
by GrandPaladin
In the aftermath of the Great War, the shattered Forces of Darkness scattered to the four corners of the world. Ten years later, these remnants of the Dark Gods’ servants plague the lives of common people trying to rebuild their shattered homes. The victorious Armies of Light have long since disbanded, fracturing into their constituent kingdoms that lacked the manpower or the will to pursue these remaining pockets of darkness that still harass innocents on the edges of civilisation. Hunting down these remnants has fallen to those called the Hunters, who many common folk say have become as savage as those they pursue. However, they are always welcome in times of need and reviled when the job is done. This story follows one such Hunter, Brandon of the South Downs, as he arrives in a remote town to investigate a mysterious shriek in the night that is plaguing its inhabitants.
No streak history
One state-enhanced oracle order, filtered by each list. Observed Royal Road ranks remain separate ground truth.
Rank updated 8 Oct 2026, 02:08 UTC
Entry forecast updated 8 Oct 2026, 02:08 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.
Not enough recent follower history to estimate a shadow rank yet.
beats 88% of similar stories
not enough data yet
beats 12% 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 5–9 chapters band, cohort of 2026-07-02. Conversion is measured as followers gained per 1,000 views lifetime.