Mythatorium

After finishing a writing project for the first time in what feels like forever, even if it’s a short one, makes me want to say “I couldn’t be any happier,” but I also know how to use a disconcerted tone. Frankly, I have a lot of feelings about my completion of this small body of work, approximating about 6000 words, that has just enough content to qualify as a teaser. This would be an appropriate time to word-dump about it, but I have so many thoughts that it may be even easier for me to sequence my ideas rather than try and spit them all out.

Processing

I’ll admit, I’m a terrible revisionist. I’m not so bad that I only write first drafts, but they’re really more like 1.5 drafts. That’s not to say that I’d ever let spelling errors or missed punctuation get past me (or, well, maybe I did, I didn’t check), but there’s parts of my process that I know I need to fix. 

My two main concerns are in drafting and revising, but that means everything past brainstorming is within a margin of error. My personality, unfortunately, wants to get everything right on the first try, and that simply won’t do for long-form writing. Technically, I can make it work, and I have been working with it for a while, but when I need to write a lot of words over a long period of time, the last thing I need is to spend more time on 10 words when I could’ve already written and trimmed 100. That means my drafting and revising stage is happening roughly at the same time, because it’s all happening in my head before I put it on paper. Technically that is compacting the process, but it misses the whole point of revision. I can certainly try to make everything just the way I want to be on the first try, but the fact of the matter is, there are things I’m going to want to change after the fact, and that’s inevitable.

My problem is that I’m afraid of revising, and that’s another too honest admission. If I have to think about going back and re-reading my work without the same passion that I had going into it, I’ll be afraid of it. I’m not entirely sure yet if that’s because I find my impassioned self cringe, if I don’t want to regret my words, if I don’t want to believe I can make mistakes, it could be any and all of that at the same time. Point is, there are a few things I know I was disappointed in the post-writing of this, and I didn’t want to go back and change them. However, I’ll hold myself to the excuse that this wasn’t meant to be a completely refined piece of work, and rather just as much an experiment, a return to form, as it was a passion project, and really much more than that.

The Cardinals

Still, there was a lot of strong intention put into this piece of work, and I want to take a bit of time breaking apart the themes and characterizations that I go over in this piece on a public forum. I won’t break apart every single line or explicate too precisely, but I will go over each character on a general basis, on one specific point in their shown story, and tentatively discuss the subjects or future plot points they are allusive to. Before all that, however, let me explain the title: The Four Cardinals. There are 3 reasons and meanings I had behind this name, and I could probably make up 2 more if you put me on the spot; I’m almost certain you figured out at least one of them. 

One, the four cardinal directions, as they are now, all four of these characters exist in different worlds on very different paths. Their destinies are all taking them in different ways, but the point of that divergence still points out: they all had to start from somewhere, and as I denoted in my author’s note, they all have more than a few things in common. 

Two, four caged birds, as I recently discovered that cardinals are not allowed to be legally kept as pets in America under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. Though Ventaceaster, aka Humming, obviously like a Hummingbird, is the one with the attachment to wind and a metaphor of flight and freedom, all of these characters have lessons to learn about finding their own way, their own freedoms through life.

Three, four cardinal sins, because yes, I am built like that. It’s an unspecified thought, and I’m still building on it, trust, but it’s important that I acknowledge that these characters are where they are because of their flaws and inhibitions, not just because one singular event, person, or phenomena is holding them down, though to some perspectives it may seem like that’s just it. Even still, I want to insist intuitively that its these flaws that will need addressing, or else there will be no progressing, and there will be no freedom.

Ventaceaster “Humming,” the Wind Swordsman

Ventaceaster was the first character in this series in my personal chronology, at least a year and a half before the making of this project. His original intent was cloudy (pun unintended, but affirmed) requiring him to die, be reborn for the purpose of aiding another world, and find a batch of heroism despite his unsavory past. However, those original plans fell through, and so I made him again, this time further back in the setting of that story. Before he dies, before another world comes into the picture, it was important that Ventaceaster was just a servant. 

He’s an assassin, a highly competent one at that, and he’s neither dumb nor gullible. It’s difficult to throw out the word “groomed,” in fear of using it flagrantly, but I can remention Ventaceaster was raised by the same woman who’s telling him who to kill. This relationship is skewed and imbalance, and that’s plenty of the point behind it, but it’s also important for me to show that Ventaceaster continues to propel himself into the proponents of this relationship, and that his master, currently known as “Madame Peregrine,” does show him legitimate kindness and vies for his own personal freedoms. This relationship is also important to his themes, and in a way his betrayal, to the values of wind as an element; So, whether either or both of them realize it or not, Ventaceaster can only progress at the dissolution of their relationship or die.

Ergo, consistent with the themes of an assassin, death is inextricably tied to his narrative. Whether he lives, whether he dies, whether he dies metaphorically, or dies pretty physically, how many lives he needs to reckon with killing, and how many more he needs to take, these are all tangled in his storyline. Songs tend to inspire a lot of my writing, or at least stir passion for specific scenes that instill greater characters in them. This character’s inspiring track is “From the Gallows,” by I DONT KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME.

Niang & Banshay, the Fire Swordsman

Niang was a character I technically came up with first, but never had a finalized thought for. He was originally meant to be a roguish character, a wandering swordsman who never spoke, and was treated like a legend. He had ghostly pale skin, and vapid clear eyes, always drenched in black hoods and robes, never seen outside the shadows or the flames that trail him. If his character were only that, he’d never see the light of day again, I’d be too ashamed of that. But the reason he wasn’t able to talk, the reason he’s so pale, is because it’s a walking corpse. Not a zombie, or a ghost, to clarify, it’s explicitly “a puppeteered corpse.” But it wasn’t a mage controlling him, or even magic necessarily, it was a curse: a cursed sword. 

Originally, Niang was going to be two dudes living inside a sword, two minds controlling one corpse. Complete silliness to blow the seeming edginess out of the water, right? Not quite, because there’s alot going on for those two still. Because it’s a curse, and curses suck, obviously. But what happened, specifically, is that the corpse is the corpse of the second-comer in the sword, who became Niang. Niang and Banshay’s dynamic remained about the same through most of their formal conceptualization: a young swordsman with nothing to live for, and a wiser mentor who had a way to teach him. Their story was dark, it was a big question if either of them could ever escape their fate, but they had each other, and that was very important.

Niang’s new story ordered a family meal of dark tragedy and asked for seconds. Old Niang was meant to be a silly D&D character, new Niang is my trauma baby inspired by more than a few different dark fantasy media. One of those helped the reason he has the traits of a scarab beetle; a symbol of rebirth, as someone meant to die several times, almost die, and then keep getting up and up again, and as a creature that is just very, very hard to kill. Similarly to Ventaceaster, Niang is meant to die, but he’s also meant to die over and over and over again. Apart of Niang’s tragedy is the fact that he’s not someone who’s not meant to be alive, shouldn’t be alive, and doesn’t want to be alive. Yet, there he is, burning the house down.

“Why do we fight, Niang?”

“Because we can.”

Niang was originally inspired by IAmJakeHill’s “By the Sword,” but I think he deserves better than to be heard by TikTok montage music. So instead, I’m going to work on attaching him to something else.

Kishar, the Water Swordsman

Kishar feels like my weakest addition to this series, but there’s a few concessions I have to make towards him. One, he is the most expressive main character here. Pretty much every other character here lacks, hides, or is missing one or more vital emotions. While it is also just as important that Kishar also lacks, hides, and is missing one or more vital emotions, it is not to the same point where he is notably deprived of most forms of expression. But, he is still someone who lacks the “correct form” of expression. 

Two, he is what I consider “the most complicated” main character here. I just mentioned his own version of emotional complexity that is important, but his narrative complexity is also very challenging. There were at least three different ideas I had for his backstory short-story, because of just how many working parts there were for him, and how much 1500~ words could actually fit. One thing that I definitely do regret about the product that I made, was how unexplored I left the name “Claire” in his story, and the weight of the tragedy behind that, that I could have at least alluded to. 

Three, he is the “worst” main character here. This could almost be a quality perception, because though he was not the last character to be conceived of, I can view him as my least well-thought of because of how little I thought of or was able to write for him before this piece. But more strongly, it means that he is the most morally corrupt of this cast. Though it is also true that “cardinal sin” applies to every character in some way, Kishar is plainly the most “evil of them all, considering his backstory here involved soliciting shady men for shady deeds, before killing several of them. 

Kishar is, in encapsulation of all that I’ve just said, the character with the most capacity at the start of the story for good or evil. The one pride I have with him is the portrayal of his key character traits, as someone capable of standing kindness, and also grand cruelty. So yes, I think I have alot more to say with Kishar, and I think it’s fine that I didn’t get to say enough of it here. If I can spoil anything about the massive plans I have for him yet, it’s that he doesn’t know himself hardly as well as he thinks he does. Kishar’s inspiring theme was Utopia by Cosmograph, a song with no lyrics.

“Hito,” the Earth Swordsman

Hito is, rather arguably, the most flawless character on this list to the point that it inverts in on itself. I made a handful of deliberate narrative choices that I wanted to help add something onto Hito’s character, but here’s a couple I want to point out. Firstly, Hito’s opening line is the only one of the four that doesn’t begin with a narration. While Hito spends about 2/3rds of their story interacting with other people, there wasn’t much room left to fill in the gaps inbetween. Alot of Hito’s thoughts and narrations are processed externally, through conversation, but are shown to be not very progressive for them at all. There’s not much Hito gets out of conversation, and I make it obvious both early and late, subtly and dramatically, how badly Hito just wants to “get something.”

Secondly, Hito’s gender, whom the esteemed non-binary crown goes to. Hito uses they/them pronouns, but it’s hard being the only non-male character, so maybe I’ll turn Niang or Kishar into a woman. However, I also do a couple more things to toy with this idea’s importance. One, I made it obvious, Hito has a woman’s body, and has gone to a fair few extra lengths to conceal this fact. Two, stacked upon that, why would such an ambivalent person care so much about this gendered perception of themselves? Hito showed at least twice an instance of not caring about a personal perception of them, and then showed an almost extreme attention to detail in the third part when it came to how they were perceived. There are a couple things I would change still, like I would’ve added a scene where someone misgendered Hito and someone had to correct them on their behalf, and I also remembered I forgot to show Hito cleaning up their own blood, that was supposed to be important.

If I were to give Hito a unique scale, I would call them the most dangerous person on this cast. Ventaceaster has his undying loyalty, Niang has his reckless abandon, Kishar has his own deadly streak, but Hito is different because they all understand something. Ventaceaster knows how to get away with murder, Niang knows how to keep pushing himself further and further, and Kishar knows the sharp lines between right and wrong and how to cross them…but Hito doesn’t understand any of that. They have no grasp of Ventaceaster’s consequences, Niang’s limit-testing conviction, or Kishar’s morality. They are a person with a gap of understanding between them and the world they live in. They lack limits not because they’re constantly breaking them, but because they don’t understand what they are, and when to stop.

Hito had several inspiring songs, starting with “HITO Mania,” by Sasuke Haruguchi, led into “Undead,” by Yoasobi, and closed out by “Secret Elementary School Student,” by inabakumori. 

Conclusion About Conclusions

I was going to leave this off on Hito’s concluding sentence, but I proceeded to have a lot of arguments with myself about not having a conclusion. I considered in back and forth amounts whether or not I should have a conclusion when I realized: I’m still bad at writing conclusions. So I should wrap around my earlier comments about my struggles with the writing process, and talk some more about my struggles with the writing process. 

There’s a narrative reason why I don’t like putting conclusions on stories. I like to think that character’s live on past the confines of their arcs or the glimpses I can get or give into their lives, even if they die, I want to harness the effect their lives had beyond death. I want worlds to keep moving, keep turning, even in the end of all ends, I want to find the sprout that will spring the next day. But because of that sentiment, I still find it very difficult to give or create closure. Even when extending that story at a closing point with an explicit end but that cliche “happily ever after,” a supposition of their journey only beginning, or more adventures awaiting them, I feel I fall short of that.

There’s a couple reasons I think this is. One, would be a similar reason of fearfulness of adequacy I have for my way of revisions. I very much heighten the importance of a proper conclusion, of the pin, the full stop on a proper story. I’m very content with the content of my stories, but I can be rather insecure about how I close them. And this applies to works outside of creative ones, like my academic work, and even applies to how I feel about general, individual tasks or even relaxation opportunities. I want to feel like I’ve put a good conclusion on a story or action, and I’m just not confident in that ability yet, and so I avoid it.

Two, honestly sometimes I just don’t know what to say. I believe this co-mingles with how I fear my own writing at times, but really, sometimes I just don’t know how to make a story end. That’s some part experience, some part confidence, and just a general, understandable vulnerability in my own abilities. If I look at it that way then I can acknowledge that’s just a skill that comes with time and practice, then I can start adapting that skill as something a part of my process. 

So, wow, I’m still struggling to write a conclusive part in the conclusion. I don’t have any good words left to end this one with, so bye-bye.