<– 002.021 | Index | 003.001 –>
All of the following is completely optional to read. This is no narrative. It in no way affects the story. I’m mostly going to ramble for a few words.
Hello, thanks for reading.
We’ve reached the end of the second book. Onward to the third.
Book three will continue as scheduled. No intermissions, no interludes. Tune in next time for 003.001.
One thing I think I struggled with the most in book two was deciding how much information to give the reader about various topics. Should there have been a chapter there explaining something or can that be inferred?
There are several things, mostly around Zagan, that I deliberately kept hidden. Some of those things were skipped over or ignored for the sole reason of keeping his identity somewhat obscured. All that despite the fact that anyone with a working internet connection can simply google the word Zagan and make the connection. Incidentally, rex is Latin for king. Zagan is not a subtle guy.
A couple of the comments had me thinking that leaving some information out is not that great of an idea.
It will be a lesson for me as I move forwards with book three.
The weakest chapter, I believe, was 002.013. I think it felt disjointed between Eva and Juliana’s scenes. Eva’s scene went through a few different versions and I don’t think I liked any of them. One had Arachne doing something other than getting tossed halfway across the infinite courtyard, another had Eva getting injured and not fixed, one had Zagan saying a lot more about his goals and motivations that I left out in the interest of keeping his name out of it.
My personal favorite chapter was 002.010. The chapter in which Wayne met up with Devon and Ylva. I like Wayne. He’s probably the most level-headed character.
We got to see Zoe Baxter outside of the classroom and away from Eva. She’s an avid researcher of all things magical, even things the rest of the magical world might frown upon. And she plays the piano.
Some other characters got a chapter or two in the limelight, detailing their daily lives. Irene notably.
My main goal for book three is tightening up my storytelling. I do not wish to repeat the above issues. POV distribution will be tightened. Primary focus will be on Eva. Zoe and Juliana will also be given some screentime, though not as much as book two. That isn’t to say that we won’t see other POVs.
I am quite excited for book three and have been having great fun writing it so far. I do hope you will enjoy reading.
I have a few side notes before we get on with things.
First, I only have one planned extra for book three. It will be a classroom discussion about order and chaos magic. I’m sure I can think up another one or two, but I was curious to know if anyone had any requests. Extras are simply an in-character method of delivering more expository information. Nothing required for reading or enjoying the main story. Examples of existing extras include classroom discussions about magic and an exploration through Ylva’s domain. We could do more of those, or perhaps a ‘day in the life of ___’ style segment.
Second, I launched a patreon! Yay! Patreon told me to be excited when I announced it and what says excitement more than an exclamation mark or two. On a more serious note: I have a job and I make ends meet. I’m not going to go into my financial details, but acquiring more money would not go unappreciated. Writing takes up almost all of my spare time, as such, I can’t promise any kind of extra chapter rewards. Not unless I make enough through patreon to quit my job. I’m not counting on or hoping for anything like that. Whether or not you choose to donate, thanks for reading.
Third, I just said that writing takes up almost all of my spare time. I decided to do something silly and write more. I’m starting a new project tentatively titled Hide and Seek. It is set in the same world as Void Domain, but shares no characters. Probably. Basic idea is stolen from inspired by a music video of the same name. Watching that video might give away spoilers, but I figured I’d go full disclosure on that. I’ll link it again after I finish the story, so if you want to wait on watching it, you’ll be reminded then.
It is not replacing Void Domain. Void Domain comes first. Some chapters are easier to write than others and I finish them early. When that happens, I’ll be tossing the extra words into Hide and Seek. There could be weeks or longer between updates. The total length is likely to be around half of Void Domain book one, so it isn’t a major project or anything. It probably won’t launch until sometime in 2016 as I like to be a couple chapters ahead, but I thought I’d mention it now while there’s a handy author’s note page to write on.
Note from later on: Project mentioned in the previous paragraphs is frozen due to lack of time and a need to focus on this story.
Lastly, I made a twitter. I’ve never used twitter in my personal life, but someone PMed me on reddit (again, I’m towercurator over there) and asked if I had one. I didn’t, now I do. It’s just set up to post links to new chapters, but maybe someone will find that useful. Incidentally, I rarely check reddit. I think that PM was there for a week or two before I logged in and then it was a while longer before even noticed the little red mail icon.
Trivia section:
-Sisters Goose, Horner, Piper, Botter, Hubbard, Cole, Peep, Griggs, Lamb. I’m sorry. I have no excuse. I mentioned a dislike of obvious references in the author’s note for book one. Then I go do a silly thing like this. I meant to only name one or two, but Lynn Cross knows the names and faces of every member of Charon Chapter. It felt wrong for her to say “hey, you two,” instead of their names.
-The song Zoe Baxter played on a piano was, in my head at least, a mix of the Diva’s songs from The Fifth Element and the track “Run Down” from The Big O. For those that don’t know, The Big O is basically anime Batman with giant mechs. The Fifth Element is… just really good. I’m not sure how else to describe it.
-Ylva enjoys daytime soap operas. She also likes puffy cheetos. She gets really into her soaps. It always fills her with despair whenever she, through the black skull, sees Eva say something like, “let’s go visit Ylva!” She has to wipe her fingers off on her tee-shirt, take it off, slip into her fancy and low-cut dress, and rush out to her throne room. She settles into her slouch of contempt mere seconds before Eva pulls open the door.
-Not so much a trivia, but in author’s notes 001, I recommended the Discworld series on the basis that Death is a pretty cool guy. I figured I might as well recommend something in this author’s notes as well. I don’t read a lot of fanfiction, probably less than ten works total. The very first fanfiction I ever read is titled Dungeon Keeper Ami. If you even mildly enjoy Void Domain, you’ll likely love DKA. I must warn about the site, as it can be confusing to new people. Every episode ends with a series of choices that anyone can add to. As such, some chapters have several chapters linked to them. Only the entries by Pusakuronu are considered part of DKA. So keep an eye on the author and enjoy! Edit from the future: Link updated to Sufficient Velocity as the old site died. As such, none of that old text is relevant anymore.
Stats:
Chapters: 21 (+two Extras)
Wordcount: 100,160 (according to WordPress’ built in word counter (including Extras))
POV counts (max of one count per chapter (including Extras)):
Eva: 10
Zoe: 6
Nel: 4
Juliana: 4
Shalise: 3
Irene: 3
Martina: 2
Lynn: 2
Arachne: 1
Wayne: 1
Catherine: 1
Devon: 1
Des: 1
That’s all, thanks for reading book two. I hope you enjoy book three.
So requests for extras, glad you asked :]
A day in the life of ____ Jordan? Martina? Zagan? Devon? Lurcher(during his dark past?)
As for classroom topics obviously not in this school but maybe in elysium training a lesson on the demonic classifications that they always receive from the source. Or, and I have no context for this one, something more about that consciousness of the Void that was hinted at here and there.
Digging deeper maybe more detail on functional differences between different kinds of foci. On the Between of Zoe’s teleportation. On the Source? Not really expecting that last one it seems too much like something that would be a spoiler now and will be revealed later in the story but it can’t hurt to ask.
Something about teleportation in general? It was hinted that there’s always something unpleasant or some kind of drawback to it perhaps more about that, a comparison of different methods and their drawbacks. Or even further explanation of the difference between proper blinking and Devon’s stepping, it seems like whatever drawback there may be to blinking he eliminated enough to feel ok about teaching it to a kid. Discussion of his morals and safety standards aside it doesn’t seem like he’d want to endanger his project needlessly.
I’ll post another comment if I think of more for now I’ll conclude by stating that I really like the extras and would love to see a lot more of them, more frequently, your schedule slash time constraints permitting of course. I think it’s a great way for readers like myself who enjoy immersing themselves more deeply into the word to get more immersion while being completely skippable and thus inoffensive for those who do not want it. I’d say the only limit to their amount should be your ability slash time needed slash willingness to crank them out.
Duh can’t believe I forgot this was just reminded by the discussion on one of the previous chapters. An extra going into details about the nitty gritty mechanics behind blood magic would be awesome. Perhaps in the context of Eva herself learning it.
Speaking of still hoping she decides to give that book gift that she was uncertain about gifting to Juliana way back when and hoping it’s a blood magic book rather than a demonology one. Juliana seems convinced the key to Eva’s awesomeness is Demonology when ironically Eva barely knows anything about Demonology in the first place.
Hmm, an idea for an Elysium Order extra popped into my head. Might do that. A day in the life of Wayne or Devon might be good ones too.
I don’t think we’ll ever see something from Zagan’s POV. It simply wasn’t meant to be. Jordan won’t be getting any kind of POV until book four or five. The details that far out are still fairly fuzzy. That said, something from either of the Coggins twins POV while they’re around him might be doable sooner.
Some of the other suggestions might get addressed in the main story, so I’ll not be doing anything with them. For now at least. If I end up cutting those topics, I might make extras of them later.
As for the time constraints, the extras are supposed to take around an hour for me to write. Maybe two tops. That isn’t too troubling. I could probably add another one or two per book. Nel’s jaunt through Ylva’s place took a lot longer than that to write and I don’t intend to do anything like that again. I almost made it into a full chapter, but nothing really happens in it to justify that.
The gift Eva was uncertain about giving to Juliana was not a book. Not if you’re talking about the thing in chapter 002.001 (Christmas time). That was described as a black marble with a red streak running across it. It will be addressed soonish.
If there was a book that Eva was planning on giving, I have forgotten and that’s bad. Could you point it out?
How strange, that’s definitely the scene I was thinking of, christmas presents, drawer slamming and everything. For whatever reason in my memory it was a book not a marble and there was more exposition on Eva’s thoughts, her indecision about whether to give that gift, something to that effect, even contemplation of consequences…. very weird.
It was a while ago obviously yet nonetheless that kind of drastic inaccuracy in memory is jarring.
Figures about Jordan, mostly it’s just me being curious about exactly what sorts of magic he is into and the like, looking forward to those chapters/extras where such things get revealed.
Good to know the extras are not too much trouble, excited for more of them :]
I wold like to know more about why runes are considered by proper mages outdated or useless .
Doable. In fact, it is probably a very good idea. There might be something in the main story that at least touches on the subject. I’ll have to see how things work out in the couple of chapters.
I’m… not sure I can accept that Ylva trivia as canon… but I can see it…
Ylva is my favorite character. Man, I wish I had been here while you were still writing because I would have begged for a Ylva POV.
I am enjoying the story a lot so far : D