Man, there's so much that I want to talk about in regards to this story. But first, I'll address the most important thing to me.

I want to thank every single one of you for reading, reviewing, commenting, favoriting, following, and leaving kudos for this story. Thank you for supporting me and my writing thus far, even after I decided to completely trash The Producer and rewrite it into Rising Stars. Thank you for being there for every chapter, every typo, every grammatical error, and for every moment of (cringe) flirting between our main characters. It truly, genuinely means the world to me that people would even read what I've written. And for so many of you to enjoy it and go through the effort to leave behind a comment or a review makes me more happy than any of you could truly know.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you so much.

[;]

I suppose I could probably talk about some behind-the-scenes stuff and arcs of the story that never took off.

First, would of course be a relationship between Jaemin and Lux. I heavily considered this for the story, and it's obvious that I was originally planning on having it when you read the earlier chapters. But as the story progressed (and as my outline slowly changed) I realized that having this relationship would take away from the message that I wanted this story to convey. Ultimately, the story is about the relationship between Jaemin/Seraphine and not anyone else. Introducing Jaemin/Lux would have only resulted in more complications between the characters and would have seemed like Jae just tossed Lux aside in favor of Seraphine, which is the last thing that I wanted. That being said, I will say that Jaemin/Lux would probably be the way to go in terms of compatibility. They're great friends, and Lux is an awesome supporting character.

Second, the possibility of a relationship between Jaemin and Evelynn. When I outlined Act 3, I was thinking about putting a one-year time skip after the release of "Better Than I Could" wherein Jae was a successful artist, as was Seraphine, and the two just lived in the same world but worked within entirely different spheres. That is, until Evelynn decides that she wants Jae to produce her album for her. And this leads to a tricky downward spiral of both Jae and Evelynn being open to forming a relationship with each other yet not wanting to take the first step. Sound familiar? It would have resulted in a similar outcome as Jae's relationship with Seraphine, only it wouldn't have as much impact. So yeah, there's a reason this idea got trashed.

Third, having Jae ditch Seraphine entirely and pursue a music career of his own. This was an idea that I played around with for some time, especially because of the content of Jae's text message to Seraphine (see XXIII for more info). Jae is certainly talented enough for it, and I do not doubt the fact that he could become a superstar all on his own. However, Jae and Seraphine are meant to be stars together, and having them be extremely successful without one another would go against the overarching goal of the story.

Those are probably the three main ideas that I had going into this story and as I developed it. Ultimately, I'm happy with the outcome of this project and am even more excited at the prospect of writing more.

After all, I have a few ideas for a sequel of sorts bubbling around in my head.

[;]

Let's quickly discuss the main characters and my attitudes towards them.

Son Jaemin - I think that my opinion of Jae slowly became better and better as the story developed. He was originally a cocky student who was undoubtedly talented, but firmly believed that he stood far and above his peers. And by the end of the story, he learned to curb his self-esteem and understood that there was always someone better than him, especially in a city like L.A. That being said, I'm proud of him for completing this journey. He's lived an incredibly difficult life, and gone through some genuinely painful stuff, and still managed to come out on top. At his core, Jae was a form of wish-fulfillment for myself. He is everything that I yearn to be, and now that we've reached the end of his story, I think I've picked up a few things from him.

Yeng Seraphine - Some might call her the antagonist, some might say that she's the reason Jae went through a painful six months— but I am sympathetic towards Sera, as is Jae. Those six months weren't a one-sided thing, Seraphine went through it too (see XXII for more info). My beta, Aerie, is a rather avid hater of Seraphine, though I can totally understand where she is coming from. Seraphine's personality in this story is abrasive, pushy, and needy in the worst ways possible. If she were a person in real life, I would not be so eager to hang out with her. I wanted to take apart Riot's original construction of Seraphine as a character, and transform into something with a lot more substance, that made her an actual character with form and function in relation to my own story. So, this is how she turned out. Similar to Jae, I'm pleased with the outcome of her character. She's grown and changed so much in the ten chapters, and I'm proud of her.

Luxanna Crownguard - Oh, Luxanna Crownguard. Probably the most inspiring, purest, and admittedly most good-natured character in this story. Her story, from beginning to end, was absolutely brilliant and I loved every second of writing her. She was more than deserving of a "happy ending," but I think that this ending was just as good. She already got closure for her relationship with Jae, and moved past the crush that she had on him. It's a little amusing that the only M-rated scene that this story had was between Lux and Jae, and not Jae and Seraphine who were the final couple.

Son Eunkyung - I sorta wish that I did more with the relationship between Jae and Eunkyung, but I think I did enough. At some point, Eunkyung would have to take her hands off of Jae and let him control his life, let him make his own decisions. She made a great supporting character, and I hope that I portrayed a healthy relationship between siblings well.

The Grand Vastaya - This cast of characters was a ton of fun to write. They always brought a breath of fresh air to a chapter, and I think it's safe to say that you guys liked them too. And Xayah and Rakan played a larger part in the story than I expected, acting as Jae's and Eunkyung's pseudo-parents by supporting them.

K/DA - So, even though the story takes place in the same world as K/DA's existence, they actually don't make much of an appearance in this story. And that's not something I'm disappointed by, I think that introducing K/DA would have caused a lot of problems for the characters, especially if I made them a focal part of the narrative. Instead, they are a cast of characters that act in support of Seraphine, and help foster her talent and creativity.

[;]

The completion of Rising Stars marks the completion of the single longest piece of fiction (fan-fiction?) that I've written. Getting here was a lot of work, and I wished that I'd kept a log of how many hours I spent writing or outlining each week, but I suppose its close to about a hundred to two hundred hours of writing and outlining.

Needless to say, I'm unbelievably proud of myself for having finished this story, and am incredibly excited to move on to bigger, more ambitious projects for myself.

With all of that being said, here's my big announcement.

I'm going to be taking a break from writing fan-fiction and returning to my roots as a fiction author.

However, because of how well a weekly schedule worked for me, I'm going to be chapters of my novel to FictionPress. You can find me on that site under the same name as this one— Aquilarion.

Once my novel is finished, I will be returning to fan-fiction while I revise it. In truth, I have no idea what I'm going to write next, but I know that it'll likely be a lot better than Rising Stars.

Once again, thank you all for supporting me.

Hopefully I'll see you guys again at the end of the year with a brand new story.

With love, Aquila.