Q&A for Book I

Hey guys, I know I've been quiet for the last week or so. Real life took a turn for the busy (good, just busy) so I haven't had as much time as I thought I would. Regardless, to tide you all over a bit, I've decided to put together a Q&A. Ask (reasonable) questions in the comments and I'll do my best to answer here. I won't be going into spoiler territory, of course, but if you want to know more background info on the world or characters or their motivations, or whatever else, just ask.

Q: Can you explain the point breakdown from the battle? I cannot figure out how he won 1m+ XP, but currently only has 500k.
A: Absolutely! The 1,068,775 experience from the Battle of Bannagh Macht is split among all the party members (not counting familiars or animal companions). Since there were 7 party members, the experience was divided 7 ways, resulting in roughly 152,680 experience per person. The additional experience from Stolen Destiny and Initiate Animamancy was not shared, although each party member got a similar chunk of extra experience from Aidan's Leadership Skill. And yes, Cai did get a share of the experience. In normal situations it's sort of a penalty for letting party members die, in this case it's a bit of a salve for her for the trauma she's still recovering from regarding her death.

Q: If Aidan levels his blacksmithing skill enough could he make his own armor to use?
A: He could, although heavier armor interferes somewhat with magic unless specially constructed, and the means to do that relies on a Smith Profession Talent. Brighid can make him metal armor which wouldn't interfere with his spells, but honestly Aidan is never going to be much of a frontline fighter, or at least not any time soon. He's got Brighid, Llwyd, and Cai to bodyguard for him, so while he absolutely will wear armor, it's probably going to be leather armor for now (actual realistic leather armor, with thick hardened plates of leather, not a glorified catsuit). Also, just for the record, he did not lose his new set of armor; his body was incinerated by the magic of Phoenix Pyre, but everything he was wearing is fine aside from the damage the Taig's vines did.

Q: Do you intend for Aidan to take other lovers beside centaurs?
A: Yes! There will be at least one completely new regular bedmate in Book II, and she is not going to be a centaur. I have no plans for him to get intimate with any centaurs he hasn't already done so with (sorry, Ysbail fans! I might be persuaded to write some side chapters with her going on adventures, though, if people want more of her or some of the others). Ailis, for the record, is not currently planned to be a full member of Aidan's harem, for a variety of reasons including trust issues between her and Aidan. Plans have a way of changing, though, so don't take any of this as a done deal.

Q: Brighid once dirty talked about Aidan breeding her. Is that possible? Could we be seeing baby centaurs in the future?
A: Aidan actually asked a very similar question to Brighid back when they first had sex. Her reply was that centaurs are only fertile with each other or with horses. Of course, when she told him that, the Gods were sealed away and unable to interact with the mortal plane, too. Who knows what the future might hold?

Q: Have you made specific plans for how to build depth into the new relationships without everyone and everything else fading into the background? (You've done great with Ailis in that respect, so I expect that you have.) Will it be something other than "rotating date night"?
A: I've done a lot of thinking about it, yes. There are two keys for me. The first is to make sure the characters are properly introduced and fleshed out before they really join the harem; Brighid is a bit of a special case in that regard and I'm actually a little worried that I damaged her character a bit by progressing the romance as fast as it happened. Then again, she does have a Reckless and Loyal alignment, and I don't feel like she's acting outside the bounds of her character. Anyway, the second key is to limit the size of the harem. Aidan isn't going to be stumbling over new ladies every other chapter. There may be sex scenes with more characters, but as far as actual dedicated harem members, that is going to progress pretty slowly. A polyamorous relationship requires even more trust than a monogamous one from all parties.

Q: Beast magic gave him a dog cock on one memorable occasion. If he had a horse cock would that open up the possibility of him breeding Brighid?
A: Changing his dick won't do anything in that regard. That said, Aidan does have access to a Journeyman (level 50+ Skill) level Beast Mage and Vivimancer who owes him a few favors, and he's got all those Paragon Points for being the Chosen champion of a deity associated with (among other things) sex and fertility...

Q: Are we ever going to see more of Lail?
A: For a while, I was actually planning to have Lail be the one killed by the Taig in the return to Bannagh Macht. In the end, I decided that her general skill set and personality didn't make sense for her to be a member of Aidan's strike team; she's a subordinate in a border patrol team, while the strike team members needed to be relatively elite. The only elites Aidan really met were Brighid and the Council members, and it didn't make sense for any of them to be the one killed, either. Either way, we haven't seen the last of Lail. She'll show up again soon enough; Aidan's going to be working hard during the two weeks before he moves to Bannagh Macht permanently, and one of the things he needs to work on is getting the people behind him. It's only natural that he would talk to the people who have been the kindest to him as part of that.

Q: (Paraphrased) Did you have an end goal in mind when you first started writing this story, or did you make it up as you went along?
A: I planned out a general series of major plot points and then let the characters fill in the rest for me. I knew from the start that Brighid and Aidan were going to have their relationship, and that Aidan was going to come into possession of a Place of Power, but none of it happened as originally planned. In fact, the very first thing I wrote for this story was a first time sex scene between Brighid and Aidan which occurred after Aidan had claimed his Place of Power. Obviously, that scene makes no sense now and won't be in the story as written, but bits and pieces of it have found their way into the story in other ways.

Q: An important part of sex and intimacy is contact and variation, something sorely missing from Brighid and Aidan's sex life, as they can only do it doggy style and the can't reach eachother's upper bodies. Could there be a way for them to rectify this?
A: There could. Several magical schools could offer solutions, including but not limited to Coitimancy (sex magic), Beast Magic, and Oneiromancy (dream magic). Aidan already has access to two of those schools, it's just a matter of if and when he gets relevant spells. There are also other slightly more mundane ways to spice up their love life. That said, there's a lot of truth behind Ysbail's reason for flatly refusing to even consider Aidan as a lover.

Q: (Paraphrased) The story implies that there are other Chosen, possibly champions of other Powers in the Realms. Do you have plans for other Chosen characters to play a part in the story?
A: How do you know there aren't some already in Book I? ;) But yes, there are plans for other Chosen character(s). Keep in mind, though, that so far as has been seen, there's no way to tell whether someone is a Chosen for certain, it isn't displayed to other people.

Q: (Paraphrased) Would you consider maybe putting in a way to skip the sex scenes for those mostly interested in the plot, character development, and worldbuilding?
A: Some of the sex scenes contain plot and character development, so skipping them entirely will lead to some holes in your reading. However, I have gotten a surprising number of requests and comments along this general line. For people who aren't necessarily as interested in the explicit sex scenes, I would suggest you read the version over on Royal Road -- it doesn't exclude the explicit sex scenes, but it does have a spoiler box function which I have used to hide the sex scenes so that they may be more easily skipped over. You'll still miss any character or plot info in those scenes, but they're easier to skip over if you want to read the story in public or just aren't interested in the sex.

Q: (Paraphrased) Is there any way I can contact you with story or character ideas?
A: You can always message me on this website. However, please understand that I already have the story planned out pretty far in advance -- I already know how Book II is going to end and what the majority of Book III is going to be about.

Q: Are you planning on going back over the story so far to fix / correct the typos in it?
A: Yes, at some point I'm going to go back through Book 1 and rewrite it to 3rd person, in the process fixing a bunch of errors (grammar and spelling errors and plot holes). I can't say when that will be, except that I want to build up a large buffer before I start so it won't be quite yet.

Q: Also will we see more of the plot filler side stories like the branches showing what happened with brighid and others after aiden sent her back to the village to warn them about the wards?
A: Yes, you can expect more vignettes and side stories, both in Book 2 and during parts of Book 1. Again, no promises on when, but I do have ideas about some side chapters.