First Immortal of the Sword - Chapter 1279 - The Ruins of the Crow’s Nest

As a virtuous wife, does it include tolerating his cousin, enduring his concubines, bearing his mother?

The world ended.Zombies and monsters rose. Cities crumbled.And Merek? He woke up in the apocalypse with a job that lets him create armor for lingering souls—spirits without bodies, desperate for purpose.Turns out, the dead don’t rest easy. Some are angry. Some vengeful. Others? Just lost. When Merek binds them into steel warframes, they don’t just fight... they evolve.Now, he leads a legion of the undead—ghosts in armor, bound to him by oath and fate.Faction leaders call him mad. Warlords want him dead. And God? If He’s watching, He’s not talking.Merek was supposed to die with everyone else.Instead, he got a support type job no one’s heard of... and a shot at rewriting his pathetic Earth-life.In this world, only the fittest survive.And Merek? He’s got undeads in steel at his side.

"Your bed is cold," spoke a voice in the room that had her eyes go wide in fear. Nervously, she turned around, gulping softly to see a shadow on her bed as if someone laid down there. The man who had been lying down sat up emerging out from the shadows where he had been waiting for her.

A conversation with a handsome stranger leaves Ariane chained in a cellar with a strange affliction. She soon discovers that the darkness of the nineteenth century’s Deep South hides many dangers. Mages, wolf shifters and the humans who hunt them play a risky game where to stumble is to die, all under the amused gaze of the apex predators of the supernatural world: vampires.

It is never healthy to attract the gaze of the aristocracy of the night. It takes much to survive in this merciless world, but Ariane will not let that deter her. The southern belle has a bite, and she is willing to learn and to grow in this hostile new world. She will use whatever means necessary to reclaim her freedom, be it guile, charm, or those intriguing new instincts that make blood so delectable.

This is a story of vampires as I believe they should be, with their strengths and weaknesses, with their remnants of humanity and the beast inside. Updates every Friday. Mind the tags.

Cover by Antti Hakosaari: https://www.artstation.com/haco

Special thanks to Svensonsen for getting me started, as well as Omi Nya, Hesketh, Rhaegar, Yaksher, Selkie and Raven for proofreading my stuff. Thanks to my patrons and you dear readers, for the support. I could not do it without you.

Journey is on Amazon, both in ebooks and audio. here is a link to the first one:

https://www.royalroad.com/amazon/B08DK6G8Y8

The story probably exists in your local marketplace as well of I can tempt you.