Vera and Caldrin made their way through Marrowfen as Vera mentally prepared herself.
Since the central plaza in front of the Marrowvault’s aboveground spire—where many of the city’s most important administrative buildings, including the Pale Hall, had stood—was largely reduced to rubble during the attack, most official gatherings w...
2025-11-15 03:26:59 +0000 UTC View PostVera sat at a small table in a sunlit parlor in Dreadwake Alcove, a serious expression on her face as she leaned forward and pointed.
“Alright. And how much does this make?”
Next to her, brows knitted tight in an adorably fierce frown that Vera thought she could’ve watched all day, Serel stared at the stacks of different-sized ...
2025-11-11 03:30:05 +0000 UTC View PostVanded looked between Vera and Serel, then moved his hand. Faint sigils shimmered in the air, rippling like a haze around the two of them.
Vera raised a brow. “Thanks,” she said, glancing at her daughter.
She assumed it was a Mark that meant their words wouldn’t reach Serel. This way, he didn’t actually have to let Serel out ...
2025-11-10 03:25:37 +0000 UTC View PostVanded Blazegrip laughed easily as he strode across the room, completely unbothered by the silence that followed his words.
Serel edged closer to Vera, small hand tightening around hers as the mountain of a man came to a stop in front of them. His gaze swept over the girl with a broad grin that showed far too much warmth for his weathered ...
2025-11-08 01:28:55 +0000 UTC View PostVera’s eyes opened when she felt movement beside her. Morning light filtered through the window, carrying the faint sound of birdsong and the wind stirring leaves outside.
She let herself stay still for a while, breathing. She was… tired.
But that was fine.
She still didn’t quite trust herself to sleep with Serel next to ...
2025-11-04 02:13:31 +0000 UTC View PostThey made for the surface as fast as they could. Gard had made the hard call to leave even the fallen behind in the tunnels of the Marrowvault. Speed mattered more than sentiment. After finding the empty throne room in those depths, the only thing they’d managed to do was destroy the ritual basins that had spawned the Tetherborn before fleeing...
2025-11-04 02:12:23 +0000 UTC View Post“I’ve got one question for you,” Vera said, Resonance gathering along Stillwake’s shaft. “You’re stronger than last time. Why?”
The Silent Lord in this world had been defeated by a coordinated strike from some of the strongest fighters around. Having personally experienced how strong the Veralyth from back then was from the v...
2025-11-02 22:58:09 +0000 UTC View PostConsider this a notice.
First off, sorry for the late chapter — especially after that cliffhanger. This week’s been packed, and I just couldn’t get it out on time. I’d planned two extra chapters, but that’s getting cut down to one, which will drop later this weekend. On Monday, there’ll be two chapters, and another extra one to...
2025-11-01 16:11:37 +0000 UTC View PostVera studied the figure before her. The mask of smooth ivory, unbroken except for the inverted crown carved into its brow—like an empty mockery of a face staring her down.
“…Hollow Ascendant.”
The words whispered from everywhere and nowhere at once, carrying a hatred so vast it felt like the world itself had spoken i...
2025-11-01 16:11:13 +0000 UTC View Post“Ma, you sure we should leave?”
Her daughter’s voice carried up small and tight as Hilde looked out the second-story window at Marrowfen’s streets. The night had sunk deep, the city swallowed by that strange, heavy kind of darkness that made even the lanterns burn paler under the moon’s light.
Hilde narrowed her eye. For an...
2025-10-28 01:58:37 +0000 UTC View PostGard had known better than to expect things to be easy. When he had headed to investigate the Bonewright Guild’s Marrowvault passages, he’d done so with the full understanding of what it might cost. The Chapter members under his command had understood that too, or so he hoped.
Since arriving in Marrowfen, time and time again, he’d be...
2025-10-27 00:51:04 +0000 UTC View PostVera stared at the image of her mother, then turned to Serel.
Her mouth opened, then closed.
A quiet voice inside her tried to speak, but she hesitated to give it shape.
It was true. She’d never once called herself Serel’s mother. Others had called her that, and she hadn’t corrected them, but she’d never said it herself...
2025-10-24 23:49:04 +0000 UTC View PostShe looked like she’d stepped straight out of an ordinary morning. A woman in her early sixties, hair mostly chestnut but giving way to soft streaks of gray at the roots, kept in check by the kind of careful box-dye that said she still cared, just not obsessively. Fine lines framed her eyes and mouth, the kind that came from years of worrying ...
2025-10-21 01:49:10 +0000 UTC View Post(Apologies. This chapter was supposed to be released during the weekend, but my schedule proved to be absolutely packed. Next chapter will come later today. There will be two more chapters this week, one on Friday as usual and an extra Patreon one sometime during the weekend. Next week I will try to release two extra chapters) 2025-10-20 13:25:04 +0000 UTC View Post
Something was simmering beneath the surface of Marrowfen by the time the sun dropped. The wind carried the taste of bone dust and distant mist, and the streets lay in brittle quiet when the signal fires rose.
Vanded watched the first one arc from the southern ward, burst white above the rooftops, and fade. A heartbeat later, another went u...
2025-10-17 23:43:20 +0000 UTC View PostVanded Blazegrip’s boots rang on worn oak floorboards as he walked down the corridor, wiping the grime and ichor from his armor with a frayed towel as he moved. Once he’d soaked the cloth through, he let it disappear into his Vaultring and brought out a fresh one to continue cleaning.
Cryptling residue was always a pain to scrub off. 2025-10-13 21:18:18 +0000 UTC View Post
Whitefinger
In Ashen Legacy, during the first expansion Veil of the Hollow King, the raid known as the Sepulchre of Silence descended beneath Marrowfen into the Marrowvault. Its final boss was Veyrith, the Silent Lord, Vowpale Ascendant. You fought him in the very chamber Vera and Serel had run a...
2025-10-12 20:52:19 +0000 UTC View Post“Mommy, I’m bored.”
Vera stilled. Her head turned slowly toward Serel, who was sitting on the couch with a book nearly larger than her torso open across her lap. She blinked.
Several times.
“You’re… bored?”
Serel nodded. “Mmm.”
Vera studied her. “You sure?”
The girl gave her a strange loo...
2025-10-10 21:10:21 +0000 UTC View Post“Vanded Blazegrip is preparing a gift for me?” Veralyth asked.
“Yes,” Gard replied after a brief hesitation. His tone came out slower than he intended, and he couldn’t entirely hide the resignation.
“…Why?” Her eyes narrowed. “Does he know who I am?”
“No, I don’t believe so.” Gard lifted his hands. “...
2025-10-06 22:47:55 +0000 UTC View PostThe crypt library that was the Ashledger Archive had a particular atmosphere to it. Vera had designed it to be similarly gothic and stoic as the rest of the estate, but the Archive might have been one of the more self-indulgent areas. Even discounting all of the shadowed alcoves, the engraved pillars, and the uniquely ornate display cases, the p...
2025-10-05 21:06:08 +0000 UTC View PostSerel shifted in Vera’s arms as the two of them stepped out into the Ember Gallery at the heart of Sablewatch Hollow. The girl’s head turned this way and that, taking in the polished obsidian tiles and the flickering sconces burning with emberlight.
Vera let Stillwake vanish from her grasp and swiped an imaginary bead of sweat from her...
2025-10-03 22:47:01 +0000 UTC View Post(Promised an additional chapter during the weekend, but ended up not having the time to publish it. Releasing a double chapter today to make up for it)
Vera watched the matron, feeling strangely awkward. Like she’d been caught doing something she wasn’t supposed to.
She cleared her thr...
2025-09-29 21:59:50 +0000 UTC View Post(Promised an additional chapter during the weekend, but ended up not having the time to publish it. Releasing a double chapter today to make up for it)
A pair of armored guards stormed in after the first, each carrying heavy bone truncheons, their eyes sweeping the tavern. One didn’t make it...
2025-09-29 21:59:36 +0000 UTC View Post(Apologies for the slight delay. Will most likely be an additional chapter later today or tomorrow)
People were staring.
That might’ve been bad enough, but some of the Hollowstone Table folk were staring with wide eyes, like they’d just seen something they shouldn’t have. The drunk man in front of Vera looked as if his...
2025-09-27 09:32:09 +0000 UTC View PostSerel was quieter than usual.
It didn’t surprise Vera. In fact, she would’ve been more worried if the girl had just bounced back to her usual energy after everything that had happened. But watching her half-trudge through the streets of Marrowfen with only a fraction of the interest she’d showcased before at all the rib-boned buildin...
2025-09-24 19:44:37 +0000 UTC View PostThere was a knock on the door. Gard looked up from his desk, hand lifting to remove his spectacles.
“Come in.”
Lucette entered, a stack of ledgers balanced neatly in her arms.
“Yes?” he asked.
“The Chapter-Master has returned,” she said.
Gard’s brows lifted. “Already? Are you sure?”
The woman...
2025-09-22 20:47:56 +0000 UTC View PostThe fire, the walls, the braziers, all of it was gone. Even Serel’s presence—clutched tightly in Vera’s arms—felt farther away than it should have.
There was no floor beneath them, only a pale expanse stretching endlessly, dull and matte like clay left to dry. It was marked faintly by grooves that resembled veins or roots or maybe ...
2025-09-22 20:47:04 +0000 UTC View PostWhen Vera woke the next morning, it took her longer than she cared to admit to blink the sleep from her eyes and actually bother getting up. Back in her old body, she’d been used to lying around for too long because it had simply been hard to move, and she might’ve thought she’d want to do the opposite now. But she realized there was its o...
2025-09-22 20:45:21 +0000 UTC View Post