#verkja

[i-can-even-burn-salad]

Happy STS, Elli!

What do your characters want at the beginning of their stories? What do they want by the end (or later on), and do they get it? Do they ever get what they wanted at the beginning, and if so, what do they think of it by the time they get it?

-verkja

Happy STS!

This has been in my drafts forever and I just don't know what to say that isn't basically retelling the whole plot of my stories (not to mention Hannah intimidated me with her answer :p)

So, I guess, all my chars just want to live their live in peace. At the beginning of the story, things are going mostly ok, and they don't see how it could be better (I mean except for Damien, things are… really not going well for him). For one reason or another, few of them have any ambitions. If I mess with their lives at that moment, they'd try their best to return to how it was before, because that's familiar, and they're mostly content.

Then I ruin it even more, take everything from them, break them into itsy bitsy tiny pieces, and give them someone to suffer with them. And slowly, keeping them in their lives turns into their new goal. And of course (after much more suffering) I give them that, as well as everything else. A place to call home where they feel safe. Friends and a partner. That job they always wanted but wasn't feasible.

So the core is still there — live a live happily and in peace — but it's better than they had imagined.

[i-can-even-burn-salad]

CARROT - Do your characters have official birthdays, whether or not they're mentioned in-text?

-verkja

Thank you for the ask! From this ask game.

Nope!

[i-can-even-burn-salad]

📜"how did you get started on your WIPs?"

-verkja

Thank you for the ask! From this ask game.

Let's see.

Twisted Thorns

I wrote it as GW fanfic in 2015 or so, then I won an art raffle in 2021, and I looked up what I had written to see how to describe Caldyn, and while I read it I saw that I had tried to rewrite it in English, and thought... why not try again. And uh yeah. Here we are.

As mentioned before, at the start of the fanfic stood the Sylvari necro chargen with the mask that makes the eyes white and the green bark look scarred, where I instantly went to "what if this poor guy was in the hands of the nightmare court?" :)

Thorns and Jasmine

While looking for writing memes, I found a post that lead me to whumblr. And after a week or two of sitting in a corner, world shattered, I started to write more of what happened during Caldyn's captivity. Too much torture for a normal looking book, yknow? And I always wanted the novel to be only his pov, but the recovery is Breannan's pov, which was fun.

Undeserved

Glass Shards already existed, and I took one look at a prompt list and wrapped it around Damien's backstory in my mind, and I went... what if I wrote that 👀

Glass Shards

This was my one and only "nano" win in 2016 (quotation marks because while I did it in a month, it was Oct 😅) and I toyed with the thought of translating, and as Undeserved came to an end, I realized I had to, or people were going to kill me.

In 2016, I came out of a year-long identity crisis after learning of asexuality, and I chucked all that anger into making those two suffer. At the core, it was supposed to be, and is, a story about them being ace.

Fancy Boots

Pretty sure the idea started with a prompt that made me think "what if someone recognizes him" and Riordan volunteered. No regrets.

Heal my Wounds

This was the first of the gw fanfics I wrote. It was. Not nearly as good as it is today. Close to questionable adaptions of the organizations and personal story lines, but

Nuisance

Damien had his backstory, and I really wanted hers as well. One piece was written for a prompt fill, and the rest just. Happened.

Till Death

At the beginning of the year, I started to daydream about a few tropes I wanted, which didn't fit any of the existing stories. When it became clear that Glass Shards was coming to an end, planning got more real, and then it kinda... took over my life. For 4-5 months 😶

[i-can-even-burn-salad]

Desire for Cedric and Hate for Lily? :)

-verkja

Thank you for the ask! From this ask game.

desire: What's one thing your OC wants more than anything in the world? Are they open with that desire? Why or why not? What would they do to fulfill it?

Ah, while on the surface, he obviously enjoys wealth and power, and would go to great lengths to keep both, the thing he would put above all is the safety of his husband. If it came down to it, he'd spend the rest of their lives in a hut in the middle of nowhere, as long as they're together.

He's... well. Yvan's already in danger due to Cedric's lifestyle, without him explicitly stating how important he is to him, so no, he's not open about that, except with Yvan.

hate: What does your OC hate? Why? How do they act towards the object of their hatred?

Raisins! SHE HATES RAISINS. DEATH TO ALL OF THEM.

On a more serious note, she just bans them from her bakery. Her hatred is exaggerated, her friends know it, and everyone goes happily along with it.

And since we all already know about her hatred, some fun facts. I'm not entirely sure raisins as dried grapes exist there. Her dislike is for any kind of dried fruit; she doesn't like the texture, and the intensity of the taste, or any of it, really.

Now whether that's a case of the common language adopting the most common dried fruit for all of them, or a possible translator deciding on putting it there, who knows. I just thought it was funny.

[i-can-even-burn-salad]

🦖 Favorite extinct animal?

🌴 Desert island item?

-verkja

Thank you for the ask! From this ask game.

Tumblr just ate my whole fucking post and I am gonna need that gun from answer 2.

🦖 Favorite extinct animal?

Archaeopteryx. That counts, right? There's even a dinosaur in the question and all.

🌴 Desert island item?

I am sure it's a nice island vacation with wifi and stuff. Because otherwise it's a gun, and not for hunting.

Of the items I own, my phone. No matter how many people roll their eyes at being glued to the screen, that thing can let me read books, write, listen to music, play a ton of games, and includes all my pocket friends.

Otherwise, a laptop would be perfect. I only own a desktop and a steam deck, and neither are really great as option. One isn't portable, and the other would drive me up the wall with a lack of keyboard.

[starlit-hopes-and-dreams]

🐶 Are you more of a dog person or a cat person?

🎤 Is there a song you know all the lyrics to?

-verkja

Thanks for the ask, @verkja! From this ask game.

🐶 Are you more of a dog person or a cat person?

Catcatcatcatcat, *ahem* I like cats :D

🎤 Is there a song you know all the lyrics to?

Nope *hides face* I'm terrible with remembering lyrics (unless I'm singing along, I know all the words then, bitches lol)

It is the main reason I never joined anything more serious than a choir when I was younger, despite the endless pressure from my dad who was in a band and thought I needed to be in one too.

All the pretty singing in the world don't mean shit if you don't know the words, after all LOL

[starlit-hopes-and-dreams]

Happy STS, Anna!

Writing about a world other than our own involves choosing some elements of our world to include and others to leave out. In your writing, do any such elements stand out, like a real topic you put in your fictional setting, or a significant everyday detail of our world which doesn’t exist there?

Did anything work its way in without your intent, e.g. sayings or traditions or units of measurement you didn’t consciously include, but noticed later on? If so, did you remove them or leave them in place?

-verkja

Happy STS on Monday, @verkja!

Interesting question. I uh. I didn't intentionally choose any real world topics to include in my writing. I'm sure there are some, but eh. Whatever is there was necessary for the kind of story I wanted to tell, not because I wanted to address real world ethics/morals/issues.

Details, however, are a different story.

I wanted indoor plumbing and toilets and showers. I got them with magic :)

I wanted food and animals that I didn't have to make up, so those are there.

Birthdays are there. Kinda. I guess holidays, but really those are limited to solstice celebrations.

Certain elements of cursing are there. Getting rid of hell, which I started off using before I realized I don't exactly have one of those, was tough. Damn(ed) gets to stay though, fuck that noise. And word derivatives of christ. I mean, I'm sure a lot of curses have derivatives that don't make sense in a fantasy world. With me, you just get to deal :')

Clothing... god I hate clothing so much. My clothing is a mix of medieval and modern and I cba to stick to one or the other. Sorry guys, deal with the leggings. and the occasional dress with no shift underneath. and sleeveless stuff. and... 😅

Details that snuck their way in:

breakfast, lunch, dinner. originally meant to call them smth generic, like midday meal and such, but I defaulted to the others so much that I gave up

same for weeks/months. I meant to measure time passing by season and year, and while I still do the last two, weeks and months kept creeping back in and I gave up

I try to avoid units of measurement, but I'm fairly sure the occasional distance measured in miles has popped up XD

I actually wanted a world with no religion. Turns out that's kind of hard to accomplish, and I'm not there yet in terms of skill. So I made a bunch of gods and tied them to the elements. Reluctantly, I made temples and have them function as a school and a library instead of a place of "worship". There are no religious holidays, sacred days of the week, celebrations, or fanatical worshippers though, that I address. I kind of. Ignore that stuff. Maybe its there, maybe not XD

Aside from removing hell, if something keeps creeping back in, I generally just find a way to include it instead of forcing myself to make some alternative for it. I already fight with my oc's to get them to do what I want, so let's make the language and worldbuilding a little easier for me, hmm? lol

[i-can-even-burn-salad]

Happy STS, Elli!

Writing about a world other than our own involves choosing some elements of our world to include and others to leave out. In your writing, do any such elements stand out, like a real topic you put in your fictional setting, or a significant everyday detail of our world which doesn’t exist there?

Did anything work its way in without your intent, e.g. sayings or traditions or units of measurement you didn’t consciously include, but noticed later on? If so, did you remove them or leave them in place?

-verkja

Happy STS!

I put in whatever I want to be part of the story. If I write about a mixed european forest in fall, picking berries and mushrooms, then because that's where I live (Okok, sadly not IN the forest 😂) and I like it. If I write about some kind of oppression, it's not because I cannot imagine a world without it, but because I want to deal with it, even if it's just by punching someone in the face.

I prefer to put it on a personal level. The temple doesn't care who you marry, but that one person can be homophobic. I have no idea how general medical care looks like (not like my chars get any), but I have that one herbalist being a prick about periods.

As for everyday details of our world - my world is a magic heavy fantasy setting, so pretty much no everyday detail of our modern world will exist there! :D

I try to keep away from common real world traditions - I haven't even decided yet if birthdays exist. I also try to stay away from measurements and the likes, but that's mostly because to me it sounds weird to use meters and stuff in English writing, and you won't find me using miles 😂

I guess in some ways, the worldbuilding falls a bit flat - if food isn't an issue, because magic can help with growing/watering/pests, there should be less poverty, but if I put in government-run soup kitchens, I have no way to let Merry starve 🙄 I don't want to think about taxes and infrastructure, I just wanna cut a blorbo up.

About things that are less obvious, I don't care. I spent years trying to worldbuild a fantasy world, and it prevented me from ever actually writing, and I am over it. I do not care about where words come from. Ok, I won't use "hell" as a curse, but damn(ed) can stay. The name Christine does exist. You can have a tomato. Gold is rare, because everyone knows if I say "gold bracelet" that it's expensive. I don't care I don't care I don't care.