Experience Point

15/01/2025

In his cave, far from sunlight and moonlight and starlight and firelight, Teyth caught a fish, and from the fish’s guts he made six strings. In his cave, Teyth grew a tree, and for six years the tree grew, watered only by his love and affection, until Teyth cut it down and used its heart to make a lute. And he looked upon his work, and knew that it was good.

10/01/2025

The throne of the chakravarti is empty: only the Queen of Emptiness sits in audience, alone in the great hall. She gazes upon Urbarri dispassionately for several long heartbeats before speaking. "You speak of omens." Her voice is quiet, but it cuts through the silence of the hall like a knife. "How little you know of omens." Her eyes are as hard as diamonds, and they glitter with the will to do harm.

But. She sighs then, and the tension leaves her voice and the room. She makes a mudra of apology. "Forgive me. I should not take it out on you. You are only doing as your lord wishes; as am I." She stands, and her shadow blocks out the glittering light of the stars in the window behind her. Urbarri does not dare look too long at her shadow: she has heard the tales of its hunger, and what happens to the unwary who express too much curiosity in the Queen's train.

"You and your lord ishvara can do nothing for our king. It is His duty, and He will see it done. He only wishes to know, before He goes forth and does it, that His kingdom will be well-cared for after He is gone." The Queen directs her gaze at Urbarri then, piercing her soul, flensing her spirit, laying her mind bare before her. "Will it? Does your lord ishvara have the sword-will to do what our king prepares Himself to do, even now? To stare death in the face and, rather than send another, face it Himself?" The Queen crosses the five-span distance between her and Urbarri in a single heartbeat; up close, she smells of the cold, of Winter itself. "Does your ishvara dare to seize the Wheel, that it may be turned?"

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06/01/2025

Battle was truly enjoined then, as the king drew his sword and cast about himself with both blade and spell. Rabila’s hawk was snatched from the air and dashed against the stones at the foot of his throne, and Rabila himself was thrown off the mountain by a single blow from the king. Eilbroon roared a thunderous cry, and although the throne was shattered, neither the king nor the co**se of his mother was harmed. Marnita caught the king’s sword with a chord, but the strike was not halted, and both she and her harp was cleft in twain.

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04/01/2025

I'm not even going to dignify this with a caption.

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01/01/2025

They turned then to their eldest sister, who still held the hand of the mother, and said to her: “What of your gift, sister?” And their eldest sister said to them: “To her I shall gift the genius of the sword, and the many lessons contained therein.” And the sisters murmured amongst themselves, and said to each other that this was a great gift indeed.

21/12/2024

When Jahaan pulls up alone on his destrier, Inarash nods to herself, pleased, and mobilises the Red Banner. "From now till sunset, do not enter any doors or windows, or cross any thresholds if you can avoid it. All of you will be responsible for dealing with that man on the horse; Inarash and I will handle the beast that hides in his shadow."

The battle between the Red Banner and Jahaan turns out to be a protracted and bloody one—one that sates even Thujun's spear—but it is no match for the battle that takes place between Inarash and Qyhnir, who emerges from Shadow and wields its hunger as a cudgel; Qyhnir, whose body in the Real is a doorway, whose many mouths cry out in discord with one another, whose roiling form tears open the very fabric of reality with its every movement. But its opponent is Inarash, whose will is steel, who has been tempered by a thousand battles, who shares a mind and body with her sword.

With each cut and slash, the warrior-general strides easily between the Real and the Shadow. Her every move is precise; but no matter how precise one is, against a creature like Qyhnir, whose hunger is all-encompassing, it is impossible to avoid everything. Qyhnir's roars of rage slowly turn into whimpers of fear as more and more of its limbs are shorn off by Inarash, until it is reduced to nothing more than a single doorway with a crooked lintel and a splintered doorjamb. It has long lost its capacity for coherent thought or speech, yet still, Qyhnir begs for its life. But Inarash is a blade, and blades have no mercy. With three quick strokes, Inarash ends the existence of Qyhnir.

13/12/2024

The night sky is dark, save for a single star that stubbornly refuses to go out. Then, just as suddenly, the light of that star fades too. The people of the world hold their breath, but they let it out soon when they realise that the world is not about to end. Not quite yet, anyway. Life goes on beneath that black, starless sky. Only the gods and the outsiders, who have seen this happen before, know what has just happened. It is the end of an era: Adrarabi the Great, praised be His name, is dead.

From the City of Seventeen Steps, a tune is struck up on a zither: slow at first, then faster, and faster, and faster, until it encompasses the whole world in itself. All who hear the song weep uncontrollably, their hearts breaking against the fullness of the sorrow that it contains, like a wave crashing against the shore on a night that knows no end. Then, just when the listeners thought that they could bear no more, that they would faint from bearing this much pain within their hearts, the zither is abruptly stilled.

It is said that, after that night, nobody dared to play the zither in the City of Seventeen Steps again.

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05/12/2024

For a whole heartbeat did they travel, until they eventually arrived in a dry land that has never known the touch of water. It was there that they encountered a young woman who was more beast than god. Her skin was as black as smoke, her eyes were as red as blood, her teeth were as sharp as swords, and worse of all, she went about the world both unclad and unshod, and on all fours in a be***al gait.

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29/11/2024

The monks welcomed the adventurers warmly, but told them that the upper bounds of the village was no longer safe. “A foul thing has taken up residence in the spires and ramparts of the palace,” they said, “a thing that recites the poetry of steel, but knows nothing of rhythm and rhyme, of metaphor or allusion. It is a crude creature that makes a mockery of beauty, and it exists only to kill and maim.” And, saying this, they showed the band the monks who have ventured into the upper bounds of the palace, and whose bodies still bore the grievous wounds and scars of the beast’s quatrains.

18/11/2024

Strong Ilu-Shuma—who wore the skin of a lion around his shoulders, and who ate and drank and laughed and loved enough for three men—spoke next, and he spoke of what he saw in the south. In the tradecircles, the priests did not put their minds to contracts and the tending of law, but instead turned their sacred temples into b***y houses and gambling dens; and in such places, the Reachmen of the King idled the hours away, and wasted their wages on flesh and wine.

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12/11/2024

"And the king, who saw well the threat that Gethos posed to her and her throne, pressed the attack, and Gethos was forced to retreat down the seventeen marble steps until there was nought but air behind him; at which point he grabbed the boy and dove through the air. And although the king made to give chase, Gethos knew the names of the winds, and he spoke to them and called upon ancient compacts and favours that they owed him and his line; and the winds answered, and secreted Gethos and the boy beneath their cloaks, and hid them in a grotto far from the kingdom." - The Tale of Gethos

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08/11/2024

For a full day and night Bysvekh fasted, and when she was ready, she dressed herself in undyed linen, and set aside her armour and her arms, and walked into the house of congregation naked; whereupon she prostrated herself before the empty throne and sought an audience with the goddess.

For three days and three nights Bysvekh remained within, and on the dawn of the fourth day, she emerged with five clay slates in her hands. And her people crowded around her, and asked her, “what has our king decreed?” And Bysvekh gathered the people before the tabernacle, and said unto them: “Our king has spoken. Let all who have ears listen, and let all who have eyes see.”

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03/11/2024

She gathers herself, wraps her shadow around her like a cloak. Behind her, the stars fade, one by one. She does not seem to notice it; or, if she notices it, she makes no mention of it. Instead, she gestures for Urbarri to rise from the ground and stand before her. "Let me look upon your youth, childe. Show me what the next age will bring. Tell me, if your lord gains the throne, what he would do with the world."

30/10/2024

The things that matter.

29/10/2024

25/10/2024

From left to right: Duke Redfort, Duke Stannisbrae, and Duke Aercus.

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20/10/2024

"Consider the Wheel. It turns in a circle, never ending, always repeating, milling the years into Seasons, the Seasons into weeks, the weeks into days, and the days into hours. But yet it will only ever roll in one direction, and the yoke that pulls it will only ever pull it forward. Which is more important then, the circle or the direction? This is a foolish question, for both are just as important. Taken separately, they each merely describe an aspect of the Wheel. Even taken together, it is insufficient to describe the entirety of the Wheel."

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17/10/2024

Duke Stannisbrae, colourized.