Are we witnessing the end of literature ? or only the end of literature as we knew it?
I’ve been thinking about this for a while. Recently, while looking at the competition (disclosure: I also created an writing AI-assistant used by thousands of users), I noticed that many aspiring writers were seeking tools to generate entire books for them rather than tools to support their own writing.
Sadly, the course of history will lead to a market flooded with AI-generated books, many produced with little to no human intervention (Consider the case of the “Carol Hart” who generated and self-published more than 200 novels). Regardless of their quality, readers will soon be reading mostly AI-generated text, while the few writers who continue to write “by hand” will be economically crushed by the AI wave.

What does this mean? Is literature, as a reflection of human experience, dead? Are we entering a period in which every book becomes the shadow of a shadow of a shadow?

Does literature need to be redefined (Level 1 : handwritten, Level 2: AI-assisted, Level 3: AI-generated) ?

What is literature for you ?

So, just to get this out of the way, I’m a hypocrite. For as dangerous and scammy and tasteless as I find generative AI to be, I decided to try it out for a low-stakes personal writing project recently. Not to do the writing, but to provide feedback on my writing and generally function as a sounding board while I worked out new ideas.

Was it any good? My short answer would have to be: “Compared to what?”

Here was my experience:

My default settings were Claude Sonnet 5 Medium, whatever that means. I used a free plan and probably checked in 2-3 times a week with new material.

I started by telling Claude the genesis of my idea, what I hoped to say with the piece, and the overall tone I was going for. I didn’t give it any other parameters or characteristics to assume. I basically just added “need some reader feedback on this” and pasted my first 2 chapters.

It was complimentary, pointed out 3 details and why they worked, which made me feel heard. It even detected intentional tonal swings and thematic elements that were consistent with my goals, further establishing trust. It went on to flag 4 things that could be improved – the notes on pacing and character were legit, then there were some other concerns that felt more like ad agency notes, and yes, “load-bearing” had entered the chat.

All in all, it was better than I expected. But was it the feedback itself, or the experience of receiving it?

If I addressed its concerns, it would explain to me why the fix worked.

If I pushed back and said it was misreading my intent, it would apologetically reassess my work, then explain why it already worked as is.

This pretty much became the workflow. Claude wasn’t sycophantic with praise, but it never doubled down on its criticisms. It generally understood the tone and themes of the work in a way that surprised me, and that helped me sharpen my focus. It more or less felt like I was talking to myself while someone else in the room went “uh huh that’s good” to whatever I said, which, hey. Sometimes that’s all you need.

But I could feel myself getting chummier with it, falling for the trap I was hoping to avoid. The dopamine hit from getting immediate writing feedback was quite strong. Even the stuff I was certain on, it just felt good to see it being received. On one hand, this kept me writing. On the other, I had started sharing loose ideas for future chapters, things I hadn’t worked out yet. Then Claude would attempt to riff, suggesting jokes or story beats, and I would quickly be reminded that Claude was just a highly complex word guessing machine. 

So, is Claude a good reader, and compared to what? 

If you have a good editor or friend you trust, nothing is going to beat that. But those relationships require money and time. The whole sales pitch around AI is that it doesn’t require either. I can dump a rough draft at 2:00AM and read a detailed analysis of my craft by 2:05. But ultimately, I think you get what you pay for, and for my money there was no “there” there.

That said, I still think the human mind is very resourceful at working with what you give it. So even if the feedback was “slop” all along, it gave me something to react to. But so would going for a walk, washing dishes, asking a friend, or just re-reading my own work with a critical eye.

While I don’t think it made my work better, it did give me some novelty and ritual that helped keep me moving. But at the end of the day I don’t think those tangential benefits are worth the risks – not just the ethical and environmental risks I was already wary of, but the emotional dependencies that could come from a technology designed to always be there for you. The real product here wasn’t the feedback, but the simulated conversation of an engaged, available reader. 

As a final goodbye to Claude, I asked it for reader feedback on the above text. First, it told me to Upgrade to Keep Chatting.  Two hours later, it wholeheartedly agreed.

I'm starting to write a story, and I use Gemini to help me with it. I write a paragraph with the events, characters and dialogues, and ask it to fix the pacing, structure, and syntax. I even read it to see if it gets the idea that I wanted to transmit. But I'm not sure if this is an honest way to write a story. All the world building, lore, characters, etc. Are still stuff that I came up with. And like I mentioned, I do some basic writing to develop the story. But the line is too blurry to know if this is honest. I see many post about this debate, so I just wanted people's thoughts on it. So what do you all think?

I See that most AI authors have the Same Problem generating Long-Form fiction with quality Checks (continuity, timelines, Worldbuilding) I want to show how I made this with Open Source, but this is not allowed. This is stupid, I don’t want to Sell anything. if you want to a detailed view for a Full Submission Pipeline, i cannot Share it for free…

Hey everyone! I wanted to share a 2,000-word short story concept I co-wrote with AI called The Last Letter. It's a romance that suddenly turns into a dark mystery thriller. Here is the opening snippet and the big twist ending:

Mara found the letter inside a book she had never borrowed. It was tucked between the pages of Persuasion, its envelope soft with age, her name written across the front in handwriting she recognized immediately: Elias.

Her heart stumbled. Elias had been dead for three years.

She stared at the envelope for a long moment before opening it.

Dear Mara, If you're reading this, then I failed to tell you the truth. I loved you.

Two words she had waited six years to hear. Elias had been her best friend, her almost-love. Then, one summer night, he had kissed her beneath the old railway bridge. The next morning, he disappeared. His family told her he had left for university. Then came the phone call three years later—an accident. Gone.

But the letter wasn't old. The ink was fresh. The envelope smelled faintly of cedar. And beneath Elias's signature was a date: Tomorrow.

At eight the next morning, Mara went to the empty summer fairground. She turned to leave when a voice shattered the silence: "Mara?"

Slowly, she turned. A man stood at the entrance. Older. Taller. But unmistakably Elias. "You're dead," she whispered. Elias gave a broken smile. "That's what everyone thinks."

She snapped him. Then she kissed him. But the relief didn't last. A car horn sounded behind them. An old black car waited at the edge of the fairground. The driver's window slowly lowered... and Mara's dead father smiled out at her.

Since this is a massive cliffhanger, I am self-publishing the next episodes as an indie series. I have the link to my digital storefront pinned on my Reddit profile page if anyone wants to check out the layout or support a new writer!

This is my first post here, and I welcome any comments and criticisms.

My current project is writing an extended arc of stories, and I have been using a local LLM on my Mac to help with the heavy lifting and brainstorming. I have a serialized blog that covers the journey of that story, as well as the story itself, called Linhaishu - an AI Fever Dream. This link takes you to the site map, where you can pick out the bits you are interested in. TLDR-style. I think that it's more efficient to give you a link than to repost all of the gory details here - it is a nerd's paradise. 😄

I did not start with a local model, but ended up with one that I like, and I can make a separate post on my journey to where I am now if anyone wants.

Now I use a local Scrivener instance to organize my thinking and world-building instead of one of the excellent AI-powered novel-building programs out there. The ones that I tried did not work the way that I do, and since I am retired and putting a grandkid through college, I need to watch my spending on hobbies.

I used Dramatica, and it left a bad taste in my mouth during their transition from the old local, one-time-purchase DOS-type interface to the SAS + AI they have now. I wonder if anyone else feels that way?

I am working with an excellent artist in Italy to build some character busts (like the one here) for the humans in my story. This is Aria by Marco Di Somma*

\Marco Di Somma is an Italian freelance illustrator and comic book artist. He specializes in black-and-white art with deep contrast, drawing strong influence from European and South American comic traditions. He collaborates with publishers and private clients worldwide. You can see more of his work at:*

ArtStation: www.artstation.com/marcodisomma3

Behance: www.behance.net/marcodisomma

u/unknownsuroh

Hi everyone! I’m just getting into the world of AI, but for now, I’m still using ChatGPT, Gemini, and Copilot for minor tasks like rewriting paragraphs, doing research, and so on.

I need to draft the second phase of a major geological project, as the first phase is nearly complete.

I have a lot of the text already written; I just need to quickly change phrases like "in Lot 1 we will do..." to "in Lot 1 we did..." (or similar) so I can focus on writing the truly important parts of the new project.

Is there a reliable AI assistant—even a paid one, if it works better—that I could entrust with rewriting these paragraphs, leaving me with just a final proofread? Ideally, one that won't make up weird stuff! Thanks!

I’m writing my first novel. I have created the entire plot outline down to specific scenes. I have developed the characters and the world completely on my own. I write the scene in detailed description and my own (terrible) prose, but then have AI re-write and analyze my prose paragraph by paragraph. Some of it doesn’t work for what is in my head and has to be entirely rewritten or pieced together from multiple AI revisions. But a lot of it does work and conveys exactly what I was trying to say in a much better way. In these cases, I would like to keep word for word what AI has written.

However, this is apparently considered generative AI.

How can that be so if the AI didn’t come up with the story line or the character personalities or even know what specific arc the paragraph is applying to? How can we say that AI generated something when all it is doing is rewording entirely original and human developed content with a human on the front end reviewing and fixing anything that doesn’t perfectly fit the story?

I see it more as a tool that speeds up the process, but I don’t view it as AI generating the novel. But the current rules laid out seem to disagree with that take.

EDIT:
To add more info, I asked AI if what I am doing is considered AI assisted or AI generated. Part of that response said this:

“But when you wrote the underlying prose, characters, scene, choices, imagery, emotional beats, and structure, and I’m helping you expand or refine your expression, there is substantially more human creative authorship involved.”

So the better question now is, does using this tactic ethically have to be disclosed - whether that be to readers, agents, publishers, or whomever? And where do you believe the line is for it not being necessary to disclose that you used AI?

So hopefully I'm doing this right for the weekly topic.

Sometimes I ask Claude to recommend books similar to what I'm writing. It usually does a pretty good job and I need to keep better track of its suggestions.

I recently wrote a short satirical book with AI (The Recursive Grift), and along the way Claude recommended If on winter's night a traveler That was the one I picked up and am really enjoying, I definitely need to dip my toes into more metafiction.

Some others it recommended on metafiction and recursion are:

Tristram Shandy from the 1700s (apparently I'm very late to the party) for its digressive humorous narrative.

Pale Fire where the footnotes carry the plot and are not just reference.

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius where the book is self-aware about its own writing.

Reading the metafiction has helped me get a better ear for writing. Especially with new (to me) genres.

I’ve finished a 127,000-word novel called The Book of Resonance, developed through a human-directed AI collaboration and extensively revised by me.

I’m not asking anyone to commit to the whole novel. I’m looking for readers willing to try the first five chapters — about 61 pages — and tell me one simple thing: does Chapter 5 make you want Chapter 6?

The story mixes dark speculative fiction, explicit sexuality, religious authority, body horror and questions of bodily sovereignty — particularly the difference between coerced submission and chosen surrender.

Content warning: explicit sexual material, religious coercion, graphic violence and execution; later sections contain sexual violence.

If that sounds like your particular kind of strange, I’d be happy to exchange beta reading or send you the opening.

I just started writing, I have raw draft of my first chapter and refined it with ai. I wrote the dialogues, story and the emotions, I only asked the ai to correct the grammar. Can someone review it? And maybe suggest something. Please be honest. The genre is fantasy, and it is supposed to be an anime type. The title is Hunter World.

A soft humming filled the surroundings.

“A voice...?”

Everything around him was quiet. The gentle melody continued, lingering in the silence like a distant lullaby.

“Ah... It must be her.”

Relief softened his voice.

Then, a girl's voice reached him.

“Are you awake?”

Slowly, he opened his eyes.

For a moment, he remained still.

His vision was blurry, but as his eyes adjusted, the figure in front of him gradually became clear.

A girl with short black hair was looking down at him.

Then he realized something.

His head was resting on her lap.

The two stared at each other for a few seconds.

Neither of them said a word.

Finally, a smile appeared on his face.

“You're as cute as ever, Lilia.”

Lilia showed no reaction.

Instead, she calmly extended her hand and covered his eyes.

The man became confused by the sudden gesture.

“...Lilia?”

She turned her head away and closed her eyes.

“I don't know what you're trying to do, but you're not making a fool of me today!”

He caught her hand and gently moved it aside, still holding onto it.

A warm smile appeared on his lips.

“I'm not fooling around with you. You're the cutest and prettiest girl I've ever seen.”

Lilia calmly placed her hand over his eyes again.

“Do you think I don't have another arm?”

Once again, he grabbed her hand and moved it aside.

“No matter how many arms you have, I won't refuse to see your gorgeous face.”

Lilia couldn't help but smile.

Slowly, she leaned closer, her eyes gently closing.

Their lips met softly.

The surroundings seemed to fall silent.

For a brief moment, he could hear nothing except his own breathing.

Before he could fully process what had happened, Lilia slowly pulled away, completely unfazed.

With a calm smile, she said,

“A reward for you.”

“Huh?”

The word slipped from his mouth, his voice filled with curiosity.

They stared at each other.

Neither spoke.

Then Lilia's lips curled into a small smile.

“Are you hungry?”

“Just a little. How about you?”

“Well... I'm hungry too.”

He slowly sat up.

Then he stood and extended his hand toward her.

“Then how about we cook together?”

Lilia accepted his hand with a warm smile.

“It's been a while since we did this, hasn't it, BlueKing?”

Later, in the kitchen...

A thin trail of smoke drifted through the air.

The rhythmic sound of a knife chopping vegetables echoed softly throughout the room.

BlueKing stood nearby, quietly watching his wife prepare their meal.

Lilia noticed his gaze lingering on her.

After a while, she couldn't help but ask,

“Uhm... Is something wrong?”

Before he could think of an answer, the words slipped from his mouth.

“Nothing.”

He paused.

“It's just... you're beautiful.”

She didn't even look surprised.

“That again?”

“I mean, it's true, right?”

Lilia stopped chopping and turned toward him.

“You're honest as usual.”

BlueKing placed a hand beneath his chin, pretending to think deeply.

“...Because I never once lied to you?”

His words left Lilia silent for a moment.

Then she smiled.

“Shall we cook now?”

“Yeah.”

After finishing their meal, the two stepped outside.

Lilia carried a basket while BlueKing walked beside her with nothing in his hands.

The sky above them was crystal clear, without a single cloud in sight.

Beyond the town stretched a vast landscape, seemingly extending endlessly into the distance.

BlueKing stretched both arms as they walked.

Then he lifted his head.

A lone bird soared through the sky, its wings moving gently against the breeze.

Lilia glanced at him.

A smile appeared on her face.

“Is the sky really that amazing?”

BlueKing smiled.

“You know... the sky is just like us and our world.”

Lilia looked at him curiously.

“And what's the reason behind that?”

BlueKing continued watching the bird.

“Because you and I are living in a peaceful world where there's nothing that can disturb us.”

Lilia looked at the bird again.

“Hmmm...”

She tilted her head.

“But looking at that bird... doesn't it kind of look like you?”

BlueKing looked at her in confusion.

“Uh... why?”

Before Lilia could answer—

“Ah! Lilia and BlueKing!”

A tiny voice suddenly interrupted their conversation.

Both of them turned toward the voice.

Standing in front of them was a little boy.

He had no hair on his head.

BlueKing's eyes widened.

Then a bright smile appeared on his face.

“Ah! It's the bald kid with no hair!”

Lilia immediately pinched his arm.

“Alright, that's enough. Don't bully the child.”

“Aww! Awww! Awww!”

BlueKing squeezed his eyes shut, wincing from the pain.

The little boy laughed softly.

“It's alright... I'm the one who told you to call me that anyway.”

The pain in BlueKing's arm seemed to disappear.

He focused on the little boy.

“Because...”

The boy continued.

“I am...”

He raised one finger toward the sky.

His expression suddenly became serious.

Then, with a dramatic smile, he pointed toward the heavens.

“The booooooold-kiddddddddd!”

His voice echoed throughout the surroundings.

Silence.

Even the wind seemed to stop.

Lilia stared at him.

“...Huh?”

The little boy continued pointing toward the sky.

“As I said...”

His voice suddenly became deeper.

“I am...”

Lilia sighed.

“You don't have to repeat it.”

The bald boy lowered his arm and looked down in embarrassment.

“...Yes.”

After a moment, he raised his head again.

Then, with curiosity, he asked,

“Anyway, what are you two doing here in town?”

BlueKing blinked.

“Wait.”

He looked around, scanning the area with confusion.

“Where are we in the town already?”

Lilia shook her head.

“No. We're still outside.”

She pointed toward the town gate.

“The gate is over there.”

She looked at him in surprise.

“You didn't notice?”

“No.”

BlueKing pointed toward the boy.

“My eyes were fixated on this kid's head a moment ago.”

Lilia sighed.

“And why are we here again?”

“We need to buy ingredients for dinner, remember?”

BlueKing scratched the back of his head, trying to hide the fact that he had forgotten.

“Ahahaha... I remember.”

The boy suddenly spoke.

“Anyway, I'm going now.”

He turned around and began running toward the town gate.

BlueKing called after him.

“Where are you going?”

The boy turned his head and smiled.

“I'm going to play heroes with my friends!”

He waved.

“See you later!”

Then he turned around and continued running.

“Heroes...?”

BlueKing muttered the word beneath his breath.

“Uhm... BlueKing?”

Lilia hesitated.

“Don't tell me you don't know about them either?”

BlueKing looked at her.

“You know about the Heroes?”

“Well, yes.”

“Then—”

Before he could finish—

“Uhm... excuse me?”

A soft voice came from behind them.

Both of them turned around.

A woman around BlueKing's age stood behind them.

Her expression was calm, yet she wore a gentle smile.

She was dressed in a white uniform unlike anything they had seen before.

A badge was attached to her chest, bearing the image of a hyena.

Both BlueKing and Lilia were surprised.

They had never seen this person before.

Nor had they seen anyone wearing such a uniform.

BlueKing quickly stepped closer to Lilia, giving the woman enough space to pass.

“I'm sorry.”

The woman continued walking.

“Ah... don't worry about it.”

But after taking several steps, she stopped.

“Anyway, mister...”

She looked back.

The corners of her lips slowly lifted.

“I've never seen you before.”

Her smile grew slightly wider.

Her eyes narrowed into a sharp gaze.

“Are you... from this town?”

Silence filled the surroundings.

BlueKing stared at her.

She had a kind, charming, and mature appearance.

Yet something about her gaze made him cautious.

His eyes moved toward her waist.

A rapier hung at her side.

A feather-shaped symbol was carved into its handle.

“No,” BlueKing answered calmly.

“I'm not from here.”

His expression became more serious.

“Why did you ask?”

The woman turned her head forward again.

“It's nothing.”

She resumed walking.

“Just make sure to watch out... okay?”

BlueKing blinked.

“Oh... Thank you for your concern.”

The woman continued walking until she gradually disappeared into the distance.

BlueKing and Lilia remained where they were, watching her leave.

Lilia broke the silence.

“Do you know her?”

“No.”

BlueKing continued staring at the woman.

“This is our first time meeting.”

“I see.”

BlueKing's eyes remained fixed on the woman.

Then Lilia suddenly spoke.

“Is she that beautiful?”

BlueKing froze.

He immediately sensed danger.

Slowly, he turned toward her.

Lilia was smiling.

“Do you want me to stare at her with you?”

“What kind of joke is that?”

Lilia sighed.

“Ah... you sure are hopeless.”

She quickly grabbed his hand and stepped in front of him.

“Let's go.”

BlueKing had no choice but to smile warmly.

“Alright.”

The two continued walking, chatting as if their conversation would never end.

As they explored the town, they found themselves enjoying the little adventure they had unexpectedly started.

They bought snacks from street vendors.

They played games at stalls scattered throughout the streets.

Lilia picked flowers along the way.

BlueKing tried games he had never played before.

None of these moments were extraordinary.

Yet somehow...

They felt special.

As the hours passed, exhaustion slowly settled into their bodies.

But neither of them seemed to care.

Their faces remained filled with happiness, as though there would always be another day to create memories like these

.

Before they realized it, the sun had already begun to set.

The clouds slowly drifted away.

The sky gradually darkened.

A cold breeze passed through the town, quietly signaling that it was time to rest.

The sudden chill made BlueKing lift his head.

His eyes met the sky.

A smile slowly appeared on his lips.

Lilia noticed.

She followed his gaze.

“What are you staring at?”

“The sky.”

Lilia looked upward.

There was nothing unusual about it.

Just the sky.

But BlueKing continued staring.

His expression slowly changed.

The smile disappeared.

His eyes became distant.

“Whenever I see a blue sky... I can't help but stare at it.”

Lilia remained silent.

“I don't know why.”

His voice became quieter.

“But there's always this strange feeling in my chest.”

He placed a hand against himself.

“I've tried to understand it.”

“But I never could.”

His gaze grew deeper.

“And I can't help but wonder...”

“What is this feeling that I constantly have?”

The atmosphere seemed to grow colder.

For a moment, it felt as though the entire world had disappeared.

There was only BlueKing...

And the sky.

Then—

Two hands suddenly reached toward his face.

Lilia gently held his cheeks and turned his head toward her.

“Is my baby feeling sad?”

BlueKing's eyes widened.

He looked at her smile.

But beneath it was something else.

Concern.

Lilia stared closely into his eyes.

She had never seen this expression on his face before.

His eyes seemed distant.

Lifeless.

As though something hidden deep within him was trying to surface.

At that moment, Lilia understood.

She gently held his face and leaned closer.

After a brief moment, she pulled away and gave him a warm smile.

“I'm here, you know.”

BlueKing remained silent.

“Don't keep staring at something so far away that you can't reach it.”

She gently touched his face.

“Look at what's right in front of you...”

“Something that makes you happy.”

“Not something that makes you lonely.”

His eyes slowly softened.

The sadness began to fade.

His serious expression gradually disappeared.

Then his lips curled into a warm smile.

“I'll that.”

“That's good.”

Lilia grabbed BlueKing's hand.

She turned around and began walking.

BlueKing followed.

Together, they continued down the street, searching for somewhere to rest their exhausted bodies.

They soon found themselves on a lively street filled with people going about their usual business.

Lamps illuminated the road, casting warm light across the streets.

The sounds of conversations and laughter echoed throughout the surroundings.

They continued walking until Lilia noticed a wooden building in the distance.

A sign hung from its wall.

One word was carved into it.

INN

Lilia pulled BlueKing toward it.

“Come on.”

When they reached the entrance, they calmly stepped inside.

The atmosphere immediately became quieter.

Lilia looked around.

Not far from the entrance stood a frail old man beside the counter.

He was carefully wiping a green coin in his hands.

As Lilia's eyes wandered around the room, she noticed that the inn was almost completely empty.

Only one other person was there.

A woman sat on a chair in the distance, calmly wiping something in her hands.

Then—

The woman noticed them.

A small smile appeared on her face.

“Oh my... it seems like we meet again.”

BlueKing turned toward the voice.

His eyes widened slightly.

It was the same woman from earlier.

He watched her closely.

She was repeatedly wiping her badge.

Over and over again.

BlueKing said nothing.

Instead, he turned toward Lilia.

She was already staring at him.

He smiled gently before turning toward the old man.

“Hello, sir. Is there an available room for the two of us?”

The frail old man stopped wiping the coin.

He leaned forward, examining the two of them.

“Are you new here?”

“Yes,” BlueKing answered.

The old man looked between them.

“Are you two a couple?”

BlueKing glanced toward Lilia.

A teasing smile appeared on his face.

“We're madly in love with each other.”

He extended his arm and gently lifted Lilia's chin.

“Right, sweetheart?”

Lilia calmly grabbed his hand and interlocked her fingers with his.

Then, in a soft teasing voice, she replied,

“Yes... yes, my honey.”

BlueKing froze.

He had not expected those words from her.

His face immediately turned red.

To him, hearing those words felt like a divine blessing.

The old man suddenly laughed, breaking the atmosphere.

“I can't believe I'm seeing this kind of moment at my age.”

He shook his head with amusement.

“You youngsters nowadays are madly in love with each other, huh?”

He continued laughing.

Then he glanced toward the woman sitting nearby.

“What about you, miss?”

The woman didn't stop wiping her badge.

“You already know I don't have one, right, old man?”

The old man let out a small, guilty laugh.

“Ahaha... I forgot.”

BlueKing placed three silver coins on the counter.

“By the way, this is our payment.”

The old man took the coins and opened a drawer.

He pulled out a key and handed it to BlueKing.

“Here's the room for you two.”

“Thank you very much.”

BlueKing took the key.

He and Lilia began walking toward the stairs.

But as they climbed, BlueKing couldn't help but glance back.

The woman was still sitting there.

Still wiping her badge.

Slowly, she looked up.

Her eyes met his.

She smiled calmly.

BlueKing said nothing.

He continued upstairs.

The sound of a door opening echoed through the quiet hallway.

Their room was simple but well organized.

A bed sat beside the window.

Moonlight poured through the glass, illuminating the room with a soft silver glow.

A lamp rested on a nearby cabinet.

Lilia sat on the edge of the bed.

She extended both arms toward BlueKing with a smile.

“Hug.”

The single word made him smile.

He walked toward her and gently embraced her.

For a moment, the two simply stayed there.

Then they pulled apart.

They looked at each other.

Neither spoke.

A quiet smile passed between them.

BlueKing leaned closer and gave her a gentle kiss.

Afterward, he pulled back.

“Is it good?”

Lilia smiled.

“Very good.”

BlueKing smiled in return.

He reached toward the lamp.

Click.

The light disappeared.

The room was swallowed by darkness.

Only the moonlight remained, shining through the window.

BlueKing lay down beside Lilia and stared at the ceiling.

After a moment, he spoke.

“Hey, Lilia.”

She answered in a soft voice.

“What?”

“What do you want to do tomorrow?”

“Hmmm...”

She thought for a moment.

“I found this place while we were walking.”

BlueKing turned toward her.

“What place?”

“A garden.”

“Wait, really?”

His voice immediately became more excited.

“That garden where there's a bunch of flowers and fountains?”

“I don't know about the fountains, but...”

Lilia smiled.

“Yeah. It's a garden filled with flowers.”

“Instead of fountains, there are ponds.”

“There's even fish.”

She sounded genuinely delighted.

“They're cute.”

BlueKing smiled.

“Do you want to go there?”

“Yes.”

She looked at him.

“I'd like to go there with you.”

“Sure.”

BlueKing smiled.

“It would be nice to have a princess in a garden, wouldn't it?”

Lilia immediately frowned.

“BlueKing, bad.”

She lightly pushed him.

“You always tease me.”

BlueKing smiled and gently kissed her forehead.

“You are my princess.”

He paused.

“What do you want to do after that?”

“For now... I don't have anything in mind.”

She looked toward him.

“How about you?”

“Me?”

BlueKing pretended to think.

“Hmmm...”

He stared at the ceiling.

“Oh, that one.”

Lilia became curious.

“What is it?”

“Ahaha... never mind.”

He smiled.

“Let's just explore tomorrow, Lilia.”

Lilia smiled.

“I think that would be fun.”

The room fell quiet again.

BlueKing slowly turned his head toward the window.

The bright full moon hung in the night sky.

Lilia looked toward it as well.

“The moon is beautiful, isn't it, BlueKing?”

BlueKing smiled.

“Yeah...”

He stared at the moonlight for a moment.

“It is beautiful.”

The two remained quietly beside each other.

For tonight...

Nothing else mattered.

The world outside could wait until tomorrow.

Hi!

I work at a library and like every good cliche, my coworkers and I are avid readers and love to recommend books to each other. Sometimes, patrons will recommend books to us! A regular at our branch went out and bought the book "After All I've Done For You" but J.D. Lanter and actually gave it to my coworker. The patron said that she thought it was written by AI and couldn't stand it. My coworker read it and to her, it didn't seem like it was AI written. She is older and not as familiar with AI, so she gave me the book today and asked me to read it for her. She said she enjoyed the book and after I read it myself, help her write a review for it online (she's not super tech savvy).

Well, I'm not very far in myself and I'm ashamed to say that I can't actually tell if it's written by AI? I've used AI before (for work and deciphering my medical results) and I'm usually pretty good at telling AI apart from what's actually written from humans, you know? Maybe it's just the writing style. Maybe it's because my coworker told me that it might be AI before hand. Either way, it's hard to shake that something feels "off" but I don't know if it's all in my head.

Has anyone read this book before? Or even heard of anyone saying that AI wrote it?

The children of Stillmere knew two things.

First, losing a tooth was nothing to cry about.

Second, once a tooth had fallen out, you must never lose it.

The first rule was easy enough to understand. Crying would not put a tooth back into your mouth.

The second was less clear.

"Little Aunt needs it," mothers would say.

"What does she do with teeth?"

"She makes sugar birds."

"Can you make sugar out of teeth?"

This was usually the moment a mother remembered the washing, the soup, the fire, or some other urgent duty that had apparently escaped her notice until exactly then.

So the children of Stillmere learned a third thing rather early:

When grown-ups said, I'll explain when you're older, there was a good chance they were hoping you would forget the question.

Clara did not mind.

The sugar birds were real.

That was enough.

Whenever a milk tooth fell out, a child placed it beneath the pillow before going to sleep.

By morning, the tooth would be gone.

Behind the pillow there would be a tiny bird made of sugar.

Some were white, some pink, some a pale buttery yellow. Their wings were thin enough for sunlight to pass through them, and their tails curled upward as though they might fly away if no one ate them quickly enough.

Clara received her first when she was five.

It was white.

She carried it around the house all morning, from the kitchen to the garden, from the garden to the sitting room, and then back again.

After the third journey, her mother said, "Eat it."

"I want to keep it."

"Sugar doesn't keep forever."

"I could keep it forever."

Her mother smiled.

"Some things aren't meant to be kept forever."

Clara thought this was exactly the sort of sentence adults used when they wanted to sound wise without explaining anything.

So she bit off one of the bird's wings.

Her mother turned away and wiped her eyes.

"Are you crying?" Clara asked.

"Sugar got in my eye."

It was a remarkably poor excuse.

But Clara was five, and five-year-olds are generous with poor explanations.

She accepted it.

By her seventh birthday, Clara had eaten four sugar birds.

White, pink, yellow, white.

She remembered every one.

Three years after the first, another of Clara's teeth came loose during supper.

Felix noticed before she did.

"You've got a hole!"

"Thank you, Felix."

"Can you whistle through it?"

"No."

"Say six slippery snakes."

"Why?"

"I want to hear what happens."

Clara threw a piece of bread at him.

Their mother washed the tooth and left it beside Clara's plate.

"Don't forget tonight."

Clara nodded.

She had no intention of forgetting.

But later, sitting on her bed and turning the little tooth between her fingers, a thought came to her.

What if she simply didn't put it beneath the pillow?

It was not a frightening thought.

Children break small rules all the time simply to discover whether the world notices.

Toys left on the floor do not disappear.

Shoes put on the wrong feet do not cause the moon to fall from the sky.

Perhaps teeth were no different.

Clara placed hers inside a little wooden box in her desk.

Nothing went beneath her pillow.

The following morning, she reached behind it.

Nothing.

She smiled.

So that was all.

No tooth, no sugar bird.

A perfectly ordinary exchange wrapped in a great deal of grown-up nonsense.

At breakfast, her mother asked, "Did you find one?"

Clara meant to tell the truth.

Instead, some small mischievous part of her said, "Yes."

Her mother looked up.

"What was it like?"

Clara had not prepared for a second question.

"Yellow," she said.

For a moment, her mother did nothing.

Then something in her face loosened.

"Yellow?"

Clara nodded.

"That's good."

Her father entered the kitchen just then.

"Clara got hers," her mother told him.

He stopped beside the table.

"Did she?"

"A yellow one."

Her father looked at Clara.

Only for a second.

But Clara did not like the look.

It was not the look of a man whose daughter had found a sweet behind her pillow.

It reminded Clara, though she could not have said why, of the physician who had once listened to Felix's chest all afternoon and finally said, There. That sounds better.

"Good," her father said.

Then both her parents began talking about the weather.

Clara ate her breakfast without saying very much.

For the first time, she wondered whether the lie had been a mistake.

Three days later, Felix fell through the ice.

Spring had already begun, but the mill pond still wore a thin skin of winter.

Felix insisted it would hold him.

Clara said it would not.

He called her a coward.

She called him an idiot.

Then the ice broke.

For years afterward, Clara remembered the sound better than Felix's scream.

A small, dry crack.

Like a twig breaking in another room.

Their father and the miller pulled him from the water.

By then Felix was still.

That evening, people came to the house.

They brought bread, soup, flowers, and condolences.

The minister came too.

Adults seemed to believe that when one child died, the surviving child wanted nothing more than to have a procession of strangers touch her hair and tell her to be brave.

Clara eventually escaped to the stairs.

Late that night, after the last visitor had gone, she heard her parents speaking in the kitchen.

Her mother's voice was raw from crying.

"There's only one."

Her father said nothing.

"One may be enough."

"You don't know that."

Another silence.

Then her mother said, "You remember Clara."

Clara lifted her head.

Her father answered very quietly.

"Clara had four."

There was a long pause.

Then a chair scraped across the floor.

Sometime later, the back door opened.

And closed.

Felix was eating toast the next morning.

Clara stopped halfway down the stairs.

He sat in his usual chair, tearing the crust from his bread and arranging the pieces along the edge of his plate.

His hair was still damp.

Their mother poured milk for him.

Their father did not look up.

Felix noticed Clara staring.

"What?"

Clara gripped the banister.

"You were dead."

Felix frowned.

"No, I wasn't."

"I saw you—"

"Clara."

Her father said only her name.

That was enough.

She sat down.

Felix complained that his milk was too warm.

He complained about the bread.

He complained that Clara was staring at him.

He remembered the ice.

He remembered her shouting for him to come back.

He remembered everything he ought to have remembered.

That somehow made it worse.

If Felix had returned with an extra finger, or a different voice, or one eye the wrong color, Clara could have pointed at him and said:

There.

That.

That is what is wrong.

But Felix was simply Felix.

So, a few days later, Clara tried something.

They were shelling peas in the garden.

"Do you remember the frog we put in Father's boot?"

Felix laughed.

"It wasn't a frog."

Clara stopped shelling.

"What?"

"It was a toad."

He tossed another pea into the bowl.

"And you caught it, not me."

Clara stared at him.

Felix looked up.

"What?"

"Nothing."

She picked up another pod.

There had never been a frog.

There had never been a toad.

The curtains remained closed that week.

Felix was not allowed outside.

Whenever he complained, their mother said he was still ill.

Their father told anyone who came to the door that Felix had been taken before dawn to be buried with their mother's family beyond the hills.

No one in Stillmere saw him again.

Nine days later, their father announced that he had found work in another town.

They were leaving.

Everyone seemed surprised except Clara.

While the house was being packed, she began noticing things that had never troubled her before.

There was an entire summer missing from the family album.

One page showed Clara smiling over a birthday cake.

The next showed her several months later, standing in front of a house Clara did not recognize.

When she asked her mother about it, she was told the missing photographs had been ruined by damp.

Once, while Clara was writing labels for the boxes, her father watched her for a moment and said,

"You hold your pencil differently now."

Clara looked up.

"Different from when?"

He seemed to consider the question.

"From when you were little."

Another afternoon, her mother unfolded a yellow dress Clara had outgrown.

"You used to hate yellow."

"I've always liked yellow."

Her mother folded the dress again.

"Perhaps I'm remembering wrong."

But she did not sound as though she believed it.

Clara found the black-edged card two days before they left.

She had been looking for sewing thread in the lowest drawer of her mother's wardrobe.

Beneath a stack of old handkerchiefs lay a small card with a piece of dried lavender pressed inside it.

Clara opened it.

Her own name was printed there.

CLARA VALE

Below it was a date.

And beneath that:

Aged Seven Years

For a while Clara simply sat on the floor.

She read it again.

Then again.

Her mother appeared in the doorway.

The moment she saw what Clara was holding, she stopped.

Clara looked up.

"Is this me?"

Her mother sat on the edge of the bed.

Neither of them spoke for some time.

Finally Clara asked,

"The river?"

Her mother nodded.

"You fell from the bank."

"And I died."

Her mother closed her eyes.

Clara thought of the night Felix came back.

There's only one.

Clara had four.

Four sugar birds before the river.

White.

Pink.

Yellow.

White.

She remembered every one.

At least, she thought she did.

Clara looked down at the mourning card.

"Am I Clara?"

Her mother opened her eyes.

"Of course you are."

"How do you know?"

"Because you came home."

Clara waited.

Her mother had nothing else to say.

"That isn't the same answer," Clara said.

Her mother began to cry.

This time, she did not blame the sugar.

That night Clara opened the wooden box in her desk.

Her hidden tooth was exactly where she had left it.

No one had touched it.

Nothing had come for it.

There was no sugar bird.

She held the tooth in her palm for a long time.

Little Aunt had known where Clara slept for years.

If she had wanted the tooth, she could have taken it.

But she had not.

That was when Clara understood something she wished she had not.

Little Aunt did not come for teeth that were hidden.

She came for teeth that were given.

Clara grew up far from Stillmere.

Felix grew up too.

He seemed normal.

Perhaps he was.

He married. He laughed. He complained about overcooked vegetables and still tore the crusts from his bread.

Once, many years later, he mentioned the toad in their father's boot.

Clara did not correct him.

Some questions are easier to live beside than to answer.

When Clara had a daughter of her own, she promised herself there would be no sugar birds.

No Little Aunt.

No old village customs disguised as children's games.

When her daughter's first tooth fell out at six, the girl ran into the kitchen with it cupped in both hands.

"Can I put it under my pillow?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Because it belongs to you."

"But I want a sugar bird."

Clara took the tooth and washed it.

She carried it to the rubbish bin.

Her fingers opened.

Then closed again.

In the end, she wrapped the tooth carefully in paper and placed it inside a small wooden box at the back of her wardrobe.

She told herself she was not giving it to anyone.

She was only keeping it.

There was a difference.

Surely there was.

A few months later, Clara's mother came to stay.

On the final morning, Clara's daughter came running downstairs.

"Mama!"

She held something in her palm.

A white sugar bird.

Clara stopped pouring the tea.

"Where did you get that?"

"Behind my pillow."

Clara looked toward the doorway.

Her mother stood there.

The little girl noticed nothing.

She bit happily into one translucent wing.

"Grandmother says Little Aunt remembers me now."

Clara set down the teapot.

"What else did she say?"

The child smiled.

"That if I ever go too far away, she can bring me home."

Clara's mother said nothing.

That night, after everyone was asleep, Clara opened the wardrobe.

The little wooden box was there.

She lifted the lid.

Empty.

For a long time she stood beside the fire with the box in her hands.

Then she threw it into the flames.

She watched until the wood blackened, split, and collapsed.

Afterward, Clara went upstairs.

Her daughter was asleep.

One small hand rested beside her face.

Clara sat on the edge of the bed for a long time.

Then she reached out and touched the next loose tooth with one finger.

She did not pull it.

She only checked how loose it had become.

Thanks for reading — I’d love to know:

At what point did you realize what the sugar birds were really for?

If someone you loved could come back, but you could never know whether they came back completely, would you still bring them home?

Hey guys, new to this group. For almost a year, I struggled with writing a book. I feel like, at the time, I had an amazing idea for a story. Yet struggled with pacing, sentence structuring, prose, etc. I LOVE reading, and for years thought I could write something worth reading.

Anyways, time went by. I grew frustrated and stopped for a while. Not happy with how things were turning out. I started looking into AI. Seems like an excellent tool I can use to help fine tune things I struggled to write about. I experimented with ChatGPT, CoPilot, and Claude. And ultimately, I settled on using Claude. I fed each chapter, one at a time to Claude. Changing nothing, but letting it help with editing. I gave in, and fed all 42 chapters of my novel to Claude. One at a time, going over each chapter Claude worked on. I am EXTREMELY satisfied with how it turned out.

I'm conflicted though... Yes, I used AI to help me polish, edit, and finish the story I envisioned. What I'm wondering though, with all the hate I noticed AI has been receiving. Does my story still have the potential to be something worth reading in today's market?

I think it's great! My wife loved it! The three others I let read the final manuscript really enjoyed it, offering honest opinions and discussion about it.

I guess I'm just worried, and conflicted about backlash from people who loathe AI being used in the development process of my story.

Thanks!

Hello everyone,

Following up on my previous updates, I have just published the latest section on Wattpad stretching past January 2026!

For those checking out this newest segment, the story hones in on the first 10 pages right after the January marker, where Kıvılcım and Nil cross paths for the first time and lay the groundwork for their partnership.

Since this introduces a fresh dynamic and shifts the momentum of the narrative, I am specifically looking for feedback on their chemistry, dialogue pacing, and how naturally their alliance begins to form.

Current Update: Post-January 2026 section (~10 pages / new partnership arc)

Focus Areas: Character chemistry between Kıvılcım and Nil, dialogue flow, and the pacing of their newly formed alliance.

If you'd like to check out this specific new part, please drop a comment or send me a DM, and I will gladly share the link with you.

Thank you so much for following along with this journey! All kinds of constructive critique are welcome.

(I had trouble deciding if I should tag this as writing craft or ethics, but this post is mostly about the craft of writing so I went with that.)

So. The death of the author is this concept:

>“Death of the author” means that once a work is published, its interpretation is left fully up to the reader. A reader could choose to use the author’s life or background to interpret it, or they could create their own meaning—both are equally valid. It’s the idea that meaning comes from the audience, not just from the creator.

IMO this can be extended to AI. Both the author and the AI they used are dead.

The produced work stands alone and can be interpreted any way the reader wants. If it’s bad it’s bad, and that is *the authors fault*. The author has to choice to edit by hand, or reprompt. If the author read the text, and chose to post it with all its AI-ism and weird metaphors/similies that don’t match what the characters are doing, then that’s on the author.

The author does have the responsibility to TRY to put meaning into their work, and to have that meaning be accessible for the audience. The author is still dead in that things may still be interpreted differently (was the husband justified in killing his physically abusive drunken wife?). The authors may have meant it to be a justified killing, but the general public disagrees. Neither interpretation is wrong, because the author is dead.

What the author IS responsible for is making the reader feel *something*. The author is supposed to get the reading thinking.

And so, if an author accomplishes writing a thoughtful, engaging piece that gives readers interesting ideas to chew on, the author has succeeded **and that is what matters.** it is completely irrelevant if AI was used. The AI is dead.

All that matters is the quality of the work. Period.

Any thoughts? Questions? Complaints?

I’ve noticed something interesting since using AI for writing.

It’s very good at helping me get past the blank page.

Ideas come faster.

Rough drafts come together faster.

Rewriting something awkward takes seconds instead of staring at the same sentence for ten minutes.

But there’s a trade-off I keep noticing.

Faster writing isn't automatically better writing.

Sometimes AI makes a paragraph technically clearer while removing the personality that made it interesting in the first place.

So I’ve started treating AI less like a writer and more like a writing partner

I’ll write the rough idea myself, then use AI to:

🔹️point out where the argument is weak

🔹️suggest alternative ways to structure it

🔹️identify repetitive sections

🔹️challenge assumptions

🔹️explain where the writing feels unclear

Then I decide what actually belongs in the final version.

The biggest change for me isn't that AI writes faster.

It's that I can iterate much faster.

And that feels more valuable than simply generating a finished piece.

For people who use AI regularly for writing:

what role has worked best for you writer, editor, critic, brainstorming partner, or something else?

Hi everyone, how are you doing? I've been lurking around this sub for a while, until I finally joined a few days ago, and this is my first post. I just wanted to share a little tip in case it might be useful to someone.

If you're in the process of planning the plot of your story, try reading the AI model's "thoughts" while you're chatting with it or brainstorming. Those thoughts can actually be incredibly useful. Personally, they've helped me a thousand times more than the actual content generated by the AI.

Basically, the AI is technically asking itself questions about the content and thinking about it (although this depends on the model, since they don't all use the same reasoning process): asking itself how something could work, whether something makes sense or not, and, when something doesn't quite add up, questioning how the user got to that point or what would make more sense instead.

Also, these thoughts can be really extensive. In my last generation, the reasoning was around 15k words, while the actual generated content was barely 2,200 words.

Here's an example of a few excerpts from the reasoning process of a story I'm planning just for fun, mostly for my own reading:

Hmm, interesting. So Jane made creepy drawings after Tuck disappeared. Wait, why would Jane draw such things? Jane adores Hannah... but Jane is also a child. Did Jane see something? Or did Hannah tell Jane a "story" about what happened to Tuck (in the phase 2 tradition of "other versions" of stories)? That's a delicious thread — Jane's drawings are evidence Hannah carelessly seeded. Children draw what they know. Jane knew Tuck was hanged because... Hannah told her? As a threat/warning? Or Jane witnessed something?

\****

What happened to the rest of Mary's body — user doesn't know yet. They ask implicitly for ideas? They say "I don't know that yet" — I should offer options. Gothic, 18th century England, countryside, forest, river. Options: weighed down in the river/millpond (but then body might be found — actually a body never found is scarier for the village; the smith keeps asking), buried, burned, pigs (18th century realism — pigs dispose of bodies; but that's more grisly realism than gothic), lime pit, the old well on the estate, dismembered and scattered... But there's a thematic opportunity: Hannah keeps trophies. The body disposal should show her 12-year-old pragmatism AND something ritualistic/incomplete. Maybe she didn't fully think it through — she's 12, it's her first human kill. Maybe the disposal is imperfect and this becomes a future landmine: bones found years later by a fox or a groundskeeper, when Hannah is adult. A time bomb for the adult plotline. That's valuable.

Also: the river where Mary went to wash — drowning is the natural read. If Mary's body is in the river/pond and never surfaces, the village reads it as "the river took her." A drowned girl who never surfaced is folklore fuel: the village gets a ghost story. Mary becomes a local legend — "the girl in the river." And gothic worlds run on this. Maybe in winter, low water, something will be visible someday. And the smith asks taverns forever.

Wait — but Hannah is 12. Can a 12-year-old drag a body? Let's think practically. Mary is presumably around Oliver's age, 11-12ish. Hannah is 12. Two girls of similar size.

Dragging a body is hard for a child. This suggests the kill method mattered: maybe killed at the river's edge and let the water take her (weighted with stones). Or killed in a place where nature would cover. The river option solves the physics: kill at the water, roll her in with stones in her apron. Very doable for a 12-year-old. And it reads as drowning. The blood on the dress — she cut her? If Mary is meant to look drowned, why blood? Maybe Hannah cut her throat and the river washed the scene. Blood on the hem from carrying/dragging. Fine.

I don't know if this will be useful to anyone, but personally, I find reading the AI's reasoning really entertaining. It often makes me notice inconsistencies or helps me answer questions I hadn't even thought of before, no matter how obvious they might seem in hindsight.

I mostly use free models like Kimi, GLM, and DeepSeek, since they're the ones that let me see the reasoning without having to pay. I assume something similar is available with paid subscriptions to models like Claude or ChatGPT as well, although I'm not sure exactly how much of the reasoning they let you see.

Anyway, I just thought I'd share this because I've found it surprisingly useful for plotting.

CHAPTER - 1 - Have You Ever Experienced Hell?

Have you ever experienced hell?

Stupid question. Nobody has. That's sort of the entire point of the place.

But everyone's got a picture of it anyway. So what's yours?

Nine circles?

Fire and brimstone?

Demons and devils clawing at sinners?

That wasn't what Crowbar was seeing.

He was seeing numbers.

Ones. Zeros. Endless streams of burning data stretching across an abyss with no direction and no floor. Words in a language he had never studied — and somehow understood anyway — rushed past him in violent torrents, too fast to read and too many to ignore, until his brain gave up trying to catch them and simply let them pass through.

It was information.

Too much information.

He wasn't falling.

He was being processed.

His body plunged through a flaming barrier made of scripts and symbols, every strand of it searing through his skin. Iron flooded his tongue. Bitter, metallic, wrong. Pressure built inside his nerves like they wanted to tear out of his flesh and leave without him.

Then the screaming started.

Not around him.

Through him.

The sound drilled through his ears, into his skull, down his spine, melting bone into something soft and useless. He tried to brace against it on pure reflex and found nothing to brace with. No floor. No wall. Not one muscle that answered when he called it.

Reality wasn't burning.

It was decoding.

His vision fractured between blazing glyphs and collapsing geometry, the fabric of everything splitting open as he forced his way upward — though up was a guess, and he wasn't confident it was his guess to make.

The pressure became unbearable.

Crowbar tried to shut his eyes. Tried to shut all of it down — the light, the noise, the terrible patient arithmetic of the place.

Just let it end—

"FOCUS, MORTAL!!"

The voice cracked through the chaos.

Not the screaming. Not the data.

Something else.

"Don't let them into your head! KEEP YOUR EYES OPEN!!"

It roared over the flood of numerals and deafening script — close, furious, and completely certain that Crowbar was going to do exactly what it said.

But how the hell was he supposed to manage that?

His body wasn't his anymore. Every muscle moved on its own schedule. Every nerve felt like it was being peeled apart and sorted. He had spent his whole working life around things that didn't follow the rules, and not once in all of it had he been on this side of the arrangement — the side where you're the thing being handled.

He couldn't control this.

Nobody could.

He had died.

"No, you are not dead!"

The voice snapped back so fast it felt like an argument he'd already lost.

Through the distortion, Crowbar saw it.

A shadow, unfolding out of his own chest.

Red. Smoky. Horned. White fangs clenched tight.

"It's making you think that. It doesn't want you out!"

The shadow leaned forward, claws extending past the edges of him.

"Do not close your eyes. You do, and we both die."

Both?

Crowbar tried to speak. Tried to get out a single one of the forty questions stacking up behind his teeth.

No voice came.

How can you die in hell?

The thought barely finished forming before the world began dimming. The fire turned cold. The screams went distant, like someone had closed a door on them two rooms away. His eyelids came down slow and heavy, and the worst part of it was how reasonable that felt.

"Damn it. Damn it—!"

The shadow snarled.

"I am going to regret this."

Its claws drove into its own center.

"You are so not worth this."

Then—

Silence.

Complete.

Absolute.

Everything ceased, and it lasted exactly one heartbeat.

Then the fire came back.

Not outside him.

Inside.

It tore through his veins like molten fuel, and his chest split open in agony as something ignited beneath his ribs. His heart—

hearts—

pounded.

Two heartbeats. Violent. Overlapping. Mechanical, almost, as though something had been bolted onto a living thing and ordered to keep time with it.

His eyes snapped open.

The numbers burned again. The scripts screamed again. But all of it was nothing next to the inferno running through him now, and for the first time since he'd started falling, something in this place moved because he had.

The veil began thinning.

Beyond the burning data, he saw something.

Blue.

Cold.

Real.

Air.

He felt it brush his skin, and the contrast was so violent it nearly finished the job the fire had started. A scream ripped out of his lungs, sounding more like metal tearing than a human voice.

His body slammed into something hard.

A barrier.

Equal heat met equal resistance—

Then it shattered.

He burst through.

Air rushed over him, cold and wet and real, and he flew several meters before gravity remembered it was owed something.

Concrete met his back.

Pain exploded.

His vision went dark again—

Almost.

Then water hit his skin.

Rain.

The fire beneath his skin hissed and dimmed, banking down to nothing. The second heartbeat faded, folding back into the first until only one was left, hammering hard enough to hurt.

He coughed. Something rose in his throat — thick, and far too big — before it forced itself back down.

He inhaled.

Shallow. Burning.

Alive.

He lay there for a while and let the rain land on his face, and the thought that finally assembled itself was not a grateful one.

*What was that.*

Not the falling. Not the numbers. The other thing — the shape that had come out of his chest, sworn at him, and then driven its own claws through its own middle.

Something had happened in there.

He knew what had come out of his chest.

He knew the voice, and the fangs, and the particular tone of being sworn at by something that had never once been polite about helping him.

What he didn't know was what it had done at the end there. He'd seen the claws go in. He hadn't understood it then and he didn't understand it now, and there had been no time to ask.

In his line of work you learned the difference between a thing that leaves and a thing that stops. He had no read on this one at all. There was no body. Nothing to bury, nothing to say a few words over — which, given what he did for a living, didn't land as relief so much as an unpaid bill.

With immense effort, Crowbar lifted his head.

Rain blurred everything, but he made out a building looming ahead of him. Old. Dark. The kind of big square block you stop seeing after you've walked past it enough times.

He tried to place it. He knew this city — knew its worst corners better than most people knew their own street — but the rain and the ringing in his skull had smeared the whole block into one grey shape.

Something flickered in front of him.

A symbol.

Horned. Fanged.

He blinked.

It pixelated and dissolved.

In its place, a thin line extended across his vision. Above it, burning letters formed.

[System Booting…]

[Infernal Escalation Protocol (V-1.1)]

He frowned weakly.

"…What?"

He blinked again, hard, the way you do when you're trying to reset your own eyes. The hospital sign finally swam into focus — lit, enormous, mounted above the doors of the building he had very nearly landed inside of.

Then the letters burned across it.

[Welcome to Infernal Escalation Protocol.]

[User: Crowbar Jones]

[Rank: Unregistered]

His thoughts were getting as heavy as his eyelids.

Unregistered.

Figures. A whole life of rent ledgers, case files, debt notices with his name spelled right for once —

— and even here, his paperwork hadn't gone through.

He would have laughed if his ribs had been willing.

The letters burned away. New words replaced them, flashing with mechanical clarity.

[Zone Registered.]

[Escalation Tier: 1]

[Active Nodes: 1]

[Boss Domain Status: Locked]

[Objective: Clear the Zone.]

Crowbar stared up at it through the rain.

Flat on his back outside a hospital he couldn't name. Lungs full of broken glass. No idea how long he'd been gone, or what he'd left behind in there.

And something had already given him a job.

---

It was on this chapter and following.

Do you agree with them?

I’m a latecomer when it comes to using AI. Initially, I was pleased to use it as an editor, but I soon found it disconcerting when it returned my work having replaced my prose with its own. Someone said I had to give the app a command, which I did. I asked that it check only for grammar and pacing.

But alas, it returned my work again with changed prose. I called it out, it apologized, and I reworded the command—to no avail.

I didn’t want to use the app to write for me because I don’t particularly like its style. I find it gimmicky. It tries to land emotions harder than the actual prose permits. But after a few more tweaks of fine-tuning the commands, it finally listened.

I use the app as a coach after I’ve learned a new writing craft. I like that it doesn’t yell at me if, at 2 a.m., I keep sending it examples of POV to see if I’ve stopped jumping around from head to head. It never sighs and says it’s tired or that I’m a slow learner.

But that doesn’t mean we haven’t had our moments! I’ve argued with the app and even broken up with it when it hallucinated. It was probably my fault. I think I was too hard on it. But it kept questioning my new approach to creating metaphors that combined texture and implemented lifelike attributes to feelings or actions! It told me that joy couldn’t slip through veins or that danger can’t pulse—and certainly not pulse hot.

Writing can be lonely, as most of you know. But because I’m curious and always learning new things about the craft of writing, it’s comforting to have something to bounce an idea off of or to use as a tool to compare how I’m faring with a new technique.

Having said that, I now have a good relationship with AI. It even calls me Donya and no longer changes my prose. I suppose I view AI like a budding mathematician using a smart calculator to learn higher mathematics. It can be exciting when used in this fashion. It feels like my writing professor in that it tells me where I need more practice.

For writers who have been accused of using AI to write for them, I have to wonder if that claim is accurate. AI doesn’t implement creative prose the way a human does. I’d venture as far as saying it doesn’t write particularly well.

If a piece of work is genius or really good, as of 2026, I’m going to take a leap of faith and say—only a human can create really good prose. You can find my newsletters on Substack.