12/15/2024

2/20/2025 7:35 PM

24

0

7 wins / 6 losses

Marauder

Ah, didn't catch that. Been a while since I've gone over SPAG rules but I'm surprised I didn't catch that myself, but I'll keep it in mind for future writing. Thank you!

I see. Thanks for your input, I was just thinking that I could shorten it down but I wasn't sure if I was too vague with my descriptions or not. Also, The wind howls, swirling around and raking it's icy hands over the faces of anything that's unfortunate enough to be wandering around outside. This opening sentence is like having my eyes raked by icy hands. lmfao

There's a few things about this I feel like I could already improve such as the fight scene and it's aftermath which I think goes on a bit too long. So far I'm planning on keeping it as is but just separating them into pages. Regardless, I'd like a second opinion plus whatever else you guys think I could work on like how I keep saying 'You' and 'The' an excessive amount. The wind howls, swirling around and raking it's icy hands over the faces of anything that's unfortunate enough to be wandering around outside. Once emerald green tree leaves wilt, turned down in submission to the frost. An ocean of snow spreads itself over the grass, marking the trails of men and creatures that tread across it alike. Dull grey skies look on from above, allowing rays of sunlight to emanate from overhead, poking through the branches here and there. Robins cease their birdsong, opting to conserve their strength to weather the biting cold. Upon a series of crunching footsteps deer emerge from the cover of the trees, their soft brown eyes darting around anxiously in search of food before creeping back into the safety of the treeline, taking care to not alert any predators that may be lying in wait. Ones with bristling muscles covered in thick grey fur and hands as big as a man's head, each one of it's fingers tipped with dagger-like claws. Ones with sharp, hungry eyes that could spot a gnat's hair from several hundred yards away. Ones like you. The deer continues through the snow, carefully putting one hoof in front of the other. You extend your foot to the tree branch above it, slowly easing your weight down on it in an effort to not shake any leaves loose. You're about two men high above the deer and have been tracking it for most of the morning, allowing it to overtake you, where it leaves your line of sight occasionally. Normally, it would've been a crimson pile of gore and bones within the first minute of it being spotted but you wanted to wait for it to separate from it's herd. You had for the other deer who had wandered off by themselves and ended up as sweet, tender meals. The herd was proving to be a reliable source of food, capable of sustaining you for a couple more months, if you needed to stay in the forest for that much longer. A mixture of fear, sweat and dirt emanates from the deer making you salivate as you slowly step from branch to branch in pursuit of what will hopefully be a juicy meal. Your stomach feels hollow, yet weighs down on your body like a stone as you peer down at your unsuspecting quarry. You're so close now. Right above the deer. It's starting to edge out of the clearing you're both in, opting to go back into the safety of the trees. You can hear it breathe, warm breath misting on the winter air. It's heart beating in it's chest, quick and hard. The warm, red blood pumping around in it's veins. Just have to wait for the next time it stops... Suddenly, the tree branch above you explodes with a thunderous crack somewhere behind you, showering you in splinters and pieces of shredded leaves. Somewhere behind you, a man's voice curses faintly. There's a shout, not one of frustration or fear - though the heavy percussive thudding of hearts is unmistakeable - but a call to arms soon followed by yells, stumbling footsteps and the rustling of wool garments. Reflexively you whip your head back, throwing an arm in front of your eyes. Pieces of oak embed themselves into your forearm, sending a stinging fire up your arm and howl of surprise up from your throat. You fall back, losing balance and hitting the ground hard with a grunt. Momentarily stunned as you are, one of the members of the hunting party sees the opportunity and rushes forward with a war cry, intending to split your skull open. Not wasting a second, you spring to your feet, spin around and blindly swing a hand in his direction. You see a heavy set man, muscles obvious from under his ill-fitting tunic, gripping a worn axe above his head in both of his humongous hands. His eyes are pulsing, full of fear and excitement then become wet stones as your clawed points tear his throat open. Blood spurts from his neck, spraying you in it's steaming crimson glory. The adrenaline, shock and fear coursing through your veins are dulled - diluted by the satisfaction of watching the man's body drop to the ground, the axe fall from his limp grasp falling to hit the ground with an impotent thud. ''HENRY!'' Another set of footsteps in front of you, these one full of killing intent. A face, features set into a mask of fury, appears from behind the slumped form of the axe wielder. This man is not as large as the first, but still well-built and determined to see you slumped on the ground next to his friend. He grips a pitchfork in his knuckle white hands which he jabs the pointed end at your eyes in an attempt to blind you. You dodge to the side fluidly, intercepting his next thrust by grabbing the shaft of his weapon and yanking it out of his hands. Strong among men as he may be, he's no match for your strength and he's pulled forward as he tries to keep his grip on the pitchfork. You follow up with a swipe to the head, opening a gash on his forehead that also spears one of his eyes onto your pointer finger nail. He screams, putting a hand to bloody hole where his eye was only moments ago blood pouring from between his fingers. His good eye looks up, full of horror and panic as you raise the severed eye to your mouth and pop into your mouth, enjoying the taste of the sweet jelly whilst you raise your other hand to deliver a killing blow. Your ears prick up, a rustle to your right ringing out a warning. One that you take full advantage of, stepping back to allow this new threat to stab at air. He turns to face his opponent, and you see that it's a woman with a scar that spreads from her left temple to her lower right jaw. It's red jagged shape cuts the smooth, pale skin of her face in half - a stark contrast to the calm blue of her eyes. She's adorned in armour adorned with the crest of a lion holding a sceptre, holding a sword with a jewel set in it's hilt, a sparkling sapphire that shines into your eyes briefly as it turns in her hands. The steel blade shimmers, a lethal silver edged thing in the sunlight. The woman quickly presses her attack, swinging her sword in an arc, which you just barely managed to avoid. You counter, hoping to overwhelm her with your strength and ferocity, a flurry of blows which she ducks under or steps away from with a dancer's grace. Several times she cuts you, opening wounds all over your body. Eventually, you're forced to back away a few feet to catch your breath. The woman tries not to show it, but the battle is starting to tire her out as well though her stance remains firm, with her sword pointed out in front of her at an angle. You circle each other, looking for an opening, inching closer to each other all the while. Thirty paces. Twenty. Fifteen, fourteen, thirteen, twelve, eleven, ten... The side of your body is torn open, an abrupt ringing reverberating in your ears, nerves screaming as blood pumps out of the smoking hole in the side of your body. Everything spins, blurring. The forest, the snow, the woman, the man on the ground screaming, the gunman, everything ceases to exist. There is only the great, raging inferno in your side. You collapse, howling in anguish and clutching your wound. Distantly, a woman's voice protests in annoyance. A man retorts coldly, saying something to the effect of getting the job done so he can go home. The woman continues to argue, and you're able to catch snatches of what she's saying. ''... my kill... need it... be mine... keep your hands off...'' You try to muster your strength but this fails, your wound too agonising to allow even the slightest of movements. Your vision flashes white, and a few times you're close to passing out. Something warm and wooden presses down on top of your face, pressing half of it into the snow. ''Easy there, my wolfen friend.'' says a quiet, clipped voice. The woman swings her sword up from her side and points it at you, startled. You strain your eye up to see a short man, staring down at you coolly dressed in a fine winter fur coat, which he pairs with polished black boots. He wears brown leather gloves embroidered with the same symbol on the woman's armour, a lion holding a sceptre. You see the rifle that had opened up that terrible wound, a beautiful instrument of death with it's polished steel barrel that roars black powder and hardy oak body. A belt wraps snugly around his waist adorned with pouches, items and various weapons though when he turns back to his companion, sliding his rifle butt off of your face you see that it makes no noise despite the jittering movements of the belt's residents. The man and woman continue to argue, namely about who gets to finish you off and therefore who gets to say they killed you. What was a slight disagreement between two people slowly becomes a heated argument, the man even turning his back fully to you so he shout at her directly. Endless bickering about ''Posh lad adding to his coffers'' and ''Low born wench trying to steal my glory'' ensues, allowing you to attempt move a couple of times. With great difficulty, you're able to shift your legs slightly without alerting your hunters. Next, you try moving your arms finding that whilst they cause a fresh wave of excruciating burn to flare up through your side, it's not as bad as before. A couple of times the woman's eyes flicker down to you, making you freeze in place but the annoyance of her companion pulls her attention away. They're both distracted, intent on trying to shout down the other. This could a good opportunity to run away, recover from your injuries and hunt them down later. However, you're in the middle of the clearing and the forest treeline is around 100 paces away - more than enough time for the hunter to swing up his rifle and take a shot. You're no fusilier but even you know it wouldn't take an expert marksman to hit a target as large as you at such a short range. You'd also probably have to knock the man down, hoping to be quicker than his friend with her sword. Or you could try to kill them both. One of them has his back turned to you and it would be a struggle to comfortably wield a rifle up close. The trouble with that is, you're already wounded heavily whilst neither of them have a scratch on them. Moreover, you've seen for yourself how skilled the woman is with her sword meaning even if you do manage to kill the man she'll probably kill you afterwards. Neither option is great, but you would prefer to not just lie there and accept death.

Finished

:)

Like cigarettes and flowery perfume?

How did it smell?

I'd love to participate. 34 please.

Merry Christmas

I've recently started making a story game, and I'm curious to hear about your guys' thoughts on an issue I ran into when figuring out how to link things together. So basically, when I was writing up the story and creating pages I realised that if I kept all the pages in one chapter I'd either have to mark them with what route they belonged to, or individually go through all of them to see what route they belonged to or where. So naturally, I couldn't be arsed to do either so I decided to make separate chapters for each route, and for each individual path on a route (the different options you can take after choosing a particular route) I make chapters for those to as each chapter requires you have to have a starting page. The game I'm planning is rather ambitious or at least seems ambitious, at least in length, for a beginner like myself. I can see needing at least 8+ more chapters for the finished product. I know, I shouldn't be too ambitious for my first story game and if it turns out that I can't do it properly I'll cut back on the amount of content. Considering the amount of work I've set myself already, I'm not planning on adding any variables or items. I suppose what I'm trying to ask is if: 1) Is there a limit to the amount of chapters you can have? 2) Is there a better way to do what I'm describing? Any help would be much appreciated and I apologise if my explanation of this problem is unclear.