Progress Report (Patreon)

4k Words!

I know I recently made a post yelling about word count, but I'm as excited for this landmark as I was the other, so here I am, yelling again! More than words, this just represents my falling back into my old creative output, at a time I considered to be "in my prime".

This, of course, is not only measured by numbers but by the writing itself. I don't know how or why, but this last week I just had an easier time writing. And I'm so proud of some passages! I can't wait to share them with other people!😄 I wrote a scene that came out of the left field, honestly. I haven't planned it, nor did I write it in the first draft of the chapter, but it came up as I was writing, and I just went with it.

And now I can't believe I didn't add it before!

The 4k word count was actually at the end of yesterday's writing session. But my brain was so mushed that I found I didn't have the mental energy to write this Progress Report. So, I had to delay my celebration for a day. 😋

In any case, if you can't tell, this week was very good! It was so good, in fact, that it made me eager to keep going. I had to stop myself from writing this morning and take Nero for a long hike instead — he deserves it, and so do I. Burnout is always a real threat if you don't learn to pace yourself.

So, I finished scene five! It was actually more than scene five since I added a bunch of things to it, but both the extra and the original skeleton are finished. It felt... so good to be able to finally write variations based on Romanus' background 👀 I can finally start to allow the player to reveal a few things to the other characters, here and there. Little tidbits, little crumbs.

Here's just a tiny snippet of one of those instances:

You nod, eyes on the ground. "But it didn't rain as much, and the moors weren't damp but bone dry instead. The winter was so harsh, we'd have snow cracking open the earth, but in the summer months, those same cracks turned into small creeks that buzzed with the sound of insects." You keep talking, and it's odd how the sound seems to come from anywhere but you. "Never saw many squirrels, but we had other animals. Packs of wolfs, and deer, and... bears. We had bears too."

(This is one of the three possible dialogues depending on your origin.)

The last scene of the chapter is split into three variations that depend on your choices in the first book. The goal for next week? Completely write the first of those variations since it's also the biggest one.

And so has our meeting, our brief get-together, come to a close. You have places to be, and so do I, but whenever you go, traveler, be sure to keep an eye on the horizon. I'll be showing up in seven days, and the worst thing you can do to a storyteller is let them speak to a void. We need ears.

Until then, the gentlest and safest of travels. May the road rise up to meet you... 🌹