Shulker Box Fic

Synonyms:
See also:	Story Length, Drabble, 155 words, 221B
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A shulker box fic is a type of constrained writing in the Minecraft and MCYT fandoms. It refers to a fic that is typically exactly or very close to 1,728 words long - the maximum amount of items that can be stored in a shulker box, a storage item in Minecraft. Additionally, the beginning and end of these fics typically echo or mirror each other, referencing the way that shulker boxes spin when opened.

The term was coined by redwinterroses on Tumblr.

Shulker Box: a shulker box fic is exactly 1,728 words long, with a word for every item that can fit in an entirely-full shulker box. And as a reference to the way a shulker spins open, the first and last lines of the fic must mirror, repeat, or echo each other in some way.

redwinterroses on Tumblr 

There are 17 fics tagged Shulker Box Fic on Archive of Our Own as of April 2023, with the oldest use dating back to July of 2021.

Some of the fics under the tag do not fit the 1,728 word count, but do fit the mirroring of beginning and end.

Additional challenges

The original coining post includes two other formats:

• Full Hotbar: A full hotbar fic is 578 words in the main body, to represent the 9 stacks of 64 items a player can have in their hotbar. It is also permitted to have an additional 64 words in the form of a semi-disconnected prologue in order to represent the offhand slot.
• Stack: A micro fic of only 64 words, representing the 64 items in a Minecraft stack.