I have a bit of a confession to make.
No, I'm not dead, but my absence was not without reason. I won't bore you with the details, but the gist of it is that long built-up stress from my less than stellar school situation was taking its toll on me and I can only very recently claim to be mostly recovered. Right now, I am working at my usual slow but steady pace, as opposed to the previous complete standstill. I'd say that's a definite improvement.
I have the entirety of the next chapter planned up in skeletal form, as well as most of the entire storyline finally sorted out. However, I find myself rather hopelessly stuck on one thing.
The action scenes.
You may have noticed a distinct lack of them so far. This is mainly because of two reasons.
One, if you read an officially published work of literature, you may find a distinct lack of them. There is a reason for that. The literary format does not handle action sequences very well, due to a very distinct lack of visuals. Flashiness is not lthe strength of the written word. I have done my best to focus on that which is - interactions, setting, plot and characters, as you may have noticed. However, this fanfic is based on both an action-adventure game and a shônen action manga. Action sequences are unavoidable. I will do my best to keep them both brief and scarce.
Two, I... kinda suck at choreographing them. I've planned out the scope of the upcoming battle sequences of the next chapter, the arsenal of those involved, the starting point as well as the ending point. I'm just not sure how to go about actually painting them up. This is a problem.
So, I was thinking that instead of making you guys wait even longer while I try to figure myself out, I'd reach out to you and see if you'd be willing to help me out. If any of you who are reading this have a bit of extra time on your hands and are confident in your ability to choreograph fighting scenes, I'd really appreciate it if you'd be willing to help me out. I don't need anything fancy, just a base to work off on. I need that help to get this chapter rolling.
If you're interested in helping me out of this little snag, just PM me and I'll send you the relevant framework. Even if it's just brief notes, I'll appreciate your help.
Lastly, I figured you'd like a heads up. Reviewer Guardian Souls was immensely helpful in pointing out quite a few issues with the previous chapters, most of them being cases of me doing stuff I hate seeing others doing. I'm currently working to straighten out as many of those issues out as I can, and I plan to update en-masse when I finish chapter seven, so you may want to re-read previous chapters when I do. This means that it may still take a while, but I AM working. Hopefully, it'll all turn out for the better in the end.
This is J signing out, editing like mad while hoping for a civil response.
(This note will be removed when I post chapter seven. It will go by the name of Höstanvindar, unless I think of something better.)