Story One:
‘That belongs in a museum!’
Sorry, couldn’t help meself. There’s certainly some Indiana Jones vibes with this piece interlaced with some very in-depth descriptions and pretty well written characterization. Although I feel for the latter the author could/should have developed this a lot more. You only get snippets of the named adventurers and it leaves a tantalising taste...without ever getting to enjoy the whole dish.
The pacing and environment were exquisite however, the pace slowly down perfectly where it needed to. Meanwhile you could almost hear the warble of the birds and the swishing of leaves in the breeze.
The twist was mayhaps a little obvious and the overall concept has been done a lot but I did enjoy the little bit of philosophy and hope at the end.
Story Two:
Question-thing: Is this meant to be set in the 40k universe due to the presence of C’Tan shards or is it meant to be Fantasy but highlighting the potential connection between the two universes (or that they even exist in the same one?)
Regardless, I really dig the layout of this piece, flipping between POVs of the acolyte and teacher, with each POV titled after them. It’s not a form seen that much, so really gives this piece a nice uniqueness.
The meat of this story is a very well written paranoia horror showing the descent of the main character into madness (though part of me for a few moments wondered if there would be a twist reveal that he was right.) The mystery and built up suspense leading to the reveal was masterfully done.
There’s a few odd spelling mistakes and areas that could be improved with a little more proofing, but this is just a minor complaint to an otherwise very enjoyable piece.
Story Three:
Hey, a bonifide AoS piece! And in Ghur too! My Astral Templar Knight-Azyros thanks you!
Description was very detailed and on point to the point of being vivid. The pacing whilst slow oozed depth and mayhaps a little baited tension. The reveal at the end was a very nice touch and does really fit in with the stoic statue-like nature of the Seraphon.
I do feel like I wanted a bit more from the Duardin and Human, they serve the role of narrators with some nice little moments of fun characterization. But I feel they could have been much more. Likewise, an extra proof read would have helped iron out this piece.
Nonetheless, this was a nice little look at the mortal realms and how the Seraphon can hide in plain sight.
Story Four:
Oh wow. Thank you, whoever wrote this piece.
It’s zany, utterly ridiculous, and so much fun to read. Its lack of seriousness possibly won’t help it garner as many votes as it probably deserves compared with some of the other deeper and more impactful entries, but I have got to say that I love what this author did with the prompt.
So we get the classic finale of a murder mystery where detective Poirot the Inquisitor reveals each potential murderer for their truth/role until finally revealing who the real murderer is...except each reveal becomes more and more absurd...until the fourth wall is torn down and what are left are poor players who strut and fret their hour upon stage and are heard no more. And then poor Liz wakes up.
I suppose a minor complaint is that the one lizardman was more a footnote than the focus, but speaking as a Skaven wearing a scale-suit to trick-trick you foolish scale-things totally trustworthy scale-thing, this didn’t dissuade me too much from enjoying this piece. Fantastic work!
Tzeentch plays such wonderful little games.
