#Touhou Randfic

[draco-omega]

Touhou Randfic #5

Tenshi + Yorihime, ‘Old Promises’

Footsteps echoed through the quiet lanes of the Lunar Capital – sharp, deliberate, implacable. Their owner passed mansion after immaculate mansion, flawless gardens of sand and reed, and art of the most subtle beauty without ever sparing a glance from the path in front of her – so fierce was the resolve upon her face and the purpose in her stride. If one hadn’t just watched her walk in circles for twenty minutes, they might even think she knew where she was going.

“Would it kill them to put up a sign?!” Tenshi growled.

Perhaps expecting such legendary isolationists to care about the tourist experience had been ill-advised and so she turned her irritation upon the nearest living creature instead.

“Hey, you!”

The lone rabbit in earshot stiffened so abruptly that she dropped the mallet she’d been carrying on the ground and then glanced at the alleyway behind her in the futile hope this statement had been addressed to someone else.

“Yes, you,” Tenshi continued. “Tell where I can find Lord Moonbutt McHead-up-his-ass.”

“...who?”

“Tsukuyomi.” She all but hissed the word.

The rabbit’s eyes went wide as saucers. Not even in her wildest imaginings had she envisioned someone speaking so disdainfully of the tallest pillar of their society. Just what sort of terrifying person was this intruder?

“I- I don’t know,” she stammered. “I’ve never met him. I’m only a rabbit. I pound mochi....”

“Well, you’ll be able to pound mochi on his face by the time I’m through with him. Where is he?”

“Er, I don’t know if I’m supposed to- I mean, they told us not to go and- Alright, alright, I’ll tell you!” she cried, shielding her face with her hands as though she expected to be struck at any moment.

Tenshi hadn’t exactly meant to flash her teeth at the rabbit – that was merely a physical inevitability of glowering so hard – but it appeared to have a desirable effect nonetheless. The rabbit relayed a frantic series of directions to Lord Tsukuyomi’s palace, her voice seeming to rise in pitch and tempo with every other word until the final instructions came out as little more than a squeak. Tenshi nodded once, then eyed the rabbit with the kind of dreary appraisal one might give a mangy dog.

“I thought you guys were supposed to be slaves or something,” she said.

“Er, no? I mean, well... um... maybe?” It was an odd question, now that the rabbit considered it. She’d never had a choice in how she spent her days and she certainly wasn’t allowed to leave. She knew she was intrinsically inferior to her overseers and that no amount of diligence on her part could ever change that. But was that really enough to make her a slave?

“Have a little more pride in yourself,” Tenshi muttered. “They don’t deserve your loyalty or your obedience.”

But before the rabbit could figure out how to respond to this, the celestial was gone – her footfalls ringing upon the stone walkways like a blacksmith’s hammer.

Tenshi made little attempt to disguise her approach to the palace, simply following the instructions she’d been given to the letter. It mattered not. Many stared as she passed through the busy streets near the Capital’s center, but none moved to stop her. She was imperious, inviolate, a celestial. And before long, her destination lay in front of her – a spired pagoda in the middle of a lake of purest blue, its surface undisturbed by even the slightest ripple. Heaven itself never looked so unblemished.

Tenshi sneered. “Figures he’d have the place that looks like a giant prick.”

She stepped forward onto the narrow bridge of land which linked palace and shore, its surface paved with intricate stonework and flanked by silent lanterns. It was a solemn processional onto a god’s demesne and the lake around it was an ornament. No fish scurried within its waters, no lillies rested upon its surface; the Moon was too pure to admit such things. It was a perfect, lifeless mirror reflecting an equally lifeless society. It was even worse than back home, Tenshi thought – at least in Heaven they had the decency to spend their days singing and feasting instead of looking down on people.

A voice from behind broke her reverie – its words clear and sharp and utterly commanding.

“That’s far enough.”

Tenshi grinned without even turning around. “Says who?” She took another, very deliberate step forward.

But just one.

The moment her foot touched the ground, a dozen blades burst from the stone around it, encircling her like a cage of razor-sharp metal. She hissed under her breath and glanced behind her – or at least as far as the tachi surrounding her face would allow.

“State your purpose, celestial,” the woman commanded. She was tall and almost martial in her bearing. Her lavender hair hung in a single loose ponytail at her side and the sword she was gripping was sunk half its length into the ground at her feet – a sword that was an exact duplicate of the ones entrapping Tenshi.

The celestial’s eyes hardened. “I’m here to keep a promise 500 years overdue.” The words came out almost as a challenge.

She took take measure of her opponent – the confidence with which she carried herself, the belt which hung loosely upon her hip, and particularly the bright yellow ribbon with which she tied her hair. She’d heard all the stories about the Scarlet Devil's failed invasion of the moon, of course, but while she didn't think very much of Remilia, anyone capable of holding Reimu captive for a month was worth taking seriously.

“You are not permitted in the Lunar Capital,” Yorihime continued. “How did you get here?”

Tenshi smirked despite herself. “Worried your impenetrable defenses aren’t so impenetrable after all?”

One of the swords surrounding her dug into the small of her spine – just enough to make it clear that it might cut much deeper should its wielder wish. Tenshi grumbled.  “Fine, fine. I trailed one of the Dragon Palace’s messengers on her way back home. Er, the one with long red hair.” She hoped there was someone who actually fit that description. Iku could be a royal pain in the ass, but she'd still feel kind of bad if she got her mixed up in all this.

Yorihime stared at Tenshi in silence for several moments, as if she too were taking measure of an adversary. Tenshi tried to pry an arm loose from the cage of swords she was trapped in, but the blades just tightened around it.

“A rabbit told me you planned to assault Lord Tsukuyomi,” Yorihime said at last.

“Spineless little sycophant,” Tenshi muttered under her breath, then locked eyes with the Lunarian. “And so what if I am? You can’t tell me Lord Dickmansion doesn’t have it coming.”

If the insult had been intended to faze her opponent, Yorihime showed no sign of reacting to it. “I can’t let you do that.”

Tenshi wrenched one foot free of its bondage and grinned fangs at her. “Then just try and stop me!”

She stomped that foot upon the ground and the earth reverberated violently. Cracks snaked across the length of the bridge in an instant and the land beneath her tore itself apart. The blades confining her fell away, some tumbling into the lake while others were snapped clean in half by the faulting rocks. She sprung free.

“World Creation Press!”

An enormous keystone slammed down from the sky above Yorihime – larger even than the one she’d placed beneath the shrine. This was no playful danmaku or warning shot; it was a heavenly meteor and Yorihime was directly in its shadow.

“Lord Kanayamahiko.”

The Lunarian’s expression was as calm while she spoke the words as it had been from the start. Even with a keystone hurtling towards her with enough force to level a castle, she hadn’t bothered to move a single limb. She didn’t need to. When the tip of the keystone neared Yorihime’s head, it simply crumbled away to dust. There was no impact, no earth-rending shockwave. The keystone just parted in a waterfall of sand that collected gently around the Lunarian’s feet as if guided by an unseen hand. Not even the ribbon on her head had been sullied by it.

Tenshi was already rushing forward. This wasn’t Gensokyo and this wasn’t a duel between friends. She was here to right a wrong left long unpunished and no arrogant bodyguard was going to stand in her way – not even if she called down a million gods.

“O master of stone and metal,” Yorihime intoned solemnly, “Return this celestials’s creation onto her a hundredfold!”

The sand around her rose up and took form: swords and spears and naginata – dozens of them, perhaps even hundreds. They aimed themselves towards the barrelling celestial and took flight in an instant. Tenshi’s eyes went wide and she narrowly banked away from the first volley, but there were too many, too suddenly. One spear drove itself into her shoulder, another into her arm, a third between her ribs.

She barely slowed. A true celestial could shrug off a landslide and she was better than any of them. Just another few feet....

“Sword of Scarlet-”

Yorihime raised one hand in front of her. “Lord Naruikazuchi, let your heavenly cry silence this interloper!”

A flash of lightning snaked forth from her fingertips with a shriek like a thousand keening hawks. It struck Tenshi squarely in the center of her chest and whatever the celestial had been about to say was swallowed by it completely.

Better than any of them....

With inhuman stubbornness, Tenshi gritted her teeth and manifested her weapon, cleaving through the tendril of coruscating power linking her and Yorihime. The lightning quivered violently as her blade passed through it and then split apart in a spray of scarlet mist. She collapsed onto the ground.

“The Sword of Hisou?” Yorihime questioned, eyes fixed firmly upon the blade in Tenshi’s hand. Its scarlet length flickered, wavering like an autumn leaf on an unseen breeze. She appraised the celestial again, as if seeing her for the first time. “You are of the Hinanawi?”

“That’s right,” Tenshi replied, pulling herself back onto her feet and attempting to will sensation back into her limbs.

“Why would one of Heaven's most venerated seek to harm Lord Tsukuyomi?"

A hint of a smirk traced Tenshi’s face once more – a frighteningly incongruous expression for one with weapons still impaling their body. “Let me tell you a story.”

She straightened out her dress and then took hold of the spear in her shoulder, prying it loose with only the faintest hint of a grimace. “Once upon a time there was a family of priests who lived in the mountains and spent all their time managing earthquakes. If a storeroom collapsed, it was because they willed it. If a village survived unscathed, it was because they ensured it. They were so devoted to their work that even the gods took notice.”

“I am aware of the special dispensation your clan received,” Yorihime noted curtly.

“Of course, with so many important errands to perform, they certainly didn't have time to spend with their only daughter,” Tenshi continued, seeming to ignore the Lunarian entirely. “No, that would just be silly – that’s what servants were for, right? But fortunately for that girl – let’s call her... Chiko – one of those retainers treated her just like the little sister she’d always wished she’d had. She took her for picnics, taught her how to make paper cranes and play the koto – all the kinds of things her parents wouldn’t. With them it was always rituals and traditions and ‘carrying on the family name’.” She couldn’t quite keep the sarcasm from her voice.

“I fail to see how any of this is relevant.”

“Then shut up and listen!”

She took a moment to compose herself again, then assumed her sweetest, most mawkish smile.

“One day when she was 13, Chiko’s father took her aside and told her the clan had just been granted a great honor – they were all moving to Heaven! She’d get to fly and dance upon the clouds and feast on food sweeter than anything anywhere on Earth. It sounded wonderful! There was just one catch – their retainers didn't get to come. They were branch family. They weren’t pure enough, not ready to be celestials. 'Some day', he told her.” She flashed a bitter smile at Yorihime. “Funny, huh? I thought celestials weren't supposed to lie.”

“I’m sure Lord Hinanawi spoke the truth as he saw it.”

“Oh, he always does,” Tenshi growled. “But I didn’t give a shit back then and I’m not about to start now. I swore to Chikame on the day we left that I’d see her in Heaven again. That I’d spend a hundred years shouting at the Dragon himself if that’s what it took.”

“And did you?”

Rather than answering, Tenshi turned to watch the cerulean arc of the Earth as it sunk beneath the Lunar horizon. The lifeless stasis of the Lunar Capital made it look even more vibrant by comparison. “You know what they think down there? Heaven’s full. Enlightenment’s on hold because we ran out of room. Of course, we both know that’s bullshit.”

“Lord Tsukuyomi has no judicial authority over Bhava-Agra. That fall squarely within the jurisdiction of-”

“Oh please,” Tenshi spat. “Save that line for someone who doesn’t know better. Bhava-Agra is the spiritually nearest realm to the moon and Lord Dickmansion here just didn't like the idea of so many 'impure' humans taking up residence that close to his stupid lifeless utopia. He leaned on Heaven and Heaven caved; not worth getting into a power struggle over a few lowly humans, right?” She shook her head. “For years, I thought the Celestial Bureaucracy was just drowning in its own red tape and sanctimony, but that wasn’t it at all. It was always him.”

“Your brashness does you no credit, celestial,” Yorihime chided. “By your own word, it’s been centuries. Has the Yama not passed their own judgment on her already?”

“You mean ‘Is she dead’,” Tenshi spat, but the ensuing silence was answer enough. Ordinary humans didn’t live to be 500.

Yorihime shook her head. “Only a child rails against the order of the universe. The Yama’s judgments are absolute. It is only right and proper that the impure remain crawling upon the Earth where they belong.”

“Bullshit!” The Sword of Hisou flared angrily in Tenshi’s grip. “If my father gets to live in Heaven and she doesn't, then there's no justice in the universe at all. I'm gonna fix that. I'm gonna make things better. Maybe it's too late for her now, but I still owe it to her memory and to the girl I used to be. And you're in my way.” Her eyes flashed dangerously.

“You can’t win,” Yorihime stated simply. “I've seen the way you carry yourself in battle. You are impulsive, overconfident, unaware of your own limitations.” Tenshi bristled with each new insult, but somehow kept her ground. “Among the enlightened of heaven,” Yorihime continued, “you may indeed rank a warrior, but you are 10,000 years too early to challenge the Moon.”

“Not so long as I’ve got this.” Tenshi’s grip tightened on her weapon’s hilt until her knuckles turned white. The Sword of Hisou, Blade of Scarlet Perception –  a weapon of the enlightened that could combat even gods. It drew out the nature of those it touched, manifesting their spirit in scarlet mist; one slash could divine the essence of any living being and bring it to bear against them – even a Lunarian.

“I am aware of your weapon’s power,” Yorihime replied. “It will avail you not; there is no spirit on the Moon or in Heaven that can touch me and neither will your blade.”

Tenshi sunk into a crouch and grinned at her. “Wanna bet?”

“I have given you enough indulgences already. Awanagi no Mikoto!” Yorihime raised her hand. “Awanami no Mikoto! Bind this child in fetters as unyielding as the tides!”

Two great columns of spray burst from the lake on either side of Tenshi, then four, six, eight, their surfaces weaving into rippling chains of purest water – chains whose links could no more be severed by any weapon than could the oceans themselves.

Tenshi just grinned. “Scarlet Weather Shroud of all Gensokyo!”

Her sword’s blade flared like a geyser that had just been uncorked and spirit surged forth from it, so dense that it was almost white – spirit gathered on a hundred visits to that land below. She felt the earnest drizzle of an ordinary magician, the unrelenting wind of a tengu journalist, the shimmering frost of a cocksure ice fairy and a thousand others like her, from the spirits which dwelled within the oldest mountains to the tiniest blades of grass. Emotions, ambitions, life.

The shackles encircling Tenshi abruptly lost cohesion and plummeted back into the lake. The swords in her side disintegrated. Yorihime leapt backwards, eyes wide with genuine horror.

Tenshi took one look at her and began to cackle. “Oh my god, it’s true! It’s actually true! I almost didn’t believe that star spangled shit-disturber.” She shook her head. “Fairies? What kind of a lame-ass weakness is that?”

“Have you lost your mind?!” Yorihime cried. “That much impurity will make even a celestial lose their agelessness!”

“So what?” Tenshi replied as the spirit pouring out of her sword engulfed her in a brilliant scarlet aura. “If some shinigami wants to try taking my soul, I’ll just kick their ass too.”

The Lunarian tightened her grip on her own weapon and locked eyes on Tenshi with an earnestness she’d not needed in millennia. “Did Junko send you?”

“I sent me,” she countered. “Because Tsukuyomi left the only family I ever loved to die alone and I’m gonna pay him back ten times over.”

“Impossible. Celestials can’t hold grudges.”

Tenshi just laughed. “In case you haven’t been paying attention, I’m a really, really lousy celestial, but that’s exactly why I’m gonna kick your ass.” She brandished her weapon, its blade still streaming with pride and ardor, curiosity and petty jealousy and all those other things that made life interesting which the heavens had learned to disdain. Just for today, she’d cast aside her celestial name and all its privileges. Just for today, she was once again that little girl who’d sworn to rail against the heavens.

She rushed forward.

“Scarlet Weather Rapture!”

#Draco Writes Fiction #Touhou #Touhou Fanfiction #Touhou Randfic #Tenshi Hinanawi #Watatsuki no Yorihime

[draco-omega]

Touhou Randfic #4

Yamame + Wriggle, ‘Sanctuary’

Run.

Run.

Just keep on running and don't look back.

Youkai were creatures of fear – born from it, sustained by it, shaped by it – but it wasn't very often that they were victims of it and even scarcer that they were so panicked they could hardly remember their own name. Then again, it also wasn't very often that one of them killed a villager with their own two hands, either.

Wriggle was having a very, very bad day.

She stumbled blindly through the winding tunnel, feet seeming to catch on every single spur of jagged rock there was to find. She'd lost all sense of how long she'd been running now – how far she'd come, where she was going, or even what direction she was travelling in.

Away. That was all that mattered.

Her cape snagged on a spiny protrusion from the cavern wall and cut her momentum abruptly short, at first strangling her and then pitching her sideways onto the ground for what had to be the third time at least. She barely felt the impact.

A villager was dead and she was absolutely 100% to blame; youkai simply didn't survive doing those kinds of things anymore – at least not small fry like her. If Reimu caught up with her, it was all over; no more cozy little treehouse with its rafters dotted with beetles, no more picket fence covered in honeysuckle for the bees to drink from, no more danmaku or gardening or teaching silk worms to weave patterns together. She'd been making a scarf for Mystia just this morning, in fact. She'd even been considering making a business of it; a youkai could do that sort of thing in this modern world, after all.

But not anymore. There was no going back now. Not that the Underground was much less frightening, but a kasha she'd met at Myouren Temple a few months back had told her the rumors about the people who lived down there were lies; that the Ancient City welcomed everyone, from misanthropes to miscreants to the merely misunderstood.

Even murderers? she wondered.

Oh course, no place in Gensokyo was truly safe from the Hakurei Shrine Maiden, but maybe she wouldn't bother to look for her down here. Or maybe she'd get just as lost as she was in all these endless twisting passageways that never seemed to-

“Erk.”

This time, it wasn't her cape that was to blame for the sudden stop. Whatever she'd just run into, she'd done it face-first. It felt... sticky?

“Well, now; this ain't somethin' ya see everyday,” came a voice from somewhere above her.

Wriggle felt torn between terrified silence and a frankly-embarrassing shriek, but somehow managed to fumble out a faint “Who's there?” instead.

There was no immediate answer, but she felt a shadow descend behind her – silent and menacing and quite a lot larger than she was. She tried to crane her head around to look at it, but it was firmly stuck to whatever springy mesh-like object was blocking the passageway.

A web, she slowly realized. An absolutely colossal spiderweb.

“Heya!”

Wriggle's heart ran cold even before the words reached her ears. Looming above her was an earth spider, all limbs and eyes and ravenous malice. She wasn't going to have to wait for Reimu to find her, after all. That spider was going to dig its fangs into her neck, wrap her up, liquify her flesh, and then-

“Hey, thanks for bein' scared of me and all,” Yamame said cheerfully, “but y'know it doesn't actually work unless you're human.”

“Huh?”

She shrugged expressively. “Just doesn't taste the same, y'know? What brings a surfacer all the way down here, anyhow? What, with the so-called prohibition and all.” She asked the question so casually it could be mistaken for an inquiry about the weather. For a moment, Wriggle wasn't even sure how to respond.

“I... um....” The firefly paused, fidgeted, and succeeded mostly in getting her left arm even more stuck in place than it already was. The earth spider's grin looked surprisingly cordial, but maybe she was just playing with her food. No spider could ever have an insect's best interests at heart. ...could they?

Well, it didn't seem to matter very much at this point, anyway.

“I did something terrible,” she said eventually.

Yamame grinned at her. “Do tell!”

“No, I- I.... really terrible.”

“Heard ya the first time.” Though she didn't sound particularly annoyed by it.

Wriggle hesitated again. Somehow it was hard to admit it out loud, even to another youkai – spider or no spider. Maybe if she just didn't say it, then it would all go away somehow.

“I killed a villager.”

“Wow, a little thing like you?”

“Hey, don't look down on bugs!”

She'd spat the words on reflex and immediately regretted them as soon as she remembered the perilousness of her situation. The only insects nearby were a couple of cave crickets and a small flatworm – hardly enough to dissuade an earth spider, no matter how willing they might be to sacrifice their lives for her. Did the youkai down here even respect spellcard rules?

But Yamame just laughed. “Damn straight – us creepy-crawlies gotta stick together, hey?”

“I thought argiope ate fireflies,” Wriggle said with a frown.

“Yeah, well they don't sing karaoke either and you oughtta hear me on open mic night.” She grinned shamelessly. Wriggle just blinked. “Anyway, you were saying?”

“Oh. Right.” The firefly youkai took a deep breath, somehow feeling calmer while trapped in a spider's web than she had for hours – exhaustion, perhaps? “It was the son of one of the cloth merchants in the village,” she began. “I'd seen him once or twice before while checking up on the silkworms his father keeps. He was out on a... picnic, I guess? Or just wandering around looking to cause trouble – it was out past the farms on the outside of the village walls, anyway.” She paused. “I saw him... pulling the wings off dragonflies.” Even in her exhaustion, the memory still seethed a little.

“So you killed 'em.”

“No!” Wriggle waved her arms in dismay – or rather set the web to undulating like a runaway waterbed while her arms remained fixed in place. “I just... I just told a couple bees to go sting him a little. You know, to make him stop it.”

“Uh-huh.”

“He was allergic.” Wriggle hung her head in shame. “Really, really allergic.”

She'd flown into a panic the moment the boy's face had turned blue, but she couldn't just barrel through the village undisguised to look for a doctor and Eientei was so far away and she always got lost every time she went looking for it and before she'd even figured out what she could do, he'd stopped breathing altogether.

“So yer running away from the surface then, hey?”

Wriggle nodded faintly.

“Well, if anyone asks me, he took a swing at a beehive and it's his own damn fault.”

“....really?”

“Really.” Yamame grinned. “Far as I'm concerned, the guy had it comin'. Bet he didn't even wanna eat those dragonflies,” she grumbled. “Humans have a bloody strange sense of taste, let me tell you.”

Wriggle paused; for the first time all day, she felt the faintest hint of a smile tease the corner of her mouth. Maybe that kasha had been right, after all; they really weren't all bad people down here. They couldn't be, not if a spider was willing to help a fly – even a little. “Do you think there's really a place for me in the Ancient City?”

“You like booze?”

“...not particularly.”

“Well, we'll worry about that latter.” Yamame landed on the ground with a thump and then set to peeling the webbing off of Wriggle's back. “Let's get you out of my bat-catcher and I'll show you around the place. Y'know, I bet Ari could use another hand with those silkworms of hers....”

#Draco Writes Fiction #Touhou #Touhou Fanfiction #Touhou Randfic #Yamame Kurodani #Wriggle Nightbug #RNG gives me an actual conventional pairing; who would have guessed?

[draco-omega]

Touhou Randfic #3

Patchouli + Lyrica, ‘Protector’

“A half-tone higher, if you would,” Patchouli said, leafing through a grimoire that looked nearly as large as she was.

“Do I have to?” Lyrica grumbled, watching with disinterest as page after page of arcane sigils flipped past.

“Strictly speaking, no, but per the stipulations of our agreement-”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it.” The poltergeist pressed a note on her keyboard and a doleful wail echoed through the library, like the dying gasp of a laryngitic leviathan.

Patchouli frowned thoughtfully. “A quarter-tone lower.”

Things being Merlin's fault was nothing new, of course; the girl's unfettered enthusiasm and shocking lack of forethought should have sent her to an early grave by now if she weren't already technically dead. No, the unusual part was that she was the one cleaning up after her.

The day had started off on such a high note, too. The three of them had been at the Scarlet Devil's new recital hall, doing a dress rehearsal in preparation for a major concert they'd been hired to perform on Hunter's Moon. Swanky didn't even begin to describe the place. Whatever choice words one might reserve about the vampire's attitude, at least she wasn't afraid to throw money in the direction of artists who pleased her and that list was apparently going to include them now; they were going to make bank on this one.

Or at least they were until a particularly spirited trumpet solo from Merlin had turned the delicate crystalline nose of a bust of Remilia Scarlet herself into explosive shrapnel. They'd been on lunch break and Merlin had decided to tour the art galleries and if one had thought she might know better than to blast 120 decibels while standing two feet away from a priceless statuette, then one had never actually met her.

The girl at least had the good grace to look actually alarmed by the outcome and tried to disguise the damage as best as she could – which is to say that even a drunken fairy wouldn't have been fooled for a second.

Under ordinarily circumstances, Lyrica would have just kept on walking past the doorway and left the cleanup to Lunasa – she was the 'responsible sister', after all. But she was also honest to a fault and absolutely certain to begin by confessing everything to Remilia's face. The mansion's dungeons had a fearsome reputation that Lyrica was in no hurry to test out on her sister and even if Remilia merely settled for monetary damages, this was undoubtedly more cash than they'd make in a whole year – to say nothing of never being hired again.

No, there was a better solution: blame the disaster on one of the mansion's many incompetent maids; there were certainly plenty to choose from. And so she'd selflessly applied herself to bribing the only other witness to the disaster into silence. Everyone knew that succubi were hopelessly weak to flirting, after all, and hell – she was pretty hot.

How was I supposed to know she was so bloody loyal? Lyrica rolled her eyes and produced another unearthly wail from her keyboard. A succubus too selfless to just fuck somebody and call it a day; what a concept.

And this was how she'd somehow found herself helping said succubus's mistress to reproduce an unspeakable language that had been lost for tens of thousands of years.

“Are you sure this will even do anything?” she asked as the last strains of her note faded into the distance.

“It will if you keep quiet and follow my instructions. Now oscillate the second subharmonic again and then repeat the first stanza at double speed.”

Lyrica bit her tongue and did as she was told.

By rights, the chance to jam with so many novel and alien sounds ought to have been right up her alley, but Patchouli's constant overbearing micromanagement sapped any bit of enjoyment she might have gotten out of the exercise – like some kind of purple-haired vampire of joy.

Patchouli stared at her tuning fork as the eldritch melody echoed through the room. At least she'd called it a tuning fork, though to Lyrica's eyes it looked more like some implement of torture; that was definitely a drop of blood quivering on the end of it, at the very least.

“According to the Hajjar Papyrus,” she mumbled – more to herself than anyone else, “The tertiary abjuration is analogous to a 5th circle canticle, which might suggest an upper mordent on the third aethereal rebuke.”

“In words I can understand, please?”

Shaking her head, the magician penned an addition to the sheet music in front of her, then handed it over.

“If this works, Merlin's off the hook, right?” Lyrica asked as she reviewed the changes.

“Reassembling a silicate matrix based on structural sympathy is elementary earth magic,” Patchouli replied, gesturing absently at the damaged bust at her side. “Remilia will be none the wiser, I assure you.”

“And you, uh... won't tell Merlin I did this for her, will ya?” She'd hate to be expected to ever do it again, after all.

Patchouli sighed heavily. “In case I have somehow given you misapprehensions, I have precisely zero interest in interposing myself in your... familial squabbles. How you wish to explain this affair to your sister is your own concern. Now, if you could just stick to the task at hand?”

“Right, right.”

Another hour passed in the most peculiar jam session of Lyrica's career. By now, her melody resembled nothing less than a parade of mournful alpacas being swallowed by a thundercloud and then strangled by a sequence of kraken. Patchouli insisted they were getting close.

“I hope you appreciate what a rare opportunity you've been given here,” she said, and sounded as though she actually believed that might be true.

“Oh. Totally.”

“This magic was thought lost with the continent of Mu – after all, how can one incant a spell in a language which even yamabiko vocal chords cannot emulate? But what need has one to speak a language when the affinity of a simple poltergeist can summon sounds from beyond memory? Now raise the third trill by one octave and play the whole thing over from the beginning.”

'Simple poltergeist', my butt. Lyrica grumbled, but she did it anyway.

At first it seemed that nothing in particular was going to happen – and why should it? Unlike her sisters, her music had no supernatural effects of its own – well, if one could even call this 'music' anymore. Patchouli insisted what she was actually playing was an incantation in a forgotten language – an echo of vocalizations made by inhuman tongues in a time before civilization. And as they reached the fourth stanza, the air in the room had grown so heavy that even Lyrica could not deny that something was happening. Patchouli's eyes widened, and for the very first time, Lyrica saw a glimmer of something vaguely approaching genuine excitement in them; it was a little eerie.

And then all at once, every single article of glass within the room disintegrated – light fixtures, ornaments, alchemical retorts that then proceeded to spill their contents all over the floor, and yes – a certain nose-less bust of Remilia Scarlet.

Patchouli blinked.

“It wasn't my fault!” Lyrica cried, but the magician ignored her and buried her face in the papyrus for several seconds before finally muttering:

“'Render the ice of molten earth unto dust of gold'”

Lyrica stared at the pile of yellow dust beside her feet – and on the table and atop the bookshelves and-

“Sand?”

“Sand.”

Lyrica considered the difficulty of reassembling a statue that was shattered this comprehensively and laughed nervously. “Um, 'elementary earth magic', right?”

Patchouli sighed, though this time with the sort of bitterness that made Lyrica instinctively reach for her spellcards. The magician shook her head. “Just... go. You have fulfilled your end of the bargain... adequately. Now if you'll excuse me, I believe there is a translator out there whom I need to murder.”

#Touhou Randfic #Draco Writes Fiction #Patchouli Knowledge #Lyrica Prismriver #Touhou Fanfiction

[draco-omega]

Touhou Randfic #2

Yuyuko + Satori, ‘Rememberance’

“Now dear, don't be shy,” Yuyuko said lightly – though Satori was beginning to suspect she knew no other tone of voice. “You can tell me all about what's troubling you.”

“I'd really rather not.”

“Oh, nonsense; everyone likes to talk about themselves. Besides, keeping things on your chest is no good at all. You might catch cold and die!”

“I'm already dead,” Satori replied flatly. “Apparently.”

It had come so gently that she'd barely even noticed the transition. She'd simply gone to bed one evening and not woken up again. And yet, on some level, perhaps she'd almost been expecting this.

The Underground had changed. Her pets had grown beyond the need for her to care for them. They'd found lives and families, moved away to the surface or carved out their own little corners of the earth to live in. Utsuho even had her own priesthood, now. People worshipped her as the Savior of the Underground, the Second Sun and the light the ushers in the future. She'd been devoted and benevolent and more than Satori could have ever hoped she would become. She had full confidence that her and Rin would keep the place running better than she ever had herself.

And she'd just felt so tired. When the world kept moving on while you stayed tucked away in your hollow little prison, was there even any point to continuing? On some level, perhaps she'd even welcomed this.

And thus it was extremely vexing to find herself having tea and pastries foisted upon her by a woman who just wouldn't take no for an answer.

“I have a great deal of experience at this, you know,” Yuyuko continued. “Why, I'm sure I've been listening to the souls of the departed for at least....” She made a show of counting off fingers. “...thirty years? Or was it 3000? Oh well, they're much the same in the end, really.” She smiled helplessly.

“And I'm sure there's someone else who'd be thrilled to have the attention. Why don't you go talk to them instead.”

“Nonsense! You're an honored guest here; a fellow shepherd of lost souls.” She held out a soft pink manjuu and smiled at her. “You really must try one of these. They're absolutely delightful.”

Did ghosts even have a sense of taste, Satori wondered. Yuyuko certainly made a good show of pretending, though Satori hadn't trusted words or smiles since she was a child – it was a lesson her kind all learned quickly. Hearts were the only things that couldn't lie, which was what made this encounter particularly bothersome.

Yuyuko's mind was unlike any she'd ever glanced at – wispy and ephemeral, like shadows dancing in the mist. Often, she said things before she'd appeared to think of them at all and never once let a glimpse of her real self slip past the fog and lightsome smiles; it made for a strangely disconcerting conversation.

“You know,” Yuyuko said, “one normally only shows up looking as much like their living self if they regret something.”

“Everyone regrets things. Everyone.” Her parents, her pets, the oni in their revelry and even those humans who'd long ago come to punish her complacency. “That is not a flaw or a failing; that is life.”

She stared at Yuyuko again, Ghost Princess of the Netherworld for over a thousand years – as impeccably courteous as she was inscrutable. “And what of you, then? If it takes regret to hold this form for a week, then how much must it take to last a millennium? What is your regret?”

“Regret? Me?” Yuyuko just smiled at her and took another bite of her manjuu. “Why, how could I feel regret when the wisteria are so lovely this morning. Youmu did an absolutely masterful job of the garden this year, wouldn't you agree?”

Satori tried again to get a sense of what was going on in that impossible mind of Yuyuko's, but it was just as futile as ever. And so, after a few more moments of pointed silence, she finally accepted the proffered confection and discovered that it tasted rather lovely, after all. Somehow this annoyed her too, for reasons she couldn't quite understand.

“They'll mourn you, you know,” Yuyuko said, sipping at her tea. “Though I suppose you ought to know that better than anyone, hmmm?” Her eyes flickered meaningfully towards Satori's third eye. Someone else might have frowned at that point, but Satori had spent centuries not letting her emotions reach her face. And yet, glancing at the ghost princess's expression, she felt that perhaps even that wasn't quite enough this time.

Of course she knew her pets would miss her. How could they not; they loved her, at least as much as anyone ever had. But if she'd been some kind of sorry excuse for a mother to them, then there was always going to come a time when they'd outgrow her. That was just the way of things. They'd mourn her and then they'd move on. They'd live full and rich lives on their own terms, just as she'd always known they would.

That wasn't what she regretted.

Yuyuko smiled at her again. There was a strange gentleness to it this time – an earnestness, immediately unlike all the wispy pleasantries she'd offered before. Satori felt oddly naked before it – as if she were the one whose heart was on display to another whose mind she couldn't quite reach. It was a feeling she'd had just once before – once, when all her centuries of practiced stoicism had failed to keep the tears from her eyes.

“Now,” Yuyuko whispered softly, “why don't you tell me about your sister.”

#Touhou Randfic #Draco Writes Fiction #Satori Komeiji #Yuyuko Saigyouji #Touhou Fanfiction

[draco-omega]

Touhou Randfic #1

Yamame + Clownpiece, ‘Newcomer’

A blond-haired girl skipped playfully down the winding passageway, damp rock beneath her feet and an unsettling purple light flickering at her side. It was nearly the only light that could be seen and cast strangely undulating shadows upon the walls of the cavern; stalagmites became grasping talons, trickles of water suggested crawling insects and silhouettes of spiderwebs loomed like giant tapestries that threatened to surge with motion at any moment.

She leaned down and picked a small brown object, weathered with time and faintly encrusted with limestone. It was hard to tell if the crack along the back was simply the result of age or of the blow that killed the skull's original owner.

“I hope it was nice and bloody.” She giggled.

“Oy! Hands off my skull pile.”

One of the shadows behind her resolved into an actual person, brown and yellow and dangling from the ceiling by a thick white tether. “It took a lotta years to arrange 'em like that and I'd appreciate you not mucking 'em up.”

Clownpiece swept her torch around the chamber and the wavering light settled on skull after skull – large and small, yellowed and as pale as if the flesh had only just rotted away, all suspended in an intricate tableaux of silken cords, like some museum piece.

Her eyes lit up. “Wow, this is pretty awesome, sis.”

“Isn't it, though?” Yamame grinned amicably at her. “So, you here for the festival?”

“Festival?”

“Down at the Ancient City.” She waved a finger at the fairy. “I mean, with a get-up like that, I just figured you were one of the entertainers. Oh, and don't worry one bit about being late; down here, the party doesn't stop until the last oni's passed out and that'll be a week yet, at least.”

“An entertainer?” For a moment, the fairy almost looked affronted, but then she pulled herself up to her full (diminuative) height and cackled proudly. “I am no mere juggler.” She brandished her torch through the air and caught the tumbling fire again while missing the irony entirely. “I am Clownpiece, fairy of hell and bearer of the light that drives humans mad!”

“'fraid we don't get many humans down here these days,” Yamame replied. “But there should still be some pretty great takoyaki down there if you hurry up.”

“Tako... yaki?” That was some kind of food, wasn't it? She vaguely recalled the other fairies mentioning it, but Gensokyo was full of so many things she'd never encountered in Hell that it was hard to keep them all straight. “Does that have arsenic in it?”

“Nah, just trans fat – s'what makes it taste so good.”

Clownpiece made a note to ask Luna what that actually was and then did another circuit of the room, attempting to guess what each of the many deceased conversation pieces might have actually died from.

She pointed to a particularly brittle one. “I'll bet that one starved to death!”

“Typhus.”

Its much lumpier neighbour: “Boiled in lead!”

“Close!” Yamame grinned. “That one was from a runaway oil fire, like... 90 years ago, maybe? Someone else got the other corpse.” She watched the fairy flutter around a little while longer, then shook her head. “So, if you didn't come for the festivities, then what are you doing down here? I mean, not that you gotta tell me or anything; I'm all for an open door policy with the surface – it's more fun that way, y'know? It's just, well, most fairies are creeped out by the bones. 'cept that kasha's fanclub, I guess.”

“Oh. Right. My mission.” Clownpiece straightened herself up again and gestured in a vain attempt to generate some gravitas. “As official envoy of Current Hell, I'm here to inspect the Former one. Make sure any ongoing tortures are up to code and all that official-sounding business, yadda-yadda.” This was a total lie, of course, but it felt more impressive than saying she was just curious to see how much the place looked like her own home. “A witch told me it was down here somewhere.”

Yamame laughed and shook her head. “You might have missed the torturing by a few decades, I'm afraid. But hey, if ya want a tour of hell, then I can at least show you where to find it. Might even make a new friend or two for yourself down there, and I'm all about that.” She flipped herself rightside-up and landed deftly on the ground, then jerked her thumb down the tunnel to her left. “C'mon. This way.”

Clownpiece nodded. “I'll make a note of your help-y stuff in my report!” This was actually kinda fun; no wonder there were so many bureaucrats in hell.

“Though y'know, I really do recommend the takoyaki.”

#Touhou Randfic #Draco Writes Fiction #Clownpiece #Yamame Kurodani #Touhou Fanfiction

[draco-omega]

10 months ago, I decided to make a game.

10 months later, I have a bunch of art and a bunch of interface code and a whole pile of design notes, and not much game.

This is my story.

(Now in bullet point form so that I can stop redrafting it >.>)

I have a treatment-resistant anxiety disorder which significantly interferes with my ability to work - both on my own projects and other things that might be called 'gainful employment'. (I still feel some shame at admitting this so bluntly, even though I feel ideologically that there should be no more shame in this than any physical impairment that resulted in the same. Fuck mental health stigma, defining self-worth by employment is toxic capitalist dogma, etc, etc.)

In part because of this, I had been effectively unemployed and living with my mother for a number of years. (I still did my best to hammer out projects, but nothing, y'know, actually PAID anything... >.>)

Then in late 2017, my mother died (somewhat unexpectedly) of cancer, which left me with no home (we'd been sharing an apartment that she had been covering most of the rent on) and literally zero income. Obviously grief and upheaval did not help with any of my prior difficulties managing employment, either.

After some debate, I decided to combine the savings I had left over from my last stint as a network administrator with a (modest) inheritance from my mother and try to actually make a living at making games. This is something I had always theoretically wanted to do, but never put actual money on the line for. (Okay, in a perfect world, I'd happily give all my work away for free and live on some minimum guaranteed income, but we do not yet live in such a world).

One of my historically biggest gamedev weaknesses was a lack of artistic ability, so this seemed a perfect thing to put money towards. I could hire an artist, which would not only allow me to make a more commercially appealing product, but would also free me up to focus on the mechanical and writing aspects of gamedev, which are the areas I most wanted to be working on and also consider myself best at. (Any followers that remember my work on ToK may recall me complaining there about how it seemed I spent my time on nothing but graphics? >.>

This was shortly after Touhou fangames had been given the official blessing to be sold on Steam, and some had already achieved great success there, so this seemed like a good way to create some instant appeal and interest in my game, while working with a franchise that I already loved to death and had written hundreds of thousands of words of fanfiction for (eg: This or that or this other thing)

And so Chronicle of False History was born!

...and yet I somehow still spent most of my time working on art. You see, having never worked with an actual artist before, I underestimated a number of things:

1) I underestimated how much work it would be to find a suitable artist in the first place (though at least this part is done)

2) I gravely underestimated how much of my time would be spent on 'art direction' or 'project management' or whatever you want to call it.

Every sprite that is created, even for canonical character designs, requires making a large number of decisions regarding:

What attack and spell poses it will have (and how to cover the broadest range of signature abilities with just two 'frames', for budget reasons)

Which of enumerable (and sometimes mutually-exclusive) costume details from canon (and fanon) should be selected (and do you have any idea just how many variations there are on things as straightforward as 'the hilt of Miko's sword'?)

Gathering a pile of reference images that clearly detail every element of the character (and action poses) to be drawn (which is also harder than you might think; a lot of art is sufficiently suggestive of details to view without actually being a good reference to reproduce and anything that isn't exactly what I'm looking for risks my artist misunderstanding my request entirely)

Designing alternate-history variants of this character in a way that can be clearly conveyed with minimal costume and color changes alone (as any significant redrawing would cost far more and the cast of the game is so large already) and doing so before the part of the game they would appear in is even written.

Gathering reference images for all of those things

Writing up a detailed description of all the decisions listed above (and often drawing actual diagrams of action poses and projectile overlays that are ambiguous to express with just words) and handing it over to my artist

Waiting a while, then getting sketches back and finding out that there is inevitably a whole pile of things that need changing (either because the artist misunderstood my request entirely - despite all that previous effort - or because an idea of mine looked far better in my own head than it does, or just the usual 'incremental improvements' to something that is on the right track but not quite there - like a sort of collaborative redrafting.)

Spending hours poking at these sketches in an image editor, testing how well individual details resolve at in-game size, how well the action frames snap together, and how I feel about each questionable element. This often extends to (crudely) adjusting and readjusting the position and angle of individual limbs and eyebrows and projectiles that feel 'off' so that I can figure out what I would like her to do with them (and whether it's even worth making her take the effort to do anything with them at all)

Finally, summarizing that feedback into a detailed list of change requests (often with new diagrams to clarify my words) and repeating the last two steps over and over and over again.

Like, she does great work - don't get me wrong. I'm very pleased with the end results and this is just an inevitable part of the process of making something professional. But it does also mean that my original idea that paying an artist would free me up to work on things other than art has been... laughable in retrospect, to say the very least. In fact, it's very possible that a greater percentage of my dev time is spent on art-related tasks than on previous projects where I was doing all the art myself - I just get better art for my trouble (and money....)

This is especially true given that:

3) I underestimated just how much art work I would still need to do completely independently of her

Raven is doing character sprites. These are arguably the most individually important art content in the game, and certainly the ones that give it the most screenshot appeal, but that has left me to do everything else. Which has included:

Figuring out how to make battle backgrounds that passably match the art style of the game (since commissioning enough of these to fill all the locations needed would absolutely blow my budget)

Designing the entire look and feel of the combat screen to mesh well with Raven's sprites while also being something I am personally capable of making (using only cheap/free resources)

Creating all tweened animations and particle effects

Designing every single little UI element that exists in the game:

Elemental symbols

Dialogue boxes

Spellcard icons (and the entire menu design that requires them in the first place)

Combat action menus

Icons to indicate spellcard usability

Spellcard tooltips

Targeting overlays

A turn order bar

Spellcard availability reminders

Font choice for damage/healing numbers, spellcard names,

More cursors that you can shake a stick at

Lots more stuff, I'm sure

And even the completed sprites I get from Raven still need multiple hours of processing each to split them into component parts with sufficient information to re-composite and animate in-game. (If you've ever wondered why my screenshots seem to only involve Nazrin while I've already shown sprites for multiple other characters, this is why)

It never ends!!

...which is a fact that has been extremely draining. Like, it is probably difficult to overstate just how demoralizing it has been to pay this much money and work this hard and long and still somehow be mostly doing art (or visual-related coding) when I naively thought this project would offer some freedom from this after the endless, endless hours I spent doing this for ToK.

And it has also revealed a very tangible (and extremely stressful and troubling) fact about this game's development:

I am going to run out of money before I am remotely close to having a saleable product

When I first laid out plans for this project, I ballparked a modest but realistic budget for the artwork. I chose an art style that could provide pleasing visuals for a very large cast of characters at a cost-effective rate (for a game, at least). I deliberately limited my cast size based upon the agreed-upon cost per character with my artist (and have repeatedly held myself back from various fun ideas because I felt I simply could not afford to make a habit of such things). I studied sales figures for comparable games to aim for a target that had a reasonable probability of sufficient return (or at least breaking even). Game development is always a gamble, of course, but I felt (and still feel) that I made a sensible budget call and it was an amount I was fully able to pay.

But in all this, I neglected to factor in what has been, by far, my most costly development expense: remaining alive.

You see, at the rate my artist is able to produce work, the cost of retaining her is utterly dwarfed by such banal things as food and rent and not freezing to death in the winter. I live about as modest a lifestyle as possible - a one-room apartment, no car, no eating out, nothing in the way of luxuries (I don't even own a cell phone) - but that is still awfully expensive when you have no income and no prospect of it in the immediate future either.

It's a vicious cycle. The less work I get done, the more I feel future financial pressures breathing down my neck, the less work I'm able to get done (due to stress and general demoralization), the more I feel future financial pressures, etc, etc, etc.

And there's a logistical problem even outside of my own stress and anxiety and being damnably human in my need for actual rest: I've spent nearly 10 months working together with my artist and thus have a pretty good sense of how fast she's able to get character art done. And unless something changes dramatically, the time required for her to finish the art assets for the game will be several years longer than I will have any savings left to pay for them - because, as it turns out, hiring an artist is actually a tiny expense compared to merely continuing to exist.

I... don't really have a good answer for this problem and I've spent a lot of time consumed by it at this point. I have faith that Chronicle of False History can be a great game... eventually. But that does no one any good if I can't stay afloat long enough to make it. I've considered pivoting to another smaller-scope game project in the meantime, in the hopes of generating some modest influx of cash that could be used to fund the rest of CoFH's development, but there are a whole slew of reasons this is dicey (not least of which is that small-scope projects have a tendency to not be nearly as small as one anticipates...)

I've also thought about exploring Patreon, but like... I'm fully aware that I don't currently produce nearly enough interesting content for people to just want to throw money at. Tantalizing glimpses of it, perhaps. The promise that in the future I might. But what do I really have to show for this at the moment?

And so, here I am, exhausted by a marathon of work I did not properly anticipate and without the tangible reward I'd expected to have by this point (not a finished game, by any means, but like... much more of one than I actually have). And every month that passes by in which I get less done on my game than anticipated is yet more cash bleeding out of my bank account, like I'm trapped on a badly leaking boat with no shore in sight. I need a rest from all these stressors (and some more personal ones not described here), but when time spent not working has itself become a stressor these days, where can I even find it?

...wow, this sure sounded upbeat, huh?

In any case, I still care a lot about CoFH and have no intention of stopping work on it. I just... need to figure out some way to allow myself to continue to do so without this enormous capitalist behemoth crushing me beneath it.

(I had originally intended to provide more of an overview of the useful work accomplished over these past 10 months here, with mockups showing the evolution of the game's visual design, but clearly that goes into a future post at this point).

#Chronicle of False History #Gamedev #Game Development #CoFH #Personal (Kinda) #What; surely posting a massive wall of text at 5 in the morning is _completely sensible_ #And not at all inane #I am... tired #But these sure are words #So many words #I apologize if I drown anyone in them

[draco-omega]

Collected Essays, Short Stories, and Other Snippets

Essays on Writing and Perfectionism

Write the Things You Want to Write

And let your work find its own audience instead of contorting yourself to serve the preferences of a louder one

An Author Seeking the Best of All Possible Worlds

The 'ideal' version of any story can never be found, so it's okay to stop searching for it

That Inevitable Chasm

There will always be a gap between the story we imagine and the story we manage to make real, but that doesn't mean we failed

Allow Yourself to Believe

On why it's important to have faith that your work has value and that success is possible

The Benefits of Not Having a Plan

How flexible outlines can allow us to take advantage of narrative opportunities we would never have predicted in advance

Veiled Perfectionism

Demanding any standard we cannot consistently meet is just as toxic to ourselves as true perfection, no matter how many other people appear to meet those standards

Essays on Toxicity in Video Game Communities

Heroes of the Storm, Toxicity, and Fallacies of the Incompetent Teammate

Whatever mistake you think you saw them make, they're probably no worse at this than you are

On Difficulty and Elitism in Video Games

There’s nothing more virtuous about playing a game on hard than on easy and its time we got rid of the notion that these two things are in competition with each other

Short-form Touhou Fanfiction

Prompt fill, Marisa + Rumia, 'Unforeseen Consequences'

Touhou Randfic #1, Yamame + Clownpiece, 'Newcomer'

Touhou Randfic #2, Yuyuko + Satori, 'Rememberance'

Touhou Randfic #3, Patchouli + Lyrica, 'Protector'

Touhou Randfic #4, Yamame + Wriggle, 'Sanctuary'

Touhou Randfic #5: Tenshi + Yorihime, ‘Old Promises’

Excerpts from larger works of fiction

Fairy Food Critics

“No! No lollipops! Lollipops would have been fine yesterday, but not today. This is about truth and justice!”

Kappatech in the Kitchen

The only thing Chiyuri was sure of is that she’d rather subsist on microwave ramen for the entire rest of the trip than allow that culinary death trap into her kitchen.

Brief Thoughts on Game Design

Tradeoffs between competing mechanics

On ‘Artificial Difficulty’

Why ‘Roguelite’ is a terrible term

Worldbuilding Musings

Worldbuilding with Monstergirls: A list of too many questions

On the right for ghosts to be born

Utilitarian Enchantments

Other Miscellaneous Snippets

Naga and Lamia: Adventures in mythological conflation

Heroes of the Storm as a Metaphor for Life

G-Rated Sex for Two, Please

#Draco Writes Essays #Draco Writes Fiction #Draco Makes Indexes #Draco Probably Should Include More Summaries #But easier said than done

[draco-omega]

So... what do I do with myself?

As I alluded to the other day, I haven’t seriously worked on a creative project in a long time now. I put Prayer and Starlight on hold back in January, dabbled with some dungeon generation algorithm work for a week or two in February, and that’s basically it for 2017. As someone who has generally always been tinkering on some project or another, this is an awfully long time away from things. I miss that headspace.

Unfortunately, my brain still feels like it’s running on half-power and I’m still juggling a ton of stress (and working on creative projects has historically only brought me more stressed, sad as that is). I don’t feel capable of producing anything at the level of competence I’ve come to expect from myself and I feel so emotionally brittle that even the thought of trying sometimes feels overwhelming. Yet I think the very fact that I’ve been away from it for so long is what’s allowed so many fears and doubts to entrench themselves as deeply as they have; avoiding something you’re afraid of tends to only make it worse, after all.

So it’s probably an important step towards recover to try working on something. The question is... what?

Prayer and Starlight

My novel-length Chiyuri/Sanae fic (with 84,000 words already written). I definitely want to finish this at some point, but there’s still a huge amount of work involved and I feel more than a little intimidated by it (and also beholden to keep parity with the quality of the rest of the story, even though I’m super rusty and probably can’t, which risks making me feel even more inadequate by contrast.) Also, nothing here would be publishable without many more months of work which doesn’t offer much short-term encouragement (and I probably could use some).

More Touhou Randfics

On the plus side, these are short and can potentially give a modest sense of accomplish in a short timeframe. On the other hand, they’re probably even more stressful than Prayer of Starlight specifically because of the short turnaround – the time between ‘I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing’ and ‘I’m putting a finished work out in public’ is very small and it’s surprisingly taxing to turn many prompts into anything I feel comfortable standing behind – as it is, most of the ones I’ve already published felt wonky on some level.

ToK

A semi-traditional dungeon-crawler I was working on until I took a break to write Prayer and Starlight instead (ironically, because it was something I could finish more quickly and get an immediate sense of accomplishment. We can see how well that worked out....) Progress was extremely slow and painstaking and I hadn’t even managed to produce something playable after more months of full-time work than I care to count, but I think most of this is because I became mired in getting every facet of interface just right as soon as I came to it, rather than ever using placeholders for anything; probably 75% of my time was spent on visual design and I can’t even draw.

If I were to return to it, I would definitely try emphasizing playable features over presentation polish and return to the latter once there was an actual game to present. The engine was at least in a state where actual gameplay could probably be added to it fairly shortly, but it’s still a huge project overall.

A different game project

Back before everything came undone, I’d floated the idea of starting work on an entirely new game using an approach completely unlike ones I’d taken in past. The idea was to get something minimally playable up and running immediately and then iterate on it publicly, rather than endlessly mull over design details until I was satisfied with them and then try to make a game from them – use placeholders and ‘strictly functional’ interfaces, regularly post playable demos before any of it was ‘ready’ or even any good, but at least get it out there instead of trying to make sure everything was just right before showing any of it off to anyone.

I still think it’s a good design exercise and also a good perfectionism-desensitization technique, but it’s also really daunting to take on something that’s still a large project and also requires rapid regular updates from me. However, letting myself tinker slowly on this without forcing myself to put it out there sort of defeats the spirit of the idea.

Something else entirely

That wizard’s tower forensic investigation Twine game? (Which is shorter than Prayer and Starlight, but almost certainly much longer than I expect it to be and still very skeletal)

Write a couple game design opinion pieces?

...I’m kind of drawing a blank here for ideas that aren’t ‘clearly worse versions of what’s already on this list’ - things with even greater scope and less groundwork already laid

#Draco Thinks Out Loud

[draco-omega]

RNG Minifics

So, as an effort to clear some mental log jams related to Prayer and Starlight, and simply as practice writing things in a brisker and less labored fashion, I am thinking of starting a (once a week?) habit of using an RNG to generating random Touhou writing prompts and turning them into (strictly bounded) 500-1000 word minifics.

The idea is to get some small stuff out there with less self-censoring and self-doubt and all that - fight back against perfectionism by tossing more stuff out there more quickly and seeing that it’s probably not all so disastrous after all.

I’ll be tagging them all as #Touhou Randfic until I come up with something better (or a specific schedule, etc.)

#Draco Writes Fiction