I do love a good roast.
The Eve of Ashes | Scribble Hub
The Eve of Ashes | Scribble Hub
The detective genre peaked in 2000s, and nowadays is dead aside from the cable TVs and those obscure sites for mystery webnovels (you know the place),
I am afraid the site isn’t loading it for me, so this witch holds her tongue as of this moment.「KISAME」! What did you just say about the mystery genre?!?! I’ll have you know that Agatha Chrxstxe started out as a webnovel writer, but offline!
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Take this! This is an Umineko forgery, a mystery based on the same rules as When The Seagulls Cry, but the game masters are 4chan girls!!
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/Conspiracy/ Girls >The Showdown of Madison Delaroux
//Cute and funny 4chan girls expose conspiracies.// Serial Channer Madison Delaroux and conspiracy-denier Ayano Sane are back! Glowies, culties and jannies beware! ESPECIALLY! That giga-glowie who calls herself [La Monarquía]! STOP trying to yuribait my accomplice! I don't care how little pantsu...www.scribblehub.com
In one chapter, see for yourself if can solve for the central mystery: “Does magick exist? There can only be yes or no!"
As a great senator who would have made Amxrica great again once said, 'duck ethos, duck pathos, duck, ALL OF IT!' Today, this Jxjx shall expose your lack of understanding of the mystery genre by MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDAing your logos into the ducking ground!!!
As proof this is a proper mystery, I call upon the following great-witches to certify that this mystery follows all rules set forth by the mystery genre!
Come forth, Witch of Miracles, Lady @BernKatstel !!
Come forth, Witch of No-Sleep, Lady @TechnologicalHuman !!!
This great witch thinks it's funny so why the hell not. Approved.「KISAME」! What did you just say about the mystery genre?!?! I’ll have you know that Agatha Chrxstxe started out as a webnovel writer, but offline!
![]()
Take this! This is an Umineko forgery, a mystery based on the same rules as When The Seagulls Cry, but the game masters are 4chan girls!!
![]()
/Conspiracy/ Girls >The Showdown of Madison Delaroux
//Cute and funny 4chan girls expose conspiracies.// Serial Channer Madison Delaroux and conspiracy-denier Ayano Sane are back! Glowies, culties and jannies beware! ESPECIALLY! That giga-glowie who calls herself [La Monarquía]! STOP trying to yuribait my accomplice! I don't care how little pantsu...www.scribblehub.com
In one chapter, see for yourself if can solve for the central mystery: “Does magick exist? There can only be yes or no!"
As a great senator who would have made Amxrica great again once said, 'duck ethos, duck pathos, duck, ALL OF IT!' Today, this Jxjx shall expose your lack of understanding of the mystery genre by MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDAing your logos into the ducking ground!!!
As proof this is a proper mystery, I call upon the following great-witches to certify that this mystery follows all rules set forth by the mystery genre!
Come forth, Witch of Miracles, Lady @BernKatstel !!
Come forth, Witch of No-Sleep, Lady @TechnologicalHuman !!!
Sadly, no smut in this story. lol jk「KISAME」! What did you just say about the mystery genre?!?! I’ll have you know that Agatha Chrxstxe started out as a webnovel writer, but offline!
![]()
Take this! This is an Umineko forgery, a mystery based on the same rules as When The Seagulls Cry, but the game masters are 4chan girls!!
![]()
/Conspiracy/ Girls >The Showdown of Madison Delaroux
//Cute and funny 4chan girls expose conspiracies.// Serial Channer Madison Delaroux and conspiracy-denier Ayano Sane are back! Glowies, culties and jannies beware! ESPECIALLY! That giga-glowie who calls herself [La Monarquía]! STOP trying to yuribait my accomplice! I don't care how little pantsu...www.scribblehub.com
In one chapter, see for yourself if can solve for the central mystery: “Does magick exist? There can only be yes or no!"
As a great senator who would have made Amxrica great again once said, 'duck ethos, duck pathos, duck, ALL OF IT!' Today, this Jxjx shall expose your lack of understanding of the mystery genre by MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDAing your logos into the ducking ground!!!
As proof this is a proper mystery, I call upon the following great-witches to certify that this mystery follows all rules set forth by the mystery genre!
Come forth, Witch of Miracles, Lady @BernKatstel !!
Come forth, Witch of No-Sleep, Lady @TechnologicalHuman !!!
I wanted to like your story—I really did. But it’s like your webnovel looked me dead in the eye, raised a middle finger, and said, “Nah, I don’t want you to like me. I’m just here to marvel at my own reflection.” What you’ve given me is the case study for my anti-guide on storytelling (Dao Of Rhertoric), and I quote myself:![]()
Project Elyse: Endless Frontier
Depressed and lost throughout much of his life, Hasegawa Satou finds himself no longer seeking anything more than a painless death—or so he thought, until the day finally comes and he realizes what he had always wanted was a better lease of life. This fruits, to his surprise, and...www.scribblehub.com
The moment I decided to share my story here, I’d already planned to not defend myself, no matter how harsh the feedback was. I shared Project Elyse partly because I wanted to see what happens, since I’ve only shared it once or twice with someone else; but the last sentence gave me a chuckle, so I’d like to make this clear, otherwise it’ll bother me.stop writing for yourself and start writing for your reader
The thing is, I wrote Project Elyse primarily for myself, which is something I mention in my AN. I’m guessing you skipped over that. If you want to rebut how this does not make my story any less shit, don’t. I don’t mean to be snarky. I understand how my story looks from an outsider’s eyes who does not share my own sentiment (what enchanted me flew over your head, and all you found were dead words) but I say this more so because this is as far as I’m going to defend myself.
(what enchanted me flew over your head, and all you found were dead words)
What does Aristotle’s appeals mean to you? I’ve seen you use it wantonly, but I’ve never understood it; or to be accurate, I haven't understand how you understand it.
You cooked better than my mum ever did to me.That's bad. This is how you stagnate as a storyteller. But you do you, I'm not your therapist to discourage from the potentially bad behaviour. I've rested my case (that webnovel doesn't connect with readers), and you proved it. While it’s fine to write for yourself, sharing that work publicly, to other people, changes the situation. The roast I did on the webnovel was about how the story works (or doesn’t) when shared with readers. If you truly only wrote this for yourself, why share it at all? Sharing inherently invites an audience, and with an audience comes the expectation of persuasion, whether you acknowledge this or not. The moment you decided to share your work publicly, to this thread, it became more than just “for myself.”
No one publishes a story "just to see what happens." There’s always a want, whether it’s feedback, validation, or even curiosity about how others perceive it. This "I’m not here to defend myself" is itself a defensive gesture, masquerading as an indifference to the roast.
I'll focus on this statement in particular. What a fine way to discredit my opinion. Truly marvelous. This is you way of suggesting that I just didn’t get it, and that the failure is on me, not your story. As if I didn't sit here for three hours in span of two days dissecting why it failed to persuade for you to respond in that way. If the enchantment you felt didn’t translate to your audience (I guess it kinda did, with population being one, but I digress), that’s not on the audience—it’s a failure of storytelling. I repeat, "Creation is not enough. Persuasion is survival." What enchanted you stayed locked in your head because you didn’t bridge the gap between your personal vision and the reader’s experience (me, and maybe others). If you truly wanted to write only for youself, there would be no need to share it. By choosing to share, you implicitly invited others to interpret and evaluate it, which I did right now. Whatever.
I've detailed it in my anti-guide. I'm using the 3B rhetoricists, Wayne Booth, Kenneth Burke, and the Lloyd Bitzer with Richard Vatz. If you are lazy (or unwilling) to read it, here's the TLDR:
Ethos is all about Credibility, Authenticity, Consistency of the author. Credibility is all about the inherent trust that writer will deliver upon on the promise. Authenticity is not just about content, it’s about tone of the writer, how he writes, does he give confidence that the story will remain engaging even in the lowest points of the story? Consistency is the unspoken pact with the reader that implicitly tells that the writer will keep the credibility and authenticity to the end.
Pathos is all about emotional manipulation. You, as the storyteller is one. You make emotions on the text, and the reader experiences through their own experiences. No reader is the same, but there's always universality in the emotions you want to make the reader to feel. But too much of it, like in your prologue and chapter 1 makes a reader manipulated to feel those emotions than being moved by themselves. The goal of pathos is to deliver emotion without sounding manipulative. It feeds off the Authenticity, keeping the whatever story you want to tell compelling, even if something in that story is unlikeable.
Logos is the tension between the "storytelling responding to reality" and "the storyteller deciding the 'how'". Even if the place is fantastical, it's the job of the storyteller to make that fantastical place feel realistic. It's the bind that connects the ethos and pathos into a narrative. It's mired in constraints, and the storyteller's job is to make as much boundary pushing without making it feel contrived, artificial, and cliche to the reader.
Rhetoric, aka the persuasion is the storytelling. There's good storytelling, and there's bad one. Even bad ones can have audience (like population: one), but that doesn't mean that you're a great genius by making a world that only you could enjoy. When you failed to persuade me, you failed to connect with me. Even your response is trying to burn that bridge down. This isn’t an issue of "what flew over my head"—it’s an issue of what your story failed to deliver.
If you cared how your story is percieved with critical thinking you would've not responded like that. In that sense, my critique deserves more consideration than a philosophical sidestep you've done, and I can simply can relegate you in my mind to "writers who only want pandering" cabinet.
You misunderstand. I’ve published my story primarily for myself, meaning readers are an afterthought, and the market a non-factor. I’ve shared it mostly to keep myself disciplined, and the chapter publish dates (‘scheduled week/month’) prove that, though I’ve mostly failed on that front. I’d like people to like my story, but it’s not my problem if they don’t.That's bad. This is how you stagnate as a storyteller. But you do you, I'm not your therapist to discourage from the potentially bad behaviour. I've rested my case (that webnovel doesn't connect with readers), and you proved it. While it’s fine to write for yourself, sharing that work publicly, to other people, changes the situation. The roast I did on the webnovel was about how the story works (or doesn’t) when shared with readers. If you truly only wrote this for yourself, why share it at all? Sharing inherently invites an audience, and with an audience comes the expectation of persuasion, whether you acknowledge this or not. The moment you decided to share your work publicly, to this thread, it became more than just “for myself.”
No one publishes a story "just to see what happens." There’s always a want, whether it’s feedback, validation, or even curiosity about how others perceive it. This "I’m not here to defend myself" is itself a defensive gesture, masquerading as an indifference to the roast.
I'll focus on this statement in particular. What a fine way to discredit my opinion. Truly marvelous. This is you way of suggesting that I just didn’t get it, and that the failure is on me, not your story. As if I didn't sit here for three hours in span of two days dissecting why it failed to persuade for you to respond in that way. If the enchantment you felt didn’t translate to your audience (I guess it kinda did, with population being one, but I digress), that’s not on the audience—it’s a failure of storytelling. I repeat, "Creation is not enough. Persuasion is survival." What enchanted you stayed locked in your head because you didn’t bridge the gap between your personal vision and the reader’s experience (me, and maybe others). If you truly wanted to write only for youself, there would be no need to share it. By choosing to share, you implicitly invited others to interpret and evaluate it, which I did right now. Whatever.
I've detailed it in my anti-guide. I'm using the 3B rhetoricists, Wayne Booth, Kenneth Burke, and the Lloyd Bitzer with Richard Vatz. If you are lazy (or unwilling) to read it, here's the TLDR:
Ethos is all about Credibility, Authenticity, Consistency of the author. Credibility is all about the inherent trust that writer will deliver upon on the promise. Authenticity is not just about content, it’s about tone of the writer, how he writes, does he give confidence that the story will remain engaging even in the lowest points of the story? Consistency is the unspoken pact with the reader that implicitly tells that the writer will keep the credibility and authenticity to the end.
Pathos is all about emotional manipulation. You, as the storyteller is one. You make emotions on the text, and the reader experiences through their own experiences. No reader is the same, but there's always universality in the emotions you want to make the reader to feel. But too much of it, like in your prologue and chapter 1 makes a reader manipulated to feel those emotions than being moved by themselves. The goal of pathos is to deliver emotion without sounding manipulative. It feeds off the Authenticity, keeping the whatever story you want to tell compelling, even if something in that story is unlikeable.
Logos is the tension between the "storytelling responding to reality" and "the storyteller deciding the 'how'". Even if the place is fantastical, it's the job of the storyteller to make that fantastical place feel realistic. It's the bind that connects the ethos and pathos into a narrative. It's mired in constraints, and the storyteller's job is to make as much boundary pushing without making it feel contrived, artificial, and cliche to the reader.
Rhetoric, aka the persuasion is the storytelling. There's good storytelling, and there's bad one. Even bad ones can have audience (like population: one), but that doesn't mean that you're a great genius by making a world that only you could enjoy. When you failed to persuade me, you failed to connect with me. Even your response is trying to burn that bridge down. This isn’t an issue of "what flew over my head"—it’s an issue of what your story failed to deliver.
If you cared how your story is percieved with critical thinking you would've not responded like that. In that sense, my critique deserves more consideration than a philosophical sidestep you've done, and I can simply can relegate you in my mind to "writers who only want pandering" cabinet.
You misunderstand. I’ve published my story primarily for myself, meaning readers are an afterthought, and the market a non-factor. I’ve shared it mostly to keep myself disciplined, and the chapter publish dates (‘scheduled week/month’) prove that, though I’ve mostly failed on that front. I’d like people to like my story, but it’s not my problem if they don’t.
I haven’t discredited your opinion, if that’s what you think. They’re helpful, but if we had disagreements I’ve chosen to not speak up. I’ve gotten into my fair share of arguments over storytelling and over my own stories, and anything beyond initial Feedback has seldom been fruitful and laborious, unless we do it through voice chat. I suppose ‘not going to defend myself’ is a defensive gesture, but seeing the steep hill I will have to climb for such little gain, I choose to keep quiet.
‘what enchanted me flew over your head, and all you found were dead words’ just means that. While you found the confessions of a whiny kid, I found kinship. Unlike you, I did not care about being convinced. I was already convinced. Does this mean that I haven’t bridged the gap between my personal vision and reader’s experience? In your case, yes.
And thanks for clarifying about your literary theory. I’ve already read through your Dao of Rhetoric & Worldbuilding when I asked. I just didn’t understand it. To clothe your literary theory as a story is clever, I guess, but it has made it twice the ordeal for me to sift through, and not in a good way. I personally have stopped reading writing guides long ago. Most of them induct you into a methodology, and you learn, if inadvertently, how to write a book; rather than how to do it. Students thereby get inducted into a world of institutionalized and professionalized writing now rendered merely technical, which leaves out so much to be desired. We come from two different worlds, but let me share you the philosophy I try to embody:
‘The fact is that however infuriatingly archaic and unfair it may be, enchantment favors the amateur: the person doing it mainly if not entirely for the love of doing it, without much thought of gain thereby. That pursuit, as Simon Leys says, ‘embodies an exquisite inexpertness beyond the reach of the professionals’ virtuosity.’
Its partly why I teach writing myself, but not in the same way as you, of course. I think a work of art has to arise out of necessity, as Rilke says, ‘from the inner necessity of a particular work itself to be done’. The artist is merely the medium through which something comes into being. ‘self-expression’ here not meaning the psychological / social need for ‘self-expression’, or to be ‘an artist’, or ‘success’. That is my only daemon.
Literary theories were once one of my interest, so I hope you don’t mind me sharing?
You keep my food from spoiling? Thank you!
Your welcome!You keep my food from spoiling? Thank you!
I've read four chapters of your webnovel, and I have to ask—do you think deception is a viable marketing strategy? Your synopsis screams "Vampires! Death games! Tragedy! Romance!" and yet, when I actually read the thing, what do I get? Four goddamn chapters of a witch playing housemaid simulator while occasionally sighing while looking through essentially supernatural version of UV light like a tired janitor who’s seen too much. This isn't slow burn—this is no burn. A slow burn at least has a spark, but alas your story is a pile of damp log that hasn’t even been introduced to a proper heat source.Hello. I thought I might reserve a slot, as I'm sure you have quite the list going at this point. I would appreciate your sharp insight/feedback on my story. The link is provided below.
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https://www.scribblehub.com/series/1381743/the-vampire-overlord-and-his-witch/
Every time I read one of these roasts, I'm tempted to intentionally write a bad story rather than attempt a good one simply to see Tempokai work her magic.I've read four chapters of your webnovel, and I have to ask—do you think deception is a viable marketing strategy? Your synopsis screams "Vampires! Death games! Tragedy! Romance!" and yet, when I actually read the thing, what do I get? Four goddamn chapters of a witch playing housemaid simulator while occasionally sighing while looking through essentially supernatural version of UV light like a tired janitor who’s seen too much. This isn't slow burn—this is no burn. A slow burn at least has a spark, but alas your story is a pile of damp log that hasn’t even been introduced to a proper heat source.
Oh, but the vampires will be there later, right? The death game is totally coming, just wait, just six more chapters—
No. That’s not how this works. That’s not storytelling in fast paced Webnovel Realm works. Readers are not here for your personal worldbuilding indulgence, they came for the goddamn vampire death game you sold them on the synopsis, not a slice-of-life magical housekeeping gig where the most intense conflict is whether or not MC will get enough money to afford rent, as if it will the highest concern when the future vampire gig happens, but whatever.
Worldbuilding is not an excuse for the early chapters' slow pacing. A world only matters if the reader gives a damn about the story unfolding inside it. What you’re doing is trapping the audience in a meticulously crafted dollhouse and refusing to actually start the damn game they came to play. Even in slow burns, like in slice-of-life urban fantasy stories, pacing exists. Yes, even in slow burns, the first few chapters matter.
Do you think it would be engaging if Superman did his actual job as a wage slave for six chapters, instead being, well, a Superman? Would anyone have stuck around if Harry Potter spent four chapters just sitting, trapped inside his mind, unraveling in his teenager's mind under the stairs before Hagrid showed up? Of course not. Alright, I lied, they do, but whatever, that's not the point. Just look at your webnovel. Four chapters deep, and the most "action" I've gotten to see is a witch using her powers to tie a creep’s shoelaces together on a bus. Oh, what a riveting supernatural thriller. I'm trully terrified.
With that, reader stats prove it. 50 views on Chapter 1 and 17 on Chapter 2. That’s bad, even if I include bots, someone who pressed "read" accidentally for "later", and your accidental clicks (you know that happens), the numbers don't lie.
Because of all of that, what I've wrote above, the ethos of your story—the trust that reader knows what you’re doing—is shattered before it even has a chance to establish itself. You know that readers aren’t idiots. They will see through the bait-and-switch immediately, go "ugh, not again," and simply close the webnovel to read something similar to this but better. And because your ethos is in ruins, you now need pathos and logos to work overtime to salvage the experience, too bad those two are the equivalent of minimum-wage grocery store clerks who have no intention of covering for their incompetent manager. Pathos is dead on arrival, because what emotions are even being stirred? "Oh no, another cleaning shift?" Or "oh no, my rent is due." You’ve written a supernatural thriller with the stakes of a mildly inconvenient Tuesday, and that's bad when synopsis promises gothic tragedy.
And logos? Sure, the story is internally consistent, but who cares? A well-organized library of tax documents is also internally consistent, but no one wants to read that either. You’re asking readers to patiently endure your slow burn setup instead of compelling them to keep going, to finally see that vampire who's probably has six-pack described with the same purple prose that first 4 chapters are crawling on. That’s a fatal mistake.
The worst part, the actual story (the vampires, the Blood Hunt, the reason anyone clicked on this) is buried somewhere around Chapter 6. Meaning anyone who starts from the beginning is suffering through five whole chapters of nothingburger before getting to the actual meat of the story. You’ve accidentally made your opening chapters feel as much of a chore to read as Caelyn’s actual cleaning shifts chores.
I can see only two ways to fix this disaster, first: Rebrand the story entirely. Slap a Slice-of-Life tag on this thing, rewrite the synopsis so that it accurately represents what’s inside, aka rebranding the meat for the right audience, and sell it properly even if it turns to the tragic romp of gothic horror. Because the current audience you’re trying to attract wants none of this.
And the second: Cut the first five chapters. Yes, all of them. Brutal? Yes. Necessary? Absolutely. You can sprinkle in any important details later, naturally, because you have the proper character already that's compelling enough to carry the damn story. That's the ugly truth I'm seeing and not hesitant to say it: A world is useless if the reader doesn’t care about it. Creation is not enough, persuasion is survival.
Thank you. I think I knew that, but this was a good reality check. Appreciate the honest feedback.I've read four chapters of your webnovel, and I have to ask—do you think deception is a viable marketing strategy? Your synopsis screams "Vampires! Death games! Tragedy! Romance!" and yet, when I actually read the thing, what do I get? Four goddamn chapters of a witch playing housemaid simulator while occasionally sighing while looking through essentially supernatural version of UV light like a tired janitor who’s seen too much. This isn't slow burn—this is no burn. A slow burn at least has a spark, but alas your story is a pile of damp log that hasn’t even been introduced to a proper heat source.
Oh, but the vampires will be there later, right? The death game is totally coming, just wait, just six more chapters—
No. That’s not how this works. That’s not storytelling in fast paced Webnovel Realm works. Readers are not here for your personal worldbuilding indulgence, they came for the goddamn vampire death game you sold them on the synopsis, not a slice-of-life magical housekeeping gig where the most intense conflict is whether or not MC will get enough money to afford rent, as if it will the highest concern when the future vampire gig happens, but whatever.
Worldbuilding is not an excuse for the early chapters' slow pacing. A world only matters if the reader gives a damn about the story unfolding inside it. What you’re doing is trapping the audience in a meticulously crafted dollhouse and refusing to actually start the damn game they came to play. Even in slow burns, like in slice-of-life urban fantasy stories, pacing exists. Yes, even in slow burns, the first few chapters matter.
Do you think it would be engaging if Superman did his actual job as a wage slave for six chapters, instead being, well, a Superman? Would anyone have stuck around if Harry Potter spent four chapters just sitting, trapped inside his mind, unraveling in his teenager's mind under the stairs before Hagrid showed up? Of course not. Alright, I lied, they do, but whatever, that's not the point. Just look at your webnovel. Four chapters deep, and the most "action" I've gotten to see is a witch using her powers to tie a creep’s shoelaces together on a bus. Oh, what a riveting supernatural thriller. I'm trully terrified.
With that, reader stats prove it. 50 views on Chapter 1 and 17 on Chapter 2. That’s bad, even if I include bots, someone who pressed "read" accidentally for "later", and your accidental clicks (you know that happens), the numbers don't lie.
Because of all of that, what I've wrote above, the ethos of your story—the trust that reader knows what you’re doing—is shattered before it even has a chance to establish itself. You know that readers aren’t idiots. They will see through the bait-and-switch immediately, go "ugh, not again," and simply close the webnovel to read something similar to this but better. And because your ethos is in ruins, you now need pathos and logos to work overtime to salvage the experience, too bad those two are the equivalent of minimum-wage grocery store clerks who have no intention of covering for their incompetent manager. Pathos is dead on arrival, because what emotions are even being stirred? "Oh no, another cleaning shift?" Or "oh no, my rent is due." You’ve written a supernatural thriller with the stakes of a mildly inconvenient Tuesday, and that's bad when synopsis promises gothic tragedy.
And logos? Sure, the story is internally consistent, but who cares? A well-organized library of tax documents is also internally consistent, but no one wants to read that either. You’re asking readers to patiently endure your slow burn setup instead of compelling them to keep going, to finally see that vampire who's probably has six-pack described with the same purple prose that first 4 chapters are crawling on. That’s a fatal mistake.
The worst part, the actual story (the vampires, the Blood Hunt, the reason anyone clicked on this) is buried somewhere around Chapter 6. Meaning anyone who starts from the beginning is suffering through five whole chapters of nothingburger before getting to the actual meat of the story. You’ve accidentally made your opening chapters feel as much of a chore to read as Caelyn’s actual cleaning shifts chores.
I can see only two ways to fix this disaster, first: Rebrand the story entirely. Slap a Slice-of-Life tag on this thing, rewrite the synopsis so that it accurately represents what’s inside, aka rebranding the meat for the right audience, and sell it properly even if it turns to the tragic romp of gothic horror. Because the current audience you’re trying to attract wants none of this.
And the second: Cut the first five chapters. Yes, all of them. Brutal? Yes. Necessary? Absolutely. You can sprinkle in any important details later, naturally, because you have the proper character already that's compelling enough to carry the damn story. That's the ugly truth I'm seeing and not hesitant to say it: A world is useless if the reader doesn’t care about it. Creation is not enough, persuasion is survival.
For some reason, this description reminded me of a show on, I think it was Fox, a few years back (based on a novel) - they HINTED at vampires in the first episode but didn't show anything, just a weird conspiracy/fleeing across the country thing until the third episode...I've read four chapters of your webnovel, and I have to ask—do you think deception is a viable marketing strategy? Your synopsis screams "Vampires! Death games! Tragedy! Romance!" and yet, when I actually read the thing, what do I get? Four goddamn chapters of a witch playing housemaid simulator while occasionally sighing while looking through essentially supernatural version of UV light like a tired janitor who’s seen too much. This isn't slow burn—this is no burn. A slow burn at least has a spark, but alas your story is a pile of damp log that hasn’t even been introduced to a proper heat source.
Oh, but the vampires will be there later, right? The death game is totally coming, just wait, just six more chapters—