Truth's Little Hero Author's Notes
Ahhhh, we're to start? Well, how about we start with the story? Did ya like it? Was it weird to read and hard to understand? Yeah, that's normal then lol, idk I always end up writing stuff that even when I'm editing it makes hardly any sense. I think the way I describe things is weird and idk. I really write for myself, I understand everything I'm writing, but idk if others will understand it when I share. I edited this story at least three times before I posted and I know there are still mistakes. One's that are obvious and one's that might not be so obvious to me lol.
Now for some insight on the content and how it came to be!
Hevin is a play on the word 'Heaven'. I honestly can't remember how i came up with it but I think it started with the slur Hev. I had that as a slur in my head and was like "what can I build off this???" and thus Hevin was born. But then pronouncing it like Heaven was weird, thus "heev-ihn" was born. In my head I say Hev as "hehv" and Hevin as "hee-vihn" even though that would been grammatically incorrect. Hev should be pronounce "heev" but that sounds weird so I say, "hehv" lol (idk if you saw the similarity but that's why I made The Wing's called The Wings. They're supposed to represent angels in a sense to the Hevin people, since Hevin is a play on the word Heaven.)
Ethrean is a play on the word 'ethereal' and mixed with the word Korean, kinda. This was the first word I created for this story and originally hadn't planned on making a second race of people, but it would have only made sense to do that.
Since this was basically based off of WWII, it'd be a bit obvious to see what relates to what.
The Ethrean people and those who started the war were in reference to Nazi-Germany and their disdain toward people of Jewish decent and anyone that didn't fit the Aryan race. In turn, the Hevin people were in reference to those who did not fit the Aryan race.
The country of Naechural basically represents the country of Switzerland. Switzerland was a neutral country at the time and often acted as a refuge to those trying to escape the war. Naechural is also a play on the word neutral (went through a tough time trying to get a good name for it)
The landscape of this place was based of the video game Half Life 2. If you haven't ever heard of it or played it then that's fine. All you had to do was imagine a desolate modern world of earth, kinda. The idea of the Underground Railroad came from Half Life 2 from the people who were freeing themselves from military control (the military in the game is bad btw-the Combine) The combine from Half Life 2 have distinct uniforms and voices in the game that were also inspired for the Ethrean military in this story. However, the voices in the game are suggested to be non-human. I was not trying to aim for that, the Ethrean military is very much human-just creepy lol.
(Inspiration was gonna come from U.S. history in slavery with the whole Underground Railroad thing, but I decided any references I was trying to make would be just too much related to Half Life and WWII)
Idk if you caught on but any other town names I created had subtle hints to Korean sounding towns.
I just wanna share with you guys where the inspiration for this story actually came from.
Many moons ago, I had a dream. In this dream I was a spy who was traveling the world alone bc the entire country I was in was practically abandoned. In my dream I came across an a little Asian boy who was from the enemy side. He was supposed to be of high status-like rich or something. But the war paid its toll on him and he was alone in the woods and angrily hitting me with a stick. But I kicked him to the ground and refused to let the kid tag along. Eventually i let him tag along idk how tho (this dream is very old, at least four years) and we traveled the country to a city that was under attack. There's one scene in Truth's Little Hero that was from my dream, exactly as I saw it. It's the scene were the little girl runs across the street with a little boy next to her. She's basically a dark figure running across the street and there are fires on the buildings, creating a trench like path behind them. And soldiers stomping their way through the streets to annihilate anything in their path. Idk it's always been a very vivid image in my head, and I feel as if I didn't do a good job recreating it int he story. (Btw my dream also had a back story. I was like spy alongside Yunho and Jaejoong from DBSK and I was in love with Jaejoong but Yunho loved him and Jajeoong liked me and we were childhood friends that like were separated and put into special training to become killers or something idk lol)
But yeah, in the end I was like ''you know what, I never got a chance to make a story about this, I think now's a good time.'' and then this story developed into something I neVER would have imagined lol
I'm also an aspiring actress, and one thing we've been learning about is how children are very close to capturing the truth. A lot of my actor's work relates to being true to the moment and to our character. All first year of college and acting studies had been teaching me things of that. I thought it was an interesting thought and really wanted to incorporate it into the story!
As for Jongdae-I still have no freakin clue what he is. Like he's literally a monster created from experiments. Like Minseok got his hands on a demon book and summoned some sort of dark essence that desired for nothing more than to kill. Like I know that's a little inappropriate since I don't know, but that's literally what I'm going to keep it as. I think it helps add to the fact that nobody knows what it is.
*Commander Fan is indeed Wu Yi Fan. *EDIT: I JUST REALIZED SOMETHING. WHY WOULD IT BE COMMANDER FAN? IF I WANTED A LAST NAME IT SHOULD BE COMMANDER WU. BUT IF I WANTED A FIRST NAME IT WOULD BE COMMANDER YI FAN. RIGHT?? LIKE, FUCK. I DIDN'T THINK THAT ONE THROUGH CLEARLY....
Idk if you saw the similarities but Hevs are the Chinese members and Ethrean are the Korean members
The flashbacks are not in a particular order. Random bits piecing the past together is all.
The part when Minseok freaked out over Yixing having bone meal on his neck is significant. Concentration camps cremated bodies dead or alive, meaning their ashes usually went up into the air and back into the ground. Bone ash is still found in the ground of abandoned concentration camps-leaving the ground slightly white and has a different texture. Those in the camps were often coated in the ash of the cremated bodies-leaving them pale and such. Minseok knew all too well of what bone meal was, it brought back memeories he wished stayed hidden.
SEQUEL IS HERE
In regards to the title. I know the title is kinda super cliché but it was something that was honest and true to the story. A play on words if you caught on. I figured it was original enough to use despite how cliché it may sound. It also gives the wrong feeling for the story, it sounds like something you'd pick up at a bookstore to read to your children. But instead you are given this angsty piece of shit lol.
I'm totally aware of how rushed and babyish the ending is. It almost doesn't fit the story, but I feel as if it was needed. Many of you were probably expecting a death, but idk. I couldn't do it just yet. I've always sorta had trouble with endings, I always start so many fics and never finish so I don't have much practice with them.
Idk about you but while writing this I kinda saw the filmography of "I Am Legend". Idk whenever I write a fic I always see it as a movie in my head and try to write it down. But yeah that's how I kinda pictured this story with the flashbacks and all. (And a little bit of "Hancock" I see some filmography of that in there too)
This was a really long author's note of me being insecure and overly cautious of what I write lol, so I made a separate page to expand. Putting all this at the end of the story would take away from the story's natural feel so ya.
If you have any questions still, please do not hesitate to ask! I understand that my writing is weird... And could cause confusion still, so please ask away!
But if you've made it down this far, I just really wanna thank you for reading the story. It does mean an awful lot and sticking out through this chicken scratch of an author's note is amazing in itself too. So thank you so so soso much. It really does mean a lot. ^-^
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