...
Melina sat on Sienna's back, carefully looking through the rockpine forest for signs of any cooking ingredients or other valuable materials. Whistlewisps flew all around them, sometimes so close that the wyrm let out an angry snarl to make the birds back away.
Alistair walked right next to wyrm, doubly as vigilant as everyone else. Remi and Illitran also walked close by. Leon ho...
2025-06-12 06:00:05 +0000 UTC
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Melina had expected plenty of resistance from Gilbert. She had expected the Guildmaster to completely reject her request and perhaps even send people to watch her to make sure she wouldn't sneak away. What she had not expected was for Alistair to get mad.
"Melina, this is out of the question! It is the Monster Realm we are talking about, not just the forest beyond Sunglow's walls. We cann...
2025-06-10 06:00:05 +0000 UTC
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...
Heiliger and her priests left Sunglow the very same day, departing on the first ship that sailed south. Melina felt intense relief when she heard the news. She had somehow managed to avoid the worst-case scenario—being dragged away to the main monastery on the grounds of being a System user.
However, it had been far from the flawless exchange Melina had hoped it would be. Heil...
2025-06-08 06:00:05 +0000 UTC
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...
Although Heiliger along with other priests had left, Melina couldn't help but feel uneasy. People around her cheered, presuming their victory but she didn't believe they had won yet. The Bishop wouldn't back away so easily.
But what did Leliana say to make her leave so abruptly?
Sadly, Melina didn't have a chance to ask. She had to continue the hectic service, ful...
2025-06-06 06:00:07 +0000 UTC
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...
Melina's heart thundered the whole time she was making pastries in the morning. The more she thought about it, the more holes she found in her plan. Her hands trembled while she kneaded the dough and she dropped several pastries to the floor when pulling them out of the oven. Sienna had made short work of them, but she still berated herself for her clumsiness.
Despite that, Gilb...
2025-06-05 06:00:00 +0000 UTC
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Melina didn't know what she had expected to see beyond the locked doors—a storage room, a library, or maybe even some equipment for Gilbert's secret hobby. One could never know who secretly harbored a passion for art, wood carving, or some other creative pursuit.
But she certainly had not expected this in a bakery. The room beyond the locked door was filled with what could only be descr...
2025-06-03 06:00:06 +0000 UTC
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"Why didn't he come this morning?" Melina muttered as she swept the floor of the bakery. Sienna was scuttling about on the ceiling, chasing the spiders out of their cozy corners and burning up the cobwebs that they had managed to weave during the night. Gilbert was sitting behind the counter, counting the earnings they made that day.
"He comes every morning," she grumbled, angrily sweepin...
2025-06-01 06:00:06 +0000 UTC
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"Oh, Melina is—" Leon began but Alistair cut him off.
"Leon, we should be paying attention to our surroundings, not spreading rumors," Alistair said coldly, glaring at the mage. He noticeably paled, clamping his mouth shut.
"I suppose now is not the best time," Heiliger agreed solemnly, but Alistair sensed that she was hiding curiosity beneath the calm exterior. Once they were out...
2025-05-30 06:00:05 +0000 UTC
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For Alistair, Melina was a mystery he couldn't solve. She tamed an ember wyrm with nothing more than a tart and readily accepted it as her familiar just a few minutes later. She stabilized a passageway to the Monster Realm in a way Alistair couldn't begin to understand. He still wanted to ask for an explanation of how a System user who wasn't even a mage could do that.
In his opinion, a g...
2025-05-29 06:00:05 +0000 UTC
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I cannot go to the Monster Realm. I cannot go to the Monster Realm. I cannot!
Melina kept repeating this chant in her head from the moment she opened her eyes in the morning. She knew it was an awful idea. Absolutely horrendous idea. Not only was she forbidden from going beyond the wall without proper escort—which probably meant she had to talk to the Guildmaster about it first...
2025-05-27 06:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Do you like the AI art added to the chapters? Or would you prefer chapters without it?
2025-05-25 06:23:08 +0000 UTC
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"Help them with my rolls?" Melina asked in horror as she looked down on her vile creations. There were so many reasons going through her mind to let Sienna incinerate the damned things where they stood.
The flavor for one—she had never eaten anything as putrid before. No, not even when she was starving on the brink of death and rotten food was her only option. It was an absolute a...
2025-05-25 06:00:05 +0000 UTC
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"Find the shamans!" Alistair ordered as he lifted his shield to protect himself from a volley of incoming arrows and rocks.
A horde of goblins was spread throughout the forest, attacking the defending adventurers and guards with whatever dirty tactics they could. Their primary strategy was to overwhelm the defenders of Sunglow with sheer numbers. However, there were also a few hobgoblins ...
2025-05-24 06:00:07 +0000 UTC
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Melina had a hard time concentrating on her work. She had <Mask of Deceit> activated the whole time, making her forced smile appear more natural. But she couldn't help but feel worried. Alistair had gone to fight off the monsters attacking Sunglow. He wasn't alone this time, he had the rest of the adventurers along with him.
But she still felt nervous, and Melina wasn't the on...
2025-05-23 06:00:07 +0000 UTC
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When Melina opened her eyes early Tuesday morning, the sun was already peeking from beyond the horizon. The sun rose earlier each morning, signifying that summer was coming close.
"Good morning, Sienna," Melina stepped out of the bed and greeted the sleepy ember wyrm, coiled up in the corner of her stone trough. Sienna yawned dramatically, revealing a row of small but razor-sharp teeth. "...
2025-05-22 06:00:05 +0000 UTC
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...
"Melina, you're a System user?" Alistair asked Melina with a pained expression. She shook her head in horror, but couldn't bring herself to answer. "And you were hiding that from me? Me?"
Blood suddenly began dripping down from the corners of Alistair's eyes and from his mouth, which twisted into a sick smile. Melina jumped back from him as he reached his arm toward...
2025-05-21 06:00:09 +0000 UTC
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...
Alistair was tired of sleeping. He had been doing nothing but that the whole day, as everyone insisted that he needed to recover. But in his opinion, his injuries were blown heavily out of proportion. They looked bad and bled a lot, giving a gruesome impression, but in reality, they were nothing more than deep scratches.
He had felt bad when Melina tiptoed to his bed, drenched i...
2025-05-20 06:00:06 +0000 UTC
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...
Melina didn't care that she had left the bakery without a word. She didn't care about the strange glances the townspeople gave her as she ran past. She even didn't care about the guards standing by the Adventurers Guild entrance door, instead nimbly bypassing them and rushing inside.
"Miss, the Guild is closed right now. Could you please leave?" The receptionist, a tall wo...
2025-05-19 06:00:04 +0000 UTC
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...
It probably needs no mention, but Master Gilbert was not happy when Melina announced that Alistair was waiting for him in the kitchen downstairs.
"What does he want?" The old baker groaned so loudly that she feared Alistair might have heard it all the way downstairs.
"He's been ordered to search for a passageway to the Monster Realm. You know the one—customers have been ...
2025-05-18 06:00:06 +0000 UTC
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...
[Congratulations! You have reached Level 37.]
Alistair dismissed the System message in haste and rolled behind the tree as a troll threw a rock in his direction. It collided with the remains of a goblin shaman, burying it deep into the soil. One less thing for him to worry about later.
"Should we get the Guildmaster?" Barrett called from his hiding place b...
2025-05-17 06:00:07 +0000 UTC
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"Look at that, Sienna! I can't believe it." Melina was crouched down over one of the garden beds, watching the tiny sprouts. Sienna looked at her curiously from her spot on the large rock in the sun, not quite understanding what she was so excited about. "I'd better water them."
Melina hurried over to the well, lowering the wooden bucket down and then hauling it back up. Then she poured t...
2025-05-16 06:00:08 +0000 UTC
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Alistair activated his Lightning Dash ability and rushed towards the marsh boar, holding his sword firmly in his hand. "Lightning Strike!"
As his sword collided with the boar, a huge crackling sound like thunder emanated around the area, confusing the beast and allowing Alistair to deliver the finishing blow. It was difficult to tell where he had to strike as the boar was covered in moss ...
2025-05-15 06:00:08 +0000 UTC
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"One berry tart and a dozen pear rolls for me, please," said Mieve, an older woman who was a regular at Sunglow Bakery, her expression glowing with anticipation.
"Of course," Melina said, getting a carton box to place the pastries inside. As it turned out, the people of Sunglow loved tarts. In fact, they loved them so much that during the last few days, Melina had to double the amou...
2025-05-14 06:00:00 +0000 UTC
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"Wasn't feyfruit toxic for humans?" Alistair asked dubiously, as Melina cut one of the smaller fruits and threw it in a pot with a bit of sugar.
"Only in its raw form," Melina said, watching how the fruit slowly turned into a pinkish shimmering mush. She has worked with so much feyfruit as an [Archmage] that she was confident in discerning the safe quantity for human consumption. Th...
2025-05-13 06:00:07 +0000 UTC
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On her way to the Adventurer's Guild, Melina encountered Alistair, dressed in a fresh set of clothes. He was a bit puzzled when he saw her heading into the city, but when she explained that she was going to meet Leon, he nodded with understanding.
"There might be a problem with getting Leon to cooperate with your plan," Alistair said.
"Why? He didn't strike me as a disagreeable pers...
2025-05-11 06:03:01 +0000 UTC
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"Master Gilbert, please take me along!" Melina pleaded with the old baker as he was about to set off on his weekly supply run.
"What are you plotting this time, Melina?" Gilbert glanced suspiciously at her, as did Knight, letting out a distrustful snort.
"I'm not plotting anything," she shook her head and made an innocent-looking face.
But Gilbert was clearly not buying ...
2025-05-11 06:00:03 +0000 UTC
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This has to be the most unpleasant dinner I've been a part of, and I've attended plenty of unpleasant dinners in my time. I even had to sit at a table with a noble who had clearly poisoned my food, just because I refused to fetch him a lunarbird from the Monster Realm. It had been so awkward as I wasn't an Archmage then yet and couldn't just openly accuse him of poisoning me. Instead I had ...
2025-05-09 06:00:07 +0000 UTC
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This is irritating. But why is this so irritating?
Alistair was eating lunch together with Melina, Milo, and Gilbert. The old baker and Melina were all smiles when the carpenter's apprentice arrived, treating him as a hero who had come to save them. Gilbert wasn't shy in offering him an extra portion of his delicious pumpkin soup but made no such offers to Alistair.
Thi...
2025-05-08 06:00:05 +0000 UTC
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If somebody had told Melina that she'd be going to the market together with Leliana, Barrett, and an ember wyrm on her shoulder a week ago, she would have called them crazy. Leliana clearly didn't like her and she had barely exchanged a word with Barrett before. Yet here she was.
They were heading to a yet unknown part of the town to her—way past the Fireside Inn. The streets were narro...
2025-05-06 06:00:03 +0000 UTC
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Melina looked at the row of sludgy tartlets in horror. They looked far from appetizing as the beef and feyfruit filling looked like a brownish-purplish sludge and the chili walnuts on top did little to improve the look. But the worst part was that Alistair was right there to witness the doughy monstrosities in their full horrifying glory.
"Oh, no… How did this happen?" Melina exclaimed,...
2025-05-04 06:00:05 +0000 UTC
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