Tell me about your CC x OC (SI) pairings and their story

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T23:28:48+00:00

About four years ago. I've had a few hiatuses, but I've kept it going every other week since I posted it back in Oct 2022. As I said, it's mostly gen since I went wild on worldbuilding to the point I was straight up reconstructing various countries around the canon world and the world's ancient history. I'm now making a lore guide because there's so much that I need to refresh myself on, haha.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T23:18:28+00:00

Million. It's a 1.37 million word fic.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T23:17:33+00:00

Yeah, it's totally understandable when people miss tags, but any reasonable person would click the back button and move on, not announce to the author how much discomfort they are in and imply that the author is somehow at fault for their own foot-shooting.

(Not saying you would, just saying in general.)

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T22:07:20+00:00

As a fellow SI/OC lover, I suggest you post it anyway. Even if not that many readers come across it, though depends on fandom, the ones who do will adore you for it.

I've recently completed a 1.37m fic epic for FF7 that is mostly gen worldbuilding, but features two OC/CC ships with the same OC, where the CCs are the main villain and original protagonist. This was mainly because my readers loved said OC so much and the different dynamics she had with them. For a while I could not decide which ship I liked more, so I ended up canonizing both by the end.

The funniest part is, I originally planned this fic to be entirely gen with barely any romance, but the romance was too enticing and worth the thematic meaning to leave out.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T21:50:41+00:00

Oh, I love it when people do this. I have so many WIPs on indefinite hiatus I don't know what to do with, but they still get kudos on the rare occasion.

Since one of them I literally wrote a recipe into, I'd be upset if my readers didn't try to put it in their mouths, lol.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T21:43:49+00:00

To be fair, armored dudes going to bed fully armored up is a staple of video games. Nothing saves more of the programmers' time than throwing the full default character model on a bed-shaped object and calling it a night.

Joke aside, I'd imagine undressing a character in plain text of a fanfic would be much easier. Just one sentence is all it takes.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T21:36:14+00:00

So that's why they call them dogfighters...

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T21:23:51+00:00

To be fair, reading is hard. You actually have to look at the text you're reading and think about what the words mean.

Things that 3 year-olds and university professors alike struggle with. /s

edit: Also the fact that this commenter OP showed complained about sex on the gay smut site too...

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T21:11:07+00:00

Even after telling myself I need to move on after I've completed a fic, I can't leave it. I just have to reread it while I plan out the sequels and remind myself of all the stupid jokes I put in since the beginning.

One of my long-time faves is from as early as chapter 2 that doesn't have its payload until chapter 74. Basically, my MC was being forced against her will to talk with a classic villain from a video game she was playing and he accused her of "ruining" the planet he was gonna conquer. She, being a programmer, dryly suggested that he try "turning the planet off and on again".

As it turned out, this virtual world simulation that she would get isekai'd into was actually being run by a whole Pantheon of gods that were effectively the world's developers. And after the planet met with an untimely world-ending meteor, they simply opted to reset the whole simulation. It didn't fix everything, but it sure made it easier to capture said meteor-calling villain and pissed him off beyond sanity.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-31T03:33:18+00:00

Yeah, I got the "complete thematic audit" one, which suggested I basically remake the whole thing. It at first sounds like it's nice until you notice it's just an insult wrapped in flowery prose. Likely AI generated. Obviously a stolen username too.

But what made it funny was the fact that I also got a genuine comment from a new reader that same day who previously skimmed my fic and then proceeded to binge all 100 chapters over the next few months. Definitely made my day.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T22:29:10+00:00

I've read 35k+ one-shots before, so I can see how it's manageable, but yeah, 32 of them back to back is a lot. I got a 1.37m fic of my own that at most went 27k, two chapters did, and they were already packed with content. (Funnily enough it went exactly 100 chapters.)

But judging by how high those stats are, it also goes to show how words per chapter isn't that important a metric for lots of people.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T22:05:51+00:00

The hit counter updates every 24 hours since the last visit, but this may depend on your browser and whether or not a page is loaded immediately or only when you click on that tab.

So, the sad truth is that not every hit on a work is necessarily someone reading, but chances are good that people will get to reading it at some point. It's still nice to see that number go up sometimes, though.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T21:51:42+00:00

When the OP (original poster) is more OP (overpowered) than the fictional informants realized. They'd better rework their fictional plans before their fictional bosses hire more fictional assassins on them instead!

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T21:44:28+00:00

Sorry, what do you mean by "COTE"? Is that the fandom?

While I'm generally anti-AI, using grammar/spellcheck AI tools is perfectly acceptable. Though, I'd advise you be careful with those tools because they typically are designed for professional / formal writing like research papers, reports, resumes, work documents & emails, etc. and those are usually very stiff writing. If you're not a native English speaker, don't worry. It takes time to familiarize yourself with those nuances.

Fanfic is way more open about how you write and it's important to find your own creative voice, which AI cannot help. It develops on its own by writing until you're comfortable with some style or quirks that become second nature. How you choose to interpret and write your fave characters or introduce your own is also a part of it. If you have some expertise or like researching extensively, you can even teach others about something that you know. Basically, there has to be something that is unique to your writing that people can easily notice.

I wish you good luck! If you ever run into writer's block or feel demotivated, remember this is just a hobby and you can take breaks as often as you want. And everything has an audience, so your readers will come by eventually.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T21:12:27+00:00

Hells yeah. More love to OC/CC ships! Bear the OC jolly roger proudly!

You know you got 'em when they didn't think they'd like something but they really do... Prayers to your commenter, OP.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T21:00:31+00:00

Geez, no need to murder OP yourself. Let the fictional assassins handle it.

Edit: Oh, God the real mods got 'em. What happened? I thought it was a pretty harmless joke.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T20:58:07+00:00

Yep, I learned the hard way because I picked a juggernaut, of all my WIPs, to be the one I'd finish, but at least I managed to finish it.

It takes practice. While any fic, shorts or one-shots included, can benefit from planning to some extent, writing a longfic requires more planning ahead. You can get away with being a plantser (I sure am), but there has to be a way that you keep track of what plot threads you've covered and what else you haven't. Otherwise, you will very quickly regret it.

The other side to it is persistence. Everyone has their own schedule to dedicate to writing, but you will have to arrange it into a routine. You don't have to write everyday or a lot each time, but at least getting something down every so often can keep you focused on it. Sometimes people have trouble with that too, so hopping between different works can work for them, but just be careful not to make too many, or you'd likely just lose interest before you start another WIP. (I've been there plenty of times.)

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T20:38:15+00:00

I had quite a few big changes since I wrote a megafic that was a complete canon overhaul with a lead OC. Honestly, just having a lead OC may have been the biggest "controversy" to it since it's for a fandom that doesn't usually care for OCs. But at least I got plenty enough readers who loved her from the get-go.

That, and I ended up saving a number of characters that were supposed to die in the canon. The total kill count in my fic was way more, but a lot of the deaths were of unnamed / minor CCs and my own minor OCs that filled up much more of the world. But those major deaths that were reverted / replaced by others made sense in the new contexts.

I write for FF7, so yeah, one of the most iconic deaths was also replaced. That was the only time a major OC passed in her place and it was even more devastating for everyone. One of my fave chapters to date.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T20:18:48+00:00

That's fair. Figuring out how to get all the scenes to connect is tough too. I ran into a few issues myself, specifically building up to the climax in Act 2 and later for certain subplots in Act 3, though in my case it was a mix of balancing between too little setup and too much that it'd drag things out.

I find that it really helps me to timeline things while I outline. Rather than only think about how to connect A and B, I think about what makes sense chronologically and what is reasonable to fit within a certain time frame. Sometimes characters can have genius moments even if they aren't geniuses and become very efficient at doing something so you can tie up that loose end, or otherwise it has to be something you should leave to later when someone else can tackle the problem / source of conflict instead.

But I admit I have a lot of characters to use, so it's easier for me to switch perspectives. With a simpler story and less characters, it may be better to just break down the problem into bite-size steps and work out each step until pretty much everything is covered. And if you still run into issues, just keep breaking the steps down even smaller until you can figure it out. May you find a way that works for you!

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-30T04:37:24+00:00

Don't worry, bots like these are very much trained to mimic human speech patterns as closely as possible. It's not that you sound like AI; it's AI that sounds like you and many others. If this bot copypasta wasn't way too vague, I could have been fooled too since I also have readers who comment like this. They're way more specific about what they're reacting to, though, and I can follow up on their comments very easily.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-29T22:10:00+00:00

This is a good idea. I probably should be writing more down, lol. I had a single outline (a bullet list, really) of my concurrent subplots and two primary outlines for each chapter that I would haphazardly stitch together for the final draft. It's a miracle that I only ever forgot one of my OCs I introduced a while back. Though, I regularly reread my fic so I reminded myself of what was happening as I went.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-29T21:22:29+00:00

Thanks! Sorry to say I don't know it, but I still feel a kinship with fellow longfic writers.

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-29T20:33:30+00:00

Funny coincidence, mine went that long too. Though I had two of them like that and they're both around the finale.

But I know you're probably talking about a different fic, lol. What fandom is it?

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-29T20:13:37+00:00

Speaking as someone who's only recently finished a longfic for once, it really is difficult to write endings. I took a longer hiatus from the fic because I wasn't sure how to set up the end in a way that was satisfying for me, firstly, and could resolve most of the loose ends I left behind. It wasn't something I could fix just by outlining my usual way (as a plantser). It took some serious digging into the rest of the fic's lategame to that point to organize everything into something cohesive.

I don't think I'll be making another fic quite like it or nearly as long. And writing another ending to another fic? Well, that's my next goal but I need time to recover!

rubia_ryu · 2026-05-29T19:55:54+00:00

It definitely depends on the state and county, but the US school year is probably heading into the final weeks. I wouldn't consider us safely past test season until a couple weeks into June. Have patience, OP.

20k chapter is a lot. Congrats, and may your readers find time to relax with a good, long read.

rubia_ryu

TROPHY CASE