April 15, 2023 - Secrets Part 2

Wow, we're cranking out the posts this month. My planning was different than usual and I'm very proud.

Yes, I am fully aware that I was supposed to do this every month and now it’s April. But I’m doing it now. I guess Cait’s *lAuNe-LeE-NeSs* was her Secret, but not really… Secrets add dimension to characters. Their own private thoughts and ideas and feelings that make their experiences different from others. And it’s high time that we have an interesting character, so I happily present Benny’s Secret: She can’t swim.

Well, most Mainlanders can’t swim because the Oceans are scary and give you weird, somewhat drunken/drugged experiences shrouded in their respective powers (I doubt anyone remembers my obsessive Oceanic lore post). But certain people have the ability to swim if their Theme etc calls for it. Benny, however, can’t swim. She’s afraid of it. Not of drowning, because the idea/fear of death isn’t really a thing here (basically, you can choose when to die - either relinquish yourself to the Goddess or strip yourself of your Mainland self and go to live in the Capetol. The ladder is significantly less popular, but you can if you want) , but just because she’s afraid of it. No one knows, of course. It’s a secret. Duh.

Not being able to swim might not seem like a big deal. And it’s not. The inability isn’t really the point here. The point is that this is something no one knows about Benny. People assume that she knows how to swim because everything about people is kind of obvious. Their Theme and Talent basically describe their entire lifestyle. So this is her bit of straying from the pattern. The part of her, however small and insignificant, that isn’t written out for everyone to see. Isn’t that what secrets can be? Just something to call your own?

Oh yeah, I designed Benny’s name character.

The name Benny has two syllables, which means it has two loops/circles. There are five letters, so there are five lines. I know I said that crosses don't count as the separation of lines, but I changed that - there are exceptions whenever I want. Why? Because all languages come with exceptions because nothing is perfect. No, not even in WU. There are two vowels so there should be two strokes (two times that you pick up and put down your writing utensil) but because the gap between the number of lines and the number of strokes must be less than three, we add another stroke to end up with the formula of two loops, five lines, and three strokes. A bit of a complicated process, but I think her name character is cool. It looks like water if you squint really hard. And by squinting really hard, I mean closing your eyes and imagining water. But I tried.

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