Withered Soil

Withered Soil (was named Present Hours at one point, not to be confused with Present Order) was a story Al had written in early 2020. It was supposed to be a reboot of the now cancelled Unstable World, but production of this has been stopped as well, as Al didn't like where this story was going anymore. Such elements of this story are now used in Amber Eyes.

Paňstvłhjømer-centric plot
The main premise of events happens when Luciano gets emotional when missing a particular figure in his life that passed away years ago, being his father Augustus. He found out about a ritual similar to what Laura uses in Amber Eyes, being a resurrection spell that required the blood of any remaining relatives of the person they wanted to revive, and figured his blood alone wasn't enough. So he ends up killing his cousins for their blood, and dumped their bodies somewhere. However the bodies were discovered, but not much evidence was there to point to Luciano being the killer.

The ritual was complete, though instead of manifesting a corporeal form as he should, Augustus instead snatches Luciano's body and takes control over it, plotting on how he would use such necromancy to build and army and take over the world, yadda yadda. He brought in Juana, seeing how docile and naïve she is, and uses her to fetch whatever materials he would need. Imran and Yusuf hear about everything, and get Juana to stop working for Lu-well, Augustus. Augustus hears about this, and attacks Imran and Yusuf, with Juana running away, blaming herself for getting her half-brothers roped in.

Somewhere around the line, Lizbeth and Sakura get possessed by whatever demons Augustus unleashed, and Vladimir and Kyung-Hu try to exorcise them, but to no avail, and the only way to get rid of such demons was to rid of the vessels they inhabit.

Jagoda also develops a sort of anti-hero persona, named Gniew, after hatred consumes them after a fight with the possessed Luciano ends up with them injured and their friend Hansel in a coma after getting beat up. They also end up killing Ignatiy thinking he was gonna kill them as well.

Astrolo-esprits/Pieren-centric plot
(tba)