Blanc's Writing Block

Chapter 2

On a certain forested area stood a girl with long black hair wearing a sailor uniform. She didn't know how she came here; all of her memories were lost.

Dusting off her uniform, she took a glance of the surrounding forest; it was quiet all around, aside from few strange animals bouncing about.

A voice inside her heart said 'open the menu'.

Muttering the menu, there's a list of drop down widgets concerning her items, skills, equipment etc.

In addition, there's a mini-map of the surroundings in the back of her mind. She was perplexed seeing as the cute animals were marked red and viewing the map's legend, it was labeled 'normal foe'.

The voice told her again 'approach the enemy and hit it before it touches you'.

Out of nowhere, a bamboo sword appeared on the ground. The girl picked it up right away, walked towards the strange animal, who flashed an exclamation mark above its head as she came closer.

...but the girl was faster. As the bamboo sword struck the tip of the strange bouncing animal, there was a message printed in green-border 'Symbol Attack'.

She found herself teleported into a circular grassland bordered by concentric circle of trees, along with two of these strange animals facing her. Both of these animals stood there on the spot unmoving, while the girl saw interfaces similar to a JRPG game in front of her .

The voice told her everything was to know about the battle.

The girl walked towards the enemy and struck a few times; damage numbers began appearing on top of it. She couldn't move from her position after the attack.

As her turn ends, she also couldn't move; only letting the enemy attack her. As damage numbers appear, reducing her overall health pool, she felt a tinge of pain but the amount of damage wasn't life-threatening.

Soon, the enemies were defeated, granting her Credits and EXP points and for some reason this world's system made her force out some embarrassing victory pose and lines.

This one battle also leveled her up, showing the increase in her overall stats.

,,,,

As the girl woke up, it turns out, she was just dreaming from playing games too much.

Fin

...

"Blanny, why is this only one chapter! I find the idea pretty interesting...but really...you...look, even the reviews agreed with me."

While Vert sat on the sofa, reading the story on phone—Blanc moved back to her desk, pretending to double-check the writings on her laptop.

"I really couldn't help it! I didn't even have any idea on how to continue it. I didn't even have any time or energy to make multi-chapter series anymore."

"I'm not an Author myself so..not sure if I understand: I know writing stories aren't easy but, this kind of half-hearted way of posting a chapter and finishing it off right away so abruptly, what would you feel if you read such a story?"

"To be honest, I...hadn't been reading stuff like that so I didn't know what to feel."

"Do you have stories that you especially enjoy?"

"Of course! I'm a big fan of adventure stories made by Falcom, I mean the stories had so much detail and immersion, it feels like I was actually there and going on adventures! Well, Vert—I know what you're thinking but I just couldn't write like her. It's best for me to find the best kind of stories that feel comfortable to do."

"I don't think it works that way, Blanc. You may think that stories and the Authors were linked by fate but aren't the biggest thrill of creating was being able to create whatever you want? If you could only create whichever that you feel is best, wouldn't it become boring?"

"I used to have that mindset. Honestly, I'm kind of afraid of working myself too hard over a story, correcting the plot-holes and stuff. Not finding joy in writing and ended up being stressed, it affect my actual work. That's why I couldn't go all out while writing...eh, it's not like I wish to be a professional or anything—I'm just a hobbyist so isn't it fine just writing however I want?"

"Even if you say 'write however you want', aren't you complaining about your slump right now, Blanc? Do you really wish to get out of your slump or do you just wish for someone to console you?"

"I...sigh...I truly don't know what I wish for, Vert. I originally just need a stress relief from work when I started picking up this hobby many years ago. When I tried again, it made me sleepy and bored. It's probably because my writings are so boring."

"Blanc, if you don't like it anymore, why don't you stop?"

"Vert. I...LIKE writing but...no matter how much effort I put, I couldn't manage to finish a single story."

"As much as I want to read your next work—does it matter whether you could finish it or not? Isn't it more important to enjoy what you're doing?"

"You really don't understand anything. I truly want to finish what I wrote and share it to the world...but there's something that made me unable to finish no matter what."

"Why don't you just force your way through and finish it anyway? You're not waging a war when pros and cons should be weighed. You're not writing for a big-time project with lots of money involved. Looking at your profile, it's not as if you're trying to satisfy the expectations of many others, right?"

"Ugh...when you say it outright, it stings."

"What I wish to say is, you have nothing to lose even if you came up with something bad. Actually, you don't even have to care about anything else and just finish it because you want to, right?"

"To be honest, I'm kinda afraid of writing bad things. I don't know if I could withstand when those critics tried to roast my writings outright."

"I don't think it would change, no matter how good and bad your story is. If people didn't like it, they could pull over everything to prove their point true. You can't please everyone, but if you don't put yourself first, I don't think it's ever worth going so far.

If you don't do it for your own satisfaction, I think it's stupid to keep going, with the meager amount of appreciation that you get. Plus, it's not like you had all day to write, right? You had to spend quite a portion of the time people could use to do something else.

Alas, it's a given that you'd be better at it the more you write, but if you didn't enjoy it nonetheless—what's the point?"

"In short, only do something if the reward is worth the effort?"

Blanc rested her head on her palm, pondering about all the things the blond girl told her.

"You could say it that way...sigh, I think I had enough of this serious talk. I much prefer nonchalant topics."

"Let me pour you some tea."

...

It was a chilly afternoon at Lowee. The girls were drinking tea: one seated at the sofa, wholly enjoying the taste. The other was drinking as she typed the words on her laptop.

"How's it going, Blanny?"

Vert put down her tea as she already finished sipping it.

"It's coming out pretty well, but I'm not sure whether to make it into a multi-chapter series."

"I don't expect such a change of heart so soon."

"I was just thinking, Vert. Maybe the main cause why I couldn't come up with anything was due to those misleading ideas. On how artists should not rush their work and wait for the right struck of inspiration before proceeding. On how they should wait and take their time while working on something. It may not necessarily be true."

"Go on, I'm interested."

"The truth is, they could just create anything they want, regardless of the mood, inspiration and everything like that. None of it truly matters in the end. All you got to do was create the stuff you have in mind and work on it until you've finished for the time being.

If you want to do it, you just got to do it right away. That's all there's to it. I never knew it was actually so simple."

"Well, that does not mean you always have to rush it straight away though. I believe taking your time and not overworking yourself is also important. Since it's a hobby, why don't you think of it the same as playing games?"

"Yeah, I know. By the way, Vert...I just thought about something."

"Hmmm?"

"Maybe I didn't even amount to anything much these days because I had the loser mindset. That I got to wait for the right opportunity and finding what kind of person I was; the things that were meant for me.

..and then I thought: what if you actually could become anything you want? That there's no such limitations as talent, age, or anything. You just have to do your best and eventually, you'd become the person you aspire to be? It'd be great if I could be someone like that.

I think I won't be afraid anymore of failing. Even if it turn out bad, it's something I created for my own satisfaction."

"...even if you say that, don't forget that you're the leader of a nation. You may not think of it as much, given how long you've been doing it already. This time, you have to do your best, not only to become the person you aspire to be, but for the citizens of the nation who looked up to you."

"That goes without saying."

"Well then, I shall do my best for my own nation. Until next time, Blanny...let's see if Lowee could keep up the majority of the Shares again."

"Hmph."

"Heh."

Vert transformed to her HDD form and flew outside the Basilicom. Blanc closed the window, letting in the radiator work to its efficiency, warming the room up.

Finally posting the first fanfiction she ever done in this year, Blanc looked up at the past reviews on her previous stories. She remember a certain user that's always there from the very beginning.

"Thank you...Belle."

Not long after, Rom and Ram came back from the Amusement Park with Mina. Since she already finished her stuff, she thought: guess it wasn't so bad to spend some time with her sisters.

"Welcome back Rom, Ram."

After all, even if they lived forever, those kind of relationships shouldn't be taken for granted.

Even if she think of writing as an important thing in life, spending time with her sisters were the same.

"I hope this peaceful days will continue on forever..." thought Blanc as she merrily played the party games with Rom and Ram.

Fin.

Author's Note :

I made Lowee having the most shares due to the recent data shared by my buddy, of Nintendo consoles dominating the entire market, followed by Playstation.

Xbox consoles, on the other hand, hardly sold anything at all. Do your best, Vert!

As for Neptune...well, Sega consoles actually didn't exist anymore after Dreamcast iirc (Uzume the last Sega-rai). At the very least, they're still making cool af games though.

On how Vert seem to know a bit about writing even if she's not an Author.

Just remember on how she was made a judge of a writing competition way back. She probably had done a fair share of reading and communicating with other Authors too.

Anyway, thanks for reading thus far. I will do my best and write more too!