“People of Blackgard,” Argrave called out, his voice amplified by wind magic.
He stood on a raised platform in a gathering square that had been constructed in the center of the city, and the place was more than large enough host the gigantic population of the city that grew around them. A servant of Elenore’s had been using this to promulgate the results of the parliament, but now i...
2023-08-30 06:51:52 +0000 UTC View PostArgrave, Anneliese, and Melanie sat behind a pure white judge’s bench, lined up side-by-side but angled inward as though to surround something. Durran, Elenore, and Galamon stood behind them, serving in an advisory role. And across from them sat gods—but it wasn’t as though either occupied a position of authority over the other. Rather, god and mortal had the same domineering bench, and n...
2023-08-29 06:54:41 +0000 UTC View PostArgrave truly hadn’t known what to expect with Sataistador. When he thought of a god of war, he pictured the honorable general type, someone like Galamon—hard and brusque, one who talks harsh and short. He supposed the addendums of ‘chaos and ruthless destruction’ should’ve tipped his mind toward the direction of someone like Genghis Khan. He had tried to worm his way into disrupting ...
2023-08-28 06:55:11 +0000 UTC View Post“You sold my daughter to a brothel?” Melanie’s father asked. There wasn’t anger in his voice—not really. Just disappointment.
“I wasn’t really going to do it,” her mother insisted. Red hair, green eyes, tall and robust—minus the scars, she was a mirror to Melanie today. “But you never visit me anymore! What else was I supposed to do?”
“But you accepted money ...
2023-08-25 06:54:51 +0000 UTC View PostAnneliese entered into a shabby old hut by the oceanside. As the door shut behind her, memories that she had long ago forgotten came rushing back. She and her mother had lived here, for a time. The little Anneliese walked to the center of the room, carrying the fish. She hung it up on a rack, where various implements for cleaning fish rested just beside. And there, back in the corner of the roo...
2023-08-24 06:52:49 +0000 UTC View Post“Did you let me win?” Durran asked Garm.
Just as it had been in their fight many months ago, Garm stood on his field of roses, though strangely they were white roses this time. Durran’s desert was black and endless, just as before, in mirror of the Burnt Desert. These battlefields allegedly mirrored their minds, whether here in the White Planes or back then, when their souls had don...
2023-08-23 06:51:41 +0000 UTC View PostWhen Galamon touched the bright white within the door to the White Planes, he had been expecting and dreading dealing with many things. Would it be the death of his brother? Would it be the first time he’d killed someone in wake of his vampirism? He had confronted these scenes in his head countless times.
Instead, when his vision returned to him, he gazed upon a tall Veidimen woman sitt...
2023-08-22 06:54:51 +0000 UTC View Post“It would be more cost-efficient for the spirits if I subsumed all of you into my alchemic body,” the Alchemist said, staring down at their group.
“It would be more cost-efficient for our sanity if we didn’t,” Argrave rebuked, looking up at the Alchemist.
The Alchemist shook his head as he watched Argrave. “You had my word no harm would come to you and yours, yet you was...
2023-08-21 06:54:42 +0000 UTC View PostArgrave’s meeting with Artur had gone about as expected—the man wanted some recognition, and so they gave it. When they had entered, the former Magister of the Order was ready to demand something substantial. But Argrave had buttered him with sweet words, promised a nice plaque with his name on it, and the man folded like wet paper. Artur wanted these vain things—and quite frankly, he
Anneliese looked up at the Alchemist as he toiled with Felipe’s bones in seemingly incomprehensible manners. When she’d first met this giant, standing beside Argrave as he endured the worst pain of his life, she had been utterly afraid of him. He seemed unreadable, unfathomable, unknowable, and most of all unreasonable. Maybe there was still some truth to that. But the events of day passed ...
2023-08-17 06:55:07 +0000 UTC View PostThough Argrave had been captivated by the discovery of [Blood Infusion], the Alchemist’s suggestion of robbing Erlebnis of knowledge drew his attention unlike anything else before.
Argrave and Anneliese walked into the Alchemist’s temporary abode constructed by his Pawns, where the giant waited for them with stacks of books laid out without much reason. He seemed to take issue with th...
2023-08-16 06:55:46 +0000 UTC View PostSaving the world was just as arrogant a thing as trying to dominate or destroy it. Each of the three carried with it an implication; that one’s personal power was superior to that of the world. It implied that the world could be changed in such a way. It was easy enough to claim that Argrave had set upon this road for the purpose of saving his own life, but time and time again he’d...
2023-08-15 06:54:50 +0000 UTC View Post“What we need most, more than almost anything, are bodies for this war,” Elenore told Argrave. “We must take advantage of Mozzahr’s arrogance to involve the dwarven nation persisting below even the Ebon Cult.”
Argrave listened to her proposal intently, and then leaned back into his chair. “Elenore… those people, the dwarves… they’ve been removed from the struggles of nat...
2023-08-14 06:53:42 +0000 UTC View PostNear a hundred flying beasts in the sky darkened the earth of Vasquer with their wide shadows in the early dawn. Just as Argrave’s royal procession with his army had been impossible to avoid noticing, so too was the so-called King of the Scorched Sand’s. The wyverns flew over the vast kingdom, trivializing the size of the land of green summer that was enduring the beginnings of the bitter s...
2023-08-11 06:55:46 +0000 UTC View PostArgrave, after stating that he needed to exhume Felipe, realized that this was one of the times where blunt honesty would not serve him as well as couching his speech in flowery language. After the fact, he struggled desperately to douse the rising flames of protest that Orion birthed. If Orion got any angrier, perhaps ‘dousing the flames’ would have been a literal activity.
But by th...
2023-08-10 06:55:03 +0000 UTC View PostWhen Argrave and Anneliese emerged from the Alchemist's fortress of obsidian, their party stepped forward eagerly to receive them. They had all seen the strange chimera named Pawn imitating Argrave, and now concern drove them in greeting. Their eagerness was abated by the looming giant that followed them. As the Alchemist exited, the vast black doors closed shut, pulled closed by an unseen forc...
2023-08-09 06:53:28 +0000 UTC View PostAnneliese followed the man who called himself Pawn, descending into the sterile obsidian fortress belonging to the Alchemist. She thought for half a second that Argrave had been returning when this Pawn emerged from the home, but only a second’s scrutiny broke that illusion. She didn’t enjoy whatever game this thing was. It had emotions, true enough, but it could not be human given...
2023-08-08 06:53:41 +0000 UTC View PostThe Alchemist walked through his abode of obsidian with Argrave struggling to keep up just behind. Argrave thought that they were heading into the library once more, but the Alchemist reached into the walls as he walked to retrieve an obsidian staff. He slammed it on the ground, and the whole placed pulsed with purple lights.
Like that, the whole of it came alive. The hallway that they’...
2023-08-07 06:52:44 +0000 UTC View PostAfter leaving their army at the Low Way, their group departed in small number for the Alchemist’s home. Along the path, Argrave and Anneliese were eager students to the Tower Master of the Gray Owl. Though Anneliese had a teacher in the form of her grandmother, Argrave never truly had someone to tutor him dedicatedly. Castro’s guidance was like sanding and polishing to this craft of his tha...
2023-08-04 06:51:20 +0000 UTC View PostArgrave looked out across a room filled with torches. He walked to specific ones, passing others by, and lit them with simple spells. A bunch of his people watched what he was doing in confusion, but he carried on unconcerned. Finally, when he lit the torch in the top right…
The floor in the center of the room started to shift around, clicking and grinding into place as a stairway slowl...
2023-08-03 06:55:13 +0000 UTC View PostArgrave, with an abundance of electric eels swirling above his head, sent them forth not to attack but to exert pressure. It was like a pointed gun, ready to fire at any moment that Castro’s attention wavered. If he should attempt some retreat again, they would follow. The old spellcaster regarded them with his eyes briefly, and then focused back on Argrave.
Off to the right side, one o...
2023-08-02 06:53:23 +0000 UTC View PostAll of the high-ranking members of the Stonepetal Sentinels were arrayed before Argrave side-by-side. They had all heard the spellcasters in their number; the king was possessed of magic enough to easily have breached A-rank by now. The two men by his side were giants both, and the sentinels were experienced enough to recognize that they bore enchanted armor. Even the king himself was no slouch...
2023-08-01 06:53:24 +0000 UTC View PostThe red moon had long ago taken its place at the center of the sky, but still Argrave paced restlessly. They were in their own tent, pitched by the Veidimen warriors for their easy rest, but sleep was the last thing on Argrave’s mind as he consulted with Anneliese and Galamon.
Argrave looked up at Galamon. “If your kid wanted to kill himself, would you let him?”
Galamon stared...
2023-07-31 06:52:45 +0000 UTC View PostCastro’s tutelage was a welcome reprieve from the monotony of self-study. Argrave had never been truly taught by anyone, and so he eagerly looked to have his ability assessed by someone so highly regarded. The first thing that was asked of him was rather simple: Argrave was first instructed to describe his current capability. It had been a little awkward, what with Ingo also present, but he m...
2023-07-28 06:54:16 +0000 UTC View PostArgrave stood at the stables with Anneliese, watching as the people there tended to the horses that had been drawing their carriage. She held a packet in her hand.
“To think… your handwriting used to be so much neater,” Anneliese ruminated, biting her lip. “What is this strange script? It used to be so pretty…”
Argrave scoffed. “Is that the point?”
“No, no, o...
2023-07-27 06:53:49 +0000 UTC View Post“Your Majesty…” Grimalt began, prompting Argrave to look into his amber eyes. “Why exactly am I here?”
The Veidimen officer was clearly uncomfortable in this luxury carriage—not that Argrave felt much different. But it seemed to bother him he was with Elenore, Argrave, Anneliese, Galamon, Melanie, and Orion—he felt his status was not up to snuff, evidently.
Argrave loo...
2023-07-26 06:52:49 +0000 UTC View PostAnestis was a very, very long way from home. He had travelled miles upward through the earth, seeking his people’s secrets they had abandoned in the cities of old. His journey had taken him far beyond the abandoned cities, though, breaching even the surface. The sunlight from the suns was harsh enough to make him nauseous, and things were loud and fast and unpleasant.
The small mercy of...
2023-07-25 06:44:18 +0000 UTC View Post“I lost well over one thousand good people, Your Majesty,” Count Castille said to Argrave. “Good families relocated, leaving entire fields untended. When my father purchased the land well over eighty years ago, he bought it with the expectation that these serf families came with the land. For all intents and purposes… and meaning no disrespect, of course… recruiting people for Blackga...
2023-07-24 06:50:09 +0000 UTC View PostArgrave awoke long before Anneliese did, eager to seize the day. He was happy to have established the plan of action they’d be taking the next week or so. All that mattered now was adjusting the attitude of some of the parliamentary seats, performing well should debate arise, and executing things flawlessly.
He and his queen quickly prepared themselves for a long day of politics, then s...
2023-07-21 06:53:57 +0000 UTC View PostArgrave took his place at the podium in the parliamentary hall. All of the guests looked at him with tired eyes. Even in their exhaustion, his reputation had grown to the point that no one would ignore him, not even Magisters. Ganbaatar came as a guest, representing the elven nations. But more than him, they’d called every parliamentary seat from all across the kingdom. Most had made it, fort...
2023-07-20 06:32:34 +0000 UTC View Post