Blessed Time 2: Coda: A LitRPG Adventure, page 1
BLESSED TIME: CODA
©2021 CALE PLAMANN
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Contents
Acknowledgments
Social Media
ALSO IN SERIES
1. Candidate
2. Trevor
3. Trials of the Tutor
4. Second Hand Blessing
5. Growing Pains
6. Catching Up
7. Deer Friends
8. Getting Messy
9. Practice
10. Hunting
11. Responsibility
12. Birthday
13. The Home Front
14. Reclaiming the Grove
15. A Chat and a Ritual
16. Improvements
17. Injuries of the Heart
18. A Stolen Battle
19. Evolution Interrupted
20. Combat Interlude
21. Troubles for Another Day
22. Nice
23. Getting the Gang Back Together
24. The Hunt
25. Triumph
26. Beast at the Gates
27. Jo
28. New Recruits
29. Bonding
30. Specialization
31. Expanding the Library
32. Taking Flight
33. A Moment of Candor
34. Acceleration
35. Preparations
36. Cavern of Rust
37. Once More with Feeling
38. Spears
39. Hiding the Trail
40. Exile
41. Field Exercises
42. Daring Rescue
43. A New Home
44. Hunted
45. Rituals
46. The Daemon
47. Clash of Titans
48. Familiar Faces
49. Mad Scramble
50. Resolve
51. Exploration
52. The Depths
53. Spirited Study
54. Infiltration
55. Smash and Grab
56. The Calm Before The Storm
57. Challenge
58. Earning the Right
59. Bearing Witness
60. The Empty Hourglass
61. Epilogue
Thank you for reading Coda
Social Media
Glossary
Groups
LitRPG
Acknowledgments
First and foremost I need to acknowledge my wife who has tolerated my long nights of typing and gamely tried to read the results even when they were pretty rough. I need to thank my father for loving the dumb stories and home brew roleplaying campaigns I’ve been concocting since I was a kid and pushing me to make the leap to writing as well as my mother and sister for their constant support.
I need to thank the Brittingham Crew (Brian, Ben, Adam, and Sean) for pushing me into writing my first flawed, choppy, novels and sticking with me ever since.
I also need to thank the discord communities over at The Silver Pen, Bad Cat Hangout and LitRPG Forum for helping me storyboard, workshop, and most importantly keep my sanity throughout the writing process. Including but not limited to (in no particular order): TheDude3445, Bri, Nulls, VeraAnne, Vowron, J. Pal, Traitorman, Origin, 4064, Fae/Kruos, NoDragons, MelasD, Vitaly, Necariin, Khend, Sam, Squirrel, Doom, and Fel.
I also want to acknowledge those who have been supportive and helpful in meatspace- Sarah, Liz, Jack, Eric, and Jerrie. I would also like to thank the support of Princess Charlotte, my cat. Sometimes, the perfect cure for writer’s block is a small furry paw on the thigh demanding pets.
I would also like to thank everyone in the one creative writing class I took. Your collective advice was almost as terrible as your purple prose, but you inspired me to actually publish books to prove your dumb opinions wrong, so credit where credit is due.
Also- A big thank you to all of my supporters, but especially to Eli for being there since the beginning, Ari for stepping up to the plate and helping out so much, and Sesharan who has always been there with a kind word.
Finally, but certainly not least, I want to thank the wonderful team at Aethon. Without their hard work over the course of months, none of this book would have been possible.
Social Media
If you enjoy what you read, please make sure to visit my website or reach out to me on twitter (where I talk about writing amongst other things) or join my discord where I almost exclusively talk about my existing books/what I’m currently writing.
https://www.caleplamann-author.com/
https://discord.gg/xzgycqtFNe
https://twitter.com/WritesCoco
https://www.patreon.com/CoCo_P
ALSO IN SERIES
Blessed Time
Coda
Dekkora’s Legacy
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1
Candidate
Micah opened his eyes, the taste of jasmine tea with a hint of lemon still on the tip of his tongue. He lifted a hand up above his head, his skinny and childish wrist clearly visible in the early dawn light streaming through his parents’ window.
With a brief prayer to Mursa, he closed his eyes. Nothing. No red glow. No swirling vortex. He’d shed the unnatural taint of Elsewhere along with his old body.
Micah sighed as he swung his legs over the edge of the bed before placing them on the cold wooden floor. At least that was something. He’d have to restart, and this time he wouldn’t be able to rely on summoning to solve all of his problems. He couldn’t count on Mursa saving him each and every time.
He stood, stretching his back and frowning slightly at his scrawny limbs. It would take months of repetition and mindless exercise to return his body to its former shape. Again.
The door to his room opened quietly and Esther crept inside, only to notice Micah already standing in the center of the room. Her brow furrowed in disappointment.
“Micah,” she asked, her voice childish and containing just a hint of a lisp, “why are you up? You’re never up this soon?”
“It’s good to see you too.” His smile was genuine, perhaps a bit out of place on a thirteen-year-old that probably should have been annoyed with seeing his kid sister, but the months of worrying about Esther’s condition had worn him down. “Maybe I got up early because you keep sneaking into my room to surprise me?”
“Mom says you won’t come to breakfast on time if I don’t.” Esther pouted at him, fishing for sympathy now that she’d been caught.
“Tell Mom I’ll be down for breakfast shortly,” Micah chuckled, unfazed by her antics. “By the way, do you know if Trevor is around?”
“He’s trying to pick flowers for the neighbor girl,” Esther giggled, her tiny hand covering her mouth. “He doesn’t know that she has a crush on Warrick.”
“Warrick, the new baker?” Micah raised an eyebrow.
He barely stopped himself from pulling out the Folio on instinct. Instead he thought for a second, trying to recall the gossip and day-to-day occurrences that were the center of his life over a decade and a half ago.
“He awakened an Uncommon blessing, right?” Micah asked, struggling to recall the exact details. “Something about imbuing yeast with mana so that the bread he makes can have healing properties? That sounds like a good fit for someone as pretty as Anna.”
“Yeast?” Esther asked, scrunching her nose slightly. “All Mama has been able to find out is that he has an Uncommon blessing. Mama says that Trevor hasn’t even been blessed yet, so he’s going to have a hard time competing with the only single boy on the block with an Uncommon blessing, even if he does have acne.”
Micah shook his head, a half-smile on his lips as he took in Esther’s tiny
“You’re too young to worry about who Trevor ends up dating,” he chided with a slight smile. “Just let him know that I’m looking for him. I found a book when I was interviewing with Keeper Ansom that I think could help Trevor with his blessing. The sooner I can talk to Trevor about it, the more likely he is to awaken to a blessing that will eclipse Warrick.”
“Eclipse?” Esther frowned, lisp returning as she tried to sound out the unfamiliar word.
“Don’t worry about it,” Micah replied, walking across his small room to put on a pair of sandals. “It just means that he’ll be even cooler than Warrick if he pays attention to me.”
Esther’s eyes grew wide. She grinned back at Micah.
“You mean he won’t have to pick Mom’s best flowers from the garden only for Anna to make up an excuse to go to Warrick’s?” Esther’s grin was a bit sadistic for Micah’s taste.
“I’m assuming this has happened a couple times now?” he asked, sighing.
“The last time she said she needed to brush her dog.” Esther giggled again. “Momma tried to sound stern when she said it was ‘the worst excuse she’d ever heard’ but she ended up laughing, too, when she found out that Trevor believed it.”
“It’s not nice for either of you to make fun of Trevor like that.” Micah fought to keep his face wooden as he imagined his brother besotted with the slightly pretty but not overly interesting Anna. “He just has a lot of hormones running through his body right now.”
“Hoor-moans?” Esther asked, face scrunching up once more.
“Never mind.” Micah shook his head. “I’m up and I’ll be down for breakfast in a second. You did your job waking me up, but I’d better change before I head out for the day.”
The precocious girl nodded sagely before opening the door. Briefly he heard her bare feet running back down the short hallway toward the kitchen. Micah rolled his eyes before calling up his status.
Age: 13 [ERROR] / 28
Class/Level: Divine Candidate 1
XP: 0/50
HP: 20/20
Attributes [Free Points 2]
Body: 5
Agility: 4
Mind: 10
Spirit: 9
Attunement
Moon: 20
Sun: 1
Night: 10
Mana
Moon: 54/54
Sun: 16/16
Night: 34/34
Affinities
Time: 10
Wood: 6
Air: 5
Blessings
Mythic Blessing of Mursa - Blessed Return
Ageless Folio
Skills
Anatomy: 7
Arcana: 11
Enchanting: 16
Fishing: 1
Herbalism: 5
Librarian: 5
Ritual Magic: 25
Spear: 11
-Wind Spear:8
Spellcasting: 30
He choked slightly. The unfair “gifts” of attunement aside, the attribute gains from his new class were absurd. Frantically, Micah called up the Folio and searched for the recording of his original stats after the first blessed return. 1 point in each attribute and 2 free points per level.
This was insane. Micah tried to avoid hyperventilating. His new class granted him more physical stats than most close-combat classes, all while providing him with more points for Mind and Spirit than even thaumaturge, a class that the rich and powerful would kill to prevent from resurfacing.
Images of his time in the Academy flashed through his mind. The isolation and paranoia settled over Micah like a heavy winter blanket. For a brief moment, he lost control.
His hands shook. Micah shoved them in his armpits to try and steady them, biting his lip in an attempt to center himself with the pain.
A couple of seconds later he was calmer. Able to think rationally despite the iron taste of blood on his tongue. He smiled wryly to himself.
He was more scared of the Royal Knights finding and enslaving him again than he was of the Durgh invasion. The Durgh, he could fight. It was just a matter of leveraging his knowledge to become strong enough to beat them back while assuaging their honor. The Royal Knights?
He snorted to himself, taking his hands out of his armpits. They were more monster-like than any of the subterranean warriors. At least the Durgh had honor and could be trusted to keep their word. The Knights were only driven by power and eliminating any threats to that power.
Micah’s only chance was to become so powerful that, by the time the Knights learned of his existence, eliminating him would be more trouble than it was worth. He sighed. All while relying on the normal limits of summoning. Even with his raised Arcana skill, he wasn’t going to risk a sojourn into Elsewhere itself anytime soon.
He tapped his teeth, sorting through and eliminating his options. Even with his insanely advanced class, he wouldn’t be able to solo the Durgh on his own. There were just too many of them.
His finger stopped just shy of his mouth. Micah smiled. He didn’t need to defeat the entire Durgh army. Just the Khan. Krosst himself had said that any being could challenge the Khan’s judgement in a test of strength. If Micah won, he could force the Durgh army to reverse course then and there.
His expression soured slightly when he realized he would have to defeat a being over level 60. He had five years to level, but that didn’t seem like enough. His apprenticeship with Keeper Ansom would slow him down.
What he needed was to train without interruption. He’d already learned everything that Basil’s Cove had to offer. Keeper Ansom still might be useful as a source of cover, but spending time with the congenial old man would provide no other real benefit to Micah.
“Micah!” His mother’s voice shocked him from his reflection. “Esther said that you were awake. Breakfast is ready and getting cold. Get out here if you want breakfast, otherwise you’re just going to have to do your chores hungry!”
He opened the door, his face screwed up in a frown. That was another issue. Until his apprenticeship was set to begin, Micah would have to do chores around the house.
Hurrying to the kitchen, Micah made up his mind. He might not be able to get out of chores around the house, but he certainly could cancel his apprenticeship with Keeper Ansom. There wasn’t any requirement that a youth take on an apprenticeship. In fact, many such as Trevor didn’t.
If a youth knew they wanted to pursue a martial path, there was no real need for an apprenticeship. They could practice skills on their own until the time of their blessing. Of course, more than one youth spent their apprenticeship years training to be a master swordsman only to be forgotten or to gain a blessing related to farming or sailing. They risked a stable career and set of skills on the dream of earning a blessing that they could use as an adventurer.
