I would like to than everyone who sent me comments on Wilhan. They helped the story and helped me as a writer. I want to apologize to B4Lurker for the piece of crap I sent him for the first proofread. Bacgen and Carla59 kindly offered to looked over the rewrites.
The next ring-sword story is the prequel, and I'm deep into rewrites trying to get it ready. The good news is that the rewrites are making it longer and better; the bad news is that it might be a couple of months before you see it. It's my first attempt at writing about magic use, which is not my favorite subject, but magic blows shit up and is used to make cool swords, so it is worth writing about.
Here are my multi personality disorderly thoughts on the ending of Wilhan Dragonslayer.
I liked the story except for the fact that you ended the hero's life with an act of genocide.
--Yes, I did have our good guy try to kill off an entire tribe. Like it or not, it was in his nature, but it was business, not pleasure. This was a story of the times, not a good vs. evil story. I did leave out the human and animal sacrifices that probably took place at Wilhan's funeral. I don't set out when writing a story to entertain others, just myself, and sometimes I entertain myself by writing something that I know will be unpopular. This story was about pseudo realism, but even I couldn't be too realistic. There were some tribes that did not practice blood sacrifice, so I didn't have to put in the scene where the slave girl gets ritually gang raped by Dragon Eaters and then killed by the Angel of Death priestess, to then lie beside Wilhan's body in the funerary ship. There would probably be male slaves and horses killed and put in the boat too. Henna, Marin, and especially Freyna, would have insisted on all of that bloodshed so that Wilhan could be just as powerful in the next life as he was in this one, but hopefully nobody wanted our favorite three cum sluts to be like that if they didn't have to be.
Why did you bury Oakheart?
1) So an archeologist could dig it up and put it in a museum so that some guy could see a picture of it a thousand years later and be inspired to write a story. -- No, really that was my main reason. In my mind this was a possible true-ish story about a rusty sword dug up out of a buried funerary ship.
2) There are other ring-swords and other stories out there. Oakheart did its part and had its story. But I didn't bend Oakheart to kill it, as happened in real life to prevent the dead from using such a sword against the living. That leaves open the possibility that the swords can be resurected.
3) Aron priestess could switch swords before the burial.
4) Someone from Mazara's family could sneak back and dig it up.
5) Grave robbers can come back hundreds of years later and dug it up to start another story.
--I have no plans for writing more about Wilhan or Oakheart because my interest in the ring sword world lies elsewhere. It's a world for me to explore other cultures. So if someone wants to fiddle with writing more about Oakheart, the Nwevic wars, Mazara, etc. go for it with my blessing, just keep the fireballs to a minimum. In Wilhan's time and place powerful magic is lost/hidden to all but Mazara's family.
Why didn't Mazara follow Wilhan back and become a fourth wife?
--Because it wasn't realistic considering the three wives he already had (Oh Wil, she's so pretty, and younger than us. She has Elizabeth Taylor's eye color and eyelash mutation. Surely you will love her more than us, can we keep her?), and the politics of the Aron situation (my family and people will shun me, Wil, but I can't live without your cock. btw, sorry I was about to turn you into a crispy critter when you killed Eadul). I thought about putting Wilhan between her legs because I'm an SOL author, but I'm trying to cut back on crap writing like that (i.e. author's frivolous fantasy character writing). I have a parody prehistoric time travel harem story in the works where whenever I want to write something unbelievable and stupid I plug it into that story. That guy shits gold, has a huge dick, and marries mother-daughter pairs at their request minutes after having anal sex with them. And yes, they all have red hair, as all fuck sluts in erotic stories must.
How did Oakheart get stuck in the tree?
--I invite someone to write that short little vignette after the close of the next story. I do know the time frame when the sword got stuck in the tree, but all I could work up the energy for was that some knight stuck it into the tree just before he died, so obviously I'm not the person to write that story.
What happened to poor forgotten Ranis?
--He's rich from all the land his brothers have given him, and he doesn't have the shitty responsibility of being a marklord, baron, etc. I was going to give him a castle and have him protect the Cazadren River against Nwevii, but he would have been old by then and would have told Wilhan to fuck off. Making him a marklord next to Tarmiz on the Helvezii riverfront didn't seem realistic. IMO elevating Tarmiz was pushing it from Arnek's perspective. Wilhan was the only one of the brothers who wanted the responsibility anyway. His motivation is debatable -- possibly he has a need to prove himself to his brothers, or maybe he is just one of those types that have to keep building and reaching for more.
What happened to Ethanda?
--Who cares? She's a girl. This story was about big hairy smelly men with spears and swords.*
Did Wilhanina grow up to be a great shield maiden?
--Who cares? She's a girl. I don't want to write a follow up story about a big hairy smelly butch lesbian with a shield.**
What's with the crappy map?
--To help with locations and travel time in my stories I make a map of colored squares in the same Excel spreadsheet file where I keep all of the character and place names. I made it, so you got it.
*Most of my story backlog is full of strong female characters, some are the lead character. The next ring sword story, the prequel, focuses on women with power. They are petite, free of facial hair, and smell nice, even the evil ones. Sadly, there is only one good sex scene. That story will be posted next but since you all liked the Sarvalk War chapter of Wilhan I have to go back and fill out the war and battle sections in this next story. They get as boring and hard to write as sex scenes. Thrust, thrust, maneuver, thrust, thrust, maneuver, thrust, climax. Blood spurts instead of jizz. Good guy wins, bad guy loses.
** I have a story set in ancient Greece that is all about Amazon hoplite armies. Most of them are black chicks -- sorry, that isn't PC, they are African-Greek women. There are also Viking Amazons in the story but they the lowest social class. It's a twisted social statement.
Dear JJ76, I like Death Bringer much better than the stories you actually work hard on. Do we get an episode in this blog entry? -- No, Fuck You.