An allegory.

Author's note: the title of this story is actually The Fire, but someone else already created a storygame with that title, so I couldn't give it the title that I wanted. My second choice for the title was The Light, but another person already took that title as well, so, if you don't mind, just pretend that the title of this story is The Fire.

A story set in medieval China.

Note: Even early on in the game you can lose by making a strategically erroneous choice so choose carefully.

Overall idea: it's fine. More showing instead of telling would have filled the details of the idea in more, but, even as unfleshed out as it is, it's compelling enough for me to continue reading the story.

Direction of the story: it's good. It makes sense for the first choice to be which gem you pick given the premise of the story.

Do we know where the valuables were being stored? Were they well hidden and the pirates couldn't find it? Maybe the pirates were in a hurry, perhaps to avoid another ship or reach some destination?

There are so many possibilities involving pirates. Maybe the pirates saw a bigger ship coming while they were about to ransack the Mary Celeste and immediately left. And then the other ship asked the group if they were alright, and they were like, we don't feel safe out here with pirates everywhere, mind if we hitch a ride with you, and they said sure, and then the bigger ship sank later on the journey.

Although, now that I have actually read the article that Will's post was about, based on the sounding rod and taken navigational instruments, it seems most likely that they were spooked by the ship taking on water due to damage from the alcohol explosions and took the lifeboat thinking that they were closer to land than they actually were and ended up dying at sea.

Based on just what you said here, could they have just been taken by accosting pirates? Like, all of the occupants were just abducted by pirates to do who-knows-what with or even just joined the pirates willingly? That would leave little trace on the Mary Celeste and seems a more realistic occurrence than many of the other options. Piracy seems to have been a common thing in those days, too.

It might help if you didn't give yourself a handjob just because someone commented in your thread.

If you don't live the life that you were meant to, then who will?

Did this friend of yours have an account on CYS?

I'm guessing that the child doxxer was fresh_out_the_oven. Did she doxx anyone other than Mizal? If anyone else was doxxed, are they aware of it, and, if they are not, will they be notified of it?

Identify each character's motivations before writing dialogue for them.

What don't you like about them?

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"I don't fear death. All you need to do is to buy new clothes."