From October 2019 to February 2023-it looked like a span of three or four years, but the time I actually spent posting updates was probably only half a year.
At the end of the day, I was a newcomer without much experience. Foolish Emperor came to me on a whim, and the further I went, the more problems surfaced. I had social anxiety, never talked things over with my editor, and knew only a handful of fellow writers. I thought the book had flopped, so I stopped updating.
When I came back to write it again, it was like trying to get up early on a weekend: all I could do was struggle, and I really couldn't get myself up. I'd forgotten all the hooks I'd planted earlier, and I stumbled my way through to a barely managed ending.
Now, at least, it had a beginning and an end.
Still, I gained quite a lot. As the pioneering work of the Foolish Emperor style, it could be said to have launched a whole subgenre. It averaged over ten thousand paid subscriptions per chapter; in today's climate of cracking down on piracy, reaching twenty thousand wouldn't be too difficult. I gained more experience, too. If I wrote it all over again, I'd definitely produce a better work.
Well then, if fate allows, we'll meet again.