Selene inclined her head with a gracious bow. "Right away, Mistress. Do you prefer blackberry and bitter regret, or the one laced with honey and hubris?"
"...Just surprise me."
As she turned to go, I muttered, "This book sounds like it was written by someone who lost a staring contest with a mirror."
She paused. "That's… surprisingly accurate."
Suspicion flickered in my chest. I narrowed my eyes, flipping back to the cover of the book.
"Cartographia Obscura: A Map of the Mortal Veins
Author: Hecarian of the Glass Compass
Limited Void Edition, First Pressing, Bound in Cognitive Leather."
"Cognitive leather?" I echoed out loud.
The book in my lap shuddered slightly. Then sighed. Sighed.
I snapped it shut like it might bite me.
"Selene."
"Yes, Mistress?" she called sweetly from the hallway.
"Did you just give me a prank tome?"
Silence. Then the faintest, almost inaudible chuckle. I could hear the effort it took for her not to break into full giggles.
"You told me on the way here that I needed to 'have more fun.' So I found you a very amusing book." Her voice carried a lilt of absolute innocence—too pure to be trusted.
"I'm going to bury you in your sleep."
"I do not sleep, so that would be quite impossible to accomplish, Mistress?"
A pause.
"…Damn it, that was a good one." I sighed. "Are all of these tomes like the one I just read? I swear if you say that they are, I will be chucking them at your head one by one as throwing practice. Don't think I won't Selene. Damn the Sanctum's rules."
Selene reappeared at the doorway, holding a sleek decanter of dark crimson liquid nestled in a tray of black lace, her face the perfect image of unbothered poise.
"I assure you, Mistress," she said, voice utterly level, "The rest are academic in tone. It was just the one I recommended you start with that had false information."
I took the wine glass she just offered me and sipped the dark red liquid. It had a slight sweet taste. It was good.
Sighing, I said, "Give me the actual geography texts. I really do need to study."
Selene bowed and placed a tome from the pile and placed it in front of me. "This is the correct texts, Mistress. Please enjoy your studying."
I gave her the side eye before opening the book.
Title: The Living World of Koray: A Geography Primer for Arcane Scholars
Compiled by the Inkfold Archive, in cooperation with the Pale Priory, Frosthold Pact, Academy of Virelian Cartomancy, and the Skyroot Geomancers of Namerae.
Hmm, so far nothing out of the ordinary. I continued reading.
Introduction: Welcome to Koray
Koray is a world of ancient origin and sprawling complexity, shaped not merely by tectonics and weather, but by divine wars, blood-oaths, elemental harmony, and ancestral memory. It is divided into five known continents: Virelia, Dravareth, Myrrhael, Namerae, and Iskavald. Each continent is a mirror of its people's soul—formed through centuries of conflict, magic, silence, and survival.
This text serves as an essential geographic foundation for travelers of multiple realms, to understand the lands they now walk.
---
Chapter I: Virelia – The Crown of Civilization
Geography: A continent of fertile heartlands, sprawling rivers, magical leyline nexuses, and enchanted cities.
Climate: Temperate and seasonal, with arcane influence stabilizing weather in academic zones.
Culture: Known for magical academies, enchanted guilds, and class-based city-states. Nobles often study spellcraft and diplomacy.
Government: Mixed governance—some city-states are ruled by Archmages, others by elected magisters or noble houses.
History: Formed during the Twilight Concord; seen as the intellectual and arcane hub of Koray.
---
Chapter II: Dravareth – The Iron Spine
Geography: Harsh plains, volcanic ridges, basalt towers, and warforged citadels.
Climate: Dry, with hot summers and frigid, barren winters.
Culture: Militaristic, disciplined, and system-oriented. Magic is coded and weaponized.
Government: Highly structured—ruled by a Grand Strategium, each nation operates like a battalion.
History: Forged through conquest; absorbed dozens of ethnic cultures into its wartime meritocracy.
---
Chapter III: Myrrhael – The Verdant Gloom
Geography: Fae-thick forests, moon-pools, spirit glades, and shifting ruins.
Climate: Humid, lush, and ever-changing due to Fae influence.
Culture: Tribal and intuitive; magic is often ritualistic or emotional.
Government: Loosely governed by seasonal Courts—Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter—each with their own rulers.
History: The first continent to fall during the Age of Thorns, now in uneasy peace with its Fae lords.
---
Chapter IV: Namerae – The Whispering Continent
Geography: Floating monasteries, snow ranges, glass plains, and elemental shrines.
Climate: Calm but extreme—icy mountains, warm inner valleys, wind-churned skylands.
Culture: Monastic, minimalist, and elemental. Focus on discipline, internal balance, and spiritual study.
Government: The Fivefold Order, each representing one of the core elements.
History: Isolated during the Fracture Wars, emerged later as a beacon of balance.
---
Chapter V: Iskavald – The Ice-Wracked Grave
Geography: Glaciers, skeletal mountains, frozen empires, and undead-haunted catacombs.
Climate: Harsh, frozen year-round save brief thaws near volcanic rifts.
Culture: Stoic, death-revering, and rune-bound. Life is survival; honor is memory.
Government: Clan-based, with the Frosthold Pact binding territories together.
History: Once the Everfrost Empire, now a broken land of revenants and bone-mages.
---
Chapter VI: Lesser-Known Realms
Skyland Arks: Floating continents in the outer aether, accessible only through dimensional flight or relics.
Subrealms: Mirror worlds born of fear, legacy, or regret. Some Sanctums in Virelia have gates leading to these.
The Sunderdeep: Believed to exist beneath Iskavald and Myrrhael—ruins of divine experiments and cursed things.
---
Appendix I: Magical Geography
Leylines: Magical rivers of energy, converging beneath Virelia and parts of Myrrhael.
Vein Nodes: Stabilized magical ecosystems used for farming and spellcraft.
Riftzones: Areas of reality fluctuation caused by old divine wars—heavily monitored.
Appendix II: Calendar & Celestial Influence
Korayn Year: 312 days, with 13 months of 24 days each.
Moons: Koray has two—Aurelia (the Blood Moon) and Veyl (the Pale Eye). Their phases influence magic.
---
Glossary
The regions:
Virelia — The Crown of CivilizationDravareth — The Iron SpineMyrrhael — The Verdant GloomNamerae — The Whispering ContinentIskavald — The Ice-Wracked Grave
---
End Notes: This primer is a simplified, living document. Geography in Koray often shifts with magic, conflict, and the actions of entities both mortal and godlike. Update logs and region errata can be found in the second volume.
May this book guide you, World Traveler, as you stride through dusk and ruin with astral flame in your heart.
— Signed, Archivist Selenar Duskmire, Inkfold Archive
---
I marked the page I just finished reading and closed the tome. I leaned back in the spectral nest. Compared to the previous text this one seemed more... sane. It still sounded dangerous but it sounded less like a haunted world circus.
I opened my eyes and sighed heavily. Before I could start reading about the regions of this world, there was something important I needed to take care of. Looking up at my statu acting personal maid, I said with all the seriousness I could mister:
"Selene... I'm hungry."
Selene did not blink. She never did, I noticed. At least, not unless she intended to.
Her pale, duskgold eyes—so still and unclouded they might've been cut from moonstone—narrowed only slightly. It was a look I was beginning to understand as her version of concerned acknowledgement. She inclined her head with the elegance of a pen gliding across parchment.
"Of course, Mistress," she said, her voice the same calm melody one might use when addressing an altar. "Your appetite returning is a positive sign. Shall I inform Mirelda to prepare something nourishing… or do you hunger for something more specific?"
Her hands, clad in those ever-immaculate black gloves stitched with crimson thread, folded in front of her. No hesitation. No mockery. Just that eerie, unwavering calm that made her seem less like a maid and more like an oracle in mourning.
But beneath it, I could detect a whisper of curiosity. It subtle but she definitely holding excited anticipation. She's such a tsunadere.
"Blood… tea, perhaps?" Selene offered. "Infused with clove, fig, and blackthorn petal to sharpen your senses? Or shall I have the kitchens prepare a raw tartare? The Widow's Cradle mushrooms are in season… and we do still have a fresh vial from the Nocturne cellars."
She paused just long enough, then added softly:
"…Or do you require something warmer? Something… alive?"
She said it with such politeness it was almost absurd. Like asking whether I preferred jam or cream on my scone. I'm pretty sure the jam would scream.
"Meat. More specifically, I'm craving some juicy steak." I didn't even have to think about it. Steak and wine was the best combination. Yeah I know, the wine is actually blood, but it's in a damn wine glass, so it counts.
Selene blinked once. A slow, deliberate motion—as though she were filing the request deep into some cathedral archive in her mind.
"Very well," she intoned with the faintest inclination of her head. "A rare blood-seared steak with marrow reduction, seasoned with void pepper and mist rosemary. I shall have Mirelda prepare it posthaste."
She turned with spectral grace, the hem of her deep gray dress whispering across the marble as she moved toward the enchanted bell pull beside the veiled study door. But just before she rang it, she paused. Then, without looking back:
"And a goblet of the 1176 Nocturne Vintage. Decanted, of course."
Clink.
The bell rang—low and ghostly, like the last note of a requiem sung to a sleeping kingdom.
Moments passed, the silence scented faintly by old ink, waxen roses, and something hungrier just below the surface.
Then Selene returned, as if she hadn't just ghosted through two layers of corridors and spoken to a matron who yelled at triplets for fun. She moved to stand beside my lounging nest, hands folded, gaze trained on me with quiet formality.
"Mirelda is preparing your request now. Would you prefer to dine here in the study, or return to the solarium or the veiled garden?" A pause. Then, dry as ever: "The triplets have finally re-cleared the shadow-ivy from the gazebo's seating cushions. Mostly."
I really hope she's joking about the last part. I really liked that gazebo.
"I'll eat here. I still have to finish this tome."
Selene nodded once, as though she had already predicted that answer down to the syllable.
"Very good, Mistress. The study will be arranged for dining."
With a subtle snap of her gloved fingers, the room shifted—not abruptly, but as if responding to her will. Shadows curled back. The spectral nest gently lifted a few inches off the ground, gliding to the corner beside the tall arched window where twilight always loomed, even when it shouldn't. A small table of polished obsidian slid in silently, its surface veined with threads of crimson that pulsed like a heartbeat.
Candlelight flickered into being—not golden, but a soft wine red, casting a romantic glow that made even the thick textbooks seem enticing.
Selene adjusted the chair across from the nest just so, then conjured a black napkin embroidered with Poppy's house sigil: a scythe coiled in silk thread and blood roses.
"You may resume your reading, Mistress. I shall serve you here."
And serve she did.
Not long after, the study door opened with a waft of warm, intoxicating aroma—charred meat, spiced blood, and something faintly floral. Mirelda "Redspoon" Glaive entered, her towering presence hunched slightly with respect. She placed the silver platter down with a practiced thud and winked.
"One widow's special, rare as a ghost's kiss. Got the marrow just right this time," she said, voice like gravel smothered in butter.
Selene gave her a single glance of icy approval. Mirelda bowed, then vanished in a swirl of kitchen smoke and satisfaction.
I now had my steak—perfectly seared, garnished with crushed grave-pepper, and paired with a goblet of deep crimson vintage resting in a crystal holder shaped like a screaming cherub.
Selene silently offered utensils lined in black silver—or, knowing me, waited to see if I'd just use my fingers again. (I did it one time. I was really hungry. Don't judge.)
"Shall I resume reading aloud, Mistress, or shall you continue on your own while you dine?" she asked, ever dutiful.
I waved her away. "I'll read on my own. I'll just use mage hands to hold and flip the book. It will also add to my mana control training."
"Very well, Mistress."