Broken Pencil magazine is once again inviting writers to “sharpen those quills” and enter a deathmatch — of fiction. In the magazine’s second annual Indie Writers Deathmatch, editors will choose the top eight stories from all submissions, and then each week, two stories will be pitted against each other in a cage lit fight to the death. Readers will vote for their favourite, and authors will trash talk each other via blog. Last year, the fight got dirty — the Broken Pencil website was hacked, leading to a sudden-death bonus round. (This year’s rules note that any attempts at hacking will result in disqualification.)

The winning story from BP‘s inaugural death match can be read here.