Shaded Soldiers || Gay MxM || Omegaverse

Intermission!

We have reached the end of the first part of this story, the end of Season 1! I like to call it the "prologue phase" since it is quite a lot of world-building and introducing the characters, Riley's background, and the premise of this still growing universe! This is a very good place to take a little pause and catch our breaths, since next we'll start picking up the pace :3

I have compiled a list of all the important characters below with their basic information! I have also answered some questions I've received about this story, and added a few other fun facts as well! But first, let me ramble a bit :3

My thoughts so far!

I love this story. I love this universe. I am so happy I figured out I can have little stories set in this same universe with their own little plots that eventually ties to this main novel. I love the fantasy element in it with the second spirits, and I absolutely love those second spirits.

Fun fact, I didn't start writing this story with second spirits specifically, it was much, much more subtle than actual beings sharing the body with the human sides, and I'm so happy these inner instincts grew into what alphas and omegas now are in my story. I had a lot of rewriting to do for the first 10 or so chapters because of this, but it was worth it!

If you've read more of my works, you may have noticed that I love writing detailed expressions and gestures and body movements, and this story has really let me take that to the next level with this "secondary language" with all the bowing and growling and other body language. Another fun fact, I've taken a lot of inspiration from horse behavior to create this body language, and added some cat and dog behavior in it as well.

But what I absolutely adore most about this universe is that I was able to go back to my roots, so to speak. When I first started writing and posting my stories online back in 2013-2014, I really enjoyed writing gay guys in cute, cuddly ways. Holding hands, being adorable, and just making them darn cute :3 But over the years, all the talk about "this is not how gay men behave", "that's such girly way of writing them", "that's stereotyping gay men" and the worst "that's just fetishizing gay men" really got in my head, so I moved away from writing men in a super adorable way, and I think it took some of the joy from writing.

But with this story, I decided fuck it! I want men to be cute and cuddly! I want more men who are secure with their emotions and are completely fine cuddling with their friends. Maybe that is fetishizing gay men, but you know what? I'll accept the judgment, but I aint stopping this time. I've found my way back to what I loved about writing: creating stories just the way I love them <3

I mean, this is omegaverse, or at least some form of it, in which men can have babies, so it's not really "realistic" anyway. These people I write about are technically different species, and has only a little to do with gay men in real life.

That brings me to the topic of omegaverse. I haven't actually read much omegaverse stories. I don't actually read stories at all (video games for the win!) I've leafed through a few comics, and heard people talking about it, but my own universe is pretty much the first real interaction I've had with omegaverse. The wonderful authors in this community urged me to create a world of my own and just have fun with it when I asked if I should even try writing an omegaverse story. Which I ended up doing, and now we're all here :3

I have plans for more stories as well, because I really have fallen in love with this universe, and I wish to explore different dynamics. For example, I have a little story of an alpha female and her male omega mate in mind, which I will try to squeeze in at some point. I also have an idea for a bdsm themed story as well, but that one will have to stay exclusively on Ream because it will be too mature for this platform =')