wardenraime

1264 - Ingrid's Duel

The mood offstage was tense; there were thousands of Lords and hundreds of thousands of hangers-on already in the seats, and many hovering over the stage to get a better look at the upcoming duel.  Pressure had focused him, tightening Leon’s muscles and getting his heart to beat like a war drum.

Despite this, he was confident.  Those accustomed to war and battle had an air abo...

1263 - Jennifyr

War Cry was, as her name implied, a vessel designed for war.  She had her comforts, to be sure, but ultimately, the ark had been built to cement the domination of the Great Black Dragon Clan over its domain.  She had fulfilled that intent magnificently; during the conquests before the Belicenian Games, the Patriarch had guided the wars from aboard War Cry, deploying ...

1262 - Esmerelda

The deck of the ark was made of beautiful, aromatic wood, with a dark grain that formed subtle arcane lines.  Whatever tree the planks had been cut from was specifically grown in this way, showing a mastery over nature magic that only the tree sprites in Leon’s Kingdom would match.

All of these details were utterly lost on Leon, however, as he struggled against the monumental weigh...

1261 - Ingrid's Challenge

Stunned, Leon couldn’t form any words to respond to Theron.  He stared at the man, utterly flabbergasted that vassalization came so easily to him.

‘Then again, he said it’s been a thousand years of defending his territory on his own without his patron, or something like that…’

“That’s…” Leon hesitantly began as the silence dragged on.  “That’...

1260 - Expanding Influence

“WHERE IS HE?!” she shouted.  “WHERE IS VROTHGAR?!”

In the face of Ingrid’s wrath, the dozens of men and women in the hangar went completely silent, a palpable aura of fear settling within.  They faced only two people: Leon and Ingrid—Leon had sent his friends and family to meet up with Gwarim, though they were still on call if anything with him and Ingrid turned vio...

1259 - Suitors

“Always remember: I love you two dearly.”

Those final words, spoken by Serana’s projection from the memory slate, rang in Leon’s ears.  He’d listened to the slate’s message many times over the past century and a half, carving every word she said and expression she made into his skull.  He’d shown the projection to no one else in all that time save for his family, b...

1258 - Preparations for the Games

Wow. I asked for all of you to like, comment, and rate, and you did. The most likes this story has ever gotten on a chapter in two days, and the most comments! Not to mention the ratings and reviews this story got on RR!

I guess reminding people to like and comment does actually help, doesn't it?

Anyway, all of you are the best. Thank you for all your support!

=)

---...

1257 - Belicenion

Thank you to all of you for reading and supporting this story! It's honestly staggering to see how many of you are here, especially commenting and liking chapters over the past couple of years. It's a far cry from this story's darkest days during the Serpentine Isles arc when a chapter might struggle to break 10 likes before the next was released.

Anyway, if I could get greedy here for a ...

1256 - Ingrid's Request

The time to leave Khosrow’s Fane quickly loomed, but not quickly enough for Leon’s tastes.  He found the entire place quite distasteful, and while he felt some regret at not seeing the War Gallery or taking his ladies through the forums that Valeria had mentioned, he wouldn’t look back once the demiplane was behind them.

After leaving the meeting with Sasan and Akeron, Mhar esc...

1255 - Sasan's Meeting II

“Given what you know about Khosrow—if anything at all—if he were here right now, able to look out into the universe and see how the world he built fares now, what would he think?  What would he say?”

Sasan’s question left Leon speechless for several long seconds.  His eyes raked the struggles and triumphs commemorated around him, all while Sasan and Akeron’s eyes bor...

1254 - Sasan's Meeting I

The time soon came to meet Sasan at the fane’s central temple, and Leon assembled a small escort to join him.  Given the fane’s apparent widespread attitude toward those with Inherited Bloodlines, he decided to leave Anzu, Clear, and Red behind, though his other four Paladins joined him and his wives.  Anzu wasn’t that thrilled, but Leon specifically left him in charge of a host...

1253 - Invitation to the Mausoleum

The atmosphere in the courtyard was tense and silent.  No one said a word, and even the sounds of the people outside the courtyard seemed to die down.

‘Or they fucked off,’ Leon noted as he glanced behind him and projected his magic senses.  Sure enough, the arrival of the Black Robes behind his small group hadn’t gone unnoticed, and not only had most of the peopl...

1252 - Race Through the Fane

“We’ll need cover,” Leon said as he kept an eye on the surrounding streets with his magic senses.  “Invisibility?  We made it here easily enough…”

“We might make it far,” Archelaus said, “but drawing close to the Lumenite bands will make proceeding under such cover untenable.  And if we’re being actively tracked…”

Leon nodded.  �...

1251 - Problems with Women

“This is a magnificent ark, Despot Raime,” Perenelle purred as the group reached an appropriate sitting room to relax in.

“The pinnacle of the Thunderbird Clan’s arksmithing… circa eighty-thousand years ago,” Leon replied with a grin.

“Sticking with that story?” she pressed.  Then, with a shrug, she said, “I can entertain it.”

“It’s no story,” Mi...

1250 - Princess and her Friends

Beauty, beauty as far as the eye could see; Miuna’s arrival at Khosrow’s Fane put on display the power of the Ocean King as she filled the streets with all the beauty she could bring to bear.

Her jellyfish ‘docked’ at an arkyard close to Storm Herald, and the smooth, fish-like arks of the rest of her convoy did the best they could to dock close to her.  Leon watched ...

1249 - Khosrow's Fane IV

The group hightailed it away from the marketplace as quickly as propriety allowed.  Gwarim and Archelaus, after exchanging a look and what felt to Leon like a brief mental exchange, steered them in the direction of the Roaming Lark, a high-class dining establishment whose schtick was hiring chefs from all over the universe to come and work for a few years and add their recipes and techniqu...

1248 - Khosrow's Fane III

Disappointments kept coming as they made their way through Khosrow’s Fane.  Beneath the luster, the shining stone, a change was happening that Leon, who had never been to the fane before, couldn’t identify.  But Gwarim, who had visited often enough, could hardly walk a single block without bemoaning another lost ‘monument’; another lost tavern, brothel, fighting arena, or othe...

1247 - Khosrow's Fane II

Arks seemingly made of slivers of radiant light escorted Leon’s convoy to a huge arkyard on one of the mountain-sized ‘moons’ suspended over Khosrow’s Fane by enormous bands of golden Lumenite.  While some of the arks in the convoy were so large that they almost had trouble fitting through the river gate—Realiz’s veritable flying mountain, in particular—there was little troub...

1246 - Khosrow's Fane I

Magic stormed around them, pulsing and whirling, and in a flash of black and blue light, Storm Herald, alongside her escorts, were spat back out into the Void.  The engines thrummed, and the arks cleared the river gate to make way for the arks following them in the convoy, while they in turn followed N’chezzar’s enormous ellipsoid, the cloud-like trail it left behind rolling h...

1245 - Leaving Voidshore

After meeting with Ramin, Leon’s party stayed in Voidshore for only two more days.  Ramin himself was eager to move on, though Leon found himself enjoying the city well enough with more time to stop and walk around.  Archelaus showed him to a few exotic parks and restaurants, all of which specialized in sights or cuisine from places Leon had never even heard of before. 

O...

1244 - Ramin

I want to make a heartfelt thank you to all of you for your support! This story wouldn't have gotten this far without all of you!

If you want to support this story just a little bit more, please visit Royal Road and leave a rating or review! It's quick, free, and every one this story gets helps ...

1243 - Useful Business

By the time Jericho’s gala wound down, Leon was dead tired.  His mind had been taxed to its utmost limit by the sheer number of introductions he’d endured, the strain of matching hundreds of names to as many faces, while not impossible to bear, wearing him thin.  Even Elise and Cassandra, his two most politically astute wives, had thin smiles and furrowed brows by the time the end...

1242 - Politics and a Party

Magic engines pulsed, braking hard as the space around the transport ark was suddenly filled with the magic senses of a hundred post-Apotheosis mages and their powerful attendants.  Such concentrated power almost physically manifested, and though the ark pilot and his giant partner were skilled, it took Leon projecting his own power to smooth out the landing.

The arkpad was large eno...

1241 - Queen's Resolution

Deep breaths broke through the barrier of Leon’s lips as his muscles relaxed, the catharsis of his exertions turning his body to jelly.  Beside him on the right lay Elise, trapped against his body by his arm, which held her tightly while his hand wandered over her expanse of formerly pristine skin, now reddened in many places by the vigor of their coupling.  On his left lay Maia, wh...

1240 - Life of Regret

For an eternity that lasted the slightest of instants, he didn’t exist.  He drowned in a black, abyssal sea, aware yet unaware, deaf and able to hear everything in the universe, blind yet able to perceive all the secrets of the universe.

He drifted through currents of time and space, watched the universe begin and end a thousand times, and forgot after each cycle.  His solitud...

1239 - Anakes' Interest

Terror.  Sheer terror unlike almost anything she’d ever experienced had Elise’s heart beating louder than her husband’s thunder.  She disliked physical conflict, training only at the rest of her family’s insistence, and her gratitude at having so many more martially inclined people in her family was boundless.

Now, she clung to that like a drowning mortal grasped at the ...

1238 - Dueling a Basileus

The crowd chattered as Leon and Gwarim calmly walked toward Triyr, Morui, and Britta.  The weight of nearly a thousand post-Apotheosis mages was crushing, but Leon weathered it well, as did the others on the stage.  For all their whispered words—most concerning this duel—Leon paid them little mind, concentrating instead on the mocking grin on Triyr, the Basileus’ confidence reac...

1237 - Sunscale Point

Upon Leon’s return to Storm Herald, wrath, cold and dark, had settled into his stomach.  He made no grand declarations nor promises.  Instead, he led his family to their quarters on the ark, leaving Anzu and Archelaus to give the necessary briefings to his people.

When the door closed behind him and his ladies, separating them from all prying eyes, Cassandra raked her...

1236 - Lords of the Storm Lands V

As Archelaus made his introductions, Damini’s dark, midnight eyes never left Leon, nor did her sultry smile fade.  Leon could feel Elise and Cassandra’s irritation at being ignored after Damini insisted on the introduction, though before Archelaus had even finished, Leon wondered if that wasn’t just a power move against Morui.

Either way, he was glad the man wasn’t close enou...

1235 - Lords of the Storm Lands IV

Throughout the day, Storm Herald continued to attract attention.  Occasionally, someone vaguely important came to inspect the ark as well as her escorts, but none disturbed the arks enough to get Leon’s attention.  This served him just fine, for he and his family faced a monumental challenge that he had prepared for but still dreaded facing.

A formal party.

...