“Keep going!” Sarke pushed.
“I’m already as deep as I can go!” sounded Lim’s muffled reply. “Do you have any idea how much shit is crawling all over me right now?”
“And if you don’t keep your mouth shut, it will only be worse.”
There was a moment of delay.
“I thought the mask was supposed to protect me…” came Lim’s pitiful voice.
“You never know… Some of these bugs can be very persistent,” Sarke said, mercilessly. “So grab th...
2025-07-11 10:30:32 +0000 UTC
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>>>
I'm really sorry for the delay, everyone! Had a bit of scare today and had to rush off to the hospital. Turns out, everything is all good!
Again, apologies for the delay! And I will also be replying to comments as soon as possible!
>>>
Now that’s more like it… Nar thought grinning to himself as he checked his gains.
-[ You have leveled up!
You have gained:
Strength 37 -> 38
Con...
2025-07-10 13:13:19 +0000 UTC
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“Get ready, the barrier is coming down soon!” Calli shouted. “Targets coming up next!”
The large boar, and even the matriarch and the rest of the boar family rushing over to their patriarch went grayscale under the influence of Calli’s granted [Strategist View] skill, which worked directly with all of their UIs through the System itself.
Oh, that one’s my target, he noticed, eyeing the smallest of the young beasts, who had kept its color. And rather than wonde...
2025-07-09 10:24:51 +0000 UTC
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Cen gave out a strangled cry as she got entangled with a particularly gnarly bush and almost slipped on the dark, muddy floor to boot.
“You okay?” Lim asked, bending down to help untangle the hapless caster.
“Thanks, and sorry!” the caster said, making a face under her hood.
“No worries!” Lim said.
Nar glanced up from them, and scanned the blurry jungle.
According to Sarke, they were almost to their destination, and around them, the jungle undergrowth...
2025-07-08 10:24:43 +0000 UTC
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Nar kept his hooded head bowed under that endless pouring of heavy, warm water, his eyes on the underbrush at his feet. The colors and the lights of the Brightnight were dimmed and obfuscated by the relentless rain that poured down from the canopy above, and Nar grimaced every time he stepped and jostled the water that had made it inside his jungle suit around. Even his supposedly waterproof boots were soaked, unable to keep out the flood of water and mud that he waded through.
Shou...
2025-07-07 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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“Right, with that settled, we still need to figure out how we’re going to be doing this,” Kur said a few minutes later, looking up from his cereal bar. “Our original plan was to split the parties in two. One stays to guard the camp, and the other heads out into the jungle to gather and harvest. But now, we can have three instead. Two out in the field and one standing watch and resting at camp, and at lunch time we swap out one of the teams that went outside.”
“It sounds like...
2025-07-04 10:30:39 +0000 UTC
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A little ball of fur darted towards them as they returned, and Nar picked up the little wolf cub, raising him to his face. Wetness lapped at his nose, and Nar groaned.
“Ugh… Wolfie, what did you eat?” he muttered, twisting his nose as he plopped the little beast back on the floor.
The little bundle of joy and energy then proceeded to wag his tail at Jul’s feet, demanding attention from her. And the quam was all too happy to provide it, getting down to scratch the little cu...
2025-07-03 10:30:03 +0000 UTC
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The rain didn’t ease overnight, and its constant droning kept pulling Nar into memories in the darkness of the B-Nex. When he managed to sleep, it wasn’t for long, as he woke up at the sounds of the others swapping for the last watch before dawn.
Knowing that sleep wouldn’t come, because he didn’t want to face anymore nightmares nor that sweltering, sticky heat inside that tent, Nar gave up on sleep altogether. His inventory was phenomenal at cleaning whatever went into it, thou...
2025-07-02 10:16:14 +0000 UTC
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Most people quickly dispersed after that, though Nar, feeling strangely awake, allowed himself to languish where he was, making small conversation with Kur while he continued to regrow the missing bit of flesh from under his left bicep.
As he chatted away with his party leader, recounting the battle to Kur, Nar wondered if he should bring up the weird feeling he had sensed regarding Leon. However, the more he thought about it, the more he wondered if he had imagined that strange mix of ...
2025-07-01 10:37:03 +0000 UTC
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A short while later, Leon dropped onto one of their collapsible chairs with a groan of relief.
“I seriously can’t thank you guys enough,” he said again, looking in between Kur, who had introduced himself, to Nar and Viy, who had guided the exhausted party back to their camp.
“Again, just doing our duty,” Kur said. By now, Nar had spent enough time with his party leader to tell a friendly, if somewhat still reserved and cautious tone. “I’m really glad we could help yo...
2025-06-30 10:30:02 +0000 UTC
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>> Apologies for the delay! I wanted to add a big life update after the chapter! <<
Nar exhaled heavily, water droplets bursting from his face. The downpour was incessant, and he felt as though he was standing in a lukewarm shower as he considered the dead beasts around them.
No, this might be even heavier than our shower, he thought idly. Though at least it washed off of all the blood bits.
“I know it’s a pain in the ass in this rain an...
2025-06-27 11:24:21 +0000 UTC
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More and more beasts dropped down on them from the swarming, massive tree trunks, and despite Nar’s frenzy of [Aura Blades], he achieved close to nothing in stemming that dark tide of fur and claw.
“You guys don’t have to die for us!” the male aethermancer suddenly shouted, his voice somehow still ringing clear and free of fear of doubt in that mess. “I didn’t think it would be this bad! I release you from the Crystal’s Mercy! Please, run!”
“It doesn’t work lik...
2025-06-26 10:30:02 +0000 UTC
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“We do?” Tun asked, speaking before any of them could form any sort of reply. Nar glanced in the direction of the big tank, but he couldn’t read anything from his all-black eyes, or dark scaly face. Even the spines covering his skull and running down his neck remained still.
“Of course we do!” Row bristled, slapping his arm. “They’re our people!”
“They might not be, but we still have to help,” Sej said, frowning. “Even if we ignore the fact that people are ab...
2025-06-25 10:44:02 +0000 UTC
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They had barely made it five minutes away from the stream, when a massive, glowing green and purple snake leaped from its hiding spot to try and swallow Viy whole.
It had been perfectly masked within an agglomerate of green glowing bushes and and purple fronds, but fortunately, the halberdier had reacted quickly enough to just about get out of the way, and there was enough room for half of them to pile onto the 16-feet long snake and pummel it to death. The beast’s HP soaked up a lot ...
2025-06-24 10:30:02 +0000 UTC
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The last watch of the night was an uneventful one.
Nar kept his senses up and extended to a wide radius around their tent, but other than the occasional shifting in the undergrowth, the darkness was peaceful, leaving the three auramancers to spend their time training their auras.
Just as the Master of Aura had told them, weeks ago, the process of strengthening their aura pathways was a straightforward and tedious one, if painful. Nar wasn’t allowed to voice his pain, and, in som...
2025-06-23 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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Leta proved to be an absolute delight of a person, with an easy smile that proved impossible to deny.
They were surprised by a large, land-based bird beast with short short wings but wicked claws and beak within five minutes of leaving the others behind, and while between Nar, Tuk and Rel, they made short work of it, in her shock, Rel stumbled onto a glowing purple bush that left her with a nasty rash across her neck and chin. Leta easily handled it by pushing a rather sharp looking and...
2025-06-20 10:30:02 +0000 UTC
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“Good job, you got the alpha couple that lead this float of tygalos. That’s what you call a herd of them, by the way,” Sej spoke in the stunned quiet. “The rest of the float will now feed on their dead, and fight to see which couple will rise to take the leadership.”
“And they won’t attack us again until then,” Kur said. “Which should give us a while, right?”
Sej nodded as she stored her gun, and that, more than her nod, was confirmation that they were safe for...
2025-06-19 10:30:00 +0000 UTC
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He landed with a grunt, and half blind but still feeling something trying to chew through his bone, he turned with a growl rumbling past his lips. And pulling his sword out of his inventory, Nar brought it down squarely in the middle of the tygalo’s forehead.
There was a moment of resistance, as the beast's HP sought to absorb the damage, but there was no blocking that kind of death blow and anger… Not at their levels at least, and warm, brown blood splattered across Nar’s wet fac...
2025-06-18 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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Nar was on the move before most of them could even react to Kur’s orders, his sword slashing in deadly arcs of brilliant aura and cutting down beasts before they could gain a foothold ashore. But it was only a matter of time before the beasts went around him…
“Nar!” Tun thundered behind him. “Let me have them!”
Nar sensed the morsvar’s ponderous steps behind him as he marched right into that seething edge of razor sharp teeth and claws, and Nar didn’t question the ...
2025-06-17 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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“We are getting separated in this,” Tun suddenly said, above the hubbub of conversation.
Row and Kur had forbidden anyone from using either the domain party chat or their individual party chats for anything other than serious business or threats, and staying completely silent had only lasted a whole of twenty minutes before a slightly embarrassed and subdued Tuk started yapping again with Jaz, even if in hushed tones, and for the rest of them to resume normal conversation as they co...
2025-06-16 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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Conversations, shouts and calls quickly faded behind them as the party headed south, wading deeper into the Jungle Tops and the Brightnight itself to put some distance between them and the stream of still arriving parties.
It was disturbing how quickly the jungle seemed to gobble up the sounds of hundreds of people in a matter of a few minutes of walking through the dense vegetation. There was nothing but shadows, colourful lights, and green mist covered tree trunks and foliage no matte...
2025-06-13 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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From amidst the crowd of green and brown clad apprentices, Nar stared up at the glowing red, half cube before him.
The gathering of the Scimitar’s apprentices was being herded by their guides towards either of the two middle and crimson shining cubes jutting from the impossibly tall wall of the Labyrinth towering above them. The cube they headed for would take them to the boundary of the Jungle Tops, which stood at the very North of the Brightnight, while the cube besides it would tak...
2025-06-12 10:30:02 +0000 UTC
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The two guides took them under a structure made up of benches and rows of columns, where apprentices and guides were gathering and checking gear, their backpacks and chatting amongst themselves, filling the air with a near deafening hubbub.
Lights flickered from fans overhead as they squeezed through the stifling crowds, the air suffocatingly hot and stale under that low, dirty ceiling.
“Here’s not so bad,” Sej said, leading them towards the back of the structure, close enou...
2025-06-11 10:30:02 +0000 UTC
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“Keep heading towards the exit. Just follow the red arrows and stay inside the red lines!” one of the Scimitar’s crew shouted as they exited the beetle and headed down the stairs from the landing pad. “And pay attention to what's going on around you!”
Nar only had time to glimpse several other elevated landing pads across the rooftops of the large, wide building they had landed atop of, each with ships and crews busy with their own tasks, and in the distance, out of the corner...
2025-06-10 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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Part 2 - Brightnight
“And yet, like them, I cannot but wonder why aura and aether are so antithetical. A non-insignificant portion of ex-Climbers cling to the belief that aura is a punishment power source forced upon them for the Original Sin committed by their ancestors, and that aura was meant to strip them of their divine right as Children of the Crystal to wield aether. And as such, they come to understand that even forgiven, some measure of punishment is still due upon themse...
2025-06-09 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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Tys ducked under his elbow, her neck bending back as she lowered herself to effortlessly avoid the hit to her face, and Nar groaned inwardly as in the grips of his accelerated [NPC], he knew that he had just opened himself to a Creation of hurt.
However, instead of her dagger punching into his side, or her knee hitting him hard enough to crack ribs and send him hurtling across the orange, blood soaking sands of the arena, she instead flicked his nose.
“Ow?” he said, in surpris...
2025-06-06 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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The broken constructs zoomed in and out of focus of her right eye, the left being forced closed under a liberal seeping of dark blood that poured down from a gash just above her eye.
Breath came quick and hot from within her, her jaw dropped, her sharp teeth showing, as she sought to regain control of herself. The shield lay on the floor besides her, and her left hand was propped against her knee, the right hand still holding on uselessly to her flail.
“You have made remarkable ...
2025-06-05 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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They sat quietly around the table in their common room. Before them, their touch-screens were filled with the endless file that was their prep material for the jungle domain.
Nar sighed and stretched his back, his eyes gritty, and checked his UI as he did so.
Almost midnight. The cilices will activate soon again, he thought, trying not to grimace at the thought of the two bands wrapped around his biceps. And then back to more dungeons tomorrow.
This time, t...
2025-06-04 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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They left engineering earlier than they had intended, carrying with them a still unconscious Cen. They promised to return to get a proper tour of the place, but feeling Mok’s burning eyes on his back, and remembering their conversation, Nar doubted he would return. At least not for a good while.
It’s not that he resented her, but he wasn’t ready for that sort of kindness and realistic help yet.
As naive as it was, he still preferred his party's promises to keep looking for a...
2025-06-03 10:30:01 +0000 UTC
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“Remember, if it gets too much at any point, just come back to the lift, alright?” Mok told them, not for the first time, as the lift slowed towards their mysterious destination.
“We’ll be okay, M, don’t worry,” Tuk said, patting her back.
“I’m being serious! The aetheric concentration down here is…”
The doors opened and for a moment it was as though a clawed vice clamped over Nar’s mouth. Cold sweat broke out across his body, and whatever hair wasn’t...
2025-06-02 10:30:02 +0000 UTC
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