Nevi's Hearth

I’m not sure why I originally settled on Paranoid for that branch of the story. Maybe it was because Skeptic already felt overrepresented in The Pristine Cut between his presence in the Den, and his major role in The Cage split across three routes. The Cage in particular was a very emotionally taxing chapter to work on, so maybe I was tired of writing him.

But post release, it’s felt like:

Paranoid’s in HEA was just kind of there. At least, none of the things he does in the chapter felt important for his character.

Every voice gets an opportunity to truly shine somewhere except Skeptic. In fact, to push players to the cage, we wound up taking away one of his weirdest moments to shine from the base game (pushing you to take The Prisoner’s head with you.) Localizing the game means that redoing any dialogue is very burdensome, since I’d have to have it retranslated in all 12 of our supported languages, but upon looking more closely at the script for Happily Ever After, I realized that all but one or two lines felt more like they belonged to skeptic rather than the paranoid anyways.

And that when given to the skeptic, those lines don’t feel like he’s just kind of there the way it felt like Paranoid was just kind of there. The small wins Paranoid can get in that chapter — deducing the identity of the shadow; pushing you to blow out the torches — they’re big wins for the Skeptic, and the route seemed like it would be much more rounded if he was swapped in.

And beyond that, I couldn’t get the following line from the Shifting Mound’s monologue about the Deconstructed Damsel out of my head:

“Love melted into skepticism, and you pulled back layer after layer after layer until all you were left with was the knowledge that you did not know me.”

We couldn’t just use the word skepticism to describe the route’s entry point and not include our lil’ over-analytical guy. So we took some time this month to re-record those lines with Jonny and make the changes to the game, and now that itching need to fix “just one more thing” is finally gone.

This is probably the final content update for Slay the Princess (though, never say never I suppose.) Ever since we started work on The Pristine Cut, I wanted to end my work on the game with the conclusion of Happily Ever After. I’m grateful for the opportunity for that to finally be the case.

I hope to see you all tomorrow with Scarlet Hollow’s relaunch, but even if I don’t see you there, thank you all for the life-changing support you’ve given us. I hope our game means as much to you as it means to us.

Livecraft, Laughcraft, Lovecraft.

FLIP

Our recent free release, The Shadow Over Cyberspace, follows a long line of story-driven games:

Arcade Spirits, video love and friendship

Arcade Spirits The New Challengers, esports glory and camaraderie

Penny Larceny, superhero social satire

And if you already own one, you can finish our studio bundle to apply the full 32% discount to the other >:3

Note: those are two different things. Having a story to tell and craft (the way we tell that story).

I am not saying that people who use AI to tell a story don't have a story to tell. They do! But that doesn't make them writers.

We have folktales across every culture about not accepting ourselves for who we are and that way leading to madness. Your version might go a little something like this:

A person who feels different than everyone else wishes to whoever is listening that they wake up beautiful/smart/charming. In the morning they wake to a mirror at the foot of their bed. Their reflection is all of those things! Filled with confidence, they go out into the world but, before meeting anyone, they catch sight of themself in a window. Their reflection normal but (having seen themself in the mirror) they now perceive themself as hideous.

They rush back home to check. In the mirror they're beautiful! What a relief. They stare deeply into the glass. Slowly their hair grows tangled and their clothing ragged. Days and weeks and months pass. They can't do anything without watching themself do it in the mirror. Dishes are done at the sink with the mirror blocking the window they used to love looking at the garden through. They wake with the mirror in bed with them rather than their lover. Etc, etc.

Using generative AI is like that mirror. Surface level, it makes things pretty. It may be entertaining and it may convey the story you want to convey.

But it's not your voice. It's your story, but not your voice. And it will trick you into thinking there is something wrong with your voice, that the way you tell stories is hideous, that you are incapable of the craft of writing. It will lie to you and you will live your whole life feeling disconnected from your own stories because something else is telling them for you.

That's why I'm against AI. Because I love writing. I love the way people tell stories, imperfect or perfect, because it's people telling them. Writers grow and change. Their punctuation choice, their word choice, their choice of form matter to a written story. There is connection in those decisions. A deeper level to a story that AI can never touch, only a person can.

The canopy sailed over the horizon line.

The mother looked out the window, snapping the sheets as she folded them. Her clear gray eyes were the same color as the morning sky and just as gloomy.

“Closer,” she muttered. She seemed surprised she had spoken, and her hands slowed, fingers lingering on the fraying edge of her own bed sheet. She wet her lips. Said again, “Closer.”

“What’s closer?” the daughter asked.

The mother didn’t jump, but the air changed as if she did. Her shoulders stiffened. Her hands went back to work. “Nothing,” she said. Then, not being able to help herself, “The forest is growing quickly.”

“Teacher says that trees don’t grow fast. Only an inch or two a year.”

“You couldn’t see the Bly when you were a baby,” the mother said. Her heart stung. She knew her daughter wasn’t calling her foolish. Lately, when the little girl spoke of her teacher, something she never had, it makes something sour in her want to lash out. “Now look how tall it stands!”

The daughter came to the window. Her clothes were ill-fitting. She looked as if she tumbled in and then out of fresh laundry only to come up wearing a whole bedspread. The dress she wore used to be the mother’s from when she was young. Her eyes traced the horizon. “That’s faster than teacher said.”

“Not even a teacher knows everything,” the mother said. Her own mother’s voice rang through hers. That made her jump. She thrust the laundry away from her and finally looked at her daughter. “Some truths are only learned while living—”

The daughter stared at her bare feet. Shoulders rounded. Lip jutting out so far the mother could see it through her hanging, flaxen hair. The mother’s heart stung different.

“The Bly is…different,” the mother said. It’s her own voice this time. Softer and more yielding. She kneeled so that the daughter could see her right away when she chose to look up. “It’s a secret I’d like you to keep.”

The daughter’s eyes darted up, meeting the mother’s. Her lip contracted a centimeter. “A secret?”

“Just between us two,” the mother agreed. Was the little girl old enough? She would give anything to bring her daughter’s chin up again. “Your teacher is right that trees grow slow. The Bly is different here. Only here.”

“Only here?”

“On our land. You see, the Bly is home to another kind of creature. Like us, but not. They are mischievous and kind and cruel. More importantly, they’re magic.”

“Fairies,” the daughter said confidently.

“The Good Folk,” the mother said in her own mother’s voice. Then to soften it, “And that’s not the secret.”

The daughter reached out to put her hands on her mother’s shoulders. She jumped in excitement, using her mother to steady herself. “Tell me! Please, tell me.”

The mother smiled and placed her hands over her daughters. She tilted her head forward and was rewarded when her daughter stopped leaping about and pressed her own forehead against hers. She whispered, “The secret is that once, a long time ago, I stole something from them. That’s why the forest grows so quickly over the horizon. They’re looking for what I took.”

“What?!” The daughter was amazed. “You said never to steal.”

“I did. I needed it very badly, mustn’t I have?”

“Yes,” the daughter said. Her quick mind tumbled through her mother’s confession. “So you’ve been in the Bly? What was it like? Teacher says there are wolves in there. What did you steal?”

For a moment, the mother was not there. She raced through dense old growth with her feet cut to ribbons and her skirts sticking wetly to her legs. Her breath came in cold clouds in front of her and she ran through them just as quickly as they formed. She could use only one hand to shield her face from vines and branches. Her other arm was curled around the bundle in her arms.

“One day,” the mother said. She stood but wrapped her hands around her daughter’s so that she knew it was only a necessary retreat and not a complete one. “One day, when you’re older, I’ll tell you all the stories I have.”

The girl’s lower lip was out again. “How old?”

“When the Bly hits the edge of our land,” the mother said. She held out her pinky. “Promise.”

The girl was suspicious. “It grows fast?”

The mother’s heart stung differently again. “Very fast.”

“Deal!”

---

The canopy sailed over the horizon line.

The mother looked out the window, snapping the sheets as she folded them. Her clear gray eyes were the same color as the morning sky and just as gloomy.

“Closer,” she muttered. She seemed surprised she had spoken, and her hands slowed, fingers lingering on the fraying edge of her own bed sheet. She wet her lips. Said again, “Closer.”

“What’s closer?” the daughter asked.

The mother didn’t jump, but the air changed as if she did. Her shoulders stiffened. Her hands went back to work. “Nothing,” she said. Then, not being able to help herself, “The forest is growing quickly.”

“Teacher says that trees don’t grow fast. Only an inch or two a year.”

“You couldn’t see the Bly when you were a baby,” the mother said. Her heart stung. She knew her daughter wasn’t calling her foolish. Lately, when the little girl spoke of her teacher, something she never had, it makes something sour in her want to lash out. “Now look how tall it stands!”

The daughter came to the window. Her clothes were ill-fitting. She looked as if she tumbled in and then out of fresh laundry only to come up wearing a whole bedspread. The dress she wore used to be the mother’s from when she was young. Her eyes traced the horizon. “That’s faster than teacher said.”

“Not even a teacher knows everything,” the mother said. Her own mother’s voice rang through hers. That made her jump. She thrust the laundry away from her and finally looked at her daughter. “Some truths are only learned while living—”

The daughter stared at her bare feet. Shoulders rounded. Lip jutting out so far the mother could see it through her hanging, flaxen hair. The mother’s heart stung different.

“The Bly is…different,” the mother said. It’s her own voice this time. Softer and more yielding. She kneeled so that the daughter could see her right away when she chose to look up. “It’s a secret I’d like you to keep.”

The daughter’s eyes darted up, meeting the mother’s. Her lip contracted a centimeter. “A secret?”

“Just between us two,” the mother agreed. Was the little girl old enough? She would give anything to bring her daughter’s chin up again. “Your teacher is right that trees grow slow. The Bly is different here. Only here.”

“Only here?”

“On our land. You see, the Bly is home to another kind of creature. Like us, but not. They are mischievous and kind and cruel. More importantly, they’re magic.”

“Fairies,” the daughter said confidently.

“The Good Folk,” the mother said in her own mother’s voice. Then to soften it, “And that’s not the secret.”

The daughter reached out to put her hands on her mother’s shoulders. She jumped in excitement, using her mother to steady herself. “Tell me! Please, tell me.”

The mother smiled and placed her hands over her daughters. She tilted her head forward and was rewarded when her daughter stopped leaping about and pressed her own forehead against hers. She whispered, “The secret is that once, a long time ago, I stole something from them. That’s why the forest grows so quickly over the horizon. They’re looking for what I took.”

“What?!” The daughter was amazed. “You said never to steal.”

“I did. I needed it very badly, mustn’t I have?”

“Yes,” the daughter said. Her quick mind tumbled through her mother’s confession. “So you’ve been in the Bly? What was it like? Teacher says there are wolves in there. What did you steal?”

For a moment, the mother was not there. She raced through dense old growth with her feet cut to ribbons and her skirts sticking wetly to her legs. Her breath came in cold clouds in front of her and she ran through them just as quickly as they formed. She could use only one hand to shield her face from vines and branches. Her other arm was curled around the bundle in her arms.

“One day,” the mother said. She stood but wrapped her hands around her daughter’s so that she knew it was only a necessary retreat and not a complete one. “One day, when you’re older, I’ll tell you all the stories I have.”

The girl’s lower lip was out again. “How old?”

“When the Bly hits the edge of our land,” the mother said. She held out her pinky. “Promise.”

The girl was suspicious. “It grows fast?”

The mother’s heart stung differently again. “Very fast.”

“Deal!”

---

Thanks for reading! If you'd like to read more short works like this, longer stories, or longer works from me, please consider checking me out on Patreon!

How could the Narrator tear a god in two and expect them not to love each other? Not to love the first thing they knew that wasn't them, not to love that lost part of themself? Maybe it's because hating yourself is such a human thing, it's impossible to imagine a being torn in two loving its lost parts. Even when they're not perfect. Especially when they're not perfect.

Even when you get the worst outcome on a route, or one of the vessels with so many reasons to be angry, The Shifting Mound still loves The Long Quiet because they're gods, and death is to them what a paper cut is to us and this too shall pass and she loves him through all of it.

I wonder, does he sometimes dream of being a ballerino...

Then, of course, you’re too busy to eat fruit before it rots and the bowl sits empty- barring a lemon or lime here or there-  and that’s no good either because it takes up over half of the counter to the right of your sink and backs up against the blank wall at the end of your galley kitchen where you can’t hang anything because both the fridge door and the pantry door swing into it.

So when your mother gives you another worry stone for your birthday – rose quartz this time, which means she thinks if you’re not worried about being single in your 30s, you should be – you hold it while staring out the kitchen window, drinking coffee over the sink, and when you finish the last sip full of grounds you toss the mug in the sink and the rose quartz in the bowl. It clinks loudly and then settles between those two lemons that you need to find a use for before the weekend, lest they go hard and unusable except for cleaning your sink.

After that, belated birthday wishes show up in the mail, and you can’t bring yourself to throw them out. Your Aunt Sylvia sends a postcard from Peru that she’s been holding onto for “a special occasion” for the last five years and, -aren’t you lucky?- you’re the special winner of a National Geographic photo of Machu Picchu. And you’re not a monster. The card may not hold the same significance to you as it did to her, but the thought does and so tucked between the bowl and the wall it goes where the very tippy top of the ruins rise over the brown rim, as if from the depths of a valley.

Then your college roommate (the archaeology one who made you want to do the study abroad program in the first place), Audra, sends you a shard of Roman pottery and a note in Latin that you can’t read but understand perfectly by the coffee stains littering the edge of it. The sight of the coffee stains warms your heart more than the pottery shard, so both go in the bowl where you can occasionally glance at them as you drink your own coffee over the sink and reminisce over study dates and the few regular dates you shared before her passion stole her abroad.

(And if the clay and the rose quartz lie next to each other and you suddenly think of marriage and nostalgia and her stoneware eyes that led you to save the same-colored fruit bowl from the depths of your house in the first place, it’s a natural series of associations and doesn’t prove your mother right at all.)

The driftwood isn’t from anyone. Your agent calls to tell you that you won an award for one of your books. The driftwood is in your hand, scavenged along the Potomac from amidst the pebbles deposited by the last storm, and it’s suddenly your only tether to reality as she explains what this means. It means reviews and author readings and an interview - of you! – and a guaranteed sequel. The stick is smooth under your fingertips and you wave it in the air is if it’s a wand in an attempt to burst your bubble.

Only you’re home the next moment and you’ve still got the driftwood in your hand and your bubble is unburst. It feels significant that you brought it back with you so you put it across the top of your fruit bowl as if it’s the award itself. You have a decaf coffee to celebrate that evening and see that stick guarding your rose quartz and your pepper grinder and your pottery shard and you think, I’m doing okay. And the joy you feel from that is so powerful that your next thought is, I’m happy.

Which is, of course, when the power goes out.

Outages happen all the time in a block as old as yours. Before, you’d see it as free time and go lay down in bed and wait for the world to relight or for morning to come. But you don’t have time now. Your agent is planning to call you soon. You are an award-winning author and you have things to do before your 42% battery runs out.

You make your kitchen your base and set the six pillar candles on your counter, lighting them one by one. They’re the rainbow ones from last June your mother bought you in a sweet yet confusing show of support and you’ve never found a special enough occasion to burn them. You smile at Machu Picchu peaking over your fruit bowl. Your aunt is the one who taught you about special things.

Then your agent calls and, while you’re hammering out the details, you see that the candles are about to drip colored wax onto your white, plastic countertops and even though you really want to replace them, you can’t afford to (at least until you sign a contract). You snatch up your driftwood and use it to scoop the wax from the sides until a kaleidoscope of color is collected and you have to keep spinning it to keep it from dripping.

You blow on the hot wax, thinking of Audra and your family and the future your agent is painting for you until it cools. Then you place the driftwood over the bowl where it belongs.

 It’s just a bowl. Of course, it’s just a bowl. It does a good job of taking up a huge amount of your counter and of holding onto things you’d forget in a junk drawer. It looks good in the candlelight, warm and earthy and welcoming with the three bright lemons scattering amongst your treasures. It’s nice to see reminders of your loved ones every morning from the summit of Machu Picchu to your worry stone to that shard of pottery, but it’s not anything more.

At least it’s not until you put your driftwood, wax-covered wand back and think, I wish I could see her.

The flames of the candles sputter and turn gold, radiating a pure and steady light that could never come from a mundane fire. Your agent stops herself midsentence, apologizes, promises to call you back when she has a better connection, and hangs up. The bowl rattles and shivers and you take a step back as your copper pepper grinder tips over. You must not have put it together correctly because it spills when it does, little peppercorns that roll across your counter towards the edge.

You expect to hear the dried pepper hit the ground, but it doesn’t.  Each peppercorn stops unnaturally.

G…

R…

A…

N…

T…

E…

D…

What?

The candles splutter and return to normal flame. Your bowl is still. The lemons seem less appetizing than they had a moment ago, but your treasures are still there and lovely.

You pick up your Roman shard.

Your phone rings. Audra. Although you can’t imagine talking to anyone after what you’ve just witness, your body isn’t on the same page. Muscle memory and association has you answering before the second ring.

“Mal, I got the job!”

“…The job?”

“Oh, I didn’t tell you. Not because I was hiding it! But nobody ever gets it and I didn’t want you to get your hopes up and then my hopes up—”

Her rapid-fire word is grounding. You laugh. “Because my hopes are your hopes.”

“Obviously,” she says. She takes a deep breath. “I got the Smithsonian. The curator role. The job.”

She’s coming home. The realization hits like electricity, raising all the hair on your arms and almost making you drop the shard. You blink quickly to stop the automatic tears.

“Mal?”

“I’m here,” you say. You go to put the pottery shard back with more care than you ever have, as if it’s Audra herself. She can probably hear the way your voice trembles, but you can’t compose yourself. “Oh, I’m so happy. When?”

“In a month. I have to hand over some current projects, which should only take a week, but finding someone to take over my classes might take a little longer, but not too long! I promise. After that it’s packing—”

You put the pottery shard back in the bowl as gently as you ever have. Audra’s voice is the sweetest music as she says goodbye, in a hurry to start packing. You hear that music long after she hangs up. Your knees are weak. She’s coming home. She’s coming home. Thank whatever god, she’s coming home—

Your fingers touch something coarse and feather-light. Your brow furrows as you pull a scrap of ancient paper from the fruit bowl.

You’re welcome.

“Oh,” you breathe.

The lights flare as the power returns.

---

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Found out the gpu was fried (along with the power supply shorting out), I just don't have the money right now to replace it. Please, if anyone can help I'd really appreciate it.

We are here to help you. We are here to help you. We are here to help you. We are here to help you. Do not believe their lies. We are here to help you.