After Eudora left the room was utterly silent.
Then Feiyang let out a bestial roar. One of the crates exploded, scattering a plume of tangy dust onto the floor.
One part of him wanted to run out, grab her, and fuck her ‘till she was ...
2022-03-21 04:32:35 +0000 UTC
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A/N: have you ever thought ‘screw that adastra fellow, I hate his dumb face and I hope he never writes another chapter again?
Well today’s your unlucky day! Bc here’s the first of 2 bonus chapters which kinda popped in...
2022-03-21 04:32:13 +0000 UTC
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Dorian was at the open market, a smattering of stalls in a marble-floored plaza which seemed to stretch endlessly, its loose rows wrapping around itself like the lively intestines of some massive beast. Its stalls were all strung with white-cloth ...
2022-03-19 18:21:45 +0000 UTC
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A/N: This chapter was 2300 words, but then I added a scene in the middle. You’ll know exactly which scene I’m talking about when you get to it. It is the sort of scene which miiiight not be the best thing to add, but ...
2022-03-17 05:08:33 +0000 UTC
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A/N: Sry this chapter’s late—it took quite a bit of finagling, but I’m pretty happy with how it ended up! Next chap is back to regularly scheduled Dorian programming
//
Kaya frowned. “What are you meant to be, ...
2022-03-15 20:21:01 +0000 UTC
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A/N: this is not an incest story, peeps!
//
Kaya woke two hours before the sun rose. She donned her new loose gray robes and snuck outside. Lights still dotted the walls and the city beyond; there was the cranking and ...
2022-03-12 22:18:08 +0000 UTC
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She rushed into a standoff.
On one side were the bronze-skinned fighters of the Narong Tribe, dressed in dark-brown smocks; Young Master Narong stood at their front. His forearm was slicked with blood.
On the other was a gang of men cl...
2022-03-10 20:21:59 +0000 UTC
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The air seemed fresher as Dorian strolled out of the doors of the Guild. Humming to himself, he took stock of the sun in the sky. That whole jaunt had gone faster than he’d expected—there was still an hour or two left, it seemed, before he’d...
2022-03-09 22:08:54 +0000 UTC
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A/N: Last artifice chapter!
//
Kal mulled it over. There were a few possibilities.
One. His longer career as a prize-fighter had finally caught up with him. He’d taken one too many blows to the head. His ...
2022-03-08 03:32:52 +0000 UTC
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A/N: Slight delay to this chap bc it turns out I had 2 more midterms (yesterday + today) that I just found out existed! … Im not an exemplary student, as you might guess
//
He flipped open the Compendium of A...
2022-03-05 18:28:03 +0000 UTC
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The testing room was spare. Blank sandstone walls. A workbench, with a small box of assorted screws and hammers. Blocks of raw material. A furnace. A bookshelf stacked with reference materials. An anvil. A clock. All made of a dark-gray metal. Tha...
2022-03-03 04:49:31 +0000 UTC
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A/N: Midterms are over, huzzah! I can go back to rapid-firing chapters!! Don’t know if I can promise dailies, but I’ll sure try for it.
//
“Will you behave?” said Dorian, frowning.
Leo nodded, goggle-eyed. “Really?” D...
2022-03-02 06:07:49 +0000 UTC
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What was this girl about to do to him? Dorian was a little perturbed.
She seemed a normal sort when he first saw her. Then she’d gotten steadily more unhinged.
His eyes trailed to the Furnace; qi-flames licked at the edges. The way s...
2022-02-26 19:35:01 +0000 UTC
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So this is the part where she gently crushes my dreams.
Dorian fought to keep himself from snorting. “This,” said the girl, sweeping her arms out like a bad actress, “is artificing!”
A herd of fools sweating i...
2022-02-26 01:08:10 +0000 UTC
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“Call me Io,” said Dorian softly. He blinked fast, watering his eyes a smidge as he looked up at her.
“Io,” she repeated, and her voice made the syllable a song. She smiled as she held out a gloved hand. “Come with me.”<...
2022-02-24 22:43:44 +0000 UTC
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Pebble chose a direction. It was the wrong direction.
Half an hour and much scampering later, they came to a stop before a gold-domed basilica, easily the most impressive structure in its block.
It was a behemoth of metal and spinning ...
2022-02-23 05:43:12 +0000 UTC
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Very quickly they found out two things about Pebble. He knew his way around here with such familiarity it was like he was following a sixth sense—and he wouldn’t shut up. He seemed an excitable sort, and utterly oblivious to the fact that neit...
2022-02-21 04:29:56 +0000 UTC
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Kaya was stupefied—by the stench or the sights, Dorian didn’t know. He grabbed her wrist. “Hold on,” he warned. “And don’t let go.”
“Ah?” was all Kaya got out before he dragged her into the disheveled swamp of a street.
...
2022-02-20 06:05:54 +0000 UTC
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Time Elapsed: 1 Month, 1 week.
“Are you sure we’re in the right place?” said Kaya, panting.
“Not at all,” said Dorian. He smiled at her. “Not this time, nor the last hundred times you asked.”
Kaya h...
2022-02-19 02:09:20 +0000 UTC
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Another Plane, Another Time…
Dorian ascended. He was a rapture of light and blistering fire, a newly-born star rising to take its place in the firmament. He was the only light in a dark, splintered world. Then he was gone,...
2022-02-14 16:00:08 +0000 UTC
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One last note before my brief break...
Don’t tell RoyalRoad this, but I’m *much* more likely to read and consider patron feedback than I am an RR comment. If you’ve got feedback of any sort, please feel free to let me know—cons...
2022-02-08 05:39:19 +0000 UTC
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“What did he say, child?” To stand in the presence of a peak-Profound Realm master like Patriarch Yalta would’ve wobbled the knees of most Vigor fighters. Dorian bore the pressure with a grimace.
“He threatened me,” said Dorian, fe...
2022-02-06 04:55:18 +0000 UTC
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“I…” Kono appeared to wrack his mind. “Maybe it isn’t under control.”
Dorian glanced back, frowning mightily. “What?”
“Look.” He gestured to the Dragon. “It’s not moving stiffly or in set patte...
2022-02-02 23:43:14 +0000 UTC
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What was this All-Seeing eye? A few explanations had been swirling in Dorian’s mind. One was that it was a trite metaphor for a celestial body—the sun and the moons might be all-seeing eyes, always above and gazing upon the plane. Another was ...
2022-02-01 05:44:49 +0000 UTC
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Beasts crowded in from all sides, snapping off stragglers at the edges. The mass of humanity contracted as hundreds of men and women fled inward. But they couldn’t flee very far—the Frost Dragon waited at the very middle, its neck ablaze with ...
2022-01-31 02:42:00 +0000 UTC
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At first it was a low, slow rumble, lost in the roar of the geyser. Dorian, on the border of sleep, didn’t register it, not at first. Only when he heard the click-click-clicking of jostled glass did his eyes snap open, just in time to see a beak...
2022-01-29 06:13:12 +0000 UTC
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The Festival was sound asleep. It was that time of night, so deep and so late and so silent that the ambiance felt like a physical thing, a thick wool blanket lain atop all the tents and huts and stands. A few revelers slouched home on wine-weak l...
2022-01-27 07:38:15 +0000 UTC
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“Finally finished!” Hu sagged back against a pillow. “Thank heavens!”
“Shouldn’t you be upset?” said Dorian as he trussed up some canvas. The elixirs had been put away, the shelves stored in trunks which were then stored in Int...
2022-01-24 20:34:51 +0000 UTC
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Two hours ‘till the Markets open and Dorian had run out of bodily fluids to sweat out. He’d been given a rib-crushing celebration hug by Kaya, a thorough interrogation about what’d just happened (most of which he answered with some variant o...
2022-01-22 19:48:27 +0000 UTC
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The Golden Roc reached godhood in maturity. After a century-cycle each Roc ascended to a higher plane, but not before leaving offspring behind. Zhang was not wrong to call it a creature loved by the universe; in that egg lay a hint of the divine.<...
2022-01-20 20:39:54 +0000 UTC
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