The Sketchbook 2

Free!! and something thoughtful I want you to know

No more exams!! Hooray!!

Just did my last one yesterday! Glad that it's over now :D

Now I can focus on the stuff I like doing. Like art and writing, mainly.

Of course, there's still school. But I like doing school, so... it's not bad.

Oh, there's so much I want to do. I won't list everything down, but I'd like you to read about this little section here.

I'm planning on reviving Ultimanium. A select few of you probably already know what that is.

I hadn't touched that story in ages. There was a time when I thought that Ultimanium would never ever get anywhere. I'd already tried twice. They both failed. They didn't end up right.

So I dropped it. I worked on Legendary instead, and even with that story, I felt anxious.

It wasn't writer's block. It was more 'I have no motivation.' Nobody was reading it anymore. Nobody was commenting. No one was dropping votes. The only reads were the ones coming from me when I was previewing the draft. It was so disheartening.

Then I realized something. It proved very important to me.

I've always tried to please other people. Nothing wrong with it though, right? Right.

But I had forgotten to make myself happy, too.

My writing had become... hollow. It was just empty. I was 'writing twigs', if you get what I mean by that. I was writing it just to keep it alive, and to keep the readers reading.

And then I recalled a very interesting quote. It's set as my profile wallpaper. This is what it said:

"Why did I write in the first place?" I asked myself.

"I wrote because of the story."

When I first started writing, it was actually in the second grade. I didn't know it at first. I never realized it, even after I won second place in a writing competition.

I wrote again, for an assignment in fourth grade, a story based off of Cinderella. I was actually already done with what I was assigned to do. But I loved that story so much. I made a sequel.

When I was a few days into homeschooling (I was in 7th grade at the time), my Dad gave me the task to write a short story based off of the things I played with my sister. The two of us, my sister and I, we could talk and act and dramatize and laugh about our stories endlessly. We never stopped. We'd do it sneakily before we slept, perhaps for another hour or two. My Dad was obviously curious to know what was really going on between us. So, he told me, go write it. I want to see. And I did.

I wrote three full pages (and probably more) with full blown inspiration and eagerness. It was about a very precious character of mine and her best friend (my sister's character) playing a prank on the older kids. Once I got into it, I couldnt stop. I was absorbed into the fantastical world I created. It just suddenly became so much more alive. My fingers flew over the keyboard of my laptop, itching to get each word out.

I realized afterwards the amazing gift of writing I had. My Dad told me, I must write more. It was amazing in his eyes. He himself said he'd never be able to write like how I did. He wrote articles and educational stuff. But he'd never be able to write a story.

After my reflection on all this, it came to me that writing stuff doesn't just mean getting it published and letting the world see it. It's about the essence. The heart of it.

Right now, I don't care as much as before if my stories don't get hundreds or thousands of reads. It doesn't matter as much has before now.

What matters now is the story, the characters, the essence. I want myself to be in there, laughing as my characters laugh, admiring the scene as they do, feeling the same pain as they do. I want to immerse myself in the adventure of my 'friends'.

Now, I'm rewriting Ultimanium for the third time. People say "third time's a charm," but who knows? Either way, I'm going to keep writing. I'm going to keep learning and growing, and having fun with all my characters.

And so, I am delighted to present to you all:

Ultimanium | Trials of the Guard