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another reading update
so i have about five hours left of how to sell a haunted house and i realllyyyyy hate these dolls/puppets.
i feel bad for blaming mark for stuff now i see his side of the story but i do have to admit he was being a bit sus in the beginning.
and the ring leader puppet? pupkin? yeah i don't fuck with him tbh.
its actually scary like? when you get to the fight scene in the house with the needle? yeah that one i was cringing so hard because i hate that stuff so much.
so far i would give it about 4.5 or even 5 stars, it's my type of creepy, an actual book that makes me cringe and be creeped out but not over the top like a slasher horror. i would recommend it so far!
Immortal Nox: The Lost City
Stretching her arms over her head, Astra swished her tail and laid her ears back with a yawn. She’d been feeling odd since getting up from an unexpected crash hours earlier. It was the first time she’d ever had that happen while playing a VR game. “Maybe it’s an update?” she wondered aloud and squinted through the tree canopy at the sky’s golden hue.
Tiredness was a new sensation to her while playing Ashguard. She’d been gathering herbs and materials for hours in-game. Long enough for the sun to begin dipping down behind the mountain range that bisected the main continent. To the north were the three major cities of Aesir, Vanaheim, and Nifelheim, and Astra Diane’s current location was three months’ worth of in-game travel into the unmapped Southlands.
Being a Healer Class, it was a miracle she’d made it this far by herself. Usually, she had her Porter, Xander, but she’d sent him back to Aesir to sell some things in hopes that he wouldn’t catch the plague from her.
The plague plotline had come out of nowhere for a game with very little story. But attempting to find a cure for it had been a fun use of the Crafting Skills she’d spent so much time leveling up. Unfortunately, she’d caught it too, and while Players respawned at the Soul Stones in the three major cities, NPCs did not.
Astra Diane pulled her Menu out of her pocket. “I should check on him,” she muttered. She hadn’t been feeling the plague symptoms since her crash earlier. Her Menu, a Scroll that always existed in her pocket, was a touch screen once unrolled. Swiping through the tabs, Astra selected her teleport list.
As for the symptoms, they were miserable. It was similar to having the flu, but in her mind, the tiredness and aching in her body lingered even after logging out. Earlier that day, she’d collapsed in-game and woke up several hours later. Astra felt fine now, so she supposed the plague had run its course, and she was free to return to town.
Being in the Southlands for so long by herself was lonely. She was, after all, a squishy Healer Class and tended to rely on the fact that she could heal herself to get through fights with monsters more than an actual strategy. She knew she wasn’t a very good Player.
She glanced top left to see her and Xander’s health bars. The Porter was at full health, as was she. Top right, she could see the in-game time, which only showed hours and minutes of the day. That was the extent of Ashguard’s HUD.
If she wanted to use a Skill, she had to remember and activate it. There weren’t easy buttons that stayed in view to remind Players of what they had, and the Skills didn’t organize into trees. A Skill simply got stronger the more it was used, and there were rumored to be hundreds of Skills out there to find. She did have a menu that listed all her Skills, but battles required quick thinking, and Players tended to have Skills they relied on more frequently than others.
She’d left a daisy chain of Soul Stone Shards, small, single-use devices, on her way through the Southlands.
They weren’t very durable, as other Players or monsters could destroy them, but they lasted a week in real-time. The most frequent complaint about them was that Players couldn’t respawn to them. They were available as teleport locations in the list, great for a quick run back to one of the major cities for a minute, but that was it.
Astra stared at her empty list.
What the heck?
She was some distance from the last one she’d dropped, and the others were older, leading up to the Player town at the edge of the Southlands, but that didn’t explain why they were all gone.
“Ugh.” Backing out of her teleport list, she moved to Inventory to get a Soul Stone Shard. That all of the ones she’d dropped in the last four game-time weeks were gone was only an inconvenience if she died. She wouldn’t have a quick way back to her current location after respawning at the last major city she’d been in. The faster she got one activated, the better.
Astra activated the item and dropped it just as she heard shuffling in the bushes.
Looking up from her Menu, she met the eyes of a Razor Boar mid-charge. “[Dodge]” died on her lips as the two pairs of tusks ripped through her midsection. Pain like she had never felt before overwhelmed her senses. She collapsed to the ground. Her armor, which was as high-quality as she could make it, had protected her a bit from the attack, but the Boar continued to slash at her as she lay helpless on the ground, unable to think past the pain.
A tusk caught her in the throat, and a terrible coldness descended upon her.
Her consciousness hung suspended in darkness; before her were the options to Wait or Respawn. Choosing Respawn, her body exploded in sparks of light, teleporting back to the last Soul Stone she’d attuned to.
Astra wheezed out a moan of residual pain as her feet touched the pavement. Gripping herself, she shivered. Her pain setting must have gotten changed. Had they updated the game? Maybe that was why she’d passed out earlier.
She now stood in the Soul Stone Plaza of Aesir, a city built on the mountainous shore and sprawling onto an island within visual distance of the rocky beach. The architecture resembled ancient Greco-Roman, giving it an air of philosophical sophistication. It was her favorite city, and it looked gorgeous in the setting sun’s light. However something was off.
Why was it so quiet?
Turning away from the Soul Stone, she found that the plaza, usually bustling with Players coming and going, was filled with market stalls and a crowd that was just trying to get their last bit of shopping done before it got too dark. While physically, Players and Non-Player Characters were identical, the system showed Player names to other Players in text hovering over their heads.
There were no Players in the crowd.
The stall owners and their customers stared at her, pale, jaws agape. A Human grandmother had dropped her basket of apples directly next to Astra. A Lycanth woman clutched her cub to her chest.
___
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Your Gay Writing Bestie
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Books...
Just went through one of my old boxes and found a hoarde of memories..
The way my chest swelled with pride at the sight😂
Tag your high school book collections!
no pressure, just fun, and a stroll down memory lane lol.
Tagging:
@queenmeansworld
Books that changed the way my brain works:
Psalm for the Wild Built, Becky Chambers
The Anthropocene Reviewed, John Green
The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd
Underland, Robert Macfarlane
The Once and Future Witches, Alix E. Harrow
Beartown, Fredrik Backman
A Man Called Ove, Fredrik Backman
There’s definitely more, these are just the ones I could remember in a few minutes
More on these to come I’m sure