Obsession with a Character

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Mental health has always been an area of cloudy self-misdiagnosis and a constant drain on my own personal energy and willpower for me. Depression, anxiety, blind anger. They are all my friends, and I have them with me every day. No matter what I do, no matter where I go, they are always there.

Different emotions manifest themselves in different ways for different people. My defense mechanism is immediately to go into fantasy. Push out the non-fiction, and fill the empty space with stories of my own choosing. Lately, the feeling of stagnation has permeated into my life, but it is one that is unguided and without reason. Typically, I can hone in and solve my own problems, but I am not one who will deny help.

Gruun, one of the characters from my 99 Cent Novella project, has currently been my focus of obsession. Having Obsessive Compulsive Disorder already makes me predisposed to latching on and never letting go, so. Writing and fantasy kinda just…fell into place as I battle my brain.

I focus on Gruun because he is what I want. He is what I need. A force of unstoppable nature, an immovable forward moving object. Regardless if you know what the fuck I’m talkin’ about or not, let me be plain. This character is a literal manifestation of my own rage and body insecurity.

He is massive, muscled, and brutal- kind, compassionate and patient, he is the balance of fury and civility. Acting in the real world like a normal person can be difficult (is everyone merely acting?). Can be? No. Is difficult. For me at least.

Normal. There’s a word that I despise. It’s a label that follows the same mantra as generalized testing inflicted upon children in “schools” all over the world. Who the fuck makes the rules for normal? And why do I have to follow them? Why do you?!

Because there is no real normal. It is a label.

Obsession rocks and reels with you, waning like the tide. Sometimes, you are up to your ankles, and sometimes your buried neck deep in the sand, struggling for air as the tide collides into you over. And over. And over. And over. And over. And over again.

There is a freedom in directed brutality. I’ve never been a believer in simply spitting out anger and harming anyone or anything in my way. So as this builds up, it festers. The anger builds first, and then frustration afterward at the fact that you cannot simply purge this fury from your body. As stress and these feelings build, they must be released. And anger is best released on yourself or inanimate objects.

Writing is in act of masturbatory masochism that is rewarding and soul crushing. I turn my anger inward so it can only hurt the person responsible for it. It sits in me, a little black hole. My own personal abyss, pulling me on top of myself, collapsing. Gruun is that release.

Hatred piled on top of the frustration and rage seeps downward like grease, soaking the whole godamn mess, making it worse. Depression and self loathing is the dark fog which clouds the entire scene. And guess where you are? At the bottom, clawing through, looking for the light in the fog.

Whenever I am sad, rage is the first emotion to burn through the fog. All my emotions converge into that rage and create a multi-faceted confusion prism of human emotion that is almost impossible to direct or hold on to for a long time. To awaken such rage, writing is an outlet that often drags me out of the shithole and sits me back high on my own big ol’ pile of fuckin’ bullshit.

But with that anger driving me, slurping down all the bullshit becomes palatable when you don’t care about what you swallow.

I’ve never felt numb. I can’t- and this isn’t a statement of pride but fact: I need to feel. More specifically, I need to feel rage. The process of inflammation, reduction, and retribution associated with my  twisted mental jungle gym concept of my own consciousness. As the anger surfaces, so does the writing.

Gruun, Spek, Alistar, Thas. They are all facets of my rage personified. Every character I create is a bloody chunk of my own fuckin’ meat, raw and vulnerable. It’s my job to toughen them, and to toughen myself. What’s in a character? If you have any skill or common sense, the first thing in a character should be a piece of yourself. Rage is the first emotion I turn to.

Yours?

 

Stolen Steel Spine

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People have a strange relationship with the world.

Little busy creatures, bustling about. In all types of weather, all types of climates, all types of places. I watch them from afar, always studying. It is not a place of superiority, rather of curiosity. Stewing, I believe, is the term I’m looking for here.

My mind is not free from idea. My projects have slowed. But sometimes the need to write outweighs the want, and vice versa. It is the struggle of both that is so godamn tortuous. The thing I miss the most was spine. A writer’s voice. Mine has dwindled into a pathetic vomit of disjointed entries like this one, or as ambiguous pieces in the abstract. And the kicker is that there is no solid way of knowing whether or not it’s my voice as a writer, or just a load of fresh, steaming bullshit.

I think most of myself is twisted in hypocrisy and guilt. In spite of the light, it gets bent. Bent around experiences, fractured by pain, amplified by joy. But always malleable. It’s this fact that drives on the terrible point, hanging like an old noose at the gallows. Dramatic.

It’s all dramatic. Each emotion, each word I push forward feels like shit flavored molasses. I don’t have the will to write now. Not forever, mind you. But the strength of mind writing takes (for me) fails me. Fuck this entry, and fuck this day.

Lost with a Compass

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Days roll on by and the guilt of stagnation hangs with the meat until there is a call for action.

Completion of tasks, both great and small, go checked off until the lists are calm, until the day makes sense again. Wandering-

There is a stark honesty about apathy and sloth. They imply peace, but are often abused. The mind is a weak thing that must be cradled by willpower and bone, or it will break. Each stone pillar wears away in the desert sand until all is dust, slow but sure.

Writing has been hard. Mostly these types of entries flow because there is no point to them. They have no definitive purpose, nor is their journey valid or useful. Creating ideas in the brain that won’t translate -or can’t- into creation itself. There’s no more will to write anymore and there must be a rally within to find the spark once more. It feels forced and arbitrary. Wouldn’t read the words pushed out like a smeared shit.

Mostly the violence sticks out. Violence in the stories, especially the killing and dealing with loss and guilt. Envy. Stick to what is comfortable and profitable, but can there be a time when comfort is a liability opposed to an asset? Of fuckin’ course.

Setbacks at a later age are harder to cope with as responsibilities, anxieties, worries, and doubt build up inside an adult brain. Not enough space to cope. So it’ll get fixated. This one is fixed on violence.

Why the violence? Why the need for blood? Is there a hurt inside that is invisible to the world and its victim? Why such blind anger? Why the need to spit pain in all directions?

Forests sometimes have a path. Deep ones, ones that have been around for decades; tempt beauty off trail, but there is no solace or safety where there is no vision. Following a compass so the path is always known is not foolproof. Many, many times the forest will swallow travellers. Some find the path once more and travel to the intended destination, wiser for the experience as a whole. All too often, the direction, goal, and destination is lost or discarded, and there are mass graves of intention and loathing that conceal an endless supply of ignorant bodies.

Wander the woods, but keep an eye on the path. Death, metaphorical and tangible, comes in many forms and feelings.

Mind the deadfall.

A Zenith’s Umbra

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Bottled rage and pain are a collective pool in which all is poured and consumed. Shattered shards of sadness and lethargy mix with an indignant sense of apathy where the only viable goal is self destruction, or loathing. Concepts of self hatred change accordingly, always mesmerizing and out of reach. When a grasp is finally achieved, there is an abyss that draws all hope toward it, the choke of tears, the burn of frustration, exhaustive overwhelming waves of just…hopeless, hopeless pain. Most turn numb after a time but the burn of pain eats holes through this veneer and then the sensation of release is all too common. But there is no release. That rage and pain just can’t disappear, or be let go of. It is an anchor. Calcified with shadows from the crawling abyss of depression. Feel it sitting? Some could ask. But it isn’t a question, it’s a statement with a shit eating grin.

As the anchor rusts inside, those shards break off and get lodged in hope, fraying it. But there’s no way to let it out without violence at this point. A mild interjection, a disagreement they are drops in a bucket of blood, where the entire sea is red, and there are many drinkers- completely parched but on their hands and knees shoveling the gore into there gaping throats, dark as the abyss that spawned them. Many choose to kneel with them, some choose to observe, others ignore. There comes a point where the light at the end of the tunnel is a pinpoint harpoon of bloody light, where the only option is endless violence, endless fury, endless tears, all frustration. Throwing anger and pain out of itself until burned out and snuffed like the stove’s pilot. There can only be blood.

Violence calls out from the abyss, a voice and a guide. That endless depression, dragging and holding, clawing- choked; see what there is now but a bleached black skeleton rattling against itself in the silence of depression and darkness. The empty void- staring into an unlit room after nightfall, the maw of familiar things suddenly unknown- there are no guiding voices in the pitch black ink. There are only demons. There are no allies. Only imagined voices. Ingrained. Doubt clings to each other, creating clots that can only cause stroke.

So utterly sad. Just…so sad. It’s the best word. Despair feels cliche, sorrow, melancholy, the only thing that works is sad. Swirling down a filthy drain, clogging itself until the tub is full with psychic quicksand, which overflows and settles into the places that are forgotten inside. It is a fluid, anger a solid, they mix and do not blend. Drink it all down anyway, each urchin of unrelenting anger appearing in the outline of a clenched jaw, let it make deep slashes and allow the sadness to infect and help fester. Doubt settled there first, but it mixes nicely with anything, a whore on the spectrum. Shackled and tamed the pain gets worse as it is contained in a smaller and smaller space. There is the essence of anger, it grows and shrinks its vessel at the same time until there is no place left to go but everywhere and against itself.

Gouge a blood trench through death, each inch a reminder of mortality so final and pathetic in the last moments in such vulnerability where dark daggers plead suicide for the owner. But there is no suicide. There is no end. No. End. Except the only one that matters.

 

Corpses and Christmas

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Death comes in a strange haze that is punctuated by a sudden snap and loss of all control. Rarely is it quiet, even when done in secret, and the meat will fight to stay alive as long as there is a soul fueling the heart that still refuses to stop beating. It is also intimate. Private. To look upon a dead body, to see the last moments of life and the first moments of death frozen in the muscles; it is seen almost too causally, and tossed aside as something normal.

Death isn’t normal, it’s inevitable. There’s a difference. To watch someone decline, point A to point B, and then be there, to stare at the body, to feel the loss. The gravity. There’s nothing normal about it. Last week, my grandfather finally died, and I say finally because he had severe dementia, and ultimately, it cost him his life. A grim blessing, truly.

Work doesn’t have time for death, so I was working like usual. The call I received was simple, gentle. He was gone, and it had been a long time coming. I’ve only seen a dead body once before, to be honest. For as much as I write about death and the consequences of it, I have little face to face experience with it. But like most things in life, one is often woefully prepared for grievous situations no matter how well adjusted they claim, or have tried, to be. I am no exception.

Walking into my grandfather’s room at home, I smelled…illness. Medicine, old sweat, piss, shit, sadness, impatience, boredom. I approached his form under the sheet, but his face wasn’t covered. He was on his side to alleviate the pain in his lung from the night before, still in the same position I had left him when I said goodnight to him. I remember holding his hand as he gripped the safety rail on the side of his bed. He still gripped that rail. I sat down beside him, and looked into his face. What I saw is now burned into my skull, my very godamn bones.

His skin was yellow and thick, like looking at candlewax covered in a thin, dessicated membrane. His mouth was slightly open, as were his eyes. They hadn’t closed them. I looked into those eyes, seeing a flicker of his iris. A clot of bright green mucus clung to his nose and upper lip, they had not cleared it. As I stared at him, I couldn’t help but feel…hate. Anger. Not at him, or my family, but unguided.

Touching him was a terrible mistake. His skin was freezing, slightly damp, and rigid. I tried to hold his hand, but it was resistant to movement thanks to rigor mortis. I had this maddening thought, this terrible thought, that I needed to wash my hands right away. I felt like I had taken some of that death. He lay there for several hours as we waited for the funeral home to take away his remains. Even though he was gone long before they took him, I never felt the void until he was no longer in the house.

Void. The perfect word.

My grandfather was dead, and I thought I was prepared for it. In truth, my experiences with death have never been normal, so I don’t understand why the subject is so simply dealt with by so many others. I feel that his death was a miserable, lingering experience that a man of his worth and caliber did not deserve. But, I am no god. I have no power here. I am merely another hunk of meat trying to make sense of more death in a world so alive.

I hate the casual way death is approached in modern times. Or disrespected. It is downplayed, accepted, spun, altered, hidden, applied, dictated, ordered, natural and forced, among other things, and it is the final answer to a question that was asked at birth, the question that burns inside every one of us until the day we blink when staring death in those empty, black sockets.

Death is not a stranger to me. I am surrounded by it, as all we are. And I can feel the clawing black sometimes. It’s like a rotted bridal veil that we all look at the world through. Death and I have a strange acceptance for one another. Well, at least an acceptance that a man and an intangible force of nature can have together. Death comes. Death is always coming, and we must all be ready for it. Even when we aren’t. Even when it’s our own.

The night before I left him, I could feel his beating heart and shallow breaths. Together, the sensation in the room felt like pleas, or prayer under the husk of death because he lost his power of speech a few days before he died. I watched him, laboring under his illness, and could only think to say, “…”

Nothing.

Living in Constant Fantasy

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From time to time, I feel as though I am just fabricating an intricate scope with which to view my world in a hue of constant fantasy.

Writing is the obvious outlet. So is art- it is all relevant. Not just to me, mind you.

Reality can be a harsh pill to take. Often, it’s taken as a suppository and forced into your life’s rectum with a cold, ungloved hand. I am well aware that reality also hurts, and can be boring at times. I think that’s why I write. Or at least that’s part of it. I write because I am bored of reality, and I want to create a new one to fuck around in. Last time I checked, I didn’t possess world-altering powers, so I guess writing and drawing will work. Perhaps there are others like me out there. I’d sure like to think so.

I finished the first novella in the Warrior Shaman series, and I’ve been anxious to continue on to the next chapter, but I find my mind disjointed and distracted. I feel like I have to scold my own brain like an unruly child. But no matter- sooner or later it all comes out. I drew a few weapon concepts for Thas, the Warrior Shaman. He utilizes a short sword and an axe, but they are no ordinary weapons. Here’s some art of his sword:

Thas_SwordConcepts

 

I wanted to create something simple, sharp, and easy to use- making it truly deadly in the hands of a master like Thas. It’s not just any sword, either. Of course it’s magic. This sword is made of singing steel; it’s a magic alloy made from iron, carbon, stone, and salt water. It’s created through gravity and intense fire magic, forged for decades in the most extreme heat and pressure, using complex alchemical powders and tars. Magic must also be used to shape the blade; mortal tools simply break, or catch fire. It is forever keen and unbreakable, and its tip is so sharp that it whistles through the air like a whip, but at a much higher pitch. Here’s a close up look of just the sword:

Thas_SwordDetail

 

He holds this weapon in his left hand. The right wields a special axe, also made from singing steel. The handle, however is made from an unbreakable portion of wood from the massive Tree of Hope- which can be seen from almost anywhere on the entire planet of Melias. Here, take a look at some concepts:

Thas_AxeConcepts

 

Sorry it’s bleary…I forgot to draw larger so I could scan it. I kinda got caught up in the moment. Anyway, you’ll see three sharp lookin’ things attached to the side of the axe head. Both sides, actually. These ridges are collectively called a bone wedge. By use of strength and the might of singing steel, this axe will cleave directly through bone, much like a wedge and a piece of fresh splitting wood. If it gets stuck going in, the design always allows for it to be pulled it out with little effort, never letting it get paralyzed in a skull or breast bone. This axe is made to fight with, period. Here’s a detail piece:

Thas_AxeOnce again, I apologize for the shitty quality, but I’m not drawin’ this fuckin’ thing over again. Anyway, I wanted to give him two different weapons because they allow for more options in combat for Thas. He can parry with the blade,  hook and manipulate limbs with the axe’s lip, hack through limbs, or run people through. Thas deals death equally for all.

I don’t know what drove me to draw these two pieces to be honest. I haven’t posted art on my blog for some time now, but something just struck me to do it. Which brings me right back to the main concept of this entry- living in fantasy.

I draw because I can’t create. I tell stories because I cannot make another world. Without the outlet of writing and art, I fear all of my ideas (good and bad and neither) would simply blend together, and I wouldn’t be able to tell them apart anymore. In fact, my grip on reality is based on how long I can steep myself in fantasy per day. But don’t get me wrong- my life isn’t so shitty that I have to spend it all in a hopeless meandering daze, constantly in fantasy. No, it’s more like…free therapy. As much as I love telling/writing/whatever stories just because I find it really fun, it’s nice to get some of these fucking things outta my head and onto paper so I don’t obsess over them in my mind.

Perhaps writing is just my way of coping with a life that can be really boring on occasion.

 

Warrior Shaman Flash Fiction

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“So you’re the best fighter in the world, huh?” Definitely sneering, but somewhat…placid. Thas decided to indulge him. 

“No, I’m not.” Thas continued his stare into the mug of ale before him.

The stranger at the bar looked puzzled. “But, are you not a Warrior Shaman? Those, those whirlwinds of death and nature?”

“Yes, I am.” Thas looked into the man’s eyes. He knew the storm cataract was glowing, but the stranger didn’t seem to mind at all.

“Then you have some explaining to do.”

Thas looked up, blinked once. “There was a time when I fought an especially fierce knight. Exhausted, I had not the strength to call to Melias, and I had been bested in martial combat. I stood before him, disarmed. I looked him in the eye through his helmet’s visor and simply stated, ‘I forgive you.’ And I awaited death. Hands palm out, down at my sides.”

The stranger leaned in, baffled and amazed.

“The knight stood, saluted me, and sheathed his weapon. He bowed once, turned, and left the chamber where he had cornered me. I never saw him again.”

The Golemborn

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Mortality is a noose that tightens a little bit every day until the trap door beneath your feet sends you to your fate. A harsh reality. Many people try to stop the flow of time’s tide through numerous methods. Plastic surgery, medicine, drugs, lotions, creams, cryogenics. Failing that, mortals will often try and make themselves remembered through deeds, bodies of work, or other types of intangible branding.

We all have plans. We all have a life that we want to do so much with, but we have an hourglass jammed into our spine that we can never forget about. What if your plans were so grand, your life purpose so monumental- you needed to be immortal? Or maybe slightly immortal? There are many different reasons for people to consider immortality. Noble or cruel, cosmetic or genuine.  It’s not always just because a person doesn’t want to die, you know. With that in mind, I introduce you to the Golemborn.

Golemborn are elemental hybrids, binding with a living organism to augment that being. Say a wizard is close to death, but his life’s work is still incomplete. He may elect to reach out to an elemental, which is a being composed of simply one…thing. It varies of course. Earth, fire, wind, water, the usual. But what about wood? Stone? Blood? Metal? Fear? Think about it. Anyway, the wizard elects a stone elemental lets say, and strikes up a deal with this being. Whatever that deal may be, once agreed upon, the elemental bestows a portion of his life force into the wizard, and effectively extends his life by several hundred decades.

However, there are side effects.

The wizard will now bear deformation. Which parts of the body depend on the type of pact and what the wizard wanted out of the deal, or the cruelty/mercy of the being they are dealing with. Sometimes the living body can become living stone, or have portions of skin convert into stone.

Internal organs may also be converted into living stone, making this human wizard a completely different organism that is unique in every way- no two Golemborn are the same because the personalities of no two elementals are the same. And depending on what the living being wishes to accomplish with this newfound immortality, different parts of the body are affected to facilitate the living being’s goals.

I’ll post some concept art in the future. In the meantime, think about what would make you want to be immortal. The answer may surprise you. The concept of this post is to highlight my works of fiction, yes. But the concept of a Golemborn is very interesting to me. What would you do with immortality? What would you dedicate your life to? Golemborn know the answers to these questions. Do you?

Warrior Shaman Flash Fiction

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Thas stood in the bar indignant. He hated the stink of them. The people crowding around, hunched.

Stale beer, old wood, glaring eyes. A thug looked at him as they stood nose to nose. A snicker behind him. A drooling grin on the thug. A flash of silver in his hand. They didn’t know what he was. All they knew was that he was a Spellslinger.

That knife blade drove home into his gut, the thug grinning still, but it soon faded. Thas held on to his attacker’s wrist, holding the blade in place. He tried to withdraw, put panic made him frantic and easy to manipulate. Thas stood in the shadows of the bar, the torchlight flickered once, and the thug shrieked in terror at what he saw.

Two tiny blood orange dots of light where this monster’s eyes should be, hidden in the shifting darkness of his hood. Thas leaned in slowly, the expression of childlike terror comical on his attacker’s wizened and heavily scarred face. Finally, the coward made eye contact with Thas. The bar was silent as they waited for his words.

He released this victim, who fell to the floor, dropping his knife which slid several feet away. The thug scrambled backwards towards the exit, scooting back on his ass. Thas advanced, never speaking, blood pouring from the wound in his stomach, his eyes still glowing, trained on the thug. His wound’s blood flow has slowed to a trickle. Thas looked down at the thief, who had clearly wet himself, but not a single soul was laughing.

Thas stared down at this attacker and growled, “run.”

A brief clamor, sounds of panic and hurried feet. It wasn’t long until he found himself alone in the bar, standing in silence.

He didn’t smile.