SSS-Class Profession: The Path to Mastery - Chapter 298: Velvet and Paint

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.

“The world underwent a mutation that year. The game world appeared in reality and various disasters started to ravage the world.

To resist all of this, everyone had to plan for their job choice, manically level up, and strive to become stronger.

There were mages, warriors, knights, and summoners—over 100 different kinds of jobs. This was a job that a person would be stuck with his entire life. Thus, everyone chose cautiously. Out of this dazzling array of jobs, Moses picked Knight—which had the most average ability value—to be his job.

At the same time, he also awakened the Hundredfold Increase System.

“”Ding! Detected that the host learned Shielding. The skill has become Absolute Defense after the hundredfold increase!””

“”Ding! Detected that the host learned Defensive Domain. The skill has become No Damage Domain after the hundredfold increase!””

At the same time, Moses also discovered that his job could evolve infinitely!

“”Ding! Detected that the host’s Knight job has met the conditions for a hundredfold increase. The job has become Great Knight… Paladin… Impregnable Fortress!”

After being torn from the only life she knew, 16-year-old Margo is forced into a new home with strangers who call themselves her parents. Haunted by memories of her past and consumed by feelings of isolation, she struggles to adapt to her unfamiliar surroundings. School offers little relief—until she meets Lucien, a mysterious boy who appears just when she needs a friend the most.Gabriel is everything Margo needs: kind, attentive, and always ready to whisk her away from her troubles. Each night, he invites her to secret places—an abandoned playground, a fog-choked garden, a crumbling train station at the edge of town—each more unsettling than the last. Yet with every chilling rendezvous, Margo feels more alive... more seen.But something isn’t right. Gabriel never comes to school during the day. Her adoptive parents never see him. And when they catch her talking to thin air, their concern deepens into fear. They say Gabriel isn't real—that he’s a figment of her imagination. Margo wants to believe them, but Gabriel feels real. More real than anything else in her life.As the nights grow colder and more twisted, Gabriel’s true nature begins to surface. Shadows move where they shouldn’t. Time warps in his presence. And the places they visit seem to echo with whispers from another world. Margo is forced to ask herself: Who—or what—is Gabriel? Why does he only want her? And what will happen on the final night he asks her to come with him?As the line between reality and delusion begins to crumble, Margo must make an impossible choice: stay in a world where she feels loved, or return to one that barely feels real.But one thing is certain—some friendships never let go.

This is the story of a man who grew up with everything—money, love, family, status—but in isolation for being unique, abnormal... an anomaly.He finally gets a chance to show his skills, his talents, his potential to the world.On that fateful day, during his Awakening ceremony, not only did he awaken his abnormally strong innate ability, but he also found out he was being rewarded, loved, favored by the system.This is the story of a man who is undefeated by anyone and anything, a man who grew powerful beyond imagination, a man who rose to power on his own.This is the story of a man who turned many worlds upside down, stopped many wars, won many battles, dethroned kings, and became kings of many.This is the story of a man who represents both balance and imbalance, holy and unholy, good and bad, light and dark, pure and impure, positive and negative, order and chaos.It all started when the system started favoring him.Watch Sam grow from an ordinary noble to the most powerful entity in the entire universe while he finds many buried secrets about his origins, about the system that governs every being in the universe, and why he is being favored by the very system.There was none like him, and there never will be.