This volume ran to 103 chapters, roughly 420,000 Chinese characters. Overall, I felt much more at ease writing it than I did the first volume.
"Ambitious One" referred not only to the protagonist, but also to the Outer Deities and their followers, and could even include the ordinary people of Backlund.
Using a Sequence from an Outer Deity as this volume's title naturally carried a certain irony. The Outer Deity followers who harbored malice toward their fellow humans were ultimately swallowed by an even greater malice, while the "half a Celestial Worthy" who retained his humanity was willing to shelter ordinary people whom those in higher positions regarded as burdens and expendable resources. Personally, I thought that was pretty compelling.
In this volume, every character I focused on hinted at their own ambition: Nimrod wanted to become a god, Klein wanted to go home, and Audrey wanted justice. Didn't those seem like perfectly normal aspirations and goals? But in this world, staying true to yourself was no easy matter for anyone. It could absolutely be called an ambition.
Then there were the ordinary people-well, not just those in the East Borough. Their ambition was to "keep living a decent life." I say it wasn't just the people of the East Borough because, in the face of the coming war, a war that was certain to arrive, no ordinary person or even Beyonder could stay out of it.
Now, let's talk about what didn't work so well in this volume. I didn't devote much space to the common people, which meant that the final theme wasn't conveyed as well as it should have been.
Going forward, I'll try to lay more groundwork and make every character feel as alive as possible.
Well, on that note, I still feel rather ashamed. Some