Hello, one and all!
Welcome back to the world of Enverdolmal!
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I hope you all have been healthy wherever you are in the world.
We just crossed 5.5K English Readers and 2.5 Spanish Readers!
Can you believe that?
It brings me to tears of joy to know that these stories sit well enough with a small and loyal group of folks out in the great big world to garner such attention.
8 thousand Readers is a lot!
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And man, I love each and every one of you.
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I hope that I am blessed with enough years, and imagination, to keep bringing you all these Chapters and the Characters who fill them.
I have a lot of new Character Dives coming soon for you all!
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And a few more that should have been out already lbvs.
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I am so sorry that I can't post more often for you all.
I am 34 and I work full time, and bills wait for no one.
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Especially if you live paycheck to paycheck!
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I hope again that this new chapter finds you all well, and I thank you for hanging around this with me in my weird little world for so long.
I really do love all of you.
I will see you back here at the Gate once this chunk of chapter is read!
Feel free to maybe buymeacoffee.com/TeranceIvy
I would be forever grateful!
Your support and love and loyalty are more than I could ever as for already!
And off we go!
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Lysin lay on his back under the star-filled sky, atop the roof of his favorite reefer dispensary in all of East Lustria.
The Esteemed Smokin' Bloke.
He inhaled deeply through his nose, taking in the potent scents of the various types of reefer plants that grew beneath him.
His fine-tuned sense of smell discerned each strain from the others with ease.
Snooty Mcboots.
Puckerberry Bliss.
Was that… Whozawhatza he caught?
But above them all, he picked out his go-to, and his all-time favorite thus far: Starchild. Oh, how he loved his precious Starchild!
The warm summer night air rolled over him as the moon peaked from behind the passing clouds, illuminating all 101 rooftops of the ever-expanding dorpie that he called home. Lysin was born and raised in Vandyost, a mid-sized dorpie on the Eastern border of Lustria where the thick, forested hills came to a staggered end, and the open and sprawling savannas of the Kingdom of Lumaleza began.
Being part of a border dorpie came with its pros and cons.
Pros in the form of greater trade opportunities with outside and non-Elf types, first dibs at the market, the ability to buy reefers of all strains and types, and access to many things that were either not legal further inland of Lustria, or rare in nature.
There were also no taxes here, as neither side could settle on who nearest the border would owe what to whom. Both sides were fine by this, and so it was. These things made Lysin's life rather pleasant for the most part. He was a staunch introvert so the small-town setting and its easy-going style worked for him.
He never had to go very far, nor did he have to communicate with many folks when it came down to his essentials. He could also smoke as much, and as often as he liked, as reefer was very much legal across Lustria. He really disliked the stereotypes that plagued the world when it came down to reefer.
Weed.
Shreat -an Elvin derogatory term for it-
He loved that his dorpie hadn't been one of the very few who had been against its use. Even so, not everyone approved of it being sold and traded around town, or anywhere else within the bounds of Lustria…
We will come back to that part a bit later yeah?
The cons you ask?
Yes.
The cons…
As peaceful and mercantile as Vandyost was, It was also home to a military fort, and a platoon of about 30 members of the famed Lustrian Lance.
Loud, militant, squared-headed, rule enforcing, buzz kills they were to the one… I mean, rules are rules. Yes, but these guys had a tendency to push the law down folks' throat.
In times of conflict, they tended to be great!
To date, Vandyost had yet to lose a single citizen to intrusion or localized battles.
The Lustrian Lance was the best of the Lustrian Army. Their ranks were filled with none but the strongest, fastest, most vigilant unit that the Kingdom could muster. Their presence brought safety and security, but unfortunately with that also came a pompous, arrogant, proud, and boisterous Lieutenant by the name of Obot…
Lieutenant Jedfey Obot.
And with every step he took, at his side was his slime of a Second Lieutenant: Porubus.
The pair were equal parts insufferable and unsympathetic, to say the least.
They also happened to be extremely anti reefer, and obvious about it. These were traits that blew Lysin's high without fail.
So one could say that there were not many cons at all really. Outside of the military presence, Lysin could easily imagine Vandyost as one of the calmest places to exist. For many a year, Lysin had considered exploring the roads that lead east and out of Lustria. His curiosity had grown more and more over the years, and even more so with the continued arrival of differing merchants and reefer farmers with the passing seasons.
Well, he would think about it.
Then finish thinking on it, and go back to the cozy silence that was the majority of his life. He like… No. LOVED to be alone.
Finding a high perch, prepping his long, thin reefer pipe (or just a simple blunt on occasion), and just enjoying the view were the things that made him happiest.
The Lustrian Lance, under the order of Lieutenant Obot, was a fly in his soup.
For although it was perfectly legal to purchase, trade for, or partake in the usage of reefer, the Lances would go out of their way to pick and jab at any and everyone whom they came across with the stuff. Unfortunately for Lysin, It would come to be one of those types of nights.
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From several rooftops away, she sat and stared.
"Lysin…"
She whispered his name faintly into the breeze.
"Lysin…Lysin…"
It slipped from her lips like a lover's kiss.
"Lyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyssssssssssssiiiiiiinnnn"
Like an assassin's dagger drawn.
She loved him…
She hated him…
He lived in her mind fee-free.
It killed her softly.
His name induced tiny jolts of Aether down her spine.
It gave her a strange euphoria.
She despised his every breath.
She needed him…
She loathed him…
Envy.
Lust.
Jealousy.
Longing.
She felt it all.
Keenly.
It pulled at every fiber of her being.
literally.
He made her mouth dry.
He made her neck sweat.
She needed to kill him.
Zandara was a Changeling.
An "Ever-Shift"
A "Rogue Form"
She went by many names. Many titles.
She had been a Butcher for a while.
THAT was fun! People actually paid her to kill stuff, and the beautiful guts and gore!
She sighed inwardly, she really did miss that life.
But the guy's wife was soooooo annoying…
So she had killed her, and her loud, smelly children, and burned the little house down on her way out of town.
She had been a Merchant. Far too easy, and money didn't attract her eye as it did most mortals. She took from the role her fortune and left the Merchants body out among the sand dunes of Suidelain.
She had been a couple of different royal folks across time even, but the lifestyles of the "higher-ups" were tedious and boring, and to top it, it was VERILY difficult to get rid of one of them for any real amount of time and play their role without gaining attention eventually. They simply knew too many other people.
By this point in her life, she had been OTHER people for longer than she had been her actual self…
There were even days when she would wake up and fully forget who she was.
Those days changed her.
Those days scared her.
She was tired of being afraid.
She was tired of being everyone else.
She longed for something simpler.
A SINGLE life…
One true and solid form.
This was the curse that all Changelings lived and died with.
Unless…
No…
Yes. It could really be.
Zandara had killed dozens.
Had worn their faces.
Lived their lives.
Used their abilities and spells.
None of them were enough.
None of them really gave her that… spark?
Thrill?
That sense of… belonging.
Well… the lives didn't belong to her in the first place no, but what better were THEY doing with them?
Nothing better than what SHE could do. That was for true and for sure.
None of them could have lived their lives the way she had, nor could they have gotten themselves anywhere near the levels of power and grandeur that she had taken them to… But still, they were never enough.
Until now.
Her softly glowing eyes locked on the man's chest as it slowly rose and fell.
Zandara pulled her cloak low over her face and silently faded into the dark of the night. By the Sun's rise, that chest would be her chest.
That muscular, beautiful, Aether-filled, powerful body would be HERS!
The way of the Changeling was…fluid?
Ever changing.
From place to place.
From face to face.
But once in their long life, if they so choose, they can lock themselves into one person's form, assuming not only their entire life, but any and all birthright.
Zandara felt deeply that she had found her final form.
Her life lock.
She had followed and studied him for just over a decades time.
She knew him just as much as she knew herself.
Just as much as she figured she could at least.
Tonight, that knowledge pool would be put to the test.
She welcomed that test with a dark and lustful sneer.
From her crouched position, she slowly rolled up both of her sleeves.
On both of her slim, muscular arms were 3 silver rings, all spaced evenly apart from one another from her wrist to her elbows.
Gleaming, deadly, beautiful combat chakrams.
She knew her target well.
This was his fighting style.
She had watched him train.
She had mirrored every move of his that she could, and created NEW techniques for and from those that she could not.
This fight was hers.
His body was hers.
She would strike first.
Hard and fast. Take him off guard.
She took a single step forward, her toe breaching the shadows that concealed her lethal frame.
She caught herself suddenly as from down the ally to her left, she perceived both sound and movement.
She halted and waited.
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Lieutenant Obot marched silently at the head of his squad.
Himself, his SL (Second Lieutenant) Porubus, and 3 of his best and brightest soldiers.
He -In his mind- was the very TIP of the Lustrian Lance.
He -In his mind- was both law and order.
Eastern Lustria was better for his presence.
Safer.
His Elves were the wall that kept the raging and unpredictable outside world at bay. He was the backbone of those Elves.
He would always lead by example.
And out of RESPECT not fear or adoration, they would follow him.
To the Elf.
Obot was an Elf who lived his life by the book, and only by the book.
Wrong was wrong.
Right was right.
And the law was never wrong, therefore -In his mind- He was always right.
All was as it should be.
Or at least it WAS.
Until just a half decade or so…
Lustrian King Mierasti V and his High Elf Court had decided that Shreat or "Reefer" -as the street folk called it- was no threat to his Kingdom's well being, and therefore would forevermore be allowed.
The King had given a pass to every Medical Mage and Herbalist to grow and distribute the wild plant from the Southern Cape all the way to the very Northernmost border.
If they would see fit to do so.
And Obot despised it.
Not only the passing of the doctorate that has allowed the foul stuff to be cultivated within his borders, but the plant itself.
It stank!
It was a dull eye sore to look at in the storefronts of the dispensaries, and on top of those things, it only made people both stupid or lazy.
He didn't see any of the helpful trade-offs that so many seemed to talk about.
Sleep better?
Helps them eat better?
Lowered anxiety?
These sounded to him like excuses to get lost in ones drug lust.
like lies told by some petty peddler.
He could hear his father screaming into his ear.
"LIFE IS PAIN! GET USED TO IT, AND GET BACK TO WORK!"
His arms tingled with goosebumps.
He grimaced away the memories…
In Obot's mind, the drug and those who used it were below him and had no place in society. But his King seen otherwise, even venturing to partake in the fackin shat himself!
The indignity…
He huffed to himself a bit louder than he had intended.
"Sir?"
Porubus said, daring to quicken his pace just enough to be beside his Commanding Officer.
Obot recognized his error in having inadvertently drawn the Elf's attention, thus he let slide the Officers offense.
"To attention Officer."
He said with his characteristically cold, hard voice.
"Your vigilance shan't dip in lieu of a mere utterance on my behalf."
Porubus hadn't an idea of how to respond.
Nor did he know if he should.
While TECHNICALLY his C.O was correct,
Porubus knew his elder's temperament just as well.
Should he have ignored it, and assumed that it was in fact rhetorical in nature?
Or better was it that he had risked the scalding and approached in the event that he had indeed misheard?
Obviously, he had chosen the latter.
Unfortunately, he had been wrong this time around.
But with a bit of time, all would be well.
Lieutenant Obot was fickle that way.
He was many things.
Approachable and flexible were not two of those said things.
This may have made him a staunch leader, but a GOOD leader it did not make.
Porubus decided that further attempts at conversation would only light the figurative keg in this particular situation.
He lessened his pace and fell back to his position once again, to the rear and left of his C.O. Just as he was traditionally trained. This was Obot's blind spot, the angle from which he was most vulnerable to attack.
Porubus did not always agree with his C.O.
He found little comfort in the fact that the Elf was inherently stiff and emotionally detached in his decision-making. But outside of these things, the Lieutenant was decent enough, and a loyal and decorated Vet of the Lustrian Kingdom.
He would mind his tongue, his station, and most importantly, his rank.
He held no great respect for the Elf.
But he knew his own place, and that was all that mattered.
When the day came that he was promoted, he would worry about a promoted Elf's problems. Tonight, he would follow his orders and assist his C.O in:
"Riding the streets of criminals and vagabonds."
As Obot would say.
A not-so-far-from-average night.
Little did he know how very far from average the night would truly be.
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Hey guys! -AND GALES!-
I hope this holds you all down till the new character dives are posted here soon!
Hey, I hear you all, and I know that my stories are cliffhangers!
But it will all begin to bleed together!
Trust me lol.
and I hope you all love every word and every second of it when it does!
I will begin to post "Part 2."
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Of these just as soon as I get out a few more Key characters lol.
I got you!
Thank you all again for sticking around for this long. It means the world to me.
And I hope that my world can mean just as much to you.
I love you.
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Until next we meet, here in the world of Enverdolmol!
Stay Safe.
Stay Healthy.
Stay Vigilant.
Safe Travels.
-Redd.