WARNING: This snippet is intended for a more mature audience than my usual fare. It's not sup...