The smoke was everywhere now. It had only been an hour since the city's residents were displaced, only to be teleported back in random, and no battle had even begun yet. And yet, the entire city was already descending into even more chaos.
This was humanity’s worst nightmare—a Dome appearing right in the heart of a city.
Cars, suddenly without drivers, became deadly projectiles....
2025-04-02 20:21:17 +0000 UTC View Post[Troops deploying in ten minutes. Get ready!]
Heroes.
They had once been creeps—just like Adam and the rest of the terrified people around him. Well, not all of them were afraid. Some were eagerly anticipating their chance to become Heroes, just like the ones standing before them now.
After every battle, the Administrators calculated how much each creep had ...
2025-04-02 20:19:16 +0000 UTC View Post“Adam, run! Just run!”
A dream. Well, it would have been better if it was just that. But as he waded through this muddy and misty world, Adam knew that it was more than that—a memory. A memory he tried to escape from.
A memory he tried to wake up from but never could. In this dream, he was running—typical. But at the very least, someone else was running with him. 2025-04-02 20:17:14 +0000 UTC View Post
“What the!?”
A few hours had passed, and the bus finally arrived at its destination. Violently too, as the driver slammed on the brakes to wake everyone up.
“Aight! Wake up, you fools!” Jefferson slammed his crowbar on the seat, making sure those who were not woken up by the sudden stop opened their eyes, “Line up and open your pouches so I can give you your share!”
<... 2025-04-02 20:15:02 +0000 UTC View PostThe world was dead.
A thick layer of gray dust blanketed everything, stretching endlessly toward the horizon. The wind whispered through the desolation, stirring up faint clouds of ash that drifted like ghosts in the air.
Ghosts. How fitting.
The world was dead.
And in death, a certain kind of life endured.
A small group of figures moved through th...
2025-04-02 20:12:45 +0000 UTC View PostThere was something about the armor that looked almost ancient. No—it truly did look outdated in Dr. Ling’s eyes. But she knew better. Outdated was not a word in Humanity Engineering’s vocabulary.
They were, after all, at the forefront of human advancement.
And yet, no matter how long Dr. Ling studied the exosuit… it looked like something built two thousand years ago.
...
2025-03-31 12:18:14 +0000 UTC View PostJulian’s senses were spiraling.
The daemon plane had gone eerily silent. The harsh wind still howled through the tower’s opening, yet the only sound that truly reached him was the low, rhythmic hum of the Black Box hovering before him.
MEGAN was speaking, but her words barely registered.
He was born in Artemia?
How was that even possible?
Human...
2025-03-29 16:18:48 +0000 UTC View Post“Did… you forget something?”
Odd. Extremely so.
The sensation crawling up Julian’s spine was stranger than the first time he transferred his consciousness to his clone.
Back then, his mind had almost resisted the shift—fighting, stretching, like a rubber band pulled too far before snapping into place.
This was different.
This was raw, di...
2025-03-27 08:19:53 +0000 UTC View Post“Julian! I… I did it! I burned the fucking rat! Do you get it!? Did you get the EXP?!”
“I… wouldn’t know that.”
[I'm afraid determining whether killing the rat had an immediate effect on the master's experience would be impossible. You would need to kill more than one, Silvie.]
“Ack, shut up! I’ve killed like a hundred of 'em, and you’re not even out here f...
2025-03-25 17:48:44 +0000 UTC View Post“W-wait, Mr. Julian! You need clearance to go there too!”
Craig’s opinion of Julian had shifted so many times in just a few hours that he was starting to feel dizzy from it.
At first, he had all sorts of ideas about what humanity’s only known mutant might be like. Maybe he’d be arrogant, maybe he’d be eccentric—but when Julian arrived on the ship, he was just… weird....
2025-03-23 17:47:47 +0000 UTC View Post"Why are you here again!?"
"Julian said there are daemons on the ship, doctor!"
"What do you mean there are daemons on the ship!?"
"I—I’m not sure of the details... he just told me to tell you!"
The frantic buzz of the control room came to a grinding halt. Every single staff member, who had been scrambling to manage the crisis on Mars, froze at the sudden, and extrem...
2025-03-20 12:55:20 +0000 UTC View PostMohinder had never been handled like this.
Perhaps he had, once—back when he was still fully organic. But that was a lifetime ago, a memory lost to time. The last time anything natural remained in his body, he had been six years old. That was when his parents, for no rhyme or reason, decided to place him in a mechanical body—the same one he inhabited now, only with some parts upgraded...
2025-03-18 16:36:22 +0000 UTC View Post"Did… you see that?"
"The issue isn’t seeing it. The issue is that it happened in the first place."
"The phasing weapon… lost? But aren’t they both made from xylarion?"
It was hard to tell which was louder—The violent hum of the shattered phasing blade still lodged in the wall, or the exterminators, who couldn’t stop whispering.
Some were still ...
2025-03-16 13:14:10 +0000 UTC View Post"How... long has he been standing there?"
“An hour. He stopped moving the moment he finished making... whatever that is. Are those... oriental swords?"
It had been over an hour since Julian boarded the DCC mothership, yet no one had approached him to commission a weapon.
When he first announced that he was only here to forge weapons, not fight, most of the exterminators had ...
2025-03-14 13:50:27 +0000 UTC View PostDaemon waves.
The name alone was self-explanatory—a relentless horde of daemons, tearing through everything in their path with merciless destruction. Like most things related to daemons, even after a thousand years, humanity was still in the dark about how, why, or when they occurred.
They just… happened.
No pattern. No logic.
Just another way for humanity to be puni...
2025-03-11 15:08:06 +0000 UTC View PostJulian was lost.
Not physically, but he had already mentally shut out Zoan’s voice since he had been talking for more than an hour now.
At first, Zoan spoke of grand things—ending the war, resisting the Order of Artemia’s growing influence in Gnarfolk territory. But then, his stories shifted.
He talked about his childhood love. His pet. He even talked about how he was ta...
2025-03-09 14:43:41 +0000 UTC View Post“Such craftsmanship, such amazing edge.”
“Oh! It turns into daggers!”
“If you place it on the ground and not look at it, it looks like it is not there at all!”
Half an hour after making contact with the isolated gnarfolk camp, Julian and the party were now inside the tent of the young gnarfolk commander, who introduced himself as Zoan.
But even after ha...
2025-03-06 16:28:02 +0000 UTC View Post“Do you think they’re friendly?”
“Why don’t you go and ask, Cyrus? They’ll probably think you’re just one of them.”
Another day passed, and Julian’s party was drawing closer to gnarfolk territory—or at least, that’s what they thought.
Right now, they were sprawled out on their stomachs atop a rocky plateau, careful not to cast shadows under the bright sun...
2025-03-04 19:20:33 +0000 UTC View Post“Thank you for coming, Julian.”
The dinner prepared by the estate’s chef was exceptionally delicious—a rarity in this underdeveloped world, where spices weren’t as developed or prominent as those on Earth. But knowing Cyrus, he had likely already imported a variety of spices from different regions of Artemia.
Juliet could’ve probably enjoyed it more if her mind wasn’t ...
2025-03-02 10:09:10 +0000 UTC View PostAntagonists.
Some people in life are simply unavoidable—persistent figures who, for whatever reason, seem determined to bring you down. People so out of touch with themselves that their only purpose becomes dragging others into their misery.
For Juliet, that person was Keena.
She wasn’t relevant to Juliet and Julian’s adventures, and yet, somehow, she always found a way ...
2025-02-27 15:33:24 +0000 UTC View PostThe hall was silent, the only sound being the whispered breaths of those present, barely stirring the dry air. Despite being at the top of the Tower of Forge, there was no actual forge here, and the three spirit flames burning in the hall gave off no heat. And yet, with each passing moment, the air felt heavier—every breath becoming just a little harder to take.
How could it not, when t...
2025-02-25 08:18:47 +0000 UTC View Post“That’s… the mark of the spirit of Searadyn!”
As much as Julian tried to hide the mark on Earth, the convenience it brought him on Artemia was undeniable. It had spared him from imprisonment and execution at the hands of the Order of Artemia while he was already behind bars, and later, it had allowed him to bypass all the bureaucratic nonsense at the Tower of Forge.
It was i...
2025-02-23 16:38:06 +0000 UTC View Post“Well, I am certain he’s here.”
Juliet led Julian across the city of Piathus again to try and find Cyrus. He could have just returned to Earth and asked him directly, but Julian was afraid that if he went back to Earth, then something… inconvenient would happen again.
He didn’t want to admit it, but there seemed to be a pattern building. Whenever he returns back to Earth, ...
2025-02-21 19:39:18 +0000 UTC View Post“Here. This is where you will be creating something for us.”
Julian and Juliet followed Frederick and his companions across the Tower of Forge… and if they weren’t in the current circumstance they were, Juliet was sure that Julian would be stopping each time they passed by something even remotely interesting. Which, in the case of the Tower of Forge, it was almost everything—esp...
2025-02-19 17:29:27 +0000 UTC View PostKeena’s voice was loud, loud enough that the people who didn’t care about Juliet and Julian at all were now staring at them and wondering what the commotion was about. That seemed to be Keena’s intent, however, as Julian felt a slight twitch in her lips.
Anyone else wouldn’t have noticed it, but Julian could also feel the beating of her heart becoming more and more excited.
...
2025-02-18 17:00:43 +0000 UTC View PostTwo weeks had passed, and Julian was finally nearing their destination—the grand city of blacksmiths, Piathus. If he were to be honest, these had been the longest two weeks of his life… literally.
He hadn’t rested in the traditional sense. Instead, he lived in both worlds seamlessly, alternating between them, fully awake in both worlds. The days stretched unnaturally long, and time ...
2025-02-17 13:18:13 +0000 UTC View Post“Hmm.”
They truly did clean it out. Julian was expecting them to stop, but the people from the Blacksmith Guild cleared their entire shop—they even took the armor that Juliet was making, and she wasn’t done with it.
For some reason, however, Juliet was sort of happy when they took the unfinished armor.
Her reasoning?
It meant that if they took it, they thought th...
2025-02-14 16:02:34 +0000 UTC View Post[Julian!? What’s happening, Julian!? Julian!?]
An hour ago, MEGAN found herself inside a void. A space where none of her programs and applications work—the only thing she knew was that she was inside a void.
It was similar to the Between, whenever she accompanied Julian while his consciousness was being transferred to his clone. The only difference was that there was nothing she...
2025-02-12 11:30:27 +0000 UTC View PostAlmost two decades ago, after the unexpected daemon wave that killed Ellie’s parents, she had spent her time recovering inside a hospital. Treatment for those who have been victims of daemon attacks is totally free, and they would also receive compensation from the World Government depending on what they have lost.
The young Ellie, in particular, coming from an extremely wealthy family,...
2025-02-11 16:29:21 +0000 UTC View Post“Hmm.”
Julian had encountered all sorts of people since his senses began to grow increasingly abnormal due to the Otherworld project. But this was the first time he’d met someone whose body was entirely enhanced by cyberware. He could feel it, hear it—every whir and click of machinery beneath the man’s skin.
Even the exterminators Kitty worked with weren’t this heavily m...
2025-02-10 13:25:46 +0000 UTC View Post