First of all, the book isn't finished yet, and I'm not dropping it. I just wanted to explain a few things before it ends.
Thank you to everyone who has stuck with it to the end. I've been in a serious slump during this final stretch, especially these past few days.
It has nothing to do with the numbers. When I finished Arceus, it was over three million Chinese characters long, averaged eleven thousand subscriptions per chapter, and had been growing steadily all along.
This book admittedly isn't Arceus, but it's approaching an average of eight thousand subscriptions per chapter too. Its performance isn't bad.
During this final stretch, it hasn't been that I didn't want to write or that I was slacking off. I genuinely couldn't get the words out. Whatever I wrote, it felt wrong.
When I first planned this book, it was never meant to be as long as Arceus. Only halfway through did I realize that the premise wasn't as easy to write as I'd imagined. It was a hell of a lot harder than expected.
The combination of a middleman and a scientist drastically reduced what I could write about. A lot of potential conflicts were resolved outright. Although there was an overarching goal, the plot leading up to it was especially flat, and I failed to make the everyday moments interesting...
I'd already used a lot of those formulas in the previous book. Following them again would just be old wine in a new bottle, with far too much repetition.
Then, while Oda hadn't stabbed me in the heart much, Riot Games kept doing it over and over. (Welcome Victor, the Arcane Pioneer, and let's take a moment to remember that, on Valoran, where technology and magic are getting increasingly absurd, someone still fights by belly-bumping people.)
The quality of the ending really hasn't been good... Let me bow my head in apology first... But writing lately really has been a headache, and sometimes I've just had to force the words out... I'll do my best to wrap it up properly...
A lot of people don't read the author's notes. I said before that it would be finished before Lunar New Year, and that's still the plan.
The Valoran material was only ever intended as a side story. I never planned to write it at length, and that's still the case. That's all...
(And while I'm here, an early Happy Lunar New Year to you all.)_