Ellake

Chapter 212 - Time to Decide

Nate took a deep breath. Arikanvil had just dropped a bombshell on them. The Law of Reciprocity might keep the True Divine being in front of them from attacking them once they ascended, as being a Lesser Divine put them outside his strata. There would be no such protection from any Lesser Divines present on Galle. Worse, Arikanvil had just told them that the level disparity was unlikely to be small, and as individuals who could contain and generate more Divine Energy, they would likely be con...

Chapter 211 - A System Divine

Nate suppressed his knee-jerk reaction to immediately deny Arikanvil. The tall, purple Divine watched them passively waiting for an answer and Nate used the moment to review everything he had deduced since their last meeting. Arikanvil was bound by the Law of Reciprocity. Everything he had done had been to balance his side of the equation, and when given the chance to broker a deal with Nate to save him from the Fourth Hell, he’d said no. In short, Arikanvil was not a friend, not an ally, h...

Chapter 210 - Blood Erased

Kiri stared at her falling body as she stood within her Soul Sanctuary. Two Soul Twins waited behind her, a third fading as she spent the contained soul energy within it to restore herself. Back in her body, completely restored, she was still falling towards the sand, but her focus was elsewhere. The feeling of connectedness, of being the only real thing in a sea of illusions was flowing through her body and just like Nate had told her, she tried to direct it before it could bleed away. A fra...

Chapter 209 - Threat of Life

Nate watched as the tree Evindal rode shifted to catch his falling wife. Portos didn’t seem inclined to let up and rushed for the finishing blow, only to lunge through a rift that opened up in front of him. The other end of the rift was in the sky so Portos appeared in the air above and immediately began to fall. The man likely would’ve survived the impact with the ground, but  Nate sensed Helen weaving mana already, wings of blood appearing on the back of her brother, carrying him t...

Chapter 208 - Battlelines

Nate shielded his eyes as light exploded across the sky like a miniature sun. When his vision had cleared there was no sign of the lightning tree and he could barely make out a figure that he assumed to be Aisling fleeing from a snake made of light. Destroying the lightning tree must have managed to erase two of the serpents but the third cut through the sky, its speed incredible to behold. Allais was easy to spot, a new serpent of light coiling around her protectively like some kind of barri...

Chapter 207 - Blood for Blood

Nate stood in his room, checking himself over one last time. Five days had passed in a rush and the hour of their planned attack was fast approaching. Five days had felt like forever, and yet, it was still not enough. Not enough to be as prepared as he would have liked, at least. But he had finished the three projects he had planned with the help of Frick, of course. Kiri, Britt and Null all now possessed Legendary skeletons with affinities for Durability and Reinforcement. As for his own, he...

Chapter 206 - Fickle Hearts

Bordain walked onto the battlefield, confident in his eminent superiority. Three days, he estimated. That was how much longer the Asmuisillans could hold out. Far to his left stalked Topaz. Today she had taken the form of a Feralli. Smaller than her usual forms, it only came up to his hip, but then, she’d been forced to expend more of her gathered supplies and was slowly running out of more powerful forms she could use. Of course, she had kept her most powerful forms for their return to the...

Chapter 205 - Plotting a Course

Nate tried very hard not to be distracted by the thoughts running rampant through his mind. He failed miserably. The night with Britt had been bittersweet but the morning had come and they still hadn’t talked about what they were. It seemed to him that his girlfriend was evading the discussion as much as he was and he couldn’t bring himself to force the issue. Especially given everything else going on. After the night of recovery, they had all gathered around the tables to discuss the nex...

Chapter 204 - Family Reunion

Determining the exact nature and content of the deal Nate made with Asmuisil had taken far longer than the initial discussion. In the end, Nate got everything he wanted. Promise of payment of enough Stat Orbs to max out both Kiri and himself at level sixty. Of course, he hadn’t told them his levels, but he knew how many both he and Kiri needed. Secondly, he’d secured a site for a branch of the Artist’s Emporium in Vilaythe, the Capital of Asmuisil. He appreciated they weren’t as conce...

Chapter 203 - Cards Revealed

Nate sat in what he assumed was one of the logistics tents of the Asmuisillan Army, under guard. His escort had handed him off quickly to someone of a higher rank, who had done the same, until Nate had found himself seated in this tent, surrounded by a squad of six mid-Golds. He’d already checked their levels and they were all in the low seventies with Epic Classes. That meant they had likely started at Uncommon. One of the guards had noted his assessment but hadn’t said anything, though ...

Chapter 202 - Controlled Falling

Nate teleported across the plains, headed in the direction of where Bordain’s forces faced off against an Asmuisillan army. After spending time talking through his experiences with Aisling and Evindal, and his discovery of the tier beyond Mythic, they had all agreed that their initial plan needed to remain the same. If they were to give Princess Morgane time to get her own forces to the Capital, then they needed to keep Bordain and his forces occupied. The only way they could see to do that...

Chapter 201 - Heavens Parted

Nate held the golden flower in his hands as it vibrated with a powerful affinity for Life. With a simplistic rune he was denying the flower access to the ambient mana but, even with that protection in place, he could feel the Concepts within the flower butting up against his Barrier. He could even sense the cost in mana his Barrier was expending to keep the flower from influencing him. With such a powerful specimen in hand, there were two opportunities now before him. The one he had been wait...

Chapter 200 - Gifts Abound

Nate stopped talking immediately, doing his utmost not to contribute to the chaos.

“One at a time,” demanded Aisling, her tone brooking no dissent.

Everyone stopped talking. Everyone, except for Kiri, who used the opportunity to drive the topic in the direction she desired.

“He threatened my parents. We need to do something about it,” stated his sister.

Nate couldn’t blame her. He doubted anyone could. So, he voiced his support.

“I agree. We should re...

Chapter 199 - Painted Path

Nate had taken to painting a new wall within his room. The delay of one hour before they would gather to talk had been extended after Kiri sensed Evindal approaching the city. With that delay, everyone had taken up various tasks to keep themselves busy and Kiri had gone to find Evindal. Deverell had disappeared to go see reactions within the Capital to their rescue of the Guildies. Ameera and Karim had elected to leave and return to Gashana with Luc escorting the pair out of the city. Frick w...

Chapter 198 - Counteroffer

Nate had frozen for a moment seeing who was arrayed against them. Three Platinums was a problem on its own and one he wasn’t sure they could challenge. Especially not with the Guildies they had just rescued unarmed and unarmoured. But those concerns paled against being in Bordain’s presence when he wasn’t bothering to veil his power. The mountain of a man who claimed to be the King of Etrua had a presence similar to Aisling that seemed to affect his surroundings. Instead of static, it p...

Chapter 197 - Jailbreak

Nate walked across the grass of the University calmly. Luc and Deverell were close by on his left with Kiri and Aisling to his right. Frick was waiting patiently inside of his Runic Gallery. Two runic arrays hovered around him and were taking up most of his focus. The Illusion rune hid them from sight and included the Sound Sigil to hide any noise they made. Though they were still making an effort to be stealthy. Obfuscation was the second rune and it incorporated a few different Sigils, incl...

Chapter 196 - Searching for Truth

Kiri sat on the edge of the bed in the Den of Desire, the two women before her nodding eagerly.

“You’re sure?” she asked Florence.

“I am,” the woman responded. “He was gloating about it. How they had dragged the Enchanter out of his bed and onto the University grounds. He kept talking about how nice they were, with all the green grass and the trees. I remember because he kept calling it paradise and then talking about the sorts of things we could do in the shade of the...

Chapter 195 - Shifting Fronts

Nate sat around one of the workshop tables with Aisling, Deverell and Jacque as they waited for Kiri to return with Luc. The apprentices were asleep in their own room as it was already reasonably late in the evening. Frick was off working on one of the mana collection sites. Aisling and Deverell were having a hushed conversation about their communications with Morgane and Hildi. Nate, however, was using the small break to give Jacque some advice on his runecrafting. 

Running a fing...

Chapter 194 - Tears Exchanged

Nate stood by the wall, his Brush of a Thousand Paints carefully colouring in the stone wall of the room he shared with Kiri. His sister lay on the bed behind him, watching from beneath the blanket as he painted a picture that was meant to represent her rebirth. The idea of being reborn was hard to capture so he had resorted to symbolism. In the background of the painting were tents like the ones they had seen in Princess Morgane’s war camp. Then closer, in the foreground, he had painted a ...

Chapter 193 - Divided Decisions

Nate glanced for the third time at the last System notification.

Congratulations on regenerating multiple limbs of a sapient being using the Concept of Life.
Your achievement has been recorded.

He was racking up Life Concept-related Achievements and was quietly confident that he would get multiple Life-related options at his next evolution. The evolution itself, though, had been on his mind and he needed to have a talk with Kiri about the topic sooner rather than later...

Chapter 192 - Life Lessons

Nate stepped up beside one of the workshop tables sculpted from the earth of the cavern. Aisling flanked him as Kiri set Deverell down on the cold stone, disturbing a small amount of dust in the process.

“...is he dead?” a small voice asked.

Nate glanced back at Callum, the young boy having slipped up silently to look at Deverell’s pale form. Nate had noted the movement through his sphere of awareness before ignoring it. Shielding the child from the sight would have been his...

Chapter 191 - Hopeful Reunion

An orb of light hovered above Nate's head, allowing him to stare up at the roof of the cave that loomed far above him. The sound of the ocean reverberated all around as he evaluated the space that had once served as both hideout and warehouse for a group of smugglers. Detritus was all that was left of their operation. Rotted wood and rusted metal from what might have once been crates or barrels was piled in a corner, covered in dust. He smiled. It was perfect.

After showing him to the a...

Book 2 Audible Announcement

After a bit of a delay, Book 2 is now out on Audible. For those of you who were waiting, here you go!

Chapter 190 - One Good Turn

“Where in the Capital?” asked Morgane.

“Where would you like to go in the Capital?” Nate countered.

“Is the Capital the best option?” asked the Marquess. “We should approach House Korinth and House Pleras. With Thane dead, the Duke and Duchess may support your claim rather than throwing in their lot with Bordain.”

“The conscripts?” Nate interjected. “If you decide to visit other Houses and gather support, what will become of the remaining ...

CritRPG Podcast Appearance

Hey all, I went on the CritRPG Podcast recently and the videos just dropped. If you want to hear me ramble on for an hour the links are below. It was a fun experience!

https://critrpgpodcast.com/en-aud/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCp9ynRRNvk

Chapter 189 - Bag of Cats

Duchess Desmarais looked upon the tree and frowned at the two burned ribbons. The Twins, her daughters, had passed from this world. She had wondered, if when they eventually failed and died, if she would feel anything at their loss. Remorse perhaps? Or regret? They had been tools she intended to use to secure her son's ascension when he came of age and had the power to defend the Duchy; the point at which her foolish husband would cease to be of use. But now the girls were dead, her son was s...

Chapter 188 - King of Tears

Coralie appeared inside the teleportation room within her mother’s villa, lying on the floor and sobbing. She had failed. Worse, she had failed, and killed the woman she loved in the process. Slamming her fists against the floor, she wailed. Why had Kiri done that? Why!?! It wasn’t fair! The only good thing she’d had in her life in years. The only thing that had been hers, and not something granted and molded by her mother, and she had killed it. She despised herself. Hated what she was...

Chapter 187 - What Is Real

Nate smiled at Kiri through his weariness, his sister keeping an arm around him as they stumbled back to camp. Even with the healing restoring his body, his Feather of Renewal feeding on a constant stream of mana, the repairs didn’t change the fact that he was bone-tired. Both physically and emotionally. Coralie’s betrayal weighed on him, not because he cared much for the Ice Mage. In retrospect he’d had very little to do with her. But he knew it would be tormenting Kiri and that 2025-01-14 19:00:08 +0000 UTC View Post