oxblood
She's Etheldred. She's Ethel. She's Adele. She's a vampire. It's in her nature to bite. It's in her nature to hurt others. It's in her nature to self-destruct.
Or at least, that's what she claims.
Made for Shufflecomp 2025. More or less based on following songs: Erlkönig by Franz Schubert, Becky's So Hot by FLETCHER, Don't Stop Believin' by Journey, Alice by Sisters of Mercy, Untamed Region by Jenny Hval, and Sinking Boat by Infinity Song.
TRIGGER/CONTENT WARNINGS: since this is a vampire story, genre-typical warnings apply (blood/biting/death/murder/etc). Additionally, there are mentions of/discussions of/allusions to: death of a child and grief, abusive relationships, usage of drugs and alcohol, smoking cigarettes. Please tell me if I missed something.
Special thanks to:
- every comp shuffler this year, whether you finished or not
- all of my friends who supported me while I was losing my mind over this (you know who you are)
- Alicja and Sasha for helping me out with this as much as they could (and this wasn't easy)
- whatever's going on with Evelin Lomes
- every vampire I've ever known. I still love you
Comments
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V4V is amazing and made me laugh out loud
I liked the repetition of (ink) all throughout.
The cleansing is an interesting concept, getting rid of / having to physically cycle out old blood through nosebleeds and the mouth. I would never want to go through it myself…
“Absolutely catastrophic reading”, Alice laughed, pulling the Tower card out of a tarot deck. “Seven of swords, seven of wands, reversed Magician…” nah I would be preparing a funeral for whoever got that reading in real life
“And so the whole theatre came crashing down and all of the Etheldreds and Ethels and Adeles tumbled out of the backstage, all of them being a grand accusation against that new self which she wanted to create.“ I liked this imagery a lot! This is definitely my favorite line.
Oh, that was lovely. Thank you.
This was a real page-turner! Such a compelling world, and the internal links/vampire tooltips add a lot. I'm sure I'll be thinking about it for a while.
This was really great! I loved the snippets about vampire culture and the use of game engine towards the end was really good. Gut punch of an ending.
wow what an incredible story about (ink)
Had to hold my breath every time! Stunning work as always!
This is so fucking good. I loved all of it, especially this part:
I am sad that Ethel(dred)/Alice did fall back into old tendencies, but change is hard. It demands you bare your soul, and she wasn't ready. It's a shame.