(Cognosticon here. There were no chapters last week, but I did post another piece of bonus content: Three Beds. That covers the Kai x Nirka request, and I'll be getting to the ZZN expansion before I cover Kai x Yurwa. In the meantime, on with normal chapters.)
As soon as she had a valid excuse, Omilaena...
2025-01-27 18:00:11 +0000 UTC View PostEven though Zae Zin Nim had been skeptical about the dryad village at first, especially how there was dirt everywhere, she had become accustomed to it. The walkways were all hard-packed, not filthy, and the rooms were well-maintained. With the many trees absorbing all the moisture, the sound of the rain within the shady rooms was surprisingly calming.
More importantly, the room they had g...
2025-01-17 18:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostKai sliced through the forests, not leaving a single footprint, leaves sliding off his armor. He'd become far more effective in the forests, not so much because his strength had increased as because he was adapting to the setting. It had only been partially conscious, shifting his claws to better run over the roots or retracting horns, just a piecemeal adaptation to the environment.
All o...
2025-01-16 18:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostTechnically Omilaena was engaged with developing their final trump card, but honestly she was barely using a fraction of her mind for that. Access to a major sect's resources didn't come every day, so she was mostly working on her own projects.
Making the agreement with the dryad matriarch had gotten her a special command medallion that granted her more access, and surprisingly a sort of ...
2025-01-15 18:00:13 +0000 UTC View PostWhen they left the sect headquarters, Kai still wasn't entirely sure what the plan was. He knew they'd come out with quite a few new benefits: new command medallions that would let them back in easily, various sect robes, and a communication seed to plant for the dryads.
And hypothetically an agreement with the dryad matriarch.
Whatever the plan as, Nymidria felt that she needed to ...
2025-01-14 18:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostThe sudden attention of the dryad matriarch put Kai on edge and his instincts, so long indulged in monstrous form, very nearly pushed him to attack before he reined himself in. He didn't have a complete grasp of Nymidria's soul, but she was in the neighborhood of 1300 - he was confident he could defeat someone with that much strength, but not quickly and not quietly. If he struck first, the cul...
2025-01-13 18:00:13 +0000 UTC View PostInitially Omilaena thought that getting inside might be a challenge, maybe even a fun one, but the dryads had already set up half the steps. They weren't breaking into the central chambers of the Verdant River sect, after all, just an outer courtyard that was technically a guest room for the dryad matriarch. The dryads could already have done it themselves, if they hadn't needed humans with suf...
2025-01-10 18:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostTechnically they were going to deal with much bigger problems as soon as they reached the dryad town, but Kai was mainly glad that he hadn't screwed up his marriage. Surprisingly, Zae Zin Nim hadn't been hostile toward Nirka, instead opting to ignore her, and Omilaena hadn't poisoned anyone, so he called that a win. It definitely seemed like they were both trying to stake their claim on him, bu...
2025-01-09 18:00:04 +0000 UTC View PostReuniting always added an extra edge to their sex, even after a relatively short time apart. Omilaena was usually the insistent one, but that night Zin Nim seemed ravenously hungry for both of them. Even though Omilaena had a good guess as to why, she ignored such details and just enjoyed it until they all fell asleep together.
In the middle of the night, she was woken by Zin Nim slipping...
2025-01-08 18:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostSeveral days later, Kai was ready to choose his next target. When no shipments came in from the destroyed work camp, the sect sent a group to investigate - the group only had one Earth Soul and they didn't seem to take the threat particularly seriously until they saw the damage.
Kai resisted the urge to shadow them, just in case they had someone extremely sensitive, and also decided not t...
2025-01-07 18:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostIt seemed like the risk had been worth it: Zae Zin Nim confirmed that no qi signals had gone out and Omilaena was interrogating the cultivator left alive for all he was worth. Hopefully Cragrila could help all the rescued captives get over their terror, but for his part Kai was mostly interested in one prisoner.
Her name turned out to be Lifrinyne, and once he got her tree out of the work...
2025-01-06 18:00:13 +0000 UTC View PostAfter the long journey south they had finally reached their destination: slaves, answers, and potentially even immortality were all within reach. The only problem now was that such things were never undefended, and even outside of the great barriers, each of the camps had a strong guard of cultivators. Cragrila had taken them close to the outer perimeter and showed them the different locations,...
2025-01-03 18:00:04 +0000 UTC View PostDispersing the slaves slowed them down slightly, but Kai estimated that the distance they moved south in a month couldn't have been completed much faster. The others must have made the same estimation, and considering that they needed time to train and prepare, they didn't complain about his do-gooding. Though in the cases of the Cloudspire peasants, he wasn't sure how much he had actually help...
2025-01-02 18:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostYears after torturing crystalliers, Omilaena was starting to realize that her work hadn't been wasted, just slightly misguided. Everything was more connected than she had believed, and even crystal cultivation was proving essential to true understanding.
"Alright, crystals in one hand, acid in the other." Omilaena gestured at Cragrila impatiently. "Then I'm going to jab you in both arms."...
2025-01-01 18:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostAt first they headed south as cautiously as possible, but when retaliation didn't come within a few days, Kai began to relax. Technically he might see beams of light in the sky at any moment, he'd just shifted to trying to be prepared for them instead of anticipating their arrival. The presence techniques were frustratingly strong levers, so he wanted to find a way to destroy their gimmick befo...
2024-12-31 18:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostIn the wake of the confrontation, Omilaena took over operations, directing them to take various measures to leave the area in case there was immediate retaliation. The slaves obeyed her instantly, and Zae Zin Nim was more than strong enough to disable the enemy cultivators. It seemed like they would be doing some interrogations.
Kai suspected that Omilaena was doing all this to make up fo...
2024-12-30 18:00:09 +0000 UTC View Post"That's him, that's the one!" Kai recognized the man speaking: it was the idiot from the restaurant, hovering just behind the leader of this new group. "You see, he has those women ensorcelled somehow."
"Difficult to believe," the leader said, "but what else could explain it?"
"Are we doing this again?" Omilaena threw up her hands and turned away, which made the cultivators she was ...
2024-12-27 18:00:08 +0000 UTC View PostThey reunited that night to share information, just finding a hotel where they could sit together instead of any grand institutions. Kai far preferred that, since all he really wanted was Zae Zin Nim and Omilaena without interruption. As they explained what they'd learned, however, he realized they could have a problem of split incentives.
"Our best lead on the poison is the Purple River ...
2024-12-26 18:00:06 +0000 UTC View PostThat kind of bullshit was one of the main reasons Omilaena hadn't gone to Cloudspire.
She was still thinking about it the next day as they split up to finish their business. It had ruined their night because Zin Nim was out of sorts, wanting intimacy in the non-euphemistic sense. Admittedly, Omilaena had come around to the creature comfort of relaxing together, but she had wanted to bang....
2024-12-25 18:00:08 +0000 UTC View PostAt first, Kai honestly wasn't sure what to make of it. His gut reaction was to take things at face value: the young man had accused him of impropriety, which wasn't fair at all since Omilaena was the only one groping. A second later he realized that of course the words were just a pretext and this was a matter of pride, or rather arrogance and entitlement.
"Take your hands off them, you o...
2024-12-24 18:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostAs far as Omilaena was concerned, the two people exploring alongside her were more interesting than the city itself. Floodisle City was big, sure, but it was another cultivator city with cultivator ranks and cultivator rules. These two would be beside her long after she'd harvested the city for whatever it was worth and left it behind.
Zin Nim took to the city immediately, treating everyt...
2024-12-23 18:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostKai had thought they were almost on top of Floodisle City, but the city kept growing... and growing. He realized that it was far larger than he expected, built atop an island that was more like a mountain. All of the sloped roofs and tile construction he'd seen elsewhere on Cloudspire were taken even further here, sprawling not just across the island, but into multiple tiers that rose skyward.<...
2024-12-20 18:00:08 +0000 UTC View PostThe month of travel to the Southern Rivers was honestly a relief, not solely from the warfare but from being entangled with other people and organizations. They had to stop occasionally, but otherwise it was just the three of them, almost like their honeymoon on Darkmist Island again. That suggested sex, but the biggest factor for Kai was just their presence, the ability to talk and train toget...
2024-12-19 18:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostBy this point, Kai was starting to get anxious. He had known that it might take several days, he just couldn't help but worry. They had rejected the idea of any sort of secret message system, because it would probably be detected by the paranoid sect, so he had no choice but to wait and work out his frustration in training. Sometimes he considered going to find them, but charging directly into ...
2024-12-18 18:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostBy the next day, Omilaena was bloated with qi and soaking in the Ice Springs. They existed within another of the inner caverns of the mountain, behind three layers of sacred seals, but instead of a hot spring, the room radiated a freezing aura. The cavern's walls had been laid with white marble and everything was ornamented in blue, as if to emphasize just how rare of an honor it was for someon...
2024-12-17 18:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostSince the Pureflower sect had given her access to all their medicinal resources, Omilaena had a truly excellent opportunity for thievery. And yet, despite that temptation, she was focused only on finding a solution. Cultivation resources seemed ephemeral compared to the real prize of understanding: a little qi would quickly become obsolete, but grasping another fundamental principle would mean ...
2024-12-16 18:00:11 +0000 UTC View PostTechnically, going to the Pureflower stronghold should have made Zae Zin Nim feel more safe, yet as they ascended away from Kai she only felt isolated. Leaving all men behind would have been a blessing in her youth, but now giving up Kai in exchange for a large number of women she couldn't trust didn't seem like a good trade. All she could do was stick close to Omilaena and believe in her abili...
2024-12-13 18:00:07 +0000 UTC View PostThey had to spend over a month essentially running errands, but it didn't particularly bother Kai. Since they were using the Pureflower vessel, they could train easily while they traveled, and it was a pleasure just spending time together again without any major obligations hanging over them.
Technically, their upcoming visit to the Pureflower sect could end disastrously, if Omilaena wasn...
2024-12-12 18:00:05 +0000 UTC View PostThe Manticore tribe civil war was over. It should have been the happiest day of Ahn Rit Kulha's life - all the factions led by his enemies were dead, Feida's faction was cooperating with him, and he was one of the most prominent Earth Souls in the entire tribe. They had taken back their territory and the patriarch's estate, so they had all the legitimacy he'd ever dreamed of.
And sometime...
2024-12-11 18:00:08 +0000 UTC View PostEnemies were falling on all sides, blood was spraying through the air, and allies roared in victory. Kai moved in the fray, dropping enemies on all sides... dissatisfied.
He just didn't share the bloodlust of the Manticore tribe cultivators, despite having endless monstrous hunger inside him, despite having literally eaten people. What he wanted was a challenge, and now that the Earth Sou...
2024-12-10 18:00:08 +0000 UTC View Post