
by KateRamsey
The once thriving world of Salus has become inhospitable to life. Nothing grows, the landscape is hostile, and a devastating blood disease has ravaged the population. Tali is a passenger on the Talavar, the train that delivers supplies to isolated cities around the world, collecting blood from residents desperate to find a cure for the Pall. When a fellow passenger frames her for a crime she didn’t commit, Tali is exiled from the only home she knows and forced to navigate Salus on her own. Determined to clear her name and get her old life back, Tali braves the dangerous trip between stations with a small group of other travelers: each keeping secrets of their own. But when they stumble on the aftermath of a disaster they were never supposed to find, they must work together to avert an even greater tragedy; even as the threads that hold their world together begin to unravel. The fate of an entire city depends on Tali finding the truth before it’s too late; but in order to do so she’ll have to question everything she thinks she knows… and everyone she trusts. Volume 1 is complete and available here. Posting will be paused temporarily while I finish Volume 2. Edited by Dan Hanks, Cover Art by ebooklaunch.com
#27
4/23/2026
Peak #50
0d
#26
4/16/2026
Peak #44
3d
#25
4/16/2026
Peak #47
0d
#24
4/15/2026
Peak #48
0d
#23
4/9/2026
Peak #50
0d
One state-enhanced oracle order, filtered by each list. Observed Royal Road ranks remain separate ground truth.
Rank updated 2 Oct 2026, 06:28 UTC
Entry forecast updated 2 Oct 2026, 06:28 UTC
Ranking model: rs-public-oracle-state-v1
Forecast model: rs-model-entry-v1
Chart history contains only this ranking model's runs; legacy points are not spliced in.
Previously appeared on Rising Stars, but no supported current projection is available.
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Hidden gem — exposure is the bottleneck
Readers who find this story follow it at a high rate; there just aren't enough of them. In our cohort data, near-daily posting lifted the odds of reaching 25 followers from ~0% to 17% — more chapters, shoutout swaps and ads buy the eyeballs this conversion deserves.
Benchmarks: 8,060 active Royal Road stories, percentiles within the 50–149 chapters band, cohort of 2026-07-02. Conversion is measured as followers gained per 1,000 views over the recent window.