This arc’s finale did not pan out like initially intended. Halfway through the arc I hit the problem that the characters of Scarlett and John that I made got along too well…

See, the original idea was that Scarlett would put up a façade war which John was supposed to take seriously, then she would get herself captured by Bearings and John would bust her out at the last minute by attacking the facility.

As you have read, that isn’t greatly different from what happened. It would probably have flowed a bit better and allowed me to iron out some of the awkwardness of the ending. Sadly, John and Scarlett decided to just hit it off right up at the start in the strip club.

When writing that chapter, I was stuck between either writing the best version of the plot and compromise my characters a bit or write a worse version of the plot and let them do how they would act normally. Ultimately, I think of myself as a character writer, so I went with the latter.

I am certain that most of you will say something along the lines of ‘That sounds like it would have been a nice plot, but you write what you want to write, Fun’. Truth be told, dunno if the thing in my head would actually have been the better plot. Things tend to be different when written down, so maybe this was also the actual best plot.

If there is one thing I say wasn’t all that great in either version, it was the way the Lorylim were kinda tacked onto the end. I just didn’t find the right places to really foreshadow their involvement in the thing without running danger that John would immediately find out about it. Just the woes of having a very smart protag.

But all of this sounds like I am whining about this arc and how it panned out. In reality, it was only the chapters preceding and the actual final battle of the arc making me feel like they weren’t as good as they could have been. Alas, not everything I write will be perfect and I am not the type to dwell on things.

In the end I got Jackal out there, even if it was slightly awkward. I don’t think it’s a spoiler that his existence is foreshadowing for something else down the line.

Different topics.

The Faux-War was a bit stompy, but I assure you that John won’t have such easy pickings with guilds that are regional powers and have better access to people like Sigmund.

The Magoi side story was much closer to the original Aclysia one. It had basically no story relevance, but people kept asking for non-John character interactions, so there was some happy fun stuff.

Beatrice was a surprise waifu added in. At the time of writing this, I haven’t heard what you people think of her, only one of my proofreaders was nice enough to tell me he found her “hard to put into words, but generally I am pleased” which sounds about right. For me, personally, she is a total waifu because I adore the less emotional types.

Also 2Booty.

That ass is grass and I am making it my lawn, baby.

Scarlett received a largely warm welcome, with lots of people saying they are looking forward to more of her. Others, partly of the same crowd, said John should shiv her because she isn’t trustworthy. While I do not share that opinion, obviously because I didn’t make John do it, I rather loved that people felt that strongly about her.

Wonder how you people liked her being a total masochist? I don’t want to give the impression that she is being fucked into submission, that’s a tool I don’t intend to use in this story, just that the repressed nympho who is used to being in control gets off on losing it for a bit.

Hopefully next arc will portray well enough that Scarlett is still her own person with her own goals who wants to get ahead.

Speaking of next arc, we are heading to Washington to visit Brenda. Gnome will go to Tier 3… unless our cuddlerock wants to take a gamble with the corruption and try to jump to Tier 4 too? Ah, only I can tell what will happen~

Anyhow, next arc John will be interacting with his family. Still no momcest, wrong branch people, move on, it’s not happening, but poor Brenda will get some attention. Also, John’s father will finally be on screen, isn’t that great?

No, this won’t make it another fluff-vacation arc, lots of things to get through.

Anyhow, here is a survey you can take if you want to give me feedback:

Would be much appreciated.

For a change of pace, THANKS! To all of my Patrons here at the end. You guys are awesome and keep the commissioned art flowing. Due to recent… let’s call it ‘dissatisfactory behaviour’ from the site, I am searching for alternatives for it, but for the moment it remains the best site to support me if you are so inclined.

Also of note is that I am releasing two other stories as side projects now. One of them is a shameless WoW fanfiction over at hentai-foundry about the hot babes of Warcraft getting reigned in by Anduin, expanding his harem of willing little cunts. The story very much takes a backseat on that one, so if you like Warcraft and my sex scenes, this will be right up your alley. Albeit there is some mindbreaking involved.

The other is about a slime creature that randomly drops into existence and has the ability to recreate parts of what it eats. Drip-Fed contains less lewd bits, but it does still contain lewd bits. You can find it over at Royal Road.

And with that, I am done shilling and talking. This was Season 3 Arc 2 ‘Scarlett Thorne’, hope to see you all back for Arc 3 ‘A merry land’.