by Tunje
Garcia Elderborn is one of the hive's most experienced provost investigators. For years she has solved murders, hunted criminals, and survived the endless violence of the lower hive. Now she's suspended, her career in ruins, and the governor wants her arrested. She doesn't understand why she was forced to pull the trigger. She only knows that someone took control of her mind, and no one believes her. Before she can disappear into a prison cell, an anonymous stranger offers her a chance to clear her name. Three deaths. Three investigations everyone else declared solved. If Garcia can discover what really happened, she might uncover the truth behind the force that destroyed her life. Accompanied by her faithful canine partner Lex and a handful of unlikely allies, Garcia follows a trail of impossible crime scenes, hidden conspiracies, and enemies who always seem one step ahead. Because somewhere in the hive, someone is manipulating minds. And Garcia is no longer just investigating murders. She's investigating the people who can make anyone commit them.
No streak history
One state-enhanced oracle order, filtered by each list. Observed Royal Road ranks remain separate ground truth.
Rank updated 2 Oct 2026, 04:58 UTC
Entry forecast updated 2 Oct 2026, 04:58 UTC
Ranking model: rs-public-oracle-state-v1
Forecast model: rs-model-entry-v1
Chart history contains only this ranking model's runs; legacy points are not spliced in.
Coupled 14-day outlook
rs-joint-entry-copula-v1
Any eligible RS entry
11%
Two or more lists
6%
Likely threshold order: Sci-fi → Mystery → Main.
Leading bundle: Sci-fi + Mystery (6%).
Estimated from one fitted shared story path; category probabilities are not multiplied as if lists were independent.
Separate entry forecast; this probability does not enter the ranking score.
Overall Rising Stars Shadow RS rank
#9431 of 12,129 · 9381 below RS #50
By genre
beats 94% of similar stories
not enough data yet
beats 17% of similar stories
Hidden gem — exposure is the bottleneck
Readers who find this story follow it at a high rate; there just aren't enough of them. In our cohort data, near-daily posting lifted the odds of reaching 25 followers from ~0% to 17% — more chapters, shoutout swaps and ads buy the eyeballs this conversion deserves.
Benchmarks: 8,060 active Royal Road stories, percentiles within the 10–19 chapters band, cohort of 2026-07-02. Conversion is measured as followers gained per 1,000 views over the recent window.
