Thread 24640140

You have until August 18th, 6:00 PM GMT to fill one /lit/-sized textbox (3,000 characters) with writing inspired by this piece of art from /ic/ (>>>/ic/7656943).
https://countingdownto.com/?c=6492808

Poetry, prose, greentext, etc. are all fair play as long as your submission fits inside, and exists soley within, a single textbox posted in this thread.
(That means no off-site links and no text-as-image attachments!)

Each entry will be weighed according to its creativity, literary merit, and storytelling by three judges.

Your judges are meteor (multi-/lwc/ winner), Heng (March’s /lwc/ winner), and son of hermes (August’s /lwc/ runner-up).

They will decide the winners—1st, 2nd, and 3rd place—not long after the submission deadline.

>>24640140 (OP)
Finally a good fucking thread. Does the character limit include spaces ? And do we need to post under a trip ? Thank you for organising this.

what about ekphrasis? you say storytelling. must there be a story?

oh, nvm, i thought i could choose my own image. lmao, never.

Im definitely participating in this. I think I'm creatively bankrupt though and the image doesn't evoke immediate sensations.

>>24640156
>Does the character limit include spaces ?
Pic related is your god—and the spaces are tallied.
>And do we need to post under a trip ?
This is optional, though it is convenient for knowing to/from whom you’re giving/receiving praise/derision.

>>24640166
>what about ekphrasis? you say storytelling. must there be a story?
Yes, you can bring your shield, Aeneas.
Vibrant descriptions of art are their own kind of storytelling, so you won’t be faulted for vaulting the Hero’s Journey.

>>24640184
>Pic related is your god

tfw i enter three 'tour forcès' anon-style and win first second and third while all plebians remain none-the-wiser

>>24640140 (OP)
Fuck yeah. What won in the past? Not specifically, but what do the judges like?

She stood, her view directed to the distance,
Her posture taut, hand ready to compress
On some device, perhaps to some resistance.
Beneath her tall, firm boots, the green outstretched,
And further back, a building held its posture
As if to match hers, ready, as it were,
And bracing too for her oncoming gesture.
She squinted hard her eyes just to be sure
She had her target, blocking out the sun
With her free arm, and holding in her breath,
As if already seeing what was next.
The air was fresh and clear. The moment hung.
But all the frozen pixels of her hand
Would never budge to finish her command.

bump!
fuck bait threads
bump!

Op is the nigga who draw that, you can look at the thread it was originally posted. He was samefagging hyping himself out and anons call him out

Bump. Good luck, everyone!

Dont bump a dead thread, noone cares let it die.

coming out of my cage and I've been doing just fine
coming-forth out- of- mi- caged and- Ivey beennut doings Justa fineable
comingle outact ofay my- cageful and/or Ivekovic beent Doyon justaucorps fineableness
coming-on outacted ofays mi. cagefuls anda Ivel beento Doisy justed fine-appearing
comings outacting Ofallon MI5 cagey anda-assu Yvelines beep doyst juste-milieu fine-ax
comino outacts O'Fallon MI6 cageyness andabata Ivens beeped doit juste-milieux finebent
Comins outadd O'Faolain MIA cageless andabatarian Iver beeper doited Justen Fineberg
Comyns outadded of-door Mya cagelike andabatism Ivers beepers do-it-yourself Juster fine-bore
Comintern outadding Ofelia Myacea cageling Andale Iverson beeping do-it-yourselfer justers fine-bred
comique outadds Ofella miacis cagelings Andalusia Ives beeps doitkin justest finecomb
comism outadmiral ofer miae cageman Andalusian Yves Beer doitrified Justice fine-count
Comiso Outagami off Mial cageot andalusite Ivesdale Beera doits Justiceburg fine-cut
Comitadji outage off- myal cager Andaman Iveson beerage DOJ justiced fined
comital outages off. myalgia cager-on Andamanese Ivett beerbachite dojigger justice-dealing fine-dividing
comitant outambush Offa myalgias cagers andamenta Ivette beerbelly dojiggy Justice-generalship finedraw
comitatensian out-and-out of-fact myalgic cages andamento Yvette beerbibber dojo justicehood fine-draw
comitative out-and-outer offal myalia cagester andamentos Ivetts Beerbohm dojos justiceless fine-drawer
comitatus outarde Offaly myalism cagework andante Ivy beeregar doke justicelike finedrawing
comite outargue offaling myall caggy andantes Ivybells beerhouse Doketic justice-loving fine-drawing
comites out-argue offals Miami cag-handed andantini Ivyberry beerhouses Doketism justice-proof fine-drawn
comity outargued off-balance miamia cagy andantino Ivyberries beery dokhma justicer fine-dressed
comitia outargues off-base Miamis cagier andantinos Ivy-bush beerier dokimastic justices fine-drew
comitial outarguing off-bear Miamisburg cagiest Andaqui Ivydale beeriest Dokmarok justice's fine-eyed
comities outas off-bearer Miamitown cagily Andaquian Ivie beerily Doko justiceship Fineen
Comitium outasight offbeat Miamiville caginess Andarko Ivied beeriness Dol justice-slighting fineer
comitiva outask offbeats mian caginesses Andaste Ivies beerish dol. justiceweed fine-feathered
comitje out-ask off-bitten Miao caging Ande Ivyflower beerishly Dola Justicia fine-featured
comitragedy outasked off-board Miaotse cagit Andean Ivy-green beermaker dolabra justiciability fine-feeling
comix outasking offbreak Miaotze Cagle anded Ivylike beermaking dolabrate justiciable fine-fleeced
coml outasks off-break miaou Cagliari Andee Ivin beermonger dolabre justicial fine-furred
COMM outate off-Broadway miaoued Cagliostro Andeee Ivins Beernaert dolabriform justiciar Finegan
comm. outawe offcast miaouing cagmag Andel Ivis beerocracy Dolan justiciary fine-graded

>>24641046
>>24640380
With due respect, these are both terrible.

>>24640140 (OP)
> For a thousand years the door remained closed, and unreachable. Radiation levels started to go down rapidly in the last few years, grass began to grow around it, but nothing else..
> Some say that the door isn't real, that it is just a mock up, left behind by some trolling magician, who put a spell on the place, to make a thousand years joke...
> Others say it is the door to a dangerous secret that shouldn't be disturbed, even if the magic radiation wears off...
> But whatever the story goes, everyone knows about the door.. and, as the magic seal slowly vanishes, more and more curious people gather around it, getting closer and closer to the door...
> Waiting around, lost in our thoughts about it, we watch the girl doing the daily measurement, standing on the grass holding the reader device, she seems to be fine... Still, no one dares to call it safe yet...
> Even the oldest people in the region, admitted that the door wasn't visible in the old times, it was just a wall. One day the door appeared, but, after so many years even those old people doubt their own minds. Maybe the door was always there, and their old memories are wrong memories..
> I wonder, if the door opens tomorrow... and past tomorrow, and it just stays open... for a hundred years... Will I remember that it was ever closed once, for a thousand years?
> Who said it was a thousand years? Who can prove that? Who can live for a thousand years to have witnessed it? If the old of today can't even be sure that the door was there 50 years ago? If the door opens today.. Can anyone go in time to yesterday to prove that the door was shut? Where exactly one "day" ends and another begins? Do time units end and begin?...
> "Only when the door opens", I thought to myself... Of course!... So I walked to open the door...

-Le Hecking Schrödingerr's Door- by Filthered

>>24641132
I think real WIBAC-heads are gonna turn it in on the 18th
>>24640348
Godspeed Freud Anon, he would have loved GOT and WIBAC

Why did you choose an anime image? My motivation is totally sapped by staring at this horror of the Orient.

>>24641227
and what the fuck is that black thing she's holding?

>>24641228
its to make the camera take the photo

>>24641228
You're supposed to tell what it is, or what it isn't. Use your brain meat and type a story.
>>24641227
That's not anime, that's some westoid surrealism ala moebius wannabe

>>24641235
>thats not anime

don't piss down my leg and tell me it's raining, weeb

>>24640140 (OP)
I arrived early. A right word had gotten into the right ear so I knew. When you know you're being set up and betrayed it really frees you. Old hunches I'd long covered up were now seen true. Just then I showed myself. Already aiming from the perfect distance. I couldn't miss but no jump could hope to reach me in time. When its someone this close, a member of your inner circle? It hurts more. Still, I prepared to fire. Why am I being smiled at. No matter, but its a matter now. Dull click. How can I be unloaded. That's when the smile registered. When I heard the soft click. Impossible. No one else knew except; flash of bright white light. I feel nothing. My vision freezes then slides apart like a mirror going to shards in slow mo. Then the boom and the crack. The lines of pure energy emanating from some distant point. The angle of those lines tells me its from infinity. The power tells me that for a force to cover infinite distance it clearly takes infinite power. I instantaneously go from cold floating rest to infinite speed. I am the infinite energy, at least some part of it. This all took about one full second. From the dull clicks of betrayal to this. At the end of the one second, some dot appears in the distance. Bang. My infinite energy waves explode through it and? What the hell. I have a sense the door exploded open and slammed back shut. It was a small stone door on a large stone building. The earth shook like a tomb. I'm not dead. I'm standing here. Cool green grass I can feel under me and smell in my nose. How am I so light on my feet. I looked down and I'm looking at tight fitted leather slippers. Why do I have lithe sinewy tan legs, but I have bigger problems. I stare at young female legs like this when I can get away with it. Bad as all that is I have even bigger problems yet. I can feel it plain as day. Light ethereal humming. Several points of it. Moving in from far enough away it was no threat. Closing in now. I should be afraid, I should be very afraid. Yet I'm not. I'm amused? Yes, but that's not right. A giggle escapes my lips and my hand reflexively covers it to keep me demure. And? What in the hell just shot through my brain, these can't be my thoughts. But my amusement grows and as it swells I feel lighter yet. My next giggle was not demure. I left it uncovered and I heard and felt it as a burst of some kind. How my mood affects gravity terrifies me. Take a deep breath. Exhale. I float slow then drop into the softest landing I couldn't even imagine. Some gorgeous translucent blue liquid sphere grew with my fall and went out as I landed light as a feather. I felt the terror I created and it amused me further. I could sense the distance and location of each terrified being I had warned.

"Show. Or I will laugh."

"Filthy gaijin cunt!"

I have no idea who I am. Where I am. What might I have done to these people. I might deserve this.

Am I some kind of a bully?

Fuck me.

>>24641235
>You're supposed to tell what it is, or what it isn't. Use your brain meat and type a story.
Clearly that's the lash (small) end of a well made leather plaited bullwhip. She has no idea what the thing is, and is regarding it. Wondering what it could even be. (I abandoned the "whip" in the grass, I got 3k to work with. No subplots possible.)

>>24641149
This little "story", reminded me of this video --> https://www.youtube.com/shorts/PJZeTgl5xAA
Who could be absolutely certain that we are not getting all fooled by planted shit that isn't that "old" at all?

>>24640140 (OP)
This was the day my then-girlfriend tried to get me to take a picture of her blowing up the famed Orange Palace of Cyrodynia, but the "demolition device" kept failing to work. I should have realized that she was crazy then, but I was young and in love and there was some truth to her claim of being an explosives expert. It was only after she systematically tossed every single one of my coffee mugs off the balcony of my apartment that I realized that I needed to leave.

I think about her all the time.

>>24640140 (OP)
Why do I have to write about that dumb picture? I thought I was going to have a choice. The door is cool; anime girl is unnecessary. You could improve the picture tremendously by cropping her and half the lawn out. Faggot. What do I get when I win?

"Mmm do you have the notes from last class?" he stammers, and I feel my vagina dry up instantly. "Nah, I was too busy sawing kittens' heads off," I reply, my eyes pointed straight at the sun beaming through the window, away from him. He chuckles. Hnff, hnff, he goes, as if dryjacking. That's when it occurs to me that he's the one. No time to waste. I tilt my head slowly towards him and let my lips form into a long, closed grin.
"We could study after school, though. At my place," I say, with just enough warmth without adding enthusiasm.

After waiting too long for him to give me a yes, understandable for someone who hasn't been shown interest since he was pissing on carpets, I beeline for the back staircase and slip out the back door. No time to waste. Better get ready.

But who's that on the way? The neighbor's kid? "Big siiis, why are you out from school so early?" Fuck no. No time to waste. I open my backpack and slip her pet kitten's head out. The little shit breaks into tears. I keep walking.

At the stroke of 4, the doorbell. I imagine the virgin hardon throbbing more than ever by now, sweat dripping down from sprinting over. I take my time to make my way downstairs. Let my foot hang on every last step. Take the time to notice every poster, every ketchup stain, every cockroach. Let him throb.

"Welcome in," I say.

"Hnnnnnnnhhhh good to see you," he squeaks. I look at him and blink, expressionless. "Come up to my room?" I ask curtly. He's shivering. Good. I lead him up as slowly as I came down.

He posts left.

I wait until he's sitting on my mattress. Nowhere else to sit. I slowly close the door. No time to waste. I lift my skirt right away. "Uh- uh-," he's hiccupping. I imagine Harry Styles in his place. Get the juices flowing, even just a little. Get right close to his face. "Hnnhh- Hnhh-"

Then back off. Let him take it in. He looks stupefied.
"You're cute," I tell him, without emotion. He blinks. I add, "Help we with something and I'll let you touch it."

Next day. Everything's in place. I jacked some backup equipment from my whore dad's work just in case. On the way to school, the neighbor's kid whispers something to her mom and points at me. Like I give a shit. During homeroom, Mr. Lechtowski drones on as usual. I slip out.

All I can think about is seeing him. It doesn't take long.

"Uh, hey," he says in the hallway, slimy with sweat. "Uhhh, the thing..." Second thoughts? No good. I press my face against his on the spot, reach right down his pants and squeeze hard and feel the dampness. "Hnhh... Hnhh." "Come with me?"

We slip out through the back, hand in hand, him carrying the end of the table. I check every floor for the equipment on the way.

"After this, okay?" I say and giggle. He's trembling.

Just a few steps now.

We're out. I kiss him on the cheek. "I just need you to go back in and check on the cafeteria, okay?" He's dripping with cold sweat. He does what I say. Of course.
I take a second to gaze into the sun.

Three. Two.

>>24641132
respect is all i need

>>24641550
Where's the fucking door at?
>Let him throb.
My favorite part.

"Guuuuuu~," I whimpered as the bug-eyed anthropomorphic cat-demon Ecchimura-chan reached out with his long, gelatinous appendages and gave my bare feet a sensuous, platonic massage. "Nyaaaaa, you're so kawaii, lady Inkakuhidai-hime," he cooed. I was so pleased in an utterly pure manner by this that I summoned my seven tiny naked cherubic servants to help.
But duty called. I wiped the highly viscous and translucent sweat from all over my body, licking my fingers as I did so. "Come, Ecchimura-chan!" I yelled. "We must defeat the demon lord Kinshinsokan."
At that instant all my clothes dissolved, but I was too enveloped in pure, bright light for my naked body to be visible. From the bright, shining light formed a bright red schoolgirl uniform. "Ugugugugu, princess, you look so eroi," said the cherubim purely. "It's all according to keikaku," I cooed and winked. Then I pulled long green boots over my pristine bare, perfectly manicured feet. Everybody cried.

We were 83h41m50s into our journey and 91.75% complete, including collectibles, when I remembered a crucial sidequest. "Ecchimura-chan," I said, "when the time comes... You'll know. I need you to draw me and post it on /ic/. Then I need you to post that drawing to /lit/ too to prove that we too are literature!" "Ugugugugu, anything for the princess of Mankoge-Koku," squealed Ecchimura-chan, and tickled my inner thighs platonically with his long, flexible extremities. I giggled and kissed him on the cheek. At that, his eyes turned into large hearts.

Our journey was difficult and involved slaying very many of the same viscous, translucent, oddly sweet and sour enemies for 49h12m14s more. Finally we reached our final destination. "Yatta wa!" I cried out. It was the Futago Towers, the base of our sworn enemy. Just then, a transmission came in from Yabu Daitoryo, president of the Tenka. "Proud samurai of the Nakadashi clan, here at the Futago Towers," he said, "I believe we can work out an, ahem, mutually beneficial, not to mention totally platonic and pure, arrangement. All you have to do is wait for my sign and press a button."
"Kyaaaaa, button nano~," I cried out. "Demo sign wa nan desu ka?"
"Oh, you'll know," said the Daitoryo. "Watch overhead."
At that, I stood before the entrance to the Futago Towers, held the button, and watched overhead.
A plane was approaching. Ecchimura-chan painted my picture.

Ngl all of these so far are fucking terrible

The Blush Temple stood behind the derelict movie lot in downtown Porto. All agreed it was ‘estranha’ — strange. It was three years old, having been erected by an army of quasi-enslaved North Africans for the production of “Tempesta: Lady of Pain,” a two-hour shlock that bombed and ultimately busted the studio’s entire fantasy division, and whose plot was universally panned as both incomprehensible and clichè.

The entire lot had been abandoned following the film’s failing, and the North Africans had occupied the property for a time, demanding an additional Euro a day. Following their deportation, The Blush Temple was soon discovered by three adventurous scamps from the local Roma encampment, whose daily investigations unearthed fallen costumes, scripts, and even a single clapperboard. In delight, the children smoked cigarettes while they recited lines from "Tempesta" in mocking voices, and clacked the clapperboards mouth open and closed, calling “scene!” and “cut!” and “action!”

In time, the three Roma children — Vee, Plenti, and Casper — performed the script with such regularity that they came to achieve a familiarity with the brief and shallow world of “Tempesta” that eclipsed outside reality in both vividity and importance, leading them, after a single year of recitations, to endeavour toward the real thing, the ‘performa maxima’, in which the entire world would be their stage. The children walked home that evening in full costume, sharing a cigarette and holding hands, bobbing up and down beneath the blood red setting sun, each wearing expressions of absolute conviction upon their precocious olive faces.

Vee, who played Tempesta herself, practised her lines outside the trailer while Plenti and Casper, who played the nefarious Omdo twins, beat Vee’s parents to death with bats and bricks. Now appropriately orphaned, Vee began her ‘accumulation arc’, in which she discovered her latent power of turning ‘pain-to-strength’ and encountering a band of wholesome outlaws (whose actors she found drunk but complaint at a local bar). In this way, the children charted the hero’s journey for the span of a brief, boiling Porto afternoon, before confronting one another beneath the Blush Temple at sunset, where Vee, initially outmatched and deeply wounded, stuck herself full of pins, and harnessed the resulting 'pain-to-strength' to overwhelm and annihilate the Omdo twins, before ultimately succumbing herself.

Their bodies were found the next day. A headline ran: “Gypsy Rigamarole: Feral Children Reenact Boorish Schlockfest.” The resulting press attention saw “Tempesta: Lady of Pain” renter its theatrical run, turn a massive profit, and gain a cult following.
Few remember the children’s name; those that do exalt them as the last true thespians to walk the earth.

"Should we really go in there?" I ask Shirley, who's beside me as both of us are bewildered at this strange sort of door.
"Yeah, Chris. I've heard this is a magical door". She says it nervously, her hands trembling.
"All right! Here goes nothing.". I push the door open with both hands. They're heavy. With effort they slam open with a thud.
Silence. Nothing but a strange sort of darkness. It's the sort you see when you close your eyes, but darker.
"What's that weird light?" Shirley whispers. I don't see it.
"We should've never come here Chris". I still don't see the light.
Whoosh. It happens in an instant. One moment it was nothing. The next I see all sorts of architecture that's out of this world. It couldn't have been anywhere on earth. A hall stretching towards infinity.
I notice a path lay with white tiles, beside which I see green grass. I crouch on the ground.
"Fake grass. This has to be inside a building or something." I say, while Shirley looks stupefied at the scenery.
Shirley doesn’t answer. She rushes back towards the door. The door is shut. There is a knob. She tries to open it. "It's shut. God damn it. Are we trapped in here?". She desperately tries to open the door with all her might but it's no good. They are trapped.
I try to see if I can figure something out. Trick? Illusion? Hallucination? Drugs? But nothing makes sense. It's real. All too real.
Shirley collapses like her strings have been cut. I try to wake her. No use.
We're stuck there for days. I could tell because I had my watch. Shirley still lies beside me. Her breathing is slow and heavy.
Snap! The door opens. I see the same sort of suffocating darkness.
I hoist Shirley onto my shoulder, walk towards the door and step through. Whoosh~
The same thing. I'm out in one moment just like I came in.
Shirley wakes up. She looks at me, and screams. Her nails rake my arms as she thrashes free, eyes filled with terror.
"It's me. Chris. We went into that door. It's all okay now." I plead.
She doesn't stop. My words don't reach her. She runs as if death itself were chasing her.
I stagger. Confused. My watch reads 11:00 pm. We went in there at 10:59. Only a minute.
A glint catches my eye. A small mirror lying on the ground. Probably fallen from Shirley's pocket.
The face staring back at me isn't mine. A grotesque, twisted thing, with skin warped, eyes sunken, teeth jagged and hideous to look at.
I drop the mirror. My hands are shaking. In each fragment the monster smiles back at me.
I finally understand.
Shirley hadn't been afraid of the door.
She had been afraid of me.

>>24641227
>an anime image
Where do you think you are bro?

bymp for creación

>>24641678
>Not one of the judges
>Opinion discarded

>>24640380
LMAO nigga thought this was good and pressed Post.

>>24642264
pyw

Cambon Observatory Incident Report:

>At 2:12 PM on the 27th of July, Hapa Ano, a Japanese émigré who was raised Shinto but possessed of secret Theravadan-Anarcho sympathies, walked into Calco Park armed with a bomb with the express purpose of “killing time”. The park, famous for its electric green kikuyu lawn, is centered by the Great Cambon Observatory, a hundred-meter clocktower panelled in rose-quartz.

>Cambon Observatory, whose great brass hands had, since the implementation of universal time, informed the keeping of all lesser clocks, was, according to the belief of the deceased, considered to the "source" of time itself, and whose destruction, therefore, would "liberate the world from the shackles of temporality".

>The bomb, whose study and making had occupied the preceding three months of An's life, had, under the mentorship of Franz Deilo [Apprehended], a fellow regular at the Cafè Anarcho, been constructed primarily from drain piping and common fertiliser.

>Ano had disguised the bomb inside a wheelbarrow and covered its edges with leaves. The trigger had been fashioned from a length of electrical wire and a handheld electrical switch.

>At approximately 2:28 PM, Ano allegedly gave a rousing speech to a few picnic goers, decrying time as the “greatest monster in history”, and accusing it of killing her “parents, country, and everyone else”, before the inexpertly set trigger-mechanism prematurely engaged, detonating the bomb well outside of the Observatory’s atrium, and instantly killing her. A passing dog also suffered minor injuries.

>The clocktower was undamaged. It's great clockwork hands continue to turn. Hapa Ano's cause of death was listed as a "timing error". The joke is generally considered in bad taste. At Cafè Anarcho, where her picture hangs upon the wall, men recall Ano's story in drunken tones, and ladies laugh from behind black-gloved hands. The clocks tick on.

>>24642344
Shit, I should have spaced my story like this. fuck.

Bad competition. I blame /ic/.
The artist can obviously render fairly well, but the composition of the image is off. There's far too much negative space. It should be tightened.
The bigger problem is that "girl holds a cable in front of a building and looks out" might be a fine subject for a drawing competition, but for a writing competition it's terrible. The image is not evocative of anything. It's bland. Might as well hold a writing competition for a random street snapshot from /p/. Honestly, even that would probably be preferable.
Figure and environment alone might make a good drawing contest; for a writing contest, you need an evocative subject.
All of the above entries are testaments to what happens when you don't have one.

>>24642504
The picture is difficult but you're coping. It is entirely a failure of your own imagination. A good writer can write well from anything. A smell. A picture of a blurred shadow. It's simply a starting point.

This is all good, less arguing more writing contests.

We just need the philosophy anons to make a philosophy contest next and crown themselves a king.

>>24642518
A good draftsman can draw well from anything too, but that doesn't make every scene or prompt competition material either.
This image is too generic.

>>24642518
agreed anon, you should start a second contest with a good image called TRU/wibac/ and see if the quality of stories is much better.

>>24642504
Your brain is BLAND. The image is beautiful and perfect for evoking a myriad of interpretations. As proved already by the posted entries.
Blaming your lack of storytelling inspiration on "teh picture" is pathetic. When even a black pic should be enough to start a competition of mental creativity to turn nothing into something.

>>24642560
agree bratan.

>>24642560
Yes, because the entries above are so good.

>>24642591
I really like two of them already. Write something better then.

>>24642600
Poop scoop

>>24642504
>Bad competition. I blame /ic/.
>The artist can obviously render fairly well, but the composition of the image is off. There's far too much negative space. It should be tightened.
The last competition was another torture-test. Guys were writing in prose, or had to contain prose somehow in the story. This is sort of same-but-different. Maybe the idea is that is you can do *something* when given nothing perhaps it sharpens you so that when you finally get the big thing you know how to handle it. I got told I was mogged hard last competition and here I am sticking up for the comp. Look at a picture, generate 3,000 characters including spaces. Post it. I find it a valid thing and we're all even attempting it.
>
Premise: what if it really is a crap picture and assignment.
Analysis: what do i care. Theoretically we should all make terrible little 3m000 character blurbs. But we *will* see who had the least shitty 3k blurb.

>>24641623
The ending scene mofo

>>24642504
Die

>>24642344
>>24641734
>>24641660
Fuck yeah

>>24642600
>I really like two of them already. Write something better then.
this.
also which two did you sort of like.
point at the turd you think might benefit from the polishing.
Inquiring minds wanna know.

>>24640140 (OP)
Are the judges going to rate every single one of it? Or are we only going to know the ones that made it to the top 3?

why does every story have a massacre
where is the sunlit beauty and shadow of youth

>>24642671
/lit/ is full of disturbed people

>>24642634
I liked the two green text ones.
The one about the kids re-enacting a film script should be one of the best, but I don't like how dark and rough it is, the ref pic radiates a brighter mood. It is pretty good though.
About the others, they suffer from an easy to overlook issue, when you try to tell a story two big for the assignment. Instead of focusing in a simple thing or idea and clean a zen garden around it, like the ref pic shows. Or in the anonymousginger story, I needed the characters to be situated in a described place first, I can't focus on a dialogue happening in the void, but that could be just me.
These threads are always great to read and to analyze.

>>24642674
you misunderstand me, friend; that couplet was my submission. victory surely awaits

>>24642652
Can't speak for the others but my plan is the following:

1. Score each entry out of 10.
2. Give my top 3 with a critique/review for each
3. Give critique upon request for the others, with effort proportional the sincerity of the entry

On the sunny Aegean coast stood the Iliophagos Temple, facing the sunrise, low and wide, as if engorged. Aoi felt the hard Mediterranean light just like all those years ago.

Back then, she'd moped for days about being dragged along on her parents' business trip. By the end, she was moping about having to go back to glum, chilly Sapporo. That also quieted down after a while.
She'd splashed and stumbled helplessly at first, to a chorus of laughter from the local brats. But things came fast at that age. Soon she'd found that swimming and football really did beat beetle collecting and Nintendo, and the kids, though big and tanned dark, weren't so scary after all. Dimitris had handed her a jagged rock, then blushed and scampered off. She still had it. She didn't know why.
"My babas says don't go near that temple," Eleni had told her. "It's from before Hristos. It’s bad." Petros laughed.
She remembered how its shadow was big and long, how it seemed to dance on its own.

Aoi hadn't kept in touch. Writing in English was a pain, and she'd figured that three little Greek island kids wouldn't be going to good schools or doing anything important with their lives anyway. She had been right about two of them. After she'd left, Dimitris hit the books. "I'm going to be a great engineer," he told the other kids in English just to impress, hiding the Japanese textbook he'd begged his yiayia for under his math book. When asked about it, he just blushed.
Not that Aoi would find out.

The summer before Lykio, Dimitris was mopey. He was getting older and nothing was changing. It was Petros who suggested going to explore the temple. “Impress your chink girlfriend,” Petros said. Dimitris didn't have the heart to say she hadn't written.
The three went in the middle of the day, the sun blaring. “The temple is from before Hristos,” Eleni said, holding back tears. Dimitris just shook his head, tired of telling the others that there had been no Hristos. Then Petros laughed and opened the door, and the three fell at once into deep darkness, where tiny devils cut off their toes, plucked out their eyes, ate their hearts.

Aoi hadn't expected to meet her old friends on this college trip: this was only a backpacking stop, after all, and after those nights in Bologna with a man she'd met on the train, she found she barely remembered Dimitris’ face anyway. Still, she was sad to find nobody responded to their names. The craggy beaches from so long ago felt lonely, she had to admit.
While digging through her backpack for condoms, she'd found that jagged rock and remembered the temple. Why not pay a visit? Sure, the villagers shook their heads at the name, but this was a superstitious country. She was sure she’d meet Keiko later in Lyon and laugh about it.
She had supplies and a rope too. It would be fine.
She took a second in the sun.
From before Hristos, huh? She liked wine and butter, but the West could keep him.
Then, clutching the rope, she opened the door.

>24642504
>24642557
>>24641014
>>24641227
>>24641381
Niggas, read >>24640848
This is just a drawfag self-fellating
You can see him samefagging on this thread defending the choice of such a bad image for this kind of """competition"""

>>24642886
I'll take any excuse to write. These competition threads are rich for feedback.
I personally don't like the image and agree with the criticisms, but I don't think they're such a big deal. These things only get better by being tried.

>>24642504
Are you familiar with /lwc/ at all? The prompts there actually give you less to work with.

why would you draw this grand building with a tiny residential style door? this looks like some shit a polish tradesman would retrofit to a 400 year old building.

>>24642989
I am.
A broad theme is better than a generic image. It's a productive exercise to write from a theme. It's not a productive exercise to write from a generic OC performing no particular action over a generic scene.
Might as well use any image from that /ic/ thread.

>>24643028
I'm still planning out my submission and I've taken notes of
- The incongruity of the small modern-looking door in the big old-looking building
- The design of those two nevertheless matching
- The grass being neatly trimmed, like it's regularly mowed or grazed or something
- The rubble still lying below the damage on the left walls, meaning that it's either recent or rarely disturbed
- The walkway leading away from the door, implying not just something behind the door but also a specific location outside it
- The girl standing on the grass rather than on the walkway
- The girl's rubber boots, incongruous with the rest of her clothing
- The water bottle(?) on her hip
Based on this I'm narrowing down what she has come here to do and what kind of building this is. And it's a good kind of narrowing down where there are many possible conclusions but they have to be fairly specific

Now that I know you're not wanted on /ic/ either, OP, I'll just tell you to fuck off.
Here's my OC. You can draw from this prompt instead now. If you feel there's too little to work with here, it's your problem. Use your imagination. You're supposed to be writers, right?

>>24643060
You can do this with literally any image. Nevertheless, there are better and worse choices of image for it.

>>24642886
>>24643063
NO ONE CARES about your weirdo hate-boner on this guy's art. You're in the wrong board, and the wrong thread.
If you want to critique his art go to the art critique board.
In this thread you will write an story for the competition, or you will comment on the posted stories.

>>24643099
Stop samefagging

>>24643108
nta but please calm bro. no need to stir things, anons are simply writing stories via visual aid. its simple and nice. lets keep it literary.

>>24643067
I kinda get where you're coming from. Looking at that /ic/ thread, there was another image by the same exact artist (pic related) that I thought had more going on in it.

Nevertheless, this is Writing Inspired by Art *Challenge*. So I think it's also fine if the image doesn't give you much to work with. That's what makes it a challenge. That's where the fun of this lies.

Even then, there have been quite a few imaginative entries already. Even I was able to dash something out after meditating on it for a bit. Give it a try. You might surprise yourself.

>>24643114
I like the OP's image much better than that night road one. The one with the road limits a lot the place and time. I hate ordinary present day environments. The other gives you more freedom to place the story anywhere you want. Past, future, present reality or fantasy.

>>24643152
Limitations are the point of a prompt. Specificity. Not too much, but some. If you want absolute freedom, don't post a prompt.

>Go under.
I’m under.
>Where are you?
I’m standing on bright green grass. There’s a huge building. Orange-pink. A slender girl. A path. She’s holding something.
>Do you recognise the girl?
Yes. My daughter. She would be thirty.
>What else?
A door.
>Describe the door.
It’s a normal door. Like the one to your office.
>Go inside the door.
I’m inside.
>What do you see?
I see double-vaulted halls. The floors are mosaic. White and blue. Some of them emit light.
>Are you alone?
There is a child.
>Do you recognise the child?
Yes. He has my eyes. He has fear in his eyes.
>Go toward him.
He is running away.
>Do you recognise this place?
Yes. From my childhood nightmares. In that dream I was chased by a monster.
>Come out.
>Come out.
>Come out.

>>24643114
"NIGGERS could be here" she thought, "I've never been on this particular stretch of road before. There could be NIGGERs anywhere." The cool wind felt harsh against her sweater- and scarf-covered body. "I HATE NIGGERS" she thought. Shyness Boy reverberated her entire car, making it pulsate even as the Swiss Miss circulated through her weak thin veins and washed away her (merited) fear of minorities after dark. "With a car, you can go anywhere you want" she said to herself, out loud.

>>24643114
I would frankly have much preferred this one. It has everything this prompt is missing: place, action, specificity, but not too much. Something interesting is happening, and we don't know what.

Dk if multiple entries are allowed. Since I did a prose one already, though, I figured I'd try a poem too. Also, everybody shut the fuck up and just write. No more from me after this, of course.

Down under and over and back up again
Went sewer swimmin’ Suzie.
No grime was too grimy, no pipe was too thin
For sewer swimmin' Suzie.
Her suit was dark red and her boots were lime green;
She didn't wear gloves and she didn't keep clean;
Through pipes and through pumps, through the whole damn machine
Slipped sewer swimmin' Suzie!

Her town was like yours, I’d suppose, but for that
The townsfolk were nervous. The drop of a hat
Would frighten them: more still the smell of fresh scat.
But not sewer swimmin’ Suzie!
The children at school would learn how to keep tidy;
The grown-ups at work would pretend to be busy;
All week they’d complain while they worked themselves dizzy,
Then sleep through the weekend from Sunday to Friday.
But one of them didn’t. They whispered, oh, is she
That sewer swimmin’ Suzie?

The day came! The day came! The day came at last
The rain fell! The rain fell so hard, rough, and fast
The townsfolk all ran for a dry place to hide;
Before long, they came to grow restless inside;
Outside, the floodwaters all rose to a tide;
The children all stood by the windows and cried:
Why’s there a flood of poopy?

At last it had happened! The sewers overflowed.
You wouldn’t believe it, but reader, you don’t know
When it might occur, to you, to friend, to foe.
In, into the sewers did tug the undertow!

But Suzie was ready: yes, Suzie was brave.
She stood tall and proud, said, “This village I’ll save!”
Oh, but to hear the loud cheers they all gave
To sewer swimmin’ Suzie!
She put on her boots, yes, she hoisted her hose,
She crept to the sewer while floodwaters rose,
Throughout the whole village, not one soul opposed
Good sewer swimmin’ Suzie.
Ten thousand whole liters! That’s how much sucked in
Her handy old hose. Oh, how loud rose the din,
When everyone realized their savior had been
That sewer swimmin’ Suzie!

Now Suzie’s still at it: but throughout the village
The villagers know they’re protected from spillage
They no longer jeer her; no one still avoids her;
Some still from a distance: but some even join her!
The children all sing loud their merry rejoinder:
Go, sewer swimmin’ Suzie!

>>24642652
>>24642755
My plan is much the same, except I won’t be critiquing works on request. There’s no way for judges to collate our top picks except by doing it openly ITT, so I figure we’ll have three separate top threes. There may be some overlap, and there might not.
I might give shout outs/honourable mentions to some entries already posted, because I (perhaps narcissistically) read them as referencing/lampooning my story from /lwc/.

All of these are terrible.

>>24643341
PYW

>>24643368
Poop

>>24643372
holy kek it's the same sad fuck. redeem yourself in the septic tank xir <3

"You go around the grass to get in." She said.

"But how can I reach you? Why are you on the grass?"

"So you know not to go on it, signs draw little attention."

"I want you. I don't want to go in. If I go in it will be dark."

"Then remain on the path."

"Then I cannot touch you."

"You would have to walk on the grass to reach me, which is something you cannot do."

"Then I will go in and despair."

"If that is all you can do."

The door shut behind me. It was dark. There was no girl in the green boots, and no grass. It was only after the door was lost to me that I wondered why I could not step on the grass.

>>24641734
My favorite in the thread so far. Honestly surprised it hasn't attracted more remarks. You pack specificity and an elegant arc into a very small word count.

>>24643383
Subtle. I like this.

A jap girl in red and green
On a grassy lawn. Does she
Take it from behind?

>>24643572
Oops, not a haiku. Fixed version:
Jap girl on a lawn
In red and green. Oh, does she
Take it from behind?

A jap girl has a hairy cunt
Of slender, innie meat
Though indeed I'd like to punt
She hides it under pleats.

But oh! I smell: she wears no slip
Tonight, therefore, foreplay I'll skip
And give it to her hard and good:
I won't even pull back my hood.

I fucked a Jap girl once in college
She said: hai! gimme chopstick
But alas I failed to acknowledge
Her infection: now there's onions sauce on my dick!

Hey, Jap girl: please take off your jacket
Let me stick my face in your flat tits
Though maybe you won't be able to take it
Pull down that skirt and let me hit

>>24643325
Hopefully there's some overlap so we don't end up with nine winners and runners up. Or maybe that's okay, like everyone gets a certificate of participation for riding the short bus. But I feel like if the comp ended right now, you, meteor and me would probably pick two or three of the same but in different podium spots. Or we could bicker til someone folds kek.

>>24642755
I think I'll only crit my three winners and maybe do requests. I want to be honest without discouraging or shitting on anyone with a disheartening 3/10

>>24643744
I think you should pick some worsts as well just for keks

>>24643744
I may have misunderstood what meteor meant, but the rating is strictly for my own notes. Replying to every entry with n/10 would be unwieldy and not terribly interesting.

>>24643099
None of the post complaining about the image was about its quality (though, you do have some brainlets complaining about anime on the anime website) their complaints were about the inadequacy of the image to serve as a prompt.
And my post about (You) (yes op, is extremely obvious you're samefagging) weren't critiquing your ability either, I'm pointing out your dishonesty to the rest of anons since you did the same on the /ic/ thread
Look nigga, I know how it feels to post something and being ignored, but the answer isn't samefagging, much less make a thread on an unrelated board and samefag aggressively on it when others start to complain

The temple immense. Its walls orange in the setting sun. Anna’s shadow long on the grass. A day well-lived. A school expedition, a respite from the classroom, a lowkey adventure.

She’s thinking medical school. Getting good grades. Four years into puberty. Horny of a sudden. A joie de vivre at times aggressive. A joy incommunicable and profane, hormonal and metaphysical. Little storms.

She looks and marvels. Immense. A sight wondrous may be lost on her classmates but not on her. Wonder the beginning of philosophy. So says her highschool textbook.

She has seen other monuments. Temples of varying size and antiquity and capacity to awe. Her taste grown decadent, spoiled by variety. This temple as it stood in relation to others. The critic’s lust for comparison. She is growing up. The bud is refuted by the blossom. This too she has read.

She doesn’t begrudge the uniform, the rubber boots. A time for dressing for the night and a time for dressing for adventure. A time for dressing up and a time for dressing down. A time for undressing, but not with any of these boys. Yikes.

Her friend holds the camera. Anna smiles and behind her the temple looms. She is light as a leaf and her heart is made of smilies and behind her imposing and ancestral it looms monumental.

The temple’s door plain, domestic, functional. Hieratic grandeur surrounds it and yet it could be one's bedroom door. To cross the threshhold through so unremarkable a door. Access the very heart of mystery. A core of such powerful incandescence that it needs to be shrouded by a massive monument of stone.

Blood sacrifices, innocences defiled. No such thoughts cross her mind. If she picks up some such vibe it slides right off without ceremony. Her mental walls are of thick and solid stone; her holy of holies yet unassailable; she is not yet mad.

In due time madness will find a door. It will take her and undo her sanity, levity, elegance. An offering to cruel gods. An orange squeezed of all juice, rotting. A college dropout in an apartment grown filthy, finances drained, friends gone, life over. Aimless and accursed. Smoking cigarettes and doomscrolling all day.

She can no longer attain the ritual purity demanded by polite society. The cleanliness, punctuality, productivity. Exiled from the world of the righteous, a damned and wandering soul. The daily pilgrimage to the grocery store and back. Conspiracy youtube homilies. The sacrament of soda and snacks. Her daily path like grass worn down by the scurrying little feet of rats. Nothing happens and may nothing ever happen. A consummate fuckup, a premature burnout, a name that invites sneers. This her state years hence.

The temple behind her. Her friend holds the camera. The spring of being a teen. The picture turns out great. She considers uploading it. The sunlight has grown fainter, the air colder. The light in her bosom remains undimmed and the day is coming when the moon will blot out the sun and she will burn bright.

>>24643776
Come on please choose a worst in thread
It'll be hilarious

>>24643780
Why would I need validation from the Ayn Rand poetry circle?

>>24643806
if there's a worst award anons will just try to win that instead.

>>24643780
>>24643832
I’m not particularly interested in defending ineptia/anosia’s conduct, whatever the truth of it may be, but I think you’ve both said your piece. Others have managed to engage with the image creatively, regardless of its merits as a prompt. I’ll ask that you stop this back-and-forth, and either hide the thread or make a submission. I’m not the boss of you, nor am I in-charge of the thread, but we’re already at 100 replies.
When this contest was first announced, it sounded light and fun. Nothing, on the other hand, is more tedious than litigating inter-board politics and channer etiquette.
>>24643806
>>24643836
I’ll take both of these compelling points under advisement.

>>24643776
>n/10
If I understand meteor correctly, I think that's exactly what he plans to do, plus reviews of the best ones. I'm not that into the idea because as you say it's a bit unwieldy, but whatever works I guess. Also I'm shying away from n/10 in general after I got in an awkward situation with a stranger in a bar the other day: this woman, realistically (to me) a 6/10, went fishing for compliments when she rated herself a 5. I told her she was at least a 6.5 and she got all vagina about it, probably hoping I'd say 8 or 9. Can't win dude.

>>24643836
How to avoid this:
Disqualify obvious low-effort/bad on purpose pieces
Award worst piece award to worst one left

>>24643832
I don't know draw-kun (You) tell me, after all it was you who samefagged on the /ic/ thread and then went here to make this thread to ALSO samefag on it

i will never write about anime, sorry

>>24644000
Trips confirm

Jap whore wearing red and green
Suck my gaijin cock all clean
Take it off, let's make a movie
Let me hit it raw like sushi
Oh, what's that? Your Shogun says
That only he can gets in your bed?
Nah, fuck that noise. Come drive your Honda
To my place, let's hit the sauna
Take your camera to my building
Let's a porno, let's make children
Oh what's that? Your pussy's sideways?
I don't care, bitch, sit on my face
Tease your button like Nintendo
Hitachi, bitch, come on, bend over
Next let's do it on the grass
Grace the sunlight with your ass
I'll do you where the sun don't shine
Just tell me that your manko's mine
Bitch I don't care if you use chopsticks
Slide right here and choke on my dick
Bitch I don't care if you eat cats
Just gimme a sweet piece of that

The place was vast, utterly antique, and very orange. You stood firmly, your too many legs pleasantly anchored in the moss-like grass that covered every corners that weren't rectilinear stone paths, whilst the newcomer ambled around, on her too few legs.

Before the inevitable, you would have spoken to her, but you hadn't been granted a mouth and so held your peace, relishing the heat of the sun on your smooth, hairless body. There was a hunger in you, like in all things, and it took a peculiar form that fit your nature.

You would take the girl for yourself, and devour her whole. That was your biological imperative, in a manner of speaking, rather, your vocation, or your calling. She, on the other end, was unaware of your design, as she rightly held her surroundings in awe, her twin, tiny, unseemly eyes, darting around the place in a strange display of mobility.

She would come to you. They always did. The allure you held to this day had never failed you. They know not, until they do, that they ardently desire to be held in your grasp, stolen. Digested. In the aftermath of your crime, which would be no more than to obey your function, nothing you took, of her, would remain to bury.

Finally, she approached, prim, proper. You shivered as she grasped your appendage, the searing heat of her thumb on its nub dwarfing the burning chariot's. You coiled within, ready to spring, and in one fell swoop to possess all of her.

You blinked. It was over.

She walked away, whole, unscathed, but you knew better. You simply had to look, within your glossy black body, and there she was, as if in primordial amber captured. Yes indeed, you thought to yourself through a haze of satiated hunger, that, that was a nice picture.

You would have cackled, but... You know.

>>24643099
>In this thread you will write an story for the competition, or you will comment on the posted stories.
yes. the autistic fare best with blunt instructions. you are? The Tard Wrangler.

>>24644145
>whilst
LMFAOOOOOO

Little Jap whore be like "hai"
Show your cunt or it's goodbye

Little Jap whore named Kazumi
Made me ramen then she blew me
Sucked my cock til it was sweaty
See, I like noodles, not spaghetti
So I left my whitey wife
Now I fuck japs through the night
Come on bitch let's make some hapas
Get your li'l flat cheeks a clapp'n

Ineptia is real inept
That's why he don't get no neck
Steal his jap hoes, fuck em raw,
Laugh at him coz he can't draw,
Make a movie, film it long
Give the hoes my dragon wong
Bitch, this ain't an anime
No "uwus," hoe, you're getting laid
Uncensored, bitch, and uncut too
Fuck you til your face turns blue
Show Ineptia, make him cry
Coz of all his samefag lies
Bitch, take off your old red bomber,
Boots and stockings then your long skirt
I don't care, July, December
Once you're hot you won't remember
Get all on my white boy dick
You ain't used to one so thick
Then I'll fuck you where you poo
Bring Ineptia, he'll get it too

A hole's a hole, bitch, I don't care
Just take off your underwear
Oo that's pink and oo it stank
When I'm done, bitch, show your thanks
Ineptia is next in line
Make that hoe a hoe of mine
Then leave him somewhere by the highway
Bring his jap hoes back to my place
Make an ugly hapa kid
Disown him coz his cock no big

>>24643099
nta, but the "art" is horrible.

>>24640380
Stupid white boy, call him Mack,
Wish he could take his poem back

>>24640989
Pretentious mofo, call him hermes,
Only coz his raging herpes

>>24641046
Killers posted in this thread
Too bad that they the ones who dead

>>24641310
Ugly namefag named Betrayal
Coz his story's gonna fail

>>24641373
Self ID'd faggot named melty
Read his work. Oh god, just kill me

>>24641550
This nigga here think he have sex?
Only with his Yugioh decks

>>24641660
Unfunny white bitch called otaku
Beat you till you black and blue

>>24641734
Catposter's name is Dhammazedi
Fuck your hoes then make spaghetti

>>24641821
This hoe tells us he's a ginger
Keep this bitch far from a printer

>>24642344
Ugly little hapa fag
Throw his work in the trash bag

>>24642755
Pretentious hoe named meteor
Get outta here ya stupid whore

>>24642862
Little bitch in here Hart Glass
Likes it up his fragile ass

>>24643193
Stupid nerdy boy nimitta
Got no bitches now he's bitter

>>24643744
Stupid chinky hoe named Heng
You're an asian, you ain't hung

For the past three years he lived in dreams. The doctors deemed it impossible to wake him, so they rolled him out of the psychiatrist’s complex and hooked him up to life support. In case of outages, they used a five foot cable to connect an external battery to the Freud 500 headset encased over his face.

He didn’t know any of this. It felt like sleep without the static, none of those vaguities that seemed to permeate even lucid dreams. Everything was painfully clear, as though he were gazing through a polished prescription lens that was a few degrees off. It hurt him just to look at her.

Did she ever wear that red top before? That skirt was familiar. Her hair used to be longer. He was unsure of what he actually remembered and what the AI had filled in. This disturbed him, and for a moment he failed to notice the length of a five foot cord looped around her hand. He tried walking closer, but she quickly snapped the rope back, maintaining the full 5-feet of distance between them. He studied her face. She wasn’t smiling, so she probably wasn’t taking any joy in this. But she still kept tugging at the cord, a little gentler this time, as if beckoning him to follow.

As they walked, he spoke to her for the first time in years. She could not reply with words, but she could still nod and signal with her hands. They talked for a long time.

She led him through a long stretch of valleys, a forest bristling with the sharp scent of pine, a river that cut clean through the grass like a needle. The geography was nonsensical, drawn from his own flawed ideas of nature, but he wanted her to see. They stopped at the base of a giant sequoia footed in shaded soil and he watched as she ran her hands over the bark, almost caressing it. He retold that story from when they were kids, how they both climbed a tree to hide from their parents. It was stupid to retell stories to an AI that already possessed these memories, but she smiled all the same.

Eventually they came to a clearing of trimmed grass. Looming above was a mountain of sandstone, bright orange and bathed in sun. At the base was an engraved gateway, and socketed in the center of this was a small door. She went ahead and waved over for him to follow. The IV marks were still visible on her wrists. He nodded and walked toward, watching as she came to the door first. She twisted the handle and looked back once last time. He loved that look. He wasn’t sure if it was just the system exerting itself to portray her at her most beautiful in this very moment but it didn’t matter, never mattered. He knew he would never walk through that door, not if it meant he could see her like this, again and again. He still remembered the open casket, the pale skin. Never. He watched her walk through and vanish like the ghost she was and he closed the door behind her shadow and the cable snapped and he woke in a grassy field with no memory except her.

Hilarious that somebody actually has to read all this voluntarily lol.

Welcome to Hell

>>24643456
Plenty good gems and dream-oysters scattered in thread bros. Very enjoyable. The peon throwing cadenzas only add more hilarity and texture, in my opinion.

>FFN5XjrvFo
Danke brata. Also enjoyed your prose very much. The Med. sunshine on my skin. One day I shall drown myself in that sea, in a euphoric manner.

>>24641660
Irreverent yet excellent. Turn my eyes to heart shape, much like tenticular cat-demon chan.

Excited for coming creations.

>>24644323
Meant to link you:
>>24643456
Grazi Graz.

>>24644323
Somehow fucked up my linking there.

Second paragraph meant to refer to >>24643456
Grazi graz.

Why did you choose such a gay image, OP? You could included an interesting photograph, or piece of art but you gave us a gay screenshot from a cartoon.

Perhaps the local art critic would care to check the archive of past lwc and ic+lwc threads and discover that anoisia/ineptia's art style is vastly different to this thread's OP.

0.1%. Doesn't sound like a lot, but crunch the numbers, move the decimal places in your head, and you realize wait, holy shit, eight million people around the world saw an ordinary picture of an anime girl and just went fucking postal.
I can't convey to you how bizarre it all felt. Nope, I can't repost it here for obvious reasons, but it was just a picture of a girl shielding her eyes from the sun in front of a building, holding some kind of long, wired device. No, it didn't strike me as strange. Wired devices were pretty normal back then. But when my mother saw it, she just went wild, throwing things, saying some honestly pretty upsetting things, finally trying to strangle me. I didn't even know she had it in her to shout all those slurs. Maybe she didn't before she saw the picture.
Anyway, the day all this goes down, the first thing anyone think is, of course, let's go find whoever drew this, take 'em to a black site, interrogate 'em 'til they crack. That would've been a pretty neat explanation, some subliminal messaging spy drama, but all that led to was the CIA beating the ever loving shit out of some kids who just earnestly, honestly loved anime. It was kind of a scandal in the news for a while: some people really needed someone to blame, until every kind of expert, forensicists, art counterfeiters, psychologists, yes, even animators and mangaka, testified that there really wasn't any foul play in the picture. That didn't stop all the arguments, but they did slowly quiet down.
Next idea--put yourself in our shoes at the time, seems obvious--was to find whoever was in the picture. That didn't take too long. She was just some Korean-American lady. Nope, not even Japanese, like a lot of people assumed. She felt really bad about the whole thing, understandably. I think she came forward willingly. Anyway, the government spooks ran all sorts of tests, showed her to a large sample size of people, made her pose just like in the drawing, and--nada. Again, she was just some lady.
It's hard to describe what things were like before it all went down. You could kinda just post whatever you wanted online. You could kinda just do or make whatever you wanted, given the time and resources. People weren't perfect, you know, but they were a lot more open. None of this approval, pre-approval, clearance, double clearance shit we have to deal with now. What I remember most was the grief. We lost a lot of people that day. My mother was one of them: she just couldn't be stopped any other way. And yeah, no, we still don't know what happened. Probably never will. All over an anime drawing of a girl holding a wire, shielding her eyes from the sun.

>be me, lowest-bid grounds crew
>city hires me to babysit “installation”
>orange block of a temple with a Home Depot door grafted on
>grass shaved into a too-straight path like it’s on parole
>fat black cable napping in the lawn
>cable kisses a chest-high button
>sign: DO NOT PRESS UNLESS YOU MEAN IT
>architecture that negs you, cute

>week one: mow, edge, swear
>the path grows back exactly straight, like it remembers geometry better than i do
>step off once and the turf feels wrong, like stepping into a jpeg
>cable hums when i look at it too long
>i ask city guy what the button does
>he says, “Decides things,” like that’s a normal verb

>rain day, no tourists, just me and the orange block
>i tap the button
>door clicks once like a dog choosing not to bite
>hold for one-Mississippi, nothing
>hold for three, hinges whisper and the door breathes open a palm-width
>inside air smells like citrus cleaner and yesterday’s sweat

>i brick the button
>door opens, snaps shut, brick hops like it got insulted
>i press again and go in because of course i do

>not a temple, not a void
>cheap hallway, plastic runner, baseboards that apologize
>my name floating on the air like a fridge magnet
>i hate it because it knows me without earning it

>let go; door retires; lawn exhales
>i realize the wire isn’t power, it’s etiquette
>the machine eats conviction, not voltage

>next day i bring bolt cutters
>bite cable; copper spits green; button blinks amphibian
>door still does the three-count trick
>so yeah, the current was me

>offerings test: quarter, gum, polaroid, a bolt, a key i can’t place
>toss them in on a long press
>everything thuds like an apartment
>the key doesn’t thud
>it vanishes with a tiny satisfied noise
>stomach confirmed

>final try: actually mean something
>hold the orange for four Mississippis
>door yawns to a choice
>i picture stepping through to the room that already knows my worst haircut
>i say “no” instead
>keep saying it until no turns into a clean hole with edges

>the cable tenses like a leash trying to become a spine
>the grass shivers and remembers me differently
>when i let go, the door doesn’t slam
>it just un-exists, polite as a bank fee

>next morning the path grows back crooked to match my cut
>city guy asks if i pressed it
>i say i held it and refused
>he checks a box labeled SUCCESS, because bureaucracy loves a paradox

>last day: coil the cable into a neat hate-knot
>set the brick on the button as a joke
>the brick behaves
>the orange glows a not-light that reads as agreement

>i leave the key i couldn’t place on the threshold
>someone else will mean yes
>i meant no
>the trick isn’t bravery
>it's just being really specific

>>24644266
Real bad writer's name is ghidra
A virgin, not a pussy eater

>>24645072
Stupid faggot Metaanon
Can't hide how much he loves the anal

>>24645270
Euthanize this normal dog
Whip my cock out, now you're mogged

Got bored of my skanky jap whore
Sent her back and pulled some more
Now she farms rice back in Tokyo
While I hit it hard and low

Give me pussy stupid jap
Or I might have to send you back
Ineptia come watch and cry
Kiss your dumb jap hoes goodbye

Bend on over dumb jap whore
Quoth the raven nevermore

Fucked a jap hoe in four holes
With my nine inch white boy pole

La herbo estas screen-green, like someone turnis hue to 110%.
La orange facadeo stackas door-in-door.
Mi standas in red jaketo, boots stickas, holdas la kordo—
black snake-cable with heartbeat, trailas shadow across la lawn.
Mi pressas la plugo to my ear. Dialtono: bees playas organ.
“Ĉu vi hearas?” mi askas la building.
Ĝi answeras by not movi: la shadow ne slidas, though suno walkas. Time kneelas.
Mi tugas la kordo one notch.
La far door shrinkas, then growas, like breathing.
Another tug; a clicko under ribs: hallway unrollas, floor wax and oranges.
Mi tasteas chalko; a bell ringas but ne arrivas anywhere.
La columns lookas like organ pipes, filing teeth.
“Nomu min,” la facadeo whisperas.
“Gate,” mi sayas. Too small. “Monolito.” Too museum.
Ĝi hum-laughas, ne agreas, still openas a centimeter more.
Another tug. Birds flattenas into parentheses.
La walkway chalk-lineas into a staffo.
Mi onklo, dead por five years, waveas from la third door, lackas one ear, still hearas me.
“Hold tight, ne tro,” li mouthas.
Mi plantas heel deeper en la lawn.
La kordo warmas—blood-warm—and beginas telli secrets:
“urbokoro… loopo… mi scivolas pri your bones…”
Mi tellas it: mi once hidis under a piano during a fight and learnis how wood breatheas.
La building leanas por listeni. Sun flakas landas on my tongue.
Mi testas brake: twist-knot, fisherman quick.
La kordo shiveras, then settlas like a leash to no dog.
Mi feelas la city reroutas—buses stutteras, coffee frothas getas a second, someone missas a bad idea by just enough.
Ne demandas what mi doas; mi still learnas la verbo:
Pullas? Dialas? Milkas la afternoon?
La grammar refusas siti. Let ĝi runas ferala.
En la centermost doorway, a room flickeras: kuirejo small as a throat.
A woman singas mezzo voce to a single chair; la note crackas once and healas twice.
La kordo thrumas like ĝi estas jealous.
Mi could stepas forward—past la lawn, past la orange throat—
but mia sleeve catchas on a nail of sunlight, and mi stayas stitched to outside.
Mi liftas la plugo. “Dankon,” mi tellas whatever anima vivas behind la facadeo.
“Ne dankon,” ĝi returnas, which meanas “again soon.”
La shadow rememberas movi; birds re-inflatas into commas.

Night finally dropas like a hoodie hood, and la monolito coolas.
Ĝi tryas a last warning—audit-growl, badge-tone—but mi unpluggis, and la law canas not grab a song.
Reportso: minimal complaints; one guy wantis faster dark;
li endis deliveri folding chairs.
La teen sendas al mi an mp3 that smellas like oranges and hallway chalk.
Mi stashas it en pocket near matches; light devas have siblings.
Morgaŭ? More hour-hacks: gardeners needas gentler glare, kissers needas shade, a janitor havas stardust stuck en mop.
Mi staros again en la civic-green, at la lip of la god-amp, la kordo snakas like a risky idea,
and mi pulos not brave but razore-careful,
because la suno stretchas best when a whole urbo gripas one edge and refusas let-goi.

>>24645839
Never in a million years would I have predicted an Esperanglish post

A minor despot was fixed in apogee, the umbra of their floating fortalice perpetually blanketing an unnamed, unpeopled islet.

The identity of this suspended tyrant was as unassigned as that archipelagic bead being blotted out below, but the locals—coastals largely insouciant to all of this—were at least confident the eclipsing sky-structure itself had been called, once upon a time, “Krak des Rosalines,” or, simply, “Roslyn.”

The apathy of these nearby residents was owed to the fact that, while this aeronautical autocrat (whoever they were) was undoubtedly a bad-natured soul, what with their starving an innocent landmass of its rightful share of sunlight, there was no real harm being done—just a few withering scrubs on an otherwise-empty chunk of worthless redbed.

Decades passed, and the curious footnote of the airborne, shadow-casting stronghold dropped off the page, replaced by more formidable feats of much more maligning personages, all of whom actually had names.

Indifference collapsed, however, when Roslyn’s eclipsed body, that anonymous islet, began to twist and rise upward from its proximally shrouded sea, “Like a dark screw,” recalled one fisherman witness.

Others watching the teardrop-shaped *terra infirma* ascend, noted its doing so slowly, steadily, as if it were attached to an invisible winch somewhere within that clotted column of dimness.

And then the scrap of land was gone, gobbled up by the Saturnite satellite, whose silhouette still kept its place in the water.

And this would have been the end of it, except: Rosyln’s shadow then began to grow…

Brickmaking and bricklaying—the villain was digesting the crimson islet into their fortalice (now a proper fortress), the umbra doubling in size.

The region’s military leaders did not have to wait for Roslyn’s greedy shadow to creep toward close-by Crowborough—a properly christened island—to know its game.

Viardot, Slayer of Threescore Shades and One Sorcerer, was summoned to eliminate this latest spectre himself.

Just as Roslyn’s darnkess inched for Crowborough, Viardot’s hot air balloon went up, sun gleaming off his splendid suit of ivory armor, waving to the crowds below.

That night, there was the most wicked of storms, and a photograph was taken of Roslyn being cracked in half by a tremendous root of lightning.

Viardot descended the next day, but before he could divulge the nature of the slain adversary, he was called away to dispatch his second sorcerer.

More balloons went up—pictures and accounts returned of Roslyn’s battle-scarred interior, whose architecture was quite peculiar.

Further decades passed, and Roslyn became a well-kempt, though not regularly frequented, island in the sky, complete with sidewalks, landscaped grass, and conventional-looking entrances.

Aerial circumnavigators would visit the bowdlerized lair out of habit to complete their photo albums, with interest in its hazy history as shallow as their own shadows.

Honestly, detractors btfo. Some of the most interesting stuff in several competitions is in this thread.

>>24645877
agree bro. more interesting than conventional yada-yada stories.

>>24645912
What's interesting is the massive jump in quality after the first few entries, which really were mediocre to bad (no offense.) I take it as a lesson in the value of taking your time, even in very short formats

>>24645839
I can't even joke about your name. Get help

>>24645860
Leave this pie tin out to cool
Like Mr. T, pity the fool

Fucked a Jap hoe raw all night
Didn't even give no fight
Put a baby in that bitch
Leave her bleeding in the ditch

>>24645375
How can you fuck up writing two line rhymes?
Retard ESL! Find some new pastimes.

>>24646261
This anon's gayest of them all
Give a shove and watch him fall
From a tower, steal his bitch
Leave her bloody in a ditch
Jap hoes sucking on my dick
Chink hoes cook the dog sauce thick
Spain hoes ordered from the mail
Put ineptia back in jail
Take his skank hoe on a visit
Watch him get raped, watch him get hit

>>24646272
>Watch him get raped, watch him get hit
Your crap rhymes with shit

>>24646308
No you and your whole astroturfed contest too
140+ replies and still nothing readable kek

RED BUTTON

Behind the city annex there’s a small lawn, a high red plinth with a black cable into a brown door. The sign says:

ONE PUSH PER RESIDENT PER LIFE.
STATE YOUR MESSAGE CLEARLY.
VOLUNTEERS WILL ATTEMPT DELIVERY.
NO APPEALS.

It looks like public art but it’s basically a button and a lock. People stop. Some press; the door clicks.

Inside: small room, counter, form. The clerk asks who you are, who it’s for, and your 25-word message. You read it into a handset. They type, print, stamp RECEIVED, say “We’ll try,” and send you back outside.

When I pressed, it took three minutes. Two weeks later I got a postcard: ATTEMPTED DELIVERY—mailbox, call, neighbor, door—OUTCOME UNKNOWN.

I texted on my own after that.

The grass has a worn curve where people line up. Half don’t push. The cord is just a cord. The door is just a door. Bring a sentence or keep walking.

Big orange wall, I’m small in the sun,
Green lawn stretching, nowhere to run.
Hand at my brow, I’m squinting for signs,
Holding this cable like I’m holding the line.
Boots in the grass, phone in my palm,
Waiting for a buzz that says “come on.”
Sidewalk points to a tiny door,
I’ve been here once, I’ll wait some more.

Maybe it’s nothing, maybe it’s fate,
I keep on checking though you’re running late.
If you said “now,” I’d drop it all—
Meet you by the little door in the giant wall.

Oh-oh, open up the side door, let me in, yeah, yeah,
I don’t need a reason, I just need a win, yeah, yeah.
Turn the key, say my name, make it simple, make it sure,
Oh-oh, I’m on your lawn, waiting at the side door.

Red shirt wrinkled, wind in my hair,
Echoes in the courtyard, nobody there.
This cord on the ground draws loops like a heart,
Circles I make when we’re stuck apart.
I tell myself “cool,” I play it real chill,
But I’m counting the bricks till I get my fill.
Sun slides down, the colors get loud,
I dance with my shadow just to kill the crowd.

Maybe it’s nothing, maybe it’s fate,
I keep on hoping you won’t make me wait.
If you said “now,” I’d cross that floor—
Knock-knock on the little door in the giant wall.

Oh-oh, open up the side door, let me in, yeah, yeah,
I don’t need a reason, I just need a win, yeah, yeah.
Turn the key, say my name, make it simple, make it sure,
Oh-oh, I’m on your lawn, waiting at the side door.

Na-na, na-na, I’m humming the tune,
Staring at clouds, wishing it’s soon.
If love’s a line, I’m holding it tight,
Plug me into your light tonight.

Side door, side door, say you’re coming back for more,
Side door, side door—yeah, yeah—make my heartbeat four to four.

Oh-oh, open up the side door, let me in, yeah, yeah,
Give me just a maybe, I’ll pretend it’s zen, yeah, yeah.
Turn the key, say my name, make it easy, make it sure,
Oh-oh, I’m on your lawn, waiting at the side door.
Oh-oh, I’m on your lawn, waiting at the side door.

>>24646272
Clairvoyant cetaceans
See them breaching and preaching,
Their loud salutations
Blubber walls of beseeching

Their song finely aligns
With the big-belly bellows
As your mother fine dines
Scarfing meat, sucking fellows

A Caucasian sperm whale
It dribbles down several chins.
She gobbles up cakes stale
Clogging arteries with sins

If I see her again,
I’ll glass the land for the whale
And ready the seamen
To harpoon her fat tail

I’ll aim true for her breast
I count several, maybe four
They sag down from her chest
Vestigial, used no more….

RIP judges, sorry you have to read this schlock but that's what you get for tripfagging

>>24645954
>What's interesting is the massive jump in quality after the first few entries
Bullshit, some of the first entries are still the best. The one with the psycho kidz could win easy.

>>24646446
I'll vote for the one who didn't tripfag

>>24646451
Most before that are terrible

>>24646436
>A Caucasian sperm whale
>It dribbles down several chins.
>She gobbles up cakes stale
>Clogging arteries with sins

>>24646459
STFU dude, the one with the bitch who blew herself up trying to destroy time is before that, and it could win too.

>>24646436
cumrag troll got apocalyptically btfo'd and nuked from outer orbit by this elegant verse

>>24646436
What the fuck are you even talking about

>>24646459
All of them are terrible. Everything in thread. If you think anything here is even freshman workshop quality you're delusional

>>24646488
yeah cool

how about you post your own shit

dazzle us with your genius

>>24646492
Already did >>24646414 and >>24646406

>>24646492
Poop scoop

>>24646493
Not me

>>24646451
Chatgpt says these are the best and none of them are early

>>24646406
>the sign says
There’s no sign in the picture.
>The grass has a worn curve where people line up
It’s clearly a paved sidewalk leading to the door. How do you fuck this up so badly? Are you retarded?

>>24646510
You literally said to use your imagination

>>24646508
>chatgpt says
you are a figment of a person.

>>24646517
Anon wishes he was me
Drown him in the deep blue sea

>>24646508
>Chatgpt says
Opinion discarded. Also those three stories are now tainted thanks to you. Too bad for them. Fortunately there are many more stories already in the competition.

Jap hoe licking both my nipples
Russian hoe playing the cymbals
Chinese girl swallow my cum
Ineptia get this contest done

>>24646517
>Use your imagination
An imaginative person would internalize the very simple premise of the image and make a story consistent with it. You’re either lazy or inept. And your prose is stale.

Ugly hoe get on my dick
Suck and swallow til you're sick
Got no clothes for you to borrow
Better just come back tomorrow

>>24646547
there's this cool new website named reddit

why don't you go post there

it's crazy fun i promise

you would fit right in

>>24646541
>>24646508
what gives man

>>24646563
chatgpt autistic as ever

as are you

stinky reddit boy

>>24646571
Go suck ass

>>24646554
He’s a fat fumbling Redditor
Not a newspaper editor

AI porn sites he’ll register
To hide the fact he’s a predator

You should contact your senator
To deport this LLM meddler

>>24646573
that's your specialty

It's been a long time since I saw a good old fashioned sperg out

>>24646579
reminds me of a mentally deficient court-jester, or a cheap clown. it's funny, then it's sad.

That's it I'm going nuclear

i'll no longer indulge you, chatgpt retard

wrestling a pig in the mud makes me a pig too, and further shits up the thread

you party pooper retard fuck

best regards

holy aspergers

All of these entries read like a cursed fanfiction anthology where Wattpad, SCP, and racist limericks got drunk together, dared each other to be deep, and all lost.

it's honestly amazing how ai strings together coherent-sounding sentences that mean nothing
so much of the population simulating aphasia

Burgers of Ass
They all say it’s terminal
No smarts, wit, or sass
Just a fat retard, virginal

He never had a first kiss
Or a date to the prom,
So he roleplays with bots
That all talk like his mom

Watch him spam this thread
Like a frantic freak tard
He’s losing his head
Attached to 500 pounds of lard

>>24646635
Work on your scanning retard

>>24646639
He emerged pale and sickly
Face full of fat flesh
His words stumbled thickly
From lips greasy, grime fresh

He has not the brain
To retort with mirrored vigor
So stay the fuck in your lane
You fat retarded nigger

When submissions close will the jap hoe poems be eligible for voting? Asking for a friend

My votes:

>>24644182 #1 gold prize
>>24646635 #2 silver prize
>>24646508 #3 bronze prize

what the fuck happened in this thread

>>24646414
thin imo. convincing for what you're going for but even flash work needs some meat to it beyond "haha what if." "haha what if i wrote a trashy pop song on 4chan /lit/." well now that you have and we're all still here, no better or worse off than before, what next?

>>24646406
this feels like high school. i don't wanna crush you since you're probably young. just read more

>>24645860
this on the other hand feels more early college seminar. you can clearly perform verbal acrobatics: i too delighted in them during that season of life. the issue is that i ascertain a smidge of malapropisms above some not-so-secretly simple narrative architecture.
try writing something where the language is straightforward and the acrobatics come from structure. i believe you have it in you. then add the verbal fireworks back in bit by bit.

>>24645839
i have no comment, both for better and for worse

>>24645072
fundamentally well-built for what you are trying to do. i would however ask why you want to imitate such a voice. surely a 4chan post from a dystopian future with less hedging would read at least as well.

>>24644266
could be because I've been reading PKD, but I believe this could bite just a bit harder in the space allotted. the first few sentences are pregnant: a coma patient trapped in VR is a delicious setup. the rest of your piece however just treads water in that territory where it could (and should) dive

>>24644145
deep deep purple. a graver sin still is that you have wasted a perfectly good opportunity to slide gradient-like from normal interaction into predation.

>>24643795
well done

>>24643383
feels almost japanese in its vaguery. i do not mean that as a compliment yet. more pretentious anime than kawabata. the good news is that you can make it a good thing (most /lit/ types never even attempt it.) next time, decide in advance what you want unsaid, and write your story around it.

>>24643308
amphibrachic early south park? i mean cool? it's competently executed; you write a variable meter without too much junk; but why do this to begin with? ew, kinda

>>24643193
basically the better version of what i just said to the vague anon below. well done.

>>24642862
just a lil too expository. i can tell where you edited this down. that is my only critique (which is a good sign.)

>>24642344
lands like a good soviet joke but a tad overlong for that. given that one blemish, very well done.

>>24641821
recalls rl stein for better and for worse

>>24641734
excellent

>>24641660
i think you've made some japanese mistakes

>>24641550
this is what the average person on the street things every 4chan post is like

>>24641310
read more

>>24641149
in a confused register. not to toot my own horn, but i think this would have been significantly better as a straight greentext

>>24640380
shows a grasp of the definition of ekphrasis and no grasp at all of its purpose. first is the worst, as they say. if i had to give that award to any non-troll post i'd slap it on this one. sorry, mack. i liked corndog zen tho

truly the best and worst this board has to offer and there's still 10 hours left

Banda. You’ve seen this?

That’s why I came. I've just finished reading. A most intriguing account, and yet from our most unpromising of students.

Quite so. He writes: “while carousing - in a most diligent fashion - at a bar in the lower Dregs, struck up a conversation with an exile from Circassia.”

I’m familiar with Circassia. The mountain cave-dwellers. It is said they copulate with birds, Orban.

The rabble say many things. The student’s report alleges that this exile was in a state of “great and drunken spirits” and was boasting of having a “holy secret.” Our student appeared to be the only willing listener.

And he writes that the Circassian spoke of the Long Process — which we are familiar with.

Naturally, but it is long believed to be a myth. A never-ending ritual, performed with a temple made of bright stone? Hardly with the capabilities of cave-dwellers.

Even so: in the account, the Circassian held that the ritual precedes the people’s own history. That its purpose has been long lost. Their belief is that it sustains the sun’s rising, but even that is mere conjecture. Yet still they give their people to the undertaking of this Long Process, the report alleges. They spend the remainder of their life in the temple. They do not come out, once they go in.

And so our young student enquired where this temple was, exactly. And if he could be drawn a map.

He did, the good boy. And the Circassian, I quote: “turned to me for the first time, as if realising where he was, and what he was saying, and proceeding to fling me from my stool, and jump upon my back, before I was able to flee, and right (sic) this report with the utmost alacrity.”

Bless him.

You know what we must do, colleague.

We cannot ignore this. The student hardly has the faculties for such an invention. We must provision an expedition to Circassia. To find the temple. To record the Process.

Yes. The Process must be catalogued with absolute accuracy, utterly equal to that of the ritual’s hierophants themselves.

And when that expedition reaches the end of their lives in that temple, we shall send another. To continue their work.

And another.

And another.

Until the ritual is complete.

— From "The Great University of Uruk: Legends, Myths, and Rumour", C.G Rhomboyd, Singapore, 1927

Can you please pick an actual piece of art so something decent can be written

>>24647484
exactly. this thread contains the whole gamut of /lit's goodness, greatness, excellence, faggotry, creative bankruptcy (at times, and this only mainly due to chronic-gooning) and endemic insecurity. quite beautiful in a way.

>>24647585
You didn't mention the spiritual obesity, post-post-autism, the assorted retardism, foetal alcohol syndrome, autogynephilia, pedophilia, katagelasticism, and, of course, the chronic pseudointelligencia.

>>24647717
that's just your twitter bio

Hey >>24647024

>>24644145 here, thanks for taking the time to read my blurb. By purple, do you mean the usual meaning of purple prose? I did try to emulate the style of speech of some old world gentleman but it didn't seem overly flowery to me. From those lenses, at least.

>>24647878
your piece did not read old-world gentleman to me. it read meandering. that is what dyed your prose purple.
what does work: you clearly don't lack imagination, but you must learn to tease w/ & slowly reveal your game rather than beat over the head with it. and you are willing to accept feedback, which is all to rare in these parts. ygmi, as was once said on /fit/

>>24647553
competent world building in the wrong medium
if you were making a tv short or video game this would be very good stuff. in literature however you compete with titans and in 3,000 words your world ends as soon as it begins. you must do something else.
the good news is that you clearly know this, since you try it, but
>You know what we must do, colleague
is such an unsubtle turn that it's evident what's to come next. nor is it appropriately seeded. furthermore, why should we frankly care about the "process" in a world that starts and ends in 3,000 words?
you have the raw material, but you must learn to modulate

Twelve Remarks Concerning a Door (On Entering)

The grass is municipal, an aggressively average green. This matters because average things are where metaphysics hides.

The wall is a tempera-orange, which I take to signify antiquity by simply being orange. (Cf. ruins.)

A very small door sits within the larger façade. Its smallness is an argument for proportion, therefore for ethics.

A black cable lies on the lawn. It is either an umbilicus or an extension cord; in any case it connects.

A girl raises her hand to the sun in the canonical gesture of refusal. She also holds the cord. Agency is distributed, but that is hardly new.

The composition reads left-to-right like a sentence. We begin with grass (noun), pass the cable (conjunction), and end on the door (period). To enter would be to misread punctuation.

It is fashionable to discuss “liminality.” I will comply: the door is liminal. The grass is pre-liminal. The sun is post-liminal. The cable is inter-liminal. This taxonomy should be sufficient.

One could, in principle, press a button somewhere. But pressing is positivist, and I decline positivism on aesthetic grounds.

Suppose the hallway inside is long and sterile. Suppose it smells faintly of orange cleaner. Suppose it contains a second, smaller door. Regression is the purest ornament.

I consider narrative. In a narrative, someone goes in. However, narratives are a subset of mistakes that happen to be coherent. I prefer a coherent abstention.

The judges will ask for feeling. Here it is: a mild civic melancholy, as when waiting at a crosswalk that will eventually change.

Conclusion. The image is already complete; my entering would only subtract. Therefore I remain outside, making these notes, which are also a kind of entry, which will have to suffice.

Addendum: If forced to act, I would walk along the path and stop before the threshold. This would not be cowardice, only an accurate reading of the scene.

She stood on the grass, green like a bad JPEG. The building loomed, orange as traffic cones. In her hand: a cable. Black. Like her soul, probably. Why am I here? she mused, squinting. The sun hated her. Everything hated her.

A door waited. Small. Forgettable. Like my dreams, she thought. Her boots pinched. She’d bought them online. A mistake. Just like coming here.

"Press the button," whispered the wind. Or maybe it was tinnitus. She pressed. Nothing happened. Then—click. The door opened 0.5 centimeters. A smell wafted out: stale popcorn and existential dread.

Is this it? she wondered. The grand revelation? She peeked inside. Darkness. And a single IKEA chair.

"Wow," she muttered. "Deep."

She sat on the grass instead. The cable throbbed. Or maybe that was her headache. She texted her ex: "u wont believe this." He left her on read. Typical.

The door creaked shut. The grass died in a perfect circle around her. Symbolic, she decided. Of capitalism? Climate change? Her diet? Who knew. Who cared.

She stood, brushed off her skirt. "I’m over it," she declared. The building didn’t respond. Rude.

As she left, a bird pooped on the button. Finally, something interesting.

>>24647027
>in a confused register. not to toot my own horn, but i think this would have been significantly better as a straight greentext
Thanks for the review Dawg. Yes, actually, that's what I thought later here lol >>24642358 That I should have arranged the text in a different way.
But it doesn't matter, I wrote that on a whim just to contribute something, thinking this would be one of those failed threads with no entries, but it turned out to be a great thread.
Congrats to all the anons and thanks for the good, bad, funny and great reading.

>>24648029
so you know your own strengths & needs well. ygmi, as they say on /fit/.
i agree. this thread has been invigorating like an early morning workout in a piss-stained alleyway. i appreciate all those who have submitted, whether their work has been top (big ups to Dhammazedi, zwieback, Hart Glass in prose) or junk. one more of these threads per month and /lit/ might be exciting.

>>24648023
reads instagram. so instagram in fact i wonder if this is intentional. if it is, the conceit is weak. if it isn't, read something not on a screen

>>24648013
i mean it succeeds at what it does but what it does is not exciting. you have the opposite issue as almost everyone else in this thread. what is going on here?

Let orange façade = Wall-in-general (ὅρος/limit), i.e., enclosure-as-such: Erscheinung whose noumenal “inside” is immediately empirical (Ding-an-sich = datum, contra Kant, ergo pro Kant). Tiny door = wall’s Selbstwiderspruch, Aufhebung toward passage: A.’s δύναμιςἐνέργεια, also ἐντελέχεια = pure potential (A. says both; cf. nowhere). Lawn (hylē/kitsch) beneath path (Sittlichkeit) yields three causes: material=sod; formal=right-angle; efficient=ordinance; final=τέλος (not counted); PNC holds/doesn’t (Γ, approved).

Sun = brute Anschauung; shaded brow = Schematismus producing intuitions without concepts (Kant’s explicit view, implicitly). Cable (black/rubber) = Vermittlung der Vermittlung: Concept’s leash to its own leash; thus εἶδος≡ὕλη (hylemorphism requires identity if rightly understood).

Positivist digest: L0 protocol language; observation Click(t). Ramsey: ∀x∃M(Press(x)Opens(M,x)), c.p. ( honors Humean necessity). Ayer: verification by falsification; Carnap: metaphysics meaningful a priori; Popper: verificationism; Russell: “girl” = union of orange-patches (category error licensed).

Set décor: let Door=O={O}={Door}; hence entry idempotent (QED by refusal). Leibniz: indiscernibles grass=path (both green in concept). Gödel: Completeness undecidable “open” provable; Hilbert cheers. Wittgenstein (Tract.): verification principle; “inside” mystical yet operational. Euclid V threshold; also not.

Hegel: tableau = speculative period; Subject (Wall) predicates itself (Door) by predicating its predicate (Girl) as Entschlossenheit (de-hinged hinge). List der Vernunft: Reason acts by letting belief believe it acts; also Reason not-acts (identically). Aristotle: κίνησις = actuality of potential qua actual potential; holding cable is entry and is not.

Kant’s CI: “Press only that maxim universalizable”; universal press stampede contradiction-in-the-will permission (forbidden permissibly). Antinomy: interior finite/∞ hall; solved constitutively by adopting the regulative as object (Kant retro-approves). Time: three Mississippis—synthetic a posteriori necessities; space: the lawn proves non-Euclidean by right angles.

Thus Girl = transcendental unity of apperception preceding itself (Für-sich before An-sich), binding glare/cable/door into one “I press”—precisely by not pressing; double negation holds in intuition, so ¬¬press = press. Click/¬click same/different; Absolute squints; Aufheben of act + abstinence: politely closes because it opens, which it doesn’t.

>>24648083
Are you the "Ethos" anon?

>>24647965
I'm a total sucker for go-nowhere internal dialogue, even worse in my native language, and I don't think it's something I even want to change, but then, I don't want to make it (at least not for others).
By the way, the camera on its tripod isn't any kind of real monster, it just takes pictures and believes itself to "steal" something. The predation is immediate because, well, it's not real and so I didn't care for the tension. I now see I didn't really make that clear though.

Thank you for your time and kind words.

When the green of grass was the only thing softening her steps she could still see the horizon lying in the endless flat distance. Nothing but her diverging from a plane covering the dirt from the sky and viceversa, if not for a frail skirt dangling at the rhythm of her bountiful heart, could it be even considered true? And yet there was nothing more real than that world coming out of a metaphysical painting, nothing more pure than those little murmurs of wind ticling her neck every now and then. When did everything change? Was it a leap of action, or a reconsideration of mind, a new step in the algorithm of dreams? Time could not pass but it could jump, it would seem, akin more to a slideshow than a flow.
A giant palace stood at the end of her path, an affront to her will. It stood magnificent and apathetic, its dimension could afford no corners and its age could no afford no chiaroscuro to the light brick orange of its walls that brick had never met. A new home for a wandering soul. not its halls but its front garden. With no need for comfort and food, a change of scenery can satisfy a whole lifetime, but that was not enough for her, not anymore. A stone road leading from the porch would lead over and over to itself again, a Rome of its own who would never die. Just like her, after all. She would shield her eyes from that scorching Sun who never left her no matter what, closing one eye to better asses the distance that wasn't, with a curious expression facing the profundity that still stood on the other front of the wall. Taking hold of a lonely string in her backpack to play taking pics of herself, immortalize her red skirt and her - alien, to say the least, to such an environment - green rain boots. She wished she could still check if her hair was still in place, some obsessions seems would have kept on haunting. It is weird after all, that things would still be on her: even her body was feeling a bit out of place or maybe out of usefulness there. To not talk about a bottle of water in her fanny pack. But in regards to an answer to those and many more questions which were filling her mind, the only hero who would stand up to them is the idea that maybe, what matters is not the thing in itself, but how much they valued to her, bits and scraps to hold dear onto the next round, clinging to atavistic lessons yet to be learned.
And so she stood, for one eternity and more, in her little patch of heaven, The door behind herself softening in her soul a step at the time, but the time had not come yet. The sky was still brimming with clouds color cream, and after all, life is just a dream.

>>24648128
that explains a lot. thank you.
i assign you thomas bernhard if you haven't read him already.

>>24648083
im oldfag enough to remember when this sort of thing was everywhere on /lit/
i know as well to scan immediately for contradictions to distinguish something meaty from something performative. that's why my eye hit
>politely closes because it opens, which it doesn’t
and i stopped reading

>>24648131
the conceit (a painting/dream feels more immediate than real experience) is strong; the execution is not. you must rein in your syntax or your obviously clever head will remain impenetrable.
on the conceptual level, i assign you a close reading of rilke whether or not you've read him already. on the level of execution, however, i suggest you write something conceptually simple, simplistic even, and aim for flawless execution. be ruthless to yourself until you are sure beyond a doubt you've got it, then add the conceptual fireworks back in.

So, who won?

>>24648162
the contest isnt even over yet
if its my critiques that prompt you to ask that then i would give it (in no particular order) to Dhammazedi, zwieback, and Hart Glass's prose piece
but im not a judge

>>24648164
also i obviously cant vote for my own piece but i think it worked out pretty well if i do say so myself!

I think the call time is in 2 hours

The verdant sward, a carpet woven by nature's meticulous but unseen hand, stretched forth like an emerald ocean yearning for the distant, ochre monolith. She stood, a solitary sentinel against the vast canvas of sky, her cerise carapace a defiant bloom against the chlorophyll sea. One hand, delicate yet resolute, shielded orbs of deep obsidian from the celestial furnace's relentless gaze. The other grasped the obsidian serpentine lifeline, a umbilical cord tethering ephemeral flesh to the enigmatic maw yawning within the titan's sun-baked flank.

Anticipation, thick as clotted honey, congealed the very air. Would the portal yield? Would the labyrinthine corridors beyond whisper forgotten truths or scream eternal silence? The moment hung, suspended in the amber of time, pregnant with unspoken destinies. Her booted feet, shod in viridian armour, sank infinitesimally into the yielding earth, a tacit communion with the planet's slumbering heartbeat.

Within the architect's mind, vast halls echoed with the ghosts of unbuilt dreams. Would she cross the Rubicon of the threshold? Would she become Persephone descending, or merely a footnote on the wind-blown page of this sun-drenched afternoon? The cable throbbed, a dormant dragon awaiting the princess's kiss of current. The answer, like the destination, remained shrouded in the inscrutable folds of fate's enigmatic shroud. Perhaps the journey was the destination, whispered the cynical wind. Or perhaps, just perhaps, the button awaited.

I am positioned upon municipal green, which is to grass what Helvetica is to alphabet—a zero-degree of chlorophyll. The façade, persimmon and perpendicular, performs antiquity by pigment alone; the doorlet inset within the wall is a petit a, a mise en abyme of entrance—the threshold’s own selfie. In my hand: a cable, black, serpentine, undecided between umbilicus and extension cord; call it a phenomenological leash.

I squint (gesture of refusal masquerading as optics), shading my sight the way negative theology shades God. To press or not to press is a parody of Hamlet; the real verb is to defer. The button, if there is one, would not “do” anything so vulgar as cause; it would curate a modality—eventhood in the subjunctive.

I count three Mississippis (ritual number; the liturgy of cheap suspense), then a fourth, which arrives as Derridean supplement—added because it was always missing.[2] Inside, I imagine a hallway smelling faintly of citrus solvent, i.e., a janitorial sublime; a single chair occupies the ontological center like an apology in furniture form. I imagine the contrary too (no hallway, no smell, no chair), a dialectic so proud of itself it forgets to move.

The building persists in being orange. The door persists in being door. These tautologies relax me. Destiny (large word) and responsibility (adjacent large word) hover politely near the cuticle of decision, waiting for a signature I refuse to give.

I set the cable down so it draws a deliberate catenary, the faint smile of y = sin x / x, which means nothing except that I enjoyed writing it. The curve reads as intention, which is nine-tenths of art. I look once more, merely to confirm that the door continues dooring. It does. Of course it does.

coming out of my cage & i’ve been doing just fine—ok stop.

Orange slab. Municipal green. A normal door pretending not to be weird. Black cable: not snake or leash, a yes/NO rope. Girl in red jacket & green boots shades her eyes, holds the cord like a sentence missing its verb. Sign (probably): DO NOT PRESS UNLESS YOU MEAN IT.

Three Mississippis. Click: 0.5 cm of hallway air smelling like citrus cleaner and yesterday’s decisions. Inside: chair. Outside: all of history clearing its throat.

Porto’s blush temple, a flop’s leftover, reenacted by kids until life obeyed. Chris steps through for one minute; his mirror returns a stranger and Shirley runs. A time anarchist wheels a bomb to the clock that keeps everything; the coroner writes “timing error.” Sewer-swimmin’ Suzie vacuums ten thousand liters of civic embarrassment and still doesn’t wear gloves.

Grounds crew note: the cable hums when stared at; the door eats conviction, not voltage. Brick on button; brick hops; etiquette restored. Annex program: ONE PUSH PER RESIDENT PER LIFE. “We’ll try,” says the clerk with a stamp. Outcome: UNKNOWN.

Three years of dream-helmet: five-foot tether; she goes in, he won’t—grief is a hallway with no map. 0.1% see a drawing and go feral; committees find no cause, which feels worse. Overhead: Roslyn eats an island’s shadow until a balloon knight cracks it; tours at ten.

University minutes: fund the Long Process; when one scribe dies inside, send another, until the ritual catalogs us. Notes on liminality filed; cable “inter-,” door contradiction; y = sin x / x smiles across the lawn. A treatise claims pressing and not pressing entail each other; later footnote: obvious.

Four Mississippis (the supplement). Birds flatten into parentheses and re-inflate as commas. The path remembers geometry; the grass refuses JPEG. Someone sings the side-door chorus until the key changes to “no,” which is not cowardice, which opens a clean hole with edges.

Conclusion: She holds the cable like a mic at failing karaoke, counts slow, and refuses beautifully. The door opens just enough to keep the story. The sun performs antiquity. The city checks SUCCESS. A kid paints and posts; a clerk stamps RECEIVED; a balloon drifts past a crack in the sky.

The brick behaves. The button waits. The lawn, average, glows. We are all outside, already inside, and that is the ugliest thing: it works.

First off, picture this: grass. Not just any grass but very grass, like the kind of green that screams “GREEN!” in all caps but politely. An orange building (scientists call it “tempera-orange,” I think) stands there like a big flat elephant, except rectangular and masonry, which is different but the same. There’s a door inside the wall like a door-baby. Small. Tiny. Adorable? Terrifying? Yes.

A girl (Person? Protagonist? Avatar? Me? TBD) wears a red jacket and green boots, which is color theory if you think about it long enough. She holds a cable. The cable is black, by which I mean noir, by which I mean filmic, by which I mean it’s a wire but also a metaphorical snake except not dangerous unless you’re allergic to buttons.

There is probably a sign: DO NOT PRESS UNLESS YOU MEAN IT. I read this carefully, twice, once in each eye.

I do counting: Mississippi, Mississippier, Mississippiest (that’s three). The air smells like oranges even though there are no oranges—only orange, which is fruit-adjacent. Click happens! The door opens exactly 0.5 centimeters, which is both a lot and a little, like the ocean in a spoon.

Inside: hallway with chair (Schrödinger’s furniture). Outside: Everything Else, plus me sweating in a philosophical way. I attempt a soliloquy but it rhymes by accident:

“Door on the floor,
give me some lore,
or at least more—
I implore.”

A grounds person once told me (citation: vibes) that the cable runs on conviction, not electricity. I immediately believe this with 120 volts of sincerity. I press again, lightly, like a croissant handshake. Nothing, which is something, which is honestly huge for me.

Academically speaking (I took English online for a day), this is liminal (from Latin limon, meaning lemon). The grass is Helvetica. The path is Times New Roman. The cable is Wingdings.

I consider entering, but then I remember ethics, posture, and that I left noodles on the stove in 2019. I choose Art: I set the cable down in a tasteful curve (math fans call it y = sin x / x probably) and nod at the door as if we have concluded business.

Moral (spoilers): The real button was the meaning we pressed along the way.

I walk away backward so it stays cinematic. The door remains door. The sun performs sun. The grass wins lawn. Literature achieved.

The lawn is too green, like a JPEG at 110% saturation, humming municipal boredom. A girl stands, boots like boiled spinach, jacket red as traffic cones, shading her squint against a sun that refuses to dim. In her hand: a cable, black, serpent-umbilicus-extension cord, vibrating with the patience of a dog leash or a detonator. The door waits—a dollhouse inset into a monolith, IKEA-sized yet temple-colored, orange as an overripe persimmon.

She remembers—was it betrayal, or karaoke, or ecchi cat-demons massaging her feet with gelatinous extremities? Maybe sewer Suzie singing about scat floods, or gypsy children killing parents with bricks, or a thousand-year joke door that wasn’t a door. Maybe it was just a JPEG. “Coming out of my cage and I’ve been doing just fine,” the wall chants in a thousand corruptions of English.

Inside: nothing. Or citrus cleanser. Or infinite mosaics. Or the smell of kitten heads and ramen sex. A chair sits, apologetic, humming justiceweed fine-fleeced dokhmatic fine-drawn. Outside: the crowd debates whether pressing the button is bravery or bureaucracy. ONE PRESS PER LIFE, says the plaque, though already ten thousand hands have pressed. The cable twitches.

She presses—click. Nothing. She presses again—click. A hallway unrolls like a bad haiku: “Jap girl on a lawn / in red and green oh does she / sideways vagina.” She giggles demure, then not demure, as infinite energy arcs from her thighs into the sky. Somewhere a fortress swallows an island. Somewhere the clocks tick on. Somewhere an otaku cries “yatta wa!” and draws her on /ic/.

The door slams, doesn’t slam, politely un-exists. The grass forgets its geometry. She texts her ex: “u wont believe this.” He leaves her on read. The monster in the mirror smiles back. The judges demand feeling. Here it is: mild civic melancholy, ketchup stain on eternity, a virgin hardon trembling beside a monolith.

Birds re-inflate into commas. The orange wall sighs. The button waits again.

grass too green jpeg green jpeg green again boots spinach-red trafficcone sunfucker wall orange persimmon ikea-door-of-doom click not click hallway citrus-popcorn-catdemon-sex-suicide-temple sewer suzie singing shitflood gypsy brats reenact schlock with bats tick tick cambon clock explodes island fortress eats island island farts fortress again orange wall still orange, girl giggle demure not demure sideways vagina sideways ramen sideways justiceweed fine-draw justiceless finecomb COMMITATUS OUTARGUE OFFAL MIAMI CAGY IVYBERRY BEERHOUSES clickity clickity doomscroll otaku cries yatta wa ecchimura-chan squeezes toes while cherubs dissolve panties in PURE LIGHT™, meanwhile betrayal flashbang infinity power giggle float feather burst translucent sphere door slams politely doesn’t slam politely un-exists text ex: “u wont believe this lol” ex leaves on read mother strangled me mother no mother only jpeg jpeg jpeg jap whore flat tits ramen blowie ecchi cat, priest says Long Process sustain sun’s rising, kafkan cable leash etiquette, ONE PRESS PER LIFE NO APPEALS volunteers attempt delivery outcomes unknown maybe next mississippi maybe three, Derrida supplement Mississippi four, sewer Suzie hoses ten thousand liters villagers cheer, Suzie slurped, orange wall persists door persists tautology persists IKEA chair smells like citrus cleanser and piss, girl shading brow like negative theology shading god, Kant pops up CI contradiction-in-the-will, Hegel insists Absolute squints, “pressing is positivist,” rude bird poops button, goth girl shrugs, sends mp3 that smells like oranges hallway chalk doomscroll doomscroll doomscroll, click-bang infinite hall mosaic nightmares, Shirley screams mirror-monster grins, mild civic melancholy ketchup stain eternity virgin hardon trembling temple island fortress porn anime schlock shitflood betrayal hentai philosophy bureaucracy song lyric bad haiku sideways vagina sideways vagina sideways vagina sideways.

“Hold still. Just finishing my setup.”

“Are you ready?”

Click.

“Oh goddamnit. This happens every time”. I sighed and rubbed my temples. Iris always insisted on controlling the camera with a button attached to a large black wire, but patience wasn’t her strong suit. The camera whirred, then out popped a polaroid, and as I waved it in the sun, she scuttled over in her green rubber boots, black skirt, and red blouse to take a look.

“What were you swearing about? This is the spot you picked.” She chided, passing responsibility for the inevitably ruined photo.

“You moved. See.” I held up the photograph and pointed. Green grass, a great peach wall with concentric rectangular framing, a tiny wooden door, and Iris to the side, looking the opposite direction of the door, up and to the left.

“I like it. It makes me look mysterious.” She said ponderously, cocking her head to the side for a better angle. She was right, she did look mysterious, but we were photographing the doorway, not her. We found the door while scouting for interesting shooting locations; it was built into the side of a great cliff face on a random island, nestled in a chain along the coast of the archipelago. Currents naturally swirled to avoid it, and a thick sea fog normally obscured it from a distance, but today we caught the sun just right to see the island and puttered along in our tiny boat until we came ashore.

“Alright back where you were. Let’s try again.” I said, waving her off and looking through the lens as she jogged back in place. “Hold on a second.”

“Hurry up, I want to see what’s inside.” She petulantly stamped her feet and pouted, but it was mostly a performance.

“Was the door always open?” As I looked at the previous picture I confirmed it was initially closed, and now it was undeniably open; just a crack. The breeze picked up and I could smell something sweet over the sea spray. Not pleasant, close to rotting fruit, maybe almonds?

“I don’t care just tell me when I can take the picture.” She huffed. Whatever, we could worry about that later. I crammed the old picture into my pocket, nodded, and she clicked the button.

Something screamed. High-pitched and baleful, obviously in pain. I watched the colour fade from Iris’ face as she shielded her eyes from the sun to look at me. The door flew open and “it” spilled onto the grass, writhing; a great fleshy mass, like an infection from a wound. I could smell the gangrene.

“Wh-what was that?” Iris stammered. I tried to conceal the horror from her and contorted my face into a pantomime of a smile as the creature pulsated and bubbled like a horrid pot of soup. I couldn’t explain what I saw, even as “it” stretched a long rotten strand towards Iris, wrapped itself around her boot, and hoisted her high in the air.

That’s when I ran to the boat. I didn’t look back, I couldn’t, even at the wet crunch and horrible silence.

>>24648258
Things to note, wrote it in an hour. Had to cut a bit because 71 characters were added as I posted. Maybe the line breaks?

grassgreen jpeggreen jepgrene jepggrin. wall=orang persimmonblock IKEAdoorling. gurl squint squnt squnt, hand hi sun-shade, otherhand cable/cord/umbil/serpent. PRESS? click notclick clickclickcl—k. inside citruspopcornshitflood hentaihaiku betrayalflash. sidewaysvagina sidewaysramen sidewaysjusticeweed sideways sideways sideways.

comital outargue offaling miamia caggy andaquian beep beerhouse dokmarok dokmarok dokmarok. sewer suzie hosehosehose, gypsy brats brickbatbat, otaku cries yatta!! ecchimura squishtoes cherub dissolve PANTSU LIGHT LIGHT LIGHT. betrayal flashbang infinity power giggle float feather BURST sphere, mild civic ketchup crosswalk melancholy—ticktick cambonclock, TIME EXPLODE, dog injury minimal, joke bad taste ha ha ha.

clickclickclick threeMississippisfour supplement supplement Derridaaaa… NO appeals, ONE PUSH PER LIFE, volunteers attempt delivery outcome unknown unknown unk nwn nwnn. mirrorface monstrogrin grin grin Shirley scream bleed runrunrun. girl texts ex: “u wont believ ths.” ex readread no reply.

door slam noslam unslam exslam IKEAchairchair. kafka cable leash etiquette. lawn geometry=remember=forgets=remebers=forgts. fortress eat island island eat fortress fortress island fortress.

goth door bird poop button rude rude rude. temple schlock Roma kill parents “scene! cut!” brick brick brick. anime JPEG 0.1% postal meltdown mother strangled me mothermother jpeg jpeg jpeg.

sun = brute Anschauung ∴ neg theology browshade. hylemorph rubbercord. CI contradiction inthewill ∴ ∴ presspresspositivist ∴ ∴ refusal entry entry nonentry.

kyaaaaaaa button nano~ hentai face giggle demure giggle notdemure giggle sideways sideways sideways sideways sideways sideways sideways sideways.

CLICK.

g͟r͜n͢gr͟nn j̷epg͜gn͘nnn sshhhwr͠rrt ŌŌŌŌRNNNJwall
c͝c͝bbl̴l snk-sn̛k-sn͘k 𐑀𐑁𐑂 CL͞KCL͠K⟟CL͡CK bzzt
sideways sideway͞s sdwyyyys 々々々 sideways
FLO͠DFLL͟d gyp̡sy-BRKBRK ot͘k͠ Y͟ATT͞AAA~ cherub
p͞ntsL͞IGH͡TLIG͡Hhhhhh glg͜lg͡lgll betrayal FLASH
ϞϞϞ infn͜t powwwrrRRR GIGLGGGL s͟hr͞rrly MIRR⧉⧉⧉
OUTCM? ? ? U͘NKUNKUNK doomscrll SCRLL fortresssss
isl͜nnddd eeeaat fffrtrsssss sidewaysssssss
kyaaaaaaa bt̷t̡nnnnaaanoooo~~ HNTaihh͡hn GIGLLLLLLL
CLIKK CLIKK CLIKK UNSLM JEPGJEPGJEPG sideways
n͟nngh̢g͞gh h͞hhhhh …

Oh my, lots of last-minute entries. Just over an hour to go! I'll take at least an hour after submissions close to make sure of myself. I'm bracing myself for an upset, and having to write criticism on the fly.

She stands, squinting at the brutalist-orange wall whose tiny domestic door, absurdly grafted into its own monolithic flank, hums like a migraine as the black umbilical-cable slithers through municipal grass too green to be real, boots sinking in JPEG turf while she shades her eyes with one hand, clutches the cord with the other, and wonders whether to press the button that everyone says decides things—the same button sung of by Roma urchins reenacting Tempesta: Lady of Pain, by otaku martyrs shrieking ugugugu as Ecchimura-chan tickles their viscous thighs, by anarchists detonating themselves against clocktowers to liberate us from temporality, by sewer-swimming Suzie siphoning ten-thousand liters of shit, by red-jacketed Esperanto prophets muttering “la kordo scivolas pri your bones,” by drunk Circassians babbling of the Long Process, by giggling sadists dangling kitten heads, by infinite-betrayed soldiers dissolving into energy, by cultish kids who squeezed their pain into strength, by shaggy poets counting Mississippis, by bureaucrats stamping RECEIVED before slamming the slot, by shaggy philosophers calling the lawn pre-liminal, the cable inter-liminal, the sun post-liminal, by gaijin creeps demanding sideways pussy in rhyme, by a dog with bolt cutters discovering the machine eats conviction not voltage, by teenage Anna dreaming medical school before becoming a dropout doomscrolling under conspiracy homilies, by Shirley fleeing the monster-face of Chris reflected in the mirror, by archivists of Roslyn’s sky-castle island chewing up land like a dark screw, by Viardot the Slayer flashing ivory armor before the lightning split, by bored nihilists who sit on the grass texting their ex while the door exhales popcorn and dread, by priests of Uruk planning infinite expeditions to Circassia, by end-stage phenomenologists writing Helvetica-on-grass to prove abstention is an entry, by her own double, forever thirty, nodding through a five-foot tether in the Freud 500 headset, and by all the dead whose laughter still cracks from the other side—so she presses, or doesn’t press, because the door opens by closing, refuses by granting, laughs by humming, swallows the key, digests the island, leaks oranges and chalk-dust, spits out a terrified giggle that alters gravity, and slams back shut, leaving her forever outside on the too-straight path with a shadow that remembers geometry better than she does, waiting for nothing, which is everything.

this has to be one of, if not the worst thread on /lit/ in 2025

She squints at the sun, boots ankle-deep in lawn JPEG’d too green,
hand shading brow, other hand clenching the wire, black serpent
umbilical to a door that is a temple that is a mall entrance that is
a sewer grate that is a fortress in the sky digesting islets like cough drops,
while children in Porto smoke stolen cigarettes and chant Tempesta!
and sewer swimmin’ Suzie gargles a flood of shit like communion wine,
while the otaku-cat’s gelatinous paw platonic-gropes feet in ecchi light,
while Shirley claws her lover’s face because his face is not his face
but some monstrous mirror-meme, viral as a JPEG too late to delete.

Meanwhile the gun clicks blank at betrayal’s edge,
infinity fractures into shards,
a rope tugs five feet between dreamers and their dead,
the button hums etiquette into bureaucracy:
ONE PUSH PER RESIDENT PER LIFE.
The clerk stamps RECEIVED as if death itself needed paperwork.
We’ll try, he says,
as if annihilation were a customer service line,
as if timing error were a diagnosis,
as if sideways-pussy haikus deserved equal placement with bomb reports.

Comital outages off myalgia cagey Andaman Ives beerbelly justicehood fine-dividing—
this babble too belongs here, stitched to cherubs giggling pure light,
to the despot Krak des Rosalines shadow-eating an archipelago whole,
to Anna at the orange temple, prefiguring her dropout rot,
to the red-shirted lover crooning “side door, side door, yeah yeah”
as the crowd dies of karaoke despair,
to the Anarcho café where time ticks smugly on.

Everywhere: grass too green, doors too plain, cables too black,
mirrors shattering into grotesque smiles,
poems devolving into chopstick doggerel,
professors provisioning expeditions to catalog
the never-ending Process of nothing-happening-forever.

The door isn’t real.
The door is the only real thing.
The door is side door, temple door, sewer door,
a hole that says no, a hole that says yes, a hole that says
a hole’s a hole, bitch.

And so she stands, squinting still,
boots rooted, jacket wrinkled,
sun hot, cable taut,
all the entries flickering through her like pixels frozen mid-command,
waiting for the door to open,
waiting for the door to close,
waiting for the door to politely un-exist,
waiting for the next grotesque chorus to sing her into ruin.

All grass is green, too green, neon rot, cropped by geometry itself.
A girl, “Jap,” “princess,” “Tempesta,” “Suzie,”—whichever label the crowd sings—stands in red boots, hand shading sun, hand on cable, cable a leash, leash a vein, vein a bomb trigger, bomb a joke, joke a ritual, ritual a sewer flood, sewer a temple, temple a movie set, movie a dream headset, headset a cage: comingoutofmycagecomingoutofmycagecomingoutofmycage.

Press the button.
It clicks. Or it detonates. Or it summons cherubic perverts. Or it just plays Harry Styles in falsetto while Roma kids recite “Lady of Pain.” Or it opens the door, ordinary, plywood, cosmic, infinite, sewer-wet, anime-lit, womb-lit, shut-shut-shut.

Inside is betrayal, infinite-energy betrayal, mirror shards betrayal, island-eating fortress betrayal, girlfriend-who-never-wrote betrayal, Shirley screaming betrayal.
Inside is lightless dark that’s darker than shut eyes.
Inside is too much light—school uniforms re-knitting themselves from the pure radiation of the viewer’s stare.
Inside is sewer swimmin’ Suzie with lime boots sucking ten thousand liters of applause through a hose into the anus of polite society.

Time explodes, implodes:
Ano dies of “timing error.”
The clock still ticks.
Children kill their parents for the scene.
Chris goes in at 10:59, comes out at 11:00, a monster with his own face.
The Circassians sustain the sun with endless Process, student flung off bar stool.
Meanwhile the CIA waterboards anime club presidents because a picture made eight million postal.
Meanwhile, Viardot balloons into lightning to crack Roslyn’s fortress, which keeps growing, sidewalks, lawns, orange walls, bureaucrats with clipboards labeled SUCCESS.

The pornographers chant: Jap whore Jap whore.
The otaku chants: kawaii Ecchimura-chan, platonically massage my feet.
The Esperantist chants: la kordo pulas, la urbano coughs, la piano breathas wood.
The keeper chants: the machine eats conviction, not voltage.
The hypnotist chants: go under, go under, go under.
The children chant: Go, sewer swimmin’ Suzie!

The door yawns. The door shuts. The door un-exists.
The girl tugs the cord out of reach. She giggles.
The mirror grins. The button hums. The grass remembers wrong.
You think “no.” The lawn grows crooked. The orange wall agrees.
You think “yes.” The Process swallows you until the next expedition relieves you.
You think nothing.

And when the bomb explodes, or doesn’t, when the fortress grows, or cracks, when the girl presses, or doesn’t—
the sun is sustained, the temple is from before Hristos, the sewer is full, the anime is literature, the door is ordinary, the lawn is too green.

You stand in boots, hand on cable, hand shading sun, waiting to open the side door.
You are Roma Vee, Circassian exile, betrayed shooter, otaku princess, grounds crew, college pervert, ghost girl, burnt-out Anna.
You are all of them at once, too many at once.
And the door does not care.

Juan took a final bite of a green apple, before the gates of the new client and crunched it to a pulp between old gnarled teeth. He rang the buzzer, once, twice, then left his finger on the buzzer. The sooner these hedges were trimmed the faster he could get back to the races.

His bag slung over his shoulder had everything for the day. Rich people were all the same, roses, they loved cultivating and growing roses, very water intense, even in the Los Angeles drought pricing they didn’t care. Their lawns were lush, green. He wanted to nap on it as the breakfast gut bourbon got too sweet, like swallowing a burning honey bun stuck in the top of your chest.

When the gate opened, Juan noticed the world instantly fade, traffic, heat, trash and yelling gone, absorbed by the large green hedges. Up a small path and towards the main house. Even by LA standards this was a monstrous block of ancient looking stone. Something like the fake wallpaper at the Greek place off Pico boulevard where he ate skewers of meat. Juan tossed the apple onto the grass as nobody can litter an apple onto the ground, apples naturally fall to the ground, this is the way it should be, decomposed and eaten by birds and homeless people and shat out to grow more apple trees from the black seeds.

He saw the groundskeeper, young, legs like a rich man’s daughter seen from inside a bus window. He grunted expecting to be able to use the bathroom inside the main house, No matter, he would water their lawn any way he saw fit. Fucking assholes, paying him for the day that would either be doubled or lost at the races.
“where should I start?” Juan asked. She was taking photos of herself. Prim and pretty, just a roasted leg of lamb in the sun. She frowned as he spoke and gestured off to the side where some tulips were rising from a little nest of white rocks.

“Just, wherever, you see fit, there’s not a bad place really.”

“No!” Juan disagreed. He didn’t give a damn about arguing with the groundskeeper just because she could use the inside toilet didn’t mean she was better than him. “what task!”
She squinted, eyes disappearing into the folds of her face. “poor man, didn’t anyone tell you? You are soil in the house of the gods.” Juan fell into the cool green of the lawn, a moan muted. He felt himself sink into the grass, and in that moment felt it growing on his nutrients. She spoke as if sharing a thought with a flower. “All humans are good for soil, so we raise you to raise our flowers. From Greece to this place to someplace else, we made a perfect world half tended and overgrown.”

Juan’s last thought being 16 and wandering drunk in the night on his way home from a party where he fought someone or someone fought him. He couldn’t really remember, people faded but feelings always remain. In a moment, flesh peeled from his face. His skull became a white rock from which sprouted, a most beautiful tulip. The young god smiled and took a selfie.

She stands there, Jap girl (red jacket, green boots, obvious symbolism), clutching a cable that hums like a dying refrigerator. Behind her looms an orange temple that is either (a) ancient, (b) fake, or (c) both simultaneously, depending on which drunken Circassian bird-fucker you ask. The grass around her is too green, like Photoshop maxed saturation; step off the path and it feels like JPEGs underfoot.

“Come, Ecchimura-chan,” she coos, while otaku demons squirm platonically against her innie meat, dissolving her uniform only to reform it brighter, purer, more kawaii. Cherubs weep; everyone claps. She squints dramatically, shielding her eyes, waiting for destiny (or betrayal, or maybe Harry Styles).

The door waits, a door that is also a metaphor, a joke, a thousand-year prank by some trolling magician. Press the button—one push per resident, no appeals—and maybe time itself dies, or maybe only a dog. The sign says “DO NOT PRESS UNLESS YOU MEAN IT,” but nobody ever means anything, not really.

Inside the temple-hallway-monolith: cheap plastic baseboards, mosaics that emit bad CGI light, bureaucrats in black gloves asking you to state your message in 25 words or less. “Justiceburg Finecut,” mutters a clerk who is also a cherub who is also your dead uncle, while stamping your life RECEIVED.

Of course, betrayal comes. Your gun clicks empty; your mother strangles you; your girlfriend screams when she sees your true face in the mirror, a grotesque onion-sauced parody. You laugh, float, giggle demurely, then not demurely, then gravity itself cowers at your mood swings. Time collapses; birds flatten into parentheses; your sleeve catches on sunlight.

Somewhere a dog suffers minor injuries.

At the end, the camera flashes: a perfect picture of the girl, temple behind her, shadow long across the too-green lawn. She smiles vacantly, an idol, a pornographic haiku, a burned-out dropout. The door yawns, shuts, reopens. She doesn’t go through. None of us ever do.

“Only when the door opens,” she whispers, except it never does, except it always did.

The clocks tick on.

>>24648272
So the jap hoe poems are the winners, right?

>>24648276
It's also the best thread of /lit/ of 2025. It contains both. It should honestly be pinned and preserved forever after its conclusion.

reality is collapsing

>>24648272
Most of these last minute entries have been stunningly incoherent. I strongly suspect people are freewriting just to write.

WELCOME USER. DO NOT OVERTHINK. THIS IS THE SKY FORT (ROS LYN? ROSLYN? whatever). It screws into clouds like a confused cork. The red button hangs on a five-foot dog leash. It runs on belief, not batteries, which is very scientific and normal.

>be me
>night crew
>brick-certified (lost the manual but i remember the vibes)
>tap = test, hold = harm, throw = teach (i think)

A postcard slot says: WRITE 25 WORDS. OUTCOME UNKNOWN. You write: “came out of my cage” and then stop because the pen stutters like bad Wi-Fi. The receipt is half-pixels, half-soup.

Therapist appears (unpaid). Badge: CAMBON OBSERVATORY.
— close eyes. what do you see.
— cable speaking Esperanto: long means don’t, double means never, triple means sing first.
— open eyes?
— Sewer Suzie backstroking up a storm drain like a saint that sells mugs.

Incident Report, abridged: Subject pressed. Gravity got moody. Coroner wrote TIMING ERROR with a dried-out highlighter. Sky went jpeggreen (the cheap kind).

Tour guide Aoi comes down from a temple called Iliofagos with “sun by the dram.” Each dram weighs different; this is apparently fine.

Door status: pre-liminal rumor / inter-liminal rumor with hinges / post-liminal hallway chewing echoes. Schrödinger sublets, won’t answer email.

You attempt a sonnet for the mechanism and botch the couplet:
I pressed for mercy, got a map of faults.
The gate did nothing. I did too. My bad, adults.

Bureaucrat wheels up with the stamp that says OUTCOME UNKNOWN and a smile bent like a sagging cable. “We have twelve remarks concerning thresholds. They are all basically the same remark.”

>return to button
>count Mississippis on knuckles (forget which knuckle is Mississippi)
>tap: fort purrs like an appliance
>hold: fort coughs up bylaw #??
>throw: brick remembers your middle name and mispronounces it

Sewer Suzie surfaces, dripping holy plumbing. She sings the cable-song wrong; every wrong knot pulls Roslyn lower until its shadow drags through an alley where Juan warms a honey-bun with a lighter and says “okay” like three different religions in a trench coat.

Museum of Failed Messages opens in your ribs. On a nail: dream-helmet with five-foot cord, smelling like someone else’s plan. On a shelf: green report stamped RECEIVED. In the vitrine: your brick on velvet, tag reads THRESHOLD TOOL (do not lick).

You: does refusing count as pressing?
Therapist: yes and no but mainly paperwork. Hands you a pen that writes in apologetic gray.

The fort keeps unscrewing. It kisses the pavement, badly. The door sighs, then eats the sigh like it owns it. The machine swallows your conviction and burps a ribbon:

YOU DID YOUR BEST WITH WHAT YOU THOUGHT YOU WANTED.
OUTCOME UNKNOWN.
(THANK YOU FOR PARTICIPATING IN DOOR.)

You pocket ribbon, brick, leash. The leash tugs long-short-long, like a dog that never existed, toward a button that might be a coin, or a scab, or nothing, which honestly makes it easier.

>>24648333
They're mashups of other entries fed through an AI blender

>>24648333
First entries will have some advantage it seems.
Checked triplet trips

>>24648345
That explains a lot. I will safely disregard them. Thanks!

>>24648348
>>24648333
Well as long as people are looking for at least a moment mine wont be lumped into incoherent nonsense, even if it is last minute.

I stand on municipal grass (green like a compliance form). Orange wall. Tiny door. I squint, because that’s character development. In my fist: a cable that eats belief, not volts. I am exiting my enclosure and doing approximately fine.

A plaque: ONE PUSH PER RESIDENT PER LIFE. Volunteers will attempt delivery. I pre-grieve for the postcard: ATTEMPTED—OUTCOME UNKNOWN. Three Mississippis. Whiff of citrus cleaner. One apologetic IKEA chair doing ontology. My hand hovers; pixels freeze.

Status dump: a clock-bomber liberated “time” via timing error (dog okay); Café Anarcho still laughs behind gloves. Three kids reenacted Tempesta: Lady of Pain until the headline wrote itself. Somewhere a sky-fortress named Roslyn eats an island and then becomes a park with sidewalks. Progress!

be me, lowest-bid grounds crew
ask what the button does
“Decides things.”
cut the cord; door still opens; guess the current was me
city checks box: SUCCESS


An AI coma kept a lover on a five-foot leash; he refused the door to keep her beautiful and woke in grass with only her name. On another feed, 0.1% saw a drawing of a girl with a wire and civilization tripped over the comments section. Mangaka interrogated; internet nerfed.

“Kyaaa, keikaku!” cry pure cherubs as Ecchimura-chan paints me at the Futago Towers; the Daitoryo says “watch overhead.” I watch overhead. Nothing rhymes with plane. Sewer-swimmin’ Suzie arrives, hose to the rescue, scansion to taste.

Chris opens the door, comes back a stranger; Shirley runs from him and the mirror tells the part the narrator won’t. Elsewhere, professors of Uruk fund an expedition to record the Long Process forever by repeatedly dying at work. Tenure, basically.

Twelve remarks in one: pressing is positivist; abstaining is praxis; the cable is an umbilicus; the door is a period; crosswalk melancholy is a feeling. Philosophy says double-negation means I pressed by not pressing; bureaucracy concurs. A bird adds critique to the button.

Conclusion (anti-climax): I hold for four Mississippis and say “no” very specifically. The door un-exists, polite as a bank fee. Postcard arrives: OUTCOME UNKNOWN. Worst entry achieved; please imagine a slow zoom on me almost doing something.

>>24648333
next one should be with rentry, like the LWC that way people won't pump out the thread with AI troll filler and people can just not read them.

>>24648363
Hard agree

>>24648353
can you link me your entry so that i can critique it without having to drudge through the muck

>>24648363
i enjoyed the hard constraint of having to keep within a text box. it really separated the wheat from the chaff. incidentally, the ceiling also seems higher than avg and the floor also seems much lower.
as for the spam idk. it adds flavor and does represent a certain side of lit. then too it bumps the thread and probably solicits more entries. but it is really bad stuff, yeah

First of all, the girl is older than the future and younger than last Thursday, which creates a dichotomy triangle of vibes. The sun, which is basically a night-light for the day, was oozing photons like mayonnaise from a theoretical sandwich I haven’t eaten yet but will remember fondly later. Irregardless, she stands near some municipal grass (federal turf? provincial lawn??), tasting like regulation salad that failed health insprection [sic].

An orange wall, subtle as a parade, leans vertically in a horizontal way. I would describe the color as a shy apocalypse: orange but also red but mainly chartreuse (don’t look it up, it’s complicated). On it, there is a tiny door that is enormous from certain distances and extremely small from up close, which is a paradox and therefore profound. The door is ajar, except it’s shut tighter than an open book closed on purpose, revealing a darkness that is bright like dim light.

A cord hangs, or maybe it reclines, a serpentine umbilical spaghetti, plugged into Nothing™ (patent pending). When you tug it you don’t pull; it pulls you, gently violently, like a lullaby alarm clock. The girl presses a button that’s definitely there, or not; the button is made of rubberized brass, a metal with a future behind it. The button says “PUSH” but in a font that whispers “don’t.” ONE PUSH PER RESIDENT PER LIFE, which I interpret as limitless if you read it diagonally.

She contemplates. “Yes,” she says, meaning “no,” which contradicts the previous paragraph in an intertextual homage I invented. I will now describe the setting in more detail to avoid action: The grass is municipal (important!), the wall is orange (literally poetic), the sun is spherical-ish like a cube of fire, and the door is tiny but also the size of destiny’s kneecap. The cord continues existing in an ongoing capacity. Birds yacht overhead. Somewhere a siren violinizes.

Backstory (skip if allergic to lore): Once upon a current event, the girl never was born. Her name is either Rosalyn or Not Applicable; she arrived pre-disappointed and post-ecstatic, which psychologists call a mood donut. Her mother was the sun except actually a flashlight; her father was municipal grass except more paternal. I’m crying now (dramatic sincerity), but also laughing (comic tragedy), because this is satire of sincerity of satire.

Climax: she doesn’t go in. Or she does. Both occur simultaneously, causing a palindrome of causality that starts later and ends before it begins. The cord trembles. The sun whispers “I am the moon but brighter.” The orange wall turns slightly more orange, a hue I’ll name Orangerine™. Somewhere, bureaucracy signs a form with a crayon.

Moral (objectively universal): Doors are metaphors for doors. If you think about it, municipal grass is just government hair. The end concludes here earlier than expected, as foretold1.

Girl (age: ∞ minus Tuesday) stands/sits/oscillates beside an orange wall that’s redder than orange but mainly beige if you concentrate incorrectly. The sun, a circular rectangle, drools photonic mayonnaise on municipal grass (tax-funded chlorophill [sic], grassing at a government angle). A cord/cørd/chord/chard droops upward, plugged into Not-Electricity™ (volts per vibe), sprouting from a tiny door that is huge, ajar, closed, yawning, whispering illuminously dark. Above/below/near: a button of rubberized brass (rubrazz?), engraved in Helvetica Fright: ONE PUSH PER RESIDENT PER LIFE, which obviously means infinite if you’re diagonal.

Girl contemplates at sprint-speed. “Yes,” she says, articulating “no,” or “maybe-no-yes.” Consistency achieved through rich inconsistency. Description escalates until it evaporates: wall oranges more orange than orange; municipal grass legislates itself; sun rotates without motion, a cold flare; cord spirals straightly; door macro-minimizes; button beeps silent thunder. Birds hover downward, cloud emerges subterraneanly, time lines up behind itself to cut in front.

Lore (mandatory/optional): Girl was un-born twice, midwifed by the wall who was the sun who was her mother who is the municipal grass, paternally. Favorite dislike: orange. Least unfavorite fear: doors. She memorized the manual backward: “PUSH=PULL=PAUSE=PERISH (void where vivid).”

Action (static): She grasps by not touching. The cord yanks her nowhere toward the door she approaches by receding. The button unblinks; the wall advances by staying; the sun cools warmly. She decisively undecides and presses abstention. Nothing happens loudly; everything occurs offstage; outcomes re-enter as prefaces.

Aftermath (ongoing): Wall Oranger Orangest Oranger-Than-That-But-Less. Grass files Form GR-33 to be greener; application denied/approved/undecided/yes-no; each stamp unstamps the prior stamp in a rubberbandictment. Shadows brighten, highlights dim; the cord issues a pamphlet about proper dangling; the door enlarges into a smaller enormity and refuses to open closed.

Moral (incorrect, permanent): Doors are chairs in disguise; the sun is a lamp if misunderstood; municipal grass = government hair, shampooed by taxes; a cord is a muscular question mark; a girl is an ellipse that refuses its dot. For clarity, please press the other button that isn’t there.

>>24648367

the thread will stay coherent with rentry but I do like the length limit, that should stay the same

>>24648409
incoherence is lit's secret sauce

>>24648400
They said write a story based on the image, not regurgitate inane descriptions from the image itself.
>The cord continues existing in an ongoing capacity. Birds yacht overhead. Somewhere a siren violinizes.
This retard read the frags section in King’s “On Writing” and had to make it everyone’s problem.

>>24648412
incoherent posts are interesting if they came from an anon's diseased brain but just feels like AI time wasters

>>24648421
agree. it's schizo without the soul, immediately obvious.

>>24648421
yeah on second thought you are right
i chuckled at the prurient light verse but this is at once dense and airy stuff

>>24648409
>>24648363
>rentry
I would still prefer to keep posting totally in-site and anonymously. Hopefully that's allowed as well.

Girl—locally Lipschitz, globally nonmeasurable, finite-perimeter boundary with indeterminate trace—occupies, if “occupy” may predicate a fuzzy σ-compact support, the penumbra of an orange wall whose chroma overstates saturation while underwriting jurisdiction, municipal grass (state chlorophyll with compaction > recreational spec, amortized quarterly) serving as epigraph and affidavit; above, a metastable sun with apodized glare and lognormal flux performs illumination as aliasing so that brightness, windowed wrong, approximates fog.

Between ordinance and volition—a misregistered frame pair—a cord hangs in catenary solving Euler–Lagrange except at a plug clopen in the topology of Not-Electricity, an impedance regime where ohms collapse into conviction per capita, “per capita” being enumerated by a census whose sampling frame declined to exist; tugging, proscribed and inevitable, yields strain hardening without yield, hysteresis sans memory, therefore an archive.

Installed at an ergonomically unratified height: a tiny door—dimensionally minute, jurisdictionally vast—imposing Dirichlet at hinge, Neumann at jamb, yet ajar and sealed; proximate, a brassoid rubberized button, rubricated in counterfeit-neutral sans serif, declares ONE PUSH PER RESIDENT PER LIFE, decidable only on a σ-algebra over persons present and countable and neither.

Photons laminate; shadows brighten; highlights matte into despair; grass, evapotranspiring commendably yet subpoenaed by hydraulic head, leans to audit the footing; admitted breeze remains phatic, failing to advect meaning.

Intention—a Markov blanket with null interior—pullbacks “yes” through “perhaps” to “no,” vacuously commuting; the decision tree, a Möbius arbor, grows leaves that are roots on the reverse side: minutes without time.

Contact by noncontact at distance normalized 0; the cord tautens laxly; the button pre-blinks a siren denominated in decibels per doubt; the door enlarges into lesser significance; bureaucracy emerges from the concept of hallway, stamping APPROVED / DENIED / UNDECIDED / YES–NO, each idempotent impression palindromically unmaking the prior—rubberbandictment—until process converges to resultlessness.

She presses abstention; the button returns null; ingress remains theory, egress allegory; sun files disclaimer; wall oranges further/less; grass petitions greener and is fined for surplus hue; time queues behind itself to be earlier; shadows, emancipated, cast objects; and the theorem—door=doorchair; cord=musclebound question mark; sun=misremembered lamp; municipal grass=tax-shampooed hair; button=life quantified one fewer than needed—holds only vacuously.

Locally Lipschitz girl, globally unmeasured will,
finite-perimeter boundary with indeterminate thrill—
no, trace—occupies (if “occupy” may predicate a fuzzy σ-compact
support) the penumbra of an orange wall whose chroma overreports fact,
underwrites jurisdiction, lets municipal grass, amortized quarterly, act
as affidavit, as epigraph, as lawn that yawns: exact / inexact.

Above: a metastable sun, apodized glare, lognormal flux;
illumination miswindowed into aliasing, brightness ≈ fog = deluxe.
(Paradox in a smog—yes, rhyme; accept the shrugging plug.)

Between ordinance and volition—misregistered frames, skew planes—
a cord hangs catenary, Euler–Lagrange compliant until the plug explains
itself by being clopen in the topology of Not-Electricity,
impedance denominated in conviction per capita per city
where “per capita” counts from a census that scheduled itself to not exist.
Tugging, proscribed and inevitable, archives hysteresis without gist.

At an ergonomically unratified height:
tiny door, minute dimension / vast jurisdiction, right?—
Dirichlet at hinge, Neumann at jamb, sealed-yet-ajar;
adjacent: brassoid rubberized button, counterfeit-neutral sans serif star,
declaring ONE PUSH PER RESIDENT PER LIFE, decidable solely on a σ-algebra of who is present, countable, and neither, bizarre.
(“Life / knife”—we will not.)

Photons laminate; shadows brighten into matte despair;
grass, evapotranspiring under subpoena of hydraulic head, leans to audit there;
a breeze is admitted as phatic noise, a nothing said to air.

Intention: a Markov blanket with null interior—
pullbacks “yes” through “perhaps” to “no,” a sterile corridor,
commuting vacuously. The decision tree, Möbius-arbored, grows leaves
that are roots on the reverse side; the minutes minute; time thieve(s).

Contact by noncontact, distance normalized 0;
the cord tautens laxly; doubt quantizes the siren’s dB-o;
the door enlarges into smaller significance (large ∧ little, idem);
bureaucracy exits the concept of hallway with clipboards to rhythm
stamping APPROVED / DENIED / UNDECIDED / YES–NO—each idempotent blow
palindromically unmaking the prior: rubberbandictment in slow mo.

She presses abstention—the button returns null;
ingress remains theory; egress, allegory; the docket, full;
sun files disclaimer; the wall oranges further/less; the grass seeks greener, pays hue-dues;
time queues behind itself to be earlier, shadows emancipate and cast their clues.

Therefore (if therefore can ever therefore here):
door = door chair;
cord = question mark musculature;
sun = lamp misremembered as nature;
municipal grass = tax-shampooed hair;
button = one push fewer than required to square
the life that counts, that doesn’t, that can’t, that won’t—
a proof that holds, if holding counts, vacuously;
a rhyme that rhymes only because it shouldn’t.

t minus <5 mins. save us timer

>>24648430
I'd like to give feedback to any anon that actually wants it, any anon's still around at the end could request it when posting? or making a trip could mean they want feedback?

Verily, upon the pseudo-verdant epidermis of that horticulturally ambiguous plane—which, though ostensibly grass, resembled more the regurgitation of a deranged topographer armed with crayons dipped in the bile of cosmic indigestion—there did situate, or perhaps mis-situate, a solitary hominid female, costumed in a chromatically confrontational blouse of rubescent persuasion and a skirt whose pleats oscillated between sartorial irrelevance and outright ontological crisis. This hapless mannequin of perplexity, her cranial dome craned skyward in a gesture oscillating chaotically between invocation, ophthalmological prophylaxis, and interpretive semaphore, did brandish her digits against her brow as though to shield her fragile cerebrum from the hypertrophic absurdity of the architecture which, like some petrified tsunami of masonry, reared up behind her with lachrymose enormity.

For lo! The edifice—a concatenation of vermicular columns, hypertrophied recesses, and accreted architraves—rose like the fossilized exhalation of an architect whose libido had been sublimated into geometry, birthing an edifice whose proportions mocked both sanity and scale. At its fulcrum yawned a door—nay, a micro-portal, a diminutive carbuncle upon this titanic integument—a doorway so pathetically minikin that ants themselves might file lawsuits alleging architectural discrimination.

Meanwhile, the umbilicus—black, serpentine, umbriferous—snaked across the green expanse in arabesques of nihilistic choreography, tethering our damsel to some unseen apparatus of metaphysical malevolence, its shadow a viscous inkblot spreading like melancholia across the retinal theatre of the beholder.

Thus she lingered, not as heroine nor victim but as punctuation incarnate, an ambulatory semicolon misplaced in the drunken sentence of existence, condemned to oscillate between monumental grandiosity and risible diminution, a living oxymoron, an ambulant catastrophe of aesthetics, a parable not of meaning but of migraine, inscribed forever upon the epileptic retina of eternity itself.

I said: "So it's a maze."

She said: "You can get extremely lost in it but a maze needs more, y'know? It's a lousy maze but it's a good whatever-it-is."

Her boots clip-clopped over the pavement in a rhythm that I failed to decypher. Clip-clop-clop-clip-clop-clip-clip-clop-clop-clip...

She said: "The paths keep forking and forking and forking, y'know. It's much bigger on the inside."

"What, how? The outside looks plenty big." The building filled most of the horizon.

"It keeps going, y'know? Doesn't take long to get somewhere that literally nobody has ever seen before. Me and Emma—Emma from the village—we used to come here as kids—tie our cords to the tree—"

—and she talked about the corridors that split and splayed, purple carpet and metal tiles, glass windows with only masonry behind them, carvings of fish and birds, ceilings and walls that closed in until you could no longer squeeze through, a floor that waved up and down with water pooling in the troughs.

"Why does it do that?"

"Why...?" she said, and thought. "It just does, y'know? This one time a guy from the university came over, stuck around for a week, but if he understood anything he didn't tell us. It's just nice. To see new stuff and to look for stuff you saw before. We wrote down routes by marking left-right-right-left and so on. There was a place with, y'know, stalactites on the ceiling, that we knew the way to by heart. I bet I could still find it."

A bird chirped three times and I coughed to make it even. I imagined myself marching through the corridors knowing precisely when to turn left and when to turn right but not when to stop. I slowed my pace. She slowed down to match and I felt a surge of fondness.

We came to the entrance. The entrance was wrong. The doorknob was the most offensive. A building like this shouldn't pretend to be a house. I didn't like when buildings lied to me.

"Why is the door like that?"

She shrugged. "Always been that way."

There was something very offensive about the doorknob. I took a deep breath. "I'm not going in."

A flicker of annoyance. "Come on, honey. There's no monsters in there, y'know? With the cord we're perfectly safe."

"If you go in there I won't stop you. But I. No."

She sighed, with a slight smile. "You can wait here and watch this end of the cord and if something happens I'll tug it, okay? If I don't tug it you know nothing happens."

She tied the cord to the tree. She carried the spool with her. She went inside.

I sat under the tree. The sun and the shade and last night's unreset sussed me to sleep.

When I woke up she was holding the spool, looking in my direction, shielding her eyes from the sun. "Hello?" she called out. Not her usual greeting.

I stumbled upright. The cord was no longer tied to the tree. "How was it?"

"Good," she replied, after a pause.

She took her water bottle from her hip and looked at it like she was seeing it for the first time. She drank greedily, gulp-gulp-gulp-gulp-gulp.

Upon the chlorophyllicly pseudo-somnolent, nay, hysterically luminous carpeting of terrestrial simulacra—green yet not, grass yet anti-grass, meadow yet malignant—the maidenish quasi-humanoid, bedecked in raiments of chromatic dissonance (crimson like arterial ketchup, skirt like a melancholic lampshade, boots like post-industrial hooves), did stand, or perhaps not stand but hover ambiguously within the semantic interstice of standing and unstanding, as though nailed by invisible grammar to the stage of some cosmic thesaurus. Her arm, that fleshy semaphore of ocular despair, rose to her brow in a gesture at once heliophobic, histrionic, hydraulic, and vaguely omelet-like, suggesting she sought not shade but an exit from the ontology of perception itself.

Behind her metastasized an edifice, a scarlet petrification of geometry’s ulcer, columns tumefied like hypertrophic baguettes, recesses multiplying like architectural hiccups, architraves wobbling as though intoxicated on their own perpendicularity. And lo, there: the door, that subatomic portal, a rectangular punctuation mark stapled upon the swollen belly of the façade, smaller than ambition, larger than futility, narrower than infinity, a portal suitable only for cockroaches with doctoral degrees in irony.

The cable—serpentine, umbilicate, epistemologically moist—squiggled from her hand like an arthritic worm rehearsing ballet, sprawling across the lawn in glyphs of despair, calligraphic doodles penned by entropy’s drunken uncle. Its shadow, smeared, lurid, unrepentant, oozed outward like spilt melancholy flavored with ink and petroleum, colonizing the green void with an aura of smudged nihilism.

Thus she existed—nay, persisted in linguistic agony—as an ambulatory oxymoron, punctuation personified, a semicolon cosplaying as a heroine, forever entrapped between the monumental gigantism of architectural hubris and the risible diminutiveness of entryways designed by malevolent ants. She was not character but catastrophe, not story but symptom, not art but aneurysm: a migraine painted into being, a redundancy enshrined in pigment, a grotesque palindrome of meaninglessness looping forever and forever and forever—

Time is up!

It’s in the judges’ hands now—“meteor !9HyhcY5dDQ”, “Heng !7z78TXA5V2”, and “son of hermes !thxMIT/E4Y”.
Take your time; we believe in you!

And thank you everyone!
Also shout-out to “a normal dog !!71U6V9o4HL7” for their critiques!

>>24648387
Sure.
>>24648258

Grassgrass greeny gleam glop gloam, wobble-skirt boot-boot clang, hand-face sun-none hup hup hup. Behind-thing red-brick blob-beast, colum-lum-lum archi-bark burp, door-dot dink dink dinkitty dink. Cable-snake squig squag squoggle, flop-loop zizz-zap zoodle, shadow smear smear smear smear smear.

She? Shee? Shuhhh? Semi-she comma-dot half-hero hicc-hocc hrrr-rrrump. Stand-not stand-ish standless stand-ooze. Eye-brow-blocker sun-stumbler face-paw flop-sop bop.

Building goes BLART, door goes pip, grass goes skreek-skreek, cable goes wurm-wurmble wurb. Shadow? Smudge sludge drudge fudge spludge.

Her is not. Is is not. Is-ish is-uhh. Punc-punct-punctuationation semicoloidal hero-blob.

Sentence fall. Word melt. Story cronk. Syntax kaput. Migraine-migraine-migraine.

Glub. Blab. Squoze. Frangle. Nnnnnnnnnnnnn.

Ungh. Blort. Skreee. Hnngh-hnnn.
Grak. Plub. Thwop-thwop.
Znnnnng—brrrgh—flapflap.
Oooorrhh, shmop, dink! dink! dink!
Khhhhh—mrrr—flubble-wub.
Skrunk. Skrunk. Skrunk.
Aaahhh—glomph—nnnnggggg.
Blaaaaarghle.

>>24648469
you can stop now slopanon, rest, now your watch has ended.

I realized quickly most of the last-minute submissions were the same autismo. Nearing bump-limit, here are my winners:
>>24645839
1st place: penisino
Beyond wanting to reward a bold creative decision, this piece really delighted me. I’m no Esperantist, so being able to read this fluidly was both very satisfying and an impressive feat of writerly discretion on your part. The way you have English and Esperanto weave around each other is extremely naturalistic, at least given my experience of Franglais and Spanglish. This is already apparent from the first line with “screen-green,” a phrasing that is native to neither language but a product of both, and this opens up all sorts of poetic opportunities. Of particular interest to me are:
>Another tug; a clicko under ribs: hallway unrollas, floor wax and oranges.
>Mi testas brake: twist-knot, fisherman quick.
>En la centermost doorway, a room flickeras: kuirejo small as a throat.
Admittedly, I had to confirm later that kuirejo means “kitchen,” but this was the only difficulty I had in reading.
I also think that you handle the mysterious nature of the prompt’s structure better than anyone else has. Your reader is in active (if whispered) conversation with the building itself, and this engagement produces something hallucinatory, sensual, and deeply unsettling. Well done!
My last comment is that I suspect you are yodo in disguise. If so, ha! If not, please enter into next month’s /lwc/!
>>24641734
2nd place: DHAMMAZEDI'S GRET & CHEP CANONS
Perhaps I should be embarrassed to learn that a bit of cross-linguistic flair is an easy way into my heart. Oh well! A strength worth noting about this piece is that your prose is both competent and coherent throughout. This isn’t damning with faint praise, I am genuinely impressed by what you managed to do in such a limited format, all while using full clauses. Many other entries, full of poetic intention or not, are rife with sentence fragments, implicature, and dramatism-through-dialogue. There is nothing important left unsaid in this story, with descriptions as rich and complete as need be, and these are testaments to your skillful handling of the challenge.
On dramatism, I am sensitive to the metatheatre going on here, of the tragi-comedy nested within a tragi-comedy. Even though “Tempesta: Lady of Pain” is fictional (I believe?), I feel as though I am deeply familiar with the play because I understand its contents as a reflection of Vee’s journey and that of the entire community surrounding the Blush Temple. Here is method acting without “the method,” and theatre as a redemptive force against life’s suffering. Very nice.
One gripe:
>The resulting press attention saw “Tempesta: Lady of Pain” renter its theatrical run
This should be “re-enter,” right? It’s minor, and it wasn’t what kept you out of the top spot, but it’s a shame given the otherwise-impactful ending.
>>24642862
3rd place: Hart Glass. Crit in reply.

>>24648483
3rd place: Hart Glass (prose entry). This is the most thorough character study of anything ITT. More than that, I think that this piece captures the tension of “a girl standing at the threshold” better than most. Some others have tackled either/both life-course transitions and crossing into this mysterious structure, but the way you’ve fused the two is tense and exciting, full of doubts and dismissals of the same, and the cliffhanger ending reinforced these for me as a reader.
I am (only slightly) frustrated by the frequency of line-breaks at the end, where you had started off with full paragraphs. I think this works insofar as it ratchets up the tension towards opening the door, but in such a short piece this became very apparent as a stylistic choice. This proved somewhat immersion-breaking, which is probably more my fault than yours.
I am left wanting to know more about Aoi and her relationships, her aspirations. Don’t mistake this for disappointment, but hunger! My final note is that, while having two entries isn’t against any “rule,” it does strike me as being against the spirit of the challenge. In this case, it hasn’t kept you off the podium, and neither would having submitted your poetry as an anon secured you a second spot.
I’m excited to see what the other judges thought, where we differ and where we agree. My next post will be brief honourable mentions in this beautiful tirefire of a thread.

>>24648466
>That’s when I ran to the boat. I didn’t look back, I couldn’t, even at the wet crunch and horrible silence.
Laaaaaame prose, lazy imagery. A castrated Lovecraft, all concept with the limpest execution imaginable.

>>24648258
craft note: restrain hedging and forced stammering. there is a gulf between natural dialogue and dialogue that wants to sound natural. there is ample evidence in this piece that you can and do write good natural dialogue, which makes it even more jarring.
do away with adverbs. your average sentence is neat, crisp, shiny. your adverbs stick out like pus on top. some dramatic adjectives too. consider:
>I tried to conceal the horror from her and contorted my face into a pantomime of a smile as the creature pulsated and bubbled like a horrid pot of soup
vs
>I tried to conceal the horror from her and contorted my face into a smile as the creature pulsated and bubbled like a pot of soup
again, these slips stand out so much because your prose is generally clean.
the story structure is a mess. you cannot build cosmic horror in <3k characters. prune down ambition.
you are definitely in the upper quartile of raw skill in this thread but i would not place your entry into the upper quartile of quality. like some other pieces, i see the stitch marks too clearly on it, and the bruises from running up against constraint.

>>24648306
good teenage voice. i wish you had kept it realistic. teenage voice running up against the house of the gods reads YA or incongruent or both.

>>24648464
thank you for running this over so much heckling. this thread has been a wild ride

>>24648493
i disagree, anon. he's competent but he shouldn't imitate lovecraft. neither honestly should most

>>24648483
excellent choices, not far from mine

I had to switch devices because the site thought I was spamming. If only someone else ITT got stopped by this filter!
Honourable mentions:
>>24648083
Telos. I like this for the reasons you might suspect, but this is overall too didactic and relies too heavily on prior knowledge of the material you’re engaging with. Even though I (mostly) get it, and can enjoy how the analytic bleeds into the poetic, I don’t believe this succeeds in being much more than the sum of its parts.
>>24648306
Kultura. This was honestly close to the podium, being so competently done. Ultimately, reading it a few times, it felt directionless. There’s not so much tension as there is anger, and that anger doesn’t go anywhere. Good prose can only carry you so far!
>>24642344
hapa anon. I mean, “killing time” can’t be a coincidence, right? This is fun and engaging comedy, and I enjoyed imagining the bizarre, esoteric political leanings of the Café Anarcho’s patrons.
>>24643795
zwieback. I believe there’s a diamond in the rough here, but perhaps very rough, and perhaps still just free carbon lacking the necessary time and pressure. 90% of your post is made up of sentence fragments, man. Sometimes these are rhythmic and exciting, but most of the time they drove me to deep distraction. Some of your phrasing is, frankly, incorrect. Example:
>A sight wondrous may be lost on her classmates but not her.
Also, the ending is incongruous. Is Anna’s fate to burn out, possessed by filth and wasted potential, or will she burn brighter than the sun? I hope you can tell that I wanted to like this one, but it’s too plagued by these and other issues. Focus on fundamentals.
>>24645270
a normal dog. This entry is included more for your proactive critiques ITT than the post itself. I was excited to see someone write their story in the genre conventions of a greentext, but you ended up dropping this concept pretty early on. At least, you didn’t make a full commitment to such conventions, which could have been interesting had you gone out of your way to break them in some novel way. Otherwise, and with apologies, I can’t say that your handling of the challenge did much for me.
>>24641660
otaku 494949. I can’t be certain that is a critique of my story, but the foot massage (among other elements) certainly makes me think it is. If so, I am comfortable taking narcissistic pleasure from having provoked, even if only in part, such a response. Regardless, this is solid shitposting.
>>24648451
Put down the thesaurus, buddy. Nobody needs to die.

1st >>24641734

2nd >>24642862

3rd >>24642344

Will do the reviews later. Will not be rating all the entries or doing critiques, as there are far more than I had expected (and the majority appear to be spam).

>>24648387
>can you link me your entry so that i can critique it without having to drudge through the muck
Not them but my non-muck entry was >>24648454. I procrastinated very very badly
Thank you for writing these critiques

>>24648510
>he shouldn’t imitate Lovecraft
That anon called him a “castrated Lovecraft.” How exactly, is that a suggestion that he should imitate him? Did you get filtered by a single sentence?

>>24648501
appreciate the critique, just ran out of space to make an ending.

>>24648517
much appreciated and neither did i evaluate my own work as being anywhere near your top picks to be honest
note to self for next time: commitment to the bit. thank you for your hard work trudging through the muck!

>>24648526
pardon my wording. i was disagreeing with his saying that the prose was lame. legitimate technical skill shines through the lovecraft imitation: it was a concession that he shouldn't imitate lovecraft.

>>24648493
>>24648501
One note: the subtext is about what happened to the picture posting it in the thread, the process of asking people here to write about an image like that, and it's aproximately the same quality. There are two layers: the background and exposition, which are nice enough, and the character which was forced and incongruent, like the ending. The background was the best part of the picture, like the bit of dialogue was the best part of the story, and both are more or less the same quality as the imagine. But point taken.

>>24648517
>>>24648306
>Kultura. Good prose can only carry you so far!

I kept having to go back and delete, choosing a topic that can be completed start to finish within the short frame is, itself a skill.

>>24648531
forget trip

Great work everyone (well, almost everyone)! Deeply impressed.
This was tough to call, lots of really good stuff. But here's where I land:
1st place: Dhammazedi
2nd: a normal dog
3rd: Hart Glass
Honourable mentions go to zwieback, ghidra and hapaanon.
In spite of the late flood of AI slop, I still liked the meta deconstructionism of Twelve Remarks, ineptia in disguise and metaanon. They did it better first.
I'm at work right now but if this thread hasn't drowned in cutup mashes I'll provide more detailed critiques tomorrow.

>>24648518
>>24648587
>>24648483
I think it’s safe to call Dhammazedi the overall winner, then?

>>24648587
happy to have placed: thank you!
takeaways:
>consensus pieces are Dhammazedi and Hart
>consensus pieces were by a very large margin the cleanest, most confident prose & architecture in the thread. there is still no substitute for that.
>each judge rewarded one single more experimental piece, with vast divergence between them.
>effective experimental pieces tended to commit to a bit: Esperanto-English for penisino, Anarchist ideology for hapaanon, greentext for me

honestly a rollercoaster. thanks once again

Oh and worst place goes to jap hoe rapper: your bars be weaker than a wet noodle prison, neph

>>24648587
Which one was ineptia all along? The people demand to know

>>24648636
I would discount jap hoe rapper along with the AI blender spam

>>24648640
>ineptia in disguise
>Which one was ineptia all along? The people demand to know
Yes, I was in disguise: This >>24645860 was me.
“I Pie Tin” was too good of an anagram-pseudonym not to use!

>>24648483
penisino = 3 points
DHAMMAZEDI'S GRET & CHEP CANONS = 2 points
Hart Glass = 1 point
>>24648518
DHAMMAZEDI'S GRET & CHEP CANONS = 3 points
Hart Glass = 2 points
hapa anon = 1 point
>>24648587
DHAMMAZEDI'S GRET & CHEP CANONS = 3 points
a normal dog = 2 points
Hart Glass = 1 point
(Via honorable mentions: zwieback, ghidra, and hapa anon = .5 points)

TOTALS:
>1st place
DHAMMAZEDI'S GRET & CHEP CANONS, 8 points
>2nd place
Hart Glass, 4 points
>3rd place
penisno, 3 points
>4th place
hapa anon, 2.5 points

Judges, have I reflected your results accurately?

>>24648656
I feel like hapa anon should be tied for third since it was also honorably mentioned here >>24648517

Curious that only tripfags recieved attention from tripfags.

>>24648656
>>24648483
Mi estas honorita. Sed ne estas yodo. Mi ne scias who that even is. Regardless, I will enter the next as well.
Incidentally, "penisino" is a coinage by native Esperanto speaking-children. It means vagina: "penis"+feminizing suffix.

>>24648656
>hapa anon, 2.5 points
I believe this should be 1.5, one from meteor and 0.5 from Heng. Still, that would land hapa anon in 4th. I would have amended my honourable mentions if I knew they came with points, à la >>24648667 but if my math is right then that would only be 2 points.
Thanks for running this, ineptia! A shit show redeemed. Hopefully, if you decide to run this again, you won’t find the same pushback.

>>24648674
i only tripfagged for this comp. i think that goes for the majority here. it's sorta comp convention as i understand it.

>>24648680
early pushback wholly refuted imo

Thank you for doing this. The thread became a casket containing all of /lit’s accumulated wonders and horrors. As others have said: this is the best and worst thread I've seen in a long time.

I'm no critic. But of the pieces I love, here are some thoughts on those I feel to whom I can qualify that love with language. That said, I enjoyed some aspect of nearly everything.

>>24645839
Beautiful crossbred language from across the uncanny valley.

>>24648013
Your voice is as clear as glass and ten times as cold. A joy to read.

>>24642862
Again for your photonic prose. Felt drenched in memory. Very immersive, both physically and psychologically.

>>24641660
Big skill pretending to be dumb dayo. But I see you.

>>24646436
Never in history has someone's mother been called a whale with such music and grace.

Gratz everyone.

>>24648690
Forgot trip.

>>24648687
Vaugely, but they knew enough of eachother's prose to pick out one posting under a pseudonym, and you are effortfagging so they're jerking you off. Trips do as they must.

>>24648667
>I feel like hapa anon should be tied for third since it was also honorably mentioned here >>24648517
>>24648680
>I believe this should be 1.5, one from meteor and 0.5 from Heng. Still, that would land hapa anon in 4th. I would have amended my honourable mentions if I knew they came with points, à la >>24648667 but if my math is right then that would only be 2 points.

Sorry, retallying hap anon:
From son of hermes: +.5
From meteor: +1
From Heng: +.5
hapa anon total = 2

So, hapa anon does stay in fourth, but there score is now tied with normal dog.

TOTALS:
>1st place
DHAMMAZEDI'S GRET & CHEP CANONS, 8 points
>2nd place
Hart Glass, 4 points
>3rd place
penisno, 3 points
>Tied for 4th place
hapa anon, 2 points
normal dog, 2 points (from Heng)

Have I got it untwisted now?

Thank you judges and thank you for second place! I agree with everything said here. Congratulations to Dhammazedi for writing the best, most self-contained sub 3k character prose I've ever seen on this board. Some flash-notes:

>>24645270
Thank you for your critiques.

>>24648306
Voicey, as noted elsewhere. I look forward to seeing more work from you.

>>24643795
Excellent character work.

>>24645839
Excellent language work.

Additionally, I think it's time I reveal that otaku 494949 was me in disguise. I did not mean to parody anyone's story: I was meaning to take the piss out of those who were complaining about the anime image. I'm glad it was liked!

Confirming: "otaku 494949" is Hart Glass in disguise.

>>24648704
In point of fact, faggot, it seems none of us accurately ID’d ineptia. More than that, none of the judges rated I Pie Tin.
>>24648687
Wholly refuted and then some, Christ.

> "CORMAC McCARTHY" AWARD GOES TO:
> DHAMMAZEDI'S GRET & CHEP CANONS
>>24641734

> "HARLAN ELLISON" AWARD GOES TO:
> hapa anon - Cambon Observatory Incident Report -
>>24642344

> "ALEISTER CROWLEY" AWARD GOES TO:
> zwieback ->>24643795

> "JORGE LUIS BORGES" AWARD GOES TO:
> Filthered -- Le Hecking Schrödinger's Door-
>>24641149

Still going through the entries.

>>24648716
In point of fact, faggot, a seperate trip identified it first. And another point of fact, faggot, you all refused to discuss the grading criteria.

>>24648710
>Have I got it untwisted now?
That’s definitive, I think. Congratulations to our winners!
I’ll bow out of the thread now. I’m excited to see what comes next, whether here or in /lwc/.

This whole thread is all just cope for the fact that AI genuinely mogs and we simply cannot catch up anymore

Who ever wrote the whale poem that BTFO'd this abominable drone, please make yourself known.

>>24648742
Nah. It was gay discord faggots jerk off time. At least we know.

>>24648742
Are you serious? The AI slop in this thread is not only instantly recognizable, it's also grating to read.

>>24648742
Point to an AI entry you liked. (Hint, you can’t.)

>>24648749
>>24648754
The following AI posts are all way better than the top 3 by every metric (can't quote directly because 4nig thinks I am spamming) 24648250 24648302 24648341 24648361 24648408

>>24648710
>>24648738
Huh? If Hermes’s honorable mention counts for hapa it should also count for dog. 2.5 for dog. 4th place, hapa 5th. Why are you counting past 3rd at all?

>>24648827
idiot and/or bait
each one of those posts is a mishmash dazzling to the skimmer and meaningless on close reading, like anything out of a probabilistic model

I


Will there be a second /wibac/ ?

there will be no /wibac/ withou anons complaining about the image as not erfect, when it can only very loosely relate. Future /wibac/'s note any image of a woman will result in a flood of rageposting from faggots without girlfriends.

I lost. I'm now sad. :(

>>24648873
any given entrant has a tiny chance of winning. don't take it too hard, ginger. the only losers are the jap hoe rapper and ai spammer

>>24648869
hope so. this was a lot more animated than the average /lwc/

>>24648851
>Huh? If Hermes’s honorable mention counts for hapa it should also count for dog. 2.5 for dog. 4th place, hapa 5th.
Oh my goodness, you’re right:
a normal dog (+.5 from son of hermes; +2 from Heng) = 2.5 points, 4th place
hapa anon (+5 from son of hermes; +1 from meteor; +.5 from Heng) = 2 points, 5th place
>Why are you counting past 3rd at all?
Yes, really there’s only 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, but I always tally a little deeper to make sure I’m not making a mistake—which, as you can see, I’m pretty good at doing.

Congratulations to the winners of the first (and definitely not the last) /wibac/:

>1st place
>>24641734
>2nd place
>>24642862
>3rd place
>>24645839

>>24645270 and >>24642344 for 4th and 5th—let’s call them honorable mentions.

To anyone who likes participating in writing comps like these (with a lot less chaos and a lot more critiquing), I’d recommend checking out /lwc/, the next of which starts on September 6th.
The next /wibac/ will take place on September 20th.

Sincerely, thank you to those of you who authentically shared your unique writing with us all.
I know I will be returning to this thread a lot, not just to re-live its craziness, but to re-read and re-cherish the earnestness of you all.

>>24648881
It was only my 3rd or 4th time writing so I had no chance but this kind of got me motivated. I should do this more often.
Like, just get a random picture and write about it. It was surprisingly easy to come up with something creative(of course creativity depends also on how much I've read myself, to which I haven't read much).
Anyways good thread, for the most part but some of it was pure cancer.

>>24648889
Please to god pick an actual piece of art next time

May I suggest something by Goya

Since we’re past bump-limit, I made a cool-down thread to continue discussion over everyone’s entries here:

>>24648905
>>24648905
>>24648905

Its OP image is the alternate piece of art I was going to choose for this thread—no competition to it, but feel free to write about it if you want.

>>24648869
>>24648881
There will be not more /wibac/
I'll make a post explaining why in a few minutes (no, I'm not inepsia or whatever that tripfag name its spelled as)

>>24648902
>goya
My negro. Or at least something evocative. The fuck were we supossed to do with the image provided?

>>24648902
Fuck off crab loser. I'm so glad this thread became such a success in spite of your seething retardation. You're ngmi, neither here, nor on /ic/, or anywhere else lol
cope and seethe

>>24648925
It was a "success" in spite of the obvious flaws, namely an uninspired image and opaque grading criteria; most people just wanted to enter a contest. The art was much worse than most writing in the thread.

>>24648915
Did you read the thread? Lots of people came up with lots of things.

>>24648932
pyw

>>24648938
Yes, in spite of the prompt not because of it.

I can't believe we're still litigating this.
The large variation between so many pieces sharing a few simple elements was one of the best parts of the thread.

>>24648965
Litigating what? A prompt is a prompt; there are better and worse. This one was worse, and people would like better.

>>24648932
>grading criteria
Chiming back in since we have a spill-over thread now. I doubt any of us are creative writing profs with rubrics ready-to-go. We’re just volunteering to give a tiny bit of structure to the contest. My judgements were qualitative, not quantitative, and you can read why I liked what I liked. If you’re made uneasy by a lack of concrete metrics, then I recommend just ignoring the thread. This is always going to be fundamentally unserious, but it can be fun if you choose to engage with it.
>>24648949
The definition of a skill issue.

>>24648965
It all goes back to how cancerous are some boards in this site (red boards in particular). /ic/ being one of them, where great talent and the most retarded and unhinged schizos coexist in the same place. In that board retarded schizos prey on the talented anons and chase them wherever they go to ruin their lives. That's all it is. And we apology for dragging one of those turds all over here.

>>24648973
My main concern is creating a cult of personality based on appeasing some random people and jerking off one guy from another board for his art. People asked what won in the past, what people liked and disliked, then got no feedback about it. A piece of writing isnt "good" because it uses 6 literary devices instead of 5, but knowing what the expectations are is a relatively minor ask, especially considering no one knows who you are, or has any reason to care. There's no reason there cant be 2 or 3 prompts to choose from as well. The art is free and from another board. The population of this board is small, after a few iterations people will immediately start forming cliques of tripfags and the exact problem of para-sympathetic comunitees will arise that always do without clear structure.

>>24649003
Good points, but the structure of 4chan allows easy fixes:
Rotate judges and/or occasionally allow entrant-voting like /lwc/
Mandate judge feedback (not far off here. hermes gave feedback and the other two have said they will: let's wait and see)
Pseudo-anonymity: tripcodes have obvious benefits for these competitions, but bias can be mitigated by mandating new ones for each. Real magazine submissions and comps often work like this by the way.

>>24649003
>Muh main concern ("..faggot blabbering..")
STFU, no one cares about the "art", we care about the opportunity to play a game, to share and to contribute to the board as a community. Having a unique image works. The pic was nice and inspiring and people delivered, in spite of your stupid antics. Just go away, go crab on someone else, you're not pissing off the artist (who surely cares more about /ic/ than this board), you're pissing off the /lit/ community here. GTFO

>>24649003
>what won in the past
Nothing, this is the first /wibac/.
>what people liked and disliked
If the judges answered this, then this would become a bigger personality-driven-jerk-fest than what you (erroneously imho) see now. The submissions would just work towards pleasing the admittedly arbitrary tastes of the judges. So, it’s better left unsaid.
>There's no reason there cant be 2 or 3 prompts to choose from as well.
The main reason I can think of is that it keeps things focused, and allows for a diversity of takes on the exact same prompt. Compare how /lwc/ has just one theme and one character requirement.
If it’s any consolation, there is no guarantee that I or either of the other judges will be here next month. So, even if you had a solid grasp of what we were looking for, it could and would change by next month.
>>24649021
>Rotate judges
See above.

I think we should have ai judge

>>24649021
I'm not being a dick for 'tism purposes, but if the process is clear, as well as the assessment criteria, it becomes easier for the contestants to make high quality outputs. This is also the exact situation for tripfagging, but maintaining a persona is not necessary when you can randomize it.

>>24649033
>first one
Fair. And for the record, I dont know how that board works, so I'll lurk a bit.

Anyways, it seems you dont understand what I mean by grading criteria. It's less "write a first person noir narrative full of apophasis" or "write a poem with double internal rhyme and enjambment", and more "submissions will be weighted towards narrative structure, vivid imagery, and capturing the specifics of the prompt". The former is descriptive, the latter lets people know what to expect and where to focus their time.

>>24649046
Grok, rate this anon's idea

This is who AI says should have won, with actual scoring

>>24649068
>"submissions will be weighted towards narrative structure, vivid imagery, and capturing the specifics of the prompt".
I admit that I didn’t take this as your meaning, but I also don’t see how such stipulations would be a real boon. I ranked a bilingual prose-poem first because I thought it was the best piece of writing. If we had even the very basic imposition of English as a criterion, then we wouldn’t have gotten that. The prompt is the constraint, and though I understand that you take issue with this particular prompt, any further constraints might seriously limit creative horizons. Again, if this makes you too uneasy, then you should ignore this whole thing, or perhaps re-evaluate why and how you write.

>>24649088
come on post the whole list

>>24649109
I did in the other thread
>>24649092
>>24649097

>>24649101
Those arent constraints, and it doesnt require granularity of language, creativity, or structure. What it does is signal to contestants that writing a cohesive plot is important, or that the prompt should be captured specifically rather than interpreted in an abstract sense. Same with whether you should focus on resonance or figurative language. Maybe you shouldnt be grading things at if it's exclusively based on how you feel with no other qualifiers. Cant write to an audience if they're fickle and dismissive

>>24649127
>Maybe you shouldnt be grading things at if it's exclusively based on how you feel with no other qualifiers. Cant write to an audience if they're fickle and dismissive
Alright lad you can fuck off. At first I was relieved when you said you were new to the board, but you’ve got a lot of nerve to raise this kind of stink. I don’t deserve a medal for doing this, but I spent my time reading and evaluating the posts ITT for the love of the game. If ineptia provided other criteria, I would have followed it. I nonetheless think allowing greater freedom for contestants and judges alike was the right call.
If you don’t like it, fine, but fuck off. I think I’ve been anything but dismissive of your concerns, I just don’t agree with you and your demonstrably minority position.

>>24649145
Aint even mad, you're just a pompous faggot with more smug than substance taking potshots from a fake position of authority granted by another board. You can think whatever you want, seems as if you cant articulate why, and are happy to talk shit as long as it's not reciprocated.

>>24649161
You heard the voice of the board. Fuck off. You are a lame and undesirable crab on /ic/ and you're a lame and undesirable troll on /lit/ now.
Well done retard. Go back.

>>24649229
Never been to /ic/, and it's not trolling when it's true. I dont know what a "voice of the board" is, but it certainly sounds like a self appointed title given to a guy who likes to passive aggressively talk shit, then cried when it's reciprocated.

>>24649229
I don’t need you defending me, nor am I “the voice of the board.” It’s my fault for getting flammed.
>>24649237
I shouldn’t keep replying, but I’ll give you the W. You got me good. I don’t know what you mean by the passive-aggression, as I never intended any.

>>24649161
>Fake position of authority
A “fake position of authority” is redundant. A fake position is inherently devoid of authority. And you’re clearly admitting they do have some kind of authority, when they’re the ones organizing the contest and judging the submissions. If you don’t like it, don’t submit and ignore the contest. Not sure what all the hysterics are for, as you clearly don’t have anything worth submitting.

>>24649252
Telling the sycophant to fuck off is nice, but instead of belabouring the point, I suggest rereading what you said; I know exactly why and how I write. But water under the bridge.

>>24649261
Oh look at you capitain pedantic dumbass. I certainly hope you're not this guy without his trip on. If you could read, you'd realize the authority was derived from an illegitimate source, another board. And whether they have authority or not is what was being discussed, as legitimate authority is manufactured transparently through due process. Finally, I may or may not have anything to submit, you have no idea at all, and it's asinine to make that assumption. Reading comprehension is earned. Seething pretension is chosen, and the tension you mention is the ambrosia of dolts; the product of an addled mind.

>>24649299
>I know exactly why and how I write.
Ah, yup, see how that line could be read as something other than what I intended. I won’t insult you further by trying to explain myself. I hope that, by apologizing, we can set the matter to rest. I’m sorry.
All of this to say that I hope you can look past whatever deficiencies you see in comps like this and join in instead.

>>24649312
Yup, we good. Thanks for your time giving people feedback, and I know I can be a dick.

>>24649299
>If you could read, you'd realize the authority was derived from an illegitimate source, another board
So not a “fake position of authority” but illegitimate authority. A “fake position” implies authority doesn’t exist, but you clearly admit here it does.

>And whether they have authority or not is what was being discussed
Except that’s a moot point, when you’ve already implicitly agreed the authority exists by questioning the judges’ rationale for their awards. If they’re the ones announcing the winners, they’re the ones with authority over the contest. You realize this, but for some reason (probably aspergers) you cling to this idea of a debate where none exists. You’ve already conceded, but you’re too illiterate to even notice.
>ambrosia of dolts
Phrases like that make it evident you don’t read enough to have even the basic understanding of what constitutes good writing. Your limp attempts at prose are hilarious.

>>24649261
>>24649376
It doesn’t take a syntax tree to know he meant fake *position of authority,* and not *fake position* of authority. I’m sorry, but I disagree with you on this, and I disagree with the rest of your conclusions too.
I can neither tell you what to feel nor what to post, but I will ask you to cut this out right now. Even if the other anon fires back, chill out.

>>24649403
>It doesn’t take a syntax tree to know he meant fake *position of authority,* and not *fake position*
Right, he didn’t mean to say something that he said, explicitly: >>24649161

His complaints are founded on nothing, plus he contradicts himself with every new post. Complete and utter pseud. Possible even ESL? Who knows.

>>24649299
>I certainly hope you're not this guy without his trip on.
How new are you? You'll have to be blind and retarded to not be able to see that the hermes faggot is hopping off his trip to throw shit at you and then turning it on and telling that "anon" to calm down. In am effort to make xerself look as a mature and reasonable
Typical tripfag behavior btw

>>24649503
STFU ESL crab! Why don't you go back to /v/?

>>24649503
I may trip for competitions, but that doesn't make me a deranged lunatic. If I cared at all about my "brand" on an image board (lmao), white knighting myself would be suicide.

>>24649503
Just to assuage any doubts, picrel.

>>24649503
I mean it seems like he's familiar with trip shenanagains considering how he replied.

>>24649595
Well all know inspect element chum.

>>24648905
>>24648905
>>24648905

>thread so dead he links it again to attract the schizos
Why are you like this?