Entry to Endmaster's Prompt Contest 3

Play as Urga, the founder of the prestigious Church of Desires, an infamous underground religion that specializes in darkness, debauchery, destruction, and most importantly, delivering coinage to Urga (although try not to tell that last bit to the followers, it wasn't in the pamphlet for a good reason).

However, Urga's time of frolicking in the deepest recesses of society is now over, as one of his many, many, oh so many enemies has sent warriors after him,

Urga's no fighter, but to what lengths will he go to survive? Up to you.

CW: Violence of the physical, verbal, and sexual varieties, as well as all the accompanying unpleasantry. Also, demon dick.

Author's Note: There is an optimal ending, however it and all the other endings are unmarked. If you reach a page with only an End Game link, you have "won".

Entry to Endmaster's Manifest Destiny Contest.

You are a historian, searching for tales about the mythical Bogatyrs, who were heroes of somewhat Arthurian quality. You managed to locate an archive of their exploits, which had once been passed down in oral form only, stored in a remote castle, taken care of by an old man of similar historian persuasion as you.

In a world where consciousness is stored on a hard drive, the most heinous crime is hacking.

Author's Note: A police officer is supposed to be a righteous dispenser of justice, but in the future, the idea of morality is basically nonexistent. Nonetheless, a lot of choices in this game can be broken down into "things a good, moralistic police officer should do" and "amoral things that get the job done". Going down one path or the other will eventually result in you being locked out of the other entirely, but it will also give you access to new epilogues and options.

Winner of the Cyberpunk Contest.

A Halo fanfiction. Story knowledge is not required, but some basic knowledge of the franchise is ideal.

On a desolate colony near the edge of human space, a Forerunner installation is located. ONI sends an expeditionary force, containing a single Spartan II, to investigate. However, ONI aren't the only ones searching for Forerunner tech.

After the Dark Age of Technology during the 21st and 22nd centuries, humanity decided to reach for the stars. Or at least the megacorps decided to, leaving behind anyone too poor or too stubborn or too old to board the ships headed for Mars and Europa. With that, the Great Expansion started: Venus, Jupiter, Saturn, the Asteroid Belt, all were encompassed by the sovereignty of the newly formed United Human Federation, or UHF. Well... that's what the UHF would have you believe. The truth is a different beast entirely.

After graduating a prestigious engineering college on Mars and patenting a valuable new piece of tech, you were approached by the Black Hoods, a completely untraceable organization that dealt with the salvage of shipwrecks across the solar system. Despite the absurd protocols (all in the name of total secrecy), the mind-boggling pay convinced you to join. What can you discover among the derelict wreckage of humanity?

My vote goes to story B.

Story A:

This one was solid. I don't like the whole concept of a Venus colony, and I think the overwhelming heat should have a little more emphasis in the story. For example, Pietro gets out of the shower, presumably barefoot, so shouldn't his feet be burning? Do they have heat-resistant flip flops too? Overall, I think that the prose was pretty good, although there were some awkward sentences, like "A short glass syringe, tucked away inside a foam padding in a box under Pietro’s bed" could be condensed to "A short glass syringe, tucked away inside a foam padded box underneath the bed". Also, two people have relations together, not relationships. In the end, I noticed most of the required elements, but there's no sentient planet (although it would've been really sick if it was implied that Venus is alive), treehugger, or humanitarian. Also, it's debatable if the fungus is psionic weaponry or not. Some fanfare is deserved, however, because it's a complete entry that fulfills almost all of the requirements.

Story B:

I enjoyed this story, although naming the two characters Carl and Carlos is atrocious for reading comprehension. You do differentiate them via dialogue--a good detail which I actually enjoyed--but it still fucking hurts my head, especially because it was completely unnecessary. This story jumps right in, showing us an unforgiving alien planet (giving me some Deathworld vibes) that requires the Helldivers laser cannon, and colonists at odds with their government. Then, we get the zealot, alongside the psionic weaponry (which is also the fungus, cool!). It's terrifying that the fungus gives people future sight and backflip powers; thankfully, the main characters have a laser cannon! Oh wait, it's forgotten about after it's used on the village and the fungus. This story also had some typos and awkward phrases, such as "With all the vindictive rage in his heart, he swung the sword down heavily on the crown of the cultist's head, feeling it crack and smash". The second clause is oddly phrased to my mind, and a head shouldn't be cracked and smashed by a sword, but rather chopped. Weird imagery. Otherwise, I did enjoy the majority of the prose, and I think it contains the most necessary elements (missing only humanitarian and unethical scientist by my interpretation). Fanfare might be warranted for the best story of the three.

Story C:

Story C falls into the pitfall of telling, not showing. We get a paragraph of exposition (in the form of summarizing this planet [not sentinet either]), followed by more paragraphs of exposition (in the form of summarizing characters that we don't even meet), followed by a brief dialogue that leads into a vague summary of a conversation (instead of the actual conversation, which the readers don't know the contents of). Then, we finally arrive at the meat of the story: something crazy is going down, and our character is caught right in the middle. Now, he has to help his brother solve this civil war... wait, you summarized that part too?! I was finally enticed by something in the story, and it just ends. There's plenty of the necessary elements included, but the story doesn 't hold up unfortunately.

This story really needed to put those additional 1132 words to use, but at least it got submitted, I guess. World's smallest violin can be the fanfare here.

Overall, I enjoyed the first two stories, but B develops faster, is a little more dynamic, and containins a few more of the required motifs, so I think it comes out on top. C is begging to be rewritten, because the idea could definitely go places with more development.

no

GGs to everyone who avoided the SHAME pit. But especially congratulations to Sherb for winning this. The positives of a contest like this is at the very least we'll have yours and Malk's stories around!

Thanks to Endmaster for running it as always, I appreciate that all the Mormons are now in the latter day circle of hell too.

If you struggle focusing, then an epic should be your last priority honestly. I have tried a couple times, and failed both times, to write something over 100k

Stop stream-of-consciousness-posting please! This is really just making it a worse look. Most of those SHAMED have crawled away to the pit, tail between their legs, yet you keep groveling here.

Hate to say it bud, but proofreading, and copypasting text into the editor, that is all a part of contest writing. If it isn't complete, then your entry isn't either. Intelligent writers set aside a day or a week for end-of-contest proofreading and pasting. You can also paste as you go, to avoid a last minute scramble. This isn't a new problem, and you probably won't get any pity points for it.

Published one minute before the deadline: DRIVE

I'm bad at RTC though

Fuckin amen to that

>Suranna makes this thread to expose the "real freaks"

>Doesn't post her own bingo card

>Hmmm