Project Soul - The parasite

 

      

 

 

She was someone they should have eliminated. They just couldn't. They wished she was born in a normal family, in normal circumstances. She didn't know if she wanted to be born at all. She was innocent, pure and lacked knowledge. How could they take an innocent live.

Simple. 

They just couldn't. 

Instead, she became their responsibility, their family.

 

 

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So in this blogpost I will be talking about my Beast fanfiction, Project Soul: The parasite. I will start with a short introduction to the story.

ProSo takes place in a fictional world, that contrary to ours is filled with magic and mystical beings of all sorts. It is the story of a group of guys (Beast) working for Cube, an underground organisation. The organisation's main purpose is to prevent power abuse. The group of men finds a girl on a mission and take her with them to their headquarters. That is where their lives with Nun Paro, the protagonist (or you) start.

 

If you haven't read the story yet and you are planning to, I advise you not to read further, because this post will contain some major spoilers. If you don't mind spoilers or don't read the story, you can continue~

 

I want to thank all the people who support this story, for giving me the motivation to write and the ideas to come up with things. I also want to thank the people who volunteered for cameo's. Thank you to the subscribers and readers who showed so much love for the story. And of course I want to thank the awesome OC characters who are all based on my awesome friends.

 

Project soul has finally reached twenty chapters and first of all, I want to apologise to everyone for the slow updates lately. I used to update daily, but since I injured my dominant hand quite badly, typing is very painful and difficult. This explains the tardiness of the updates. I also apologise to the readers of my other fanfictions, for the late replies. ProSo is my main project and I will try to update the other two frequently (once a week is my plan). 

 

From here on I will elaborate and reflect on the characters and the story development. I will try to discus every character separately.

 

Of course we start with the main character, Nun Paro. 

Paro is a girl whose mind and heart are like a developing child's, around 5-6 years old. She has never had any human interactions, aside of the occasional scientist group that enters and checks up on her. She has never spoken with any of them, nor have they spoken with her. Paro's body is made to be around the age of 20, making her a young adult. Due to the lack of human interaction she doesn't know any customs, nor does she have any idea on what morals and norms and values of society are. In her days living with the others, she learns them slowly. Learning practical things like language, instructions on daily activities and routines, walking etc. are easier for her to learn, because she was made to be able to do something at her first or second try. A perfect imitation. 

Sentimental things however, confuse her to no end and gain results that are rather surprising. Though she does not understand what emotions are, despite having them and feeling them, she is really sincere in them, because she never learnt how to suppress them. She didn't have the long trial and error period a normal child would have, hence lacking in her mental development. It only contributes to her innocence though, since she only knows sincerity. 

I will not reveal anything about Paro's powers, because that is something the story itself will elaborate on. The only thing I will tell though, is that Paro's ability is related to her mental state. She is able to touch a soul, literally and figuratively speaking and her power is driven by her emotions. Since Paro can't control her emotions, she's also unable to control her powers. She herself didn't even know that she had them.

 

Next character is Yoon Doojoon.

Doojoon being the leader of the group, has a responsibility to take care of everything. He himself assigned it though, since he knows that the others, especially in this situation, need someone to guide them when everything goes amiss. He is especially concerned about Paro's development and insecure on whether they are able to raise her well or not. Despite not being the one to find Paro and not considering himself the most loved, he does his best for both Paro and the members, to take care of them.

Doojoon is the stern father when he needs to be, knowing that bad things are more easily perceived than good things. He is also the one to lecture or punish Paro, being immune (or acting like it) to her puppy eyes and the aegyo she learned from Yoseob. Though Paro never voiced any complaints on Doojoon's 'mean' behaviour towards her, he thinks that Paro likes him least of all members. What he doesn't know though, is that Paro looks up at him like a daughter to her father. She has an innocent admiration for the man, being able to do anything in her eyes. Doojoon is her superhero.

 

Let's proceed to Jang Hyunseung.

Hyunseung is the one who finds Paro in the ruins of the laboratory on their mission. He was supposed to kill her at first sight, since she could be a great danger to the world, but he couldn't bring himself to. When he first found Paro, he couldn't feel nor see any emotions from her. Even her eyes were completely empty. The dagger Hyunseung unsheathed, was supposed to kill her, but instead caught her curiosity as it reflected the light and that had attracted her attention. That was the first exposure to her child-like, curious innocence. Hyunseung watched the girl who was like a new and completely white canvas, ready to be graced with colour. The colours of life and living.

He took her with him in the end to the headquarters and claimed to take responsibility over her. He was joined by his other members, the 5 guys he considers close enough to be brothers and together they take on the role of the girl's guardians. Why Hyunseung saved the girl has to do with their past, which I won't reveal yet. What I can say, is that he has a weak spot for innocent lives, that benefits to his sense of justice, but disadvantages himself and his safety at times as well.

To Paro, Hyunseung is the guide of her emotions. She learned about their existence because of him and wants to understand them. She relies on her instincts most of the time, not knowing how to deal with the surge of sensations in her mind. The others helped her understand them, but she always finds herself seeking Hyunseung when she has trouble with them. Hyunseung is even more protective of Paro than the others, because of her innocence and always finds himself worrying about the girl. Paro had heard Gikwang, Yoseob and Dongwoon call him 'umma' once and in her eyes, Hyunseung really became the mother-like figure, the guardian of her heart.

Oh right. There is some romance involved in Hyunseung's case. I will leave it up to you to decide who's involved in this matter. 

 

Moving on to Yong Junhyung.

Junhyung was the one, who at first didn't want to have anything to do with the girl when they found her. Though he didn't voice it out directly, he didn't want to involve himself with her, knowing the dangers she could bring with her existence, but also because he isn't one to trust things and people easily. He always searched for an ulterior motive in finding her. Why would the enemy make the grave mistake of leaving one of their experiments alive with the chance that they would find her? It didn't make sense. Unconsciously he found himself taken in by Paro's radiance and opened up to her. When he realised it, it was already too late. I didn't really show this in the story, because I knew that it'd take too long. This is the main reason for writing a long author's note. I can discuss things that didn't appear in the story.

Junhyung is the one who has a big role in teaching Paro the practical things, like speech, writing and others. He became her teacher in a lot of thing's, wanting the girl to be able to vent for herself. He even wanted to learn her self-defence, since she lacked the knowledge about the dangers in the big bad world, but seeing that she wasn't even stable in walking yet, he decided to wait a bit longer. Paro looks up to Junhyung's knowledge, since he teaches her in a lot of things. Doojoon is usually busy with Cube as the leader and not able to do it himself, leaving Junhyung to the task. And being the perfectionist he is, Junhyung doesn't take a half-hearted result. He is stern when he's teaching her, but a loving older brother figure when they are playing and just talking. Paro finds herself being confused by the male's two faces, but nonetheless likes him a lot.

 

Next up is Lee Gikwang. 

Gikwang's laid back personality allowed him to easily accept Paro. He found her cute and endearing, comparing her to an innocent defenceless animal at times. As a Beast Tamer Gikwang has a soft-hearted personality towards defenceless creatures and values life a lot. He is very caring towards the girl and with his senses more sharpened than the others in the group, always keeps an eye out for Paro. Hyunseung's decision to take responsibility for the girl, raised his level of respect for the man. He didn't have the heart to eliminate the girl, nor watch her die. He would probably have done the same thing if Hyunseung hadn't asked for it.

Gikwang took the role of the fun brother who plays with Paro a lot. He learned her how to get along with others by asking his animals for help. The girl finds animals quite intriguing and of course loves playing with them. Gikwang's outgoing but humble personality also allowed her to develop herself socially in the days she spent with them. Paro considers Gikwang as one of the 'fun' and 'playful' brothers. She likes spending time with them, knowing for sure that she can cheer them up whenever she's in a bad mood. 

 

And now we will go on to Yang Yoseob.

Yoseob is quite a cheeky fellow and despite not being laid back he's quite easy to go with the flow. He had no strong objections against taking responsibility over the girl and raising her. In fact it interested him. He of course didn't want to see her die either, but didn't want to make any judgements until they heard what Carlo said. As a fairy, he holds a lot of magic and mostly pure natural magic in him. As a being close to nature, he also values life, more than a human would usually, since life is a precious thing given to one and could be taken back by Mother Nature at any time. He was quite convinced by that. 

Joining Gikwang, Yoseob is one of Paro's usual partners to play with. He uses his abilities a lot to please her and entertain her. The spellcaster also found himself singing a lot to the girl, since she seemed to like it. He hadn't had the chance yet to learn songs to her, but for now doing it for her sufficed. Fairies are quite sensitive and fond of music, which is a way of expression. While Gikwang is the active kind of partner to play with, the kind that likes to run and jump around, Yoseob is the more calm kind, who sits around idly, staring at sceneries and just sit and sing, talk or do something else. It depends on Paro's mood to who she chooses, but till now she had never refused any of them.

 

The last of the beast gang is our maknae, Son Dongwoon.

Being the caring person he is, Dongwoon didn't choose to trust Paro in the beginning. Although he went with what his hyungs chose, he had decided not to be attached to this girl from the start. He wasn't as suspicious as Junhyung, but knowing how ugly things could turn out, he decided to stay neutral, while Junhyung was quite against it. While interacting with the girl though, Dongwoon found himself opening up to her as well, after being exposed to her innocence. It wasn't as abrupt as Hyunseung's interaction, but the male couldn't bring himself to be cold to a frail girl who knew nothing of the world.

After some time, Dongwoon became the one who took Paro's side when Doojoon overdid it with the scolding and Junhyung with the stern lessons. He became the one to rescue her from Yoseob and Gikwang when she became too exhausted, while she also sneakily ate the peas she didn't like or replace the milk she disliked with orange juice or tea. He was the buffer and spoiled her when the others didn't, which also resulted in him becoming the 'easy hyung'. He didn't mind though, since he could only care for her in this protective way, his own way.

 

Moving on to the females! First is the eldest of the three, Kim Baeri.

Baeri is the one to take care of Paro's injuries and one of the first to notice something strange about her. She couldn't really place her finger on what it was, but she also noticed how empty the girl could be and feel. It concerned her and made her grow suspicious of Paro at first. Being one of the people to  care a lot about the guys, resulted in wanting to protect them from harm. They were impulsive and too soft hearted in her opinion. They lacked the switch that could turn them into cold ruthless beings, to finish their mission. When it was decided that they would take care of Paro, Baeri involved herself as well. She could keep an eye on the girl and more importantly as a healer and a female herself she was concerned over the things the boys had no knowledge of. Knowing that things could become quite awkward while raising Paro, she decided to participate as well.

 

The second girl is Bae Chaima. 

Chaima is a hot headed girl who values the people and things she cares for a lot. Once she finds something to treasure, she'll prioritize its safety above her own. This also applies to her friendships with the group and the Cube agents she's close with. Paro's arrival in their lives started out as an intrusion in her opinion. She with the two others made a pact and swore to protect the boys from the harm that could be caused, even if it meant her elimination. However in the latest chapters you can see that her determination wavered. Once she opened up to the girl and came to care for her, she became as much of a treasure in her life than the others. She couldn't bring herself to face her cruel fate, having experienced a hard past herself.

Oh right. Let's not forget that one of the antagonists is Chaima's dear sister. Of course Chaima loves her sister more than anyone or anything. They grew up together and know each other better than they know themselves. Her revival caused her a mental shock that changed her personality slightly. Chaima became more weary and suspicious.

 

The last character I'll be discussing is Lee Hongjung.

Hongjung is good friend with Baeri, Chaima and the guys. She's a figure you usually only see at the office, since she's not as physical fit as the others. Her personality is also quite different from them. She's like a wallflower and one to think things through. Hongjung has a rational and calm mind. When Paro came into the picture, she was the one to suggest the pact to the other two, knowing that they were capable of doing outrageous things if she didn't bind them by something. Although she is the youngest, Hongjung is one of the most clever in Cube, due to her calm demeanour. She's also the peacemaker when things get messy in the group. After the tragedy in which two of their friends died, Hongjung was forced to mature. She was as cheeky as Yoseob, but grew more to become like Hana, a former friend that died in the tragedy and now a revived antagonist, and took over her role in the group.

 

 

I used this blogpost to elaborate on the characters and use it as some space for discussion. The story has come to a point where the introductions to Paro and her powers are almost completely over. There will be more action from now on and before I started on that, I wrote this post to reflect and collect my thoughts on how to continue writing. It's also fun to share my thoughts with you all and hopefully ProSo will become a bit more popular than it is now.

Share your thoughts on ProSo in the comments <3 I'd love to hear your opinions.

 

Again thanks a lot for the support and the love. I will deligently continue writing. <3

 

Lots of Love,

Saenan