Author's Ramblings

I really can't write side stories, damn it.

I can't even make them up anymore.

Actually, it's not that I can't make them up. I just don't want to recycle the main story's plot.

But writing a new plot is such a hassle.

Rather than do that, I might as well not write any. My previous book didn't have side stories either. (Though I promised I would write them before, later I figured I might as well write a new book—which was this one.)

I definitely won't write side stories for my next book either. Waaaah.

Let me tell you about my initial ideas for this book.

After I finished my previous book, I considered two themes.

One was about the interactions between the Land of Rain and the three little ones, while the other was about the Warring States period and interactions with Hashirama and Madara.

But then I suddenly came up with the idea of becoming Tobirama's adopted son.

With the protagonist being an Uchiha, it was bound to have some appeal and market potential.

After settling on the theme, I started outlining it.

In the original outline, Tobirama adopted the protagonist, but remained distant from him because of his identity.

It wasn't until the protagonist displayed his talent at school that Tobirama acknowledged him and began guiding his training.

As for cooking, it was meant to bring the two closer together.

Of course, all those detailed cooking steps were purely the author trying to pad the word count.

Which resulted in a whole bunch of cooking scenes early on.

Later, readers said it was too padded, so I skipped the detailed cooking steps.

And at first, I intended to write Danzo as a villain.

That was to say, he and the protagonist would have a conflict when