Farrago sits in the Library of Ettlemont, and the walls shake with sounds of battle. Errant arrows smash through windows, sprinkling glass down onto the stone floors. He covers his head with the bag in his hand, books inside hitting him in the face. Farrago recoils, holding his eye a moment, before another arrow splinters against the wall. He resumes rifling through the books before him, throw...

"Liam, would you quit always going ahead of the group and stay with us!" Savannah shouted.

Liam shook his head pointedly.

Chris talked in hushed whispers behind them. Oscar walked as far away from everyone as possible.

Savannah glanced at both of them before groaning. "You two are so unhelpful!"

Chris looked up from the ground at her and narrowed his eyes. "Could say the same for you, princess...

In a world without Aurora, the mentalist would find himself lost in a maze of uncertainty. His life would be one of solitude, with little sense of direction or purpose. He'd wander through the mirror world, searching for something he cannot name. Every day would be a journey of discovery, but without Aurora's guidance, he would struggle to find the path forward.

The Mirror Maiden would be a shado...

Mattie pulled herself up from her chair and threw another log on the fire in the cottage. It was colder than a witch’s tit as her grandmother used to say, and she was feeling every degree in her old bones. She sighed and headed into the small kitchen to fix a can of chicken noodle soup and a cup of herbal tea. She hated eating alone, but this is what her life had come to and she just lived day by ...

The police department was an ocean of sounds, officers walking in and out, one-sided conversations, the occasional laugh. Shuffling through a small stack of photos, Hatchett thought back to when he was first assigned to the Martian police department. He had been manufactured military grade and assigned as security for the Lunar National Bank. He had excelled and after thwarting an armed robbery H...

If Malka didn’t exist, Barak would probably get eaten by an owlbear right off the bat. Assuming he survived and found Shiri anyway, things would quickly go off the rails. There would be no tavern brawl, no meeting up with Paz and Lior, and no saving the mayor. Shiri and Barak would argue over whether to save the gryphon, with no one to mediate, and this conflict would escalate to the point where t...

The five heroes are equally this story’s protagonist, but Barak is the one who initiates the call to adventure, beginning his journey across the continent. If Barak does not exist, then no one notices the Void affecting the southern farmlands, and so no young wizard goes stumbling into the Children of the Stars’ forest.

Malka would likely just keep walking north through the forest, uninterrupted ...