"Welcome back to 'Author's Anvil,' the show where we bring you the masterminds behind today's most gripping stories. Today, we have with us the enigmatic creator of 'The Devil’s Playground,' the hottest web novel on the scene — a story so eerily real, some fans are calling it... cursed."
“Ladies and gentlemen of the audience please give a round of applause to a proclaimed genius of our generation!”
A crowd of onlookers in the audience erupted into applause and cheer, like a thunderclap shattering the stillness of a quiet night. Abruptly a large screen behind the host soon lit up revealing a blank icon in the centre (the author’s personal icon).
Once the applause began to die down inch-by-inch, the host placed his elbow onto the table and leaned towards the screen behind him.
“Say, you must have seen the news by now. It seems that many of your fans have been calling your novel cursed.”
The host looked towards a piece of paper in his hands, relinquishing a puzzled expression.
“It says here—if I’m reading it correctly—that one of your side-characters, Daniel Ha, seems to have the exact same name as another Daniel Ha that was reported missing approximately 24 hours before the release of his debut chapter—It even looks like all the features match up: long brown hair, earrings, lip piercings—the list goes on. Seems like an odd coincidence, doesn’t it?”
Chapter 47: Trial of the Infernal Clock
Comments:
“WTF? Why is TF Daniel Ha here?! I swear I saw him on a missing poster” — @I_See_youu (27 upvotes)
“STFU It's just a coincidence.” — @TheTheoriser1173 (31 upvotes)
“BRO are y’all blind?! Every new character in this novel has been someone that’s been reported missing. This novel is cursed. I'M TELLING YOU!” — @BensonTheBagger (52 upvotes)
“Haha,” the author, only known by the username [My Profile 2477], let out a light chuckle through his mic before answering the question.
"Coincidence?" his voice echoed softly, calm—almost too calm. "Isn't it strange, though... how the world seems to align in such perfect patterns sometimes? Events, names, faces—they all have a way of converging, don't they? But I wouldn't call it odd. Not at all."
In response to the author's peculiar words, the host let out a small, nervous chuckle and leaned back into his fine leather chair—slightly perplexed and lost on the author's rather strange response. Unsure of what to say next, the host blurted out the first thing that came to his mind.
“Haha, cough cough well then, shall we move on to the next question now?”
However, the author, still maintaining his calm tone, responded to the host’s abrupt change of topic. “Yes. Of course, change the topic if you must.”
The host’s smile wavered for a moment, his eyes darting toward the camera—an instinctive glance that betrayed his unease. He felt a pang of regret for his own rudeness, knowing the awkward shift was now immortalised on live television. To steady himself, he licked his lips quickly and adjusted his tie, forcing his trademark grin back into place.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“Right, moving on...”
(static)
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"Welcome back to 'Author's Anvil,' the show where we bring you the masterminds behind today's most gripping stories. Today, we have with us the enigmatic creator of 'The Devil’s Playground,' the hottest web novel on the sce…
(static)
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Tick tock, tick tock
A clock that was stationed at the end of a dimly lit room signalled that it was 4:50 in the afternoon. Directly below a flickering lamp—held up only by a thin piece of wire—stood a female detective, peering at the screen displaying a recorded tape of the TV broadcast featuring the author. Her sleep-deprived eyes held an irritated gaze as she watched intently.
Her brown hair was dishevelled as if a wild animal had been nested in it. Her hazel eyes were perpetually dilated from all the blue light that entered it.The black suit she wore hung on her frame with wrinkled creases—on the right side of her chest, her blazer pocket was decorated with a silver name tag that said ‘Yoo Ji-soo”. With a frustrated sigh, Yoo Ji-soo spun around to face her partner, who was slouched in his chair, his face etched with the same simmering frustration that mirrored her own.
“Well that’s all the footage we have of this author character.” Her tone then swiftly turned from light frustration into anger, as if a thermostat was rapidly set to high, “GODDAMMIT! Hyung sung I told you that this…this damn web-novel author?! Has nothing to do with the disappearances! You’ve wasted my time!”
“YOU DON’T GET IT!”Kim Hyun-sung—Yoo Ji-soo’s partner roared, he slammed his desk with both of his hands, like an enraged ape, causing two skyscraper-like towers of papers on his desk to tumble over and scatter around the floorboard like a wave from the ocean. He swiped his hand across his black spiky hair and unleashed a groan that was further accentuated from his voice that was as coarse as gravel. He ran his other hand across his stubble before relinquishing his own feelings of utter irritation.
“YOU DON’T GET IT, YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND!” He exclaimed as he began to frantically point towards the repeating broadcast, “EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER THAT THIS…THIS DAMN AUTHOR HAS MADE, HAS BEEN EXACTLY THE SAME AS ALL THE PEOPLE THAT HAVE GONE MISSING, IT’S BEEN A YEAR. A YEAR SINCE THIS HAS BEEN HAPPENING, CAN’T YOU SEE! CAN’T YOU JUST SEE WHAT’S BEEN IN FRONT OF YOU THIS WHOLE TIME!?” Hyung-sung once again slammed his hand down onto his desk and desperately grabbed a file off of his keyboard and furiously began to read off names, “look, LOOK! Daniel Ha, Gabriel Lee, Namra Kim. All gone missing and all seen in…in ‘the devi’s theme park’ or some crap like that! Exact same name, exact same features!”
Hyung-sung’s words, only acting as coal igniting the flame within Ji-soo. She began to slowly walk toward Hyun-sung, like a drill sergeant trying to intimidate a recruit. “So you’re saying that this guy is just mysteriously sucking up people into his own web-novel, is that what you’re trying to say?”
“No, no no. That’s not what I’m saying.” Kim Hyung sung said with a sigh, “This can all be cleared if we just open an investigation on this guy, he can’t be innocent: Mafia, trafficking, kidnapping, anything! Ji-soo you just have to trust me on this, please.”
“Then what, huh? We literally have no evidence and no reasonable suspicion. What have we got on him? We spent the whole night looking at dud footage, we have absolutely nothing to go off of.” Yoo Ji-soo said before walking past the still desperate Hyung-sung to grab her bag that was hung on a wooden coat rack.
“Ji-soo…” Hyung-sung tried to call out his case one last time. However, his endeavor was cut short by a loud slam that rendered him completely silent. With the look of defeat soon plastered on his face, his body went limp, as if he was a ragdoll and he fell onto the leather cover of his worn chair.
While aimlessly spinning around on his chair, after a few rotations, Hyung-sung’s eyes soon locked onto the blank icon of the author that was shown on the repeating broadcast in front of him.
“What are you up to?”