An Explanation of the Selection of Monster for the Previous Story

You know, not a lot of monsters have meaningful weakness. Werewolves have silver, which is pretty impractical, and the main problem faced by mummies is that they're boring. No wonder vampires are so popular.

Challenge of the Flavorful Dish

"No, inspector. There are no signs of violence and no indication of poisoning. The cause of death is natural."
"I have reason to doubt that," Inspector Iagius said. What reason need there be aside from the intuition of that veteran avenger of crime? Nevertheless, grounds existed! The dead man had not gone through life without enemies or without making a will. That will . . . was missing!
The doctor cared about physiological signs and not motive. And rightly so. He shook his learned head. "The sole unusual fact about this corpse is how much garlic he must have eaten!"
"Garlic, you say?"
"Crates of it!"

*****

"Well, Mr. Modusta, I only have one question for you before I stop wasting your time."
"Not at all, Inspector. Happy to help."
"Is it true that the victim dined here the night of the murder?"
"It is."
"Falgunus! Arrest this man!"
"What?"
An escape attempt! Mr. Modusta made his try, but Custos Falgunus was too fast for him in body just as Inspector Iagius was in mind. He struggled, but he might as well have wrestled against a mountain!
"He's full of energy, sir!"
"I am! Because this is outrageous!"
"And deviltry. Mr. Modusta, I talked to your other guests. They reported tasting no garlic at all. You knew the victim had worn a vampire costume for a party once! That made him vulnerable to garlic in sufficient amounts, larger of course than what the true vampire requires, and that's why you had your chief load his dish alone with all the garlic in the house! Take him away, Falgunus."
Another triumph for Inspector Iagius!
Finis

The Fate of an Inconvenient Premise

I Got Staked by a Texan and Sent to Another World Where I'm Still a Vampire but There's Garlic in the Air So I'm Weaker Than a Normal Human
Volume 2

"This quest reward magic item negates my vampiric weaknesses!"

Finis

Proper Halloween Titles

Sure you want to have skeleton kings and vampire kings, but is king a scary title? How about kaiser, doge, pharaoh, or potentate? Really it's just kaiser, but I wanted to see how the others look in print. Very plain. My goosebumps are gooseflat.

Halloween Sorting

Let's examing the categories of how people celebrate Halloween in particular and October generally.

Halloween Horror Type: These people watch well-reviewed horror movies and play Alien: Isolation.
Halloween Irony Type: These people watch Friday the 13th movies after the first one and play Unity asset flips.
Halloween Spooky Type: These people carve jack o'lanterns, put skeletons in their yard, and play Castlevania and Disgaea.

There is a group which does nothing at all, but it's better not to say anything about that. The important thing is to find your faction and coordinate to win the Splatoon Splatfest which will have this as its theme any day now. Spooky Type is clearly the most popular, but Irony Type probably has better players.

A Brutal Takedown

More like Dorkula and Van Smellthings! Wait, did Mad Magazine already do that?

The Future of Fantasy

We've had enough dark fantasy. It's time for smark fantasy. That's right, secondary world professional wrestling. Think of the gimmicks! The giant guy could be an actual giant. That's all. That's the only extra gimmick. Except for . . . Mummies! I was lying before, because there are many options.

Zombievember

Or we can talk about them right now. Zombies are terrible. They're just humans minus. Whatever's causing the zombification is worse than the zombies, and that isn't as bad as whatever's causing the vampires and demons. Bottom tier threat, one out of thirteen, not even worth Turn Undead.

The Latest Fantasy Subgenre

Street fantasy deals with fantasy in a modern-day setting, but instead of vampires and werewolves, it's furry green lightning men from Brazil.

The Limits of Fiction

Make sure not to make your fiction too realistic, or you risk replacing our world with one of your own invention. That wouldn't be so bad if your taste weren't terrible, but here we are.