Three times I have considered abandoning The Immortal Game.

That sounds harsh; it is. At no point in the past sixteen months have I suffered any illusions about who’s in control here. I write this story because I want to, and if I didn’t want to, I could stop. It would be a terrible thing to do to you, the reader, but there it is. That door has always been open to me. Three times I considered going through it.

Because the truth is that writing long is a pain in the ass. It’s easy to get high off a good idea and write an entire one shot before you crash, but it’s harder to keep up a sustained addiction. Okay, my analogy fell to pieces back there, but you get the idea. When you write long, there are bumps along the way.

The first time I wanted to bail was shortly after the story was published on Equestria Daily. It barely scraped out a rating of four stars—and now you go “four out of five isn’t bad at all, I don’t see why that would upset him.” The truth is that TIG’s initial rating placed it in the bottom five percent of all fics on Equestria Daily, ever.

It wasn’t that my expectations weren’t met: in truth I didn’t have expectations. It was just that I had come face to face with TIG’s destiny. I would write out the next eighty thousand words of the story in what even I would admit was pretty mediocre writing, receive a little bit of attention and praise for it, and then move on to maybe write something else. Quitting seemed appealing—what did I have to prove by sticking around?

“Always finish what you set your hand to,” says Durnik. I’ve known him since I was seven years old.

I’ve had trouble writing the epilogue. Perhaps that’s an understatement. Never before have I felt so much like I have no idea what I’m doing, like I’m just making shit up as I go along, like I’m a total ameteur playing at epic fantasy the way a child plays at being a knight by wearing a kitchen pot for a helmet. Two months ago I was tearing my fucking hair out trying to figure out how to finish my story, with no ideas in sight.

The second time I considered leaving the story was for altogether different reasons, and it was around the release of chapter fourteen. I was writing The Power to Destroy and God, and an interesting thought occurred to me: why not just have them, well... win? What if Titan never bats away the Elements of Harmony and instead becomes a statue on Celestia’s lawn? What if Terra gets her head chopped off before she ever gets a chance to be anything but evil?

I knew that those two chapters I was writing, with the catharsis from Twilight Sparkle’s unification, were going to be the best in the story. I wasn’t going to top the Battle of Canterlot in the third act no matter how high I turned the volume or how much money I blew on special effects. It was all downhill from here, so why not just call it? Sure, the story would be worse overall, but it would end on a high note and I would save months and months of my own time.

“Always do the very best job you can,” says Durnik. For those of you confused, I’m referencing a character from The Belgariad, a series of novels I read as a boy. And as strange as it sounds, the dialogue surrounding these two lines has always stuck with me.

I’ll explain why the epilogue has been so hard.

I can’t make you happy. I don’t know what you want. See, I’ve gone around to almost a dozen people—prereaders, friends who read the story—and I’ve asked them what they think should go in the epilogue. I’ve gotten messages from readers, too, telling me that character X needs to make an appearance and plotline Y needs resolving. I’ve finished three drafts of the epilogue—the cumulative word total between the lot of them is about thirty thousand—and in each case I’ve had a different set of people tell me they’re disappointed at the lack of element Z.

I could conceivably answer every question that you might have about the events of the story, except then somebody would ask a new question I’d failed to answer. I could write a separate scene from the POV of every major character to give them closure, but that alone is twelve characters and around forty thousand words. I could tie everything up nice and neatly, and the result would be a terrible mess.

And so the third time I considered leaving my fair lady was about ten weeks ago, when I realized that I can’t make you happy. In a very simple sense, and in my mind, TIG has one plot, and that plot happens in a world with a lot going on. Not every question needs to be answered to resolve that one plot. Not every character needs to have their destiny laid bare. And so I thought: the plot is done, the conflict is over, why bother going on with an epilogue that will fail to meet expectations?

Ultimately I decided I was being a lazy dick and hitched up my trousers, but that still didn’t help my predicament. I can’t make you happy.

I’m a little embarrassed that the solution I ended up using took me so long to come to. See, I can make myself happy. I can write what I feel is a balanced ending and leave it at that. And while that might seem simple—it is, after all, how I wrote the rest of the story—believe me when I say I terrorized myself for months over this.

The purpose of this blog is not to extoll my excellent work ethic—though I’m aware it does that to some extent, which is a little annoying. Instead I want to offer up a bit of explanation as to why it took so long to write, and I wanted to say this:

I’m glad I didn’t give up writing this story when it was only ten thousand words long: I’m glad I wrote it through to the end. I’ve made friends I hope to keep for decades to come. I’m grateful to twenty thousand people who let me share a story with them. I’ve learned that building a skill takes thousands of hours of practice, and that writing is a hobby I can hold onto for the rest of my life.

I have a lot to learn.

So this is what I’ve been doing this past month.

For those of you who don’t know what I’m linking: that’s a graph of my progress over this year’s NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month. The objective is to write fifty thousand words in a month, or by midnight on the thirtieth of November. You may notice that I failed to reach the 50K word mark on time. I also noticed this.

I hate failure. Do you like failure? Probably not. I know I’m not special in this regard, even if I’m special in almost every other way (looks, talent, youth, etc). In addition to that, I absolutely loathe being handed a participation ribbon. I was a participant. I showed up, and then contributed nothing of note.

So what led me to fail? Why did my course falter? Well, I think it might have been arrogance. I’m generally a humble guy, but I may have crossed the line a little at some points.

On November first, I’m visiting my parents. My friends encourage me to write what I can on their computer and get a healthy start.

“NaNoWriMo?” I say. “I’m AestheticB. I could write 1700 word biographies for my NPCs in Dungeons and Dragons. And then they would get six star ratings on Equestria Daily. I don’t need to write. This contest is my bitch.”

On the fifth, you’ll see that I did write... 500 words. The plan was to ease myself into the story and let it take off later. Upon hearing this, a friend told me I was fucking crazy.

“Look,” I say with a derisive snort. “I’m AestheticB over here. Writing words is pretty much my super power. I know exactly what I’m doing, and it’s kicking WriMo ass—just as soon as I’m finished refreshing my FimFiction for comments that heap praise upon me.”

Day 13, I write nothing at all, dedicating my time instead to schoolwork, because even I prioritize sometimes. I’m told that I am ten thousand words behind.

“Ten thousand words?” I ask aloud despite the fact that I am alone. “That could be a challenge for regular people who don’t own $200 keyboards. I feel sorry for the peasants people who aren’t you know, me, because that also means they aren’t AestheticB, bitches.”

The schoolwork strikes back on days 21 and 22, but I remain resolute. “Oh, shit,” I say. “I’m over ten thousand words behind, now! If only I were—oh wait, I am AestheticB. I’m going to hit this shit like a thunderstorm gone to war.”

Day 27 I’m playing XCOM and Ambion gets shot dead by a critical hit. “What the fuck is this?” I say. “Do you have any fucking clue who I am, Muton? I wrote The Immortal Game, you mutant alien shitweasel. You can try to pull that shit when you’re an inspiration to hundreds. Hundreds.”

This morning I look in the fridge to find out the orange juice I bought that I thought was no pulp does, in fact, have pulp. “Lots of pulp?” I say. “What the fuck is lots of pulp? They should call it 'lots of fucking shit.' I’m Aesthetic-Fucking-B. I don’t take shit from OJ.”

Then I look online to realize I’m going to fail NaNoWriMo.

The worst part of it is that if it weren’t in November it wouldn’t be nearly as hard. November is the month of scrambling to get every assignment done for me, and that’s magnified by the fact that I have no reading week in the fall semester. I wrote close to ninety thousand words this June. Forty thousand when I’m trying for it is just pathetic. Really, none of this was my fault. I don’t feel like it was arrogance at all.

But what am I going to do to console myself? Go read the comments on Sparkle’s Law? I mean, sure, that might make me happy for awhile. Twenty thousand reads is nothing to scoff at, and neither is the vault interview, six star rating, two week feature, etc etc. But as nice as it is to have over a hundred people tell me how talented I am, throwing around words like “The King of Comedy” and “The Best Story I Have Ever Read,” it still won’t change the fact that I failed NaNoWriMo.

So what am I to do? Sure, I could go check out TIG and bask in the praise of my loving readers, the fanart, recursive fanfiction, music, rave reviews, and a six star rating that defies the traditional constraints of the grimdark tag. As nice as it is to have you peasants tell me I’m the greatest thing ever to happen to English literature, it still doesn’t change the fact that my dedication to quality over quantity led me to fail NaNoWriMo.

Because the fact is, it’s hard to be AestheticB. I worry that I’m not spending my near-divine level of talent enough, that I’m not inspiring enough people or changing enough lives. Other people only have to worry about surviving though their mundane existence, but I’ve always known I’m more important, destined for something greater. And it really sucks when I fail to meet an arbitrary word quota for reasons that weren’t my fault at all.

I guess the real lesson to be learned here is that none of you could possibly understand the challenges that I face in life, and certainly none of you could face them yourselves. Really, I pity you for not being able to properly pity me.

—

I think we’ve all known somebody like that. Someone who structures every interaction around making themselves feel and seem bigger, carefully looking for every opening they can use to boast in the most humble way they possibly can. It’s the kind of trait that goes hand in hand with being a compulsive liar.

I don’t actually have a point here, I’ve just been watching a lot of Extras and thought that if there was a twisted version of me, it would be arrogant and pathetic. Publicly, I mean.

But I did spend this month balls-deep in schoolwork and NaNo, which wasn’t much of a secret considering I mentioned it as often as possible. No, what I was working on wasn't a pony story, and no, you probably won’t get to see any of it for a long time.

I want to develop my ability to create my own world, characters, and magic systems, and I want to practice long-form editing, so this was a pretty natural course for me to take. I want to get better at writing, and this will build my skills more than anything else I could do.

But now that November is over that project can be suspended while I focus my efforts on The Immortal Game. I know many of you have been waiting patiently, and I’m very grateful for that. The ending has been a hard thing for me to write, and I don’t want to let you or myself down.

After that, I think I might like to try another ensemble comedy. We’ll see how that pans out, though—that kind of story is also very hard for me to write. But hey, I love the challenge.

Man, I haven't enjoyed a video game in forever!

Okay, so we hit the viewer cap and a lot of you guys got locked out. It sucks, but hey! We're also successful.

Here's a link to where you can watch the session in its entirety. I'll post a youtube link when one comes up.

In it, I talk about writing, The Immortal Game, action scenes, why I ditched Rarity's Theorem, and where I get all of my brilliant ideas, all while cribbing off of Pen Stroke's popularity to get an audience, which was kind of cool.

Interview thing, over here, right now.

Get in here!

Let me just take a deep breath, pump my arms a little, roll my shoulders, that sort of thing, because speaking in links can be exhausting.

If you're anything like me, that link is now open in a new tab, awaiting your perusal, so I'll give you a brief explanation. This coming Wednesday, Wanderer D and Arcainum will be moderating a livestreamed panel of three authors. Those three authors are Municipal Engines, Pen Stroke, and myself. We're going to get together and answer some questions, mostly with a focus on writing. In the blog that I just linked, you can suggest questions or subjects for us to discuss. If you opt to watch the panel live via Wanderer D's livestreaming channel, you can ask questions then, too.

Just remember that you should be asking your questions over in WD's blog, not here. And it is very, very important that nobody brings up The Immortal Game's outstanding epilogue. Really, really important.

With that out of the way, I can honestly say I'm excited and terrified—I've never done anything like this before. I want to be funny, intelligent, charismatic, and most of all I want to incisively answer the questions that anyone might have. I'm worried I'll talk too long and hog the spotlight, or not contribute enough, or say something horribly stupid or offensive. Basically, this is a first date.

Now, were this a story, my fear would grow worse and worse as the big day approached. It would gnaw at me from the inside until I was certain I was going to fail and make a fool of myself. Then, with careful prodding and encouragement from my friends—which I'd have, in a story—I'd hit that panel and my fears would dissolve when faced with my love of the subject matter.

But this isn't a story. And fair warning—you know how you sound completely different to everyone else than you do to yourself? I've had my voice described to me as "Retard clown." So, I should be pretty easy to pick out.

Edit: Don't mention Rarity's Theorem, either.

Today is the The Immortal Game's birthday. Unless you want to consider it's birthday October 19th, 2011, in which case this day would be the moment of conception. That's right folks, this day last year was the day I started writing. For my first story outside of the two flash fictions I wrote for a high school English course, it's done pretty well.

I was going to wait until the end of the story to do this, because then you could ask me questions about the way it ends, as well as whatever else you might ask. See, I could fill the final chapter blog with any number of things (I have one blog draft over six thousand words long) but I've decided not to. I don't know what you guys want to hear about my stories, my writing, or me, so I'll just let you ask me. Ask me anything. There are no rules governing the questions you are allowed to ask.

While asking, please bear in mind these ten archrules:

A) You can ask any question.

B) One question per comment. No multi-part questions.

2B) After I've answered one of your questions, feel free to ask a follow-up question or an entirely new question, along with some follow-up comments on my answer. I just don't want people putting twenty questions in one comment.

C) If you ask a question that even comes close to violating the terms of the ABC Non-Aggression-Pact, I will delete you comment. Don't talk about it, and don't talk about anything it talks about. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you don't need to worry about this.

D) If I decide your question is offensive, I'll delete it. If I'm not comfortable with answering it, or I can't answer it, I'll say so.

E) I'm more likely to give a thorough and well-thought out answer to a comment containing complete sentences, proper spelling, and grammar. Just saying.

F) No one can answer questions on my behalf but the pre-readers. Even if they do, I'll probably still answer just because I'm a control freak.

G) These comments will contain spoilers. My answers will not spoil anything currently unpublished.

H) I may outright lie, tell lies of omission, and tell the truth in such a way that it leads you to believe a falsehood. I probably won't, but I'm only human, and we all have a couple of questions that merit that kind of response.

I) If you can't think of a question, you can ask for trivia. I might give you a tidbit about my stories, my writing process, or me.

I'm not a very popular guy, but history shows that my readers are way more awesome and enthusiastic than anyone else's, so I have no idea how this will turn out. I'm terrified of some of the questions the pre-readers might ask, but other than that I don't think this will become unmanageable. I'll be answering questions until the next blog goes up, so if you can't think of anything right away and don't care for random facts, feel free to sit on you question.

That said, ask away.

The more I frolic around with my League and my horror story, with my serial comedy and my six thousand word blogpost talking about high school art class, the more I can't help but feel I've forgotten about something. Like, you know that feeling when you know there's something you were supposed to do, or maybe said you were going to do, but you can't remember what it is? I've got that, but I just can't quite place—

Oh, right.

I've often wondered about the relationship between the writer and their readers. What do I owe you? What do you owe me? I think the most popular answer to both of those is nothing; Neil Gaiman once famously remarked that "George R R Martin is not your bitch."

I used to think that I could hold myself to a higher standard, and that's where the weekly release dates came from. I wanted you, the reader, to know that I was close by. That I wasn't going to abandon you all with only half a story. A man finishes what he starts.

Chapter 21 of The Immortal Game, The End of Harmony, will be released Monday, August 13th.

But I also wanted to keep myself going, to stave away that dreadful rot that we call writing fatigue. A deadline can put me in the chair and force me to find the motivation. Does that sound terrible? It isn't. The need to be finished, a desire for attention—these things seem bad by themselves, but in reality all they are is thrust. You point yourself in the right direction and things will take care of themselves. Yes, it's easier to write only when you feel like it, and you can even afford to do that with a story like Twilight Sparkle Gets A Free Salad, but this isn't a 9k word comedy one shot. This is a 300 000 word fantasy epic, and it deserves—no, demands—a real commitment.

The release dates failed in more ways than one. Not only did I fail to meet them on several occasions, but I even rushed to meet one once. Mayday, mayday, we've lost engine control. The first draft of that chapter was a complete disaster. I don't regret failing to meet the release dates as much as I did. Did postponing chapters make me dishonest? The answer to the question is an emphatic and resounding yes. But honesty is cheap. There is no virtue I would not sacrifice for my work.

Chapter 22 of The Immortal Game, The End of War, will be released Wednesday, August 15th.

There are other sources of thrust, other ways to keep to keep yourself holding on when there is nothing in you save the will. My bag of tricks has more to it than naive inspiration and dreams, than the selfish need for attention. I've always had an ace in the hole.

You.

I can't express how I feel when I see the excitement generated by uploading a new chapter. There's more to this than a number of comments or likes or favorites, than the star rating I thought was all I wanted in the world. I know that there are people who want me to write The Immortal Game, because they tell me so. I get emails, wonderful emails, telling me that you appreciate what I do, that you think I'm doing a good of it, and above all else, thanking me. They make my day. I know authors with over a thousand followers whose readers don't give them that kind of care. So thanks, guys, for helping me write The Immortal Game.

Chapter 23 of The Immortal Game, The Immortal's Endgame, will be released Friday, August 17th.

I suppose now you'll want to read it.

I am an extraordinary gentlecolt.

If you have not already read this, do so.

I’m supposed to tell you two things in this blog. The first is what my thoughts on the results of the experiment are. The second is my reason for joining the League.

But truthfully, I don’t care about the experiment. That’s not to say that popularity doesn’t concern me—of course I care a little. Of course I want fans and followers and fanart and Oh my god it’s AestheticB! Get him! That’s a very human need, a very human desire to have. You recognize it for what it is, you listen to what it has to say, and then you ignore it and do your own thing.

So all I’ll say in regards to our collected data set is that it’s a testament to the skill of the Extraordinary Gentlecolts that none of them failed to live up to the standards set by their partner.

So why did I join the League? A number of reasons.

I wanted to be in a league. Seriously, that was a big deal for me. We wear monocles and top hats and smoke pipes, and we look fabulous doing it. The mystique of being part of some big secret society has a lot of allure.

More than that, I wanted to make some friends and do something silly. Writing doesn’t need to be so serious all the time. This is a hobby, not a job, and that’s an easy thing to forget when you’re being asked for a new chapter four times a day by well-meaning fans. Writing is a pretty solitary activity, but being a writer doesn’t have to be.

I never set out to meet new people when I started writing pony fiction. I set out to learn how to write. I’m constantly amazed by some of the friendships I’ve made as part of this fandom. Here was a chance to hang out and work with some truly fantastic people, and all of us had a total blast. That’s why I joined the League.

I was paired with Arcainum.

I wrote Twilight Sparkle Gets A Free Salad.

He wrote Twi Hard 2: Twi Harder.

What was it like working with Arcainum? Funny story: all the other pairings worked off of prompts. A genie in a bottle. Psychedelic drugs. Humans, or something.

We didn’t. Comedy Random Action story starring Twilight? Independently thought up. Twilight reads a book to become an action hero? Also independent of one another. We had a little chat, told each other our ideas, and were amazed at how much we were both on the same page. In short, I don’t think the random number generator could have given us a better partner.

So go read Twilight Sparkle Gets A Free Salad. And go read Arcainum’s stuff, especially if you liked Twi Hard. Harpflank and Sweets is just pure fun.

No, not that

Dark and mysterious. Great and terrible. Since time immemorial intellects vast and cruel have watched, and waited, biding their time until the proper moment. That moment is now, and the world will shake and tremble under the might of an incomprehensible willpower. Its coming is inexorable. The change inevitable. Nothing is as it seems.

For in all of creation, from the screaming birth of the universe to the unfathomable end of time, from the heart each supermassive black hole to the edge of each galaxy, from the beginning of every story to the end of every life, there is no power greater than