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“We’re survivors,” he told her across the flame of the lamp.

“Survivors?”

“Yes.”

“What in God’s name are you talking about? It’s been an entire week since half our weaponthanes have gone searching for help, and not even one man has returned!”

The clan hall fell silent, save for the sniffling of another orphaned child. Huddled around the dim glow of the lamp, all of them knew that they would soon be starving. Dead.

“Sooner or later they will catch us and they will kill us. They are going to kill us and eat us and you won’t face it.”

“Hell woman! We haven’t even seen them yet – we don’t even know what they are yet!”

“I’m not sticking around to find out.”

She stood up from her seat, moving down the steps and towards the oak doors, but stopped. She returned to her seat; one of the guards had motioned in the strangers.

@Austinc ; @Serpent ; @BgirlStories ; @ LucyWitch ; @Evie22 ; @AzBaz

One of them spoke: “Kobolds?”

The villagers gaped at the outsiders. There haven’t been any since the roads had been blocked. Under his breath, the man whispered a prayer.

“The worst kind. It’s the Happy-Fun-Fun Band.”

“They’re kobolds nonetheless,” one of them smirked.

“But it’s strange, all the traces we picked up are at least half a moon old,” another replied.

“Well, this lot is just better at hiding their tracks. Besides, we were told to get here as soon as possible.”

A sigh of relief sawed through the air.

“You’re the hunters we sent for! Please... you’re our last chance!”

 

Alrighty gang, you've been called up for a cute little short story contest! 500-1000 words, your choice on subject matter and genre. Theme is also up to you. Naturally I'll be throwing my hat in the ring. And I'll be aiming to win. Deadline will be in five days time - easy peesy. At least one big bad admin is watching so you'd better declare your intentions quickly! I'll continue the tale once four people have confirmed that they want to participate (in a reply to this post), or in two days time.

And I guess we can make things up as we go on, if anyone else wants to join. As of now, unless anyone wants to adjudicate, we'll somehow do a vote for first and second place. In addition to bragging rights, you might even get rewards.

Anyways, have a good day.

Dammit I saw weaponthanes and thought I was getting a KODP story.

Lol at bringing in Azbaz with all the literal children though. But he's pretty out of practice after all that time languishing uselessly furry hell, maybe this is challenge about the right size for him.

AzBaz is the one I see as biggest competition. Ozoni and Austinc are going to be hard to. The others I will crush

That's if they even accept. Still waiting on a yay or nay.

allg

'literal children'? ...

I've been waiting for a duel! I'm in.

Do I say the subject and stuff now or later?

Everyone tagged except Az and maybe Serpent is in middle school, and you in particular are writing a Harry Potter quiz, so yes. What were the quotes for?

Literal children is just... I don't know actually, it just looked like something I could quote XD

I literally say that I’m in high school on my profile. 

You're 14, that's the age of maximum unlikeability for a child regardless of what grade you claim to be in.

I’ve said that I’m 15 multiple times before. I’m going to be a sophomore in less than a month from now.

It will be an apt title.

You’re 15? Lol, I thought you were older.

You can tell Gower once you've finished your story, and have handed it in.

Don't reply to this post!

Remaining time till contest ends: 1 day!

Send your stories to Gower to preserve anonymity and prevent bias during voting.

BgirlStories has accepted.

Serpent has accepted.

Austinc has accepted.

LucyWitch has accepted.

ShoujoAddict has joined.

lordkarstark has joined.

The Broken God has joined.

C6H806 has joined, left, and joined again.

Lurkinator has joined (I think, don't really know).

Peebis has joined.

Jacoder has joined.

Since there's so many people, this isn't a duel anymore and is now a tourney. Making executive decision to stop any more people from joining btw

Theme up to me? Well I'm going to rip out your heartstrings with the most emo story ever. I'm in!

Yeap. Until someone steps in I'll use this to preserve anonymity, and post stories. Then you guys could reply under the one you wrote (after voting finishes). Seems like a very stupid roundabout way but oh well.

Why would you need a new account for that? Can't the participants just send their stories to your main account, just like they sent them to Gower for the (awful) poetry duel?

I'm participating as well, and it seemed weird for one of the contestants to post all of the stories.

Doing a weird camp thing for soldiers. Very deadly. Very weird. Help.

I’m in.

@LucyWitch
Looks like a typo in the original tag for her.

Oops, thnx Miz.

Thank you. I would like to participate but I don't have an idea for a story yet.

Just think of anything. There are plenty of writing prompts. Nothing will happen if you lose

Any particular reason they're all kobolds now?

@lordkarstark You should get on board with this. 500 words in five days is easy, right?

I have been meaning to write a 1000 word story anyway, so sure

This looks cool, can I participate?

If you want yeah.

My schedule will is now back to normal, so I am here to state my intentions to join. I have nothing to lose, ans everything to gain.

I feel like we should be chasing you out of the thread, but am conflicted on whether this should involve pitchforks or merely rotten vegetables.

Both.
We need some torches too.

No, torches are too weak. *pulls out flamethrower*

I realized that the "duel" was made with the tagged folks in mind. I'd hate to intrude (and after my last blunder I am probably on End's priority ban list), so I hereby retract my intentions to join. I will finish the story I started and post it elsewhere, seperate of this contest.

Lol I'm not sure if Ozoni really planned for this many participants. I'm not sure if we can really call this a duel at this point either.

Oh well, the more the merrier.

It turned into Fortnite. Only less gay.

@Lurkinator

Your "friend" wrote a very stupid storygame that is failing to meet site standards, and not even managing to be funny. You must now prove that you and your "friend" are not the same person by producing a superior short story for this.

Can do and will, that story was kinda published as a joke, won’t do it again

Am I just supposed to write about anything? 

>500-1000 words, your choice on subject matter and genre. Theme is also up to you.

With school coming to an end for the year, I’ve been assigned a summative essay on ‘who is the most responsible for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet’, and I was wondering if I could hit two birds with one stone.

Not a short story. If you submit that it better be a damn good essay :)

What if I make it a personal narrative. I start it off like this:

It was a normal day, but all of a sudden I had to write an essay! It went like this  “Friar Lawrence is most responsible for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet...”

lol no

add more than that - then perhaps

I think that Romeo and Juliet are most responsible for their own deaths because they didn't have to kill themselves. 

You should post the essay anyway as its own thread, maybe you'll get a comm or maybe Gower will grade it for you.

We’ll all rip it to shreds for you, but still somehow give you an A. If you get anything lower than a C, show that thread to your teacher and he/she/it will defer to our suprior CYStian logic. 

Yes

Yeah I probably should. I’ve actually currently got a D+ in English because my teacher assigned a 70 point Formative where I have to draw something that shows the type of character Tybalt is. I know it’s easy, I just really hate drawing.  I had 2 checkpoint assignments that were worth 25 points each, and when I turned them in late, I still got a B+ on them, it only raised my grade by one percent. My English teacher is an absolute loon and grades our essays on what she thinks we’re capable of and not based on how they compare to everyone else’s. It also doesn’t help when she labels my class as her smartest, my class is the only one allowed to pick our seats, and tries to treat us like everyone is in a more advanced class than regular English 9.

I actually had a different teacher last semester who retired mid school year, it was like his second or third year teaching, and he was pretty great. No late grade reductions, constantly made jokes, and we were allowed to pick our seats. I used spend like 30 minutes writing an essay and get an A, but when I tried the low effort thing on this new teacher I got a D. I’m not even sure what I did wrong.

This looks relatively interesting, I wish to join this. Are y’all ready for the worst, most cliche thriller you’ve ever read? Neither am I. 

Seems cool. Can I join? 

sure

I got stuck in a thing with Digit, so I have to leave this duel. Sorry

Wow, chicken. I’m in the same thing. It’s 500 words. No more than an hour of your time or two if your super slow

Fine I take it back.

Why do we have to send our stories to Gower though? Why can't we just post them in here?

I think it is to avoid bias, as Gower is an ambassador from COG he has no interest in picking sides. So I think if we send them, Gower will receive it and post them all and the authors will be anonymous until the winner is announced.

Grah. I don't like my own story. So stupiiiid but I already sent it iiiiiiiiin

I have a very small hope that I will actually submit something. 

Then why join? There will more than likely be consequences for not submitting anything.

It’s still a hope. 

Is the story allowed to be more than 1000 words long?

Yes, but try to keep it at a reasonable length for posting if you want people to actually read it. Never underestimate the apathy of the average forum goer.

Who is judging the competition?

Gower. 

Okay. So does that mean that Gower is the only one that gets to read the stories? Or will everyone get to read them after he's finished judging?

Actually, let me rephrase that. All of the contestants will submit their stories to Gower, but I’m not sure if we are going to vote or if Gower will judge them. As an English prof, he is qualified to judge the stories in any way he wishes (or how Ozoni wishes).

Gower will post them so they can be voted on with the authors kept anonymous.

Oh okay. So does that mean that everybody is voting?

Yes

Oh! So I can still send in a new story since I sent mine to Ozone accidentally! Yay! XD

I guess I’ll try.

Just to clarify, the people participating are the kobolds?

I probably should have asked this before writing, but can the story act like a prologue rather than a full on story? I have stories I have almost finished but they act more like an intro rather than an actual story.

Just turn in whatever, it's probably going to suck as badly as you do anyway.

I was planning to start writing once the kobald story was finished, so I guess I now have to wait until after the deadline to start it.

The course of the kobold story's based on your performance.

I think I'll join. Perhaps add another kid to the Happy-Fun-Fun Band. I did just start writing a storygame, and the first page makes for a decently coherent short story. One that leaves quite a few loose threads, anyway.

You know what this needs? Multiple elimination rounds until there are only two left and we can finally witness an ACTUAL duel.

My proposed bracket: 

 

BgirlStories vs Serpent

Me vs LucyWitch

Shouja vs karstark

Broken god vs c6h8o6

Lurkinator vs peebis

Jacoder vs Ozoni

-2nd round-

(Winner of BgirlStories vs Serpent) vs (winner of Me vs LucyWitch) vs (winner of Shouja vs karstark)

(Winner of Broken god vs c6h8o6) vs (winner of Lurkinator vs peebis) vs (winner of Jacoder vs Ozoni)

-Final Round-

(Winner of (Winner of BgirlStories vs Serpent) vs (winner of Me vs LucyWitch) vs (winner of Shouja vs karstark)) vs (winner of (Winner of Broken god vs c6h8o6) vs (winner of Lurkinator vs peebis) vs (winner of Jacoder vs Ozoni))

 

We can even do some kind of betting, like March madness, if we wanted

 

Or just the lazy method of keeping to the free for all and kicking the worst loser out every round.

It's up to Ozoni though, he has taken up Ficsean's torch as Challenger of Noobs.

This sounds good. I'll set up the brackets and make a new thread that isn't an absolute mess.

Would we make different stories for each round or keep them the same?

Depends on Round One and how u guys do

2nd round could just be poems or something

Yes we should do a triathlon, with short stories, poems, and maybe an essay for the final round

Survival of the fittest. Each round the losers get banned.

If that’s how we’re doing it then I might as well just abandon CYS. I doubt I can beat anyone tbh.

Nothing of value will be lost. Actually, ehhhhhhhh your storygame was okay. Maybe some storywriting skill will leave, but still not much. 

 

Bold words for someone with nothing written.

I have many, many reviews written. Next time you criticize someone for not writing anything, think about what they have actually written other than stories. 

It looks like we've paired the first two opponents together.

I’ve already finished and submitted my story, not sure what he’ll be doing. Plus, he's probably ass at writing short stories anyway. 

Just looked up your review on my story again. You bitched about the format, you bitched about the “historical accuracy” even though I was thorough and no generals didn’t get to have personal mobile telegraphs because that’s how it worked, then you bitched about the lack of knowledge on the conflict, even though you didn’t need it to understand the story. Your only valid criticism is that of my grammar, other than that the review is a throw-away and the other reviews had helpful criticism. I know that story was shit but at least the other reviews (some of them at least) explained what I needed to do better. 

 

If that didn’t get through to you then maybe this will. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries. There I said it. I fart in your general direction and bid you ado.

Lol. I love Monty Python!

You two should make your own separate duel thread. Unless Broken God is a complete little bitch he should demand satisfaction for these insults.

Your only featured comment is on some deleted game with cat in the name. I think his criticism was well placed.

Also he's gay.

Wait, it’s not deleted, I just can’t access it from your profile. It’s still bad though.

So who would I send my entry to? Gower or the other account seeing as how it looks like there has been a change of plans 

What other account and what change of plans?

Ozoni's alt, I presume.

Ozoni made the Ozone account to post the stories, but it was also stated that Gower would be the one to publish 

Gower, just so that you have something submitted in case anything happens. 

Sendo to Gower pls.

Okay, I finished the story and sent it to Gower.

Is it cheating if someone helps you? I wrote the story myself but Niemand helped a bit with the spelling and grammar. Is that okay?

I reckon I should just make another thread for posting actual entries.

Maybe tomorrow I will make a new thread, with a post for each bracket.  That will help keep the discussion organized (ha).

So are we actually doing brackets? I thought that was just an idea Austin pitched. Not sure if Ozoni wants it to get that complicated. (But I am not going back to look for posts I missed.)

Yeah, that'd be helpful! I have made a new thread with the brackets and everything set up though, so we could use that.

This seems too complicated and too dependent on everybody showing up, I'm going to fire you if it doesn't work out.

And by that I mean burn you at the stake.

And if things work out?

Here's to things working out xD!

If the opponents don’t submit anything, then the other person automatically moves on to the second round. I better get started soon.

 

I submitted mine, to Gower.

Also, is this gonna be judged by Ozoni only, or is it gonna be judged by the public like in Fiscean’s poetry duel?

I'm competing so it's gonna be put to a vote. Also, it's now organised in a tourney bracket.

Ah alright, I just saw the new thread now. Your tag on me didn’t work for some reason.

 

How do we do it as a tourney if the writers are anonymous?

After we finish voting on which story in each bracket is better, it's revealed who the writers are.

Just a friendly reminder: there's 1 day left before the culling begins. I'll announce in advance when we have 5 hours left.

We’re going back to a free-for-all.

9 hours left before the deadline.