dragonheartednovels

Quick Poll for next Story's Blurb

Posted a few chapters for this a while ago and it sort of languished until now. Since I've got a few chapters ready I wanted see what people thought of the blurb I came up for it when I post it to the other places. Poll will be up for a day. Anyway, here's the blurb:

Have you ever believed in magic? That fantasy monsters and cryptid beasts could be real? At those moments, did your mind stray to what might hide in the dark?

I’m about to find out.

Not that the kno...

[D'sP] Fae Powered Growth - Chapter 271

Doyle sighs, ‘So with that bit of drama wrapped up, I’m going to assume Ace and friends will focus on delving for the next boss.’

Ally nods, ‘That seems likely enough. Does that mean you’re going to make a new floor?’

Doyle sighs again, ‘Second thing on the list. First, though, I have to take a look at my paths.’

Ally frowns, ‘Why the sigh? Paths are the core of what makes you, so they’re sort of important.’

Doyle tilts back and forth, ‘I really...

[D'sP] Downfall Of The Council - Chapter 270

You would think that the council would understand how important the traders were. After all, pre-system money made the world go round. Instead, they treated them like pack mules or independent truckers.

Important? Yes, but someone you treated as important? Most certainly not. Though the fact that there were so few of them didn’t help. That is, it didn’t help either side of the equation.

Pre-system the council could have gotten away with screwing over a small number of workers,...

[NR] Space Water - Chapter 469

Rosha walks over, "So, what's the stats on that thing? It isn't an accessory or anything, but stand alone magic items like that tend to be quite rare as drops."

Jason shared the description and caused Courtney to freeze in shock.

{Everfull Ice Skin of the Deep Sky

Description: This water skin is made from the hide of a tardigroid that was a single piece of hollow ice. The skin retains the monster's ability to fully restore the water within it three times a d...

[NR] Ice Shell - Chapter 468

The sixth floor was strange. All previous floors had a mix of tardigroids, but mostly featured the more feral forms. That was no longer the case.

While most groups of monsters would still have more animalistic members. The general composition switched to being at least half bipedal in form. This didn't mean the monsters were any smarter.

However, along with a more humanoid form came a smaller size. Even if being built like a tank was useful in a one on one fight, a humanoid shape ...

[D'sP] Square Brackets Vs Parentheses - Chapter 269

{Mithril (lv20) pattern gained at lv20}

Doyle spends the time waiting for Ally to get back staring at the remains of the mithril sample. There was only about a sliver of the stuff remaining after he had deconstructed enough of it for the pattern. On top of that, unlike the other samples, this pattern was low level. Oh, and of course the fact it seemed to have two levels attached to it.

Though even without Ally, he had a pretty good feel for what the first level meant. It likely wo...

[NR] A Little Boost - Chapter 467

Jason considers what the others had just revealed before nodding. "I'll have to focus on breaking away from the System's direct control then. Well, I will after we finish this. I doubt we'll have much time that we can spend together before we need to split up."

Rosha pouts, "We've hardly been able to stay together as a group and you're already thinking of leaving?"

Courtney sighs, "He has a rather unique situation. It will likely take him only a few times longer to go from level 3...

[NR] A Little Tired - Chapter 466

The giant tardigroid at first feels pain as Jason's never ending threads dig deeper into its body, and then nothing. Well, more than just nothing. It loses feeling in the front left shoulder and arm as the limb goes limp.

In the end, the monster's size was just a little awkward. Too big to properly defend itself against Jason's attack and yet at the same time too small to ignore. A proper Kaiju would have been able to take the strike and have kept going.

Then Lily finishes sending...

[Closed] Deciding the Short Story Prompt for February 2023

Below are the full prompts as the poll doesn't allow the full text. In the case of ties the first option that got there wins. The short story will be finished by the end of the month and will be available to all patrons.

• Powerful Cat (or some other type of pet) keeping its weak owner alive after an apocalypse because it can't live without them petting and or brushing them.
• Tastes like Chicken - Multiverse tourism can be quite lucrative when you find the right alt-verse. T...
  2023-02-04 04:37:11 +0000 UTC View Post

[D'sP] Aftermath 2, Something For You - Chapter 268

The shark-toothed lady stepped into the dungeon and made her way to the second floor so no one would realize she was there. A smart plan as soon enough people were back to delving. Sure, the first floor is less popular in theory, however it has more instances so while unable to delve the sixth, people would hit up the first.

After a quick look around, she took out a selection of weapons, each enchanted. Then came a set of five magical herbs, each one recognized and common as dirt on bas...

[D'sP] Aftermath Up Top - Chapter 267

Ace sighed as the lady left, though Jim didn’t let him relax long.

Jim, “So uh, I don’t think we’re getting rid of this platform any time soon.”

Ace frowned, noticing that the changes the lady had made to the platform persisted. In fact, the entire structure looked more stable than the wall behind it. “I don’t want an executioner’s platform outside my town’s gate.”

Jim snorts, “I don’t think you get a choice about it. Give the town menu a quick check ...

[NR] Ten Icy Or One Big Boy? - Chapter 465

An arrow streaks across the cavern before bursting into more shards of burning metal than the arrow head could possibly create, peppering the icy tardigroids. As an opening salvo, this does a decent job of distracting the monsters.

Decent enough that Courtney, Jason, and Lily are able to make it halfway across the arena before the tardigroids can respond. Though the three could have gone farther if not for running out of obstacles to hide behind. There just wasn’t anything big enough ...

[NR] Arena Fight - Chapter 464

Jason sighs, “Not worth looking into them. Though it does make me wish I had been more knowledgeable about the subject. I’m sure at least a few of the bits of loot I’ve gotten would have worked. What are the chances I get something to use from the dungeon?”

Courtney shrugs, “Really hit or miss. One of the big requirements is that the material can’t be big enough to create something other than an accessory. This is partly because it represents power being condensed, but mostl...

[Closed] Collecting Short Story Prompts for February 2023

Once again I'm here to ask all of you for short story prompts! I'll take the more popular ones as decided by the number of hearts (or that I particularly like) in the comments and make a poll at the start of the month. The winner will be made into a short story of a thousand or so words.

Not many rules on what you can suggest at the moment. That will mostly be figured out as we go. Besides that, the short story will come out before the end of the next month.

Rules for prompts:

[Archived Short Story] Seer Didn't See It Coming

Magic is a funny thing. Take invisibility as an example. To the rest of the world, it is as if light is traveling through the invisible person and yet, despite everything we know about how light works, they can still see.

For most people, this is a relatively vague thing that even the magic users casting the spell don’t care about. After all, sometimes magic decides to agree with you when you realize what it is doing is impossible. Believe hard enough that you shouldn’t be able to s...

[D'sP] Neither Judge Nor Jury, Just An Executioner - Chapter 266

Ace and Jim are sitting in a private room, deep within the dungeon sphere complex. On a table in front of them, are a bunch of system screens laid out like so many pieces of paper. Nine of them are grayed out while the other 39 have red marks on them. Though those marks don’t quite match the rest of the panel. Sort of like someone had used a similar font, but it wasn’t quite the same.

Ace sighs, “So how much wiggle room do we have?”

Both of them knew that when dealing with...

[NR] Matching Bracelets - Chapter 463

Rosha rolls her eyes, "Anyway, my gear took a bit more work. You'll notice it isn't quite as color consistent. That sort of wasn't avoidable.

"You generally don't see hair like mine in the wild and so to find matching colors requires a little more work. Silver actually would be a decent enough match, you know, except for how dumb and obvious it would be. Though without that I'm basically limited to pastels.

"Who knew that being a white and pink bunny would have a downside? Still, ...

[NR] Not ShadowS, ShadowED - Chapter 462

Jason laughs and points his be-furred fist away from the others before sending out a couple rapid body blasts through it causing all the fur to fly out, embedding into the wall before it vanishes. "There we go, that was easy enough. Now what kind of loot did we get?"

Courtney pulls out a magnifying glass. Jason sort of remembers seeing it before. Then again, he might just be thinking of the one Gregor had. Though the purpose is obvious enough and soon enough she tells the others what th...

[D'sP] Maybe The Rules Were There For A Reason - Chapter 265

Doyle sighs, ‘Well, you aren’t wrong. I did consider adding a couple of void kobolds to the fifth floor. Though even if I don’t end up doing that, I’m certainly going to have a couple go there for a little.’

Ally nods, ‘You basically have to. Who knows if the monument will end up reacting to them or not? While I don’t see a direct copy of them on the thing, I see some winged kobolds that might be related.

‘After all, space is the perfect place for wings when not de...

[D'sP] Void, But Not That Void - Chapter 264

Doyle suddenly thinks of something. ‘So, that river over there? We call the next settlement over “the settlement upriver” because, well, it’s upriver from here. While I can’t be certain, the local settlements seem to be in somewhat of a diamond shape with us, anchoring the one end.’

Ally nods, ‘That seems to be the case. If I had to guess, there is probably another dungeon on the other side of the diamond. Though since we haven’t heard of it yet, we probably won’t hear...

[NR] Black And White - Chapter 461

With about ten minutes to spare, Jason is in the dining room, eating the early bird breakfast. Though seeing as this was an inn relatively close to the dungeon, he is far from the only one there. In fact, even when he first got down there from his room there were already people leaving after having finished their meal.

Jason doesn’t have to worry about being ready that early today as their instance will have reset by now. A fact that proves true soon enough, as neither Rosha nor Court...

[NR] Clearing A Meridian - Chapter 460

After bandaging up Jason’s arms, the party retreats out of the dungeon. Not just that, but they decide to let the dungeon reset. Of course, they would have preferred just resetting the fourth floor, but that wasn’t an option.

As for why? Simple, they shouldn’t have suffered so much so early. While the glass tardigroid was a surprise, it shouldn’t have been a “nearly lose both arms” surprise.

Even the easy going Rosha agreed that they weren’t taking the dungeon seriou...

[D'sP] Well That's Comforting - Chapter 263

Doyle, ‘So since I can’t really do much about getting my queen up to speed, is there a way to kick-start the kobolds? With how you described the racial languages, as long as I get them up to speed it should stick even if people start delving aggressively. Well, I guess the boss and her friends could spread it when given a chance. Actually, now that I think about it I don’t think I have kobolds in the fifth floor farm so I guess they’ll have to.’

Ally nods, ‘As long as delver...

[NR] Ouch - Chapter 459

Courtney rolls her eyes, “Jason, the drop isn’t going to go anywhere. It doesn’t matter how well you handle pain, let me fix up your arms before looking into that. In fact, Rosha, you go take a look so he isn’t distracted.”

Jason laughs, “Just a flesh wound! Cover it up and ignore it for a little. It will go away.”

Courtney raises an eyebrow, “Are you feeling a little loopy from blood loss?”

Jason continues to laugh, “No clue! If I had to guess, something...

[NR] But Is He Right? - Chapter 458

Jason shrugs, “While an attack that covers miles can be useful, that is for smashing the weak. Oh sure, it can be useful against stealth or speed, but after a certain point AoE attacks are inconsequential. The damage is comparatively weak.

“A fireball that can kill a thousand mooks might not even break through the resistance of a single enemy of equal level. Right now? Sure, no one around our level will be able to shrug off a fireball. Give it a hundred more levels, though?

�...

[D'sP] Despite The Wait, He Was Too Early - Chapter 262

Of course, after the party breaks up when they get back to town, Henry is off to see the butcher. And honestly, he isn’t wrong in his opinion. The butcher can help him. In fact, with the limitations placed on the butcher by Ace, it could even be seen as safe.

Yet still, Henry is about the only one who is regularly getting lessons that hasn’t been assigned to do so. After all, even if Ace doesn’t like the butcher, Ace also understands they need his knowledge. As it stands, even if ...

[D'sP] Queen's Gibberish - Chapter 261

Doyle stood back from himself and considered the floors. In theory, which floor he chooses doesn’t matter as eventually the ageless ant queen will become a wandering boss. However, the system seemed to like to say stuff like that and then under deliver. After all, he had gotten the paths related to his monsters evolving into elemental variants a while ago and yet nothing. It almost felt like someone out there was rolling dice and yet never getting a crit.

Whatever the case may be, for...

[NR] Spicy Take - Chapter 457

Rosha pouts a little, but she does end up admitting their situation is a bit different from Peter. So, after a little more faffing about, the group turns around and leaves the dungeon. Though without the fights, it only takes them a quarter hour to get back. Of course, they were “leaving early” no matter how you slice it so the people monitoring the exit paid extra attention to them until they noticed the group only had three people.

For a full group, especially one that didn’t lo...

[NR] When It Resets - Chapter 456

Courtney sighs, “While interesting, how does the fact that you believe dungeons are basically the System’s attempt to convert all the Energy into Qi and Mana affect us?”

Jason shrugs, “Well, for me personally it means I’ll be dungeon diving a lot more at the higher levels. The fact that a dungeon’s core room removes all Mana and Qi regeneration means it is basically prime real estate for my in-game cultivation. I’m sure it won’t be a one stop shop of course, but useful n...

[Closed] Deciding the Short Story Prompt for January 2023

Below are the full prompts as the poll doesn't allow the full text. I'm going to run the poll for five days and in the case of ties the first option that got there wins. The short story will be finished by the end of the month and will be available to all patrons.

• "DEY TOOK 'ER JERBS!!!"  The Knight Lord Commander was slumped over the bar after his 5th drink, or was it his 6th? Bah, doesnt matter, nothing matters anymore. Ever since the kingdom decided to sta...
  2023-01-04 11:34:17 +0000 UTC View Post