Beyond the Veil: BL Mysteries in a Supernatural World
These short BL stories are narrative snapshots, presenting moments captured mid-scene or pages torn from an expansive narrative. They are fragments designed to ignite the imagination, inviting readers to consider what came before each encounter and what destinies lie ahead for the characters. This format encourages a deeper engagement, transforming reading into an act of co-creation.
Boy’s Love, or BL, encompasses a diverse genre celebrating romantic relationships between male characters. Known as Yaoi or Shōnen-ai in its earlier forms, BL originated in Japan and has grown into a global phenomenon, appreciated for its rich character development and emotional depth. It serves as a powerful medium for exploring themes of acceptance, identity, and love, resonating with a vast international audience across various countries.
This collection is part of an experimental research and storytelling program operating at the intersection of human creativity, interdisciplinary arts, and applied artificial intelligence research. The project explores how digital tools can support writing and publishing processes, shaping new forms of storytelling and scriptwriting while enhancing digital literacy skills and workflows. It also comes from a sincere love of BL stories.
This collection blends the enigmatic world of Mystery/Detective BL with the magical elements of Supernatural/Urban Fantasy BL, occasionally touching on Trapped/Survival scenarios. These compelling stories, from Leaf Richards and Jamie F. Bell, challenge characters to uncover truths both earthly and otherworldly.
We invite you to explore these short BL stories. Engage with the characters, ponder their fates, and allow your imagination to complete the narratives, making each reading a unique, personal experience.
Today’s BL Short Stories
Corridor Dust and Unfinished Business
Author: Leaf Richards | Category: Journalistic | Genre: Mystery/Detective BL
A bustling university hallway on a bright summer day serves as the unexpected stage for a strained reunion between two young men, Edmund and Owen, whose past is entangled with a shared, unresolved mystery.
Don’t Look Away
Author: Leaf Richards | Category: Dystopian | Genre: Supernatural/Urban Fantasy BL
Elias, a young man still grappling with a profound loss, is deep within the decaying, ‘shrouded’ lower sectors of the city during a bleak autumn. The air is thick with dampness and the metallic tang of decay, the remnants of a past cataclysm. He’s on a desperate scavenge, but his efforts are constantly interrupted by the lingering echoes of his heartbreak. It is in this desolate landscape that he unexpectedly encounters Ashworth, a mysterious figure whose presence is both unsettling and strangely magnetic.
Hold Still
Author: Jamie F. Bell | Category: Colloquial / Conversational | Genre: Supernatural/Urban Fantasy BL
A biting winter afternoon in a desolate city park, where the mundane cold masks a parasitic supernatural presence.
The Anchor’s Truth
Author: Leaf Richards | Category: Cinematic | Genre: Trapped/Survival BL
In the dim, fire-lit interior of the small, secluded cabin, Peter and Terrence sit close, the remnants of their harrowing journey still clinging to the cold air outside. The physical danger has subsided, making way for a deeper, more volatile emotional confrontation. Terrence, typically composed, prepares to reveal truths that will redefine their entire relationship.
The Cold Air’s Edge
Author: Leaf Richards | Category: Post-Apocalyptic Survival | Genre: Contemporary Campus BL
Near the close of their senior year, as autumn leaves cling precariously to branches outside, Kenny and Owen meet in the desolate main hallway of their high school. The building, much like their relationship, feels like a ghost of its former self, a place of quiet decay where past difficulties and the pressures of their peers have left an indelible, chilling mark. They are attempting to clear the air, but the weight of unspoken words and a looming sense of societal decline makes their every movement heavy with anticipation and dread.
BL Storytelling and the Arts, Skills Development and Digital Transformation
AI-Assisted Storytelling and Automation: Our research at the incubator actively explores AI’s transformative role in creative development, particularly within the dynamic landscape of BL storytelling. These case studies, spanning genres like Mystery/Detective BL, Supernatural/Urban Fantasy BL, Trapped/Survival BL, and Contemporary Campus BL, exemplify how AI tools are being studied to address unique BL-specific challenges. We investigate AI’s capacity to assist in intricate world-building, craft compelling suspense in Mystery/Detective scenarios, generate authentic dialogue for Supernatural narratives, and streamline the overall scriptwriting process, pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in narrative creation.
Creative Talent Development and Training: Beyond technological integration, our project examines the evolving skill sets crucial for creative professionals in an AI-augmented future. The iterative process of developing these BL short stories and chapters offers invaluable insights into the future of digital publishing, narrative design, and film production workflows. We emphasize the critical importance of digital literacy, advanced storytelling techniques, understanding process automation, and developing proficiency in managing diverse AI tools, ensuring artists remain at the forefront of innovation.
We’re excited to learn about these new technologies and how they can be applied to expand the boundaries of human storytelling. We encourage you to keep reading, keep imagining, and keep exploring the incredible potential that opens up when creativity meets technology.
About the Project
By design, these stories have no beginning and no end. Many stories are fictional, but many others are not. They are snapshots from worlds that never fully exist, inviting you to imagine what comes before and what happens next. We had fun exploring this project, and hope you will too.
The BL Stories. Unbound. collection is an interdisciplinary arts and narrative storytelling experiment. It is part of a creative arts and research program by The Arts Incubator Winnipeg and the Art Borups Corners collectives. This project focuses on two key areas: AI-Assisted Scriptwriting, exploring AI for generating ideas, plot structures, and alternative story arcs; and Talent Development and Training, studying the skills and training needs for creative professionals managing AI and immersive technologies to inform future training curricula. Funding and support were generously provided by the Ontario Arts Council Multi and Inter-Arts Projects program and the Government of Ontario. We thank them for supporting the arts, digital transformation, and applied Artificial Intelligence (AI) research for northern innovation in Ontario.
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