Absently, as he clambered off the wing, William glanced at the line of flower shaped wax stains that had been stitched along the side of the Drake he’d just dismounted.
“S’alright kid,” the instructor called from her position in the co-pilot seat. “You flew as well as you could. Sometimes the odds just aren’t in your favor.”<...
2024-11-02 09:06:23 +0000 UTC View PostWilliam sighed as the crystal orb on his desk returned to its usual blue hue.
“She’s going to make you pay for that,” Xera opined from over his shoulder.
The count of Redwater county just shrugged. “I’ve little doubt. Still, needs must. As tempting as it might be to slink back to the academy rather than stay here and ‘fac...
2024-10-26 22:58:16 +0000 UTC View PostWell, at least he doesn’t look like he’s about to keel over anymore, Piper thought as she followed her liege lord into his personal lab.
Indeed, after a shower and a nap, the young man seemed almost sheepish about the state he’d been in when he’d stumbled into her office.
Fortunately, for him, Piper was one of the fe...
2024-10-18 12:41:48 +0000 UTC View PostAs William stepped into his office, he couldn’t help but feel that just maybe some of the people inside were annoyed with him.
There was his sister, who was sitting on the couch with her arms folded grumpily over her chest.
Xela was… looking a bit haggard. Which was to be expected given she’d both been de facto running his terr...
2024-10-11 09:04:27 +0000 UTC View PostIf anyone had ever told her Xela that she’d be sitting in a shard being piloted by a plebian one day, she’d have struck them for the insult.
And it was an insult.
Though I can’t help but wonder if the fact that this particular plebian in question is pretty decent behind the controls makes it better or worse, she p...
2024-10-06 13:16:51 +0000 UTC View Post“It’s so smooth!” William’s muffled voice came from within the confines of the Basilisk’s rear-gunnery position, the bulbous pod twisting back and forth in time with his manipulation of the foot pedal controls. “And responsive.”
Twenty minutes or so ago, that kind of praise would have filled Clarice with pride. And to an exte...
2024-09-30 08:58:04 +0000 UTC View PostContrary to popular belief, William’s mother didn’t actually spend every hour of every day inside her office. Despite the presence of his many aunts, he knew that the head of the Ashfield family spent much of her time riding about the county seeing to many of the issues that might require her attention as the head of a small territory.
I was originally going to keep this bit of concept art to myself while I commissioned some more, but recent events compel me to unveil it.
(Apologies for any errors in this text, I've been up just under twenty four hours at this point in time due to... some sort of intestinal bug.)
Indeed, part of the reason I hedged my bets on Fri...
“The Drake,” Griffith said to her tired audience of Marine-Knight cadets, her voice echoing off the walls of the massive hangar they’d just entered. “Considered old, but far from outdated, the Drake is the workhorse design of the Royal Navy and the craft most of you will fly should you be fortunate enough to be chosen as designated pilot...
2024-09-15 13:10:16 +0000 UTC View PostClarice smirked victoriously as she clambered out of her family’s shard and onto the solid tarmac of the academy’s landing field. Ignoring the clouds of blue-green aether that served to obscure the landing area as other shards came in to land, the half-elf took a moment to soak in the many looks of envy, disbelief and confusion that were bei...
2024-09-08 10:22:47 +0000 UTC View PostFinn Mecant was not a man easily given to bouts of nervousness. That certainly hadn’t always been the case, but after nearly ten years spent delivering goods across kraken infested oceans, through monster filled jungles and over treacherous mountain passes, any notions of nervousness he might once have possessed had been for the most part, bea...
2024-09-01 21:08:18 +0000 UTC View PostPiper was an alchemist. A fairly talented one at that. She was the one who invented Bear-Blood after all.
Prior to her enrolment in the alchemist’s guild, the venerable guild had been churning out a variant of Earth-Blood that did little more than burn hotter and longer. In short, a slight improvement on the base asset of the substance a...
2024-08-24 12:43:35 +0000 UTC View Post“That’s right, careful now. Nice and easy,” Xela instructed her ‘student’ as they slowly came in to land.
Seated behind the younger girl, the wood elf felt more than saw the rear wheels of the craft hit the runway. Then the front wheel.
Satisfied, the wood elf released her own deathgrip on the craft’s secondary control sy...
2024-08-17 12:03:44 +0000 UTC View PostPausing only to ensure the clearing was clear, Isabella wasted no time in dashing to the log at the centre of it and shifting it aside.
A peculiar sight to be sure, if anyone were observing, given that she herself was invisible. To a casual observer, it would seem as if the log just… suddenly decided to move of its own volition. Fortunat...
2024-08-11 17:18:41 +0000 UTC View Post“Did you really waste a spell-charge on that?”
William ignored Griffith’s grousing as he gingerly applied his newly created bag of ice to Verity’s shoulder.
“How’s that,” he asked carefully of the sitting and slightly fidgety orc. “Better?”
“Y-yes,” she responded, slightly flushed and eyes averted as she k...
2024-08-02 12:21:20 +0000 UTC View Post“With that said,” he continued as he slowly forced his rational mind to reassert itself. “I can’t help but wonder why you’re doing this?”
The dark elf seemed momentarily wrong footed, almost reaching for the edges of her shirt, as if to pull it back about herself, before she rallied.
“I thought this was what yo...
2024-07-26 13:36:15 +0000 UTC View Post
Little known fact, in addition to playing Warhammer, Blue is a huge fan of the Infinity Tabletop game by Corvus Belli.
While it takes a lot of inspiration from a lot other things (Dune being amongst the least), I've always loved that a lot of cultural inspirations for the factions are slightly more obscure than in most ficti...
“I can’t believe you made me get out of bed for this,” Bonnlyn groused as the members of Team Seven watched the first of two Shards be wheeled down the ramp of the newly arrived airship.
Marline chuckled as she turned to the eye the dwarf. “Not at all excited to see the shard we’re going to be spending the next two weeks practici...
2024-07-21 23:52:07 +0000 UTC View Post“You know, when we decided to go on a tour of William’s new territory, I had a feeling we might encounter the dungeon at some point,” Olzenya opined from her position on a nearby cot, the high elf staring blankly at the concrete ceiling overhead. “Not for any great length of time you must understand. In my experience, once you’ve seen ...
2024-07-13 21:34:46 +0000 UTC View Post‘Ninety percent of sapient communication is non-verbal.’
Truth be told, Piper wasn’t entirely sure where she’d first heard that bit of trivia, but the dwarf woman had never found cause to disagree with it. In her experience, communication, more often than not, was more about the subtle gestures that preceded words than the...
2024-07-07 15:23:52 +0000 UTC View Post
Been meaning to get around to making AI mockups of the main cast for a while - ostensibly to use as references for when I get around to actually hiring an artist :D
For now, enjoy the AI (I had fun putting these guys together, but it took a while :P ).
As William stepped into his mother’s office, he made sure to shut the door behind him. He wanted this to be a private conversation after all. While he’d likely be denied that by virtue of his invisible watcher’s planting an ear to the wood of the door, he’d at least have made it more difficult for them to make out his words.
It was...
2024-06-29 01:54:57 +0000 UTC View PostWilliam liked to think he’d achieved a fair amount in his new life.
He’d killed an ancient aquatic god-beast in the depths of its lair. He’d lead a disparate team of first years to victory against a team with more than three times as much experience – and triumphed. He’d thrown a spanner into the works of a continent-wide conspir...
2024-06-24 00:12:18 +0000 UTC View PostChapter is pretty much finished and I should be posting it sometime in the next... twenty four hours or so :P
With that said, a recent comment has echoed something I've been considering myself. That being that between my break and the surgery there's not been a much content at all this month.
Now, while I don't doubt many of you ge...
Verity struggled to fight down a frown as she watched her teammate ‘chat up’ a pair of his family’s guardswomen from around the corner.
Sure, he was technically just trying to help his team gain access to the family hangar, but it still wasn’t right!
It just wasn’t… proper, for a lad to be acting like that. Being all flir...
2024-06-14 16:45:34 +0000 UTC View Post
Been greatly enjoying my break. So much so that I've been puttering around with my 3D printer attempting to make a new Steam Tank for Age of Sigmar.
...When an idea occurred to me. And I figured I'd see if it was as amusing to ya'll as it was to me.
And I figured I'd also let ya'll know that I'll be back next Friday with the first ...
“Well done.”
As far as first words were concerned, William definitely hadn’t expected those to be hers.
She certainly looked like she wanted to say a few.
“My thanks, mother,” he acknowledged, about as gracefully as he could. “Please be sure to tell Tala it was a hard fought win.”
And wasn’t that the...
2024-05-21 15:38:56 +0000 UTC View PostWilliam certainly didn’t remember a dining table being present the last time he was in Griffith’s office.
Hell, how did they even get it through the door? He thought idly as he reached for a buttered scone.
As he did, his eyes briefly passed over the third member of their little post-match meeting.
Griffith wa...
2024-05-15 12:45:48 +0000 UTC View PostThe dull roar of the crowd was only slightly muted by the small alcove they’d been tucked into prior to the start of the match. Rather than starting at disparate ‘duty’ stations as they would be in a regular match, the team was instead all grouped together.
Assumedly to replicate the idea of us landing nearby a downed airship, 2024-05-06 09:24:37 +0000 UTC View Post
I said Sunday and come hell or high water you'll have a Sunday release if you want it.
Issue is that I'm fully out of juice for the day and I'm reaching the point where I'm starting to write 'just to get it done'.
I thought getting a huge double length chapter out would be a fun 'treat' with no cliffhangers.
I regret that de...