HikariTenjou

Please think for a moment, stealing art is not just taking someone else's efforts, it's disrespecting all the hard work they did in their lives to reach the point they reached now. Wouldn't you hate it if you finally reached that point in time where you were satisfied with your art only to have it traced by someone else? It might look easy and you might think "It's just one picture, they'll never notice" but you have just completely disregarded everything they've done thus far! All those hours put into learning, sketching, practicing, until calluses develop on their hands; all those hours spent away from friends, away from family to learn and improve; everything they aspired to be and worked for thus far was rendered inconsequential due to a single trace. 

You may claim it's out of respect, but it's not true at all. You are just degrading their actual works. 

If you feel like you lack confidence, that you want to get there faster, sooner and aren't patient enough to improve, there's nothing I can offer you. Art is hard work. I have been drawing since I was 7 years old, learning basic shapes to pencil crayon at a family friend's place. I learned traditional methods and never once tackled humans, mainly learning still life and landscapes. However, those years of hard work helped me when I found things that inspired me enough to create something for myself, even if it's just composition in a small way. Through the years it's clear to see my struggles, the changes and all that and I've worked very hard to get where I am now. 11 years is what it took to get me here now.

Next time you see something like this, please stop and think for a moment, what it'd be like to have your best efforts stolen. By creating something for yourself is the first step to confidence.

If you have stolen before:

1) Apologize to the person who you stole from
2) Either take down or credit all stolen works
3) Continue on drawing, but improving for real this time!

This applies to all mediums!

I'm not actually directing this at anyone but it'd be nice to let people know >< 

Shout out to OndineNova who recently was discredited D:

3) To apologize to all my GUMI Cantabile readers. I know there were many of you who liked the cute and funny moments. Unfortunately I want to make my own OCs and own stories as well so I hope you can forgive me. *bows* As a result, if anyone would like to pick up on the project where I left off, they'd have my blessing. The basic outline was supposed to go like this:

1. Gumi meets Roro while lying in a giant sunfish suit
2. Gumi barges into his life, befriends his miku tree and reconciles with Uchimaya-kun
3. Roro's fanclub of 50 girls notices her and tries to twart her attempts to befriend him but after transforming into super kappa mode (from My colourful confuse) and a heartfelt confession from the leader of the fanclub, they concede defeat and tell Gumi that she'd better take care of Roro or else

4. Gumi has to go back home as Gakupo kicks her out for freeloading. Needless to say, she uses the opportunity to drag Roro there and explain the origins of her kappa powers. 
5. The two meet and take care of Gumi's kappas. Roro feels somewhat intimidated as Gumi is manlier than him. Gumi and her kappas form a badly-executed script (consisting of forgetting their lines frequently and going out of character often) where Gumi is the princess in need of being rescued and Roro would be the knight who rescues her. During the skit, the real Dark lord (The dark lord is like a fawning girl) begins watching, taking notes, and trying to execute the plan himself. Despite the horrible acting, Roro is amused and plays along with Gumi, telling her that he doesn't mind and smiles again.
6. The two stop the Dark Lord's kidnapping scheme through Roro's hero powers and Gumi's kappa powers. The girl he kidnapped though is Roro's sister Mizki! It turns out they haven't talked for years and she's very angry with him. Gumi meddles to see what happened to reconcile them.
7. Roro is unable to stop Gumi and turns to Gakupo for help. Gakupo reveals Gumi's tragic past wherein he was partly responsible for (the fact that the old Roro's empty eyes resembled his sister's made him want to help Roro and redeem himself.) Meanwhile Gumi manages to get out of Mizki the fact that she doesn't hate her brother but is disappointed in him, though she won't say the reason.
8. Things become awkward between Roro and Gumi as he doesn't know what to do with the information he received. Gumi convinces him to watch an Extreme Ironing world championship match. In it, she faces off against an ex-friend of Roro. 

9. After Roro gets into an argument with the buff male maid (clingy boy for sticking 15 years) hints of his past are revealed: he gave up everything for the girl he loved but she died and left him with nothing or so he thought. Thus begin's Gumi's process of brutal honesty, forcing friends to reconcile through fists and his friend revealing that in worrying about Roro quitting high school, he forgot to congratulate him getting engaged to his girlfriend. After realizing that his friends didn't see his absence as a betrayal, Roro is able to slowly path things up with them. His friends jokingly whisper for Gumi to take care of him since he can be an idiot. Gumi agrees cheerfully.
10. Miku comes back from her debut tour as an idol to talk to Gumi. She talks to her about her inability to choose what to do after high school and tells her that she expects to see her at a prestigious idol school audition. 
11. As Gumi considers it deeply, Roro encourages her and helps her practice. In her choice of song, her first love was discussed and Roro realized that she was like him; not strong enough to love again. 
12. Gumi attends the audition (a whole bunch of vocaloids are introduced here!) and low and behold she has to compete against famous idol Miku to accomplish her dream! Even though they're friends, they won't go easy on each other precisely because of that! In the end, Gumi is completely defeated by Miku and cries in Roro's arms. To cheer her up, they promise to not give up on singing and sing a duet together. Meanwhile, Mizki who despised her brother for abandoning his family for the girl he loved, after attempting to break him and Gumi up for revenge (not knowing they're not together)watches the scene. "It can't be helped if he's happy..." she pouts, takes a video of their duet through the window and mails it off to the audition company.
13. Gumi drags Roro and Gakupo to a weird off, the greatest competiton of all time. There, they meet rival team Miki, Piko and Yuki! Despite the fact Miki's obsession with cherries, Piko's kuudere nature and Yuki's mood coordination, Gumi manages to drag the weirdness out of her teammates through the incorporation of extras like Megurine Luka (Gakupo's tsundere crush), Mizki and Miku Tree, taking home the win!
14. Gumi, Roro and Miku Tree win tickets to see the Holy Sword (subterranean people) where they realize they've actually met before and continuously pushed each other down a hole! With some tension at the beginning, they forgive each other. Meanwhile the subterranean people were pissed at Gumi for hanging them with coat hangers so they orchestrated a petty act of revenge. This involved them pelting Gumi and Roro with leeks (their least favourite food). Miku tree devours all the leeks and grows to enormous size, managing to withdraw the Holy Sword and is crowned Queen of the town.
15. Mizki calls Roro for some brother sister bonding time. Gumi tags along with Gakupo. Mizki starts to support Gumi and Roro while Gumi's eating and running technique left Gakupo and Mizki to cover the bill (both she and Roro eat a lot/mountains of food). Luka walks by, mistakenly thinks Gakupo is on a date with Mizki and Gakupo runs after her in tears. Mizki is stuck with the bill. She vows that as much as she loves her brother to never eat out with him again.
17. Gumi gets mail! She has passed her audition despite being crushed by Miku! Roro gets mail too! He passed even though he never entered in the first place! They are befuddled. Attending the general meeting assembled (featuring the full vocaloid cast), Gumi meets her first love who wronged her. To her surprise he went to visit her and apologize or being a jerk in middle school. Gumi decides to be friends with him but takes Roro along. Roro feels like a third wheel. Gumi excessively talks to Roro. Her first love feels like a third wheel. The two males suddenly find a topic to bond on. Gumi feels like a third wheel. Overall the evening ended with each of the 3 wondering if they should have not come to leave the other two alone. (Gumi's first love story is based on Sorry To You ; o
18. Gumi's high school friends come to congratulate her on her entry into the firs ever idol school! Kandagawa-kun's crush on Gumi is revealed as he begins consulting with Roro over how to win her over.
19. Kandagawa-kun confesses to Gumi and surprisingly she says yes! Roro is more bothered by the fact he has to play relationship coach for them but otherwise feels more bored with each passing day. After stalking them on a date one day, on Kandagawa's request, he notices that Gumi seemed uncomfortable the whole time. He asks her what's wrong and Kandagawa overhears. She explains that she doesn't actually like Kandagawa-kun but didn't want to do to him what her first love did to her so she accepted his confession to protect their friendship and prevent him from hating her. Kandagawa comes out and explains how he never wanted to pressure her like that and they reconcile as he realizes that she probably treasures friendship far too much to like anyone right now and decides like her from afar instead.
.... after some events yet unplanned
The Tanbata Festival arrives! Gumi and Roro go together and everyone thinks they're together. While Roro fiercely defends it, he doesn't realize that Gumi has long since fallen for him. On a whim she confesses and he rejects her. Both think they're ruined the friendship stupidly until Gakupo forces them to reconcile.
.... school life passes with Hiyama Kiyoteru being the teacher in a class of vocaloids.... (Roro's failed romance with Yukari Yuzuki and other stuff)

?)Everyone thinks Gumi and Roro are together and it takes weeks for them to give up and accept that they're telling the truth when the say they're not
??) An accident occurs where Gumi is seriously injured and suddenly everything becomes clear for Roro: Gumi despite being near super human is not infalliable and will not be there forever. He realizes that he likes her as well.
???) After a very awkward buffering period, Roro confesses to Gumi. Gumi thinks he's joking. Roro confessed again. Gumi still thinks he's joking. Roro kisses her. Gumi believes him before fainting.
????) They spend a week on a crusade trying to convince everyone that they're now together. Their friends don't believe them since they don't act any different and they were just convinced that they'll never end up together. The end result is a 50/50 split. Gumi and Roro give up and just decide to live life as usual.
... some more events...
END) Miku and Mizki reflect on how Gumi and Roro have changed over the years. Roro has opened up, and become more accepting of others. Gumi has stopped living life as if it'll end the next day and started to treasure the present. There is a brief talk about other couples and the fact that Miku and Mizki are still single (*sigh*) but they wish their friends the same happiness that Gumi and Roro experienced.
EPILOGUE) After accomplishing their dream of becoming idols, Gumi and Roro decide to get married and face all the other dreams in store for them! The entire cast is present at the wedding and in true Gumi Cantabile fashion, it ends up a mess with cake everywhere but everyone's smiling and laughing. The last wedding photo ends with a large thank you to everyone.

Events with no place in time line yet: -Gumi and Len's worst date ever (prior to meeting Roro) as rebounds for their respective crushes. This causes Gumi to find bananas revolting.
-A female vocaloid sleepover at Roro's house since Gumi's house is not big enough. Hilarity ensues.
-... there was more but I forget for now!

Actually Gumi Cantabile was supposed to be a seemingly comedic story about depression and finding reasons to live. Some revelations come in huge chunks like in Gumi's past while others are hard to come by. The reason why Gumi insists on doing something every day and partaking in so many projects was to combat that fact but slowly she finds things she wants to live for and changes. The same with Roro, wanting to disappear and not knowing what to do now that his world (his fiancee) died, clingy boy fro writing 16 years would have happened if Gakupo hadn't run into him one day and interfered.

The point I wanted to convey was that the world is wide and if you lose something you love, there will be plenty more for you to find as soon as you start looking. So don't give up! Rise above the pain! Even if it's for simple things like eating delicious foods, seeing your friends again and the like, they are the things that will save us more likely than not. If you feel like the world has abandoned you don't give up completely, there will be a place for you for sure! Sometimes you're unlucky and you don't find it right away but it will be there, waiting for you to come home. Sometimes if you're lucky you'll find more than one place to exist though one is often enough. As you live, you change. Even though there are holes in our heart now, as we find happiness in the simple things, we will find that those holes only exist if we dwell in them and refuse to come out. We have a great capacity to forgive and love so don't be afraid to reach out to someone. Gumi failed many times but her on 77th failure to make a friend she met Roro. You never know what will happen. Friends will present themselves at unlikely moments so if you continue living something good must happen. It's statistically impossible for life to remain horrible forever (but if you have clinical depression please see a proper doctor).

I was depressed and I wanted nothing more than to disappear so I made this comic as a kind of wish fulfillment. I wanted friends who stuck by me forever and to do all those things eventually but life just didn't seem to permit it. But really I was just running away from reality; if I tried hard enough something would surely come out of it. Sometimes it's not easy but I couldn't keep hiding behind a fantasy. I'm sorry, that's the real reason I quit. I wanted to find happiness in my own life and not just happiness in a fabricated world. 

I don't know why I'm posting this but Gumi deserved a happy ending. Now I've given it to her in a small way. I too wish one day someone will give me a happy ending but to work towards that I have to keep trying, to keep improving myself, and to tear own the barriers I've set against other people. 

I hope you all work towards your own happiness one day. May all your dreams come true