Yours Truly, Highness (An OCD Experience)

Prelude

They say the reps been running down the Green Hill since eons ago. They tell the world that his spiky blue awesomeness is no longer the rival to the iconic Nintendo mascot. Sales have dropped, ratings have winded, it is as if nothing could save this video game franchise from splattering into a million pieces and end its suffering once and for all.

Sonic the Hedgehog, as everyone knew what it went by. From hero to zero, absolutely disgraceful.

The fandom is still optimistic, however, as they are always looking forward to the new releases despite facing constant repetitions in playstyle and outraged mechanics. As for the community itself, quite a lot of creativity, although not very much diverse ideas are unleashed as outputs. Fans love shipping, and it was more than prominent on this hedgehog franchise for some unexplained reason. Over time, this becomes full of cringe and filth, and I'm absolutely tired and beyond fed up with it all.

So I quit, quit being a fan who once defended the vile hatred spewed towards my childhood heroes. What are they, just a bunch of anthropomorphic kiddie figures programmed to feed the kids full of stupidity and embarrassment? The more I thought about it, the less attached I've become towards the franchise altogether.

And let's not even talk about the upcoming movie whose trailer absolutely disgusted everyone to death.

All of these thoughts cursed me to damn good whenever I biked home from school, and it continued to haunt me when I left home for college. To cope with this, I eventually found other hobbies and interests that show more relations to what I have been doing in real life. Balling on the street and chatting with friends about who could draft Zion Williamson? Check. Constantly analyzing seasonal themes and characters I personally despised in Game of Thrones? Check. Living superb with lacrosse teammates while keeping my grades fresh? Check. Banging the hottest electronic rave music and keeping an uplift burst of confidence? Check. Having a healthy and meaningful life rather than sitting my bum on the computer all day looking for low-quality content? Check.

No matter what, I vowed to myself that I would never return to my disappointing past.

I. Was. Through.

Well, through until last month or so, I don't know whether I was dumb enough to surf on the Internet finding Sonic the Hedgehog contents once more, as I did many years ago as a kid. Somehow, looking back at those fan arts, walkthroughs, Archie comics, and AMV tributes for different characters, stumbled upon a serious addiction that I could yet possibly make myself let go of. My drugged brain was pleading me to keep searching for these memories as if my entire life depended on it. It became my secondary food source, yet I feel what's been chewed away was my own energy and time, all wasted on going back in time and cherishing what I gained and lost.

Before going in deeper on why I even let myself become trapped in this madness, music is pleasing to the ears, and the aging songs become beautiful treasures once they are outdated and not constantly played on 92.3 FM or something like that. That is also known as nostalgia, a longing for something you've lived through in the past, or better put, an alpha blood-sucking leech who wishes to devour your restless soul and throw it in turmoil.

And last month, I sank into the nostalgic lake of melodic tunes, expecting myself to reawaken and get back on track. But my fingers just didn't think twice before scrolling down YouTube for more recommended stuff. YouTube recommendations have a very weird algorithm that just throws you either content that's related to what you're watching, or old videos that have nothing to do with what you search for. And once this video was discovered by my sinful curiosity, I wished I was the second Oedipus Rex.

The recommendation was a fanmade video created by a Sonic (or specifically, Sonic's arch-rival, Shadow the Hedgehog) fan who goes by the username "shadow759". The name itself sounds quite generic, but he is a talented guy from El Salvador who entertains his viewers with smooth 3D animations, as well as delivering unique ideas for fanmade stories. Later, I got to know his counterpart YouTubers: Sasso Studios - Sonic Animations, Mark Darklighter, MEGA X, and Balenaproductions. All of whom I eventually subscribed and watched a ton of their contents.

The video was titled "Blaze's Valentine Dilemma", featuring some of the secondary casts from the Sonic franchise. The plot revolves around a princess named Blaze the Cat (because, she's a cat, duh), who was confronted by Cream the Rabbit and later Amy Rose, who is the self-proclaimed girlfriend of Sonic, to go on Valentine's date with someone after a series of dressing crisis. In the end, through a series of attempts with Miles Tails Prower, Knuckles the Echidna, Professor Pickle, Sonic, and Silver the Hedgehog, Blaze did not show romantic interest towards any of them, thus ending up loveless until Silver showed up and they decided to hang out. Cream was left in tears because she failed to help Blaze fall in love. But Blaze told Cream that it didn't matter for her because she's not ready for it, and even if she won't ever be, it will all work out in the end.

While the moral of the story was nice, and the animation was pleasing to the eye, I've realized how deep of a hole I dug for myself to never crawl out of again.

It was pathetic, to say the least, that I loosened the rope from reality. Because for the next month until tonight, I've wasted more than enough time surfing through their uploads. I lost interest in absolutely everything else. Studying in college is surely important, and I still need to find a part-time job over the summer, yet because of that goddamn recommended Sonic video was I stuck in yet another obsession loop.

I have had my favorite characters from Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, but none of them stuck to me like personal responsibilities. When I was a kid, I used to love Miles "Tails" Prower. Like seriously, what kind of eight-year-old fox can fly with two tails, run at high speed with the fastest thing alive, work with robots, and creating ass-kicking mechanic gears?! Plus, Tails was damn relatable too. He's always following his idol (or better put, best friend/brother) Sonic around and always depending on him to save the day, yet throughout the years he begins to show independence and a sense of maturity when he can fight alongside Sonic as well. He was no longer the wimp who let fear take over him, but his 200 IQ to match with Dr. Eggman's evil schemes.

Even so, I grew out of him when I entered my teenage years. I desired action, I desired someone who's powerful and "cool" (or better put, edgy). Shadow the Hedgehog became my ideal choice for a year at best, but then something told me that I can't accept him as a relatable person. Following my intuitions, I eventually let Shadow off my watch and fell vacant with every last character since.

Anyway, after watching that video, I immediately grew an attachment to Blaze as a character. I've begun to realize that she's one of the few characters out there who's just so likable for who she is, and is a rather special child. shadow759 accurately depicted her personality as she's supposed to be in canon, which was the catalyst that led me to become a victim of my own careless actions.

But it was like a wildfire spreading through the corners of my soft marrows, I've become dangerously attached to Blaze. Her calmness, her role as a freakin' princess, her intriguing backstory, her pyrokinetic abilities that converted into sheer epicness compared to the rest of the Sonic cast... Everything about this fiery feline was just perfect to me, and I couldn't get her off my mind.

Which... is the problem that I've failed to put out ever since...

My name is Claudius Allison, and this is the confession of a crazy story I'm about to tell.