Volume 09 Preview

“What are you doing?” Ara-kun asks me in an act of curiosity. “Just a dick measure-contest,” – Kenta needs to fight on other fronts now?

“…I never considered that. … You won, Momo,” the alfr accepts readily, – Ara’ainn makes a life-changing decision.

“Here we are,” I hear Ara-san proclaim to the rest of the party. – We return to the farmstead that nursed Kenta.

Mirianne feels frustrated. She couldn’t put the finger on it, but that Rine-girl was bad news. She wanted her to go, wanted to beat her, but it’s like she’s a whole other lifeform. – The feeble feelings of a quite normal teenage girl, especially compared to whatever we may call our main characters.

“BARBARIANS!” One of the bystanders shouts out. – The conflict is set.

“I had some conversations with Katarine-san and Grekkun, as you wanted a way to measure someone’s power, and therefore made a tier-list.” – Finally power-scaling explained!

““““““Woooooohooooo!”””””” What is that? A howl? A cheer? Please not a cheer. Shit, they really look like they’re happy to see us, which isn’t exactly a situation I’m used to. – That’s kinda sad, Kenta…

“Lad, you want to learn how to fight barbarians, right? Then let a barbarian teach you!” – Will this become a student/teacher-relationship?

Rine: “No, if we return now, then we did nothing!” Kenta: “I just may have avoided death another time!” – Risk and reward.

“…it comes down to the decision, whether you want to find your own solutions or copy Gottfried-kun.” – Rine has to make a choice how to progress.

“I give up.” – Wait, after all that effort!?

Volume 08 – Afterword

Hello, kentusrpg here.

Well, this is an awkward Afterword, as it’s one I redid quite recently. Usually, they come after writing the alpha-draft of the volume, but there has been some developments, that I thought to address here. In addition of the old Afterword vanishing with some other stuff. I could recover most, luckily.

Alright, let’s start talking about this volume. I hope that Gottfried could live up to the hype I tried to build up so far. Stronger than anything we witnessed so far and close to the peak I like to establish, though we still haven’t seen his full power yet. This puts all the effort of the family so far in perspective.

This also concludes the second saga of the story, which includes volumes 4 to 8. While the first one was about assembling the cast, this one is about knitting them together. Or if we look at Kenta, first to get to people to be close to and then actually befriending them. Of course the wives also have their arcs, but they don’t fit as neatly in the saga-structure.

Kyou went from someone who wants to control the party to someone who wants to provide. Rine learned the value of power and the struggle of growing up. Ara’ainn learned that sex and romance might be different things… Well, she had already more than a century to learn stuff, so let’s settle on that. I’m sure that avid readers can point out a lot of different things the characters learned, be sure to comment!

There will be more to learn in the future as well. Maybe some will pick up Kenta’s next big step at the end of the next volume, which is coming out soon. Thank you for being my PR for this one again, Antsago!

Now thank you to the readers. I try to not apologize here, which is actually hard, but be thankful for everyone who is still willing to return to this story. I’m blessed with you and I’m always happy to see you comment and theorize. This makes me feel noticed and glad that I can make people think about what I write, which in return means that I somewhat move them.

Finally to MioChin. This is your last volume as an artist chum, and I’m really sorry to present that picture you drew so late, but several health issues and ongoing therapy made it hard to re-enter the world of writing fiction. Thank you for your effort so far, and that you put up with my endless nitpicking and desire of consistency. I hope our collaboration so far will continue to be a benefit for your life as a whole, so that I’ll be a part of your bright future! I know you are to mine!

Good bye, MioChin! I hope you will enjoy the story as a reader!

February 2024 Update

Hey there, just here to let you know that Antsago returned as my proofreader (thank you so much, chum), and that the beta-draft of volume 9 is finished. I somehow forgot to write the new Afterword for volume 08 though, so plan is to do exactly that within the next week in addition to the volume 09 preview.

The prologue will be posted when we finished PRing chapter 1 to get some leeway, so I expect mid-March.

Update January 2024

Happy New Year! Well, it’s been a while since then, but still!

I’m a bit behind my self-set schedule, but happy to announce that I finally finished the alpha-draft of volume 09 at least (compared to be finished with volume 09). This being the alpha-draft does mean that I will take at least two weeks to longer to make it a beta-draft, though since I had so many pauses and retries, at least the first chapters has been revisited several times before, so I hope they will be finished quickly.

For now I will finish the Afterword for volume 08 though, even though I said a lot already that I wanted. Yet it’s still important for me and will also inform the people who follow me on RoyalRoad to keep up with the news.

Thank you for your comments and support. 😉

Volume 08 – Extras

Hey there, it’s been almost a year and I’m sorry for the delay and I don’t think that the long radio silence was necessary. How do I start this best…

First, I do plan to continue the story. While I could make long paragraphs about what happened to me and such, I try the short version: My health has improved after a long time, but finding my drive in the change of lifestyle changed and I needed to search for what I want to write about with this story.

Second, volume 09 hasn’t finished yet, though I revisited it some times. The changes in my life and drive does make it hard to resume, especially as I’m always finding faults and need to re-learn to let stuff go at some point and just publish.

Third, I won’t be able to write as fast as before. There are physical limits and time constrains, as I need to use much to remain healthy.

Fourth, I don’t know if I want to go through the work to find a new illustrator. Aside from every-increasing living costs and effort, I really like to have someone to stay for some volumes, which may be trouble for all sides due to my slower speed. For now I decided to make sure at times that I look for someone, but aside from that, I will first write and publish maybe three volumes and then, when I saved some money for it, I may try to find someone willing to illustrate everything, which may in return come to a longer partnership which benefits everyone.

For now I plan to finish volume 09 in January and in case that I get in touch with Antsago and can persuade them to proofread again, the release will be a bit delayed for some quality result. If not, I will probably post everything somewhen in February.

That’s it for now, have a Happy New Year.

Volume 08 – Epilogue

We’re finally at the story-end of volume 8, and I’m very concerned about volume 9’s progress, as it has totally halted after I started on the RoyalRoad Community Magazine… and I’m still almost finished with the alpha-draft. Oh well, I hope I can use these writing habits I improved and will become much quicker on I hate wed in exchange…

Last time, Kenta has… confessed? Demanded? Well, he expressed that he will go out with Rine if she agrees. And it has nothing to do what wiill come.

Volume 08 – Chapter 7-5

Hey there, didn’t come to much writing this week. I also doubt that next week will be better, but we can still hope? At least I could make some progress on my RoyalRoad Community Magazine entry, but it eats much I hate wed time after all… sorry about that, but it does help me getting into better writing habits and to learn how to pace my hand better.

Last time, Gottfried considered whether you should kill Rine or not.

Volume 08 – Chapter 7-4

I forgot last week to show you the pictures that were finished. Oh well, take a look here, here are all of them so far. Making an extra post seemed a bit too much, considering how much I fight wordpress each week recent

Illustrations are still going on, but process is made.

Last time, Rine became a girl on fire!

Volume 08 – Chapter 7-3

This time, we got some presents! It’s a chapter where we already have images upon release!

Drafts of the rest of the pictures is also done. Some of the prior pictures had been posted as well, but not be added to the posts, as I still try to figure out how to make adding pages work again. Also, volume 9 is nearing its finish… well, the alpha-draft is. Just a bit before the epilogue, depending how much time I can spend writing, it could be finished within this week or the end of the month. But then comes beta-drafting…

I hope to finish soon, so that I can spend more time writing a writing project for RoyalRoad, basically a small adventure story for the RoyalRoad Magazine January 2022, which will not only give me a time to reset my mind and continue working towards increasing my PC-time per day (as my hand is still a limiting factor, but it does get slowly better surprisingly after two years of no noticable change). Check it out here, just don’t expect something with depth.

Last time, we looked at Rine and Kyou, who both manage their situation in their own ways. Now let’s return to our protagonist! What imbeccible ideas might he has?

Volume 08 – Chapter 7-2

Happy new Year! Here is my present to you! What? It’s the same as every week? It only means that every week is precious and special, right?

First line of pictures are finally done, now we need to work on the rest. But this speed reminds me of the good old days. Sadly, my writing isn’t as fast as it used to be…

Last time, we looked at Rine and Kyou, who both manage their situation in their own ways. Now let’s return to our protagonist! What imbeccible ideas might he has?