After more than seven months of writing to reach this point of the story, I decided to share my thoughts. Not only is this a personal thing, so I can assess what I’ve done so far, but I also want to share to you readers my thought process in this story, my inspirations, and the ideas I want to explore.
Conceiving this story/Inspirations:
Female Main Character - When I started reading English translations of light novels and then moving on to web novels, I always read stories with male MCs. Eventually, I also tried web novels with female leads, most notably Worm. In recent years, there’s been some controversy regarding female MCs in books and especially movies about them being Mary Sues, as well as other criticisms. I then thought how about I try my hand at writing a female MC? I challenged myself to write a good female MC, even though a male MC would've made this type of story more popular.
Psychopath Main Character – I didn’t want to have a “normal” protagonist. I wanted something very different.
How about a psychopath? There are many stories with supposedly psychopath MCs, but I wasn’t very sure with their depiction. At first, I shelved the idea because I could see how hard it will be to write an actual psychopath MC, and tried to find some other peculiar defining trait for my MC. Then I came upon the book “Gone Girl” with a female psychopath MC. It changed my perspective on writing psychopath character. I’m not going to spoil anything with the book, just that it’s very different from other psychopath stories which mostly dwell on killings and shock value. Gone Girl goes deep in the mind of a psychopath and that inspired me. Furthermore, male and female psychopath have differences, which I considered as an interesting challenge to write.
World Building (Corebrings) – There are many stories with a superpowered group maintaining peace and stability but my inspiration for the Corebrings are the Knights in Knight Run. It’s not a famous webtoon, so many might not be familiar with it. Give it a try. I even used the name Purple Bloom in homage to the Purple Flower in Knight Run.
Alternative History – Instead of setting it in the far future like Knight Run, I set it instead in an alternate history earth. And the inspiration for that is SCP. You probably got a slight feel of SCP with the BID. There are other organizations mentioned in the story that will play a bigger role in the future.
Group of people with powers – There’s been mention that this story has a Worm feel to it at the start. I’ve read the entirety of Worm, Twig, and Pact. So Wildbow’s various groups of superpowered people has inspired me greatly, but my main inspiration for having a group of people with powers as part of the main cast is Animorphs. Goes to show that I’m a 90s kid. Basically, it’s Gantz/Evangelion for kids that got past censors because no one expected that kind of content to be in a children’s book with goofy covers.
Ideas I want to explore in this story:
Relatability – Perhaps one of the main tips for new writers like me is to make your characters relatable. Instead of making a “conventionally” relatable MC, I made a psychopath MC. So am I violating that tip I mentioned? Nope. I believe that all of us have psychopathic traits here and there. You’ll find yourself relating to Erind in one way or another even in weird ways. It is a social experiment of sorts.
Starting small – In most stories with OP MCs, or even YAs, the MC will become one of the most important person in the story quickly, like they’ll led the rebellion, have the secret weapon etc. I’m not saying that’s bad; if the story is geared for enjoyment and power fantasy then that’s the way to do it. However, I intend to write this story for a long time, and making the MC immediately an important player will put a time limit to the story, and I could easily write myself into a corner. Another reason we’re starting very small in scale and taking it slow is because I want to explore how Erind’s psychopath mind evolves through her experiences, before she becomes an evil mastermind in the far future of this story.
Absolutes are right – If you’ve noticed, the Corebrings and the BID and other people in authority take a black and white stance when it comes to Adumbrae. Transposing this to other stories, you may have an iron-fisted government and the MC will lead a rebellion, hoping to change the world into something in the middle ground. That is not the case here. I wanted to explore a story with a black and white figure of authority that is not evil, that is actually right. Why? Because our MC is a psychopath who can’t see black and white. Isn’t that an interesting twist to the usual setup? Not sure how this will go.
No main villain – I got this idea from Overlord. It’s pretty famous so I think many of you know of it. There’s no villain in Overlord. You may say the MC is the villain, but not really because he’s just trying to protect his own. Can’t also say his enemies are the villains in the traditional sense. For one they pose no threat to him. And they don’t even know about him and are just trying to survive. I’m trying out that setup in this story. I think readers might wonder why this story doesn’t have a clear cut villain. But as the story progresses, I hope it becomes clearer what I’m aiming for. Let's see how this pans out.
Depicting a Psychopath MC – There are plenty depictions of psychopaths in media, including in manga and light novels/ webnovels. Usually, what is branded as a psychopath MC is a revenge story where the MC is bullied/oppressed/betrayed and then he goes on a killing spree. That’s not a psychopath. Psychopaths can’t even muster the emotions to get angry like that. With that backdrop, many readers come into REND expecting that serial killer MC. My fault actually because the start of the story (before the edits) gave a wrong impression. Anyway, it is hard to put myself into the mind of a psychopath, which is why the first arc’s characterization of Erind is shaky before I eventually got to revising it to be more consistent.
After more than seven months of writing to reach this point of the story, I decided to share my thoughts. Not only is this a personal thing, so I can assess what I’ve done so far, but I also want to share to you readers my thought process in this story, my inspirations, and the ideas I want to explore.
Conceiving this story/Inspirations:
Female Main Character - When I started reading English translations of light novels and then moving on to web novels, I always read stories with male MCs. Eventually, I also tried web novels with female leads, most notably Worm. In recent years, there’s been some controversy regarding female MCs in books and especially movies about them being Mary Sues, as well as other criticisms. I then thought how about I try my hand at writing a female MC? I challenged myself to write a good female MC, even though a male MC would've made this type of story more popular.
Psychopath Main Character – I didn’t want to have a “normal” protagonist. I wanted something very different.
How about a psychopath? There are many stories with supposedly psychopath MCs, but I wasn’t very sure with their depiction. At first, I shelved the idea because I could see how hard it will be to write an actual psychopath MC, and tried to find some other peculiar defining trait for my MC. Then I came upon the book “Gone Girl” with a female psychopath MC. It changed my perspective on writing psychopath character. I’m not going to spoil anything with the book, just that it’s very different from other psychopath stories which mostly dwell on killings and shock value. Gone Girl goes deep in the mind of a psychopath and that inspired me. Furthermore, male and female psychopath have differences, which I considered as an interesting challenge to write.
World Building (Corebrings) – There are many stories with a superpowered group maintaining peace and stability but my inspiration for the Corebrings are the Knights in Knight Run. It’s not a famous webtoon, so many might not be familiar with it. Give it a try. I even used the name Purple Bloom in homage to the Purple Flower in Knight Run.
Alternative History – Instead of setting it in the far future like Knight Run, I set it instead in an alternate history earth. And the inspiration for that is SCP. You probably got a slight feel of SCP with the BID. There are other organizations mentioned in the story that will play a bigger role in the future.
Group of people with powers – There’s been mention that this story has a Worm feel to it at the start. I’ve read the entirety of Worm, Twig, and Pact. So Wildbow’s various groups of superpowered people has inspired me greatly, but my main inspiration for having a group of people with powers as part of the main cast is Animorphs. Goes to show that I’m a 90s kid. Basically, it’s Gantz/Evangelion for kids that got past censors because no one expected that kind of content to be in a children’s book with goofy covers.
Ideas I want to explore in this story:
Relatability – Perhaps one of the main tips for new writers like me is to make your characters relatable. Instead of making a “conventionally” relatable MC, I made a psychopath MC. So am I violating that tip I mentioned? Nope. I believe that all of us have psychopathic traits here and there. You’ll find yourself relating to Erind in one way or another even in weird ways. It is a social experiment of sorts.
Starting small – In most stories with OP MCs, or even YAs, the MC will become one of the most important person in the story quickly, like they’ll led the rebellion, have the secret weapon etc. I’m not saying that’s bad; if the story is geared for enjoyment and power fantasy then that’s the way to do it. However, I intend to write this story for a long time, and making the MC immediately an important player will put a time limit to the story, and I could easily write myself into a corner. Another reason we’re starting very small in scale and taking it slow is because I want to explore how Erind’s psychopath mind evolves through her experiences, before she becomes an evil mastermind in the far future of this story.
Absolutes are right – If you’ve noticed, the Corebrings and the BID and other people in authority take a black and white stance when it comes to Adumbrae. Transposing this to other stories, you may have an iron-fisted government and the MC will lead a rebellion, hoping to change the world into something in the middle ground. That is not the case here. I wanted to explore a story with a black and white figure of authority that is not evil, that is actually right. Why? Because our MC is a psychopath who can’t see black and white. Isn’t that an interesting twist to the usual setup? Not sure how this will go.
No main villain – I got this idea from Overlord. It’s pretty famous so I think many of you know of it. There’s no villain in Overlord. You may say the MC is the villain, but not really because he’s just trying to protect his own. Can’t also say his enemies are the villains in the traditional sense. For one they pose no threat to him. And they don’t even know about him and are just trying to survive. I’m trying out that setup in this story. I think readers might wonder why this story doesn’t have a clear cut villain. But as the story progresses, I hope it becomes clearer what I’m aiming for. Let's see how this pans out.
Depicting a Psychopath MC – There are plenty depictions of psychopaths in media, including in manga and light novels/ webnovels. Usually, what is branded as a psychopath MC is a revenge story where the MC is bullied/oppressed/betrayed and then he goes on a killing spree. That’s not a psychopath. Psychopaths can’t even muster the emotions to get angry like that. With that backdrop, many readers come into REND expecting that serial killer MC. My fault actually because the start of the story (before the edits) gave a wrong impression. Anyway, it is hard to put myself into the mind of a psychopath, which is why the first arc’s characterization of Erind is shaky before I eventually got to revising it to be more consistent.
