by Desert Mermaid
Accused of kidnapping royalty. Hunted by the most powerful fleet in the Matalis. Their only hope? The ocean itself. Eight competitors. One stolen ship. A fifteen-thousand-gold bounty. Kere Brynan and seven others won the Trials of Eight—a combat simulation competition in Andovarra. Their prize? Escorting Prince Sondil to his wedding on the tropical island of Takatari. It should have been a simple honor guard duty. Instead, Princess Charina and Prince Sondil vanished from their own reception, and eight innocent people found themselves framed for an impossible crime. Their only choice: steal a ship and flee into the wildest waters of the Matalis Ocean. The vessel they commandeered pulses with stolen navigation magic. The waters glow with fragments of a shattered cosmic catastrophe. And something vast and old whispers through their dreams, guiding them toward Fairy Tale Island—a place that dances with the tides and holds secrets older than the Wildstorm Apocalypse itself. But survival means more than outrunning the Luminous Fleet. Kere's crew is fracturing under the weight of old wounds and new betrayals: her former lover Jori, now revealed as her half-brother; a former pirate turned wizard seeking redemption; a Half-Celestial rejected by two worlds; a Catfolk sorcerer who forgets everything each dawn; and others bound by desperate choices and secrets that threaten to tear them apart. On Fairy Tale Island, the dying magic offers one chance at salvation. Enter Verity Grotto and face the truth about who they really are. Those who pass gain knowledge that might save the island—and themselves. Those who fail walk away empty-handed while the island crumbles into the sea. Some truths shatter comfortable lies. Others drown you in what you've been avoiding. Where illusions drown, only truth survives. What to ExpectChapters released Tuesday-Saturday around 6 pm MountainChapters run 1500-2500 words, with longer chapters for combatThe magic and combat systems are based on Pathfinder 1E, which is owned by Paizo, Inc.The world, Ciredan, is homebrew and is my own creation. NPCs are unique except for the ones on Fairy Tale Island.I have planned the story so that the characters need to reach at least level 18 to face their BBEG. They start out at level 3. I have enough material for a multi-book series, so many plot threads will be left unaddressed and picked up in later books.Although the novel is an adventure, and adventuring happens, it is character-driven.Although I used AI to edit some of the content and generate other parts of it, I edit heavily for hallucinations and cross-chapter errors and inconsistencies. It's a lot of work!
