The Black Craft Saga Week 20 Dispatch
— From the War Mode Office. Two worlds tremble as omens ignite, powers awaken, and the fragile illusion of control shatters.
📚Note From the War Mode Office:
We’re updating how chapters are organized so the reading experience is clearer and the series can grow sustainably. Chapters 1–3 remain free for everyone, serving as the open gateway into the world. Chapters 4–6 are now part of the free-subscriber tier, meaning anyone with a free subscription will receive those chapters by email. Because of Substack’s limitations, these chapters remain locked in the archive, but we will happily resend them by email upon request to any free subscriber who needs access.
From Chapter 7 onward, the story enters the paid-subscriber tier. This ensures continuing support for the work while keeping the beginning of the saga accessible to new readers and giving free subscribers meaningful content before the paywall. This tiered structure—free for all, free for subscribers, and paid—creates a smooth progression that supports both engagement and the long-term development of the series.
🪶 This Week’s Movements:
Two tales unfold beneath skies that signal ruin—one stained by crimson and void moons, the other lit by the cold hum of fluorescent confinement. Each setting becomes a crucible, revealing how terror—whether supernatural or systemic—shapes the hearts of those trapped within it.
In Dowling, the heavens twist into a herald of ancient powers, sending villagers into panic and unleashing forces long thought buried. In the brig, Dareya faces a darkness crafted not by sorcery but by human design, a calculated cruelty meant to sever her from the dragon who defines her very being.
Slices of Midnight: In Indamar, hysteria becomes a weapon. Grobbins wields it first, twisting fear into doctrine, while Morgan and Muriel reclaim it with far greater mastery. Their rise capitalizes on a village ready to believe in salvation or damnation at the slightest push. The undead horror of Delwort’s return shreds the boundaries between life and nightmare, leaving the people desperate for meaning. Into that desperation the witches step, reshaping truth, rewriting allegiance, and preparing the Isle for a reckoning that none but they fully comprehend.
In Ashborn, fear is of a quieter, more methodical kind. Dareya’s captors use isolation the way Morgan uses spectacle—each tightening control through manipulation, breaking the spirit before breaking the body. The Order’s Council believes itself secure, shielded by protocol and arrogance, even as Veyrakh’s restrained fury radiates from the Spire like distant thunder. Much like the villagers mistaking the witches’ ascension for divine intervention, the Council mistakes Dareya’s silence for submission. Both are wrong.
Together, the stories reveal a shared truth: power thrives in shadows—whether cast by burning moons or stone-walled cells—and those who wield it often mistake fear for victory. But fear is volatile. It births rebellion, awakens old forces, and binds destinies closer to catastrophe.
As Indamar bows before witches and the Order clings to its illusion of authority, both worlds stand at the threshold of upheaval, their fates turning on the choices of those who refuse to break.
🕯️🕷️👑 Infamy’s Daughters:
The Eighteenth Chapter of Slices of Midnight will drop on Tuesday Morning, December 16 at 10 am EST to Infamy’s Daughters for paid subscribers.
When the moons above Indamar turn blood-red and void-black, panic erupts across Dowling. Grobbins exploits the hysteria to condemn the priestesses, but Miss Jocelyn arrives to challenge him—only for Delwort’s corpse to rise in a blaze of green hellfire. His undead rampage leaves Dell Belfort dead and Bartleby consumed in flames before an unseen sorcerous force tears Delwort’s body apart in a violent storm of ancient magic.
Morgan, the legendary witch of Indamar, emerges from the crowd as if stepping out of myth itself. With Muriel at her side—and the Orb of Myceen now in hand—they sway the terrified villagers with promises of salvation while dismantling the Society’s credibility piece by piece. Their manipulation fractures the village, isolates Jocelyn, and prepares the ground for a catastrophic revelation as Muriel raises the Orb to summon the truth: the spirit of the fallen High Priestess herself.
📖 Read Chapter 18 - Available December 16, 2025
🌞🜚✨The Shadow Lineage:
The Twenty-second chapter of Ashborn arrives for paid readers on Thursday Morning, December 18, at 10 am EST in The Shadow Lineage.
Dareya is thrown into a brutal military brig, accused of treason and isolated under constant surveillance. Deprived of food, water, and rest, she endures psychological erosion and physical abuse meant to break her spirit and force information about Veyrakh from her. The interrogations escalate, led by a captain whose cold precision reveals the Order’s intent to dismantle Dareya’s will piece by piece. Through it all, Dareya holds the bond with her dragon close, silently begging him not to intervene, knowing his rescue would mean her immediate execution.
Elsewhere, the Council analyzes her capture with a blend of arrogance and fear, convinced she can be contained despite her surviving the Aerie collapse and maintaining an active dragon bond. They wager on isolation, believing themselves in control, unaware Veyrakh feels every echo of Dareya’s suffering. At the Spire, the dragon seethes with barely restrained fury, promising devastation when the moment comes. The chapter frames a tightening vise: Dareya weakening but unbroken, the Order confident but blind, and Veyrakh waiting—coiled for war.
Read Ashborn Chapter 22 - Available December 18, 2025
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Stay Sharp. Stay Strange. Be Wise.
—The War Mode Office
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