SO. I'm not dead! Hihi! Sorry! Gods.

Before anything, may I preface with the fact that I have read and loved every single comment and review I've gotten on this fic, and the only reason I haven't replied is out of guilt of vanishing aoieghaoegh. Also, I think I've seen a few of my headcanons/worldbuilding tidbits from this fic floating around out in the wild and by gods I wanted to cry tears of joy? Like, holy shit yall. Thank you all, truely.

Ok, now time for the somewhat more serious things.

First of all, to all of you people currently reading this, holy shit thanks for sticking with me for this long, and I apologize for just vanishing on everyone. It's been… a while, and I'm sorry everything on this end was just left hanging with no word from me at all, and a deleted tumblr to boot. In my defense, the deleted tumblr part was more the fact that I needed to stop procrastinating and actually study for my exams. At least, that's what I seem to recall being the reason. Current running hypothesis for wandering off for milk and not returning til now is that the Nanowrimo burned me out of writing for like two years, before I got dragged back via power of shipping, pandemic, and overall fandom shenanigans.

I guess that brings us to my second point: holy shit its been nearly six years since I updated this fic ahaha oops. Six years since any updates, and around four years since I started writing again. The latter point is more relevant because as you can see (if this is the version posted on ao3), i've anon'd my username- mostly because my writing style has changed so fucking drastically since the last update for this fic that I don't think I'd be able to come back as is (and also completely jumped fandoms. oops.) The good side of this is I think I've gotten a better grasp on what my writing style is like now, as that came from experience and osmosis and stepping away for a while, but the bad side is that the change is drastic enough that there'd probably be a somewhat drastic tonal shift if i try to continue scales and fangs as is.

Which I guess leads to the third point: a lot can happen in six years. Since the last update, I've come to the realization that the path I originally wanted to pursue (doctor/radiologist pipeline), was not gonna work. It didn't suit me, I didn't suit it, take your pick. I ended up finishing that undergrad degree in a health field, went to do a master's in some shade of engineering, finished said master's, and as of last september I've been doing a PhD. Which is probably half the reason I'm back, honestly. Procrastinating on experiments and reading/writing papers tend to yeet me in odd directions. Education aside, I've fallen in and out of multiple fandoms, and generally stuck to writing for one particular pairing, even completing a longfic and a half along the way. Six years is also a long time for a person to mentally develop and change, especially with a pandemic lockdown and more between then and now, and I guess my mentality is also too different to get into the same brainspace as our dear protag here anymore? I barely remember who I was at the age where I first started writing this fic which was what, 17? And I'm 24 now. Granted, the more you write an sioc the more they fall out of your original personality and become their own separate character, but the base is different, now. It wouldn't feel true to who I was, or who I am now. This is getting more philosophical than I had wanted aogiehaoegha.

All of that aside- I think what I wanted to say is this: I don't want to abandon this fic. Granted, it'll probably never reach a proper conclusion (whether said conclusion is til the end of suijami's life or til a point in the naruto verse where the most prominent problems are solved is anyone's guess), but I had plans yall, so many plans. Fine, many of these plans have changed since along my own goals in life, not to mention my notes from years ago for this fic are nigh indecipherable, but the point stands. Unfortunately, it doesn't help that I cringe quite hard when trying to do any rereads, which would be necessary to dig up some of my memories for the whole thing (and for the editing).

Which, yeah. This brings us to the final point, which would probably also be some sort of closure on my part. There are two-ish choices leading onwards from here: 1) I can probably post what my plans were for the fic. The detail would vary, but would provide a general timeline of events and shit, but it would be out there and yall would have an idea of what I had originally planned. 2) Mass. Editing. As in, at minimal go back and edit every chapter to better flow with my current writing style (and humor), but that leaves out a glaring issue of getting back into the headspace of a character that I no longer know. So, option 2.5/3) Re-writing/mass editing, so that when suijami dies back in her old world, she's closer to my current age. Maybe not 24, but definitely not 17, but it'll make any future writing for this a helluva lot smoother, and I won't have to try to remember what I did or didn't know at the age of 17. It'll also make things funnier, because the most naruto media I've absorbed since then has been through fic lol, so her knowledge of canon would be more… distanced. Ehe. That'll bode well. Ehe. (Shite. I barely remember how to use , I've been spoiled by ao3 lmaoo)

And yeah! Dear readers, thanks for reading this stupendous AN and for hanging around for so long. It's been a while, and we've all grown since then, but I guess this fic should at least get some closure one way or another, right?

So, what do you all choose?

This is Morningwing, signing out.