Five Promises.

Since she asked about how Graven died… here it is. XD

I realize that what I wrote doesn’t actually answer the question but oh well

Also, it would appear that Matty, Graven, and Halden have made themselves permanent fixtures in the Soraeverse.  lol

-----

Matty does not remember how Graven died.

He remembers fire. Shaking. He remembers wood and metal and earth and blood flying everywhere, and a stark numbness that drowned out everything else. There was no sound, no feeling, no thought, nothing except for a single, repeating phrase that echoed over and over again in his head:

“This is a dream. This is all a dream. This is a dream, and when I wake up, Graven will be there, and he will pat me on the head, and exercise with me, and give me breakfast, and tell me what we are doing today.”

But Matty did not wake up. And neither would Graven.

-

He found Graven lying in a patch of scorched, burning earth, motionless, his eyes darkened in a way that frightened Matty without him understanding why. Some distant part of Matty’s mind whispered that Graven shouldn’t look like that; that the heavy metal pieces that made up his body should not be in those positions or so far apart from each other; that as much as Graven loved fire, he shouldn’t be lying so willingly, so close to so much of it. Matty knew that he shouldn’t be so close either, that Graven would discipline him for it when he woke up, but for some reason, he couldn’t walk away.

His vision was beginning to blur and his ears were filled with an undefinable roaring. He fell to his knees at Graven’s side, reached out one hand, and touched the warforged’s shoulder, meaning to shake him awake.

Instead, a shock of pain burst through the numbness and sent Matty reeling back, shrieking and clutching his hand as the metal burned him unforgivingly. Suddenly, the realization crept over the horizon of Matty’s mind, that this was not Graven, that Graven was somewhere far, far away now, and Matty was never, ever going to see him again.

Matty screamed.

He screamed in a way that he hadn’t screamed in many years, a wailing cry made hoarse by ash and smoke, a sound that threatened to tear him in half from the inside out. He was still screaming when the people found him, drawn by the sound of the explosions and the dying roars of the thing that had attacked Matty and now lay hacked to pieces across the field. He was still screaming when they picked him up, struggling and shouting, “Leave me alone! Put me down! I want Graven!”

But soon his cries were reduced to whimpers and his entire body went limp as Matty was carried away, into the village and into the darkness of exhaustion. Somewhere in the midst of the pain, the tears, and the silent desperation, Matty made his first promise:

“I promise I’ll be good."

“If I’m good, then Graven will come back… won’t he?”

-----

Matty lay in bed recovering for a long time. Healers were able to tend to the burns on his hand and legs, and the blood was soon wiped away and the cuts bandaged up, but the pain that plagued his thoughts would not leave.

His thoughts often turned to the fish. The fish, and birds, and small animals he had watched over the years as they moved and struggled and survived, and then gave up their lives so that he could continue living.

He had never really given much thought to what that meant. But now, he was beginning to understand. And the more he understood, the more he realized that he did not want to understand, but just as the fish would not swim again once they had stopped struggling, there was no going back now.

So Matty cried. And cried, and cried. Even when his body had healed and he was able to move again, he chose to remain lying there, alternating between crying and sleeping and crying himself to the point of utter exhaustion once again.

-

Over time and through the tears, the people from the village were able to get Matty’s story out of him, or at least the important parts. They learned what Graven had been to Matty, and they tried their best to repair him. But nobody in that village knew how to fix a destroyed warforged, and so eventually someone came to Matty and explained in quiet, gentle words the same conclusion that Matty had arrived at long ago.

And Matty, in response, went on sleeping and crying and barely hanging on to life, until one day a familiar face appeared in his room, looking at him with an expression of mixed pity and disgust.

Feather said, in the same strong voice that Matty recognized from three years ago, “Stop crying. It won’t bring him back. If you keep crying like that, I’m not going to help you.”

She left Matty with his thoughts then, and he sat there quietly for a long time. When she came back, he looked up at her, the tears dried on his cheeks, and he made his second promise, out loud to Feather, inwardly to himself:

“I won’t cry anymore. I promise.”

-----

Matty stopped crying then, but he found that there was little else he wanted to do. The people in the village had recovered his fullblade and returned it to him before he left with Feather, but he didn’t want to touch it. Even looking at it only brought on more pain.

What had happened to Graven’s remains, Matty didn’t know, nor did he want to know. He tried not to think about Graven. Thinking about Graven hurt more than looking at the fullblade. Matty considered the possibility that even being run through with the fullblade would hurt less than thinking about Graven. At least there would be an end to that kind of pain.

-

Once he was living with her, Feather made Matty get out of bed, made him eat and wear clean clothes and do chores around the house, “just to get you moving,” she said. When he didn’t have anything to do, she sent him outside. He didn’t like being outside. Outside was where Graven belonged, and when there were sounds in the trees or the brush and Matty looked up only for Graven to not be there, it felt wrong. It felt like the whole world was completely wrong.

One day, Matty was wandering across a part of the field he had not yet explored, when suddenly he tripped over a hole in the ground and went sprawling down a hill. When he opened his eyes, he saw before him a little mushroom, poking out of the ground. He remembered this mushroom. He recognized it from a long-ago encounter, a mushroom that, if he recalled correctly, did interesting things to people’s minds when eaten.

He shoved it in his mouth without hesitation.

The next twenty-four hours were utter bliss, filled with absolutely nothing, only a floating, empty feeling that was not satisfying but at least did not hurt. And even though he woke up to the feeling that an axe was hacking away at his head with every heartbeat, and to Feather screaming at him, more angry than he could ever remember her being before, it was not enough to stop him from returning to that spot and taking it again. And again. And yet another time.

Every time he woke up, it hurt even more to remember.

-

After the fourth time, he woke up to find that Feather had tied him firmly to his bed and was standing at his side, her arms crossed. She glared at him and said: ”I thought Graven would have taught you better than this. But if you want to forget him so badly, then be my guest.”

Matty stared up at her, eyes wide. ”I don’t want to forget Graven.”

Feather looked back at him. ”It sure seems like it.”

After she was gone, Matty lay there, thinking. Finally, he quietly made his third promise:

“I promise I won’t forget. No matter how bad it hurts. I won’t try to forget anymore, Graven.”

-----

When Matty was better, and Feather trusted him to not eat any more of those mushrooms, she began to teach him how to fight again. He had lost a lot of strength over the past few months, and while he had always been clumsy with the fullblade, it was now nearly impossible for him to manage it. Feather sighed and declared that it might be better to find him a new weapon.

Matty agreed. The fullblade was still too painful to even look at.

Because he had come to understand. What had happened to Graven had happened because of Matty. If Matty hadn’t needed to be saved, then Graven would still be alive.

He wanted to never need saving again.

It was only because of that reasoning that Matty allowed himself to be brought back to the village.

The bladesmith remembered him. Matty’s breath hitched when he saw the man standing there, staring at him with a look of shocked recognition and sadness. Matty opened his mouth to say that he was looking for a sword, but before he could get a word out, the bladesmith had taken him behind the counter and to the back of the building. Before he knew what was happening, Matty found himself standing before a wooden box. It was well-made, out of fine wood, and Matty knew what was inside it. He did not want to see it. It looked so small.

The bladesmith said, “We thought you might be back someday, so we kept him here.”

Matty did not cry, because he had promised he would not cry anymore, but he did shake furiously, and Feather placed a hand softly on his shoulder and told him that there was a place, not far from the house, where he could go to visit Graven whenever he wanted.

-

Matty insisted on digging the grave by himself. Feather watched from the edge of the clearing while Matty struggled with a shovel made for a grown man. He let her help once the hole got deep enough that he couldn’t throw the dirt out on his own. But once that was done, he placed the pieces in the ground himself, one by one, tying them to his back and carrying them carefully into the hole, climbing in and out of the earth until his entire body was caked in it.

He was grateful to the people who had gathered the parts, because he knew that he would not have been able to bring himself to do it. He also thanked them for wrapping each piece in cloth, so that he did not have to look at them. His eyes burned and watered, but the tears did not fall as he focused steadfastly on climbing, up and down, up and down, until the very last piece was laid carefully in the ground and the earth was piled up again in its place. When it was done, Matty shivered and huddled by the small mountain, sniffling, until Feather came and gathered him up and brought him back to the house.

-

Matty wondered what he would use to mark the grave, until suddenly, in the middle of the night, he awoke with the answer. He crept off into the darkness, dragging it behind him until he came to the clearing. He clambered up the mound of earth, not caring that he would get his sleeping clothes dirty, because this was far more important.

Matty’s feet sank slightly in the loose dirt, but he managed to stand upright enough to stab his fullblade into the earth, sinking it into the mound until three-quarters of the blade was hidden beneath its surface. He stepped back and immediately tumbled off the mound, rolling to his side and sitting up, looking at the silhouette of the fullblade’s hilt in the moonlight.

And finally, finally, Matty was able to accept that it was over, that Graven was gone and there was no bringing him back. That Graven had died so that Matty could live.

Because he had wanted Matty to live.

And despite all of his intentions, Matty crumpled on the ground and cried, helplessly, brokenly, and yet as the tears fell, they seemed to wash away some of the heartache he still carried with him. Through the tears came the first prayer of many he was to make over that spot, and the fourth promise:

“Graven, I’m gonna live. I’m gonna live the way you wanted me to, and I’m gonna get stronger and stronger, and someday I’m gonna be happy again, and I’m gonna do everything I want to do, ‘cause I can, ‘cause you gave me this chance…”

“Graven! I’m going to live! I promise!”

But as he knelt there in the dirt, he choked out one more sob as he realized:

“I’m going to live… but I’m never going to stop hurting… am I?”

-----

Halden does not remember how Matty died.

He couldn’t be expected to. After all, he was only five years old when it happened. Besides, he had never experienced death of any kind before, and so he could not be expected to recognize it, especially not when it happened as it did that day.

But Matty remembers it clearly. He remembers seeing Halden standing before him, a small child with a serious face. He remembers thinking that he had been Halden’s age when he first met Graven. He wondered if Graven had thought him to be that little when they first met. Graven had seemed so tall then. He wondered if Halden saw him as that tall.

Matty’s fingers clutched a little tighter around the hilt of the falchion that now hung at his side. He thought about all of the promises he’d made over the years, and as he looked at Halden, the promises began to change into something a little bit different.

“I promise I’ll be good, so that I can teach you to be good.”

“I promise not to cry, so that I will never make you cry.”

“I promise I won’t forget, so I can teach you everything I’ve learned.”

“I promise to live, so that I can always be here to protect you.”

“And even though I will always live with this pain, I promise… that you will never, ever have to understand what this pain is.”

And a part of Matty died then, to be replaced with someone stronger, someone who would never again need saving, so that he could help and protect and always, always be there for Halden, when Halden needed someone to be there.

Someone, he hoped, that Graven could be proud of.

Mushrooms and Promises.

(What I wrote for yesterday's write-in instead of working on my NaNo novel.)

-----

Matty woke up very early the next morning.  As always, he laughed a little bit when he saw Halden, and made sure to pull the blankets over him carefully before he left.

"Halden," he said softly.  "I'm going out for a while, but I'll be back soon."

"Hmmph," said Halden.

Matty turned then and started walking.  He knew, if Halden had even heard him, that Halden thought he was going to do his morning exercises, as usual.  Something hurt a little bit at that thought, making Matty pick up his pace.  It wasn't a lie, right?  He wouldn't lie to Halden, right?

Matty went to the door, where his bag sat from the previous night, packed full of the bottles that were usually strapped to the inside of his pants.  He picked it up and remembered Halden looking at him strangely as he had carefully stacked the bottles together last night, first on the floor, then in the pack.  Matty hadn't liked that look.  It said that Halden knew something was out of the ordinary.  'Well, at least it won't happen again,' Matty thought as he put the bag over his shoulder and left the house.

The morning was cool and slightly foggy, but when the sun rose, it would certainly burn away the mist that collected on the ground, as it always did here.  Matty walked through the grass, listening to the silence and wondering how this place had changed since he last saw it.  He wondered if Feather was awake yet, and when he could talk to her.  He would like to do that before they had to leave again.

The path he took led away from the house, across a small lawn and through a wooded bit of land.  Matty suddenly felt a little anxious, leaving Halden so far behind--but then again, this wasn't something that he should see.

It had been a fact for so long, that there were things that Halden didn't know, that somehow over the years it had become a truth, that there were things about Matty that Halden did not and could not know.  Just like how Graven could never really know about Halden.

Matty saw the place from a distance, before he had left the trees.  It was the hilt of an oversized sword, the blade stabbed a third of its length into the ground in the center of a clearing.  The earth was carved out into a small hill that dropped off sharply behind where the sword stood.  Matty walked around that rise in the earth to the other side.  Nearly hidden from view was a stone door set in the side of the carved-out hill, overgrown with roots.

Frowning, Matty put down the bag, the bottles inside clinking against each other as he did, and began to clear the plant material from the door.  He wondered why Feather had let it get so overgrown.

Then again.  His hands paused as he realized.  It had been a very long time.

Slowly, Matty pulled away the dead stems until the door was free enough to open.  He pulled on it and it gave way, revealing behind it several stone shelves, fixed into the ground in the hill.

It was the type of grave that normally would be shared by a family, in which generations' worth of urns would be stored.  Matty sat back and looked at it.  There were no ashes in this place, as there had been no ashes to begin with.  The actual remains, Matty knew, were even farther beneath the ground, in a place that had only been reached through days of effort and pain and grief.  Instead, on the bottom shelf of this crypt stood dozens of bottled mushrooms.

And a promise.

One by one, Matty started pulling bottles out of the bag, each one containing a different mushroom, stacking them neatly on the shelf.  The bottom shelf filled as he did so, and he found himself moving up to the next one.

He hadn't thought he would be able to, but somehow he started talking.

"Hi, Graven," he said softly.  "It's me, Matty.  Sorry I haven't been by sooner.  I've been busy."

A bottle rolled away from his grasp and he had to fumble for it inside the bag.  "I brought a lot of mushrooms this time," he said.  "I still haven't been off this continent.  But I've been to a lot of new places and found lots of new mushrooms there," he said.  Suddenly, he hesitated.  "Well… not so much lately.  But I think…"  Matty sat back on his heels.  "I think you'd understand."

It was a few minutes before he reached for the next bottle.  "I guess I haven't told you about Halden," he said as he continued stacking mushrooms on the next shelf.  "Well, not properly.  Not… to you.  Anyway, Halden is the boy I'm looking after."  Matty paused.  "Um, I guess he's grown up already.  But I still need to watch him.  His family is powerful, so I have to make sure that nothing bad happens to him.  I guess I've done all right so far," he said, faintly smiling.

"I think you would have liked him, Graven," he continued.  "He's… not like normal people.  But I think he tries really hard at the things he does, and he tries to do right by the people who are important to him."

"I like to think that you would have gotten along…"

The bag was about half-empty now, and Matty had to look inside to find the bottles.  "Since I met Halden, I've been living in a big house and eating good food," he said.  "I didn't know there were so many kinds of food.  Also, I'm glad Feather told me about not being able to pee anywhere I like, 'cause they get mad at you in the city if you pee anywhere but the toilet."  Matty laughed a little bit.  "Actually, even when we're traveling, Halden gets upset about peeing where people might see.  I don't get it."

Matty stacked another bottle and sighed.  "I don't get a lot of things about this world, Graven," he said.  "I don't get why there are so many rules, and why people are so different in one place from another without really being different at all.  Kind of like these mushrooms," he said as he placed another one.  "I don't suppose I'll ever get it.  I don't see the differences in people that Halden seems to see all the time, and I don't know how to explain it to him."

"And I don't know how to explain to him things like… why I want him to do the things he wants to do, now, or live life importantly, or…"  Matty's voice faltered.  "I don't know how to teach him what you taught me."

"I guess I can't be… how I wanted to be like you."

Matty looked at the next mushroom.  It was round and white, with a thin stem, and dried beyond the point of being edible.  The bottle was scuffed from being carried around so long.

Graven had carried his end of the promise.  Always.

And finally Matty was able to say what he'd known he needed to say here today.  "I'm sorry, Graven," he said.  "I don't know if I can keep doing this.  I don't know when I'll be here again, or if I ever will.  'Cause Halden needs me around, and…"

Matty sat back on the ground and buried his face in his knees, still holding the bottle in his right hand.  His head ached in an unfamiliar way, and the smile he always worked so hard to keep going had disappeared.  "I'm really sorry, Graven."

"'Cause, Halden has to become king, and if he does, I don't think I'll be able to travel around so freely anymore, and even if I do, it can't be for something like mushrooms.  Because… Halden doesn't know why, why it's not really about mushrooms, and I don't want to weigh him down with something he doesn't have anything to do with…"

Matty's head really hurt now.  He didn't know how to explain it so Graven would understand.  He didn't know how to say it in a way that wouldn't be admitting that…

"I can't keep my promise to you, Graven."

Matty finally put the bottle on the shelf, his hands shaking so the glass slammed against the stone, but it didn't break.  His other hand was pressed against his left eye, which was hurting in a way he didn't understand.  "I can't do it," he repeated.  "I can't be both."

"Graven, of course I'll keep trying, but I… in case I can't do it, I… I'm sorry."

"I'm really sorry, Graven…"

There was only one mushroom left.  Matty picked it up.  It was an old one, so dried and withered that he couldn't even tell what kind of mushroom it had once been.  He didn't really care.

It had been a promise.

"Graven, I won't forget you.  I'll never forget you.  I know that much," Matty said, still holding the last mushroom.  "But I…"

There wasn't an end to that sentence.  There couldn't be, because Matty knew it would hurt too much to say it, that Graven was being left behind because Halden was here now and there was nothing that could be done about it.

And for an instant, Matty couldn't stand Halden, couldn't stand all the rules and regulations and laws that governed what people were and were not allowed to do, and why promises, like the promise between a child and guardian that they would travel the world and collect mushrooms and always, always be together, why promises that couldn't fit into that perfect grid had to be thrown away--

And then Matty wanted to cry, because Halden didn't deserve to be thought of that way.

The mushroom was on the shelf and the door was closed, and Matty was finally on his way to do the morning exercises that Graven had taught him as a child all those years ago, knowing that soon his head would stop hurting and he could forget and he would be able to smile again for Halden, finally.

For a while.

Experience Machine.

Are people familiar with the thought experiment called the "Experience Machine"?  (Here's a link if you haven't heard of it before.)

I came to a weird realization today:  The Experience Machine exists and we've already chosen it.

Things like video games, television, movies, cosplay, books... aren't those as good as the Experience Machine, and haven't we already chosen them?

(I realize this is not exactly the argument of the Experience Machine, but bear with me.)

I bring this up because whenever the idea of the Experience Machine comes up during discussion, people (at least a few) always seem to get really vehemently angry about it and insist that they would never take part in such a machine.  I have never understood, because for me the choice is really easy: I would always take the experience.

In my mind, whether the experience is "real" or not shouldn't matter; I have no idea if the things I experience are real or not, or if I'm just living in the Matrix or something anyway; at least by choosing the Experience Machine, I acknowledge that I am not actually doing anything, but I at least receive the experience.

Which led me to today's realization:  People play video games (or watch television, or observe art) because we want the rewards of experiencing life without the risks.  And as an artist, it is my purpose to provide that experience.

... here's a picture of action figures.

Marching Band.

10/8/11:  Beautiful day for a Valleyfest.

And then, when I came back to school, this was waiting for me:

Too Much.

It's because I write too much, isn't it?  That it's difficult to follow my rambling thoughts.  XD

Actually, I write too much when it's unnecessary, but when I'm trying to write a lot, I really can't.  "Write 15 pages!"  Stuck at 12... something like that, usually.  More to the point, "Write a 50,000 word novel!"  But the closest I've ever gotten is 30,000...

If you don't know what I'm referring to, it's NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), which takes place in November and which is an event where you try to complete a 50,000 word novel in a month.  It's about 1,667 words a day, which is not too bad until you start falling behind, and suddenly you have one day left in which to write 20,000 words...

But this year I'll definitely do it!  Because SilverEyes42 and I will be writing a set of not-exactly-collaboration novels in order to stay motivated!... I hope.  XD

Unexpectedly, my novel ended up taking place in the Sorae universe as well.  All I really know so far is that my main character is named Jaeger Noughtwind right now.  Um... I don't know if that name will stick.  (Andria's doesn't even have a name yet!  I'm one terrible step ahead!  XD)

We also named another character Gilbert, which is not a reference to anything at all.  But as a result, roommate Tiranee and I have been coming up with the most ridiculously German names possible.  It's really bad.  Don't let us do that.

Campus Photos.

Photo taken outside of Friley Hall at sundown.

Photography isn't my focus or anything, but I do enjoy it.  :D  I really like taking pictures of the sky at different times of day.

Being Honest.

"Aaah... Romano, it'd be so cute if you were this honest all the time."
—Spain

So if I'm going to make an actual blog where I actually blog about real things, I might as well be honest about it.

I am a total nerd.  The complete list of all the things which qualify me as a nerd would be very long and too boring to read, but in summary, it boils down to anime, comics, and games.  I just happen to be lucky in that I have parents that are understanding enough and a stubborn streak... stubborn enough that I've pushed my way through school and through life intending to live as a complete and total nerd and be proud of it.

Want to know what I do with my free time, besides keep blogs on about four different sites?  I post fanart to deviantART incessantly.  Sometimes it's good, usually it's just stupid things to make people laugh.  I also cosplay.  The number of costumes I've made is rather ridiculous, considering the short time I've been cosplaying (this is the fourth year), but lately I've only been playing Ventus [Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep] and Romano (South Italy) [Axis Powers Hetalia].  On Friday nights, I play Dungeons and Dragons with my friends.  I'm currently playing a human swordmage, who by some stroke of misfortune (read, Andria mistyping my information into my character sheet) is five years old.  It's been... interesting.

I also spend a lot of time working on Sorae, which as I've mentioned is just a catch-all term for all the other little projects that I do when I don't feel like making computer models.  I try to link everything back to Sorae, since that's the one thing I think might actually be profitable someday out of all the random things I do.

I mentioned briefly what Sorae is in the last post, but I'll copy and paste the definition I wrote for Andria for her novel project elaborate here:

Sorae is unlimited potential.  It means “the amount of energy in the sun, and the limits set by the sky.”  It is everything we are, and everything we could possibly be.  It is everything encompassed by this universe and every other universe that could exist.

Sorae can be pronounced in different ways. 

Sorae (soh-ray) = sore (“that”) = sole (“sun”) 

Sorae (soh-rah-eh) = sora e (“to the sky”) 

Sorae as “sora e” = “to myself” (Stefanie Kim Yoshiko)

But the meanings are infinite.

Sorae accepts that the possibilities for pain are infinite, but so are the possibilities for happiness. 

Further, pain and happiness, and all other sets of dichotomies, are naturally connected.  Sorae accepts that all concepts, no matter how seemingly different they are, are naturally connected.  Similarly, all people, all existing things are connected to each other.  These connections are not always apparent, and in fact may never be discovered.  But Sorae accepts the possibility of those infinite connections.

 That's it, in a nutshell.

... hmmm.  Well, that's all I have to say for now, which is kind of a shame since my second class in a week has been cancelled today and I have nothing to do for two hours.  I'll just end with a photograph I took today, I guess.

I'm not really a photographer, but I like taking photographs, and campus was really pretty today.  Except I got a whole bunch of dried leaves flying in my eyes.  I think it's time to bust out the "contacts + goggles" solution again.  Er, I guess it's not "again," since I've never actually put it into practice.  Well, we'll see.

Bloggy Blog, Again.

Well.  Where to go from here?


My name is Stefanie.  I've also got a couple of middle names, which are "Kim" and "Yoshiko," which when put together into a single word happens to be the name I'm probably most known by online.  I've also got a last name, which is not particularly interesting and also happens to be something like the 22nd most common Vietnamese surname.


In addition to these names, I also have more website profiles than are probably useful at this point, including a useless tumblr, two deviantART accounts (one for fan art, one for serious art, the former of which is mainly stupid comics, the latter of which will never, ever achieve anywhere near the traffic of the stupid one), and a WordPress floating around out there somewhere that actually has no text entered onto it.


So what am I doing making (yet) another bloggy type thing?  Honestly, I've no idea.  But in an uncharacteristic moment of optimism, I find myself believing that I might actually use this one.


Use it for what, you ask?  Again, no idea.  Probably cosplay photos.  Probably miscellaneous text ramblings.  Probably reposts from dA and tumblr.  Probably incoherent notes about my novel writing and video game designs that are of no real use to anybody.  Probably nothing that anybody will take any real interest in.  But as an artist, or maybe just as a self-proclaimed narcissist, I happen to get a lot of satisfaction out of seeing the stuff I create plastered all over the Internet, and in the long run, that is probably what this blog will really be about.  :)


Oh, about the title.  "Sorae Project" is something I've been working on for a couple of years now (although I only came up with the name for it about two months ago... hahaha).  The project started as a series of novels that, while apparently unconnected, actually were all taking place in the same universe across thousands of years.  Since then, it's branched off into a comic project and also a collaborative novel project with my Spain/SilverEyes42 (who should tell me if she cares what name I use for her on this blog, because this probably isn't the last time I'll talk about her or France.)


"Sorae," as I've defined it, means "the infinite potential that humans possess."  Therefore, this blog is also part of "Sorae," as there is an unlimited potential to the topics I'll probably post about.  Well, that's the easy answer XD


I'll finish up this first post with a quote, 'cause quotes are awesome.

"What if everything you see is more than what you see—the person next to you is a warrior, and the space that appears empty is a secret door to another world?  What if, on a crowded street, you look up and see something that, given what we know, should not be there?  You either dimiss it, or you accept that there is more to the world than we think.  Perhaps it really is a doorway, and if you choose to go inside, you will find many unexpected things."
—Shigeru Miyamoto