《Welldark》Author’s Note – Welldark Book 1
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HELLO!
Before anything else, I want to thank the proofreaders that have accompanied me along this project. My first thanks goes out to Omnius, who has steadily supplied me with feedback all the way through the making of this book. He is closely followed by Dan and Lim, both of whom often gave me advice in terms of planning and a good amount of feedback themselves. Further thanks go out to WolfOfParis, Dawodd, and everyone else who helped with the project in any ways, however little.
A second group that deserves my thanks is YOU, my ‘normal’ readers. I appreciate that you decided to give these stories of mine your time. Be it for the lewds, the banter, the worldbuilding or whatever else may make you interested in my body of work, I’m glad to supply entertainment. A special thanks to all my Patrons who support me financially and make writing a possible effort, financially.
Now, to start with my actual Author’s Note.
In case this is the first of my works you have read, let me introduce myself. I go by Funatic and I write stories of the kind I like to read. Originally, this was limited to some porn on a website (CHYOA.com) I frequented. That site has a branching function that allows people to add their own spin to stories, as long as the owner of that story is fine with it. I used it to add the kind of erotica I liked to read, whether that was in terms of quality, attention to certain details over others, or kinks.
As my skill grew, I got a bit higher aspiration. I wanted to write stories that were good without the lewd bits and just have lewd bits in them for whoever might enjoy them.
Aside from one project, which is deliberately all porn, I think I have succeeded in this. Sure, this very book wears its intention on its sleeve, Karitas is an open pervert, but I would say I have brought to you more than just pornography. If you come to my body of work just to have a quick wank, I think you won’t leave satisfied anyway…
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Anyway, I write stories with attractive characters and when I feel it's appropriate, I make the attractive characters bang. I have no publisher that stops me, no employer to justify my decisions to, just my own creativity to rely on, on whose basis I may fail or succeed. God bless the Free Market.
Welldark originally spawned in March 2019, when I was bored and decided to create a little prologue for a premise I had in mind already. There were a couple of goals: 1. A situation in which harems were logical. 2. Monster girls 3. University setting 4. Dimensional travelling. The shape this took pretty quickly resembled a mixture of Highschool DxD and RWBY. I don’t care to hide the parallels, but I don’t plan to skirt particularly close to either in terms of actual content. I regard both as rather poor in terms of storytelling. The mechanics are interesting enough though.
As I realized I did want to write this but also knew I would be hard-pressed to make this another weekly release project, I decided to try another approach and actually write a book for once. Usually, I write a chapter, let the proofreaders check it for spelling and logic mistakes and push it out there without really editing a whole lot. I wondered (and still wonder at the time of writing this) how my body of work would change if I finished an entire book first and then took the time to refine the entire thing.
The decision was made, I started writing Welldark and, about a year later, on the third of May 2020, I had the first draft finished. That was also when I wrote this note.
I like the book I wrote and the world attached to it, from what has been shown to what is beyond the current scope of necessary details. I hope you like as well what came of the final draft.
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Originally, I had pretty big plans for what would all happen in the first book, but to get to any actual action, I would have needed to rush the romance along and I just didn’t want to do that. I have botched a fair bit of romance plots in my days because I wanted to get to something else. At least for this book, I wanted to make the love something that felt like it came about believably.
So, it was basically all about Esther and Karitas, with some structural building blocks of Welldark at the side. Those will be necessary going forwards. I have a good number of ideas where I want to take the story next. More harem/Anomalia members are a given. I don’t think it’ll surprise anybody if I say that a few have been shown already in this book, be it only for a few paragraphs.
I don’t think I will dedicate a book to the addition of any one girl. More likely, a lot of plots will run in parallel and some will resolve whenever it is natural, as life runs its course. That is how I prefer to plot things. For the moment, I will concentrate on what ideas I have for Karitas’ university years. Should this world prove to be popular by the end of then, then I will likely continue with my adventures beyond. If not, then I will find an appropriate ending point.
That’s talking years into the future though.
What follows is 2021 Funatic. The first round of edits has been completed.
I discovered a couple of things in the process. Mostly just how much I improved between the first and last chapter of the book. Early chapters were almost entirely rewritten, be it due to character inconsistencies, bad speech patterns, or (most frequently) strictly awfully constructed paragraphs.
The increase in quality is undeniable. Perhaps I will make the first draft of this book available along the published version, just for people curious on what changed. I will have to ponder if that is a worthwhile thing to do. (Note: I ultimately decided against this).
As big as the quality increase is, I also discovered that I loathe editing. It is incredibly dull to read what you wrote yourself, knowing every intention and every follow-up sentence. It’s the literary equivalent of playing Minecraft with cheats enabled. You may build something grand, but did you really earn it? Similarly, can you enjoy a narrative construction you know inside out already?
I will stick to it, because it is a good thing to do for the final product. It’s just boring, is what I am getting at. Not that this, being my job, can and should only consist of things that please me. I just shouldn’t hate my life because of it. Ultimately, the goal is to provide the best story I can. This aids in that goal so some suffering is completely bearable.
I’m basically just rambling at this point. I just don’t know what much to say, so I guess I will keep to the good old adage that silence is gold and say my goodbyes.
Hope to see you for Welldark Book 2,
Funatic.
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AOT: Boats
I know, the title doesnt seem to make sense. Its an acronym. For what? Hm. T means True. Up to you otherwise. Oh, right. The acronym actually does have an impact on one of the themes of the "story". At the same time I mixed it up with a reference to the original plan for this when I started, so yay. A double. Well, actually, a triple. Again, up to you. I should also mention that, as the rhyme that starts the story probably tells you, its gonna get kinda disturbing. All kinds of disturbing. Just to let you know.
8 182The Humanity Initiative (discontinued)
Virtual gaming has been around for ages. Many live their entire lives online, not caring about what’s left of the real world. The few who do, fear nuclear annihilation. The risk of an unfortunate chain reaction is too large to ignore, but as of now, prevention is impossible. Humanity, in its biological form, would never survive as it is. That’s why the UN has its full focus on “The Humanity Initiative”. The field of genetics shows promising results, but are years from ready. If bombs were to fly tomorrow, something must survive. Recent VR technology has a potential candidate for that something.Farah Al Farzha never plays online, she loathes the very idea of it. She is in love with reality, and competitive fencing is her way to prove it. But when she reluctantly went online, she couldn’t exit, or at least a copy of her consciousness couldn’t.Human, but juridically speaking no more, Farah struggles in a game that would’ve been illegal. To her only consolation, the game is modeled after reality, a place foreign to the gaming brats around her. But what demands do the UN put on potential ‘human’ survivor candidates, and how will natural selection be replaced, when reality is no more? _______________________________________________________________________
8 244Sentinel of the Deep
New chapters Saturday, Monday and Tuesday When Thom's best friend goes missing in the lake in the middle of Juniperville, the townsfolk are out for blood. Thom is the only one who knows about the creature who came out of the lake, who shape-shifted into the young woman who abducted his friend. Seeking answers, he travels to Scotland, where he is invited to join the Modern Folklore Investigation Team (MFIT) as an intern. As he gets closer to an objective truth about the nature and intentions of water beasts, he learns that he has a rare and special power, one with the potential to bring back his friend from the deep. The only one who knows about Thom's power is his MFIT colleague Ondine, who has a secret of her own - one she has repressed for years. Even as Ondine urges Thom back to Juniperville to a reckoning with whatever it was that stole his friend, she realizes that she, too, must face up to the truth of her legacy, and its power.
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(Based off of the "Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted" movie.) 19 year old (Name) (Last Name), a half neko and half human girl has been on two crazy adventures with the gang while going to Monte Carlo to get the penguins and chimps to take them back to New York City when they plane crash in a train yard and meet circus animals who help them escape from French animal-control officer Capitaine Chantel DuBois who is after Alex. (Name) eventually meets Vitaly, a grumpy Russian tiger who seems to try to trust (Name) and the Zoo animal gang until Chantel DuBois captures the Zoo animal gang in order to hang Alex's head on her wall. Will (Name) and Vitaly tell each other how they feel or will it be too late?
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A/N: I was like 19 when I wrote this book. It's not my best work. 😭 Genesis Carter and Jeremiah "East" Wright thought that they had life all figured out until they met each other. Their romance was slow but sure, bringing a world of chaos along with it. Will they defy the odds and hold each other down? Or will unfortunate circumstances break them apart?
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