PudgeThePug
New Member
Hello everyone!
I'm new to novel writing but not world building. I have DMed many D&D worlds but I'm trying my hand at a Dark Fantasy novel. I've had this story in my head for a few years and finally hammered out a good world building baseline.
I'm working on the first book in a dark fantasy horror series. It follows Lucian Vaelmont, a knight whose family was destroyed by a nobleman's betrayal. His father died in a cell waiting on a trial that never came. Five years later, Lucian has a dented breastplate, a bad knee, a small band of loyal companions, and one goal: find the baron responsible and make him answer for it.
The hunt leads west, through a rain-soaked river town, a crooked toll clerk's ledger, and a carter who drinks too much and won't stop talking about the stars. Beyond the last waymarker is Hollowmere, a marsh village most people won't even name. A year earlier, something happened there that no one can quite explain, and one of the brightest stars in the sky hasn't been where it belongs since. The baron is headed straight for it with a cart full of strange supplies and a plan he thinks will make him a god's master. He's very, very wrong.
The tone is gritty and grounded: realistic sword-and-shield fighting, mud, bad ale, and people with complicated reasons for what they do. Underneath all that is something far older and bigger that doesn't care about any of them. I like horror that creeps in quietly instead of jumping out at you, and I'm trying to write a story that asks hard questions about justice and what people will give up to feel safe, without handing the reader easy answers.
I'm eager to learn better ways to write and juggle with different concepts and maybe give out some advice of my own.
I'm new to novel writing but not world building. I have DMed many D&D worlds but I'm trying my hand at a Dark Fantasy novel. I've had this story in my head for a few years and finally hammered out a good world building baseline.
I'm working on the first book in a dark fantasy horror series. It follows Lucian Vaelmont, a knight whose family was destroyed by a nobleman's betrayal. His father died in a cell waiting on a trial that never came. Five years later, Lucian has a dented breastplate, a bad knee, a small band of loyal companions, and one goal: find the baron responsible and make him answer for it.
The hunt leads west, through a rain-soaked river town, a crooked toll clerk's ledger, and a carter who drinks too much and won't stop talking about the stars. Beyond the last waymarker is Hollowmere, a marsh village most people won't even name. A year earlier, something happened there that no one can quite explain, and one of the brightest stars in the sky hasn't been where it belongs since. The baron is headed straight for it with a cart full of strange supplies and a plan he thinks will make him a god's master. He's very, very wrong.
The tone is gritty and grounded: realistic sword-and-shield fighting, mud, bad ale, and people with complicated reasons for what they do. Underneath all that is something far older and bigger that doesn't care about any of them. I like horror that creeps in quietly instead of jumping out at you, and I'm trying to write a story that asks hard questions about justice and what people will give up to feel safe, without handing the reader easy answers.
I'm eager to learn better ways to write and juggle with different concepts and maybe give out some advice of my own.
Last edited:
Myth Weaver
