The first volume is indeed quite short; this sentence deserves its own line.
When I was considering the plot, I kept thinking about the "you are what you eat" premise. If I didn't apply that to the protagonist and only reflected it in supporting characters, it would be putting the cart before the horse—a complete waste of such a setup.
Therefore, I determined one thing from the very beginning: the protagonist had to eat something. This also dictated that his early-stage advancement would be a leap to the heavens, a jump-style progression. The typical satisfaction of steady leveling would only come in the latter half; for the beginning, I would cultivate other sources of satisfaction based on this "leap to the heavens." I have written similar tropes before, but they were few and far between, so for me, it felt relatively fresh and avoided aesthetic fatigue.
With this mindset, the first volume was destined not to be long. If I had dragged it out for a hundred chapters or more while Ding Songyan remained a mere mortal—useful for nothing but his wits and social skills—the reading experience would likely have been disastrous.
Of course, if I really wanted to do that, it wouldn't be impossible, but I would have had to rely on external forces to lower the power level so the protagonist could do more and have a greater sense of participation, rather than being completely dominated and controlled, which would be frustrating for the reader.
After weighing my options, I chose to end the first volume at around two to three hundred thousand characters—the length of a novella—which is just right for a single event.
Once I truly began, there were certainly adjustments made based on the feel of the writing and the feedback from you, the readers—such as the daily interactions of the "family of five." Because some clever readers spotted the anomalies early on, I actually cut a large portion of the follow-up; otherwise, there would have been too many red flags, and the impact of the plot twists would have been lost. I mainly kept the interactions with his younger sister, as that is the highlight. The parts with Daniu were streamlined but largely intact, and while the parts with his parents were significantly reduced, the key points for character development remain.
Additionally, characters who were originally meant to have more screen time in the first volume, such as the Headless People, have been moved to the second volume. This ensures the first volume revolves primarily around one event, preventing Ding Songyan from opening up too many side quests with his ordinary strength, which would have dragged down the story's pacing and left everyone anxious, wondering, "Why isn't he practicing martial arts yet?"
Not practicing martial arts was, of course, a choice to avoid the conventional path; when he finally does, he will do it in a big way.
In this way, the more common martial arts realms—Body Tempering, Qi Refining, and Aperture Refining—can be passed through relatively quickly, allowing the focus to shift to Aperture Refining, a cultivation method that I’m not sure is unique to this book, but is at least novel.
Ultimately, after adjustments, the first volume was reduced from my expected eighty chapters to sixty. The story is told quite completely, and the images and personalities of the main characters have been established.
When designing the first volume, I deliberately included parts of the cultivation arts that were less "martial arts" and more interesting to me, such as the non-martial *Heavenly Heart Wisdom Sutra* and the *Useless Divine Skill*, which I find quite amusing.
This gives everyone an initial impression that this is definitely not your standard medium- or low-martial arts world, preventing readers from entering the later parts with those specific expectations.
This is, at its core, a mythological world with various great beings. It is only because of the "Severing the Connection Between Heaven and Earth" that those divine abilities and spells gradually regressed, forming the current, relatively low-power, martial-arts-leaning era. In this context, the original divine abilities did not disappear; they were merely weakened. Some exist in the form of witchcraft, while others have been integrated into various martial arts, allowing them to achieve things that normal martial arts—and even many low- or mid-level xuanhuan stories—cannot.
While this differs from the martial arts world in your imagination, if I only wrote what was already imagined, I would be returning to the era before web novels. For a genre to always have vitality, it must constantly renew itself. Innovation might not always be accepted, but failing to innovate is a guaranteed death sentence.
Being able to present the world I envisioned in the first volume for everyone to see—I feel that part of my writing intent has been achieved.
As a xuanhuan novel with martial arts leanings, there will inevitably be a heroine. As for who it is, I cannot say for now. When I update the character cards later, I will label them as "supporting female characters" first and modify them once everything is fully determined.
Besides Xiaoqing, the demoness, Dog Brother, Master, Zheng Zhuxi, Xu Chang'an, and Qi Xiaoxiang, who are definitely going to be added, who else would you like to see?
It has been ten years since I wrote a story with an Eastern flair. My sense of language, word choice, and writing style are all still slowly adjusting. This is not something that happens overnight; I can only take it one chapter at a time, and I ask for your patience.
There wasn't much fighting in the first volume. My personal habit is that if the protagonist isn't involved, I try to keep the fights "brief and to the point." As long as the meaning is conveyed, there is no need to waste too much ink. Otherwise, imagine how terrible it would be if, at a critical moment for the protagonist, I spent two or three chapters detailing the life-and-death struggle of supporting characters.
And as an ordinary person, Ding Songyan could only manage to land a hit on a severely weakened Yan Changqing while the latter was suppressed by the Heavenly Heart Mark, and even then, he was using the opponent's own Qi and had another secret thread working in his favor. If I had arranged for him to have too many fights, I wouldn't have been able to justify the logic.
This also caused the supporting characters' arcs to feel a bit rushed. With Ding Songyan now directly at the Grandmaster realm, things should be much better later on. After all, his power level and the things he can participate in have increased, so many plot threads can be woven together without worry.
The first volume didn't leave many long-term hidden threads like *Lord of the Mysteries* or *Circle of Inevitability*. There are only two, mainly because I wanted to try a different writing style for this book—keeping the early and middle stages as relaxed, refreshing, and fast-paced as possible without making things too complex. Yes, the transmigration, Kunlun, and the mastermind behind the scenes will all be revealed and resolved later; I am quite good at filling in plot holes.
In this volume, I am quite satisfied with the characterizations of Xiaoqing, Dog Brother, and the demoness. As for "Life is like first meeting," besides the demoness and the Ding family, there are others, but this is a sentence that needs time to settle; it certainly won't be fully revealed in the first volume.
I have already revealed the title of the second volume: "Meeting with Spirit, Drinking for You," and the volume's opening quote is "There is no banquet in the world that does not end."
One is about gathering, the other about parting. The theme is the fast-paced, vengeful, and sentimental nature of the *jianghu*. Under the umbrella of martial arts, this is actually relatively easy to write. Therefore, the second volume is strung together by several small events; there is no single massive, explosive main plot line. Of course, that is the overt line; the covert lines are still there, flowing silently, waiting for the future.
As per tradition, I am taking a three-and-a-half-day break to organize the outline for the second volume and grasp the tone I want. Updates will resume on July 1st at 12:30 PM, and the book will be officially published on July 2nd. There will definitely be extra chapters upon publication, as I do have a bit of a backlog.
Thank you all.
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