The story of an unfinished story's writing

You might not know this about me, but I sometimes see myself a bit of a writer, of some sort. Not a very knowledgable, experienced or remotely successful one, that is for sure. But I am one in many ways as I am an avid reader. I wouldn't dare say I am one prone to the beautiful prose and best seller shelves, far from that, but I do believe I was able to captivate the hearts of a few, at least for a time. Because, much like many stories, this one did not meet an end.

And that is, unfortunately, the worse yet likely outcome most stories meet.

Left by the side in draft papers, forgotten within the many stories we dream about, mine is much alike. But today, I thought to myself: what not pay it homage? Because even if I did not finish the story, the journey was well worth the effort.

The challenge

I had written before. Or rather, I had started writing before. Fragments of scenes, openings to grand adventures, worlds sketched in half-forgotten documents saved under vague names like story_1_final_v3. They never made it very far. Most stories lived and died inside my own head, polished endlessly in imagination, never quite daring to exist outside of it.

This time, I wanted to go further.

I knew myself well enough to understand that inspiration alone would not carry me. If I waited for motivation, I would end up with another promising beginning and nothing more. So I decided to make it less about inspiration and more about discipline. I set myself a challenge: two to three thousand words every week day. For as long as I can.

No more “when I feel like it” or “when I have time.” On the dot.

The story itself was, admittedly, a bit of a self-insert which opens a whole other discussion we might dive into another time. There is something both indulgent and revealing about placing a version of yourself at the center of a world you control. But at that point, I did not particularly care whether it was subtle or refined. I was not writing to impress. I was writing to train.

It was, first and foremost, a writing challenge.

I did not sit down thinking, "This will be published. This will be great." I sat down thinking, "You will write today. You will have made something today." And at first, it was good. Almost surprisingly so.

I would come back from class, sit at my desk, and write for an hour, sometimes two. The words flowed more easily than I expected. There was a certain thrill in watching the word count climb, in knowing that I had met the goal I had set for myself. Each day felt like a small victory. Proof that I could, in fact, produce something tangible.

The "plot"... if one could call it that

Isaac was born from that question. A 21-year-old student sitting in class, probably bored, probably thinking about anything other than the lecture in front of him. And then: a window and a message.

It is, admittedly, not the most original inciting incident.

I had spent a considerable amount of time reading and watching stories about “the System” with blue screens, stats, skills, titles. Worlds gamified and reality reduced to clean, readable interfaces. There is something deeply satisfying about it. To be fair, I consumed a lot of it. Enough that it inevitably seeped into my own writing.

So when I gave Isaac a window and a message, I knew exactly what I was doing. I was stepping into familiar territory, but that was part of the exercise. I did not want to reinvent fantasy, I wanted a framework solid enough that I could focus elsewhere.

I went with the classic overpowered main character for a simple reason: I did not want to dabble into romance, nor did I want to spend too much time on the emotional turbulence of everyday life. Nor, if I am honest, did I want to carefully chart the slow climb from weakness to strength. Training arcs, desperate survival, scraping by for every small increase in power might be compelling to write, but they require a kind of narrative patience I was not ready to practice.

However, what I wanted to try my hand at was world-building. Perhaps the most difficult exercise in writing. But definitely what I was the most excited about.

Creating a world that feels coherent, layered, and alive is no small task. It demands consistency, and imagination. It demands that you answer questions readers have not yet asked, but will definitely ask. And I believed that by giving my protagonist overwhelming authority from the start, I could remove certain complications. If he did not need to worry about survival or incremental power gains, then I could spend my time asking: How does this world function? What are its rules? What happens when someone can bend them?

It was, in a way, an attempt to simplify the variables.

As for the character it self, I have to be honest with you: I was projecting. Quite a lot. Most of the time, instead of asking myself, “What would he do?” I asked, “What would I do?” I did not carefully separate myself from Isaac. I lent him my logic, my curiosity, my sense of humor. Not the mark of a masterful author, perhaps. There is a certain laziness in that approach. Characters are meant to be distinct and... alive, after all.

This might sound repetitive and a bit of an excuse, but again... at the time, I was not striving for literary excellence. I was striving for consistency, output, and momentum.

The story went up one chapter at a time, every day.

And what I had not expected which truly caught me off guard was that people were reading it. Some feedback was encouraging. Some was critical. A few comments pointed out weaknesses I had suspected but hoped would go unnoticed. Others praised elements I had not even realized were working. But the most surprising discovery was this: some people were actively looking for that kind of story.

A story that focused more on the world than on more intricate character drama. And though I had set out to keep things somewhat detached, something changed along the way. The readers began to comment on certain side characters. They speculated about futures and pasts. They worried about outcomes. And somehow, despite my intention to keep the focus broad and structural, we (both them and I) began to grow attached.

For a time, I felt a strange sense of responsibility. These were fictional people, born from convenience and curiosity, and yet they now existed in the minds of others. They were being anticipated. Discussed. Waited for. It is a humbling feeling, to realize that something you created has stepped beyond you.

And then, after three months, I stopped.

Not because I hated it or because I had run out of ideas. But because I had reached the goal I had set at the beginning. I had written consistently and proven to myself that I could maintain a schedule. I had shared my work publicly and endured the scrutiny that comes with it.

Perhaps I did not reach the end of the story. But I reached the end of the challenge.

When I stopped, there was relief and a quiet sadness. Relief, because the pressure of daily publication lifted. Sadness, because I knew some readers would check back and find nothing new. Because I knew the world would remain suspended mid-motion.

But above all, there was pride.

I had written something. Not perfectly, nor completely but genuinely. And I had found the courage to let others see it. The lesson was not about the story, its protagonist. It was not even about world-building.

It was about writing. About writing even when unsure. About showing it even when imperfect... because how else would you know?

For a long time, my stories stayed in my head or in private drafts. In that space, they could be brilliant forever. But they could also never be tested. I would reread them and fill in the gaps myself, convinced the pacing worked, that the emotions landed, that the idea was strong. Of course it worked: I already knew what I meant. Readers do not have that advantage.

Sharing a story feels a bit like rereading the same paragraph three times in a row. The first time, it seems fine. The second, you notice a strange phrasing. The third, you realize an entire sentence could be clearer or removed altogether. Each pass reveals something new, not because the text changed, but because your perspective did.

Feedback works the same way. Other eyes are another reread. They notice what you grew blind to. They question what you assumed was obvious. And suddenly, the story looks different again.

If you keep your work to yourself, you only ever read it from one angle. Growth comes from shifting perspectives, from allowing others to see what you wrote and reflect it back to you. In the end, the lesson was simple: you improve by writing, and you refine by letting it be read.

The lesson?

Your life is made of your past, and your future is paved by your life. One experience provides the scaffolds for another. That is how life is built after all. For me, this experience actually shaped one of the best skills I believe I could've gotten: the ability to receive criticism.

In computer science, you can code alone for hours, convinced your architecture makes sense, that your variable names are clear, that your solution is elegant. It runs. The tests pass. It feels complete. And then a senior reviews your pull request and leaves three short comments that quietly dismantle your certainty.

“This could be simplified.”
“Edge case missing here.”
“Why this pattern?”

At first, it stings. Not because they are harsh, they are often remarkably polite but direct and straightforward, but because they see what you did not. The same way a reader notices the awkward sentence you skimmed over ten times.

Over time, I began to appreciate that feeling.

A well-placed remark from someone more experienced is a gift. It is constructive and points somewhere forward. And frankly, it is far kinder than the unfiltered roasts you might receive from strangers online. Senior developers tend to critique the code, not the person. The internet is not always so generous.

Writing taught me to detach myself from what I create. A chapter is not me. A function is not me. If something is flawed, it is not a judgment of my worth but an opportunity to refine. In both writing and programming, isolation slows growth. Collaboration accelerates it. You begin to welcome review comments. You learn to ask for them. You start seeing criticism as a second pass over your work, like proofreading a chapter. If you had to quote me on something, it would be this: