《Tome of Stealth [A System Anti-Apocalypse]》Chapter 12
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Post by ProudJesusFreak1273 4:23 PM, April 4th, 20XX
At my church, we have two pastors and they are up in arms about this Passivity Precept thing. The older one says that it's a messenger from the devil and that good Christians shouldn’t use it or enter that game thingy. The younger pastor says that since it wants to rid the world of violence it is doing God’s will. I am just so confused. Do you have any advice for a good pious Christian?
I trotted and sneezed my way back to where Lore waited for me. When his eyes met mine they twinkled with amusement. Seriously, here I was working my butt off, and he was entertained that I died! The urge to punch his gorgeous face practically overwhelmed me. I satisfied my desire by sauntering up and violently sneezing on his shoulder.
The horrified look on his face made dying almost worth it.
I laughed maniacally as he darted back towards the respawn point.
That was so funny I had to do it again! With a smirk plastered on my face, I ran after him. He turned a corner. I followed. The tunnel appeared empty, but I could feel eyes upon me.
“Lore,” I said. “Ahchoo! Get back here!”
He didn’t reply. I continued forward.
From out of nowhere elegant masculine hands shielded my eyes without touching my skin.
“Got you. Now you’re dead.” I hadn’t noticed before, but his husky voice sounded like velvet and sin. Chills ran down my spine, and not in the "I'm scared" way. My gutter-mind spun into all sorts of directions I needed it to not go. Like, ever. I mean, this was Lore who was probably a classic “love’em and leave’em” bard. He was not boyfriend material, not that I was looking for one. No, what Lore was, was one hell of a seductive bard.
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I cleared my throat and felt pressure in my sinuses. I used my sleeve to cover my nose and mouth.
He released me just before I sneezed again. I turned to look at him.
“And why exactly did you attack me with your germs?”
“To wipe that amused look off your face. Dying fucking hurts, you know?”
The smile in his eyes disappeared, replaced by deep shadows. “Oh, I am aware.” He gestured towards the mining cave. “Ready?”
I sighed. “Yeah.” Another unwelcome sneeze burst from me. “Ugh! I hate sneezing!”
We only just started walking when I stopped and turned to him. My eyes bulged. “Wait a second. How the hell did you hide from me? That tunnel had, like, zero good spots.”
He gifted me with a smug smirk and kept going.
“You’re also blue and white in a dark cave. You shouldn’t be able to hide from anything.”
His chuckle didn’t give me the answer. He kept walking. I ground my teeth and jogged after him.
“So,” he said, obviously changing the subject. “With the death penalty you earned, your ability to stealth is ruined. Do you have a plan to kill more rats?”
We reached the ledge above the miners, and I peered down to see the changes made to the group in the aftermath of my attack. The enforcer and the grunt rat were now closer to the wall. They searched their surroundings with diligence.
When an awesome stupid idea popped into my head I smirked. “Well.” I backed up a few yards. “Why don’t you watch?”
I drew my swords and cast Add Air onto them. I crossed my arms to cast invisibility then bolted for the end of the ledge. As I pushed myself forward, I aimed my body at the armored rat. As my body went into freefall a rush of adrenaline hit me. I neared the rodent, lifted my swords and then plunged them down into its thick skull. His head burst like a watermelon. A fresh meat and old sock scent filled the air. It also splattered all over me. Gross.
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As we both tumbled down the ground flew toward me. Pain shot up my legs and arms. I screamed. My vision dimmed.
You have sustained falling damage but because you have a level in Parkour your personal damage is reduced! Your opponent isn’t so lucky! Good job!
I had about a third of my health left but at least the rat under me was dead.
I skimmed the prompt as I tried to recover. A pinprick jabbed into my back and two burning points brushed my neck. Warm sticky liquid drenched my sweater. I couldn't breathe... until I sneezed.
I rolled forward and turned to face a grunt rat and one of the miners who wielded a pickaxe.
Wait! A miner was attacking me now? What the actual fuck? Seriously, the gall of this guy! I speared it in the heart. It let out a monstrous screech. A billion nails scratched my eardrums. I pressed my wrists to the sides of my head as if I could make the agony stop. The creature collapsed and died. But the ringing in my ears just began.
I turned just in time to have a trident miss my face. Surprised, I jumped back. I blew on my swords to cast Add Air again then charged the last motherfucker, a grunt. I aimed at its eyes and buried my blades in. It squeaked and jerked my swords out of its head taking its eyes with it. Ewww! Unfortunatly, while it looked like it was almost dead, it still had a little life left in it.
Its two front incisors glinted in the green light just before its teeth plunged into my neck. It must have caught an artery because blood splattered over the rat and everything, really. while still in its mouth, I struggled, but that made the pain worse.
Then someone turned off the lights.
You have been killed by a Grunt Rat. Your current death penalty is: “Feeling a small sharp rock in your shoe for the next 25 ISS minutes... There will not be a rock in your shoe so even if you strip naked you’ll still feel it.” We told you not to die again, but did you listen?
As I appeared near the entrance, I growled. Then I sneezed. When I took a step, I winced with pain.
“Arg!” I stomped my foot and immediately regretted my decision as the nonexistent rock dug painfully into the soft arch of my foot. “And you. Prompt thingy. Stop interrupting my fights. If you have something to tell me, let me know after I’m out of battle!”
Are you sure? I could have critical information.
I sighed. “If it’s absolutely necessary to my survival go ahead, but if it’s just damage explanations or level ups on skills then save it for later.”
Sure thing, Player Grace
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Sword System Academia
2/17 NOTICE: I'm putting this on hiatus, possibly permanently. I didn't want to spam with an "update chapter", so hopefully here and in the story blurb will get enough eyeballs. There are a couple reasons for ending SSA for now. 1) I wrote the next chapter but wasn't happy with it. I've been less and less satisfied with SSA's quality the more I thought about it. Part of the reason is... 2) I am seriously thinking about trying to publish some novels to help pay the bills, since I don't have my other source of income anymore. I have never asked for anything from SSA readers, no money, not even a review or rating. SSA is written for fun to amuse myself, primarily, and I would kind of feel bad actually charging someone money for something as unserious as that. I don't think it is good enough to ask anything in return. To use an analogy from music, SSA is more like a jam session with a bunch of friends. You're just chiling and having fun playing some music. I mean, if you are Mozart or even Eminem, your jam session is good enough to sell, but for an amateur beginner like myself, haha, no. If I want to publish something, I feel like I need to go the proper route of practice and rehearsals, which might be more similar to a classical concert performance. With SSA, I work from worldbuilding notes and a loose outline, but what you are essentially getting is the first draft with lots of so-called pantsing. Pushing out a web novel like this also means it is very difficult to go back and improve things without breaking everything else downstream. I wanted to try this "jamming" approach, as it was a good way to teach me about another aspect of writing, but to move forward, I think I need to hone my "classical" techniques, which emphasize rewriting, or at least, revising outlines. 3) While I intend to try to make $$$, my actual current goal is to "get gud". I've spent a lot of time recently trying to understand the self-publishing industry, and I'm pretty sure I can make some money by using short-term strategies with my current amateur skill level. But I've seen too many authors come and go/burnout, and really, the only way that I think I can enjoy writing and still make money on a long-term basis is to become a better writer. And the next step for me, which I haven't done much before, is to spend more time on rewriting and outlines. That is pretty much antithetical to the way SSA is developing. I've always been kind of 20/80 plotting/pantsing, but I want to spend a lot more time outlining before I even start writing. SSA jam sessions don't really fit my goal anymore. If you're curious about what's next, read on... Among other regrets, I regret not finishing SSA. It's the first story I've dropped, but then again, it's the first web novel I've attempted, so I suppose that's not a surprise. I don't think traditional web novel formats suit me that well. The whole SSA story I had loosely planned (beyond a first book or major arc) is way too large as well. Big story = good for neverending webnovel with Patreons, bad for penniless and fickle writer like me. I am currently outlining a complete trilogy to another story in great detail. I want the story to end concisely, and I also want the chance to really spend a lot of time on the full outline to spot pacing problems, character issues, lost themes, and so on. I'll still share this story on RR. What I intend to do is finish book 1, flash-publish the whole thing here for a few weeks, then publish on the big Zon. Repeat for books 2 and 3. The upcoming story will be about crafting heroes. The backdrop is an isekai-like setting, where elves will summon humans to their world as heroes, but the whole hero crafting business is still in its infancy. The elven mage researchers are figuring out how to imbue heroes with power, while the heroes are trying to figure out how to use the powers that they gain. Humans are the best hero templates because they are blank and have no intrinsic magic. Or at least that what the elves thought. The human MC has his own secrets... There will be some similarities with litrpgs, but I would call it more a progression fantasy or gamelit story. For example, the stats are very low, at least initially. Say we have a stat called Str. Going from Str = 1 to Str = 2 is a huge deal. Also, going from Dex = 0 to Dex = 1 is an even bigger deal. I guess you could call it a "low-stat litrpg", haha. Also, the heroes won't be gaining stats simply by killing things or leveling up. You can't increase stats arbitrarily, either. There will be rules to how stats can increase, and how they work with each other. The elven mages will be figuring out these rules in order to craft stronger and stronger heroes. Some inspiration will be from cultivation magic systems, but there won't be overt cultivation, at least for now. A theme I really want to explore is the idea of interactions. That includes things like hero crafter vs hero, tactics vs strategy, skill synergies, racial interactions (dwarves, elves, etc), and son. Yeah, so hero crafting. I'm super excited about this project and venturing into publishing. If you want to check out the upcoming story, you can follow my RR author profile to see when it drops here. Finally... THANK YOU TO EVERYONE! I'm very sorry that SSA is stopping, but I hope at least some of you will find the next story at least as enjoyable, if not more. Thanks to all the readers who gave SSA a shot. Big hug or solid fistbump to all of you, whichever you prefer! I hope this message is not a downer but an upper, because I am psyched!! -purlcray -------------- BLURB: Talen, youngest Master of the Koroi, makes his way to the Empire's capital to salvage his clan's fate. But the bustling city has few opportunities for the traditionalist. For the old sword clans are fading. With the rise of alchemy, gold can purchase strength that ordinarily took years of training to cultivate. Sword artists, once rare and accomplished, are quickly growing in number, especially among the wealthy noble class. Even with such alchemy, though, no one has advanced to the rank of Grandmaster in countless years. Talen's true dream is to walk the path of a sword artist to the very end while fulfilling his clan duties. And then the Swordgeists return, fabled founders of all sword arts, gods who had touched the world long ago and vanished. These myths turned into reality warn of a coming threat. Alongside this warning, they issue an invitation to the Sword System Academy, a path to power beyond the mortal realm. But first, they will hold an entrance exam... Story notes:Sword System Academia blends elements of western and asian fantasy such as xianxia and litrpg. I took parts from different genres I enjoyed and twisted them into my own creation. There will be an explicit system, both of the litrpg kind and the hard(ish) magic kind, but it is embedded within an academic structure that will develop over the course of the story. This is my attempt to design a unique type of system, the System Academia.
8 153Wild West Hero in the Realm of the Lizardmen
Hero Beaumont is at it again. The vicious outlaw finds himself reborn in another body. With a new, monstrous form, what will the gunslinger do and how will he survive in a new world that is as dangerous as he is? Book Two in the Wild West Hero series. Read Book One here.
8 94Marvel Wild Fiction
I die! But i got reborn !? Thank god ! I promise not to sit all day infront of the computer anymore and be a responsible adult ! Wait. Why is there a museum for Captain America ?! Why is Tony Stark showing up on the TV ?! Why is there a hammer in New Mexico ?! I got reborn in the Marvel Universe ?! Spent 10 minutes to contemplate life Hey God , can i return to heaven ? P/S: A wild fanfiction of MCU ,new inexperience writer, please don't judge me grammar too much ! Also english is not my first language and even if it is i will make a shit tons of mistake anyway, but i have fix the grammar part of the early chapter ok?
8 296A Hero's Song
Gabriel lived his whole life in an underground lab, surrounded by people who only sought to use him - tricked into believing he was broken from birth. Trained to be a killing machine, he never thought he could live a different life until one unusual day. Accepting the risks, he decides it's time to escape. After being invited to join the Sentinels, the guardians of justice, Gabriel learns that - like the lab - not everything is as it seems in the outside world. What he doesn't know, is that his actions will change the fate of the universe as we know it. This is Gabriel's Song. All Rights Reserved D.L. Schrader
8 180Vell, the Gluttonous Mirror [HIATUS]
(Loop, END?) When he died, Al's grandfather left behind a mystery: a set of notes describing the creation of...well, Al wasn't quite sure. He knew magic was real, and that his grandfather was not crazy, but his knowledge ended there. Nonetheless, He vowed to complete his grandfather's legacy. Al decided to seek help from an expert. (Pause. Process. Reset.) Al's employer, Bram, is an expert. Probably. Relatively speaking. As a paranormal investigator, he knew a fair bit about magic. Sure, he didn't really comprehend magic's inner workings, but that was understandable: Bram had discovered magic by pure chance. Together, the pair investigate mysteries and urban legends that defy normal explanation. Of course, though they might be clueless, Magicians still walk the earth…and Al’s grandfather left behind more than some dusty notes… Now, if only Al could discover why— (Loop, START.)
8 153Bestfriend as a Mate
Yoshi Shiro's bestfriend was his dog, though it seemed more like a huge wolf than dog. They did and went everything together. Sometimes the dog went missing but it always came back home. Once Yoshi was 16, the dog completely vanished never coming back. Once he's 18, a man enters his life unexpectedly with the same striking dark brown eyes as the dog. Yoshi trys to stay away from him but with a unnoticed mate bond and meddling outsidersWill Yoshi find his bestfriend again and maybe a bit more?
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