Artlo

The Blank Canvas

As an artist, have you ever dreamt of your drawings coming to life? Imagining all your characters animated in front of you, battling, hugging, interacting each other... Maybe even with other people's characters.
With landscapes and beautiful settings and environments, even with creatures no one has ever seen before? All of these from within your mind, to be real?

Here in the country of Artlo, is where  all imagination can come true. Where ink can be controlled by magic, and can bring your drawings to life. And the people who can use that magic, they are what we call the Artist Magicians! With their handy wand brush, their capabilities as an artist are unbeatable!

But that isn't all, it is also the home country of one of the legendary 5 Heroes who saved the world from a benevolent darkness that once engulfed the whole world. He is the one and only, Van Gogh, the greatest artist of all time. And here in this same country, is where he spent his university days in the AP University.

Here, in this beautiful country, is the one and only place, you as an artist, can ever dream of going!

Or.. At least, what it's supposed to be.

The country of Artlo... Has fallen throughout the ages. Far from what it was before.

In this day and age in the world of Reactra,

Art is dead.

It's magic is seen as nothing more but children's entertainment.
It's not entirely bad in this country though.
Everyone's flourishing, living normal lives, kids are going to school, no one's hungry.

But it's incredibly boring.
Art is looked down upon by many people as it doesn't make too much money.
It doesn't make you successful at all.
But since that's the only thing I'm good at and the only thing I love, I can't just let it go.

My name is Ace, an artist magician. I gain money by entertaining kids at parties and such. I'm 17 years old and I'm in my senior years in highschool.

My dream was to become the greatest Artist Magician of all. I wanna get into the top. But I don't know how to start. With the situation I'm in, I'm stuck being like this.

So while no one's asked for me to go do my job, I buy a lot of sketchbooks and sketch my way out of boredom. I do this for long periods of time, and while I don't have any jobs to do, I put my drawings up on a wooden board near the central market and sell drawings after school. It doesn't make a lot of money really, and if people do get interested, I blow it off due to how awkward I am when talking.

I'm not exactly a rich student. I left my family to chase my dreams here, even if my parents didn't agree with me. They didn't give me any allowance, any clothes, anything for me when I left. My sister packed me lots of food and gave me a bag of coins though. She was the only one that believed me.
Right now I live in a scrawny old apartment that I was lucky enough to afford, but I have no more money left in exchange.

It's hard.

But it's not the worst part. No. Not my financial situation, not my introvertedness, not cause people look down on me.

It's that I am never.. ever satisfied with my level in art. I don't know why. It's complicated. For me, it's not enough. I have this burning urge in my heart that's been screaming, like some kind of demon telling me one word repeatedly to the point I had nightmares about it.

"Draw."

"Draw."

"Draw."

"Draw."

It's giving me the thoughts such as "Am I bad?" , "Am I not enough?".

Even so, who am I doing this for?