Author’s Note – S2 Arc 1 ‘Old Blood’

I want to start by thanking all of my Patrons. You guys rock and It can't be stressed enough that you are my hope to one day make this more than a hobby. If you would like to support me, please click the link and pledge whatever amount seems reasonable to you.

Now to the actual Author’s Note.

“As the pieces came together I eventually ended with the conclusion that the only way for Thana’s story to logically end was to die. Yes, I could have introduced tools to make it different but I dislike doing so. Believe me when I tell you that the person most saddened by her demise is me (I actually cried writing her death chapter, fucked up stuff).“

Anyone remember that statement from the last author's note? Well, sorry for tricking you. It had actually crossed my mind then and several times after to just reveal that Thana would come back. I didn’t make a secret out of the possibility existing, although I left the HOW in the dark until the very last minute, but actually confirming that she would come back felt wrong…

This arc was never supposed to be this long anyhow. I had originally wanted to make this about as long as the Bloodfallen arc, which was around 40k words. Well, with almost 120k, this one is even longer than the 100k of the last arc. Actually, this arc is longer than some books you may have read, like The Hobbit (95022 words) or the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (109571 words).

This is because things kept inflating the length. The original plan was that I introduced Lydia, then the announcements happened and then we moved to Rome. However, I had a lot of spare time in between these announcements and suddenly Siena wanted to be a thing, also Nathalia, who was scheduled to come in the next arc, could use a bit more screentime, right? Not to mention that Aclysia deserved some more time, also, in order for the betrayal of Herman to sting, I needed to develop him a bit more. Also, Momo needed a bit more time. Worst of all, my chapter length is now about 2400-2500 words average, back at the Bloodfallen Arc it was 1793, so that didn’t help.

Oh also: Fluffy Monday. You can thank/blame a guy on my Discord for that, I put a lot of things into that Monday that had to happen and I am not mad that I made it (on the contrary, I quite liked doing some cute stuff with no threat attached for a change) but it sure took a lot of time. Writing fluff is surprisingly hard.

Let’s talk about the name for a moment. Old Blood was a multi-layered title, as I always strive to have. On the surface Old Blood points towards the noble houses of Germany in this story, in other words: Lydia, as this arc is largely her introduction into the story. Going a bit deeper, Old Blood also refers to the rivalry between the Habsburgs and the Hohenzollern. Lastly Old Blood is a rather crude note towards that, at the end of this arc, the blood of old people will be spilled. We will talk about the one doing the spilling in a moment.

Lots of very strong people in this arc as well: Romulus, Sol, Luna, the Reichsadler, not to mention showing Gaia literally erasing someone at the end of the arc. I very much like Overpowered characters, and I can’t wait for the day that I can fully bring John into that fold where his powers have become completely ridiculous, we are slowly getting there.

What else happened in this Arc? Well, there was the side story. Gnome and Salamander were mostly just digging deeper on things you were already aware about and I showed an uglier side of Sylph in the form of her flipping the fuck out. Having a peek into Undine’s thoughts was probably the biggest surprise for most of you, being that she turns out to be a rather conflicted gal. It will probably take a while until we can get back to that plot point, but I hope you keep it in mind whenever even the slightest mention of Undine is on the screen. Totally not being ominous right now >:D.

Also in this arc: Me using Europa Universalis 4 screenshots to draw maps. This may or may not be implemented in the future again, so please let me know whether you felt it was an okay way to display things.

In terms of girls we have 0 new and 4 actual additions this arc. Thana, Momo and Lydia were all already on screen in the last arc, our resident princess was there even before that, technically, but now they actually have speaking roles. I usually only count girls that actually had sex scenes into my girl’s category, but we all know that John’s gonna stick his dick in crazy in the forms of Siena and Thana soon enough.

I think we have finally reached the point where I am not going to introduce a whole slew of girls in every arc. The harem now has the size of 11 members, counting every girl that lives, he has sexed, or will sex soon. Next arc will see Nia Fae, I think I can say that much without a spoiler, and another girl but I can’t say more about that without giving you the spoils.

I think this is all I want to say about the arc. If you have any questions let me know in the comment section, or write me a PM if that is more of your stick. Feedback is always appreciated, so if you could tell me what your most/least favourite moments and/or chapters this arc were I would be interested to hear. Also, once again, consider supporting me on Patreon, thanks go out to everyone who already does.

Extended Character Insight: Herman Glaurum

Or SecretBlonde as he was known for the longest time. His secret is something I took a lot of time building up and, as always, I feel I did it a horrible injustice. The problem with him was that I didn’t want to give too MANY hints, because his was an identity I wanted to be an actual punch to the gut, so people figuring it out in advance would have been a bit problematic. I am also trying to not make John like a clueless buffoon, so having the audience figure a lot of this out before him makes him look heavily incompetent, the goal is to give you guys enough hints to figure it out if you really look into it, but otherwise you are supposed to get this at the same time as John.

Herman started as a dummy plot if I am honest. I knew I would need some shape of antagonist in the early arcs. Not someone like the Bloodfallen who were more of a background threat, but the Bloodfallen only came about afterwards anyhow.

First mention of Herman is therefore all the way back in chapter 2 (or 4 if you count from the very beginning) as the person looking up to John after he uses Possession for the first time. What I then made from that was the information broker known as SecretBlonde, but it would take some baby steps to actually create that nickname.

First the decision was made to actually make him an information broker. I needed an antagonist, yes, but not an actual enemy to fight. John had enough of those in the form of monsters. No, what he needed to be was a constant threat to something John used to have: Privacy. With the loss of privacy there was also the danger of people finding him that you really don’t want to find you. That plotline was only briefly cut on with the bunch of rockers at the start.

Anyhow, I had my enigmatic enemy in the background to shape however I wanted once the story would pick up some steam. Then I created the world and made the decision to have the Discord chat that would spawn be populated with important people from almost all big organizations. Thana also rolled around at that point, so I decided to have the communists involved in the shape of ‘Blood’.

That’s when the idea struck me to make SecretBlonde a Nazi and then the pieces lined up. The pieces to make Thana’s life the hell it was, to give her the send-off she deserved and then have an excuse to bring her back. SecretBlonde, at that point, became the Betrayer of All. The one who only was focused around one and only one part of the Nazi ideology, the superior human being. The one who would do whatever it took to either make himself like her or, if that failed, to at least have her stay in this world.

The goal was set, it was time to construct the path. First, I introduced Herman by putting him in the hospital. Just a background mention, nothing important. Next, I had him in Aclysia’s side story, as his in for the group. Herman himself told you about that part, however, so no need to rattle down the story here.

With the intention of writing Herman so that he looked like a total bro, but who sometimes took actions which didn’t add up with that persona. This is perhaps where I failed the most, I don’t think Herman said or did a lot of things where people raised an eyebrow and went “That’s not in character” which is partly good, he was meant to be a VERY good actor, but there should have been some more hints in the way he acted.

Not that I didn’t give you no hints, mind you. The whole meta-talk about detective stories he had with Momo for example was a giant nod towards him not being completely clean. The joke about metal was a bit more out there but Aurum in Glaurum isn’t exactly hidden either. An apothecary just being able to say, with certainty, what the tank Thana was in would be able to do was also not handwaving, but him literally having built the thing. I try not to do a lot of handwaving (I am by no means opposed to doing it, if the story so requires, but it’s a tool to be used cautiously), so I hope that stuck out at least a bit. There were some more nuggets you could find every here and then, upon rereading the story with the knowledge of who he is, but I don’t think this story is good enough to warrant a second going through…

Which is mostly the early parts sucking from a writing perspective, starting Arc 3 things get tolerable in my opinion. Back to Herman though.

So, we reach his end according to the prophecy. He dropped his persona, read as: it fell. A bit of a stretch, I know, but it’s a fucking prophecy, these are always pretty stretchy. Just the nature of the beast. If you want to you can take the line “I fall for my convictions” instead.

With Herman Glaurum ends the first antagonist of the story. With SecretBlonde removed, the slate is finally clean for the tournament to begin without John having any worries of the past. Which means we get to focus on other characters instead.

Next Arc we will see the mother-daughter rivalry of Nariko and Rave, Momo getting a fighting style, Nia Fae, a Christmas party, Thana’s true power, Siena being a murderous bitch, what the Metracana really is and much, much more.

Be ready for what I plan to make the longest Arc in the season, I hope you all come back for the second arc of the second season ‘Rex Germaniae’ of the Gamer, CHYOA edition, called ‘You will remember me’.