I had many ideas for NaNoWrimo.
This wasn't one of the good ones, but it's the one I'm managing to write.
Behold, a contemporary re-imagining of the origin of Marisa Kirisame along with a creative reinterpretation of a certain incident.
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You know, the one kind of advice that really used to piss me off?
"Follow your dreams."
It still kind of does, you know? To start with, this kind of cookie-cutter statement is so old and stale that you'd swear mold should be growing on it, and yet it's still smeared on the side of practically every disney knock-off and fantasy novel. You'd think by now that people would be fed up with it. And then there's the question of what the hell is a 'Dream' anyway? It's all very well and good to say 'if you want to do something, then go do it', but how do you about picking something to actually do? If you're a kid in highschool that's just bored by the classes, fed up with the cliques, and just doesn't see the point in just about anything, what kind of dream are you supposed to be chasing after?
Do you break your back studying topics that bore the shit out of you, in the vain hope that maybe if you do well enough you'll get enough scholarships to scrape through college with only enough debt to last until you're middle-aged, all so you can work some soul-crushing office job?
Do you try and break into the entertainment world and consign yourself to the possibility of just being eternally poor with the faintest possibility that just maybe one day you might end up 'discovered' and force the stars to align well enough to actually make you somebody in an industry filled with desperate people hungry for any kind of success at all?
I'm over-simplifying shit a bit of course, because when this all began that's basically what I thought. I was a high-schooler who was fed up with the rat-race bullshit and didn't see a way out that didn't involve a ton of crushing work that I'd hate.
I got lucky in the end though.
I found a 'Dream' worth chasing, and you know that saying about how if you're working doing something you love, it might as well not be working? I got something like that going for me too.
Anyway, let me introduce myself.
My name's Marisa Kirisame. Your stereotypical witch.
I like sappy romances, tea, studying magic, flying, explosions, and winning through overwhelming firepower.
And this is is where my story begins.
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Most stories start off with the protagonist being in a position of weakness. This display makes them more relatable, sets an easy villain that they can take down to show their growth, and can even create a counterpoint for later when they have the chance to face their problems again with a fresh mindset or new bullshit powers. The delinquents making trouble seem so petty after doing some world-saving bullshit, and the contrast created is easy to see and understand.
This story starts off with me as one of those delinquents cutting school.
We weren't so much 'friends' as we were mutual acquaintances who'd hang out together to take the edge off the boredom. Which mostly meant going around picking fights. With each other, with thugs from other schools, it didn't really matter. Although we were usually a bit more careful with each other than we would be with assholes just showing up. At the very least, they agreed to not try pulling my hair. It was pretty scraggly, like the rest of me was, but it was pretty much my only real expression of femininity. I was short and built like a ruler. Thin, whippy, and flat on all sides.
Now, I could say something like 'we enjoyed a deep bond' or 'that we fought for justice and friendship', but people think I lie enough already. We just enjoyed the fighting and the struggle. It's something hellish and painful and was less about thinking and more about reacting. I went home to my old house glad that it was empty sometimes, because explaining all those bruises, black-eyes, and split lips would not have been fun. Setting aside the painful bits, just losing yourself in the moment where there was just the next punch and thinking long term meant a couple of seconds ahead, was something that I liked. It was a distraction that demanded every ounce of my attention. The world narrowed from an insanely long and boring one way road to actual choices and decisions where the impact of your mistakes and successes was felt in seconds.
Anyway, to sum up an afternoon of general poor behavior, I fought a lot, had some nasty bruises, and had won in the end. Even if I got knocked down a bunch and ruined a set of uniform pants, I got back up and thrashed him. Rocky might be bullshit in a lot of ways, but he had a point about it being more about picking yourself up to keep going.
So, there I am, bloody, bruised, thoroughly triumphant, and paying absolutely zero attention to my surroundings, when I crash into someone. At the time, I didn't really pay attention to her face or what she was saying. Most of it boiled down to a disappointing sigh and quiet muttering about dumb thugs. But she had been carrying a bunch of books when we ran into each other, and when provided the opportunity to be a 'Good Samaritan' to a person who'd already made it pretty clear just what she thought of me...
I just walked off with one of her books neatly tucked into my jacket while she was busy stacking the rest back up.
It's funny how much of life is made up of these simple coincidences. If I had grabbed any other book, not been a total jerk and stolen one at all, or just been paying any sort of attention to where I was going and not walked into her like a dumb ass...
Well, there's no point in lingering on the what-ifs.
The end result was I stole my first grimoire from Patchy before I even knew what it was, and later that night my first meeting with Mima.
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The thing you have to realize, is that once upon a time, I had no idea how weird this world really was. The world was unquestionably logical, gods were pure fiction, youkai only existed in folktales, you get the idea. The point is that my worldview wasn't always as cosmopolitan as it is these days.
So, when I got home and actually decided to take a look at the book I had borrowed without the intent to return, I was slightly disappointed to see what looked less like an actual book I could read and more like a film prop in a cheesy fantasy movie. The cover was thick and well worn leather, there was a genuine metal clasp, and the title was actually embossed on the spine.
'Mima's Guide to Transcending Petty Mortal Boundaries'.
I treated the book with all the respect it seemed to deserve at that moment. I lobbed it onto the kitchen table where it landed on the clasp. There was a nasty crack and that was it for the little piece of metal. It broke, and I could not give less of a shit. My knuckles were still a bit sore from slugging people in the face and I was hungry. Dinner was spaghetti and nobody was going to make it for me. So, I set to work. Got the water boiling, fried some meat for the sauce, the usual. I'm not a great cook, but I can certainly manage the absolute basics and avoid burning water at least.
It was still kind quiet. I had actually felt a little lonely for a second.
"Man, you've got some interesting eyes there, kid." Then Mima spoke her first words to me. And thus, I had the ever loving-shit scared out of me because a green haired woman dressed like a wizard who decided to break into my home. This beautiful first impression only improved as I freaked out and threw my plate of spaghetti at her. Of course, Mima's a ghost. She's only about as solid as she wants to be. So because she didn't exactly fancy the idea of being covered in tomato sauce, the plate went straight through her, shattered against the wall, and let the noodles leave a tomato red trail on what used to be a relatively pristine wall.
Naturally, she just laughed it all up and I wouldn't be able to focus on anything except the fact that apparently I was now either hallucinating or had an actual ghost in my house. I wouldn't think to ask her what she meant about my eyes for a long time, and because this was the kind of joke that only got better with age, she'd wouldn't bring it up unless I decided to ask her about it.
And that's the basics of how I started to get involved in a world that I had absolutely zero business sticking my neck into.
... What do you mean I'm a terrible story-teller and I'm leaving a bunch of shit out? Fine, if you really want all the boring little details, then I guess I can start over and lay them all out 'properly'.
Should I begin with 'Once upon a time', too?
