Horror elements in a cultivation story

[RepresentingWrath]

I'm not sure where to put this, so I will post it here. Now let's talk about the topic of the thread. Hard to call something so basic an epiphany, but for a basic guy like me it is. So I had an epiphany. Aren't cultivation stories really great for including horror elements? Yes, those stories about young masters, jade beauties, and other memes.

Jokes aside, let's look at the basic example. Tomb raiding, or grave robbing. Isn't it a perfect scene or an arc to put some mystery into it, add some living deads, or amp the claustrophobia part?

Don't like tomb raiding or adding living deads? Well, what about those "gods" above "gods." Usually they are humans, but stronger. Or "demons" but stronger; and they look like humans. But why not make them closer to lovecraftian horrors?

A usual cliche of those novels are various 'locked' realms, basically a dungeon. And despite the cliche always stating how this "dungeoun" is super old, or made by someone super uber strong cultivator, it's the same stuff. Why not add some horror vibes to it? Like it was made by an alien organism, and the enemies are not cliched young masters, or "spirit beasts" but something more creepy.

Last example. What about underworld? Sometimes it's the same old world, the only difference is a fancy "under" slapped before it. Why not make it an actual underworld, that MC or side characters will explore, and this place will make the blood of those characters run cold. They would want to leave it, not because the entrance closes in a few days, no-no. They want to escape cause they are frightened.

Have you ever read cultivation stories that actively use horror elements? Maybe you are writing one? Share your experience and thoughts about it.

P.S. Lord of the Mysteries is not a cultivation story.

 

[AYM]

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How I understand it, these horror elements create more suspense but aren't scary to read. It's more like thriller. In my writing I wouldn't write lovecraftian because it contradicts the foundation of my worldbuilding but I'm including other ideas.

 

[BearlyAlive]

Isn't reading cultivation stories horror enough?

While it looks easy enough, I do think those genres clash at a few points that make it hard to write something the readers would take seriously. First would be the classic "expectations vs. reality" conflict since horror is about suspense and a feeling of fear and dread, while cultivation stories are at best about inner harmony and at worst about assholes roflstomping everything with the power of PLOT and random doomsday artifacts...


Can't really plant fear for life or fear of the unknown if your reader expects nobody important (outside of the tutorial mentor) to (temporarily) die and MC winning everything by virtue of ass-pulls.

That's like introducing multi-layered political intrigues into a harem novel where most if not all readers just want to watch the MC gotta catch 'em all.

 

[ParticleOfSand]

"Cultivation: Start From Simplifying Martial Arts Techniques"
The way this book handles horror is that there's a constant threat of death. I won't say it's good, but it does have some unique aspects for hidden dangers that one doesn't expect from the genre. Basically, death could come out of nowhere and in unpredictable ways.

 

[AYM]

"Cultivation: Start From Simplifying Martial Arts Techniques"
The way this book handles horror is that there's a constant threat of death.

As it should be.

Too many scriptures have 50000 old monsters in the world who could each flatten Mt. Tai with a fart, and nothing happens.

 

[NotaNuffian]

I'm not sure where to put this, so I will post it here. Now let's talk about the topic of the thread. Hard to call something so basic an epiphany, but for a basic guy like me it is. So I had an epiphany. Aren't cultivation stories really great for including horror elements? Yes, those stories about young masters, jade beauties, and other memes.

Jokes aside, let's look at the basic example. Tomb raiding, or grave robbing. Isn't it a perfect scene or an arc to put some mystery into it, add some living deads, or amp the claustrophobia part?

Don't like tomb raiding or adding living deads? Well, what about those "gods" above "gods." Usually they are humans, but stronger. Or "demons" but stronger; and they look like humans. But why not make them closer to lovecraftian horrors?

A usual cliche of those novels are various 'locked' realms, basically a dungeon. And despite the cliche always stating how this "dungeoun" is super old, or made by someone super uber strong cultivator, it's the same stuff. Why not add some horror vibes to it? Like it was made by an alien organism, and the enemies are not cliched young masters, or "spirit beasts" but something more creepy.

Last example. What about underworld? Sometimes it's the same old world, the only difference is a fancy "under" slapped before it. Why not make it an actual underworld, that MC or side characters will explore, and this place will make the blood of those characters run cold. They would want to leave it, not because the entrance closes in a few days, no-no. They want to escape cause they are frightened.

Have you ever read cultivation stories that actively use horror elements? Maybe you are writing one? Share your experience and thoughts about it.

P.S. Lord of the Mysteries is not a cultivation story.

Had read a couple of them and yeah, I forgot the names of them.

1. The first one involves evil spirits, the standard gore and body horror. Where one moment MC can be in a normal area and still talking to the living and the next, stuck in a vacant place with nothing but the dead.

Still, like one MC always say, fear stems from the lack of firepower. You are afraid when you don't have the ability to harm.

2. The second one also involves body horror, but more on cultivation = shoving insect bugs into one's body. A parasitic relationship is forged as the bugs slowly eat the host inside out while granting them shitty cultivation powers. Also, the higher level the cultivator, the more insect like they are.

And the solution to kill the "cultivators"? Becoming mutants. Apparently manual scripts exist to allow normal humans to do horrible rituals to gain supernatural powers, but obviously at a heavy cost etc. MC was lucky to always have the best mutation and not having to pay the price, such as when he mutated his eyes into polycoria, he managed to evolve it into the god and demon hunting pupils instead of goat slit eyes and only had to rip his eyes out once instead of a hundred times while hunting for fresh eyes.

 

[BigBadBoi]

The cloest thing I can think of horror in xianxia is in "A Regressor's Tale of Cultivation". The top level immortals are literal cosmic outer god tier eldritch horrors that can read your mind and memories. The MC once almost went insane and turned into a pillar of salt in the later currently TLed chapters.

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That's like introducing multi-layered political intrigues into a harem novel where most if not all readers just want to watch the MC gotta catch 'em all.

political intrigue that is basically just the women fighting over who gets to suck the MC dry for the night sounds fun to read tho. The epilogue of Sevens where the MC tries to run away from his wives is hilarious.

 

[ElijahRyne]

I'm not sure where to put this, so I will post it here. Now let's talk about the topic of the thread. Hard to call something so basic an epiphany, but for a basic guy like me it is. So I had an epiphany. Aren't cultivation stories really great for including horror elements? Yes, those stories about young masters, jade beauties, and other memes.

Jokes aside, let's look at the basic example. Tomb raiding, or grave robbing. Isn't it a perfect scene or an arc to put some mystery into it, add some living deads, or amp the claustrophobia part?

Don't like tomb raiding or adding living deads? Well, what about those "gods" above "gods." Usually they are humans, but stronger. Or "demons" but stronger; and they look like humans. But why not make them closer to lovecraftian horrors?

A usual cliche of those novels are various 'locked' realms, basically a dungeon. And despite the cliche always stating how this "dungeoun" is super old, or made by someone super uber strong cultivator, it's the same stuff. Why not add some horror vibes to it? Like it was made by an alien organism, and the enemies are not cliched young masters, or "spirit beasts" but something more creepy.

Last example. What about underworld? Sometimes it's the same old world, the only difference is a fancy "under" slapped before it. Why not make it an actual underworld, that MC or side characters will explore, and this place will make the blood of those characters run cold. They would want to leave it, not because the entrance closes in a few days, no-no. They want to escape cause they are frightened.

Have you ever read cultivation stories that actively use horror elements? Maybe you are writing one? Share your experience and thoughts about it.

P.S. Lord of the Mysteries is not a cultivation story.

There are quite a few here…

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[TheEldritchGod]

No.

Horror isn't easy. People think it's simple. Take a girl put her in peril from a monster = Horror.

No.

Horror has a number of very important elements. The first of which is POWERLESSNESS. This is one of the problems with WH40K. It is hard to have a HORROR STORY when your MC is a 10 foot tall slab of muscle and rage with a brain so washed it squeaks when he turns his head too fast.

Now there is horror in WH40K, but almost always it involves NORMAL HUMANS. These normal humans are in situations where they are powerless.

Cultivation is, BY DEFINITION, the accumulation of power. Yes, they can have no power, or be in way over their head, but the very genre itself is about the MC gathering power to overcome impossible odds. At no point do you say, "I wonder if the MC is going to fail?" You say, "I wonder HOW the MC is going to get out of this?"

That is not horror.

If there is no QUESTION the MC will survive, then there is no horror, and if your story is a cultivation genre but has "scary things" then it is an ADVENTURE Genre, not Horror.

Here.

That is Iamcrusty. He has a really DARK sense of humor. However, in one of his videos, he includes a mod into his VR Skyrim campaign that does a very good job of being horror, at least in the beginning. Why? Because if you saw the series in total, you'd know the main character, the ghost, Hunkleberg, that possesses the body of Donkle is a MONSTER. I mean, FUCKIN' EVIL. He is a BASTARD to the point of comedy. He has NO FUCKS GIVEN.

But when Mildrew starts to lose his mind and its clear that Hunkleberg is honestly spooked, it turns into a horror story. Why? Because you see Hunkleburg, the MONSTER who is an absolute KILLING MACHINE, helpless. He's honestly SCARED. When you see Hunkleburg scared, you KNOW shit done got REAL, Son!

Then he pulls it around and the story is Meh.

But at the beginning, when Hunkleburg is honestly terrified and panicking. You can feel the horror. I think it's his best episode, because while the whole series is some seriously DARK humor, that one episode is honestly scary. You see Donkle, the possessed guy becomes unhinged and acts like he's been charmed by the ghost woman, which makes sense because Donkle has already been possessed by a ghost. Hunkleburg. He's WEAK to the mental influence of others..

Hunkleburg can FEEL his control over Donkle slipping. When Donkle starts chanting about, "But I want to join the circle of the BONE ARTISTS!" you go, "Oh Shit. Hunkleburg is FUCKED."

If you have a helpless MC in a cultivation story, it isn't cultivation. And if he's just going to overcome the horror, then it isn't very horrifying, is it?

Horror and Cultivation are diametrically opposed and while you should never say never, I don't think they'd work well together. Maybe you could have one ARC in a cultivation story that was horror but as a story in and of itself? No.

 

[melchi]

This, eldritch says that the two genres conflict with one another. I think the only way to make cultivation into horror is to make the cultivation seem like cultivation but is actually something different, very dark.

 

[RepresentingCaution]

Last example. What about underworld? Sometimes it's the same old world, the only difference is a fancy "under" slapped before it.

Under where? Underwear!

 

[KidBuu699]

I don't remember the name but I remember reading a cultivation story(think on RR) where the mc was a Jiangshi. Think the story started out with him being murdered and his female friend being abused by the adopted teacher. Pretty sure it went into the whole demonic/undead cultivation thing real fast.

The only issue I think these types of stories have is that the genre traps the writer in going in a certain direction. For the story mentioned above I think he just started destroying minor cultivation sects and being hunted down. Which is alright for an arc or two but after that it gets old. Just rinse and repeat story points . . . Which is most cultivation stories anyway. . .

Besides that I can't really say others really have horror themes. Like Nercopolis Immortal I thought was a disappointment. Less about Tombs and stuff and more about how things are arranged in rooms. Revered Insanity had the insects living inside you but it wasn't really horror.

 

[Corty]

I think it is a good idea, but it is basically simply how these stories work, and we will never get to see the day of light. Every MC is always OP, has a boon or something, or an innate gift. There is simply no place for any type of horror-esque tension to be included.

I could be wrong but I don't see it happening.

 

[WinterTimeCrime]

As an avid horror fan and a psycho/thriller horror writer, I completely agree with statements regarding cultivation being a terrible fit for the genre.

Whatever type of monster or entity you try to produce, it's redundant since you already know the MC will train on mountain Seikakakomi for 5,996 years to overcome their fears and turn the abomination into some necklace charm or power-up.

Same with system. No point when the dude is just going to unlock some special skill called 'Dark No More' and miraculously get over his/her paranoia or depression.

I can't work with protagonists who will throw away their despair. I need someone ready to plunge into the abyss and have no obvious way out.

Cultivation/System MCs just aren't human enough.

 

[Succubiome]

It might not be automatically popular, but that doesn't mean it won't work narratively-- just whoever writes it might have a harder time finding their audience.

Gaining power can be pretty horrifying if you write it right.

 

[RepresentingWrath]

This, eldritch says that the two genres conflict with one another. I think the only way to make cultivation into horror is to make the cultivation seem like cultivation but is actually something different, very dark.

I said horror elements, not horror. Also, everyone colelctively forget one important thing. You don't have to write super cliched cultivation for it to be cultivation. Same as isekai. You can write a smartphone one, or you can write Re:Zero. You can write, something-something got invincible with cheat, or Overlord, or Mushoku Tensei, you name a good isekai. Just because we don't know one, doesn't mean a good cultivation story doesn't exist. Nor does it mean we can't write one.

Personally, I think it can be very easily achieved in the beginning. People forget that in the first few arcs, when MC is basically level 10, he can meet graves of those who were level 90. You can't have enough firepower or enough cheats to close that gap, unless you write a stadard super cliched cultivation. But if you add just a little bit of depth, this beginning can have one or two horror elements. You can include it later on as well. Cultivation stories have those power level gaps you can't really close in a second with a cheat. This feeling of powerlessness can be used as both motivation for MC to keep getting stronger, and to help with building suspense.