Atividade

  • Rose Fagan publicou uma atualização 3 anos, 1 mês atrás

    Yet, never once did Selene’s stoic expression crack. A shell of holy light embraced her, and her dark hair danced on the whipping winds. She stood unwavering like a goddess, filled with majesty and grace.

    Suddenly her gloved hands blazed with red light, and flames swallowed her holy sword from hilt to blade. With its addition the power coursing through her weapon surged by several orders of magnitude. A thunderous noise arose, as though the whole mountain was groaning in protest. Stones split and jagged rock pelted the canyon floor.

    Wolfblade was forced to disengage and retreat.

    This young woman had stared down his energy sword and didn’t blink. Her improvement since leaving Skycloud hadn’t slowed in the least! But he wasn’t done testing her.

    His mind turned.

    The black-cloaked golem stretched out a hand and released a pulse of magnetic blue light from his palm. It blasted toward Selene like a bombshell. Without breaking stride, Selene slapped it barehanded. Her burning angels released a gush of fiery energy at just the right instant, consuming the pulse entirely.

    A loud, shrill sound rang through the canyon!

    Wolfblade’s face was lit by a column of fire that shot from Selene and into the skies overhead. As the fires raged higher they transformed into a phoenix eight meters wing to wing. Each feather was clear and distinguishable, a lick of flame that fluttered in the wind. The bird was obviously a thing of fire, but it seemed as alive as any other creature.

    The blazing phoenix dove right toward the metal man, smashing into his chest with a shuddering blast. The intense heat immediately reduced his black cloak to ash!

    The fires raged as they engulfed him, blackening the canyon walls. The slate first turned angry red then began to drip like wax in an oven. Soon the sides of the canyon bowed outwards like they were trying to escape the fires. Magna gathered underfoot and the air warped from the intense heat.

    Selene was wreathed in flame. Slowly, she raised the burning sword in her right hand and pointed it at her opponent. "Do you wish to go on?" [1]

    Wolfblade conceded without a fuss. "I’m beaten. I underestimated you. You aren’t the next Baldur, you’re better. Anyone else, and I would spare no effort to make sure you died now before you became a problem later. But you… tut-tut, well. We shouldn’t keep him waiting."

    Dark Atom’s leader returned his weapon to its sheath. His golem trundled over, unscathed though he’d just waded through a lake of fire.

    The slightest frown pulled at the corners of Selene’s lips. She knew what her fires could do. The strongest steel became liquid, but this metal monstrosity seemed unfazed. It made sense – for the Dark Atom to cause Skycloud so much trouble for so long, they had to have many secrets.

    The two walked into a small crevice that smelled of sulfur. Rivers of magma lazily flowed through it. Colder air turned the surface an angry black, but one could easily see the molten rock through the cracks. Its unstable coating often fractured and rearranged itself. A careless step would be a dire mistake in this place.

    A small path intersected by burning rivulets meandered toward the center of the magma lake.

    Wolfblade picked his way carefully along, leading Selene deeper in. He stopped before the entrance to a grotto and slipped a strange token into an indentation. A grinding sound answered, the sound of stone on stone, as before them emerged a thick metal door. When Wolfblade pulled it open, he revealed a pitch black maw leading deeper into the mountain’s heart.

    "You’re here."

    A voice whispered from the darkness, sinister and magnetic. Ripe with charm and wisdom. A tall and voluptuous figure slipped from the shadows as though she were shedding a dress. Long, silver-grey hair tumbled down her shoulders, the same color as her eyes. Their pale color did not detract from the sharp gleam that twinkled in their depths, in fact they seemed to radiate a hazy beauty. Hard to define. A pair of complex-looking pistols hung from her waist, which were oddly paired with the researcher’s goggles perched on her head.

    "You’re Selene? As elegant as I expected. My name is Hellflower." This mature, intellectual and attractive woman flashed a captivating smile. "His Excellency, the Caliph of the Sands, awaits inside. He’s expecting you."

    Selene followed without a word.

    "So calm, knowing you’re about to meet a demon. The young demonhunter has grown a lot in her time out here in the wastelands. It makes me wonder how he’s doing…" Hellflower stared absently at Selene’s back, lost in thought for a moment. Her eyes then turned to Wolfblade – or more specifically, the weapons strapped to his back. "Your bodyguard is an interesting fellow. I’ve picked through countless ruins and I’ve never seen toys like these before."

    Wolfblade cast her a look over his shoulder with his one exposed eye. "Does it excite you?"

    She grinned at him, a flirtatious smirk that was both dangerous and alluring. "I’m not like the two of you. I’m just a Seeker, so all manner of technology excites me."

    Wolfblade nodded. "Then you can have it."

    That was not what she was expecting. "What?" Hellflower blinked at him.

    "It’s the last time we’ll ever meet," Wolfblade replied.

    When he said it the metal golem stopped in his tracks. Wolfblade handed her one of his precious swords – artifacts of immeasurable value – without a second thought. He didn’t even give it a longing glance as he walked further into the cave, disappearing into the darkness.

    Orange light flickered off the dark walls, giving the unsettling impression that magma would burst from them at any moment. Waiting in the deepest recesses was a ferocious figure whose eyes burned like coal. They were fixed on Selene. "If you’ve sought me out, it means you’ve seen the tip of the iceberg. What do you think so far?"

    She stood calmly beneath the demon’s gaze. Slowly, her hands curled into fists but then relaxed. "I need to know the truth."

    "If that is your reason for coming, then I’m afraid I must disappoint you. I cannot give you the truth. That is something only you can find."

    "What can you tell me about what happened?"

    The creature’s voice was strange, both echoing and coming in layers – a dozen voices whispering over one another. He never moved an inch. "Both Baldur and Sterling were tasked with hunting me down. However, it seems they discovered something else in the process. It killed one and maimed the other, but what it was… I do not know."

    "But you must have some clue."

    "If you really desire to discover what happened, then it will do no harm for me to reveal it to you. Your fallen father had a very unique relic. It spat green fire that devoured the body and consumed the mind. I have heard tell that information as to its whereabouts can be found in the borderlands. Perhaps that is where you should begin. What’s more, your uncle Sterling disappeared after returning to Skycloud. If you were to find his whereabouts, then he could tell you what they found."

    A relic of green fire, devouring body and mind? She’d never heard of any relic like that. But she didn’t spend too much pondering it, either. Selene turned and made to leave.

    Wolfblade was next.

    The Caliph of the Sands remained seated on his stone dais as Wolfblade placed several shards of something before him. With some inspection one could tell it used to be a skull.

    "It seems-"

    "I see." The Caliph never moved, but the shards of the skull seemed to react to his will. They rose up off the floor and pieced themselves together. As the fractured bone hovered before him, the demon looked into its empty sockets. It was as though he was peering back a thousand years, eye to eye with the giant this skull once belonged to. "My splendid king. Ever since you fell our species has waned. Why have you chosen a human?"

    The inert shards floated before him, silent. No response was forthcoming.

    "But I have faith in my king’s judgment." The dark-robed monster swiped its clawed hand, and the skull disintegrated into dust, borne away on the stagnant wind. All the while Wolfblade stood speechlessly to one side. Retrieving that artifact had not been easy, only for the demon to smash it apart moments after its delivery. The Caliph’s smoldering eyes turned onto him. "Have you considered the offer?"

    Wolfblade did not hesitate, dropping to one knee. "I accept."

    The demon nodded approvingly. His rumbling voice bounced through the shadow-shrouded cavern. "Very good. There will be things you must forfeit, but all sacrifice has value. You will reap much in return."

    Wolfblade knelt before his master in silent gratitude.

    [1]

    1. 0.0

    1. A note from Tipsy Wanderer:

    I’d like to take this opportunity for a brief chat. Several readers have expressed dissatisfaction with our protagonist, saying he is too weak in strength and character. If we confirm to mainstream writing tropes then the main character should be able to overcome any challenge, defeat any challenger. Women should throw themselves at him in droves. While this may be more marketable and appeasing – and frankly easier for me – it would make for a ‘comfortable’ story instead of an ‘excellent’ one.

    The style I’ve chosen is more challenging, more probing. I am hoping to find a marriage between good story-telling and a crowd-pleasing narrative.

    The hardest part of the creation of this novel is not its theme or conception. It’s being asked to confirm to a prescribed way of thinking. Anyone who’s ever written a story will know that it’s a very subjective process. Infusing a product with the ideas of several people is counter-productive. Truth be told, there are many characters and settings I’m not pleased with. I would have preferred replacing them with other, frankly more inspired ideas. However, they had to be changed in the interest of working with a director and sticking to the script. It has definitely made things more challenging, but I’m still confident that the eight hundred thousand words that will comprise this tale are just beginning. I continue to strive to compose a grand epic, and I hope to have everyone’s support. The next installment will probably appear online next year. Something for you to look forward to. Luz said in a very excited voice, "Luckily we had sir City Lord’s help, we’ve already gathered several hundred thousand people and I think most of them will become Shaman Religion believers. We’ll pick out a few people with good talents to train into Shaman Sorcerers to help the City Lord. The Shaman Religion was originally a spirit beast religion, so it will very likely spread across this area."

    "With Miracle Commerce’s backing and the help of all these Forest of Chaos experts, how could there not be success." Chu Tian looked at him, "If you fail, don’t come back to see me, just swallow excrement until you die!"

    Luz wiped away his sweat, "Yes, yes, I will definitely succeed!"

    There were no problems on the War Hounds side.

    The Transport Tower couldn’t be delayed any longer.

    At this time, the Great Summer King Dongfang Gan contacted Chu Tian. He had already prepared maps and information on the surrounding countries, as well he wanted Chu Tian’s help on something, hoping that Chu Tian could come to the Great Summer Country’s North City.

    The Great Summer Imperial City was changed to the central Central State, so the previous Imperial City was renamed North City. Although it wasn’t the capital city anymore, it still had several hundred years of history and was the number one city in the north.

    After the Great Summer Country’s announcement on their name change, all kinds of trouble came. A large kingdom was not just a name, once a country became a large kingdom, their diplomatic level was automatically higher than a small kingdom and the surrounding small kingdoms would even have to pay tributes for protection.

    There wasn’t many communication between countries and other than dependent countries, most didn’t care about geopolitics. However, if a single space had several different powers appear, it would harm the benefits and influence of all these powers.

    The War Hounds Kingdom was a dependent country of the Eagle Burial Kingdom, so there was no choice. The Great Summer Country was an independent country, so how could they become a large kingdom that easily? Thes surrounding countries all had opinions on the Great Summer Country, but the power of these small kingdoms were limited and they didn’t need to care about them. What they needed to do was take in some of the stronger kingdoms.

    This didn’t clash with Chu Tian’s mission. Chu Tian needed to go and find the incredibly precious crystals, he couldn’t just run to small kingdoms to look for them, right? Since it was like this, he might as well do it. When he took the maps and the related information, Chu Tian began to visit them with his Great Summer Country Scholar title.

    "There’s still something I don’t understand." Meng Yingying was sitting in an airship, "How did you turn grass into food? It was clearly grass, how could it have the ability to cure illnesses?"

    "Actually it isn’t hard to explain. The War Hounds Plains soil is rich and quite abundant in spiritual energy, so the herd raised on the plains would contain strong energy. However, the bodies of humans and demon beasts are different, so they can’t absorb it." Chu Tian stopped before continuing, "I just used the medicine and the source energy array to make it so the grass can be absorbed. It can indeed fill one’s stomach, but it doesn’t have high nutritional value, so it can’t be eaten for long."

    Meng Yingying revealed an expression of understanding, "So the food being able to cure the illness is because of the antidote in the medicine?"

    "You also have time you’re not dumb!"

    "Pei, pei, pei, you’re dumb!"

    The two of them sat in the airship chatting while Chen Bingyu sat to the side. She was just holding a cup of tea and said nothing like a block of wood.

    Meng Yingying was tired of arguing with Chu Tian, "Where are we planning to go?"

    Chu Tian opened a map with the War Hounds Plains in the center, with countries in every direction of the War Hounds Plains. There were three-four small kingdoms to the north with territory and population that was even less than the Southern Summer Country. They had already been swallowed by the Eagle Burial Kingdom, so to the north of the small kingdoms, it was the territory of the Eagle Burial Kingdom. Although the map could not draw all of the Eagle Burial Kingdom’s territory, the part that was revealed was enough to demonstrate the pressure coming from the north.

    The Eagle Burial Kingdom was a spirit beast warring kingdom and the only kingdom in the surrounding area, so Chu Tian was not interested in the Eagle Burial Kingdom or its sphere of influence. This was because in the chaos of war, it was hard to establish markets in these places, so there weren’t many of the resources they needed.

    Chu Tian’s eyes swept over the small and large kingdoms around the War Hounds Plains, finally falling onto a not too small kingdom in the southwest corner. The country was tall and slim, without much territory, but there were many different biomes in the country, so the resources must be relatively rich.

    Chu Tian saw the country’s name and immediately thought of the ghost masked old man from the Central State Black Market.

    "Looking all around, there is only one large kingdom.
    Is this another Cinderella Story? It hasn’t had any disturbances in several hundred years and although the territory isn’t large, it should be very rich in resources, as well as having a strong national power. This is a large kingdom that is more worthy of the name than the War Hounds Kingdom or the Great Summer Kingdom, so we’ll go there."

    "What is the name of the country?"

    "The Great Zhou Kingdom!"

    Pa!

    Meng Yingying and Chu Tian didn’t have any reactions.

    However the sitting Chen Bingyu’s body slightly trembled and the cup in her hand was shattered to pieces on the ground.

    Meng Yingying asked in a surprised voice, "Big sister Bing, what is it?"

    Chen Bingyu realized her mistake, "No, nothing."

    Meng Yingying was filled with confusion. Chu Tian could see that Chen Bingyu was hiding many secrets, this girl’s origin was not very simple and it was likely she wasn’t someone from the Southern Summer Country. From her reaction, could it be she was related to the Great Zhou Country?

    The Great Zhou Country wasn’t that much bigger than the Southern Summer Country, but because its territory is strangely shaped, it was like a long slithering snake. Therefore, it could have borders with the Eagle Burial Kingdom, the War Hounds Plains, Southern Summer, and even the Forest of Chaos at the same time.

    The Great Zhou Country in the ancient era was a prosperous place, so there were many precious inheritances and ruins. The Great Zhou Country was established on their ancestors’ inheritances and ruins, so there were many sects in the Great Zhou Country. With all these inheritances, this was a country of sects without a fixed royal family or upper class, mainly being ruled by the sects.

    The Great Zhou Country was relatively close and it was the strongest neighbour they had. Chu Tian would visit the Great Zhou Country with his Great Summer Country Scholar title, using it to create an alliance between Great Summer and Great Zhou.

    The Eagle Burial Kingdom to the north was a threat no matter what.

    If the Great Summer and Great Zhou Countries work together and prop up the Northern Militant Country as a vanguard, it wasn’t hard for them to resist the Eagle Burial Country. At leas they would be able to stop them from pushing any further south.

    Of course.

    It was not easy to tell if the Great Zhou Country would give Chu Tian this face!

    The airship travelled tens of thousands of meters above, passing countless wildernesses, finally arriving in the Great Zhou Country’s territory. Cities and buildings filled with an ancient style appeared in front of their eyes.

    The world was large and nothing was strange. Even in a human country, the style and customs would not be the same.

    Most of Great Zhou’s powers hid in mountains, with most sects being built in cultivation paradises people rarely visited. Anyway, most of the cities didn’t have strong energy gathered and most of the cities were just filled with people sent by the sects to take care of matters. They cultivated pills and spirit beasts, with most of them having to send tributes to large sects, obtaining their protection.

    They arrived at the Heavenly Yin Mountain.

    The Heavenly Yin Mountain was one of the Great Zhou Country’s eight famous mountains, meaning there was also an ancient ruin here. This was the territory of the Black Moon Sect of the six large Great Zhou sects, it was a large sect that had lasted for thousands of years.

    The surrounding large and small cities were all constructed by the Heavenly Yin Mountain, belonging to the influence of the Black Moon Sect’s outer sect. Each city in the Black Moon Sect’s sphere of influence belonged to the Black Moon Sect. If there wasn’t the Black Moon Sect protecting them, these people would not have a way of surviving here.

    Because of this, the people of the Heavenly Yin Mountain all took serving the Black Moon Sect as their greatest responsibility. Most people chose to join the Black Moon Sect’s outer sect as an outer sect disciple. If their innate talent was high enough, they could enter the Heavenly Yin Mountain to become a Black Moon Sect inner disciple, being able to obtained the thousands of years old inheritance of the Black Moon Sect.

    The Great Summer Country had states as separate territories.

    The Great Zhou Country had sects as separate territories.

    This was very interesting. In order not to attract attention, Chu Tian chose to to ride a griffin to discuss the situation. This was because although he was the envoy sent by the Great Summer Country, the problem was how he would meet the Great Zhou Country’s king.

    Wa, a griffin!"