Fantasy
Tempest of Iron Tides
The Gathering Storm The ocean had always belonged to no one—and yet, men had tried for centuries to claim it. Captain Elian Voss stood at the prow of the warship Aegis Valor, his coat snapping in the rising wind. Before him stretched an endless expanse of darkening water, the horizon swallowed by a wall of storm clouds. The air smelled of salt, oil, and something metallic—like the promise of blood.
By Sahir E Shafqat5 days ago in Fiction
Bacon. Top Story - April 2026. Content Warning.
Satan, laughing, spreads his wings. He launches into an atmosphere riddled with smoke, soot, and ash. He feels the radiation from a thousand fallen nukes. For humanity, it’s certain death. For him, it’s like bathing in a sauna. He laughs again at the thought.
By C. Rommial Butler5 days ago in Fiction
The Painting That Aged Instead of Her 🎨
THE PORTRAIT IN THE ATTIC 🖼️ When renowned artist Julian Reeves painted his girlfriend Celeste's portrait during the summer of 2019, he did not intend to create anything supernatural or extraordinary, just an oil painting of the woman he loved captured in the golden light of their Brooklyn apartment during the happiest period of their relationship, but the painting which took three months to complete and which Julian considered his finest work developed a quality that neither of them could explain and that would eventually destroy their relationship and transform their understanding of love, beauty, and the terrible cost of trying to preserve something that is meant to change 🎨
By The Curious Writer5 days ago in Fiction
Bahlool and the Silent Traveler
Bahlool and the Silent Traveler Baghdad was a city of wonders, but one afternoon, the mood in the Great Hall of Khalifa Haroun al-Rashid was anything but wonderful. A traveler had arrived from a distant land, bringing with him a challenge that left the city’s most famous scholars and viziers completely speechless. The man didn't speak a word; instead, he posed his questions through signs and gestures.
By Amir Husen6 days ago in Fiction
Like The Ashes of Lanterns on the Wind
One of the problems with living in the swamp is that there is no horizon. The other is the random appearance of the wisps. The lantern’s glow reminded me of the little pests, each a lantern unto itself. Sometimes, like tonight, they would cover the swamp. Like people, there were many types of wisps, and the problem was figuring out which were which, especially given how identical the flames were to each other. If you followed the right ones, you could become a richer person, but if you followed the wrong ones, you could become as ashes in the wind.
By Jamais Jochim6 days ago in Fiction
The Woman
Every Handshake Delivered a Flavor She Couldn't Ignore THE GIFT NOBODY WANTED 🎁 Nora Kim discovered her ability on her seventh birthday when her grandmother hugged her and she tasted cinnamon and honey so strongly that she searched the room for cookies before realizing that the flavors were coming from the embrace itself, from the warmth and love that her grandmother radiated through physical contact, and this was the beginning of a life lived through a sense that nobody believed existed and that transformed every human interaction into a gustatory experience that could be beautiful or revolting depending on the emotional state of the person touching her. Handshakes with strangers tasted like water, neutral and forgettable, but handshakes with people harboring hidden anger tasted like burnt metal, and the embrace of a friend who secretly resented her tasted like spoiled milk despite the smile on the friend's face, and this constant involuntary translation of human emotion into flavor meant that Nora could never be deceived about how someone truly felt about her because their body chemistry communicated through her tongue what their words and expressions might conceal 🍯
By The Curious Writer6 days ago in Fiction
The Library
A Librarian's Secret That Has Been Hidden for a Hundred Years THE DOOR THAT SHOULDN'T EXIST 🚪 Maya Santos had worked as the evening librarian at the Thornfield Public Library for three years without noticing the door behind the reference section, a door that blended so perfectly with the oak paneling that it was invisible unless you were standing at exactly the right angle in exactly the right light, and she only discovered it on a Thursday evening in December when she dropped her phone and watched it slide across the floor and stop against a door frame that she had walked past thousands of times without ever seeing 📱
By The Curious Writer6 days ago in Fiction
How to Break a Monstrous Curse. Top Story - April 2026.
1. Extraction - remove yourself from all sources of conflict; the birthplace of curses. A week before your eighteenth birthday, your mother will sit you down and tell you not to panic, “there’s something you need to know—”
By Lauren Everdell7 days ago in Fiction
The Night I Opened My Door — And Everything Changed
The knock came at 11:43 p.m. I remember the time because I had just checked my phone, hoping for a message that was never going to arrive. The apartment was quiet in that heavy way only lonely spaces can be. The refrigerator hummed. The clock ticked. My tea had gone cold beside me — a habit lately.
By imtiazalam7 days ago in Fiction
The Window
The glow was the first thing everyone checked in the morning—not the sun, which was unreliable and messy, but the steady, cool blue of the glass. Every home was a gallery of these illuminated rectangles, windows that offered a view far more curated and pleasing, than normal human optics could receive from the unfiltered world that hid behind everyone's' walls.
By Meko James 8 days ago in Fiction
