100 days of enemy recs: 79. Original Work

[melannen]

So okay this isn't a fandom. But I do occasionally go wandering around the original work tags on AO3! Or someone I follow for their fanwork starts posting something original that uses a trope I like. So here is a recs set for original work that I love a lot that has good enemyship.

• Astielle by unpretty (100000+ words)
  Chapters: 30/?
  Fandom: Original Work
  Rating: Explicit
  Warnings per chapter
  
  Summary: A half-feral hero, a monster king, a bastard prince, and an open world. Bound by destiny, they save or slay one another, an endless cycle of death and rebirth. When the Moonlight Monster rises, the Starlight Hero is Astielle’s only hope. Unfortunately, she’s a little busy with her rock collection.?
  
  This is original fantasy poly romance by a fanwriter who is best known for her DC comics fanfic. You may recognize it from my Yuletide letter! It is a WIP but it's 100000+ words and it's very good. It's more-or-less inspired by Legend of Zelda:Breath of the Wild, but it's entirely it's own thing and you don't have to know any Zelda. The three main characters are the reincarnations of three people who have been bound together by fate for generations, always reborn to never be alone. In every cycle, things go bad and at least one of them kills at least one of the others (though the lines of allies/enemies/lovers don't always fall the same way.) Until this time around. Will they manage to cheat fate and never turn against each other this time around?



• His Greatest Adversary Yet (15418 words) by architeuthis
  Fandom: Original Work
  Rating: Mature
  Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
  Relationships: Retired Male Superhero/Male Supervillain Who Keeps Seeking Him Out Because He Misses Him
  Additional Tags: Superheroes, Supervillains, Villain Protagonist, The Smallest Indivisible Unit of Identity Porn, Worldbuilding, Cosmic Wonder, Comic Book Science, Sexuality Crisis, Presumed Dead
  Summary: Doctor Nowhere doesn't do the nemesis thing. But the Blue Beacon hasn't been seen in a while, and the more he learns about why, the more it haunts him.
  
  This one is terrible because I will never be able to tell people that Max Missing is my favorite supervillain and have them know what I mean. I usually try to avoid talking about how much there needs to be more of a story, but this one is clearly designed on purpose to make people scream that at the end. Also it needs to be the core of a massive universe - maybe not Marvel sized, but at least My Hero Academia sized, it does an amazing job of sketching out this whole superhero universe in barely 15000 words about Max the retired chemistry teacher who got bored and realized he really liked being a supervillain! And also didn't realize he was gay until at age 65 he stumbled over his nemesis out of uniform, and couldn't look away. (There is, at least, a sequel fic, which helps a little.)



• The Tsar’s Indecent Hot Sauerkraut Wrestling Ring: Hot Cabbage Rampage (18079 words) by beautifulduckweed
  Chapters: 3/6
  Fandom: Ursula Vernon (Twitter), VERNON Ursula - Works, The Tsar's indecent hot sauerkraut wrestling ring - UrsulaV (Tweet)
  Rating: Explicit
  Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
  Relationships: Original Male Character/Original Male Character
  Additional Tags: Inspired by Twitter, Imperial Russia, Hot sauerkraut wrestling, Indecent hot sauerkraut wrestling, Erotic hot sauerkraut wrestling, There were no sauerkraut tags on AO3 before today but I sure am fixing that, Russian-typical misery, Cabbages, Enemies to Lovers, There's a Good Place reference here, I can't help it if Chidi said it first okay, Cool Guys Don't Look At Explosions, the flames are hot but their hearts are chilled, Training Camp, Masturbation, Wrestling, Oiled Wrestling, Finally some smut over 15K words into this allegedly smutty fic
  Summary: Ivan is a simple farmer boy with little to his name, and then the Tsar's men take away everything he has to live for—except revenge. This summer, read the story of how one lowly peasant with nothing left to lose takes on the corrupt national pastime of hot sauerkraut wrestling, and takes down the entire Russian empire in the process.
  
  I guess this one isn't technically original work because it's based on an Ursula Vernon tweet but c'mon, it's the tale of love among the indecent naked hot sauerkraut wrestlers!

Comments

cabbages and souffles keeping me fed with the sheer.....intricate rituals

[pengwern]

I have kept from reading Astielle despite following the author because I know myself around WIPs, but you and all the rapturous comments make it sound the right degree of amazing when it finally finishes so I can get around to it.

But the two other fics!!!!! Wow. I've read the second three times and that there's no other ending or continuation torments me like as to snakes. And I'm eagerly awaiting the ...distressing caustic environment athletics....sure to commence any time this month now.....

(I would love any recs if you have more along these lines, because they were incredible.)

Re: cabbages and souffles keeping me fed with the sheer.....intricate rituals

[melannen]

Yeah, I have a superstitious tendency to not follow WIPs directly because it seems like the minute I do they stop updating entirely. Kitty Unpretty has a mixed record with wips so no guarantee it will ever finish but I follow her tumblr and eventually I couldn't resist and it's. So good. (If it helps, it's currently at a reasonably good stopping point where the OT3 is finally together and they're taking a little bit of time off to be together before they dive further into plot.)

My history says I have read that second one ten times in six months. ;_; If I'd realized the author was open to fic in time, I would definitely have also nominated it for yuletide. Because ! I want to know more! About everything!

Sadly I don't really have any other recs! I haven't been great at bookmarking these and it's so hard to find anything in OW. Architeuthis's other original works fic is also really good though!