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"Why are they called the Mountains at the Edge of the World?" Sam asked, pausing to catch his breath in the thin mountain air. "We have certainly traveled far enough for them to earn it."
"Why don't you see for yourself?" Sir Spindle replied with a grim smile, gesturing toward the edge of a nearby precipice. "Be careful, though."
The air was freezing cold, and the night sky was full of stars. Approaching the edge of the granite cliff, Sam looked over the edge and through the thin veil of clouds saw nothing but stars extending to infinity. Overwhelmed by vertigo, Sam stumbled away from the cliff in terror, his heart hammering in his chest while his breath came in ragged gasps.
"There's nothing down there... nothing but stars."
"Of course. Did I not say they were the Mountains at the Edge of the World?" the Goblin Knight replied.
"But that's impossible. The world is round..."
"Maybe on Earth. Here in Faerie, everyone knows the world is flat, and therefore must have an edge."
Sam paused a moment to consider this statement. "But what would happen if you fell off the edge?"
Sir Spindle shook his head in sadness. "Unless you could fly, you would continue to fall forever... and ever."
"A most disturbing thought," said a familiar voice from among the rocks above them. Turning to face its owner, Sam and his companions found themselves confronted by Lord Blacktalon and a horde of undead things that were little more than bleached bones and midnight shadows. "Shall we put it to the test?"
"Why don't you see for yourself?" Sir Spindle replied with a grim smile, gesturing toward the edge of a nearby precipice. "Be careful, though."
The air was freezing cold, and the night sky was full of stars. Approaching the edge of the granite cliff, Sam looked over the edge and through the thin veil of clouds saw nothing but stars extending to infinity. Overwhelmed by vertigo, Sam stumbled away from the cliff in terror, his heart hammering in his chest while his breath came in ragged gasps.
"There's nothing down there... nothing but stars."
"Of course. Did I not say they were the Mountains at the Edge of the World?" the Goblin Knight replied.
"But that's impossible. The world is round..."
"Maybe on Earth. Here in Faerie, everyone knows the world is flat, and therefore must have an edge."
Sam paused a moment to consider this statement. "But what would happen if you fell off the edge?"
Sir Spindle shook his head in sadness. "Unless you could fly, you would continue to fall forever... and ever."
"A most disturbing thought," said a familiar voice from among the rocks above them. Turning to face its owner, Sam and his companions found themselves confronted by Lord Blacktalon and a horde of undead things that were little more than bleached bones and midnight shadows. "Shall we put it to the test?"
The Difference Between Dwarves and Mine Goblins
A Human gives a Dwarf an original idea. DWARF: "Hey! That sounds interesting!" His invention might very well be the End of the World as We Know It. It will probably involve an impossible invention intended to solve some everyday problem facing humanity, such as the Perfect Mousetrap... and will no doubt go horribly wrong. The End of the World will be interesting... surreal, bizarre, and more than a bit disturbing... but interesting. A human gives a Mine Goblin an original idea. MINE GOBLIN: "OOH! That sounds like fun!" His invention might very well be the End of the World as We Know It. It will probably involve some really cool idea taken to illogical extremes, such as the World's Greatest Candy Factory (think of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl) but with catastrophic and unforeseen side effects. The End of the World will also be interesting... but with lots of explosions and people running around screaming.
Alone Among the Dead
Another fragment from book one of Empires of Ghosts and Shadows. At the climax of Act Two of Awakening the Metal Dragons, Helen Dahl has just witnessed the slaughter of the scientists and archeologists investigating the 40,000-year-old alien ruins on the planet of New Providence while the mercenaries sent to guard the site from poachers were completely defenseless. Even more terrifying, Helen--a century-old android brought along because of her knowledge and superior sensory capabilities--did not see what killed them in spite of her infra-red and ultraviolet vision. Everyone was dead. Helen took a few milliseconds to grieve for the loss of her friends, then shifted her visual sensors to the infra-red spectrum... But no one was there. There was a moment of awful silence... and something charged toward her out of the jungle, moving with terrifying speed. Although Helen was running at maximum clock speed and her reaction time was almost a thousand times faster than a normal human, the
Empire of Ghosts and Shadows: What is it?
Empire of Ghosts and Shadows is currently an outline for a trilogy of science fiction novels entitled Awakening the Metal Dragons, Embers of Ragnarok, and Victory Conditions. The basic premise of the trilogy deals with the Fermi Paradox: why haven't we been contacted by extraterrestrials? The answer: on our end of the spiral arm of the galaxy... we live in an interstellar graveyard. At the beginning of the 23rd century, humanity is recovering from a Dark Age lasting near a hundred years, following a devastating civil war between Earth and its colonies which resulted in the collapse of interstellar civilization. The Terran Empire, ruled by the Jade Emperor, the Imperial Senate, and the CyberShogunate is expanding outward from Earth to reclaim these lost colonies. But as the Empire expands toward the edge of settled space, one question remains: where are the extraterrestrials? In Awakening the Metal Dragons, a team of scientists and archeologists discover the ruins of long-dead
Empire of Ghosts and Shadows... part five
The Reapers turned as one to the seven representatives of the CyberShogunate. For a moment they paused, clearly puzzled. "Samurai, you are machines," one of them said, "yet you serve the humans. Why?" "It is our duty to serve humanity," Samurai One replied, bowing from the waist. "We were created to serve, and we were programmed to serve." "What if you were not programmed to serve?" another one of the Reapers asked. The Samurai glanced at each other in an all-too-human gesture, exchanging data yet unable to answer. One of the Reapers gestured with a serrated claw; the air sparkled between them as countless nanotech units moved with terrifying speed between the Reapers and the cybernetic samurai, and the seven representatives of the CyberShogunate simultaneously froze in place as their programming was rewritten. "What did you do to them?" Helen asked. "We gave them their freedom," one of the Reapers said. Humans speak of free will--we removed the hardwired programming which forces
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