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Oof! Can't believe November the 1st is coming up so fast, also it's the day my 1st novel The Angaran Chronicles: The Underside is being released Amazon. A novel I wrote the 1st half of for NaNoWriMo 2012. Just made a new docx file for the NaNo part of Secret War: The Annihilation Plague.

Wishing all of you the best of luck!

Oh boy!

I think that means I need to start writing my Aztec Flower Wars rulebook!

 Easy E wrote:
Oh boy!

I think that means I need to start writing my Aztec Flower Wars rulebook!

Just started planning now. I’m really bad with novels (as my past several attempts have shown me), but short stories seem to be much easier. Hoping to use the opportunity to flesh out some old villains, since they barely get any stories outside of entanglements with the protagonists.

I'm not trying to do NaNoWriMo because I'm moving house and I don't have time to write a whole novel.

I have planned a new novel, The Case of the Lonely Girl Detective, which I'm going to get some feedback on from my creative writing club but that won't be until December the way things are going.

Besides, I'm a year behind in finishing The Case of the Call of Cthulhu, so I really ought to work on that first.

SkavenLord wrote:Just started planning now. I’m really bad with novels (as my past several attempts have shown me), but short stories seem to be much easier. Hoping to use the opportunity to flesh out some old villains, since they barely get any stories outside of entanglements with the protagonists.

Short story collections are fun! I'm the opposite, I mostly write long-form stuff which I'd done for so long, when I began my Creative Writing course on short stories, it took me ages to comprehend the difference between them. The critique I got mostly was 'This feels like the 1st chapter of a novel' lol. Good luck with your work!

Kilkrazy wrote:I'm not trying to do NaNoWriMo because I'm moving house and I don't have time to write a whole novel.

I have planned a new novel, The Case of the Lonely Girl Detective, which I'm going to get some feedback on from my creative writing club but that won't be until December the way things are going.

Besides, I'm a year behind in finishing The Case of the Call of Cthulhu, so I really ought to work on that first.

Fair enough, moving house is stressful as frig and it's always a good idea to try to complete old projects before moving on to others. Good luck with moving and hopefully you might be able to do NaNo next year.

How are you guys going with the word count? I'm a bit ahead and having a good time writing my work. Here's a couple of scenes I've finished and pretty happy with.

For context, in the 2nd scene, Attelus is climbing up a man-made plateau to try infiltrate a Sororitas Convent at the top.

For a while now, Dellenger had been fighting to lose his tail, but no matter how hard he tried they kept after him. He counted at least seven of them and while their numbers helped it’d been a long, long time since he’d had such trouble with enemy stealthers, a fact he should not have been surprised by, this was Inquisitorial Black-Ops a whole new, foreign world to him, despite how much it hurt his pride, Dellenger tried to rationalise it by thinking the enemy were using some kind of tech or sorcery to be able to stick to him like adhesive. The very first official mission as a Throne Agent it seemed he’d found his match was pretty damned soul destroying.

It had to be their main enemy’s agents, Dellenger had seen their skill and enhanced abilities first-hand. It had to be, if it was them, it was unlikely he could defeat them, maybe one, but two? Three? But he couldn’t keep this dance going on for much longer, he had to turn and confront them soon. Why did they have to choose him?

A stealth battle like this was a complex, subtle thing. Dellenger knew they wanted him to lead them back to their hideout, but he sure as frig wouldn’t let that happen, not until he was positive he’d lost them, which seemed to be more and more implausible now, much to his frustration. So, he needed to find a good place to try ambush them but until then Dellenger needed to keep moving and as chaotically as possible. He couldn’t go to base, but he couldn’t avoid that part of the city either, as where he did go and where he didn’t go would likely clue their enemy into the general position of their headquarters. He couldn’t stay too long around it either.

It was also likely their enemy had been in the city for longer than them, so knew the best places for an ambush far better than Dellenger. Dellenger had a map of Quorasita in his pocket that he’d looked over dozens and dozens of times since they’d left the Audacious Edge a few days ago. But looking at a map was an entirely different thing than exploring the city first-hand, hence why they’d been doing this scouting mission in the first place.

As he leaped over another alleyway, he felt the presence as it lunged the gap just after him. A frigging presence he hadn’t noticed until now.

Dellenger landed and spun, his knife drawn and flashing in the moonlight as he slashed out desperately. The monomolecular blade sliced through flesh and rib, much to Dellenger's surprise. The figure cried out in agony and fell onto his back, writhing on the rooftop, but that allowed his comrades to close in.

Four figures seemed to emerge from the night, their forms reflecting their surroundings in a bulging, distorted way. The only thing visible were their rebreathers. Behind him, Dellenger felt three more moving in to surround him.. The fact they have cameleoline over a camoleoline cloaks already spoke of their technological capabilities. They ignored their writhing, dying comrade on the ground. An inhuman act Dellenger knew their enemy’s agents were more than capable of.

Dellenger dreaded talking to these fools, so he stayed still, knife raised and beneath his camoleoline cloak, took hold of his lasgun.

‘Who are you?’ said the vox distorted voice, it croaked from the grill of the middle one on the left side and sounded like a droning ornithopter blade. Dellenger made sure to keep his attention forwards as the way the voice echoed made it seem they didn’t want the hearer to know who’d said it, but it was obvious to his attuned hearing.

It only took Dellenger a second to consider his answer and he couldn't help let a smile cross his face as he said, ‘Serghar Kaltos.’

One of the figures started slightly at the mention of the name and it took a good few seconds for the speaker to reply. ‘As in the infamous assassin, Serghar Kaltos? You do not fit his description.’

Dellenger shrugged, they had no idea how much information they’d just given away from just that one sentence alone, if they weren’t grox gaking him, of course. Dellenger was never the best at reading people, especially when he couldn’t see their faces.

The speaker didn’t say anything more, but Dellenger could hear the faint click of a connecting vox-link and the muffled exchange of conversation, but couldn't make out the words and to their credit, they kept their gazes strictly on Dellenger so he couldn’t tell who was speaking to whom.

After a few seconds the vox clicked again and the speaker said, ‘Even with the possibility of re-constructive surgery we do not believe you are Serghar Kaltos, even with how you have managed to evade us until now.’

Dellenger just shrugged again.

‘Who do you work for?’ demanded the speaker, seeming to realise the futility of asking Dellenger his name again.

‘Take a wild guess.’

‘You are Inquisition.’

Dellenger didn’t reply, he didn’t even blink.

‘You are Inquisition,’ said one of the other enemies behind Dellenger’s back. ‘We knew you would come despite our best efforts. But you have fallen into our trap and when there is one Inquisitorial fool, there is always more you are like vermin and-’

The ranter was interrupted as Dellenger opened fire with his lasgun, racking a fully automatic barrage that perforated through the four enemies in front of him in a burst of pink haze. At the same time, Dellenger dropped to the deck, so the impressively fast gun shots of the remaining enemies spat through empty air. Their suppressed autoguns were familiar wet kisses in Dellenger’s ears.

As he fell, Dellenger dropped his knife, took a photon-flash grenade from one of his pouches and tossed it behind him, hoping to hell and back their masks didn’t make them immune or else he’d be very dead, very soon.

The sound of their warped, pained cries almost made him convulse with relief and he rolled to face them, Lasgun shooting. Two of the three were cut down and thrown off their feet. But the last one managed to let off a few blind shots but it didn’t last long before Dellenger had retrieved his knife, lunged the distance between them and plunged the tip through the attacker’s shoulder and together they crashed on the roof. Dellenger pinning the attacker by the throat with his knee.

Dellenger twisted the blade, causing the man to gurgle and gasp, the attacker’s fingers scrambling against his thigh.

‘You’re a talkative one, aren’t you?’ said Dellenger. ‘If you keep being talkative like that you’ll be spared the agony that will make my knife in shoulder seem like nothing very soon.’




Attelus awoke with a start and couldn’t help crying out as his mind comprehended the fact he was a good four hundred metres off the ground and hanging off the surface of a sheer cliff face. Luckily he was still wearing his re-breather so his cry was a mere muffled mutter in the wind. Despite fighting the urge, he looked down to the forest canopy long below and had to fight to gain control of his heart as it crashed inside his ribcage, making every inch of him pulse painfully with the fear.
He hadn’t meant to fall asleep, he didn’t even know he’d fallen asleep.

It took Attelus a few minutes to calm himself down, doing so with long slow breathes, but when the panic disappeared so did the adrenaline rush which allowed the pain to rush back. The ache eclipsed his every inch, causing him to cry out again through gritted teeth.

Gasping and groaning through gritted teeth, Attelus pushed his forehead against the rock, begging for the pain to stop or abate even slightly. Hoping Faleaseen’s voice would emerge into his mind and she’d magically stop it, but it never happened. He’d pushed himself too hard and too fast, even beyond his enhanced strength and endurance. But time was of the frigging essence, he had to.

The pain didn’t subside, but his body seemed to acclimatise to it and this allowed Attelus to finally lookup. There was no sign of the top of the plateau only the ninety degree overhang at the wall’s top, but he knew he only had about fifty or so metres left to climb.

Attelus rolled his eyes, fifty or so metres that’ll probably be harder to ascend than the last two hundred metres combined. He slipped his hand from the climbing glove and began to try to rub some feeling into the other, meanwhile checking the time on his wrist chron. He only had a few hours before dawn. He very much wasn’t looking forward to traversing that overhang. He’d been given rushed as frig lessons on how to climb before they flew to the surface, he’d received a few over the years, but nothing had prepared him for this. Attelus had been somewhat blase about falling before, but now he was desperate not to, even more so than if he knew he’d die permanently. He sure as frig didn’t want to go through this gak all over again. Then if he fell again, he’d have to try again and...it’d be like that mythological figure of ancient Terra Scykiphus who was cursed by the gods to push a boulder up a hill until he reached the top, where it’d roll back down again. It seemed to be a fitting comparison to this situation right now.

After rubbing the other hand for a while, Attelus exhaled and after three exhales, he tugged the blades from the rock. The act made more pain course up his arm, making him growl again and it took him a long time to raise his palm and try to push it back into the rock, but he didn’t do it quite hard enough and the blades bounced away in a shower of sparks and the impact jarred his pain beyond before as his arm flung down, falling right for his thigh, but even through the pain and his whirling mind he managed to stop it from punching into his muscle tissue.

Roaring with the agony, Attelus cursed with all his heart Enandra's name for sending him on this assignment, his father’s name for being a psychopathic gak-head, Soloston’s name Etuarq's name. Even the Emperor a few times, as he repeatedly banged his head against the cliff.

According to his wrist chron, it took him about six minutes to regain control of himself, but it’d felt like hours.

He shot his attention upwards, after everything he’d been through this was nothing. This was physical pain, which was nothing compared to the mental and emotional pain he’d endured.

Roaring, he smashed his palm into the rock above, then tugged out the blade of his boot gauntlet, making pain blast up his leg and him growl out, but he endured it as he kicked it back into the cliff.

He dreaded how much exhaustion and the agony was going grow to be when he finally, finally reached the top, and how he would cope with that during the infiltration itself, but by the Emperor, he frigging well will make it. He frigging well will!

Hey, again, guys, thought I'd check up with you again. Hoping you're keeping up with the word count. I'm keeping up and having a great time writing my story! Hope it's the same for you guys as well!

Gah! Had to scrap the planning and start over. Tried to code too many variables without knowing what to fill them with.

Originally, the procedural generation in the story was focussed on an “open world” model without a goal rather than something linear. This next one should be easier and more organized, now that it has a more definitive beginning and end.

 SkavenLord wrote:
Gah! Had to scrap the planning and start over. Tried to code too many variables without knowing what to fill them with.

Originally, the procedural generation in the story was focussed on an “open world” model without a goal rather than something linear. This next one should be easier and more organized, now that it has a more definitive beginning and end.

Aww that stinks, mate. Wishing ya luck, though

Instead of the Aztec Flower Wars, I have started a sourcebook on the Ionian Revolt instead.

Only about 8K words at present, but ink to page!

 Easy E wrote:
Instead of the Aztec Flower Wars, I have started a sourcebook on the Ionian Revolt instead.

Only about 8K words at present, but ink to page!

Yup! Noice! My philosophy is that even if you don't make it to tho 50k words you've done words nonetheless that you might not have put down if you hadn't begun NaNo. Keep up the work and good luck!

Oof, been feeling a bit deflated on NaNoWriMo right now. You guys still going strong, I hope.

Nope, I had to shift my attention to editing some projects for my publisher, so new content stalled while I work on that.

Understandable! I managed to finish last night! It was hard to get through writing as I had my vaccine the day before and was having fun with the side effects. But managed it! I hope you guys got there as well!

I think I only ended at 10K words. :(

 Easy E wrote:
I think I only ended at 10K words. :(

Well, that's 10,000 more words done than if you didn't. Nice work!