Winter, After the Harvest

I like this title, it’s a pretty creative choice. “Winter, after the harvest” evokes feelings of new growth and change, as the crops spring back after a long and harsh winter.

In a way, this theme is present throughout the work, as Lord Winter transforms from a spoiled college kid, into a rugged adventurer who goes through many hardships alongside his crew. Traditionally a loner, he makes friendships and bonds that can only be formed from a shared sense of camaraderie brought upon by fighting together.

The story is characterized by Malk’s strong writing. His writing is consistently excellent throughout the work. When you read a Malk story, you know you’re in for something great. Just like how “Prayer of Destruction” evoked feelings of the religious sublime, this work evokes the feeling of a road journey done right. It feels like the Hobbit and The Fellowship of the Ring, because of how the band travels together and interacts with each other. Except this work is much darker.

The cast of characters that accompany Lord Winter are an eclectic and entertaining bunch. We got one-eyed Frie, the fearless leader, we got Stitcher, the healer and fighter who’s also a bit religious, Tor, the warrior from distant and foreign lands, and the mysterious Crowley. I honestly feel like Crowley was the earliest version of Julian. They’re both really similar in their fervor and dedication to wiping out evil, maybe Crowley was the first iteration of that character. I enjoyed the camaraderie and friendship between the crew, and how they joke around with one another.

The final twist where you find out the truth about your family and discover the lore was really cool! It was so good! I did also like the ending where you choose to reject your destiny and just become an adventurer with Frye’s crew instead. Both were great!

The story was really compelling. I wanted to find out the mysteries of Lord Winter’s family, and see his magical abilities, since he hypes himself up a lot in the beginning. Lord Winter’s magic was a really creative choice. I got to hand it to you. Having the main character shoot magic bolts from his grandfather’s skull, which he carries around everywhere with him, is a bold and inspiring choice, especially since this is grimdark fantasy.

Speaking of grimdark. The donkey rapists. Good lord. The villains were really great, the donkey rapists were a mix of terrifying and funny. I think the pain-worshippers however, were just terrifying. I also liked how the vampire tricks you into going with the pain worshippers rather than fighting you directly, which is what I expected.

The story is continuously unexpected and novel, at no point did I feel like I knew what was happening next. You took it to some really crazy directions but it worked so well! I never expected that we would go underground into this creepy underground city. The branching was also really good, within the main path, not including the death scenes you could stay with the Vampire or choose to ascend and meet the far ones. Also, there’s some strategy involved in the branching, especially in the combat scenes. I liked that.

Drawbacks:

I’m going to be honest, I didn’t like the path where you choose not to go back to Winter Manor and embrace your destiny, and instead stay at the college. I finished the main path, the crux of the story, so for curiosity’s sake I tried that path out. It was pretty good, but the main path outshone it by a lot. And after having such great characters in the main path, it was hard to get invested in anyone in the side path. But that’s not shade on the side path, that’s more a testament to the greatness of the first path. I didn’t really care as much about the devil worshipping cult, with the blood sacrifices, but it was not too bad and the writing was superb as always in your works. Honestly, the path itself wasn’t bad, I think it’s just coming from the first path to explore the less awesome second path made the difference, like the contrast was noticeable.

Regardless, love this story! Excellent work! Easy 8/8. Looking at the work as a whole, it's wonderful.

The quality of writing was really good, there were little to no spelling or grammatical errors that I can remember. You can really tell the author spent a decent amount of time polishing and editing his story.

Malk's writing style has always been conducive to setting up a a believable atmosphere. The same can be said of the dialogue, its never janky or awkward and you can always imagine it being said by an actual person.

Writing style and quality is well done over all.

I decided to take the unwavering warpath...path and determine my own fate rather than accept an inheritance. I got the feeling the entire time the ritual was going to go terribly wrong.

“James was a fat, incompetent fuck." James is no longer best friend. Chn'Magoth is new best friend.

I'm liking the vomit scrying thing. Its very fitting for this type of story.

I see a sliver of Necromancer in here. Not to mean its been copied or ripped off in any way, but the "Me/Us against the world thing" is similar to what Necromancer had and its gives the story a nice rounded out feeling to it. The hubris of the protagonist and the characters really shines through in some instances, which is also a nice touch.

It's a goods setup for a dark fantasy story, and the site needs more of those anyways. So the dark fantasy category as well as the resulting stories were a good inclusion.

"You are not stricken down immediately, however, so it must be true."

Getting immediately murdered by the students would have been funny. But power does indeed reside where people believe it does, as the bald fella from game of thrones said.

"You cackle in delight as you leap into the air, punching a hole through the ceiling, and flying off into the night. " Something about this sentence seems off, but its probably just the relative brevity of it.

I think my one complaint is that I've found both ends to this path, I was really hoping there would be more to it. However, that's due to the story being set to a strict deadline, and I am sure if it wasn't there would have been more to it.

To be honest, the storygame description left my mind once I started reading, and I believe my curiosity got the better of me and lead me to ignoring the main path which should have been obvious to me.

I am most certainly going to be reading through the Lord Winter path, which should satiate my desire to see more.

This was very well written from what I have seen of it so far and I can say whole heartedly it deserved to win the contest.

Interesting how candles are mentioned twice on the opening page. The MC burns through five, while elsewhere in the not too distant past, your Uncle lights one for your dead parents. One can't help but wonder if the wax seal on the letter was from the flame burned for your dead parents. Nice contrast with the name "Winter." Call to action, immersive opening, Winter starts off strong.

I think we all know whose narrator's voice is speaking with lines like this:

"In your dreams, you wander through impossible vistas in the shadowed days of antiquity."

I don't know if rejecting the letter was meant to be an entire branch, but that section did feel a little rushed. It went a lot longer than I imaged, though, which is why I mention it. I was honestly expecting a quick death and was pleasantly surprised to find more links to read through.

Since that choice, however, the path becomes very linear. There's an option for a quick death, but you're given single links for about four pages, maybe five if you don't count the quick death. It's not completely out of the setting as you're traveling towards a single destination. Maybe the solution is to combine one or two pages together. Or add more pages. The same can be applied to when you arrive at the crossroads.

I guess I was a little unaware of the ability of the MC to cast spells. When the party was first assembled, each member had their specific tasks or classes. There wasn't much background on the actual MC beforehand, but you discover abilities as you go. The option to cast a spell threw me off at first because of that. From the cast of characters, I'll say Stitcher stuck out. Not only because she was first introduced, but because her name is in obvious contrast to the woman herself. That sticks out and is how you make characters memorable. Nicely done. Frye and Tor were largely the same. John Boy wasn't as strong during my read. Crowley who?

As you journey, the MC grows more into an adventurer. More is shared, and you're learning to be skilled with a dagger. It adds to the immersion as progression is found, not only in story plot, but in the MC as well. Being at University, no wonder why you don't start off as a beard-growing, axe swinging BAMF. One doesn't become that without adventure and struggle.

With the Lich ending, I can't help but wonder if the story's come full circle. The estate itself doomed to lure adventurers in. The innocent MC starting out, fated to become undead evil. A dangerous place to approach, peril lying within. It's a fulfilling ending, neatly-wrapped with another letter (more symmetry) and leaves me wondering if the next story will involve the same world, an undead power to vanquish. A great addition to the newly-created category.

I've always said that the first page sets the tone for the rest of the story. Malk manages to do what only one other author has ever done: get me hooked from the very first paragraph. 

Seriously, his stories have the gritty darkness to them that makes EndMaster's stories so compelling, but manages to add his own style of lyrical prose that establishes him as a class of his own. Everything from the whore in Winter's bed, to the lamplit streets below, has life and soul breathed into it.

First I made the choice to go hire the Merry Men. The awkward, realistic way Winter first interacts with Frye, the humorous exchange and storytelling in a pub with the two of them and Stitcher... this forms a bond of camaraderie with the mercenaries without overdoing it. 

Then the incident with John boy, the deer, and that THING crawling out of the puddle? The story that Tor told, with Father Time and Sea and Grass? It was told so well I'm tempted to ask for a short story expanding upon that. Both scenes gives us some insight into these men as characters worthy in their own right. In particular, Malk did an incredible job of giving us a preconceived notions of Tor as some kind of muscle bound oaf, then flipping it around on its' head and adding deeper layers to his personality.

And then immediately throwing us into a fight for our lives which also has a bit of humor thrown in. It's not every story where you're apologizing to your grandfather's skull for using it as a blunt weapon.

The insight with Crowley was also an incredible swerve out of left field! Although before I get into that, I do have an error in the narrative to point out here. In the page where he wakes you up, he waves your grandfather's skull in front of you in a bid to get you to follow him. You clearly recognize it as your grandfather's skull. Then in the next page, it says:

"It’s only after you catch it that you realize it’s your grandfather’s skull, and he had disarmed you"

Despite that blooper,  as I read more and more about the horrors that took place against Crowley, I found myself both sickened and impressed with Malk's commitment to detail. Feeding tubes, torture devices, blood everywhere. The whole area sounded like a chamber of Hell itself. It also made me respect Crowley more as a character, and understand why he took the vows he did. 

The story continues long after that, and the quality gets better with every page, but at the risk of ruining the story for  I'm going to stop here so I can go back and read through the other paths. All I can say is that this was an incredible story, and it deserves all the awards and accolades it gets. How this story is not in the top 5 list on the site, I will never understand.

Gargantuan, gargantuan, gargantuan, gargantuan…

*Somewhat spoilery*


Loved the adventure path; kinda fucked up that Winter’s didn’t do anything about Thompson or acknowledge his death, and Crowley is just there with a vamp and brainwashed village; if there’s a sequel, the six could at least reunite

This was a good read.
I've only played through one of what I suspect are two paths so far, and will be going back to play through the other soon.
The story is well told, and the characters well developed, though I'm still left with some questions, like "why am I carrying around my grandfather's skull"/"how does magic actually work".

Darkest dungeon in CYOA form except you're the Occultist

each pathway feels kind of short, and though there was some decent world building I felt like there wasn't enough details in each scene especially when it came to the endings/epilogues. I like the premise, but I felt like it could of been more.

Let me just state the obvious right away: that was really fucking good. The story has a way of drawing you into its world so deeply that at times it almost feels like you're right there in Lord Winter's shoes, trudging through wastelands and other planes of existence with a grim determination. Every line of narration in this story almost feels like it was meticulously crafted to draw the reader further into the world and Lord Winter's quest.

The characters were fantastic, Crowley being my personal favorite for his mysterious demeanor and a pretty kickass background tied to Winter's ancestors. The group's dynamic is charming and seeing Winter grow closer to them as he sheds his posh exterior to become a jacked adventurer was really cool. They might just be the best main cast I've seen in a storygame in a long while.

I do have some complaints about the story, but most of them are minor (grammatical or spelling errors here and there). I was kinda bummed out to see that the alternate path for rejecting your destiny and staying at the university was so short and rushed but I'm positive that was just due to the time limit for the contest and that it would've been fully expanded had you the time. Still, it was a nice little distraction from the main path and gave me that nostalgic feeling of reading Necromancer for the first time.

Overall, this game is a solid addition to the site and one of the best storygames to come out in recent years. This well deserves its featured spot. I'm always gonna be more of a CYBERMONKEY guy though. 7/8