Customizable Audiobook Settings

Everybody already knows this is the future. The standard options at first will be:
- Normal
- "Funny voices"
- ASMR
- Narrator shouting to be heard over a vacuum cleaner
- Drunk friend trying to explain the plot (he does not remember it correctly)
- Hatsune Miku
Developments will continue of course.

Irreplaceable Dignity

The guard stationed at the crossroads pondered his duty. "Not to denigrate so eminent a person as I hope to be considered, but could not a statue do as much as I? Ah, a chance to test. Hail, Terad!"
The final salutation was no silent thought. Terad answered, and soon the two agreed to terms over a rough likeness of the guard, altered from another comission which depicted an official who had already secured a better post.
Upon delivery, the guard fixed his replacement and left to pursue a separate occupation. The statue watched over the crossroads ably. No crime occurred which would not had the proper guard been present. The sole notable incident involved a traveler from afar. Taking the statue for a local god, he left an offering and prayed to it before continuing his journey.
Incensed, the true crossroads god smashed the statue to splinters. The guard marveled upon seeing it. "I never realized how strenuous this routine could be for a guard of lesser resilience. I am aggrieved, lamented substitute, that you bore the weight of my miscalculation in thinking myself inessential." He proceeded to consign the statue to the care of the proper gods in his prayer. Both duty and piety thus returned to the world.
Finis

Characterization Aid

When creating a character, ask yourself the following questions.
What living family does he have?
What deceased family does he have?
What colors does he prefer?
How well would he perform in the hit new tactical social deduction game Fire Emblem Shadows, the true test of wits?

Likely Astronomical Phenomenon

The entire universe so far as we can observe it is probably contained within a big ol' spaceship, right? We wouldn't know if it weren't. I call this the "Big Haul" theory. As for who's driving, I bet he wears a cap to keep the super-sun out of his eyes, each of which is larger than a galaxy. What concerns us is where he's driving and what the recipient intends to do with us.

Addendum

Now, with the help of AI, you can enrich your story with portraits of people who don't appear. Consider your avant garded.

Author Biographies

Stop doing those. Put in biographies of the story's characters instead, or better yet, biographies of people only mentioned, or, best of all, biographies of characters not even mentioned, such as the fifth king of a place that is brought up in one conversation.

Addendum

I would have called it "All-Out Hundred Battle," thereby proving either why I'm not in charge or why I should be.

Salesmanship in the Modern Era

The naive ask why Konami is spelling the hottest new Yu-Gi-Oh format all funny, but the savvy never considered anyone would call a new product a single word that brings up thousands of results on any search engine. The key mistake was to spell it "Genesys" rather than "Jennasyss" or, to be particularly saucy, "Djenasus."

Telote's Saga

The custom of the kings over the Wilse was to invite to their weddings the hero Yitgand who had aided their ancestor in taking the kingship. Telait first ended the custom, saying Yitgand was surely dead as was everyone else who roamed alongside his grandfather's grandfather's father, and none blamed him for that except one.
For during the feast a man thrust himself into the hall who had greatness in both his stature and his age more than any could believe. He rebuked King Telait, saying that forgetting one man was nothing, but since he had remembered, he must have forgotten valor and honor instead. He then foretold that the issue of that wedding would be good for little, that it was a shame, and that it was no curse from him who was Yitgand but simply a sign of the age.
All went as he said. The king's son Telote's hands did not seek the sword or know what to do with one, nor did he have wit in counsel or speech. The king said he would reward the man who could rear him better. Yitgand came again, saying he doubted the result but had never shirked a challenge on that account. He had charge of Telote from then on.
Telait's son cast off his sluggishness and killed a hero shortly after, when he was twelve years of age. He followed that with countless deeds of bravery and open-handedness so that his enemies feared him more than shame while his friends were outnumbered only by men seeking his friendship. After he took the scepter from Telait's quavering hand he did still more. Every king whose ancestors paid the Wilse tribute did so again, and many were forced to it for the first time.
When Telote made up his mind to take a wife, he refused to bring back the custom, saying that he remembered valor well enough but disliked Yitgand for his harshness and odor. The wedding passed in peace. Yitgand said of it that the king's reasons were as good as any he ever heard and worthy of a bold man.
Finis

Addendum

"It must have been a stylistic choice to make the sports scenes in these movies this slow-paced" - sports fans of the future
"In Rookie of the Year we see the beginning of athletics as we understand them." - movie critic of the future
"Why are Jedi Knights so bad at jumping?" - people of the future

Future Athletic Performance

In the future, physical excellence will have reached such a peak owing to improved conditioning and genetic engineering that people won't even imagine today's sports anime aren't documentaries.

Let's Meet in the Town Square

The town square being, of course, Sword Art Online Variant Showdown Offline Version. Further, by "let's meet" I intend to signify my intention to marvel at the name and nothing else.

Addendum

Harnessing war-cheetahs to your chariot is advisable only if flight is anticipated, and people will judge your bravery accordingly.

Military Innovation

If you had a chariot pulled by crabs, you could strafe. There's probably a planet out there which has crabs big enough that hasn't figured this out yet, but soon a great empire will arise.

The Artisanal Cycle

In the future, resources will be so abundant that all the cool guys will have hand-crafted gear that will make stripping corpses worthwhile again. Then, the fights over the stripped stuff, and a new epoch of heroes.

The Second Accord

Nobody was quite sure what to call the celebration, but that one should be held was a matter of galactic consensus. Referring to "peace" seemed inappropriate since there had never been a war; indeed, the determination of every analyst and computation on both sides that there never would be was what prompted the present relief. Till the moment itself, none could be honest in claiming he knew whether an encounter between intelligent species would result in the extermination of one as many predicted against the theories of approximately as many.
The formal ceremony to confirm eternal non-agression took place in a space installation constructed for that occasion, a trifling endeavor for a pair of interstellar civilizations. Numerous heads of state attended (the investigations following first contact provided another point of reassurance in that neither species had united into a single nation, a cause of anxiety). Lesser politicians considered themselves either lucky to be invited or else took it as a portent of a continued rise, but as for the deal-makers whom few of the public knew for all that everyone there did, they regarded their inclusion as nothing exceptional. A smattering of celebrities enlivened the event, less from their charm and more from the attempts of either species to explain the sources of their fame.
That procedure as well as much additional conversation impinged on the main disappointment of the historic encounter. Just as the two species had no cause for conflict, neither did they have any for less-violent intercourse.
"This music, I am sorry to say, is discordant to my human ears."
"Your 'pineapple' is not displeasing in shape, but it is quite inedible for us."
"Humor barely survives differences in language. I am unsurprised that none of yours makes it across."
"I have no reason to denigrate your archery, nor any to prefer it over our own."
"I expect you have no culinary use for this garlic. It is only a shame you have no vampires!"
Amid laughs, the other party requested an explanation, out of politeness merely until he heard it.
"Those exist among you?"
"They do. It was once thought they were fiction, but the fact has become unpleasantly evident. There is some speculation that colonization of the moon has led to an increase in their power and numbers."
"How curious that we have a similar monster! It can transfix a man with its horrible eye before feeding." "That is, it can transfix a man of your species. Is that not so? Likewise for ours, I believe."
"An experiment does suggest itself."
Vampires and other unsavory creatures had cause to lament the swift creation of the monster hunter exchange program.
Finis

Legibility

Some people have trouble getting into fantasy, what with the invented terminology and exotic names. In other words, the greatest contemporary fantasy universe is online drama. It's a cooperative work too, like Thieves' World.

Social Discomfiture

Imagine announcing your Switch 2 Roguelike releasing today only for another company to do the same thing. How mortifying!

If You're Looking for Sword Names

That Saxo Grammaticus fellow names about five thousand swords in his factual and accurate Danish history, stuff so obscure only Shin Megami Tensei games have cottoned to them.

Addendum

Some might protest that making convicts live inside a whale is essentially a death sentence. Those people go in the whale.

Incarceration Solutions

Prisoners often end up inside whales, but fantasy governments should consider sending them there directly. It's like exile except nobody gets mad at you for sending your worst junk.

Everyone Knows, But Nobody Wants to Be the First

Every single work of fiction should be printed in two versions: Furry and non-furry.

The Laws of Dead and Living

Who carried the grumblings of the owners to the king, and what was done about it? Taums it was, the son of Aums, and he told the king this, that the men of the kingdom had become few in number, not enough to see the harvest done, the farmers feared.
King Hadwis was not deaf but heard it all, not slow to war either but swift in it. He mustered strong men, as many as there were, to march on the underground kingdom. Who led the center? He did, proud in his armor and hard to look upon. Who led the right? It was Count Hemma, unbending and wise in war, the king's brother by oath. Who led the left? Count Kyvring led it, whose hall and whose riches were the greatest any had, but he disdained comfort when foes enjoyed life.
The host seized the caves that were the porch of that realm and dared to go farther. Count Hemma slew men that had horns and were huge, Count Kyvring overcame giants that killed three men by stamping once, and more than one hound of manly size learned the king was too strong for them. The slaughter was great on both sides, but more on the one, and the country below became the king's.
Hadwis made all submit and left them afterward in ownership of their land but under his law that never again should the underground steal away living men from their landly toil but only the dead that both countries might thrive.
Finis

Declaration of Science Fiction Principles

1. "Wormhole" is a terrible term.
2. Spaceships! Woohoo!

Examining the Tail

We all know swords are cooler than bows which are cooler than many other things, gardening for instance, but are we misguided in looking at the items alone? The fact of the matter is that blacksmiths are a thousand times cooler than fletchers. The swordsman goes to a dwarf or huge guy and gets his meteorite-derived blade, but whom does the archer patronize? A workshop filled with grumbling children overseen by a sweaty man who considers manual labor beneath him.

Easy Replacements for Big Flavor

Done: "Dishonest"
Fun: "Soothless"

Addendum

The ideal fantasy plot: A guy gets into 3-5 fights. He loses either the first or second.

Fantasy Struggles

Is the hardest part of writing fantasy pretending that dancing is cool? Or is it paring down your ideas to match the complexity of those employed by the multimillionaires of KISS? Probably the dancing. Most of us, if we're honest, will admit that The Elder sounded a little too complicated.

Game Design Question

Would people in every universe converge on a game similar to chess, or is it so boring that only our world would bother with it?