Writing, in a way, is a terribly boring task. You stare at an empty monitor, move your fingers frantically, and that's all there is to it—watching a blank white page slowly fill with black.
Some might say it's fun, but I don't know. For the act of writing itself to be enjoyable, you'd have to be an emotionless psychopath who doesn't know what boredom is, or someone who giggles at the sight of a mosquito buzzing around.
Writing isn't fun. You only feel joy and a satisfying sense of accomplishment after it's done, when you look at the finished piece. The process itself is endlessly boring.
Nevertheless, there are two cases where writing is fun. The first is during a growth period—when you're thoroughly enjoying watching your own skills improve.
If even I can see my writing getting noticeably better—if my sentences, descriptions, and dialogue are all leaps ahead of before—then what could be fun if not writing?
Human beings are wired to enjoy their own growth, to feel pleasure from it. Whenever you improve even slightly, the corners of your mouth rise, and your chest tingles like a pubescent boy falling in love.
Then what's the second?
It's simple. It's what's commonly called 'writing motivation.'
The reason writing is fun? It's because I wanted to write it. The scene I wanted to write. The sentence I wanted to write. The line of dialogue I wanted to write. When writing down something you yearned for, your fingers inevitably move faster.
But motivation to write isn't necessarily about writing what you want. Some people start serializing fueled by the desire to see different stories of works they love. In my case, I was writing fueled by the reactions from the reader gallery.
In the end, 'writing motivation' can be anything you like. You can even write just because you want to see a stupidly cute pretty girl flapping her short little arms and legs as she scampers about.
Like how your heart pounds in front of someone you like, writers are fundamentally beings who can grow endlessly as long as it's to write what they love.
It's the same principle as a clean fighter beating one on steroids and illegal drugs after receiving cheers from his beloved wife. Liking something gives strength to the one you like so they can achieve and obtain what they desire.
In other words, writing motivation is an author's stimulant, an author's launchpad, the final goal that an author's mind desires.
...Of course, it's not always a good thing. Writing motivation helps with writing, but if you start serializing based solely on it, the moment that motivation disappears, the story's lifespan ends.
If you wrote looking only to your motivation, then without that motivation, wouldn't there be no reason to write?
Furthermore, as I said before, writing is absolutely not an enjoyable activity. It only feels fun thanks to motivation. Without it, it's no different from talking to a wall.
In that sense, I was a first-rate author. My actual writing skills were at best second-rate, but in terms of finding meaning in the act of writing itself, I was first-rate.
"...Heheh..."
[Did it please you so very much? They even cursed at you to insult you?]
"That wasn't an insult. It was praise for my writing."
I'm the kind of guy with great fuel efficiency whose writing motivation fills to the brim from a single praise post, a single compliment.
Of course, I'd almost never received praise in the reader gallery. Actually, it wasn't almost never—it was practically nonexistent.
Most compliments were in the comment section of the novel I serialized on Novelpia. In the reader gallery, I only got cursed at, never praised.
So I felt even better. The reader gallery had praised me. Those picky bastards, those who laughed mockingly and said "this novel is retarded," those who brought out knives to figure out how to murder my novel the moment something felt slightly off—they praised my writing.
So I couldn't stand it. I wanted to write. I wanted more praise. I simply couldn't contain myself.
It felt similar to why a man's heart races for no reason when he sees an aggressive woman, or why a woman can't let go of a guy even though she knows he's a real fucking bastard.
Such people usually have moments where they act warm or do something nice just once. Because it contrasts so sharply with their usual behavior, it gets imprinted on the prefrontal cortex for life, making it unforgettable.
[How can a curse become praise...? I truly do not understand...]
"Why, it's like asking a woman 'did it feel good, you fucking bitch?' after you bumped uglies."
[Ugh.... Is that... what it feels like..? I understand.. Mm...]
Of course, human thought and memory are relatively weak to shock. If there's a bigger shock, they temporarily break down.
"...You... heard it...? Words like that...?"
[....]
"....Really? You said you were originally... a man..?"
[L-Lord Hairo didn't say such crude words..!!]
"...If he didn't say crude words... then you did... other things, right...?"
[....]
"Hoo...."
The sentences that had been shooting out, my fingers that had been moving frantically, stopped. A brief silence filled the room, and my broken brain spun wildly, trying desperately to think.
[W-what are you looking at like that!!]
"I didn't see anything. I can't even see you in the first place. You're just a voice inside my head."
[You definitely looked!! Y-you insolent...!! Don't... don't look at me with those eyes..!!!!]
"Ah, yes. I see. Understood."
...I messed up.
Another me. Someone clearly different from me, yet unmistakably me. The fact that such a being—someone who was originally a man—had done it with a man felt violently jarring to me.
Of course, whenever he talked about his Lord Hairo, I had thought this bastard was a lost cause with how he giggled away and gave off a female scent, but realizing he had actually gone all the way to the end was information I couldn't handle.
Honestly, a bastard who was originally a man doing it with a man... that's no different from being gay, is it?
[I-I'm serious...! If you keep this up, I'll sulk...! I'll sulk completely and keep bothering you....!]
Now that I looked, that wasn't it. Even though this bastard was originally male, the way he talked in my head marked him as just a female specimen from the start. He was a female who had already lost his mind to his flesh, deluding himself into thinking he was a man. So maybe falling in love with a man was only natural.
...But that's me. I entered the body of female Ha Seoyun, my consciousness mixed with female Ha Seoyun's, and for some reason at that time, he got sucked in together... If you had to describe him, he feels like a senior advisor.
If that advisor-senpai, who became female before me, who lived a second life to achieve another me's dream first, had turned into such a female... if she couldn't overcome the body and her mind turned from male to female...
Then would I too...?
"No, fuck!!!!"
[U-urk...?! Why are you screaming all of a sudden...!!]
"...I had a fucked-up imagination. It's your fault, so take responsibility."
[H-how is that my fault...]
"Ah, you don't have to take responsibility, just please be quiet. Let me rest for a bit."
My barely-recovered thoughts shattered into pieces in an instant. Figures, with my useless imagination befitting a writer, I had to go and see a future that didn't exist from A to Z.
No. That person is me, but not me. The name is different too. The genre isn't modern, it's fantasy. I know that's me. Through instinct, or something spiritual—I don't know what—but I know it. That was definitely me.
But the environment he lived in was different, the world was different, anyway... there were too many differences. So I'm not him. I'm not someone who gives off a female scent just by thinking of one person.
I'm not. I'm not, dammit. I'm not.
[I can talk now, right...]
"Shut up."
[Unngh.. okay...]
It took roughly ten minutes before I could start writing again.
***
There had been a slight incident in the middle, but thanks to having the excellent writing motivation that was the reader gallery, I was able to write for five hours straight without even going to the bathroom.
The words kept flowing, the character count rapidly increasing, and as a result, I completed another five chapters of roughly 5,000 characters each.
Of course, a novel with only five chapters couldn't have plot hooks stretching out for long, so my vitality charging station quickly disappeared... but it was fine. Rereading what I wrote and rereading the comments, somehow squeezing satisfaction out of them, improved my mood.
...Though feeling like shit after writing was an unavoidable order of operations.
"I feel like I'm going crazy..."
[Do not fret so much! Was not her wish ultimately to become an author? You are fulfilling her wish, so do not think so deeply!]
"You're right. But it doesn't work out as easily as I think. How should I put it... it's just, yeah."
Fundamentally, I was the male Ha Seoyun. But I took over female Ha Seoyun's body, and female Ha Seoyun's memories, her entire life and consciousness, mixed together with mine.
Mixing black paint with black paint just gives you black paint, but nevertheless, the two clearly mixed. Even if it didn't show, two paints had mixed to become a new paint.
That was why. Every time I wrote a story, the guilt of packaging someone else's story as my work coexisted with the sensation of exposing my private shame that shouldn't be made public, creating a truly terrible feeling that wouldn't wipe away easily, like grease stuck to a plate.
The feeling that I wasn't myself. That the me who wasn't me sold my story without the me who wasn't me caring about feelings.
Even as I spoke, I didn't know what kind of bullshit this was, but it was real. I ignored myself, I loathed myself, I hated myself, and I wasn't myself.
But it was clearly me, I was okay, and I wrote.
Confusion seized my head again, and mental unease made me think plenty of thoughts I didn't want to think once more.
"How on earth did you endure it.."
[..You will endure it in the end. It may be difficult right now, but it is possible. Because you are me!]
And from that standpoint, Harse's words were a great comfort. Having gone through something similar before me, he told me I could do it, which was quite reassuring.
Although calling him reassuring was a stretch since he had shown considerable femininity... he was so reassuring now that it made me forget all of that.
[But don't you feel a bit hungry..? Hmm-hmm..]
However, that reassuring demeanor didn't last long. The gentleman who had been so reassuring just moments ago looked like a cute child watching my reaction just from asking if I was hungry.
...Still, it helped. Just as she said, I was hungry right now. Of course I was—how could I not be hungry when I hadn't eaten yesterday or today?
Humans are creatures that must eat food to live. If you don't eat, you'll become nothing but bones, and through extreme diet success, your weight will drop to the 20-kilogram range. Looking at this small, fragile body, even the 10-kilogram range might be possible.
Appetite is one of humanity's most basic desires. A powerful primal desire strong enough to make you forget mental anguish for a while.
"Let's eat something."
[Good! Let us eat something delicious!]
To eat, I came out of my room and opened the living room refrigerator. The refrigerator interior was divided into three levels: the bottom filled with beer, the second level packed with energy drinks.
...It was a familiar sight. The original me had also filled their refrigerator like this, so I wasn't surprised. It's just that I remembered a fact I had forgotten, and with that fact spread out right before my eyes, I could only sigh.
[...From what I can surmise from the memories, is this not a machine for storing food to prevent spoilage?]
"That's right."
[Then why is there no food at all...?]
"It's a sad sight."
There was no rice in the refrigerator. No side dishes. The only thing there was a steamed chicken with swollen glass noodles that I had shoved deep inside, thinking I'd eat it someday.
"This is all the money I have."
I checked my account to order delivery, but the empty account was useless, and the crumpled bill I suddenly remembered and found while rummaging around the room was just a single 10,000-won note.
No food...?
No, it's fine. Ten thousand won isn't exactly chump change. It's plenty expensive money. The problem is delivery food prices have gone crazy; there had to be food you could buy with ten thousand won.
...Come to think of it, even eating at a restaurant was pretty expensive these days. It was questionable whether there was food you could buy with a single 10,000-won bill.
Conclusion.
Let's go, to the convenience store.
To the dreamland where you can have a meal for ten thousand won.
"Uh.."
[Went to the bathroom.. Sorry.. (ㅡㅡ;)7]
No convenience store.....?