Onc Stories

The Open Novella Contest is back for 2026! Join fellow storytellers and plant the seed of a tale that will blossom into a 20,000+ word novella within 12 weeks! Your epic quest begins February 1st, 2026, so mark your calendars with this date!

When a cautious Formula One engineer crosses paths with a damaged comeback driver, she discovers that the most dangerous variable she should assess in the sport isn't speed-but attachment. ✦✦✦ Adriana Santos has always known her place on a championship-winning Formula One team is contingent. Excellence, she learned early, is not the same as security. She works in a role the paddock barely understands-simulating failures before they happen, answering 'what ifs' before they become 'what went wrong', and treating the car like a living thing whose future rests in her hands. Her work is quiet, precise, and easily erased the moment she becomes inconvenient. She is careful because she has to be. She knows Joshua Thomas long before she meets him: the driver who changed his name to fit in, the anomaly on a rival team forever tipped for titles. To Adriana, he's a reaction curve that never quite returned to baseline after last season's crash. His comeback is framed as resilience. Many are simply waiting to see him fail. They meet by accident, in a moment stripped of his usual extravagance and pretence. Adriana notices what she always notices-the face behind the mask, the way he laughs through failure like it doesn't frighten him. Adriana doesn't forget him, though. She keeps her distance but Joshua doesn't, and their reluctant friendship begins to bend into something riskier. And they both know exactly what it could cost them. ✦✦✦ ✦ Open Novella Contest 2026 | Prompts 24, 29, 30, 44 ᴄᴏᴘʏʀɪɢʜᴛ © 2026 ʙʏ ᴀᴜᴅʀᴇʏ ᴀʟʟ ʀɪɢʜᴛꜱ ʀᴇꜱᴇʀᴠᴇᴅ.

Under the cherry blossoms sits a nimble girl, her face sullen, and her eyes caved in. She was sitting by a gravestone, staring longingly towards where her mother was laid to rest. Guilt, regret and melancholy was all she could feel. Had she known her mother would pass away, she wouldn't have left her in hopes to pursue her dream as a light novel writer. Inspired by her mother's creativity and imagination, she also wanted to walk down the path her mother went. However, her visit to her mother's grave at the first sign of spring soon turned out to be an ordeal when a cherry blossom flower piqued her interest. One touch and she was now in a world where magical creatures walked on land. But, her role as the daughter of the greatest witch follows more troubles and challenges than she had ever anticipated. ------------ An open novella contest entry Main prompt: #2 Other prompts: #11

SPOILERS FOR SUNRISE --------------------------- An Eternal Sunrise one-shot! Main prompt: Fall #63 Sub-prompts: Spring #16, Fall #78, Fall #80, Winter #93, Winter #104 -------------------------------------- The Wolves of Glindale are a species of wolves as old as time. Blessed with powers beyond human imagination. Also known as 'The Mother Wolves', they were the ones who created the first werewolf. Ever since their creation, early werewolves have dedicated The Temple of Lycaon to them and made pilgrimages to gain their blessings. Every 100 years, when the first blood moon of the year appears, the temple's gates emerge, signalling the beginning of another pilgrimage season. Thousands look for its whereabouts, but without success, save for a chosen few who had their spirit as their guide. Yet, finding the temple is only the first step in a series of daunting challenges, and only those worthy can see the end of the finish line. Dr Melissa Ortega and her associate, Dr Christopher Bentley, are tasked by the Director of the Ministry of Lycan Affairs (MLA) to look for the elusive temple and study the legendary wolves. But of course, he won't let them venture into the unknown alone without a powerful guide. Who is this mystery guide? And, will they find the Mother Wolves? Keep reading to find out! ----------------------------------------- This tale can be considered as an alternate timeline to the main series, and is a standalone! Also, this book is rated Mature for violence, gore, and mentions of SA, trauma, and body horror common in the genre. -------------------------- 2026 (c) All Rights Reserved. All writing done is mine, and so is the cover design using Canva. NO AI USED! No stealing, or I will send AJ and the McIntyre family after you. 😤

I woke up to flame, fury, and a rare spark of hope in my heart. Thalia is a Princess- or, she was, before the Chancellor betrayed and killed her father. When Saltspire falls and a legendary dragon tears through the city, a captive heiress must choose between revenge, escape, and survival in a world ruled by a vicious prince. From prompt number: 4

When her office burns down an editor must work together with the most infuriating man alive or risk the promotion she's been working her entire career for. **** Chielozonam 'Elo' Williams is doing great. All things considered. It doesn't matter that the job she loves as editor at PerfectRomance, the publishing imprint she's been working at for the past five years has started to feel more like a chore these days. It doesn't matter that her judgemental father might be right about her wasting her life away by not using her full potential. What really matters is getting her dream promotion and enjoying the prime years of her youth. That is until the unthinkable happens. After Elo's office building burns down overnight she's forced to share an office with the one person that makes her blood boil: Connor Price. Archenemies since their days at college Connor makes getting under her skin an art form. He's brash and rude and irritates her like nobody else can with his scathing looks and contemptible behavior. It's not long before they're locked in a battle of wits, neither willing to back down or give up. When they have to work together to acquire a potentially lucrative manuscript, they are forced to put aside their long-standing animosity for an adventure that will blur the line between hate and desire until neither of them can tell where the fighting ends and the falling begins. PEOPLE WE MEET ON VACATION meets ANYONE BUT YOU meets THE HATING GAME in this contemporary rom-com about resilience, self-discovery and two sworn enemies who can't tell the difference between wanting to kiss or kill each other. Beautiful cover made by @ToWolfKin THIS NOVEL IS ONLY AVAILABLE ON WATTPAD AND INKITT. IF YOU ARE READING THIS ANYWHERE ELSE, PLEASE INFORM THE AUTHOR VIA WATTPAD, AS YOU MAY BE READING FROM A MIRROR SITE WHERE IT HAS BEEN PLAGIARIZED AND YOUR DEVICE MAY BE SUBJECTED TO A MALWARE ATTACK.

ALIEN AMONG US is a small-town sci-fi novella filled with humor, heart, friendship, and enough secrets to make you wonder what-or who-might be hiding in plain sight. ************************************************************************ Entered into the Open Novella Contest 2026 | @OpenNovellaContest - Rules & Guidelines: here: https://www.wattpad.com/story/406004197-open-novella-contest-2026 **Main Prompt** 25. You live with four other housemates, but one of them is secretly an alien trying to learn how to act human. ©2026 E. S. Elias, All Rights Reserved. Book Created & Published to Wattpad: 02.01.2026 Book Marked as Completed: 00.00.2026 Book Cover: Me @DesignsbyEH Word Count: 2,222 / 20,000 Goals: ✔ Round 1 ✔ | 2,000 words ✔ | Round 2 ✔ | 8,000 words ✔ Round 3 _ | 20,000 words LONGLIST _ | SHORTLIST _ Round Winner? _ | Honorable Mention? _ | Ambassadors' Pick? _ Mentioned in Ambassador Newsletter _ Top-5 Winner? _ Rankings: #ONC2026: #ONC #2 02.03.2026

How do you find your future soulmate whom you have yet to meet? Better question; how do you find them within the week? Any ideas? All you know is that if you don't, you will lose them forever. So wouldn't you drop everything and try anything to find them? ONC Prompt: 90. You receive a voicemail from someone you love, recorded one hour after their confirmed death. Started: Feb 1, 2026 Ended: ~ Book Blurb/Author Notes can be found after the last current chapter ~ Cover created in Canva ***This book might contain occasional colorful language***

"Seriously!" Jisung scoffed as he locked eyes with Chan, who was unfazed as ever. "You are not sending me across the country just to steal a necklace!" --- At the far end of the country, where the air was cold, two men stood facing each other. "You sure are cocky..." Hyunjin dragged, his eyes fixed firmly on the older man in front of him, who only gave him a cold look. "Can't help it. Genes." Minho turned around before jumping from the five-story building to a nearby three-story one, making Hyunjin sigh, his breath visible in the cold air. "Yah! At least wait for me-" He paused. "Bitch." --- "Do you believe in love at first sight?" Jisung dragged his fingertips along the numbers etched on Minho's neck, making his breath hitch very slightly. "No." A story where two ominous people are sent against each other to steal the Luciacsa Sigmorica Necklace, worn by the great Queen of Segmantia, also known as the underground mafia jury. But what if those nemeses find out they were already paired by fate... as soulmates... But- Something isn't right. #MINSUNG #ONC-26

When Benaiah Sullivan and Lelaina Ramos meet outside of a bar one night, their chemistry is instant. However, they're both in relationships, so they say goodbye and go separate ways, but life has a funny way of causing their lives to collide. So, they decide to be friends, but over time, unspoken feelings develop as they become each other's safe space. When obstacles arise with their romantic partners, their friendship also suffers with arguments fueled by confusion and unfed desire that pushes them apart on more than one occasion. But they always find their way back to each other. Like an imaginary thread, indefinitely tying them together. **When Harry Met Sally × People We Meet On Vacation** ONC Entry 2026, Prompt 24: Staying as friends feels safe, but that doesn't mean it's the path you're meant to take.

**ONC 2025 LONG LIST** Eros (Cupid) gets rejected by Psyche for a newly-revived Narcissus. Convinced he is a failure who does not live up to his job description, Eros quits in anger and embarrassment, breaking his bow and his vows and retiring to Florida. -- After Hell's major overhaul, Kelsia-a repentant succubus and a hopeless romantic-finally gets a chance to earn her angelic wings back. That chance? Find Cupid a match and bring him back to work. -- Will they bring love and fireworks back to humanity, or will they doom all life to fizzle out like a sad, loveless, deflated balloon? This story contains strong language but no planned explicit scenes. Please do not skip the introductory chapter for trigger warnings.

For Centuries Grim has been collecting souls. It's what he does, it's his purpose. One day, while collecting a soul in the park, he comes across a lost puppy. For reasons he can't explain, the urge to return the small dog to his owner is overwhelming. He soon finds the animal's owner, a woman in her mid-twenties named Maria. He is struck down by her beauty and realizes that he had once claimed the soul of someone she loved. He becomes even more conflicted when he realizes he has just one year to claim her soul.

"The sky seems empty of the stars tonight," she mumbled, gazing at the sky. "Stop looking at the sky then." He said, coming closer. "Because they keep falling in your eyes." ________________________________ Violetta Evanston's plain and simple life takes a turn when she finds out that the person she trusts more than anything, the person who knows her more than anyone, the person whom she's been Penpals with, since years, is none other than THE KIM TAEHYUNG. Will she be able to protect her heart from the man whose dark, lethal gaze is enough to steal the heart of anyone he wants? ________________________________ [ONC 2020 LONGLIST] [ARMY AWARDS 2021 - 4th place winner in Taehyung Category]

When a young woman goes missing without a trace, the police write it off as another missing persons case. But her mother is not convinced... After the fallout from a corruption scandal forces the disbanding of her old unit, Elise Wu is transferred across the country to Corviston. She is paired with the grumpy, withdrawn Simon Brown, who she had worked with previously. Simon quickly becomes convinced that the mother is right in her instinct. A trail of clues leads to an unlikely path...

× ONC Round 2 Ambassador Pick × Dorothea thought she had her life under control. Sure, she's not super rich and successful, and she doesn't have a gorgeous, loving partner by her side, but she's a barista in a local coffee shop who swore off of relationships, so she doesn't expect anything better. That is, until one short encounter at work flips her world upside down. Sofia Amaro has been Thea's number one weak spot since their high school days, but whatever they had ended five years ago. She left the town, and Thea moved on-or so she thought. When Sofia suddenly returns because of a work project, and a friendly round of drinks turns into a lot more than either of them had in mind, Thea is conflicted. She's a different person now. But Sofia is too, and she's not the same girl who strung her on for over a year. So when she tells Thea she wants to be more than friends now, Thea has to decide whether she's willing to take the risk once again. Perhaps some mistakes need to be made twice. ~ ❤️‍🩹 ~ Entry written for Open Novella Contest 2025 Prompts: 120, 121, 18 Genre(s): NA Literary/General Fiction PUBLISHED: 2/20/2025 COMPLETED: TBA

In a ruined world, what traces of humans remain? In an overgrown corner of a once-intact room, nestled in the roots of a young tree, a barely functional camera watches over the decay. Maintenance calls go unanswered, leaving it to conserve power, turning on its lens only when things get within its proximity range. Its largely monotonous world gets disrupted when a family of birds make the tree it rests on home. Mysteriously, their presence stirs a torrent of memories within its circuits, some intact and others corrupted. However, recalling memories comes at a cost, and its power, gleaned from the sun, gets drained faster than it can recover. Despite the risk, the camera cannot cease. It is compelled to observe and document the intertwining of past and present unfolding before its lens. As it continues it realises why the family of birds recalls seemingly unrelated memories. ? It was bound by a promise of the past, one that was corrupted beyond repair until an overlap between its owner and the birds were found. Now, repairs of core memories are underway and soon, the bigger picture reveals itself. The battery falls, and the past gives way to the present. *Longlister of the 2024 ONC*

* ONC 2023 Shortlister * "She caught the eye of one of the horsemen, and something in his face caused her to pause mid-step. The man he was standing with, realising he was being ignored, turned to see what he was staring at, and his mouth fell open. 'Arner! The prophecy!' he hissed. That seemed to attract the attention of the whole party, and before Aleyna knew what had occurred, they had all stopped what they were doing, and stared openly at her, before tilting their head in her direction, bowing. The last of the men to lower his head, the one who had first spotted her, was now biting his lip, something like worry creasing his brow, before he too bowed." * * * Aleyna, a professor at Lyknisia's Academika, is from a world of science and reason. To her, magic is something found in children's stories. It's not real, has never been real, and never will be real, and nothing anyone can say will change her mind. Arnerstrom, known as Arner, is King of Mynythia. He is from a world of magic and spirits. A world where the unseen is just as powerful as the known, and where prophecy dictates almost everything. But when a prophecy appears to be fulfilled by chance, Aleyna is whisked away from her books at the behest of Arnerstrom, and taken to a land of mystery and secrets. A land where magic is very real and spirits govern all. Set in the same world as The Winter Ghost, but located many kingdoms apart, The Convert Queen is a fantasy romance novella where what you see isn't always what you need to know.

Moving across the country to the apartment directly across the hall from your high school best friend is either a stroke of genius or a statistical disaster. For Elizabeth Stokes and Jackson Tyler, who have spent a decade perfecting the art of "just friends," the proximity should be easy, familiar, and completely safe. But as their old rhythms collide with the adults they've become, the logic they've used to protect their friendship starts to fail, proving that love is the only variable you can't account for.

Every time she lights a match, she escapes into a new world. *** Alicia Robertson is a high school student who is constantly treated like an outcast. Bullied at school and neglected by her parents, her only solace is in her matchbox. One lit matchstick and she is transported to a world of her choosing. Things start to change when the mysterious new boy starts to take interest in her. It's all fun and games until she opens a dimension that was meant to stay shut... FOREVER!!! ********** Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are purely the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. ********** This book is entered into the Open Novella Contest (ONC) 2020 Under the Fantasy and Science Fiction Prompt #26 ********** Other relevant prompts are: Fantasy and Science Fiction Prompt #24 Horror and Paranormal Prompt #49 Mystery/Thriller and Action Prompt #54 ********** Release will span through February to April

⋆˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖⋆ She wasn't meant to be in Mosukoshi. Hisashi works six days a week, making sure his tavern is always ready to serve the souls that visit for one final drink. Paid in silver, he eases their transition, providing comfort before they pass onto the afterlife. But when Momoko, a young girl with no recollection of her memory, appears one day at his tavern, questions arise about how a living human had managed to enter the land of limbo. Forced to be a guide, Hisashi takes Momoko under his wing, and the two set out on an adventure in search of answers about Momoko's arrival; all while Hisashi is forced to confront his own past. Journeying through the wondrous yet dangerous lands and waters of Mosukoshi, its up to Hisashi to help bring Momoko home, and find solace in his own history. ⋆˖⁺‧₊☽◯☾₊‧⁺˖⋆ Hey, it's my first novel! Thank you so much for reading this. Cover credit to me! #ONC2024