I wanted to post this right when I finished The Horizon, but to be honest, I forgot right up until I was ready to update the story.
But yeah, a big thank you to everyone who’s been following my AHIT fics!! Lately, I’ve been getting a lot of great feedback and The Horizon is close to 100 kudos on AO3! I’m kind of surprised since--when I first began writing these fanfics for AHIT--it was more to break out of a bad block: I was struggling to update some of my other work and really needed something to keep myself active, but also give me a bit of a breather. It’s been fun write and explore different ideas regarding the game.
For those of you who may have missed the note I posted at the end of the last story, I will be continuing this as a series; however, I’m going to take a break before starting on the next big fic. Similarly to how I wrote shorts for Tales of the Fire Spirits before working on The Firelands, I’d like to experiment a little and work on things that I won’t really get to cover in the “main” fics. This includes adding more oneshots to TotFS as well as a few other short fics to fill in information on some minor characters that may make appearances later on.
As for artwork on these stories--like the fake title cards--I still plan to do them, they’re just taking me a while. I’m having to switch back and forth between different projects, and since they’re really more of a thing on the side just to have fun making, I’m just not able to get them out as fast as some of my other work.
Long time coming, but here’s the second of the fake title cards for “The Firelands.” My idea for the fire spirits is that they resurrect, their ashes returning to the Firelands upon death where there’s this pits of embers for the newborns to stay in until their old/healthy enough to climb out and begin searching for food on their own. These pits are guarded by some of the elders and it’s some of the foxes jobs to make sure there’s a constant supply of food for the newborns to sustain themselves on. Mainly charcoal. So in this act--unable to resist the cute, little, flaming fluffs--Hat Kid helps find lumps of charcoal across parts of the Firelands to feed them. This would allow some early exploration and teasing as to what kinds of obstacles and enemies she would face in this area.
Quick note that the newborns would also be pretty much living fire with a weak, physical form at this point so, unless you can sustain a good flame in your own hands, it would be better not to pick them up for both your safeties...
Since I want to play around with the plot of “The Firelands” a bit more closely to the actual gameplay/mechanics of AHIT itself, I’ve come up with some ideas for what sort of collectables and design alternatives would best fit. This is the concept I’ve come up with for a new outfit for Hat Kid, which will be introduced in the upcoming chapter. The boots are leftover from her main outfit, but--rather than have her usual hat--she’s got this big, burning flower in her ponytail like what we see in the burning section of Subcon Forest.
Might draw some title cards later since I’ve split the fic into different “acts” as well, so this was good practice.
Part 2 of 2 of the storybook for my AHIT fanfic, “The Firelands.”
Part 1 of 2: Here!
Had a bit of trouble restricting the pages to a reasonable amount, so if you want the story in fuller detail, I’d definitely recommend reading the story. However, I hope this works well enough. :)
First of the fake title cards I’m working on for my fanfic, “The Firelands.” In this act, Hat Kid gets chased by the fire spirits up in the treetops deep within the burning portion of Subcon Forest--just within the boundaries of the Firelands itself. In order to escape, she has to both outrun them and trick them into exhausting their energy.
((Wanted to explore Kit’s psychology a bit more through the Badge Seller’s perspective since there are some aspects I didn’t get to cover as much as I would’ve liked in “The Firelands.” Just kind of a short piece. For those of you who haven’t read the full fic yet, you can find it here.))
There is was again: The smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes, the laugh that was so charming, so full, so desperate--as though the feeling of laughter was entirely new and she would never know it again after this moment, so she clung to it. She held onto the feeling so tightly that she fooled herself into believing it was real.
If it weren’t for the Badge Seller’s wealth of experience, the young woman might have fooled them too. Much like her vulpine abductors, she was a vision of warmth and light. Her irises glistened like twin suns and her wild locks moved like fire as they rolled across the golden glow of her skin. The deception, however, was short-lived thanks to the prominence of her markings; on her arms, her legs, and around the rims of her eyes. They were proof of not only the intense inferno welled inside her, but of the miserable years spent nursing it.
“Tell another!” she warbled, grinning up at them from where she sat on the hard earth of her ‘den.’ “Just one more.”
They held back a sigh. This was their own fault, really; the vendor hadn’t been cautious enough. Their carelessness had brought them one step too close to a cursed painting--leading to their essence becoming trapped first in it and then in a puff of smoke once it was later drawn from the ashes. They’d known that Subcon Forest was even more dangerous at this time of year, when the fire spirits conducted their rituals and laid even more traps to add to the Snatcher’s own. Their steady watch over the hatted child was no excuse, not when they were more than aware of the forest’s hidden threats.
Well, the Badge Seller only needed to be patient. They knew the fire spirits’ behaviors better than most. They also knew more about this woman--this vixen--than possibly anyone living. They weren’t the sort of person the foxes were drawn to most. Eventually, the spirits would grow tired of them, and they wouldn’t like their pet spending so much time listening to the vendor when there was fun to be had elsewhere. Either she herself would too grow bored and would set them free or the spirits would inevitably take action themselves.
He also knew that the woman was just trying to experience a fleeting moment’s companionship in some way a poor, broken thing like her could. She begged for stories: It didn’t matter what it was about, or if it was true or not, so long as it was interesting--and it took a lot to disinterest her. There were so many places she’d never go to, people she’d never meet. She used stories like currency, waving freedom before her captive’s in exchange. She couldn’t with the Badge Seller though, not when they knew why she wanted them.
“What’s even the point of all this, vixen?”
“Come on, come on!” she chortled in reply, her tail sweeping the ground behind her, “Why not talk? Not going anywhere yet.”
They could always refuse to play along, ignore her entirely. That was the quickest way to dissuade her, but she had something of theirs that they held in reserve: She had the Badge Seller’s pity.
The vendor wouldn’t say it, but they’d seen her before, tiptoeing around the edge of the burning forest, near the border she’d never willingly cross, before a sound would spook her back to the Firelands. She was strong enough break through that barrier, but not mentally. If it wasn’t her shattered mind and the disillusioned affection she held for the fire spirits, it was fear toward Subcon Forest’s many dangers keeping her from ever daring to escape. The foxes didn’t mean to--just like how they didn’t mean to break her in the first place, they weren’t clever enough to know better--but they’d cemented those feelings in her. The woman had already been chosen as a favored playmate, but she’d become a more-or-less content prisoner. Even if someone ever came to her rescue, she’d likely reject it.
Nevertheless, there had to be a hidden part of her that still understood these wrongs--otherwise she wouldn’t crave this so much.
The Badge Seller tried tapping into that. They had been humoring her for some time, telling story after story, silently reading her all the while, but they were growing tired of it themselves. “What kind of void do you think you’re filling? What kind of story do you want to hear? They won’t do you any good, but go on--tell me.
“How much longer, vixen? You wait year after year for these sorts of fleeting connections, but that’s all they are: Fleeting. Soon enough, your other captives and I will be gone, back to our own lives, but you’ll still be here. So what’s the point of trying to grasp something so beyond your reach?”
A bandage could only do so much for someone bleeding as heavily as she was.
There it was: The cracks in the smile. The rising steam in place of tears made impossible to shed. The conflicted look in her eyes for why there were there to begin with, because she refused to answer.
“Crying doesn’t suit you, vixen,” the Badge Seller muttered with a silent huff, watching her. Then, feeling that they’d said enough, relented just a bit, “Fine then. Just one more.”
