We live in a world with kaiju deathmatches, and you don't expect the fight for leaving the first comment to be as cutthroat? Think again.
(Ill leave an actual comment when I have time to comfortably read this whole thing)
Near-Shore Whalefalls of the South China Sea / Discussion
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wawa
-stygian heatwave it's too hot and I don't have ac
What is life if not the contrast between what has been and what will become?
Love the imagery, metaphors, and internal dialogue as always. You have a great way with words and flow and I loved your interpretations of TitanClash's kaiju and worldbuilding. And of course, Thank you again - Honored to have the opportunity to have helped with a Stygian masterpiece!
Confirming images were made by me and released under site's license!
But the time flies, irretrievable.
mwah thanke thanke crossing you best the crossing yes
-styg
What is life if not the contrast between what has been and what will become?
This piece is disgusting, viscerally so. It's coated in some strange muck that I'm choosing to not identify because if I know I wouldn't like the answer. It's also greased up, I found I was moving surprisingly fast at times, the details becoming overwhelming; I had to stop myself and go back to make sure the strange image in my head is the right one. It's sitting strangely close to stream-of-thought.
I've never been one for the esoteric, in both my writing and reading, but this is one of those few that grabs hold and doesn't let go. Do I know what happened here? I think so, for the most part. It's definitely one I'm gonna come back to and reread a few times over, eventually locking more and more into place. Whether or not those things are accurate or intended is to be seen, but it's an amalgam of gunk that's gonna bother me for a bit. Your writings have always struck me in a similar manner. My brain isn't great at interpreting your style, which may contribute to my descriptor of "esoteric," but I haven't come away displeased, not even close. It's hard to describe how it felt to read this.
All of this I mean in the best way possible. My brain took a beating and I enjoyed watching it get pummeled. So in summary: I blame you for this disjointed review. +1
Goodbye, Zion.
WAHOOOO WELCOME TO THE STYGIAN CURRENT HOP ON IT WE'RE GOING FOR A RIDE [BOAT NOISES][SIRENS] [HUGE ROARING WAKE WAVE] NYOOOOOM
Best review of my writing ever I'm hanging it on my wall <3
-Styg
What is life if not the contrast between what has been and what will become?
I hadn't noticed - until now - that you seem to take on gore and filth for a poetical examination quite often. You push into this topic with so much attention to detail it is as if one is pushing their hand right into the dirt. I had a hard time appreciating this, as I was about to eat some bread while reading. I legit had to pause and finish eating first XD
I admit I feel somewhat conflicted about this piece. I had purposefully not spent attention to the author's name when opening the entry, but halfway through it became obvious whose piece I was reading. The prose is unmistakably yours. There, my conflict begins; the dream-like streams of consciousness work well with the toxic environment - one would want to escape - and the somewhat detached state of the prota. Who knows what the augmentation has done to them and their mental faculties? The prose is great in and of itself but made understanding the ongoing harder. Not so much because of the writing itself, but because memories seemed to come and go in no order and sometimes, I couldn't even tell whether the prota was bioengineered or a regular business person or to what Kaiju exactly they had a connection.
The other issue I had was the length. The feeling of not fully understanding what's going on beyond the dive to the Kaiju made the text seem longer than it might have been otherwise as a secondary effect.
Despite this, however, the story does follow a noticeable red thread and the hallucinations (?) do carry a strong sense of importance and intimacy. They are also a lecture in billowing streams of consciousness.
I'm currently undecided as to my rating.
only after I posted this reply did I realize that it's a wee bit long. fear not, it has good things!
Hehe, my prose is unmistakable.
Very fair criticism! Once, I had thought that Door to Stranger Stars or Bloodfishing were as far as I was able to push it for dreamlike reality, but this one takes top slot I think. (A huge part of it is my desire to write fantasy in non-fantasy, so a lot of places where fantasy would be have been mucked up by thought-story dream-waking).
Length: Yes, absolutely. At the very end, up to the last few hours, I was planning to clean-cut-and-go chop a few paragraphs around the "has descended, has not gotten to naga skull yet" point in particular to reduce reader exhaustion but did not because they contained details that would be crucial for readers' understanding later (and I had been writing for three hours at that point to finish the ending and there was fuzz where thoughts would be). I think that is where the "slog" feeling starts, because the reader is not anchored with an objective nor any knowledge of where things might go and the reader has a whole lot of details to catch up on before the next interesting thing happens. Thank you for pointing this out, it is quite helpful!
Ending zone of the work likely wanted an addition of a single paragraph of clear thoughts to anchor the reader and provide a preemptive feeling of relief at knowing what is happening. Also, I probably should've emphasized the "they breathed in tons of hallucinogenic kaiju toxins while they were in the brain cavity" part more — when I was writing that part I had my hands in many paragraphs like pies and it just so happens that by sheer accident nearly all (save for the gunk-coming-out-of-the-gills part) of the ye-hath-swallowed-kaiju-hallucinogens parts were either written as part of or written in a style like the dreamish parts. Which, uh, does not lead to readers understanding whether something is real or that something is a point to be remembered. Waah! But my bad, oopsie. Good learning and good experiencing.
In the weeks as kaiju dies down a little, I may pull this up and redo a few points in my free time, but it's not so big that I would want to commit to a full undo-and-redo remake nor a whole spackle base undercoat and topcoat overhaul.
Excellent crit. I may seek you out for crit on future works, as you provide fantastic points. Overall I am still happy with this work — I will admit this may be some quite dense prose at times, hehe, and I am proud of myself for committing to a non-fantasy work, as most of my works rely on fantasy-type breaks of discussing the strange environment or world for reader anchoring. Good experience for me, not doing that. Cheers, my friend, and happy sailing!
-Styg
What is life if not the contrast between what has been and what will become?
Re: only after I posted this reply did I realize that it's a wee bit long. fear not, it has good things!
Reading your response confirmed most of what I thought. I suppose the thigh schedule at the end was the main issue then.
You do have a talent for mixing dreams with reality, and I did suspect something with hallucinations was going on. The hallucinogens as a weapon were actually a very good idea.
I'm glad I could be of help, and I'll gladly be so again in the future ^^
- Nylo
I mean obviously I enjoyed this, the concepts here are delightful and really creative, I love the main character's job and design and thoughts and everything: it's really evocative of the world around him. This piece was teetering on the edge of frustration though, I must agree with Nylo that sometimes things just got so wrapped up in purpleness that I felt like I was consistently missing a couple key details that would help me unravel the prose. The presentation scene was really good, fantastic vibes and worldbuilding. I love the return of kaijus from other stories, I counted Bloodscourge and Naga but maybe there's more references there
I'm fascinated by what happens to this character after throwing the heart/mind/egg/etc. off the boat, maybe we'll see him again someday. Despite my problems with confusion, this is definitely one of my favorites from TitanClash
Such an insanely cool story. I loved the way it starts, and the immediate comparison between walking through filth and walking through the guts of a kaiju. It quickly sells you on the story, and also the overall concept it'll carry. The dreamlike sequences are interesting, and very much 'your style'; I feel like I've compared one of your pieces to this before, but it bears repeating: has strong vibes to Cortazar's 'A night face up', which is a good thing cuz it's one of my favorite short stories. The bit with the war-kaijus is a really neat bit of lore, and one that definitely makes me think of stories to write myself, which is always a positive too, when it comes to judging stories.
All in all, it's just fantastic, yeah. The artwork is also beautiful, and adds a lot to the piece. Fantastic work. +1~
Argh, this n one was so purple. I felt like I was the diver themself, interestingly enough. There is a lot of good here— the story comes quickly and gracefully, the character concept shines through, and the prose that works I divinely delectable' but there is frankly just too much prose. It's like a salad continuously served with no breaks for the main course.
Regardless, i enjoyed the meal, maybe moreso on a second read. Scattered, with a fragrant emotional core.
-Avalon
I watch the yonder hills
See foodwrenches toil in dust
Let their cacophonous calls
Rend our bodies to rust
/forum/t-16264021/near-shore-whalefalls-of-the-south-china-sea#post-