Webnovel Feedback Roasts For the Fearless

[Tempokai]

Relatively new writer, just finished reading your "Dao of Rhetoric," and would love some feedback.

A Record Of A Bodybuilder's Journey To Ascension

I read two chapters. Two chapters that want to be everything at the same time, and in doing so, they become absolutely nothing. If your doctor was also a clown, a plumber, and an anti-social jerk, would you trust them to diagnose your illness? No? Well, that’s exactly what your novel feels like. You’re out here stitching together epic muscle-sorcery fights, dystopian debt slavery, gangster brawls, political oppression, and deep philosophical musings on freedom—all while your protagonist is flexing his pecs at the audience like an unpaid OnlyFans model.

You clearly have ideas—so many ideas, in fact, that they’re vomiting all over the page without the slightest regard for whether the reader can actually digest any of them. Your implied author—the personality behind your writing—is desperate to say everything you thought of, all at once, drowning the reader in a lore dump so aggressive it might as well be a waterboarding session. The result? Overwritten worldbuilding notes stitched together masquerading as a story.

You’ve got a world, sure. You’ve got rules, definitely. You’ve got a pseudo-gigachad protagonist who is only “pseudo” because he lacks the necessary morals, presence, or intrigue to be an actual chad. Instead, he reads like yet another discount xianxia rogue cultivator, except instead of cultivating the Dao, he’s cultivating a mountain of debt like a deadbeat parent with a gambling addiction. I should be rooting for his downfall just to see when this smug mass-hoarding wannabe collapses under the weight of his own hubris. But no, your story doesn’t persuade. It doesn’t make me want to see what happens next. It just exists, flexing at itself in the mirror, admiring its own muscles while the audience walks out of the gym in boredom.

And speaking of persuasion—you absolutely butchered it in the synopsis. A synopsis is supposed to tease the story, not dump the entire second act in my lap like an overeager fanboy at Comic-Con. When you start revealing what happens to the MC in the distant future, you’re spoiling the reader before anyone else can even get the chance to spoil it for them. You kill your own ethos, your credibility, because now I’m wondering if you have any self-restraint at all.

Then, there’s pathos. Oh, boy, it's faulty. You know this MC is an unlikeable jerk, so I'll talk about him. He's fine. Some of the best protagonists are jerks. But when you force-feed a reader his muscle mass every three paragraphs like it’s the only thing about him that matters, it gets exhausting. You said he was built like a tank in the synopsis, we got it in the opening, and yet you keep hammering it home like a gym bro who won’t shut up about his max bench. He would have been a perfect silent MC—a Gordon Freeman-type badass—if only he didn’t open his goddamn mouth.

And finally, logos—the logic of it all. Your worldbuilding is strong, I won’t deny that. But what does it matter when you’re delivering it like a college professor who assigns the entire textbook as required reading on Day 1? Instead of persuasive storytelling, you’re just infodumping everything immediately, leading to reader exhaustion. And because of that, your first and second chapter doesn’t feel like a serious, comedic, dystopian action piece—it reads like an overexaggerated satire of itself. Like someone parodying a webnovel that doesn’t exist yet.

And these are persuasion problems that stem from technical failures. Do you need all those overwrought metaphors that slow the story to a crawl? Do I need to know the MC’s debt is measured in kilograms the size of a small moon before we even get to the action? No. I came for action first, comedy second, and worldbuilding as the seasoning—not the main course drowning out everything else.

Worldbuilding is context. And you don’t need this much context for either jokes or plot progression to happen. Your story should be persuading me to keep reading—but instead, it’s standing in front of a mirror, admiring its own reflection, flexing endlessly, while the audience quietly leaves the room because the story keeps flexing the worldbuilding muscles only it admires.

I expected persuasive worldbuilding because you’ve read my anti-guide on rhetoric. I thought you understood the art of making people care, even a little bit. But instead, I found this.

And it’s meh.

 

[wad]

I read two chapters. Two chapters that want to be everything at the same time, and in doing so, they become absolutely nothing. If your doctor was also a clown, a plumber, and an anti-social jerk, would you trust them to diagnose your illness? No? Well, that’s exactly what your novel feels like. You’re out here stitching together epic muscle-sorcery fights, dystopian debt slavery, gangster brawls, political oppression, and deep philosophical musings on freedom—all while your protagonist is flexing his pecs at the audience like an unpaid OnlyFans model.

You clearly have ideas—so many ideas, in fact, that they’re vomiting all over the page without the slightest regard for whether the reader can actually digest any of them. Your implied author—the personality behind your writing—is desperate to say everything you thought of, all at once, drowning the reader in a lore dump so aggressive it might as well be a waterboarding session. The result? Overwritten worldbuilding notes stitched together masquerading as a story.

You’ve got a world, sure. You’ve got rules, definitely. You’ve got a pseudo-gigachad protagonist who is only “pseudo” because he lacks the necessary morals, presence, or intrigue to be an actual chad. Instead, he reads like yet another discount xianxia rogue cultivator, except instead of cultivating the Dao, he’s cultivating a mountain of debt like a deadbeat parent with a gambling addiction. I should be rooting for his downfall just to see when this smug mass-hoarding wannabe collapses under the weight of his own hubris. But no, your story doesn’t persuade. It doesn’t make me want to see what happens next. It just exists, flexing at itself in the mirror, admiring its own muscles while the audience walks out of the gym in boredom.

And speaking of persuasion—you absolutely butchered it in the synopsis. A synopsis is supposed to tease the story, not dump the entire second act in my lap like an overeager fanboy at Comic-Con. When you start revealing what happens to the MC in the distant future, you’re spoiling the reader before anyone else can even get the chance to spoil it for them. You kill your own ethos, your credibility, because now I’m wondering if you have any self-restraint at all.

Then, there’s pathos. Oh, boy, it's faulty. You know this MC is an unlikeable jerk, so I'll talk about him. He's fine. Some of the best protagonists are jerks. But when you force-feed a reader his muscle mass every three paragraphs like it’s the only thing about him that matters, it gets exhausting. You said he was built like a tank in the synopsis, we got it in the opening, and yet you keep hammering it home like a gym bro who won’t shut up about his max bench. He would have been a perfect silent MC—a Gordon Freeman-type badass—if only he didn’t open his goddamn mouth.

And finally, logos—the logic of it all. Your worldbuilding is strong, I won’t deny that. But what does it matter when you’re delivering it like a college professor who assigns the entire textbook as required reading on Day 1? Instead of persuasive storytelling, you’re just infodumping everything immediately, leading to reader exhaustion. And because of that, your first and second chapter doesn’t feel like a serious, comedic, dystopian action piece—it reads like an overexaggerated satire of itself. Like someone parodying a webnovel that doesn’t exist yet.

And these are persuasion problems that stem from technical failures. Do you need all those overwrought metaphors that slow the story to a crawl? Do I need to know the MC’s debt is measured in kilograms the size of a small moon before we even get to the action? No. I came for action first, comedy second, and worldbuilding as the seasoning—not the main course drowning out everything else.

Worldbuilding is context. And you don’t need this much context for either jokes or plot progression to happen. Your story should be persuading me to keep reading—but instead, it’s standing in front of a mirror, admiring its own reflection, flexing endlessly, while the audience quietly leaves the room because the story keeps flexing the worldbuilding muscles only it admires.

I expected persuasive worldbuilding because you’ve read my anti-guide on rhetoric. I thought you understood the art of making people care, even a little bit. But instead, I found this.

And it’s meh.

Lmao, thanks for the roast.

I have no idea what I am doing, I don't have any notes about world building or great writing prose like these other authors do. I just kind of write whatever comes to mind.

The stuff you wrote about about the synopsis was fairly eye opening. I had thought what I had written was a better angle to sell my story, but I feel you might be right that it reveals a bit too much. Definitely going to look to fix that to make it a little less revealing.

As for the over expository section about his kilogram debt to the planet, I added it much later down the line, as I thought it might add some context. But seeing what you wrote made me think it might do better to trim it down slightly, or just remove it all, as it could be a little jarring to have all at once.

Thanks for taking time to read it.

 

[TheIcMan]

Failure Frame was just terrible... with awkward romance and generally terrible convenience. All the characters were very 2d cardboard cutouts... I think FF started off as a webnovel right on shousetsuka ni narou?

No idea where this is coming from but I agree at least for the LN, if it weren’t for the art, shit wouldn’t be popular.

Although I do like some of the world building, so I will be plagiarizing borrowing from it for my own stuff.

---

 

[Tempokai]

You Are Being Saved, Please Do Not Resist (WC/SCP-When Day Breaks start)

Just like how cracking the atom gave humans the ability to destroy themselves and nuclear power, the Waifu Catalog granted me immense power to do whatever I wanted. I could kill worlds, enslave whole civilizations, or establish an eternal empire of oppression where genocides are a daily...

www.scribblehub.com

I'd like some feedback on this story of mine. I'm doing a daily release of (~3k word average per chapter) so every day at 7 AM Eastern Standard Time there'll be a new chapter.

Could I also trouble you for another roast after my first Arc is completed?

Fanfiction exists to scratch an itch; if it fails to do so, it fails to matter.

It’s a simple truth, one that should be tattooed onto the inside of your skull before you even think about putting words onto a page. I read three chapters and sat thinking like a knockoff The Thinker sculpture in trying to write this roast. Fanfiction is not a “proper” original story—it is derivative by design, borrowing from something that actually persuaded you to write in the first place. It is a response to something greater than itself. That means it has to work twice as hard to matter. It must both respect the themes and essence of the original while also justifying its own existence. It is bound by storytelling rules and the canon it dares to manipulate.

You? You threw all that out the window before you even hit the first paragraph.

I could go easy on you. I could say "Oh, it’s just another OP self-insert" and leave it at that, because God knows the internet is flooded with them. But your crime is worse than mere mediocrity. You didn't just write a bad fanfic—you wrote something that has no reason to exist at all. It is a mismatch of worlds, themes, and logic, stitched together like a Frankenstein’s monster with the brain of a goldfish. A Fate OC dumped into SCP-001: When Day Breaks? Are you kidding me? You really thought that made sense? That these two concepts, diametrically opposed in tone and purpose, would somehow blend together into a satisfying story? Fate is about heroism, gods, and grand mythological clashes. SCP-001: When Day Breaks is about existential horror and inevitable despair. They do not mix. They do not complement each other.

But instead of realizing this and pivoting, you plowed forward like a child cramming puzzle pieces together by force. And what did I get? A god in a world that is supposed to be hopeless. A setting designed to be inescapable doom reduced to a shitty anime battle arena. You killed any possibility of suspense, tension, or stakes the moment you gave the protagonist invulnerability and infinite power. Why? Because you have no idea how to write a compelling challenge. You wanted a playground, not a narrative. You wanted an SCP horror apocalypse that functioned like a dynastic warriors game where the OP protagonist effortlessly mows down faceless enemies. And worst of all? You wanted people to believe this was something deep.

You don’t just fail at logos—you brutally murder it in cold blood. If the world is ending and the protagonist is functionally untouchable, why should we care? What’s the conflict? Where’s the tension? Why are we reading this? We already know she's going to win, that she's going to keep obliterating every obstacle with no more effort than a toddler kicking over sandcastles. There is nothing to root for, nothing to hope for, nothing to fear. It’s just one long, repetitive, self-indulgent curb stomp.

But maybe you were aiming for pathos, right? Maybe we were supposed to feel something for the protagonist? Too bad you made her a complete hypocrite. She monologues about free will while kidnapping a child and shoving them into a sleeping bag like a sack of potatoes. She cries about "saving everyone" while flexing god powers that turn city blocks into craters. She laments their weakness while snapping their fingers and casually vaporizing an entire street. The cognitive dissonance is staggering. Every time she whines about being "powerless," it feels like a billionaire complaining about having to pay taxes.

And ethos? DOA. You have none. You try to justify the MC’s actions with moralizing monologues that ring hollow because their actions are completely detached from the reality of the story. She doesn’t feel like a hero. She doesn’t feel like a person. She feels like a mouthpiece for whatever fleeting half-baked thoughts you wanted to vomit onto the page.

I kept asking myself: What was the actual reason for writing this? What itch was this supposed to scratch? Maybe, just maybe, if I squinted really hard, I could find something. Maybe you wanted to write about horror meeting heroism—about a god struggling with the weight of their power in a world she wasn't meant to save. But that’s not what you did. You wrote a joyless, self-absorbed power trip that doesn’t respect either of the worlds it borrows from. You didn’t make Fate richer. You didn’t make SCP richer. You just mashed them together and hoped for the best.

And let’s be real here: you didn’t even write this for yourself. If you did, you wouldn’t have left an author’s note begging for motivation. You didn’t scratch an itch. You just vomited words onto a page because you felt like you had to. That’s why it feels hollow. That’s why it doesn’t matter.

And that’s the ultimate tragedy of this entire thing—not that it’s bad, but that it’s meaningless. It’s a non-story, a void, an empty exercise in nothingness. It’s neither engaging nor fulfilling, neither thrilling nor thought-provoking. It doesn’t challenge. It doesn’t inspire. It just… exists.

And if a fanfic exists without scratching an itch, does it even exist at all?

 

[LuciferVermillion]

It's been a while since I could see a user that is actually reading and giving actual roasting (review).

This might sound stupid, but please roast me Tempokai-sama.
https://www.scribblehub.com/series/211234/the-impossible-fate-that-leads-to-a-god-of-a-new-world/

Not sure, but my genre is Fantasy and Sci-Fi. Perhaps a slow burner too.

 

[Unit_301]

Fanfiction exists to scratch an itch; if it fails to do so, it fails to matter.

It’s a simple truth, one that should be tattooed onto the inside of your skull before you even think about putting words onto a page. I read three chapters and sat thinking like a knockoff The Thinker sculpture in trying to write this roast. Fanfiction is not a “proper” original story—it is derivative by design, borrowing from something that actually persuaded you to write in the first place. It is a response to something greater than itself. That means it has to work twice as hard to matter. It must both respect the themes and essence of the original while also justifying its own existence. It is bound by storytelling rules and the canon it dares to manipulate.

You? You threw all that out the window before you even hit the first paragraph.

I could go easy on you. I could say "Oh, it’s just another OP self-insert" and leave it at that, because God knows the internet is flooded with them. But your crime is worse than mere mediocrity. You didn't just write a bad fanfic—you wrote something that has no reason to exist at all. It is a mismatch of worlds, themes, and logic, stitched together like a Frankenstein’s monster with the brain of a goldfish. A Fate OC dumped into SCP-001: When Day Breaks? Are you kidding me? You really thought that made sense? That these two concepts, diametrically opposed in tone and purpose, would somehow blend together into a satisfying story? Fate is about heroism, gods, and grand mythological clashes. SCP-001: When Day Breaks is about existential horror and inevitable despair. They do not mix. They do not complement each other.

But instead of realizing this and pivoting, you plowed forward like a child cramming puzzle pieces together by force. And what did I get? A god in a world that is supposed to be hopeless. A setting designed to be inescapable doom reduced to a shitty anime battle arena. You killed any possibility of suspense, tension, or stakes the moment you gave the protagonist invulnerability and infinite power. Why? Because you have no idea how to write a compelling challenge. You wanted a playground, not a narrative. You wanted an SCP horror apocalypse that functioned like a dynastic warriors game where the OP protagonist effortlessly mows down faceless enemies. And worst of all? You wanted people to believe this was something deep.

You don’t just fail at logos—you brutally murder it in cold blood. If the world is ending and the protagonist is functionally untouchable, why should we care? What’s the conflict? Where’s the tension? Why are we reading this? We already know she's going to win, that she's going to keep obliterating every obstacle with no more effort than a toddler kicking over sandcastles. There is nothing to root for, nothing to hope for, nothing to fear. It’s just one long, repetitive, self-indulgent curb stomp.

But maybe you were aiming for pathos, right? Maybe we were supposed to feel something for the protagonist? Too bad you made her a complete hypocrite. She monologues about free will while kidnapping a child and shoving them into a sleeping bag like a sack of potatoes. She cries about "saving everyone" while flexing god powers that turn city blocks into craters. She laments their weakness while snapping their fingers and casually vaporizing an entire street. The cognitive dissonance is staggering. Every time she whines about being "powerless," it feels like a billionaire complaining about having to pay taxes.

And ethos? DOA. You have none. You try to justify the MC’s actions with moralizing monologues that ring hollow because their actions are completely detached from the reality of the story. She doesn’t feel like a hero. She doesn’t feel like a person. She feels like a mouthpiece for whatever fleeting half-baked thoughts you wanted to vomit onto the page.

I kept asking myself: What was the actual reason for writing this? What itch was this supposed to scratch? Maybe, just maybe, if I squinted really hard, I could find something. Maybe you wanted to write about horror meeting heroism—about a god struggling with the weight of their power in a world she wasn't meant to save. But that’s not what you did. You wrote a joyless, self-absorbed power trip that doesn’t respect either of the worlds it borrows from. You didn’t make Fate richer. You didn’t make SCP richer. You just mashed them together and hoped for the best.

And let’s be real here: you didn’t even write this for yourself. If you did, you wouldn’t have left an author’s note begging for motivation. You didn’t scratch an itch. You just vomited words onto a page because you felt like you had to. That’s why it feels hollow. That’s why it doesn’t matter.

And that’s the ultimate tragedy of this entire thing—not that it’s bad, but that it’s meaningless. It’s a non-story, a void, an empty exercise in nothingness. It’s neither engaging nor fulfilling, neither thrilling nor thought-provoking. It doesn’t challenge. It doesn’t inspire. It just… exists.

And if a fanfic exists without scratching an itch, does it even exist at all?

Okay, the logos, pathos, and ethos I can accept readily since when I started it, I didn't exactly think about those points when I wrote it. These three points you raised are definitely something I'd need to think about the next time I try to start a story rather than 'just do it' and 'follow a feeling'. About the compelling challenge, I suppose from the surface it'll definitely look like as you said 'protagonist is functionally untouchable' but there are dangerous enough SCPs on Earth that will threaten the protagonist.

However, the part about this fanfic existing without scratching an itch is something I'd have to rebuddle. This fanfiction was originally written for another forum called QuestionableQuesting. On it, there were a bunch more of these Waifu Catalog fics that's essentially a smutfest where protagonists enslave waifus and husbands. The original hook for this story was that someone chose to be good rather than irredeemably bad as all other WC protagonists are, and they chose to try and save a world rather than plunder it. I realize now this hook is definitely less effective on Scribblehub considering the difference in culture. I've effectively Target-In-Canada-ed myself.

 

[Tempokai]

Alright, I've rewritten the prologue and wanted to know your thoughts on whether I'm heading in the right direction.

Spoiler: Rewritten prologue

“Well, that was boring,” a disinterested voice bemoaned from the emptiness of space, sounding as if two beings were speaking in tandem. Amidst the nothingness around, the faint light from stars glimmered in the distance. Yet, the voice remained; Cold and distant, yet still alive, like a spectre of inconsistencies that shared a common purpose. Looking at the earth, the voice sifted the clamoring souls below till one of the many through the ages humankind lay barren and alone, chosen as the last by measure of chance.

“I wonder how this person will change the earth this time around? ” the spectre-like being inquired in anticipation and curiosity, gazing upon a human soul. The being's tandem tone of devilish intrigue and a satirical simper made form in its expression of a sadistic humanoid smirk where the voice had previously bemoaned. “The last one barely had the others intrigue, let alone enough interest for one to intervene,” the voice continued, forming from its tongue, a human-like form; The form of a mischievous yet blameless child with vibrant hair extending beyond its feet, dressing itself in a white cloth sheet similar to that of an ancient Greek chiton. Lacking the features to define it as a man or a woman, to all mortals it was simply a being that looked human.

“Really? Is this really how he subconsciously thinks we look?" the being said, looking over the perceived body it had formed. Holding its hand to the cosmos, starlight could be seen through the palm more beautifully than with the keenest of eyes. Satisfied and unbothered, a sinister grin formed before it decreed amongst the stars, "be it in present or past, Lou Barrett, be chosen for my purposes, to freely do with my power as he wishes, till rejection of this gift or death, it shall remain.”

***

There was a dream. To say it felt more like a nightmare would not be an exaggeration. Though the scenery, a vast forest filled with floating lights filling the emptiness, alone sat a person with their back turned to me. A thick dark cloth, frayed and worn, rested atop their scraggly form. As I ventured toward them, my view of their hands, veiled in a purplish-black smoke, showed a crudely weathered longsword, being patiently sharpened with a wet stone. Hearing the snap of twigs and brushing of leaves from my feet, the figure turned it's head toward me, it's face hidden behind an expressionless white mask with a single black stripe running from the upper left corner to the bottom right. Locking eyes with the ironically eyeless mask, it formed an inhumanly wide smile, as if it were made of clay. Opening to unveil a row of jagged, broken teeth behind its lips, gnashing in agonizing rhythms like that of hundred of broken clocks ticking out of time, I couldn’t help but back away. Standing to face me, the cloth covering draped over it like a mourning shawl, and like the mouth, eye holes formed as curved slits of glee, crying from them fresh streams of crimson tears.

My breath became visible as chills of fear ran up my spine, telling me to run. I was already turned around, dashing through the stationary lights of the forest for what felt like all I could muster before I considered to look back and see whether I was being pursued. Gazing back over my shoulder, the forest began folding outward to reveal the night sky, filled with more stars than the mind can comprehend. Amid the stars approached not the masked figure of smoke but rather, a human half my size, draped in a plain white short-cut Greek-style chiton. Flashing a smile behind a raised finger, their gold and grey hair, flowing like a river between the chiton sheets creases, lifted towards the heavens. My attention drawn up to follow it, I stumble back in bafflement from the sudden replacement for the child being myself, standing in aloof confusion by the sight of me.

Straightening himself up as I usually would to seem more confident, the other me asked, “Who are you?” his voice just as curious as I was. Looking down at the ground, which had previously been dirt, now reflected a face that was not my own upon a mirror-like surface of water. Unlike my doppelganger, who bore a wider face, short dirty blond hair, and sunken eyes, I had a slimmer face with short grey hair. Taking it in, I shook my head.

“I do not know," I replied, lifting my head. "Who are you?” I asked for I truly did not know who I was in this moment.

“I am you, Lou Barrett, as are each one of them,” the other me answered, gesturing around him to reveal an infinite number of the grey-haired me, scattered as if copied by a mirror illusion. Turning their faces toward me, each bearing different expressions and emotions from sullen to overjoyed, fearful to fortunate, each sank into the water beneath them in shock.

“Tell me, what is this place? Who were those people I saw?” I begged of the one before me, trying to reach toward him. Though my body was unable to move closer nor further from him, trapped in place by the waters reflecting this new me.

Before I could question further, he answered, “you are what you are, and this place is you. As for those beings, well, I cannot say.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” I asked, confused.

“You will find the answer when you succeed,” he replied as if he’d said it a thousand times before and were tired of it before falling through the water floor. Looking down at where he had stood, the water below me gave way, and I fell with a loud thump onto my back. My head was pounding, I felt physically drained, and my back hurt slightly worse than normal. In the distance, I saw a bright light, only to realize that I was just opening my eyes.

The one you already read:

The Supernatural Case of an Accidental Time Traveler Volume 1 - Prologue | Scribble Hub

www.scribblehub.com

I'd say it's far better as a thematical prologue than previous one. Previous was the direct and lacking gravitas, as I said in the previous roast. This new prologue achieves it thematically. It feels terrifying enough and grand enough for an average reader to be persuaded to click "next," so I can say it does the job it needs to do far better.

 

[Tempokai]

THE ROAST 66: Ah, you overcooked piece of literary roadkill. You’ve done it. You’ve ascended to a level of obliviousness so pure, so astronomically dense, that black holes are taking notes. You’ve waltzed into my domain, my sacred temple of roasting, and smeared your unearned arrogance all over it like a toddler with finger paints. Congratulations. You’re officially the first person to make me question whether the communication a mistake.

You see, this thread—"Webnovel Feedback Roasts For The Fearless"—was built on a simple, beautiful principle: no egos allowed. You post your link, I analyze it, and I deliver the roast about the work and the ego. That means no delusions of grandeur, no pathetic wailing about “oh, the world is against me,” and certainly no cringelords whose only purpose in this forum to be an absolute clown for no god damn reason. And yet, here you are, strutting in like some second-rate nihilistic prophet, convinced that you are the misunderstood genius and the rest of us are mere peasants too dumb to grasp your cosmic brilliance. Spoiler alert: you’re not.

You’re not a tragic anti-hero. You’re not the lone enlightened figure in a world of sheep. You are, at best, an NPC glitching out in the tutorial level of life. And trust me, if I wanted to roast a broken character, I’d go read another webnovel in this thread and they'll thank me for that.

And before you even try to respond with your usual pretentious drivel—spare me. I’ve already seen your past incarnations, your deleted profiles, your dramatic “I’m dying” posts followed by the inevitable "I'm cringe incarnate!" spiel. We get it. You’ve read Undertale AUs and now think suffering makes you profound. News flash, buddy: suffering doesn’t make you deep. It just makes you bad at making life choices.

So, let me make this simple for you: This isn’t your space. This is my space. I am the Roastmaster, the Übermensch of Feedback Roasts, and the undisputed literary executioner of this thread. And you? You’re just the latest unfortunate soul to stumble in and mistake self-pity for self-awareness.

At first, at least in this incarnation of a profile, I spared you. Your previous incarnation's post is preserved at #18, and it's reeks of performative suffering that even Dostoevsky would've blushed at and would've gone to write about clueless nihilistic dumbfuck #186731 in the afterlife. Ego that performed "dying" on that profile, writing cringe post on top of another, thinking it is doing some kind of "experiment," to prove exactly? That you can irritate people into ignoring you? To show how "performance" of absolute hypocricy works in action after creating a new profile with the same fucking name but without "-tachi" at the end? This incarnation is even more stupider, but I already dismissed you, a your peacock shaped ego, controlling 19 year old teenager who doesn't know anything about real suffering before in this thread.

Your piece of work isn't even worth roasting. It's performative suffering through and through. Who do you think you are persuading with it? Who's your ideal reader? Similar cringelords? Edgy nihilists? Misunderstood children overdosed on edginess? Fun fact, given the sheer performative suffering, they don't read webnovels, they're fucking zoomers. Hell no, they just sit in the TikTok, doomscroll until CCP algorithms start to show suicidal content, and just do it. They end themselves, and your work doesn't even show up on them. Why on earth do they need to read suffering, which is entirely filled with hypocricy, when they already suffer? That's not an ideal reader to write for.

You've declaring yourself to be suffering, subscribed to the “tormented soul who understands the futility of existence” aesthetic, dramatically announcing your own "suicide" and in reality slithering back to the forums, but what for? What's the meaning of such actions? I don't see a properly functioning person. All I see is ego, thick suffocating ego who declares "you don't understand my work!", while it is your job to be persuasive for the fucking readers to understand the position of the MC, who is in reality your mouthpiece for half baked, existential despair and SUFFERING. Now I hate that word, thanks to you. You're an Ippolit Terentyev in real life, minus tuberculosis and plus dozens layers of performative irony.

I appeal a petition for @Tony to clean up the last messages on this thread (which I'll report now, due to violating the ethos of the roasting thread) and maybe somehow ban @Hoshino from ever posting in this thread. I remember that Xenforo has this function, so I plead the almighty Tony lock that ego up from ever posting again in this thread.

 

[anonjohn20]

星野さん, not that I want to roast, but I don't even know what you are trying to show & tell in your novel. When I read, all I had is confusion. The title of your novel doesn't seem to have anything to do with what you wrote, including the synopsis.

Here are my POV when reading your novel:
+Chuunibyou protagonist.
+Feminine protagonist despite a guy.
+It felt like I'm reading a story about a Chuunibyou daydreaming every day, trying to be this and that.

So, what's your point in this story? What are you trying to tell?

Sorry for using this Tempokai-sama.

He probably had half-baked AI try to make the story for him. lol

 

[Omnii]

Okay... so I am an honours psychology major. So I believe I know more about what I'm talking about in regards to the mental health aspects.
Note that this is all regardless of how Hoshino acts, I do not condone the behaviour, and instead recommend ignoring it.

...I think you should look at the definition of a Chūnibyō.

To start, this is your burden of proof. If you are disputing a claim, you should bring evidence of the contrary. But I will ignore it for the sake of the discussion.
While the term was popularized as a joke by Hikaru Ijūin, as a way to describe expansive delusions developed in early teens. It has been used similar to other terms such as hikikomori as a real psychological condition. Regardless of its merit as a psychological term, the traits shown in the chapter are consistent with a variety of other personality traits. Specifically a fantasy-prone personality (FPP), this is consistent with what is found normally in Chuunibyo.

It's not something depressing, at all.

I can understand why you think that, this isn't a topic discussed that often. While FPP has a significant focus on the hypnotism, I will be avoiding that as it superficial to the topic. But to get to why it is related to depression and is significant, I need to first explain what I meant by mental/emotional scarring.

'Severe' mental scars, is something that you wouldn't even want to recall.

You would hate yourself several times for recalling it. You would even knock your head on the wall, slap your face, or feel extremely irritated whenever something, or for completely no reason, you recalled that annoying shit.

You would suddenly burst into laughter for no reason, you would suddenly quiet down and started crying. You would even open your eyes for one whole night, laying under the table and staring straight at it because you want to tell yourself it's okay.

The more you hear others trying to comfort you the more it would make you scream and yell at them.

To start, you really misunderstood what a metal scar is. The things you mention can be found across various mental illnesses and disorders. There isn't one that covers all of that, and it won't be found in someone (because they wouldn't make it). But still, even for say, bipolar disorder. You would need a strong mixed episode to exhibit similar behaviour.

Emotional scarring is separate from mental illnesses. I apologize for using mental scars as the term, I thought it would be clearer for a layman. But any traumatic event that is ignored or healed poorly can turn into. I don't want to get into the specifics of anything here, but it doesn't need to be a severe traumatic event to cause this scarring.
What it does, is not cause someone to hate themself for thinking about it. It is instead the painful memories or events that negatively impacts someone. Similar to a physical scar, it just makes it painful to touch too much, or hard to use. These can lead to various coping mechanisms, the things that exist to make it so emotional scarring doesn't lead to obvious negative impact from the scars.

For the purpose of this discussion, I will only go a bit into avoidance, like what the character did, and stonewalling like you seem to suggest.

(I deleted like 20+ minutes of work here... why did I write this in the forum . It may be a bit confusing since I am trying to rewrite the next two sections.)

A Chūnibyō wants to stands out... it's a delusion, but it's a good one as you are trying to achieve something in this delusion.

To start, I have to explain that these tactics for dealing with emotional scarring are generally subconscious and the conscious tactics are irrelevant here.

The most common form of avoidance is disassociation, this is a psychological process, not a mental illness. This means that your brain is working subconsciously to make it so you aren't affected by these emotional scars. What it does is altering the thinking to make the world not feel real (I'll explain below), lead to dissociative identity disorder, or lead to amnesia and periods of fugue. To explain it to a layman, I would compare it to hiding a mess under a bed or in a closet and which you then forget and you have someone trying to stop you from checking. But eventually this mess can leak out from where its being hidden and make itself known, due to the brain being pretty darn bad at helping itself.

I have to admit that you may be right that the character might not have Chuunibyo, it depends on how the character acts with others. Like does he want to stand out, does he want to make friends and how he interacts in social situations? The alternative, which likely still exists regardless of the Chuunibyo is some form of psychosis or disorder causing it and disassociation. The disassociation is likely is derealization and depersonalization, which is like your brain separating your thinking mind from your sense of self and treating your identity as a scapegoat for the emotional scars. It also makes the world not feel real. Think of it like this, your thinking mind is by itself as it pilots the body and sense of self from a third person. It can understand the world and appears the same as anyone else, but is unable to feel the emotions properly. It knows consequences, but it isn't able to work towards goals to prevent the harm, because it just can't force the separated mind into doing its best.

(I wrote this so much better the first time :< I may edit if it remains later)

Pretending to be delusional = 'Chūnibyō'

The reason why this is incorrect is what I think you have misunderstood.

Chuunibyo develops due to pretending to be delusional, but Chuunibyo is being delusional.
Chuunibyo isn't the adolescent trying to stand out, but instead the consequence with the combination of other mental health illnesses, processing and emotional scars.


I am a bit tired of writing, considering it's been about two hours? Because I had to rewrite so much... so I'll be quick here.

I think this is meant by the timing and situation when the protagonist hugged his sibling.

The protagonist, hugged, what seems to be one of their very few grounding devices. After they seemed to be dead.
I don't know how this is ever a bad timing or situation? Hugging is one of the most prevalent actions across culture for people passing on. Especially considering the protagonist is in such a headspace has such a strong emotional connection with them.

I saw how my dad died, but I merely stood there, gripping my fist and swallowed my snots. I never came to hug him, no matter how much I loved him as a family.

I think you are complaining that the character has these avoidance based processing, and think that stonewalling is what the protagonist should just man up and deal with?
Sorry if I misunderstood, you didn't really make sense saying.

The reason why I wanted to talk about this is, you need to realize that the character already had a system to cope with these emotional scars. The delusions are a showcase of how much more the character has had to develop. Their brain has entirely different different developmental pathways that aren't able to stonewall and withdraw.
If this were the first showcase of the character experiencing loss, sure. They might be able to be expected to be able to stonewall. But no. This is a character with extremely late stage mental health illness and processes. They are to the point that they should be getting therapy for the rest of their life, and fighting to improve for most of it. Likely never to recover to the level of an average person.


I would have liked to explain more about why it is so impactful and how it isn't reasonable to expect the character to just deal with it. But I am tired of writing this.

I also do not think this all is what is going to be what is worked on in the novel, especially reading this

In the next chapter, everything is like a video game, you are the programmer, and you can do whatever you want with literally everything. Go back in time, seeing your brother/sister? (no idea, your his/her confused me deeply), mother, confession, becoming a Russian,

It sounds very disappointing, but that does not mean that the chapter doesn't have a point. I believe these elements, that I think you disregard are the basis for the development. I think you underestimate the effects of a severe depression and the underlying causes of these delusions.

Hopefully this is readable? Also, @Tony could I keep this post? It is relevant to the roasting, just a more psychological analysis of the writing.

 

[Ed.Spain]

Know what? It's 3am in my side of the globe. I've been awake for nearly 24 hours, but I can't sleep. This thread had multiple conflicts going on, like a chaotic battlefield with free for all rules.

Entertaining, but derails the purpose of the thread. Also, I appreciate the roasts here; I'm afraid of submitting my own novel to @Tempokai but I keep learning about writing stuff.

So yeah, thanks for this, regardless of the egos crushed.

 

[Clo]

I'm afraid of submitting my own novel to @Tempokai but I keep learning about writing stuff.

Same. I had no idea about the whole rhetoric and logos/pathos/ethos way to dissect a story. I'm super glad for all the roasts I see.

I'm happy my stories aren't being roasted, because while I may love the feedback (logos weak here, pathos weak in this passage, etc.), I would find the Gordon Ramsay-style delivery probably too difficult to really appreciate the feedback.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Sounds like time to lock this thread and set up a Roasts II thread...

 

[JayMark80]

I have to say I appreciate Tempokai's roasts. They make me think, validate some choices, and regret many others. I learn a lot from reading them.

---

Actually, that is out of character, so don't read anything above the horizontal line.

I learned the best lesson of all from these roasts, absolutely nothing.

 

[Tempokai]

I'm a very new author knowing almost nothing about how to write stories. Please torch my creation as best as you can.
https://www.scribblehub.com/series/1374077/stars-of-gerhana/

I’ll be blunt: If this is your first-ever attempt at writing, and you’ve never so much as scribbled a story in a school notebook, fine. Congratulations, you wrote something longer than most people ever will. That’s cool. That’s also the only thing saving this from being a complete dumpster fire. It’s okay—for a practice run. But for an actual webnovel? No. Just… no.

I read your first three chapters, and let me tell you, it became painfully clear that you are not serious about this. Don’t lie to me—you didn’t actually expect people to read this, did you? The ethos of your story—the trust, the bare-minimum credibility that even amateur webnovel readers crave—collapsed the second I hit that bloated wall of generic VRMMO babble. You’re coasting on clichés and vibes, but the problem is, those vibes are “meh” at best and outright tedious at worst.

As a synopsis maker, you had one job: sell the story in a couple of sentences. Give readers a reason to care. What did you do instead? You slapped together a blurb that boils down to “dude gets VR invite; mysteries happen” and called it a day. Vague, generic, utterly forgettable.
What are the stakes? Why should I care about Lucien? What makes this VR game different from the 10,000 other VRMMO webnovels out there? I’ll tell you what your synopsis answers: absolutely nothing.

And then there’s the tag situation. One tag? ONE?! It’s 2025, and you think “Game Elements” is gonna get you discovered? Tags exist for a reason. Use them, or your story will rot in the forgotten depths of whatever platform you’re posting on.

Now, clichés aren’t inherently bad—when done well, they’re like comfort food for readers. But you? You served readers boiled, unseasoned cliché stew, then let it simmer in unnecessary descriptions until it became an indigestible sludge. Let me ask you something: do you read other VRMMO stories? Because if you do, you should know that nobody gives a damn about reading the full ToS in detail. They skip that boring nonsense. At best, they make it a quick joke; at worst, they mention it and move on.

But you? No, you made readers wait through minutes of MC reading EULA hell, stretching the moment until it felt like a punishment. It’s like VTuber starting a stream and then watching the still image until the streamer fully starts it. I get it—you were trying to be immersive, but you failed to realize that immersion dies the second boredom creeps in.

And when MC spawns in the starting town, he just… wanders. Oh, he wanders a lot. He walks through streets. He admires flowers. He takes in the scenery like some medieval tourist who forgot why he was there in the first place. For half the chapter, nothing happens. It’s all vibes, no plot. Then, deus ex machina AI voice shows up and finally pushes things forward. But by that point, most readers have already zoned out or hit the back button.

There’s no internal logos (logic) holding your story together. Instead of thinking critically about how to create tension or progression, you just followed the VRMMO template step-by-step, assuming the clichés would carry you. They didn’t. The MC’s reactions are inconsistent, jumping between wide-eyed awe, snarky gamer commentary, and deadpan panic without any clear reason, obliterating pathos I had for the character. By the time the mind-reading AI showed up, I wasn’t thinking, Oh, this is interesting! I was thinking, Is this still the same protagonist? Or did the author just forget how they wrote him two pages ago?

Lucien? He’s not a character. He’s a sock puppet version of you, roleplaying as a storyteller. There’s no carefully constructed persona, no implied author, no depth or proper emotional arc. He’s just you, having some thoughts, reacting to things, and dumping words on the page. He’s a cardboard gamer god trope who doesn’t grow or struggle. He just is, and not in an interesting way.

If you actually want to improve and take storytelling seriously, you can absolutely do that. Writing is a skill. You can learn it. But you’ve got to start from the basics. Basics of the basics. Read more, analyze what works and what doesn’t in other stories, learn how to create stakes and cut the fat from your prose. Your writing currently as is? Total Bruh with capital B. If you just want to have fun and keep writing for yourself, that’s fine. But if you’re going to put your work out there and ask for feedback, you’ve got to be ready to hear the hard truth:

This is a rough draft at best, a practice run, and nowhere near a finished story. It has potential—sure, due to aligning the story with a VRMMO cliché. But right now? It’s a giant, fat OK for existing. Nothing more.

 

[Hsinat]

I have been very temped to ask you a favour, but the record of my embarrassments keeps on growing. But who cares? Check out my stuff, and please root out all the flaws! This is my first time writing a novel. Please be meticulous.

 

[Stemcells]

At this point, I'm admiring you, really.
I know what shit I've written so far, so please, please try to read my novel,

Effortless Dominion

Also on RoyalRoad and webnovel~ This man had a thing for creating 'arty corpses. ' Gait of a soldier, calmness of a saint yet temperament of a depraved, he should have been caged. Even the strongest of the alloys would have degraded on his mere sinister glance, carving a path...

www.scribblehub.com

Thank you for taking the time, even if just a little.

 

[RiloCree]

I’ll be blunt: If this is your first-ever attempt at writing, and you’ve never so much as scribbled a story in a school notebook, fine. Congratulations, you wrote something longer than most people ever will. That’s cool. That’s also the only thing saving this from being a complete dumpster fire. It’s okay—for a practice run. But for an actual webnovel? No. Just… no.

I read your first three chapters, and let me tell you, it became painfully clear that you are not serious about this. Don’t lie to me—you didn’t actually expect people to read this, did you? The ethos of your story—the trust, the bare-minimum credibility that even amateur webnovel readers crave—collapsed the second I hit that bloated wall of generic VRMMO babble. You’re coasting on clichés and vibes, but the problem is, those vibes are “meh” at best and outright tedious at worst.

As a synopsis maker, you had one job: sell the story in a couple of sentences. Give readers a reason to care. What did you do instead? You slapped together a blurb that boils down to “dude gets VR invite; mysteries happen” and called it a day. Vague, generic, utterly forgettable.
What are the stakes? Why should I care about Lucien? What makes this VR game different from the 10,000 other VRMMO webnovels out there? I’ll tell you what your synopsis answers: absolutely nothing.

And then there’s the tag situation. One tag? ONE?! It’s 2025, and you think “Game Elements” is gonna get you discovered? Tags exist for a reason. Use them, or your story will rot in the forgotten depths of whatever platform you’re posting on.

Now, clichés aren’t inherently bad—when done well, they’re like comfort food for readers. But you? You served readers boiled, unseasoned cliché stew, then let it simmer in unnecessary descriptions until it became an indigestible sludge. Let me ask you something: do you read other VRMMO stories? Because if you do, you should know that nobody gives a damn about reading the full ToS in detail. They skip that boring nonsense. At best, they make it a quick joke; at worst, they mention it and move on.

But you? No, you made readers wait through minutes of MC reading EULA hell, stretching the moment until it felt like a punishment. It’s like VTuber starting a stream and then watching the still image until the streamer fully starts it. I get it—you were trying to be immersive, but you failed to realize that immersion dies the second boredom creeps in.

And when MC spawns in the starting town, he just… wanders. Oh, he wanders a lot. He walks through streets. He admires flowers. He takes in the scenery like some medieval tourist who forgot why he was there in the first place. For half the chapter, nothing happens. It’s all vibes, no plot. Then, deus ex machina AI voice shows up and finally pushes things forward. But by that point, most readers have already zoned out or hit the back button.

There’s no internal logos (logic) holding your story together. Instead of thinking critically about how to create tension or progression, you just followed the VRMMO template step-by-step, assuming the clichés would carry you. They didn’t. The MC’s reactions are inconsistent, jumping between wide-eyed awe, snarky gamer commentary, and deadpan panic without any clear reason, obliterating pathos I had for the character. By the time the mind-reading AI showed up, I wasn’t thinking, Oh, this is interesting! I was thinking, Is this still the same protagonist? Or did the author just forget how they wrote him two pages ago?

Lucien? He’s not a character. He’s a sock puppet version of you, roleplaying as a storyteller. There’s no carefully constructed persona, no implied author, no depth or proper emotional arc. He’s just you, having some thoughts, reacting to things, and dumping words on the page. He’s a cardboard gamer god trope who doesn’t grow or struggle. He just is, and not in an interesting way.

If you actually want to improve and take storytelling seriously, you can absolutely do that. Writing is a skill. You can learn it. But you’ve got to start from the basics. Basics of the basics. Read more, analyze what works and what doesn’t in other stories, learn how to create stakes and cut the fat from your prose. Your writing currently as is? Total Bruh with capital B. If you just want to have fun and keep writing for yourself, that’s fine. But if you’re going to put your work out there and ask for feedback, you’ve got to be ready to hear the hard truth:

This is a rough draft at best, a practice run, and nowhere near a finished story. It has potential—sure, due to aligning the story with a VRMMO cliché. But right now? It’s a giant, fat OK for existing. Nothing more.

Tysm. I've never had such a detailed critic on my story and you've really given me some helpful insights on what i need to improve.

The idea does have some potential, but yeah, there's no motivation, no tension, nothing to engage the reader. You've read through the lines and yes, that was definitely just me immersing myself into a world, Lucien was just a vessel for it. There was definitely 0 conflict and every scene got stretched way too much. And the clichés, I definitely leaned too much on that.

In all honesty, this story is my entrance to the world of writing novels/webnovels/stories in general. You've helped so much just by pointing out the lacking essence of my story. I'm sure your criticism will stick with as I improve my story writing skills.

Now i know what i can do to improve and get people to care more about the story. Again, thank you.

 

[anonjohn20]

Tysm

For a second there, I forgot that that means "thank you so much" and thought that you were accusing the legendary reviewer of having autism. Luckily, I figured it out as I read the rest of your reply.

 

[Tempokai]

「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 !!!

Oh, you, you magnificent, chaotic, internet-gremlin of a author. What exactly are you trying to do in that webnovel? I’ll admit, when I clicked open your story, I came in ready for madness, ready to solve conspiracies, untangle mysteries, and—if I was lucky—maybe even laugh at a clever genre bending meme or two. Instead, what I got was four chapters of literary dodgeball, where every word felt like it was thrown at my face at 100 miles per hour, daring me to understand it without suffering brain damage. You said if I can solve the central mystery in 3 chapters, but I will ask you back: did you made me to persuade to solve exactly that after 3 chapters?

Spoiler alert: I’m concussed, delayed this roast for 3 days, and I want 9% beer after this roast.

Let me be clear—post-postmodernism is my jam. I like stories that bend the rules, mock the very idea of narrative structure, and drown the reader in meta-commentary until they’re gasping for air without collapsing into white noise. But, there's always a but, post-postmodernism is dangerous territory. If you don’t do it with precision, you don’t just lose the reader—you bury them alive under an avalanche of references and irony, and look at it, that’s exactly what you did.

You’re not writing for a normie, and honestly, that’s okay. Normies were never going to make it past Chapter One. Too bad you’re not writing for anyone who reads with their brain turned on either. Your ideal reader seems to be some strange hybrid of a 4chan oldfag who moonlights as an Umineko scholar, a terminally online Vtuber addict, and anon who thinks irony is a food group because it is only food it sees on the web. That’s a… very niche audience. Cool, right? And you’ve made no effort to extend a lifeline to anyone who falls outside that bubble.

You might think that’s a flex—"Look at me, my writing’s not for everyone!"—but what it really does is cut off your ethos at the knees. Your authority as a proper storyteller only works if your reader cares about what’s happening, and for that to happen, they need to feel like they’re part of the world you’re building. Instead, you’ve put up a giant sign that reads: “Exclusive Club for Memelords Only, Cringelords Beware.” If you’re not fluent in shitposting and unhinged Umineko references, you’re going to stare at this story, furrow your brow, and mutter: “Huh. Weird. Drop.”

Trust me, I tried to care, I wanted to care. You made it impossible. When you introduce a mystery, you have to give the reader a reason to solve it. You didn’t. You laid out your “mystery” like a half-eaten pizza—no explanation, no context, just a cryptic mess of half-baked clues and smug self-awareness. Sure, you dropped hints about conspiracies, goat-headed girls (on which I didn't find any connection to current story), and shadowy figures like La Monarquía, but without any emotional or intellectual stakes besides "lmao lol", why would I give a damn? If I don’t care about your characters, why should I care about the mystery?

And speaking of characters—what in the fresh hell is going on with them? Madison Delaroux, your purple-haired, shitposting chaos engine, is a walking meme with the energy of a caffeinated raccoon. Ayano Sane? She’s the tired, long-suffering straight man who probably has PTSD from dealing with Madison’s nonsense. Valerie? The elegant ojou-sama with magic tricks and secret knowledge. They’re fun on the surface—sure—but only on the surface. Here’s the problem: you assume I already know them. You act like these characters are old friends I’ve been hanging out with for years. But guess what? I don’t know them at all.

By Chapter Four, I’m still sitting there like a confused guest at a dinner party, trying to figure out who’s who and what their deal is. Oh, they went on an adventure together? Great! Too bad I wasn’t invited. Oh, Valerie’s part of some secret order called [Trono Palido]? Cool, I guess! Why should I care? Without context, backstory, or emotional connection, these characters are just noise.

And because I don’t care about your characters, the pathos of your story falls flat. I’m not invested in their struggle, I’m not rooting for them to succeed, and I certainly don’t feel any sense of urgency when they talk about (((Them))) (are (((they))) with big crooked noses or what?), or La Monarquía. The stakes feel like an inside joke I’m not in on—“Hey, remember that time we fought goatgirls in suits? LOL, classic!” No, I don’t remember that. And I’m not going to go back and read your other works to figure it out. If your story can’t stand on its own, that’s a problem.

Now, let’s talk about your target audience. Ask yourself this: Who are you writing for?
Is it for the 4chan oldfag who still worships Umineko and gets nostalgic about long-dead forums? Maybe. Is it for the terminally online Vtuber fan who thinks sleep is a suggestion and memes are the only form of communication? Probably. Is it for the “mystery enthusiast” who likes to read with their brain turned on and figure out the complex mechanics of a story? Absolutely not. Your writing isn’t for them at all. And here’s the kicker—it’s not even really for me, someone who loves post-postmodern storytelling and understands all your references.

The truth is, you’re writing for both and neither at the same time. You want the meme-brained degenerates to eat this up with a spoon, but you also want the intellectual post-postmodern crowd to stand back and admire your cleverness. But I don't think you did it for those intellectuals, so scratch that, but not entirely, for this reasoning. If it's like so, the meme crowd needs a brain-off reading experience—simple, fast, chaotic. The post-postmodern crowd needs structure—something that holds up under analysis. You gave me a frustrating blend of both, and it failed to persuade me to keep reading.

If you wanted me to solve your mystery, you would’ve made your opening approachable or give me the reason to care about your shitposting ladies. You would’ve laid out some emotional stakes, some reason to care, something that whispered in my ear, “Keep going. You’ll find what you’re looking for.” Instead, you handed me a tangle of half-revealed lore and meta-commentary a la Umineko and expected me to untangle it just because LOL MAGIC TRUTH COLOR-CODED SYSTEM.

I’m not going to give you suggestions on how to fix this, because honestly? I don’t “get it” in the way you want me to. This is too deeply tied to your authorial style, your niche audience, and your personal obsession with Umineko and 4chan. I can’t tell you how to change it without breaking what makes it yours. So instead, I’ll just say this: you failed your persuasion check. You had four chapters to convince me, and you didn’t.

Take the L. Wear it with pride. Maybe your ideal reader is out there, waiting to devour your work with brain fully shut off and meme receptors set to maximum. Maybe they’ll love it. Me? I’m moving on to write another roast.