Afterword - Book 5 - Chapter 21 (Patreon)

Chapter 21: Regretful Truth

Revisiting unhappy chapters is always a miserable experience for me. It just doesn't take much for my mood to sync to Ranthia's when I'm editing, so sometimes I feel like I don't know why I curse myself with repeated rounds of editing.

It wasn't really intentional when I wrote this chapter, but I feel like the advice that the councilwoman gives Ranthia actually helps to explain why the hell she persisted in meeting with Ranthia, even when Ranthia turned out to be emotionally distraught. The odds of getting what she wanted narrowed, but there's also a chance—at least in her eyes—that Ranthia's vulnerability might make her more susceptible to remembering the honesty and belonging that she promised. The odds were long (longer than she knows, even), but she still chose to roll the dice. Because doing so cost her nothing when she was already present.

And it might just offer her exactly what she wants. (...look, I'm saying what she believes, not what we believe).

The encounter with her wasn't part of my original plan. Honestly, I can't even really remember exactly when I decided to throw her into Ranthia's path here, but I don't think the idea lingered for very long before I got to this point. It does make sense given her personality though. I had once planned to give Ranthia some form of contact with the Council eventually, but this wasn't exactly what those plans were (nor had I intended to use them—they'd been discarded for a reason).

So what will come of it? Time will tell.

I'd mentioned a couple of afterwords back that Ranthia's battle against Rogue Wind wasn't terribly climactic. And the simple answer is that most elves aren't terribly effective combatants. They possess overwhelming advantages in terms of physical prowess compared to most beings on Pallos, and most of them are risk-adverse enough to prefer to punch down where the can. Small steps, to borrow the councilwoman's thought process. Ranthia, on the other hand, has taken entirely too many lives and fought against highly diverse Skillsets, honing herself in the process.

There was no contest, not against an arrogant child that pretended to be a badass.

Unfortunately, the same logic applied to Anthelleon, though not quite so severely. It was just notable enough that Ranthia managed to drive a lance through her friend's pride though, so great going there, Ranran.

I'd honestly planned to have an entire chapter dedicated to Ithil here, but Ranthia just could not have possibly cared less. Next time, I suppose.

Around the same time as Sunny became an actual member of the recurring cast instead of a one-off, I started planning this scene. Of course, she reacted a bit differently than I was expecting, but who doesn't? That's the problem with my writing style, any character that becomes distinct in my head becomes unpredictable.

The scene itself is bittersweet, for me. I actually really like Sunny's reactions here, but oof. From Ranthia's PoV, pretty much nothing is going even slightly okay. Avyna is further removed from her life than ever, and she doesn't even know if she can allow herself to have hope for their future—or if she even wants that in the first place. And now two of her closest friends are upset, and it's her fault!

But hey, at least she has a scary woman pounding at her door. That's always good for... something?