General Writing

[noodles]

[negzee]

[Sampson]

[negzee]

[pucha]

[Kinokokao]

[negzee]

[Kinokokao]

[Maxine MagicFox]

Wheee~ I've been in a bit of a slump with writing lately. So I decided to try to do something fun and off the wall to get me back in the swing of my story. Not only did this help me to get back my voice for this particular piece but to reacquaint myself with my characters.

I wrote this within the span of an hour. It's un-editted and... well... I doubt it will EVER be published. I just picked a random theme and went with it. Oddly, the theme happened to be about the poor title of my story. This is NOT canon, though it's also a borrowed idea from an earlier version of the story. Waaaay back when I was first coming up with the idea of these books I wrote a story that featured another set of questors (who will show up and pre-date Maxine). The story started out with the boy, Lee, posting up his and his friends advertisement onto a town city bulletin board. On the top of the page was written The Little Questors. I liked the sound of it so much that it stuck as the title for the book - and then became the title for Maxine's book which I decided to write out first.

Spoilered for length.

[spoiler]The Little Questors - Short Story
P. M. Fischer

How The Questors Got Their Name

“Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta!!” Maxine screamed loudly, waving something up in the air that flapped loosely back and forth.

Every eye in the pub turned to stare at the voice, but upon realizing it was nothing more than a twelve year old child, they all returned back to their drinks, chasing her out of their minds.

Kriss burried his face in the palm of his hand, completely embarrassed. “Can she be any more embarrassing?” he muttered quietly to Amar.

The black-robed boy didn’t even raise his head, which lay resting on his arm on to top of the table, to answer back. His full attention was on the black cat in front that was licking up milk from a saucer. “It’s only morning, sprite. She‘s just getting started. There are exactly eighteen more hours left for her to come up with more ways to embarrass herself.”

Shoving her way past the other patrons, Maxine slammed a sheet of paper on the table triumphantly.

Kriss left antenna dropped two meters as he shot her a dubious look. “And… what exactly is this?”

“It’s an empty piece of paper,” Amar answered coldly.

“It’s the answer to our money problems, actually,” Maxine answered proudly, taking a seat at the table. Reaching over, she petted the cat as she continued her explanation, “It’s a flyer, actually. This city has a bulletin board up on display in the town square. And wouldn’t you know it, it’s chalk full of all kinds of advertisements and help-wanted requests for questors such as ourselves.”

“Questors? Is that even a word?” Kriss shot back at her. Shaking his head, he ignored his own question, “No, wait, never mind that. So, what is it exactly that you want us to do?”

“Isn’t it obvious, sprite?” Amar answered, pulling the cat and bowl closer to him out of Maxine’s reach. “She wants us to fill out that paper advertising ourselves.”

“Ourselves?”

“Our services!” Maxine shouted again, a smug smile across her face.

“Our services? And… just what kind of services are we providing here?” Kriss asked, getting more and more impatient by the second.

Amar sighed, “Our questing expertise.”

“And we get paid for it. That’s the best part! Whatever job someone gives us we get MONEY! MONEY!! You hear that? Money!” She reached over her shoulder and picked up her braid of hair. “Ugg, to be able to afford a bath in a REAL tub. With REAL soap.”

Kriss sighed and pulled the paper closer to him. “So… what exactly do we right on this thing?” he asked, staring between the two of them.

“Oh, wait. I know!” Maxine said, snatching the paper back towards her again. She began the motion of starting to write something but stopped mid-action when she realized she was missing a crucial tool in the writing process. “Pen please,” she demanded of Kriss with a wave of her hand.

Kriss sighed and reached into the sleeves of his green and yellow habit. When he withdrew his hand again, he had a quill and ink set which he handed over to Maxine reluctantly. Snatching the items up, she dipped the pen and began writing. When she was done she had produced three words at the top of the page.

The Little Questors.

“That’s not a word!” Kriss screeched.

“It is, too!” Maxine snapped. “It’s someone who goes on a quest, you damn sprite!”

“I believe the proper term for that is ‘adventurer,’” Amar chimed in.

“Who asked you, Warlock?” Maxine spat, shooting him a chilling glare. “To hell with the both of you. We’re Questors, and that‘s final!”

“Little… Questors…” Kriss sighed. “Why Little? Couldn’t it have been ‘young,’ instead?” As a creature that was only the size of a three year old human child, Kriss was naturally a little resentful to being called “little” anyways.

“But, doesn’t it just kinda flow off your tongue that way?”

“Fine! Whatever I don’t care,” he growled, digging his hands into the roots of his two antennae. “So, what about the rest of it?”

“The rest?”

“Of the advertisement, you stupid human!”

“Oh, yeah… Ummm… I dunno.”

Kriss palmed his face once more. Regaining his composure, he then looked over at the Warlock who was petting his cat, retracing the places Maxine’s hand had passed. “What about you? You got anything to add to this hair brained idea?”

“Well, I suppose it should start out ‘For Hire:’ and then describe the three of us in some way.”

Liking the idea, Maxine’s pen flew across the paper. “For Hire: One human Magician graduated from the Middle-East Arcadian Magic School.”

“That’s a lie!” Kriss roared. “You didn’t graduate!”

“Oh, suppose I put down the truth then. Fallen Angel Re-incarnate who can see the World of Threads.”

“Keep your voice down, Maxine. Remember. You talking about something like that is how I ended up putting a knife to your back and taking you hostage when we first met? Do you really want a repeat performance from one of these much bigger gentlemen?”

Maxine glared at him. “And what should I put down for you? One human Warlock skilled in the art of assassination.”

Amar’s lips spread out in the chilly sneer of his, “That would be satisfactory.”

She rolled her eyes and started writing again.

“Wait! You’re not going to actually put that,” Kriss flared.

“One human Warlock skilled in the art of Red Magic.”

“It will do,” Amar agreed with a nod. Beside him, Kriss relaxed in his seat. “And what about you, sprite? Here’s one. One sprite, flightless and skilled in the art of - what was it again - Magic Investigation?”

Kriss shot him an injured glare. “Hey! Magic Investigation is very important,” he said defending himself.

“You’re right. You can tell me all the many ways I can kill you with my weakest spell and the many spell possibilities that could counteract them - except for one minor problem. You can’t cast a single one of them.”

“One Sprite,” Maxine interrupted the two of them, “skilled in the arts of holy magic and earth spirit summoning. Knowledgeable about magic.”

Kriss leaned his head for a second, analyzing the sentences in his head before nodding his head in approval. “That sounds about right.”

“Price for services: negotiable. Contact us at the Wyvern Pub.” Grinning broadly, Maxine then held paper up high triumphantly again. “AND WE’RE DONE!” she screamed so loudly that the man closest to her actually dumped his drink down the front of her shirt.

Kriss shot up from his seat, picking up their gear even as Amar also jumped up, mading a quick apology to the man who was just starting to his feet with a look that could kill. Amar then grabbed the arm that she was holding up with the paper and pulled her off the seat. Together the three of them made a swift exit.

Unphased, Maxine didn’t even pause outside of the pub. “You guys just wait here,” she called behind her as she took off at a dead run. “I’ll be back as soon as I hang this up!”

For the third time that morning, Kriss buried his face in the palm of his hand. “And she’s the Weaver Reborn?”

“The Elemental of Time must have had His hands full if she’s anything like His predecessor.”

“You know, the legends never say what exactly happened to Drakkar. I’d bet money that Remus found some deep dark hole and buried Him in it forever.”

Amar shook his head and sighed, picking up his cat, “Come on. Let’s go find her before she finds some other new way to embarrass us.”

The End.

Saddly, The Little Questors were never hired. And their money troubles persisted…
[/spoiler]

[Kinokokao]

:3

I had flash of inspiration last night for a world. Let me summarize it for you:

[spoiler]

People live in dense, walled, fortified towns, always along water, which they use to moat their towns -- a water barrier is crucial, and going across this barrier is dangerous. They've established themselves in a chain of civilization going from the headwaters of the mountains downriver to a lake, and then the ocean eventually. They're surrounded by a dense, deep forest and it is within this forest that some threat lurks; some type of "monster" (currently unknown, it's not infinitely important right now)

The cities are largely independent from each other and connected by a common bond, culture, and economy, based on river trade -- the river is the way they navigate. Debating some specifics about the this scenario, but that's the gist of it. The cities function like trade outposts and control centers; I'm thinking loosely of 11th century Russian or Quattrocento Italianate towns for an inspiration as to the political and social structure -- city Princes/Dukes and a ruling body of magistrates, that sort of thing. Like I said, largely independent, the people don't often fight amongst themselves due to the unified culture/economy and external threat; most political strife is limited to the pecking order of the individual ruling houses and such, rather than large-scale military pursuits.

[/spoiler]

Not sure what I'll be doing with this world, but there it is.

[Maxine MagicFox]

[Sampson]

I really want to read your take on the equestrian fornication of Poseidon and Demeter.

And when writing about Persephone, try not to make it all "OMG PERSEPHONE HATES HER LIFE." And don't make Hades seem evil, since he's really not. As a matter of fact, he has one of highest sets of morals out of all the gods.

Seriously, she could visit the Elysian Fields anytime she wanted to.

Or you could make your book like this:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfSwEaeOsJE&feature=related[/youtube]

You should.

[Maxine MagicFox]

No, I don't think Hades is evil at all! >_< And Cupid is just stupid. He's the one that shot his arrow and made Hades want to kidnap Persephone.

:3 But no, I think in my adaption I would definitely have Persephone falling in love with Hades. I mean, he had to enchant her a little in order to get her to eat those seeds. :3

It won't be a complete tragedy, because I never read it as such. Kinda one of those situations where two strangers are engaged but overtime they fall in love with each other.


*sigh* it's scenes like Poseidon and Demeter that makes me wonder what I will be able to get away with in the way of sex scenes o_O;

But I wonder if this is going to be one of those stories that gets lost when I try to place some "order" into them and gets mentioned in the intro. There's only this one story where they are together and the only thing that comes out of it is Arion - a horse rode by Heracles and then Asta-something (some king in the Troy story). But if I recall, Arion had several other adaptions where he was sired by Gaea in one of them if I recall. ... I mean, the only reason I could think of for recounting this story is just to set up Heracles'.

But even so, how far do I want to go with these stories ^_^;
It's a project that can get complicated very quickly, but, that's why I want to do it, BADDLY. I love these stories. I'm not even sure how I would do it.

Maybe tonight for fun I'll do an adaption of Arachne and see how it comes out. That's my favorite story. <3

[Kinokokao]

[Maxine MagicFox]

^_^; Kino, it was one of the few times that I read a history rant by you and learned nothing, but hopefully it taught some other people stuff.

~_^ Remember, I've had a few classes on this, plus took a little Latin which the teacher backdropped a lot of history for us, and other stuff.

The story of Heracles and Hercules, for example, while they are supposedly the same person, the myths are different and there are some that actually believe they really are two different people.

As for the actual changes in the one original Greek region, this was due to the mere fact that it was an "adoptive religion". While I can't remember the names of who did what, the greeks are a combination of a multitude of religions which were adopted as one group of people went through and conquered them. Instead of tearing apart their beliefs and forcing them to adopt a new way of living, they permitted the people to live as they did. In this way they adopted architecture, schooling, and religions.

My Latin teacher actually explained to me that scholars think that the story of the Minotaur, his labyrinth, and Theseus with Ariadne's thread (WARP WIRE WARP WIRE F.O.E. :3 ) came about with Mino's confusing palace and that he worshipped the bull - but I've seen sources that mention this idea and discredit it, but it's a thought that has stuck in my head as a mere example of how these myths can come to be.

@first line ... my confession: for some reason I associate the gods by one name from one of their counterparts and I can get them all confused. Eros is always Cupid to me and Hades/Pluto is Hades to me as is Persephone. And then there's Hera, but for Hermes I call him Mercury. I TRY to call them by their greek names but I'm not very good at it when I'm chatting on the fly. Athena/Minerva is one of the few that you might see me interchange within the same paragraph. Same with Diana/Artemis - I just love both of those names for those women.

Also, one of the gods of the home, actually THE god of "Hearth and Home" is Hestia/Vesta.

She is rarely known because there's only one and a half myths attributed to her and one "unproven" one. Her "creation" story when she was eaten along with Zeus by their father. Then there was a story Homer told but sometimes with each retelling he would change that character to be a nymph instead. And then there's one mini-myth without historical written document that tells that she use to be one of the top tier olympians before she gave up that seat to Bacchus - however, Bacchus himself is rarely listed as a top tier olympian to begin with anyways. (uhh... because I know Kino will catch me on it... Bacchus is Roman name and Dionysos (OS and US can be used here) is his greek. BACK OFF KINO, I KNOW MY STUFF... most of th etime)

But for better or worse, she's one of those gods that Kino mentions of having no myth attributed to her but still had a LOT of influence.

Vestal Virgins were a group of women who were the ONLY female priests in Rome. These gals DO appear in mythology, including the story of Ilia, a vestal who was raped and gave birth to Romulus and Remus - the founders of Rome.


<3333 god I love these stories.

I'm so rusty, though. Next time I go to a book store I'm going to look up a book on these myths and recapture my thoughts. x_x I actually had to relook up some information on Vesta as I was typing.