Hello! I wanted to post this as a sort of update on life and this story. No, this is not a new chapter. Yes, this might be the author's note we've all been dreading. But please don't hit that x button yet! I've got some stuff to say.

I've been struggling with various blocks, but even when I have gotten some writing done, it hasn't been on this story. Sorry! I just…don't need an escape the same way I did when I started this. My life still isn't perfect, but it has improved. I don't feel the need to get away as much anymore, which leaves me without the extra will to get over my block on this story. I love this story, and I want to finish it, but I don't know how. To that end, I feel like I've been doing y'all a disservice by just leaving you hanging and saying I'll come back eventually. Because at this rate, I might not.

There, I said it. I might not ever get back to this. It sucks.

To give y'all some closure, I've got some notes about what was going to happen in the future of the fic:

- Merra gets one of Henry's crows from when he's introduced. It's silly, but that was planned from the very first chapter.

- Speaking of Henry, he and Merra were going to work together on duplicating Tharja's taguel hex. I really enjoyed writing that and thought it would be super cool if that was available to other characters. Panne wouldn't have to be the last one anymore!

- Tharja goes to jail. Sounds pretty extreme, but I really couldn't imagine her rivalry with Merra ending any other way. Certainly not peacefully.

- Remaining hexes I had thought up were things as silly as having to be a certain distance or more away from Robin (trying to get closer would be like hitting an invisible barrier), having to be a certain distance or LESS from Robin (in the case that the previous hex messed up), to things as debilitating as inverting left and right (which I imagine would be way harder to deal with in real life than a game), insomnia, and constant sleep-paralysis demons. It was all going to end with flat-out poison as Tharja gets more desperate, resulting in her being arrested for attempted murder.

- Noire, if ever introduced (as I balked at the idea of introducing ALL the children), would be accepted as part of Merra and Robin's family unit. Donnel would have been her father, like in my game, but he was never recruited in-story so that would have been awkward. Actually I was thinking that if I did introduce all the child characters that there would be some discrepancies between the pairings from their timeline and the new one. I ultimately decided against it because I am not about all that drama, but it was a fun idea.

- The only one that stuck around was Severa's parents not being together because obviously Cordelia didn't make it. Her dad would have been Lon'qu, who would end up marrying Emmeryn instead in the story's timeline.

- I was going to have a goofy scars conversation inspired by the one in Jaws, where all the scars get progressively more outlandish. Shenanigans would ensue, like someone overzealously putting their leg on the table to show off a scar on it and people pulling up shirts like "Got this one here from a risen!" And everyone being like "we've all got risen scars at this point, Stahl, show us something original." "Vaike, get your leg off the table, there are ladies here." "I ain't no lady!"

- I like the scars talk idea because I've got this one on my neck that looks like someone tried to murder me. It's actually a cat scratch. I've probably mentioned this before.

And that's all I've got! I was going to wing everything else, as per usual.

Not to promote my other works on main, but if anyone was waiting to see the rest of the story before reading the epilogue I posted, don't. Now is as good a time as any to see how it ends. It's time for closure, fam.

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, to everyone who has read, reviewed, followed, or favorited this story. Every time I received a notification it just completely made my day.

You can stop reading now. The rest is just me talking about life.

It's been so long since I started writing this that I'm not sure what I have-and haven't said anymore, so I guess skip this if you've seen it before.

When I started this, I had no life. I'm not kidding. I was in a bad place after finishing high school. I had no job, no college plans, no car, and no nearby friends. In the year that all of this was true, I started writing this. Throughout the course of writing this story that's all changed to some degree. (Though some of it is more true now than ever, oddly enough) I got a job, I got my driver's license, I took a couple semesters at the nearest university, and even made new friends! My mental health improved by leaps and bounds and all of a sudden it was getting harder to relate to Merra, my own character. Weird, right?

So I know I've talked about my life a lot in the author's notes, so here's some new developments:

- I quit my job at Dollar General after working there three years, having outlasted everyone, even my boss, from when I was first hired.

- I went to work at Walmart in the next town over. Pay was better, breaks were better, workload was definitely worse.

- My roommates and I all got evicted. The one I was sharing a room with moved to Utah, one of them couch surfed between a friend in Texas and another in Oklahoma, I moved back in with my mom and the other two went to stay at a weekly motel.

- I injured my shoulder at Walmart. Walmart was not very happy about this.

- I got worker's comp. from Walmart. I assume they were not happy about this either. Like, you joke about worker's comp and it's all fun and games until suddenly you need it.

- I got fired from Walmart. (Oops)

- I tried to go back to Dollar General like a coward only to discover that my old manager marked me as "Not Eligible for Hire" like a complete bitch. I don't even know what I did wrong. I'm pretty sure you need a BIG reason to be marked that way. I'm calling corporate to file a formal complaint against her. It's gonna be great.

- My roommates and I got a new house! It's an hour away from everyone I know :(

So that's life right now. I'm back to no job and no school and far away friends, but at least I have a car now? I guess as far as other things I'd jabber about go I posted the first episode of my Abzu LP quite a while back. I haven't gotten my TV set up yet because we I haven't even been moved back in with my roommates for a month, but as soon as I do I'm finishing that. I haven't been able to write anything since October, but I do have a new Fire Emblem story up if anyone wants to read it!

Last thing, I've got an ao3 now under the same username as this account. Due to Fanfiction removing their desktop accessibility from mobile, I will no longer be posting on here with any semblance of punctuality, as I usually post exclusively from my phone. I hope to see you there!