Karura is eight years old, the daughter of a baker, and the newest genin in Sunagakure.... more>>

She's also the most dangerous puppeteer the village has produced in a generation, and nobody can figure out why.

In a hidden village struggling with poverty, sandstorms, and enemies on every border, Karura builds puppets that shouldn't exist, fights like she's been doing it for decades, and quietly works to make life better for the people around her. Her teammates don't know what she really is. Her sensei simply does with what he's given. The Puppet Brigade looks to her as the next leader.

She has secrets she can't share. Power she can't explain. And a village that's going to need every bit of both, because Sunagakure deserves to finally stand at the top for once. <<less

Some among mankind held greater gifts than others. Whether they were passed down from ancient times through bloodline, resurfaced through sheer fortuitous chance, or perhaps arose anew as a beneficial mutation, some were simply born chosen. Zanma was not among those few.... more>>

The only inborn gifts permitted to him were endurance and nimble fingers. He practiced no lost, one-of-a-kind technique and possessed no artifact that would permit him to advance ten times faster than his peers. He was merely above average, but it was him who his master chose as one of two inheritors.

Indeed he was merely above-average, and yet, out of his generation, it was he who would carve his name into history and come to be known as a monstrous genius, a destroyer of evil and upholder of righteousness; not by the virtue of a heavenly gift, but his own two hands.

What To Expect:

- Psychic powers. This is nearly half of the cultivation system.

- Puppets, as in proper puppets, not just robots or mind controlled people, and Zanma will use them as his main thing rather than a support tool that gets tossed aside (can you tell this bothers me in xianxia?)

- Extremely far-future setting. Technology so advanced it becomes simple again. The story takes place in a manmade megastructure.

- "No Golden Finger" - this is somewhat only partially true, but the point is that Zanma doesn't have heavenly talent or a heaven-defying time dilation bead that lets him cultivate 10x as fast. I want to write a character who is "normal" but still ends up being interesting and gains the reputation of a "monstrous genius" due to his own merits. I generally don't like the common trend of xianxia focusing on how you can only get ahead by finding ways to cheat.

- No harem.

Submitted for Writathon Nov.2025 <<less

Arthur Moreau disappeared during a live broadcast.... more>>

No warning. No transition. No last words.

One moment he was finishing a world event in front of fifty thousand viewers. The next, he was gone, and what arrived somewhere else was Gepetto: his character, his creation, the most feared Marionettist ever built in a game where power was the only language that mattered.

The world that caught him is not new to collapse. Gods have existed here, and some of them have died. What stands now is only the latest arrangement of a cycle that never needed him.

Elysion is a Republic in the way that a cracked foundation is still a building. The institutions function. The titles exist. But beneath the gas lamps and the steam columns and the elevated rails connecting district to district, the actual structure is simpler: those with enough power do what they want, and everyone else absorbs the cost. The working class breathes chemical residue and calls it employment. The middle class negotiates in a market that has stopped rewarding negotiation, trains for credentials that no longer open doors, and moves forward because stopping is worse. There is no king here. There are only people with enough accumulated weight to act as though the question of permission does not apply to them.

The Church of the Solar God holds the whole thing together, which is not a metaphor. A population that does not share language, origin, or history requires something to organize around, and the Church understood this long before anyone thought to ask. The Solar God is not a symbol. He walks. He acts. He has reasons of his own.

And now, Players have begun to appear.

Not as heroes. Not as chosen figures. As variables carrying power without understanding the system they have entered. The world does not pause for them. It absorbs them, bends around them, and continues.

Gepetto does not try to fight it.

He studies it.

While others assert themselves through force, faith, or the assumption that visibility equals strength, he builds something quieter. Not an army. Not a faction. A structure: distributed, patient, invisible until it is not. A web that does not need to be seen to function.

The skills are real now. The strings are real. And what they touch does not reset.

House of Puppets is a story about control, belief, and the cost of acting in a world indifferent to your intentions. It follows a man who does not seek to win, but to understand the rules well enough that losing becomes unlikely. Because the puppeteer pulls the strings. But in a world this old, someone is always watching.

A word from the author:

House of Puppets is not a standard webnovel. Not power fantasy. You won't get that constant power escalation hit or that achievement system satisfaction. What you get is slow burn, structured more like a novel than serialized content. Each chapter accumulates. Each arc tightens. Tension builds and doesn't release until it's supposed to.

The work touches on philosophy, politics, economy, metaphysics, theology. Everything woven into narrative, not explained to you. If you've already read Lord of Mysteries, Reverend Insanity, A Song of Ice and Fire, works that trust readers to hold complexity, you already know what we're trying to do here.

The ambition is simple and honest: get there. Write something that redefines what this genre can do. I can't promise we make it. I'm a beginner without experience and this work is experimental. But I can promise I'll give everything I have trying. <<less

God is dead. And an empty THRONE, the seat of reality, now awaits it's new ruler.... more>>

In the wake of His dead, the Whiteout came—
a catastrophe that swept across the modern age, granting every human supernatural power, turning reality into a battlefield, and the world into a crucible to forge a new ruler.

On that day, Jack lost everything.

He watched his mother die—
and he recognized the killer.

The man who raised him.
The man who trained him to become the same monster.

Driven by grief, revenge, and the will to survive, Jack enters a world where every act of kindness comes at a brutal cost… and every sacrifice takes something that cannot be returned.

But there is still someone worth protecting.

Elise.

The girl who sees the good in him—
even as he begins to lose it himself.

To save her… and everyone he loves, Jack becomes what he must:
A liar.
A weapon.
The very thing he hates the most.

Not for power—
but for love.

But the more he sacrifices, the less of himself remains.

As reality begins to fracture and the truth behind the THRONE unfolds, Jack is forced to confront the cost of his choices:

What if saving the people he loves…
means becoming the monster he was trained to be?

And when the THRONE is finally claimed—
what will rule reality?

Love?
A necessary lie?
Or something far more terrifying?

***

Early chapter access link and discussions on our Discord: https://discord.gg/EeKHZCKa4v <<less

Mary was once a normal highschool girl, getting ready for her senior year in high-school. That was until the day a home intruder entered her home and bludgeoned her head against the wall, causing her to regain the memories of her past life, of a city mage killed in action. ... more>>

Though the intruder managed to be stopped, her life wouldn't stay the same anymore, not after trying to use the magic of the old world and something else responded... 

She must now navigate a world that she thought was once completely sane to her, now with countless shadows that seem to hide secrets that she had never known to consider, while also reeling from the strange creature that seem to have been born from her magic. 

But that doesn't begin to cover the other questions that rattle within her soul. What is the true nature of this world, why is magic so monstrous in this world, and why does no one know that magic is real? This doesn't get into her new roommate in her mind, who has her own opinions and stance in their life. If their going to continue living their life, they'll need to learn the truth behind the veil and why magic isn't such a sweet fairytale in this world.  

Set in the world of Arcanum, in the Ambrosia Timeline.

Written on Royal Road as well. <<less

Tyane was never meant to fight.... more>>

Raised in secrecy, she broke every rule to claim a forbidden power—and paid for it with exile. Now, alone in a world that hunts what it cannot control, she is taken in by those who see not a child, but a weapon in the making.

Under relentless training, her strength grows. So does the silence inside her.

Then she is taken again.

Bound by the Laces of Anansi—an artifact that can bend will and identity alike—Tyane is forced into a captivity where resistance is not just futile, but erased.

Rescue may come.

But whatever returns may no longer be the girl who fled. <<less

Ten years have passed since the tragedy that shook Delphine Parish—a battle between light and darkness that left the Bordeaux bloodline forever scarred.... more>>

Once, their name stood among the most honored. The Bordeaux family were protectors of the mortal realm and champions within the Pantheon of Egos. But time has a way of twisting legacies. Their lineage, once blessed, now bears the weight of redemption.

Through whispers of the past and eyes that see beyond the veil, the world watches as Noir Bordeaux makes his choice—carry on the family legacy, or leave it behind and start anew. His mother’s sacrifice, his godmother’s guilt, the ancestors’ mistakes, and the echoes of ancient spirits all converge within Meteor Kingdom, where blood, power, and fate intertwine beneath the southern moon.

What began as a simple tale of survival becomes something far deeper—a testament to legacy, love, and the heavy price paid to protect them. <<less

"Born directly from the pits of Hell, imps are among the least of the true devils; these vicious, manipulative fiends, however, hold an important role in the corruption of mortal souls. Unfettered from the ranks and duties of diabolical armies, imps delight in any opportunity to travel to the Material Plane and subtly tempt mortals toward acts of ever-greater depravity.... more>>

Imps vary widely in appearance, ranging through a spectrum of bestial traits and grotesque body shapes, though most take the forms of red-skinned, winged humanoids with bulbous features. Such a typical imp stands a mere 2 feet tall, has a 3-foot wingspan, and weighs 10 pounds.

Unlike most devils, imps often find themselves free and alone on the Material Plane, particularly after summonings to serve as familiars and their masters have perished (often indirectly due to the machinations of the imp itself). With no way to return home, these imps, freed of their bonds to arcane masters, can become dangerous pests or even leaders of small tribes of savage humanoids like goblins or kobolds."
- d20pfsrd.com <<less