Hey, sithlorde1988 here! I know, I know. This isn't an ACTUAL chapter. But this is still a needed update, which will serve a couple of distinct purposes, three of them to be precise. So let me proceed with the first of those purposes.

1) Updated statuses on my ongoing stories: I know there's quite a few of my stories that I have ongoing that I haven't updated in a while, so let me go ahead and address those now.

Pokemon: Shuffled Journeys- I was planning to resume this story, and I even have a half-typed out chapter of it on the back-burner, but I realized while typing chapter 11 that I didn't do a good job of tracking my progression with the characters, causing me to end up not being able to proceed past the mock battles of that chapter (Ash VS Iris and Gloria VS Hop) as a result of not keeping a good track of the characters' Pokemon's levels, moves, and so on. So thanks to that, I eventually decided to put it on hold for a time, but I've now decided that it will be one of the stories that I temporarily discontinue, but will eventually give a rewrite, along with some others I will list below. DISCONTINUED, WITH A REWRITE PLANNED TO HAPPEN AT SOME POINT IN THE FUTURE.

Frozen 2- Boreal Destinies: I know a lot of people have eagerly been waiting on an update to this, but after thinking it over recently, I decided that like Shuffled Journeys, this will also be discontinued but be in consideration for a rewrite at some point in the future. Alternatively, if there's any writers who feel like they can do this story adequate justice, I might be willing to adopt this story out for someone else to try and write themselves. And if no one wants to, I'll give it a rewrite myself eventually. DISCONTINUED, BUT UP FOR POTENTIAL ADOPTION WITH THE POSSIBILITY OF A REWRITE IF NO ONE WANTS TO TAKE IT OVER.

Digimon Data Squad Redux (rewrite) : I plan to finish this one eventually, but for now its on an extended hiatus until I can make myself sit down to rewatch Data Squad to refresh my memory of the plots of every episode past episode 4 to be able to properly cover those plots while being able to make sure I can properly integrate Kyori into said plots without taking away from the plots of said episodes. So yeah, apologies to all who followed and favorited that story, but you'll be waiting a while for an update on it. So thanks to all of the people who followed/favorited the story for both the support and your continued patience! ON EXTENDED HIATUS FOR THE FORESEEABLE FUTURE, BUT WILL EVENTUALLY BE FINISHED

Bakugan: The Pyrex Chronicles - To be honest, I was planning to continue this at one point, but then my co-writer brought the fact that Pyrex is apparently a kitchenware brand to my attention, which I'd not considered when naming the main OC of the story. As such, due to not wanting to have an OC named for kitchenware, I'm going to have to unfortunately halt work on this story for now. However, it is NOT discontinued since I plan to give this story a rewrite, much like with Shuffled Journeys and possibly Boreal Destinies. But it might not be right away, depending on when I can make myself sit down to start the rewrite. These days, I've developed something of a 'one-at-a-time' mindset for the most part when it comes to stories. But I will get to this eventually. DISCONINUED, WITH PLANS FOR A REWRITE OF THE STORY TO TAKE PLACE AT SOME POINT IN THE FUTURE.

A Mine is A Terrible Thing To Waste Redux (Rewrite) : Unlike every story I've listed to this point, I DO plan to finish this story, since it's actually super-close to being done, with only around 3 to 4 chapters at most remaining on it. And I also have a chapter partly typed out for it, so this one could actually see an update at some point in the semi-near future once I finish typing out the chapter in question. ON HIATUS, BUT WILL EVENTUALLY BE FINISHED

Digimon Frontier: Return To The Digital World - I plan to finish this one as well. I just have to make myself sit down and actually write out chapter 4, since I have so many other stories to manage, it takes a bit to update each of them. But I will eventually finish this story as well. For now though, I'm putting it on an extended hiatus until I can get chapter 4 typed out, which could be quite a while honestly. ON EXTENDED HIATUS, BUT WILL BE FINISHED EVENTUALLY

As far as the Total Drama stories on my profile (other than AMiATTTWRR), they're all discontinued, with the possibility of rewrites happening in the distant future based on when I get to said rewrites. So that's the status of my ongoing stories, other than one that I will list below:

Phantom Files, Book 2: Rise Of The Monarchs - Currently 46 chapters in, with the last two chapters (47 and 48) already typed out. The plan is to target this coming Saturday or Sunday (either the 28th or 29th of September) for chapter 47 being uploaded, but I make no promises on which day it'll be other than to talk that over with jdimock, since he has school stuff starting up that I have to work around for my uploads since he helps edit the chapters (for lack of a better way to describe his role in making the story), so will have an upload in the not-too-distant future. IN PROGRESS, WITH THE LAST TWO CHAPTERS TO BE RELEASED OVER TIME.

And with that update, that's the status of all my ongoing stories. Now to the second purpose for this 'update':

2)Looking for a long-term editor/co-writer: After how successful (to a point) both Persona 5- The Phantom Files ((and the sequel (titled Phantom Files, Book 2: Rise Of The Monarchs)) had thanks to two particularly helpful individuals who go by the (pen)names of AKANOS and jdimock, who basically took up a role for Phantom Files (AKANOS) and Rise of the Monarchs (jdimock) where they looked over the chapters as they went up, ultimately either leaving critiques on what I did right and/or did wrong (AKANOS), or going through each chapter in depth as they went up, sending over edits they found that I needed to make which I made (jdimock), which was a very great help in making those stories what they ultimately wound up becoming.

Mind you, it wasn't a perfect fix for those stories, since I still see errors in both stories that I need to correct (mainly spelling errors with the occasional wording error), but they're surely far better off than they would've been without those two's assistance. So if they're reading this, a very big shout-out to AKANOS and jdimock! Thank you both so much for your help with my recent stories!

That being said, after the success those stories enjoyed thanks to the two I named, I'm looking for someone else to take up a similar role with any future stories I undertake (which will probably be across various fandoms, given what I have backlogged to work on), so if anyone is interested in that, feel free to either leave a review or PM me (I accept either form of communication).

Or failing that, I have a discord I check fairly frequently since I'm in three different servers, one of which is a server I made myself for discussing my fanfiction stories (since sometimes the site glitches and updates become difficult to pull off as a result), which I can add people to that want to be added. Or, I can just give my Discord handle for those who might want to be able to talk to me on there via DMs. So there's a lot of ways to talk to me.

But in all seriousness, it would probably help my stories tremendously to be able to secure a long-term co-writer/editor since jdimock is only signed up to help out until the end of Rise of the Monarchs, meaning that once that ends, I'll be flying solo for future stories. But with a co-writer/editor, I can probably make my stories continue to improve and get better than they would be if I was self-editing (since while I am a good editor, I'm only human, and can easily overlook stuff because I skim stuff for edits at times and don't always look with a fine-tooth comb right away), so a co-writer/editor would be helpful! So yeah, feel free to PM me or leave a review if you're interested and we can discuss things from there.

With that having been said, on to the third and final purpose for doing this 'update':

3)My ongoing poll: For anyone interested, I have a poll currently up on my profile that will help influence which story I work on next once Rise of the Monarchs wraps up. While I did do a similar poll a while back, that poll ended in a very messy (and very inconclusive) tie, so I'm taking the top option from that poll and the top option from a poll I did prior to it and having it be between those two options. For those curious, I'll break down those options below.

Option 1- PERSONA 4: THE GOLDEN APOSTLE (Persona Series) : As the name implies, this would be an adaptation of Persona 4 Golden.

Plot: After his parents get sent off the grid for yet another spy mission (even if he's unaware they're spies), Yu Narukami finds himself sent out to Inaba for a year to stay with his uncle and cousin, Ryotaro and Nanako Dojima. Unbeknownst to anyone involved, once Yu arrives in Inaba, a murder mystery begins. Not surprisingly, things happen so that Yu is forced to awaken to the power of mysterious beings called 'Personas' to try and solve the mystery. However, he won't have to do it alone. Along the way, he is joined by a group of friends, who eventually refer to themselves as the 'Investigation Team'.

Or so the plot of canon Persona 4 Golden goes.

But what happens when another character is added to the mix, one who is an older half-brother of Nanako's that resulted from a one-off hookup Ryotaro did at a King's Game party around 10 years before Nanako was born? How will the addition of this extra character change the plot of Persona 4 Golden, especially when he has the stigma of being the last living member of the once-infamous Kusanagi yakuza clan? Can Gaignun overcome the stigma around him, and recent tragedies in his life, to be useful to the Investigation Team? Ratings, Pairings, and Release Date TBA (partially pending the results of the current poll)

Option 2- FIRE EMBLEM: THREE HOUSES - SECRET OF THE CREATOR (Fire Emblem) : A slight rework of the game Fire Emblem: Three Houses, where both male AND female Byleth are in the game simultaneously.

Plot: In the Imperial year 69, the progenitor gods Lord Xanatos and Lady Shyla are enjoying a hard-earned peace with their young son Leicester, while their eldest child Sothis is out protecting the peace of the then-fledgling land of Fodlan. However, disaster strikes when the hand-picked champion of Sothis, the liberator king Nemesis, becomes corrupted by his own power and starts slaughtering everyone in the village of the progenitors.

However, in a bid to preserve the bloodline of the progenitors as well as potentially safeguard the future of Fodlan, Xanatos and Shyla make the difficult choice to have their son Leicester placed into an enchanted sleep.

Fast forward 1100 years to the Imperial year 1169, when a pair of well-meaning retainers of one Erwin Gloucester unearth the hidden cave that Leicester is sealed in, managing to remove his casket and carry it out, unaware of the person in the casket smacking his head on the ceiling when the casket is jostled, causing him to lose his memories and forget everything. Taking advantage of this, Erwin tries to coax Leicester (or Les, as the letter on his chest identified him, prompting Erwin to call him 'Les') to live with him and help him with odd jobs. Leicester accepts.

However, unbeknownst to Erwin, his retainers would inadvertently expose his plans to use Les as a pawn to oust the ruling house of the Alliance, House Riegan. In response, Les, who had just gotten back from a stay in an underground bunker run by a friend of Erwin's, or one Thales, where he had been experimented upon, with the results that his face ends up slightly disfigured, though with the trade-off he gets a second Crest.

But in the process of said experiments, he happens upon one of the Alliance heirs in a younger Lysithea (who he ends up calling 'Sithy' due to not being able to pronounce her name correctly, to Lysithea's amusement), with whom Les strikes up a fast friendship, even though they don't get a lot of time to chat then.

After the plans were exposed, Les ran away, ending up in House Riegan territory, where he was intercepted by the retainers of Lord Riegan who went by the names of Judith and Nader. Once they lead him to the head of House Riegan, Les explains his side of things. To his surprise, Lord Riegan (or Oswald as he introduced himself) not only understands, but offers Les both asylum and a chance to be adopted into House Riegan as a younger brother to his grandson Claude. Needless to say, Les accepts pretty readily. Claude then introduces Les to the children of the Alliance houses.

At the same time, over in Remire village, the leader of a pack of mercenaries, one Jeralt Eisner, and his twin children Byleth and Bylene (or female Byleth) are woken up by a trio of Garreg Mach students being besieged by bandits. Needless to say, when Byleth and Bylene act to save the house leaders, they earn not only the respect of said leaders, but a chance to choose their place of allegiance. What will Byleth and Bylene choose? And moreover, when given the chance to each pick one of Garreg Mach's three houses to lead, what will the two choose? And how will it affect the flow of Three Houses? Pairings, ratings and release date TBA (likely will be in the first chapter of the story when it finally goes up, depending on if it wins the poll or not)

And there's an in-depth breakdown of each of the two options on the poll. For those curious about how to vote on the poll, if you go to the top of the window this 'update' is no doubt open in (if you're viewing it on PC, otherwise it'll be the equivalent thereof for mobile devices), you'll see a picture of Rock from Total Drama Presents: The Ridonculous Race (or Ridonculous Race for short), with the word 'sithlorde1988' next to it in blue lettering. Click on where it says 'sithlorde1988' and you'll get taken to my profile page. From there there should be a section near the top that says 'Poll: Which of these would you rather see go up next? (Since I can't decide) (Will be up until the final chapter of Rise of the Monarchs goes live)' with the words 'Vote Now!' in blue lettering. Click on that and you'll be taken to the poll, where you can vote for one of the two options I went over above.

Note that as I have it set to being a blind poll, only I can see the results until I close the poll. So vote for whichever option you like, and once chapter 48 (aka the final chapter) of Rise of the Monarchs is posted, I'll close the poll and tally the results, and whichever of the two options has the most votes will be what I work on next. And then whichever option had less votes will be the next story to go up after that.

Therefore, both will get done, but this poll will decide the order they get done in. For an estimate, I'm going to guess the final chapter will probably go up sometime in early to mid October (since it's currently 6:53PM on Thursday, September 26th, 2024 as I type this 'update' out), but that's only an estimate. The poll will end whenever chapter 48 of Rise of the Monarchs ends up being posted. So that's how long people have to vote on the poll.

So, to conclude this 'update', I've given an update on the status of my ongoing stories, announced my intention to seek out a long-term co-writer/editor for my stories (however you want to put it), and also announced a new poll that is up on my stories. Also, any stories I didn't list above are ones that are either long finished, or long discontinued.

Regardless, I left those on my profile partially because I was too lazy to delete them, and partly so that anyone who wanted to see my early work (as unpolished/rough as it might be in comparison to my recent stuff) can do so. So yeah, vote on the poll, and to anyone who followed/favorited any of the stories I listed above, thanks for your support, and please be patient if it was one of the ones I plan to finish and/or put on hiatus, as those will all be finished eventually. So I think I'll end this 'update' here before it goes on too long. So yeah, until the next actual chapter of one of the stories this 'update' is posted for, sithlorde1988 out!

-sithlorde1988