Reaper Release Stream

Questioner

What happened to Mu Enkai?

Will Wight

Well, if you will read the prologue to Ghostwater I think that's very clear that Mu Enkai fought Lindon and lost. And then he used that loss to motivate himself and fuel his rise. It was a meteoric rise likes to which has never  been seen on cradle before, it makes Lindon look like nothing and he became a Monarch in the matter of days. He immediately ascended, joined the Abidan and became the 9th Judge. I think that's obvious...I thought I had implied all that in Ghostwater prologue so it's not even a spoiler.

Questioner

Ichigo is so cool and awesome! Why don't you like him?

Will Wight

Alright, so for those who don't know Ichigo is the Japanese word for strawberries so he is asking why I don't like male strawberries and the answer is  I just prefer female strawberries. So it's not really a prejudice thing it's just a personal preference  and I think they taste a little better that's all.

So, there is one other possible meaning to that question. So, Ichigo is also the name of the protagonist of 'Bleach'. Probably isn't what he meant and probably asking about my strawberries preferences. But the protagonist of Bleach is fine. I don't dislike him. I don't have problems with him. The only really reason I don't like him as much is  because I feel like the story is less interesting with him around. When he isn't around they tend to go into  a lot of side characters who tends to be just way cooler. So we get to explore all the Captains in The Gotei 13 organization. That's just a lot more interesting to me and that only happens when Ichigo isn't around. So not a big fan of Ichigo  being in spotlight. I don't dislike him as a character or anything.                                                                                                                                                                                       

So I don't dislike him but funfact, the Abidan Court was in its original iteration modeled off the Captains of Bleach, so that's why they have Mantles. That's a Captain Haori reference. It changed significantly as I developed that organization but that was the original inspiration as I was taking kind of taking...I would say Captains from 'Bleach' and then I guess sort of Forsaken from the 'Wheel Of Time' kind of thing. That makes sound them more evil than I think of them but that's sort of the organization I was going for when I initially thought of Abidan. So that actually comes from bleach and that's how much more compelling I think the side characters are in bleach than the main character.

Questioner

Does Dross really sleep? Or did Dross really sleep.

Will Wight

Dross sorta rests. He doesn't, isn't going all the time. He doesn't exactly sleep. No but he does rest and kinda go dormant for a time.

Questioner

Is void aura a thing?

Will Wight

No void aura is not a thing. There is no elemental attachment to aura in cradle's energy system.

Questioner

What path would Deadpool be on?

Will Wight

I don't know. Deadpool kinda, his set of powers is kinda like, just kinda, a sorta general sacred artist. So I don't know what kind of madra he would have or what he practiced. I feel like saying something memey about Ryan Reynolds but I don't know what that would be exactly. 

(comes back to question later)

So, what path would Deadpool be on?  He feels like a guy who just kinda has an iron body, and the maybe is an Underlord or something?  Yeah, I don't know.

Questioner

Did you always plan on having Akura Grace die or was her death come up later?

Will Wight

Eh, I mean a little of both. Like I said earlier I set characters up so that I can use them however I need to. So I wanted to do something with Akura Grace pretty clearly. I mean when I was describing her and she's one of the two people besides Pride in the beginning of Uncrowned that gets any of the spotlight. Clearly I was setting her up for something right? But it was always, haha feels mean, but it was always something tragic. It was going to be, either she was killed or left behind or betrayed the group or something. You know. Something bad was going to happen and when I needed someone to die at the end of Wintersteel I was like 'Ah we go'. So there it is. She always... never headed for a good end. Yep.

Questioner

Who is your favourite Bleach side character?

Will Wight

Favourite Bleach character...that's hard for me to say. It used to be Hitsugaya, the Ice-Dragon Captain, but overtime I think that has faded. I really like the interaction between the Captains more than I like any one of them. Chad is the only true correct answer. He is truly the most Chad character.

Questioner

As we know Monarchs are pretty much immortal however do they age to a certain age before their age stops  completely?

Will Wight

Yeah! The whole idea behind advancing to Herald and then to Monarch is sorta their bodies get perfected in a way. So the only reason Sha Miara didn't immediately age up was just because her inheritance works differently. That's all. A normal advancement would be, it would age them forwards or backwards as necessary and their body would stabilize.

Questioner

What are the chances of another DragonCon meetup next year?

Will Wight

Well I enjoyed DragonCon very much and the chances of another meet up next year (2022) are high. Those are some high chances. The fan meet up was really the highlight of my DragonCon trip. It was a lot of fun. It still takes a lot out of me. It was really cool to meet people, put some faces to names even though I'm going to forget all your names by next year including probably my own. So I really enjoyed that and I really enjoyed getting to meet some people I that I only met online. I really enjoyed being able to talk about some things I don't normally get to talk about and some things I get to, that just come across as more genuine in person I guess. So if you couldn't make it this year try to make it next year it will be great.

Questioner

Did Valin have authority?

Will Wight

Yeah, to some degree. I don't know how to say without spoiling anything what kind of authority he had or what level. It was certainly not to the level of what a true Sage would have, and if you're asking me about a matchup between Valin and Lindon or Valin and Yerin, they would take him apart like a lego house.

But at the same time, he did have enough authority to escape his world and sort of manipulate the fabric of Valinhall and get through the Way. So, to some degree, even though it was a crude, half-formed thing, yeah, he had some authority over some things.

Questioner

Do Travelers have a special sense like Sages do since they manipulate space?

Will Wight

No. They do not. Valin was a special case in that sense.

Well, let me be clear. When Travelers form a connection to their Territory, they can sense that connection and a lot of the abilities they get from that Territory. So the ability to stretch themselves out and affect space, you might say that that is a special sense. So, in a sense, they have a sense, if that makes sense.

Questioner

 I’ve always been a bit confused about what makes a talented sacred artist advance faster than their peers? They just refine madra better?

Will Wight

Yeah, that is part of it.  It's really a... How I think of it, is it's more like a madra talent, a talent for madra control, so it's something that just sort of clicks better for you.  So that's one aspect of it.  Another aspect is maybe you understand your techniques better or faster.  So that's one thing.  Another thing is some people seem to have a deeper connection to certain types of aura than others.  so if you are born into a clan or sect or something that only practices one path, your talent is determined by how compatible you are with that particular path.  Which may bot be the thing you are really best at.  But you would never know, because you are only ever exposed to one path.  So that's another factor of talent.

The reason why it is poorly defined in the book is because there is a number of things that people mean when they say talent.  And I found that to be true in a number of the cultivation novels I read.  They would talk about talent, but it would be unclear exactly what talent was.  So either they would have something like talent is effectively your XP gain modifier, or how fast you level up.  Or, they didn't really define talent at all.  Some people were talented because they were good at weapons, other people were talented because they were good at magic, and other people were talented because they learn really fast, and so on and so forth.  And I like that a little better; that felt kind of real.  Some people are more talented at certain things because the logic of it just clicked for them  Other people are more physically or mentally suited to the task.  You know, that kind of thing.  And it felt good to me.  So that's sort of where I've been.

Questioner

You have said in the past when you get stuck, just keep writing. My question is this: HOW? If I could keep writing, I wouldn't be stuck. Do you have any tips on how to work past those points?

Will Wight

Yes and no.  I think what you are trying to get me to tell you is how to feel like you are not stuck, and how to know what the next thing to do is, because that's when you feel like you are stuck, right?  That makes sense.  I understand that emotion extremely well.  But you're probably not going to like what I have to say, which is: it's just keep writing.  That is the answer.  That is the full answer.  You're saying how, there is no how.  Just keep moving your fingers until words come out.  So you're like, "If I knew what was coming next, I wouldn't be stuck.  If I knew what to write, I wouldn't be stuck."  It's not a know what to write.  It's a write something.  Just write anything.  Just put something on the page.

There's a great scene with Sean Connery in Finding Forrester where he's sitting down at a type writer, and he's talking to a student.  And he just sits down and starts writing.  And the kid goes, "What are you doing?"  And he says "Writing." I can't do it.  "Writing! I'm writing like you will be doing when you start punching those keys." (Will *attempted* a Sean Connery accent here.)  So the answer is just punch the keys.  So the kid sits down at his typewriter, and he's not typing, and Sean Connery asks him "What are you doing?" and he says "Thinking."  And Sean Connery goes, "No, that comes later."  So first you write, then you think.  That's the answer.  That is it.  I don't know what to tell you.  That's the trick, that's the answer.  

Now, long term, there are a lot of things you can do to help it come out better.  One thing is the more you know about your story, usually when you are stuck it means there is something you don't know about your story.  So, one of the methods to find out is just by writing things and figuring it out, you can change it later.  But another one is going through and answering questions for yourself.  So, taking notes and answering questions.  I don't recommend you do that; I recommend you do that later after you've gotten you're writing done for the day.  But that is something that over time, oh, OK, I know the answer to the question, or I know the material, or I know the characters really well, so you can make up better answers.  That's really the point of doing background information.

Questioner

Yerin at the end of Bloodlines vs Estyr Six

Will Wight

You know, there are some things that Yerin can do that Estyr Six doesn't have a good ability to block.  Like, Estyr Six is an extremely powerful telekinetic, probably one that could give Yerin trouble.  But at the same time, Yerin's now a suedo-herald, working on a conceptual level, so she's able to fight on some of the same tiers that Estyr Six can, and she can shoot what are effectively laser beams.  And Estyr Six doesn't have a good way of blocking laser beams.  So I'll have to give it to Yerin.  Mainly just a compatibility issue.  Now, there are problems that Estyr knows how to solve that Yerin does not, not that she is not capable of doing that, because there is some of those that a herald would probably be capable of solving, she doesn't know how.  Also, Estyr Six's power set is a lot more similar to a sage's.  So yeah, a little bit of a nuanced answer there.

Questioner

If you were to revisit Cradle what path would you pick for the MC to follow?

Will Wight

You know, there are a number of changes I would make to Cradle if I were able to go over it again.  So, there were a number of things I considered for the main character.  I probably would stick with the Path of Twin Stars though; I ended up really liking that.  That was something I picked for a number of reasons, some of which ended up being relevant, some of which ended up being unnecessary.  So I wouldn't change Lindon's path I don;t think.  I might change how it developed or how he learned about it or how he developed it, but I don;'t think I would actually change his double path.  And I don't think I would change, I like one being a combat thing and being a sort of control thing.  I also like it being thematically linked to one another; both sides being thematically linked to his path and thematically linked to the icon he eventually gains and to... I just like the way that came together.

One of the main things I would change I think, I would change... Now here's one thing.  So initially, ruler techniques were still the control option.  They were a lot more about dealing physical damage, there was a lot more of a division between dealing spiritual damage and dealing physical damage.  So striker techniques, and madra, and pure madra in general, would be better at damaging things that had a spirit and had a spiritual component, and not as good at, for instance, cutting though a door.  Where as ruler techniques and weapons were a lot better at physical destruction, destroying things that didn't already have their own madra system.  So that was a dichotomy I planned, one of those things that I was going to play into through Path of Twin Stars; he has one path that is good at physical destruction, one path that is good at combat in a spiritual way.  I would emphasize that more in the magic system.  

In terms of storytelling, what I would change is probably a lot more about that Abidan stuff.  So I would unravel that differently.  I think I would have more of a character and character arc for Suriel.  And I would arrange it differently.  Also, now that I know how many books there are going to be in the series, I would divvy out information in a more controlled way, because I know how many books there are going to be.  That is one of the things that was irritating, because I didn't know how many there were going to be, I didn't know how to split all of that up.

Questioner

Are there taboos on Cradle?

Will Wight

Yeah, there would be in multiple different cultures and among different people groups.

Questioner

Where will Shira and Ziel's first date be? Are they more an ice cream and just chat sort of couple, or go to a movie? Go on a hike? What is Shira's idea of a perfect date?

Will Wight

I was only aware today, with the introduction of this question, that people were shipping those two characters.  Although I did kind of wonder when I wrote those scenes, am I setting them up to be shipped?  I should have known the answer to that question is always yes. *deep sigh*  So, let me see.  What would Shira's idea of a perfect date be?  Let me think.  Ok, she seems like the kind of person who would appreciate something unusual.  Some sort of, something where the other person put in some to think of something you wouldn't normally do on a first date.  So probably not ice-cream, probably not movies.  Something like, I don't know, a Cradle thing, I was going to say something like skydiving from a giant mountain or something, or a flying creature, but that's a lot more usual on Cradle.  That probably wouldn't be too thrilling to her.  Something else.  And Ziel is the kind of guy who would not put any effort into that.  So there's a lot of issues there already that they are going to have to work though before their inevitable romantic development.  This is making me want to put a scene like this into book 11 though.  Just for the meme value.  Not for the romance storyline, because as we all know, I am allergic to those.

Questioner

There is a lot of debate between the fanbase about the height of power that the original Blackflame Empire reached. Can you confirm if the original Blackflame empire had any of the following: Monarch, Sage, and/or Herald?

Will Wight

Yeah, I'm pretty sure the original Blackflame Empire had a monarch, maybe two monarchs, I'm not actually sure about that off the top of my head; I'd have to go back and check my notes.  But I think it's probably one.  That would be my reasonable guess there.  I think that's true.  They had at least a couple of heralds for sure.  And I think probably a monarch.

Questioner

Are you uncomfy writing at least one kiss into every book?

Will Wight

Yes.  It's less about my discomfort with physical intimacy in general and more that I don't care about relational development in real life really.  So it's basically more that I, that other people, I don't see them as real.  I think it's maybe just a focused narcissism.  I really just think everything revolves around me, and that anything that involves other people is sort of tedious.  That's all it is.  Nothing serious.

Questioner

When Lindon's Story in Cradle is done and finished, do you think the world may get more stories? If no, what are our chances of getting some kind of Index like the Aurelius Archives, covering madra types and paths?

Will Wight

So when Lindon's story is done in Cradle, one thing I'd like to do before the series is over, and I know I am running out of time now, but I would like to do some spin-off short stories, kind of like I've done a long time ago in the past for Traveler's Gate and the one I did for Ziel.  I'd like to do a few more of those.  And the Halloween one I did like five years ago now.  Four years, three years, whatever.  All the years blur together.  So, I'd like to do some of that.  After Lindon's story is over in Cradle, I think... I can't make a decision on that yet.  It's something that I'm open to do more Cradle side stories or extra Cradle stories, I just can't commit to that yet, because a lot of it would depend on me being clear about where the story ends which of course I can't do.  It would also depend on how people respond to that, what else I'm working on.  I do know it won't be the first thing I'm doing; new Cradle book won't be the first thing I'm doing.  I've got to write something else guys.  I love writing new things, and I have been on Cradle for a long time.  I really love Cradle, I really enjoy writing it; that does not mean it is something new though.  So for me, just for my personal preference, I would love alternating between Cradle and something else, but now Cradle is just about over, so I'm probably going to do a new series afterwards.  I have a couple of ideas that I'm batting around for that.  

Questioner

Are you guys still wanting to do a Kickstarter like thing for signed copies, hardcovers, special editions, etc. You guys mentioned it in a blog post at one point.

Will Wight

You know, that's something we're still working on, something we're still considering.  The only reason we haven't done it it already is it just takes effort.  It takes time and energy and somebody's got to lead it; somebody's got to put the Kickstarter together.  It's obviously not something we couldn't do, it's just something that we'd have to put energy into, and we're not sure it would be worth it.  We do want to, we'd like to, we plan on it, but when, or what it's going to be... It'll probably be some kind of special edition thing.  Some sort of hard cover printing or something.  Real life sacred weapons with real magic powers.  Portal to Cradle.  A date with Will, Sam said.  That's right, that's on the table.  Actual dragon eggs.  One of the lost Valinhall swords I think is up for grabs.  Other than that, nothing special.

Questioner

What ever happened to Arelius servant 113? Please tell me he is alive and well and still with the lady who's hair pins Eithan took.

Will Wight

Yeah, he is.  He's fine.  He had a great life.  He's really enjoying it.  He and Mu Enkai are chilling together in the heavens.  Didn't I actually do a cannon answer to that at one point?  I thought I did.  I thought I actually responded and said I took care of him.  I thought I did.  I don't remember what it was, because he was really just a background character. The fate of 113

You know, here's one thing I can talk about for a minute while I'm cutting down some trees in Stardew.  Some people ask me, and sometimes they are irritated by this and sometimes they like it, but they ask why I put detail in characters that don't end up mattering.  So, Naru Jing, Cassius' wife is one of them, servant 113 is another one, so, why do put detail into these characters if I don't intend to give them a major role?  Then, other fan theories rely on, Will wouldn't have given that character that much detail unless he intended to use them at some point.  Well, there are a couple of answers to that, and the main one is, if you've got to have a bartender, why not make him cool?  I've got to use a couple of lines to describe him any, and I can describe him as some sort of bland old balding man, like you expect, or I could describe him as having a dragon for a hat.  And you wonder about that character; it's more interesting. That's all.  It's more fun to write.  I get to write a little back story paragraph about him, it's more fun for me.  And I feel like if you are going to have the character, you might as well make him cool.  Right?  And then people are like "Ah! You wouldn't have given him a cool potential back story unless you intended to use him."  No, I absolutely would have.  So, sometimes I come back and use them.

There's a second reason of course.  There are some characters that if the occasion comes to use them, I would like.  And that's the case, for instance Naru Jing is the example I used a minute ago, Cassius' wife.  She is a character that I was like yeah, if the occasion arises to use her, I would absolutely like to give her a bigger role.  She's a neat character, she has a fun backstory, she and Cassius went on all sorts of adventures when they were younger.  And she could in the future.  But it ended up being just another one of those things.  I could go into all of these little sub plots in Cradle if I wanted to, but that would kind of make it like the middle books of the Wheel of Time, and that's not my goal.  One of my major goals starting off writing fantasy in general, when I was writing House of Blades, was I had all of these fantasy novels that I loved, and when I summarized the plot for people, they were really excited.  They thought, oh man, that sounds awesome.  Then they try to read it for themselves, and they were irritated, because they can't get past the forty pages of them describing rugs.  And I thought, well, I want to see if there is a market for the people who want the cool story without all the rugs.  And that is where my inspiration to write fantasy came from.  And I love Wheel of Time.  I think Wheel of time is probably the best example of long form epic fantasy out there, and I genuinely like it a lot.  It's got a special place in my heart.  I enjoy it quite a bit.  Just like I enjoy a lot of these Chinese web novels, that were also hard to recommend.

Questioner

What is your least favorite cultivation trope?

I'll tell you right now.  It is, there's a lot of these cultivation novels, and I know this has a lot of cultural baggage to it, so I'm not necessarily ragging on the cultural origin of this, but it is women characters are rarely as much a part of the setting as the male characters.  And there is often a cultural expectation that the men will protect the women, or that the women aren't as capable as magic martial artists as the men are.  Which is almost always contradictory to the magic system, because the magic system does not require you to start with inherent, biological, physical strength.  The magic system does not favor men over women.  It is completely neutral, and we see enough high level practitioners to go, so women can practice this, so therefore, where did that cultural expectation come from?  So it is not only annoying, it is contradictory to the setting.  So that is my least favorite trope.

Questioner

I've noticed that spent Madra often returns to essence. Is that somehow recycled into aura? 

Will Wight

Yes/  So in the books, I establish how constructs and forged madra, well, all madra does this, it's just I pay attention to it with remnants and forger techniques, dissolves into these motes or sparks of rising light and dissolves back.  Yeah, madra dissolves back into aura.  That's what essence is.  It's kind of madra fuzzing back into aura.  So yeah, that does happen.  But because of the way it dissolves it's not useful for ruler techniques.  I mean, eventually it would be; you could sit there and let it dissolve and eventually you would have some aura to use, but it disperses quick, and aura tends to change form based on what it's around, so it's not good for fueling ruler techniques, but it is something that get cycled back into the aura of the world.

Questioner

Can goldsigns have "externals" like in Iron Prince, where they technically aren't directly attached to the body? Does Harmony's halo or Ren Fei's cloud count?

Will Wight

No, not really.  I mean, they are not directly attached to the body, yes in that sense.  Like, one of the examples in this question is "Does Harmony's halo or Renfei's cloud count?"  Yeah, those are goldsigns.  And they count as being attached to the person's spirit, not their body.  But they are directly attached to the person.  That's the criteria.  So a goldsign does have to be attached to the person; physically hovering next to them often counts, because they are attached to that person's spirit, rather than sitting on their head like a hat.

Questioner

Have you read the web serial Beware of Chicken? It's about a cultivator who becomes a farmer.

Will Wight

You know, I haven't. There are a few of these popular web serials that like Beware of Chicken and He Who Fights Monsters or Fights With Monsters, which is the actual title, that I know I should check out but I just haven't yet. I tend to, oh got a geode nice, hey the local blacksmith and break those open, you guys know that? So there are a few of those that I just haven't checked out yet. Not for any particular reason just, I think it's procrastination more than anything else. One of the things that I do I lot is I just go through and add new things to top of my TBR file that I probably should be whittling down.

Questioner

You have a chance to spend a couple of hours with another author of your choice. Who is it and what do you discuss?

Will Wight

Another author of my choice? Jane Austen. That's who it is. And we'd discuss a couple of things. One is, I would like to know her opinion on prose and how she came to her style. She's very, she has a very concise prose style that I really like. And another one is, I would very much like to know what happens to you when you die. So two good things Jane Austen could answer for me.

Questioner

When Malice was punishing Mercy after she lost in the Uncrowned tournament, did she intentionally not include Lindon in the punishment?

Will Wight

What I intended for that moment, and I'm still going to leave it a little bit up to interpretation because it's all about how you read the characters in the end, but my intention for that scene was more about Malice was kind of treading the line and so she was going okay which of these would be more embarrassing to Mercy and which of these would be a little too embarrassing and that was one she decided, based on her analysis of the situation, that would be a little too embarrassing for Mercy. Now is that true? Would it be too embarrassing to Mercy? She didn't know. It was just kind of one of the things that Malice thought at that time. So that was my understanding of it.

Questioner

Is Northstrider the most attractive Monarch.

Will Wight

I think you probably have to ask somebody... I mean that would be a... not to me. That would be a very opinion question I guess. Is Northstrider the most attractive Monarch? No? They're all effectively physically perfect pretty much so it's kind of down to viewer taste at that point. So I can't really answer the question.

Questioner

Clearly he is.

Will Wight

Yeah, in that case, I've been corrected. Clearly he is.

Questioner

Most attractive Monarch?

Will Wight

I guess I've answered that, huh?

Will's brother (offscreen)

Reigan Shen.

Will Wight

It's Reigan. Sam says it's Reigan Shen so it's Reigan Shen.

Will's brother (offscreen)

I like cats.

Will Wight

He's into cats. He does not have cats ears, does that anime style cat ears, does that affect your opinion?

Will's brother (offscreen)

Yeah, absolutely. 

Questioner

Who is your favorite Judge or Abidan member and why?

Will Wight

Hm. Favorite Judge or Abidan member? Just for pure fun either the Ghost or the Fox. They're just fun characters to mess with, to think about. They kind of have fun personalities and they both are... so the Ghost and the Fox both have a tendency of popping up on people and, as you know, I really like characters who just pop up unexpectedly on people. So because of that they are probably my favorites. More fun to write. I obviously have a soft spot for Suriel but I kind of like them all.

I had a, I answered this earlier today, but I had a whole story line planned as like a heavenly/Abidan story line and it was about a person who was a new recruit to the Abidan and he was going to end up using both the power of the Void and the Way. And he had a dragon companion, a black dragon companion, that gave him destructive powers aligned with Void and he had a little tiny blue sort of river fairy spirit who gave him water aura powers. So you can kind of see where this is going.

And he was going to end up being a new Judge. He was going to replace one of the Judges but that was a long time before Cradle. So what happened was I was writing a cultivation knockoff, I knew I needed a heavenly realm, I needed a kind of a pantheon and a heavenly realm story line. So I went back to that book and I repurposed the Abidan from there pretty much wholesale. So, yeah. At that point, by the way, Mercy was the Ghost. So there you go.

Questioner

Does Sha Miara have to manifest an Icon?

Will Wight

Yes, she did. In a sense, manifesting an Icon is, all it is, is the Way recognizing you as the manifestation or representation of a concept. So you really embody a concept enough to connect with it, to connect with its reflection in the Way. So, yeah, when Sha Miara inherited her mom's power she would have manifested an Icon, absolutely.

Questioner

The Silver Spoon Icon.

Will Wight

Yep, that's the one.

Questioner

What is your favorite book, web novel and game that you have discovered in the last year?

Will Wight

Ooh, book, web novel, and game. Does it count if I say Subnautica: Below Zero for the game? Is that cheating? Because while I did not discover Subnautica in the last year, Below Zero came out in the last year. So, still counts.

So book, web novel, and game. Trying to think of what all games... I mean I really liked the Demon Souls remake for PS5. That was really good. Again, I feel like that's a cheating answer, though, because it's not exactly a game that came out in the last year but technically it is. I don't know. I'll have to think about the game part.

Then book and web novel. Book and web novel. Now book is going to be hard. Let's see, let me look at my Kindle. I don't know. I liked Alec Hutson's The Shadows of Dust. That was a space fantasy series that came out and it was coming out when I was thinking out outlining a space fantasy series. So that was something I was like wow this is fortuitous and he wrote The Crimson Queen which was a book I really liked a few years ago and then, of course, the rest of that trilogy. So I enjoyed that, that was creative and neat. But that's the first one that pops into my head.

I really liked the last Dresden Files book. I actually really liked, there was a Dresden Files book, the one before last, that Peace Talks, that wasn't as popular and you know it wasn't my favorite Dresden Files book but it was a Dresden Files book and that is all I needed. And it had been way to long since I had had any Dresden Files book of any description so I was extremely happy to get both of those. Still really good.

And then web novels. Now the question is, how to narrow down my answers. Probably I'm the Lord of an Intergalactic Empire was, I think that was hilarious. It also happens to be scifi/space opera stuff. But it's just, I think it's very funny. One of the top negative reviews for that series is well it's almost like a comedy. Well it is a comedy, it is 100 percent a comedy. So I don't know what they were thinking. And I Want to be a Power in the Shadows or I think it got translated as Eminence in the Shadows. That's getting an anime which is great because it's fantastic. It's like fantasy isekai One Punch Man.

Someone is saying plus one on Iron Prince. And yeah, I would have said that if I had discovered it in the last year but I didn't. It's been more than a year, right?

So, Intergalactic Empire I think is great. I also have weirdly enough been really enjoying Kidnapped Dragons. I'm not all the way, actually I am all  caught up on that. I enjoyed that. That's very much not something I usually like because it's very slice of life but it's about a guy raising, effectively, four daughters who are shape shifted dragons because he has to keep them happy because otherwise they'll destroy the world. And it's surprisingly wholesome and slice of life and yet, I enjoy it. So that is an unusual combination. Usually I don't like those at all.

Questioner

The Beginning after the End was amazing.

Will Wight

Yeah, the Beginning after the End is amazing.

Questioner

What happens to the contents of a sacred artist's soulspace when they die?

Will Wight

So your soulspace can be, it tends to meld with your remnant. So anything that happens to be in the soulspace sort of dissolves to spiritual energy and it merges with your remnant. So in some cases you can take what is in their soulspace from their remnant. You can have a soulsmith extract it. But usually it just kind of becomes a useless mass of energy in the remnant. So those rings around the soulspace, the Sword Sage's remnant, those were, I don't remember if I revealed exactly what they were so I'll be a little vague. Might not matter but I just don't remember. They are constructs that were in his spirit before he died. So, therefore, they just kind of became circles of energy. So they were not useful constructs, then. Yerin doesn't have them anymore they were just kind of absorbed and digested.

Questioner

What's your favorite doughnut shoppe?

Will Wight

Krispy Kreme.  Is there another donut shop?  There's actually a couple of donut shops near us.  What is it?  Duck Donuts?  Voodoo Donuts.  And then Donut King.  There are a couple of those that are decent.  But I just... Nothing beats a glazed Krispy Kreme donut heated up in the microwave.  That's he peak of desserts really.  So it's really funny when you get more expensive desserts and you're like, yeah, this is pretty good, but I could have put a Krispy Kreme donut in the microwave.  (Transcriber's note:  Bear in mind I am simply a recorder of Will's words.  His positions are his own.  I take no blame for the horrors he perpetrates.)

Questioner

When it is said that Northstrider drains a dragon of their latent authority, is that just authority associated with his dragon icon, or is it just a neutral flavor of authority?

Will Wight

No, it's dragon icon.  So it's dragon icon authority.  Dragons are multi-iteration representations of strength and power, all sorts of stuuf, elemental control, all that kind of thing.  And therefore, when he drains them, he expands his authority and his connection to the dragon icon.

Questioner

Pure madra has multiple characteristics that can be selectively emphasized. Do other madra types have multiple characteristics as well? It seems like shadow madra and dream madra do.

Will Wight

Yeah.  Yes, so, one of the things I've called them in my notes, and I think maybe I've referenced them in the books a couple of times, is I call them lesser aspects.  So what they really are, is while they are not types of aura on their own, it is a characteristic that a type of madra can be programmed or cultivated to possess.  So, the Fisher path, like Fisher Gesha, is really just force madra; it's force madra that pulls and binds together.  So connection madra is not a thing, it's not a major aspect, but it is something that can be activated in force aura.  So it's sort of similar to how sword aura is really just an offshoot of force aura, and cloud aura is an interaction of wind and water aura in a unique pattern that appears in a cloud.  And as you learn to sense that particular pattern and cultivate it in your spirit, train your spiritual perception, you can sense that more clearly and it feels like one complete aspect to you, even though technically it isn't.  So yeah.  There's lots of... All madra aspects have this.

Questioner

If you had to pick between Sage first or Herald before Monarch which would you choose and why?

Will Wight

A Herald. I'd pick Herald. As much as I think Sage is the, I guess, more optimal option just because you gain access to abilities you didn't have and as Herald you don't exactly, like it's sort of you are like you were before but just kind of better at it. Uh, Heralds get a few things that I think are really important. And this I think is mentioned in Reaper but I don't think it gets fully explained but Heralds are effectively immune to any attack or attempt to harm them that doesn't have intention behind it, doesn't have will behind it. So, therefore, they can't drown unless someone drowns them. So they can just lay there at the bottom of the ocean and just sit there forever. And that would suck, they wouldn't have a good time but they wouldn't die. So they could fall from any height and be fine. They would have to be thrown into something to be hurt by it. So just for the sake of improving yourself-

Questioner

Only Will can kill a Herald? I see what you did there.

Will Wight

*laughs* For the sake of survival, if you're picking superpowers you always pick the one ensures your survival first. And yeah, that's my answer, I guess.

Questioner

What other names were you considering for advancement stages?

Will Wight

Boy, there was a lot. I went real back and forth on those. One of them was Highgold was initially going to be the highest level of Gold and I was going to put something like Lowgold, something/Midgold, and we even went back and forth on Truegold being the middle but that ended up sounding like it was better than Highgold so we switched it up to where it was.

We also had, I think I tried out colors as the Foundation stages instead of materials. But because I wanted to the badges as a physical thing that's why they're physical materials.

Questioner

Superhighgold.

Will Wight

That's what it was. It was Lowgold, Highgold, Superhighgold. Like your hair turns gold and your eyes turn green.

So then for the Lord realm and higher I went back and forth on so many things. So many. I ended up really liking the sound of the word Underlord, that's why I kept that as the thing. I liked Underlord, I liked Archlord, and I didn't want to use the term Overlord again because I'd used it in Traveler's Gate. So I did not want to do that but, of course, I gave in because it made sense. You know, Underlord Overlord, right? Makes sense. So, because of that [trails off into Stardew Valley game play].

Questioner

Did you do a poll for the Overlord thing?

Will Wight

Yeah, I think I did.

Questioner

Ultra Instinct Gold.

Will Wight

I actually really liked, I'm going to spoil Dragon Ball Super a little bit for those who aren't caught up on the manga. So Dragon Ball Super, everybody probably knows this by now who cares but Goku got a power up a few years ago called Ultra Instinct and the idea behind that is it's skill taken to the highest expression. It is your instincts are perfected to the point you no longer need to think and I thought that was a really cool power up. I thought that was neat. I was not a fan of Super Saiyan Blue. I think they ended up making it look cool but it's just another Super Saiyan, right? But Ultra Instinct I thought was really neat. And then Vegeta did something in the anime that was kind of the opposite path and I liked that idea. And they expanded on that in the manga and in even more detail in the last couple of months. So that Vegeta has his own like different path he's embarking on and it really was similar to Sage and Herald and I thought that was really fun. So I really liked that.

For Herald and Sage and Monarch, I had a lot of different ideas. And that's honestly one of the reasons I don't talk about the advancement stages until later in the series. One is I don't like overwhelming the reader with terminology as much as I do. Like I'm already doing it more than I want to. But another one is because I wanted to be able to change my mind on the cultivation rank names. And then I didn't. I especially didn't like Herald because it implies that they have to be attached to a Monarch in order to get that rank. And that's not true. So what I did instead was because of that, because I ended up using the name, I invented this kind of cultural concept that most Heralds only advance because they are sponsored by someone which makes sense. So, therefore, they became known as Heralds of a Monarch. And that was something that was already kind of true. So I sort of just brought it out to explain the name. So that was how that went.

Questioner

Will you kill off Akura Shira in the next book?

Will Wight

That's a misconception people have. I don't kill off the characters in the books because the characters are not real and I am not in their world. So, I am not doing anything to them. What's happening is I am designing a scenario in which they are maliciously killed by me.

Questioner

What did Fury ask as his prize when he won the uncrowned tournament?

Will Wight

You know, I have that information but I don't remember it. That's one of those things... these are a lot of those things that I just write down in my notes and then it just gets buried in my big pile of notes. So it's on my computer somewhere but I don't remember the answer and I don't want to speculate. I think it was probably the right to create a perfect descendant then what he did was make Akura Shira.

Questioner

Is Akura Shira only interested in Ziel in hope of marrying a Archlord?

Will Wight

Is this the third Akura Shira question? That's another good fodder for a short story now. I need to just do this whole thing where it's just like somebody awkwardly pursuing Ziel or smoothly pursuing Ziel and Ziel just completely apathetic because that's usually how he reacts to things. So is she only interested in Ziel in hope of marrying a Archlord? No.

Questioner

What is Akura Shira's favorite kind of flower?

Will Wight

Is this the fourth Akura Shira question? What is the deal...? What is Akura Shira's favorite kind of flower? The Osmanthus flower.

Questioner

What is Shira’s Path? And does Ziel think she's cute?

Will Wight

Wow.  More Akura Shira questions.   For somebody that has like 4 lines in the whole series, that's a higher number of questions than I anticipated.

Will's brother (offscreen)

Mu Enkai, is that you?

Will Wight

Yes, it's Mu Enkai.  I do not remember; I don't remember that.  She is not an important person to me.  So I don't know.  I'm sure I have an answer to that question somewhere.  But I don't, I don't know.  I wish I knew.  Let's see.  Akura Shira's path.  I need to start saying Akura by the way.  Akura is how I always say it; it's sort of the Japanese pronunciation convention because it's obviously a Japanese inspired name.  But I told Travis  I guess, a long time ago, to pronounce Akura, and now the audio books say Akura, so I need to line up with the audio books.  I need to get in line.  So Akura.  Akura Shira.  What would be her path.  I don't know.  I can't think of anything sufficiently weird.  I was trying to think of she summons leaches or something.  I'll have to figure it out.

Questioner

Rocket boots?

Will Wight

Rocket boots.  It's probably rocket boots.  That's what it is.  It should be a fan path.

Questioner

What's your favorite RPG?

Will Wight

What is my favorite RPG?  Skyrim, as lame as that sounds.  It's so funny, because often, one of the reasons I go off about Subnautica so much, is it's not the most well known thing.  It's not obscure by any means, but I'm not talking about Stardew Valley or Minecraft.  It's not news to anybody that Undertale is good.  But it's often true that the most popular stuff is popular for a reason.  So, yeah, Skyrim is good.  It's a really good RPG.  I don't know what to say.  But I really loved Divinity Original Sin 2.  I have a lot of time in Divinity Original Sin 2, I've played through on every character in Divinity Original Sin 2.  Big fan of Divinity Original Sin 2.  I got half way though a play though not too long ago.  So yeah, big fan of that one.  When that first came out I was singing its praises to friends non-stop.  And I played through the first act, well Fort Joy certainly, literally four or five dozen times.  I've put a lot of time into that game.  

So, let's see.  Favorite RPG.  Ok, someone is saying meh Skyrim; consume one soup and you beat the game.  Ok, here is why I like Skyrim.  Yes you can be completely OP in Skyrim; you can be completely busted in Skyrim.  You can be OP, that's fine, but it's a single player game so who cares?  And it's sometimes fun to just be busted OP.  And if you want to play the game in a more challenging way, you can.  So I've done some playthrough where I've deliberately not done the fortify restoration loop or some other means of getting unlimited power fast, and it was fun.  

(responding to chat) So, Witcher.  Ok, I hate to say this, because I really like the Witcher books, but Witcher 3, I'm not a big fan.  And I've talked about it positively in the past; I do think it's a good game.  I'm not going to crap on it as a creation.  But, I don't really like it.  And the reason is it feels like it is the split between an open world and a linear RPG, so there is a lot of stuff that I wanted to go and run and do, that was a goal I set myself, like I want to go around and play all the best Gwent players, or I want to collect the cards.  Oh, you can't.  Because they are a higher level than you, and any random bandit patrol will just mulch you.  So therefore you have to level up before you can do stuff you actually want to do.  And one the things I love about Breath of the Wild, which is not really an RPG, otherwise that would have been my answer, is it's truly open world.  It's something where, one the first things I do, anytime I do a Breath of the Wild playthrough, is I go through and find all the towers so I complete the map, so I can have the map fully open and do whatever I want to do.  And that's fun.  I want to be able to set and drop objectives as I feel like.  Because the story really is the story of me, going through the game, right?  So Witcher I couldn't do that.  I had to progress with the story and not go off on my own.  I was like, oh, this is really annoying.  Until you get to certain parts of the the story where you are mandated to go and run around.  And that's also annoying.

Questioner

Who is/was the hardest character for you to write?

Will Wight

Well, I mentioned this not too long ago when someone went through and compiled all the Yerin-isms in all the books, that's what I call it when Yerin has some sort of folksy saying that she just happens to pull off the top of her head, I call those Yerin-isms, and those are hard to write. And they were harder. She was, for a long time, the hardest character to write just because of that dialogue convention that I made up myself. So, I have no one else to blame. But I wrote it that way so she would have a unique manner of speaking and I used to do an entire Yerin pass for the early books. Now, later on I got better at coming up with them off the top of my head. So, that became easier. But that's always hard.

In terms of the easiest characters for me to write, they always are Dross and Eithan. Just because I can just write jokes off the top of my head for them all day long. That's fun, very easy. So, yeah, there you go.

Questioner

How many bunches of Jades does it take to kill a Monarch?

Will Wight

I thought I had escaped this forever. (Will's sister laughing off screen.)

Will's brother (offscreen)

That is a top tier question.

Will Wight

That is a top tier question. How many bunches of Jades does it take to kill a Monarch? In Sacred Valley? All of them. Literally, every one. A bunch of Jades is like a cluster of Jades that grows on the same vine so if you have a sacred artist that's sprouting off the same vine as another, I think thats... It's like that simulation of how many lions does it take to take on the sun and the answer is, well, with enough, an infinite number of lions, eventually you would quench the sun and the sun would go out and the lions would win. So there you go.

Questioner

What is a piece of cut content that you fully fleshed out, but never found a good spot to put in the books? Besides jade cycling techniques, that is.

Will Wight

Well, I shared a lot of that before, I guess, Bloodline I think.  I shared some of the things I had thought about there.  There's a lot of paths that I made.  I think one thing - this is funny, but I made a full character sheet for Charity, Akura Charity.  So the owls thing, that's a real technique.  I know all the techniques in The Book of the Silver Heart.  I have a character sheet for Pride too somewhere, but, you know.  It's Pride.  Charity though, I have names for her weapons and artifacts.  I have some elaborate stuff, and we just never got into it.  Maybe I'll shove it into the nest book.  She still has a role in the series of course.  So maybe I'll elaborate on that.  So that's one thing.  I have character sheets for quite a number of people, but Charity is one that I was looking through my notes the other day, and I was like, huh.  I fleshed out her path.  And I never really did a whole lot with it.  

So, anything else... Another piece of cut content...  Oh, there is a lot of setting stuff.  A lot of Serpent's Grave.  Even in Elder Empire.  I actually built the Gray Island, for the Consultant Headquarters in Elder Empire, I built that in Minecraft so I would have a map for it.  I just went into creator mode in Minecraft and built the whole thing.  Built the docks, built the different traps, and the underground chamber, and all that stuff.  I ended up losing that map because I transitioned computers and didn't back it up.  So I was really salty about that.  So that's another thing; there's a few setting things that I fleshed out then didn't get to include, because of course I, instead f lingering on settings, blow past them at the speed of light.  So there's stuff with Blackflame City and stuff with Serpent's Grave that I came up with, then just didn't use.  I do that a lot with characters and settings; come up with details for them that are probably never going to come up.  There's a few sages that I think are super cool that are probably never going to come up.  Just a few paths they get to use that are (aren't?) cool.  There's also some that I initially had that overlap with another character or they just aren't that important.  So there was one guy that was on a sun path, and he was conjuring... It's kind of like Heaven's Glory but taken to the utmost extreme, because he's a sage.  So yeah, a few things like that.  

One of the first things I did in Blackflame actually, was I went through and defined all the monarchs, and the most prominent heralds and sages and stuff, because I wanted to know who the most powerful figures in the world are.  I did this in Elder Empire too; I went and elaborated on the regents and guild heads in one document in order to define the setting and the magic system.  That's one thing I really enjoy doing, and I recommend anyone do it if you are trying to write a progression fantasy sort of setting where people scale in power, is if you define the upper end of the system really quick, even to yourself, it can help you answer questions you didn't even know you had.  Somebody asked me earlier, how do you get past being stuck, and the answer I am sorry to say, is really just write nonsense.  Write the best scene you can think of.  Well, I don't know what to write.  To bad, keep writing.  Write as though someone is holding a gun to your head so words keep coming out of your fingers.  So that's how you do it.  Another answer that I'll elaborate on is you want to know more about your story.  One of the ways to do that is to answer questions to yourself.  Defining powerful people in your magic system is another way to answer questions you didn't even know you had.

So, one of the first things I did for Elder Empire, which I didn't do this for Cradle, mainly because I just went through and I had a file that's literally called powerful people of Cradle, and I just went through and outlined all the monarchs and their relationships to one another, and their factions, and what continent their on, their most powerful and loyal sages and heralds, all that kind of thing.  So, I went through and did all that around Blackflame, when I was really trying to define the setting, and of course I had done a little bit of that already, because 3 of the monarchs show up in Unsouled, so clearly I had done some of that already, but I finished the documentation there.  And in Elder Empire, I wrote a scene with the Emperor and the first generation Champions, uniting the world.  And of course at least of those first generation Champions became a regent.  And I didn't know anything about Estyr Six at the time; I just thought about a woman with long hair, and a black coat, and three lizard skulls that she was levitating around her with her powers that I thought was really cool, and because of that image, I fleshed her out into one of the major people in the setting.  And that ended up helping me fill in history of the setting that I didn't know I needed, and the dominoes sort of fell, and that inspired me and gave me some gaps to fill in later.

Questioner

Can one person inherit multiple distinct bloodline powers (eg akura armor + aurelius senses)?

Will Wight

No.  So, the idea is you have one... (Will gets distracted by a scarecrow.)  All right.  So you really have slot, so to speak, for a bloodline power.  So if you did inherit two bloodline powers, they would blend.  They would blend, or one would overwrite the other.  It depends on how powerful the ancestor leaving you the bloodline power was and ow much of it you inherited.  So if you inherited a really strong measure of a bloodline power, that one would be dominant.  The example of course is Akura armor and Arelius web detection, because those are the two major bloodline powers in the series.  With those two, it would really depend.  If you were a direct descendent of Malice almost certainly your bloodline would be stronger than the Arelius one, so it would probably just be overwritten.  But there's a possibility you would get a hybrid.  So if Malice left a stronger, it would kind of be like a, lets say a suit of armor that had some detection capabilities while it was active.  And was a different color, or was more sensitive to being controlled, or armor that now as part of its defensive mechanism web of madra.  Akura, your right.  Akura.  That's definitely how you say it and always was.

Questioner

Do natural spirits need lord revelations?  Do they need to be remade with soulfire to advance to the lord realm?

Will Wight

Yes they do need soulfire to advance to the lord realm.  In terms of do they need revelations, yes and no.  They need to understand themselves better like sacred beasts do and human sacred artists do, but it's a little bit different for them just like it is for anything else.  However, something like a naturally advancing tree for instance, it's really more about, like Emriss Silentborn when she was alive. it's really more about growing degress of sentience and awareness more than it is... Oh, hear we go.

Will's brother (offscreen)

We found batteries.

Will Wight

We found batteries.  I'm being dismembered.  She's trying to make me into a Skywalker by cutting my arm off.  That's how it works.  Except she was attacking me at the shoulder, so I don't get to be Luke.  And I don't get to be Lindon either.  

Sage Of Quotes

Do Fury's kids have to abandon their paths and start on a new magic system? Are they able to advance without cradles aura?

Will Wight

So one of the things that I have... One of the tenants of this multiverse I guess is when you advance under your own power you have almost completed the definition of yourself if that makes any sense. You have finished defining yourself, you have... now transcended your mortal being. You are now this person. Now, of course, you can change and grow over the course of infinite lifetimes, as indeed we have seen from the Abidan. Some of them grow weary and retire. Some of them change from who they were as mortals. So you do change and grow but not as much as you would. In a way, your origin is somewhat fixed.

But people who are taken beyond their world are not subject to that principle. So they can continue to practice sacred arts if they have a source of aura. Can they get other sources of aura outside of Cradle? Yes, they can, that is something they can do. It's not inherently on other worlds that are not cradle but there are ways of doing that. And they can perceive sources of aura that other people who grew up in other worlds cannot. So that's the kind of thing that they could... they could find a way to keep practicing their sacred arts

OR

They could learn new magic systems from another source, another world, another... There would be other energy systems that they might be compatible with. Usually, they would be compatible with something that is reminiscent or... shares an icon you might say with the path they are already on. So if they're, talking about Akura family so if they are on a shadow path and there were some sort of shadow elemental path they would be able to learn that more easily. 

So.... Yeah, that's the answer. They would be able to learn new magic systems or they would be able to continue their own if they found an appropriate source of aura to continue to cultivate.

Questioner

If you could write anything you want right now, without worrying about sales, productivity, fan reaction, or anything else, what would you be writing?

Will Wight

I fully understand this question, but really, anything.  It's not a particular thing, it's just I like coming up with new ideas; it's just fun.  So most anything action-fantasy related.  I say anything, I mean in my very narrow niche.  So, I had been considering something that is more like a Korean light novel in style, something that is a game sort of system, but in the real world.  So something like Solo Leveling or The Gamer, those are the ones that I guess would be more popular that you would know.  Something like that I think would be fun, something I've wanted to do.  Because infamously I don't really understand LitRPG; I don't really get it.  I've read a lot of it; it's not really my cup of tea and it feels like ti should be.  So I would like to figure that out in the genre that is closest to what I would like to write.  So that's one thing I think would be fun.

Another thing I think would be fun is I mentioned space fantasy earlier; that is something I have been kicking around for awhile.  I think that aesthetic is really cool.  Again, it's just a theme, just a subgenre, it's not a particular story.  There are a few character ideas I really like, a few game mechanics I really like, or world mechanics.  I would love to do a sort of survival style fantast novel, like The Martian.  I would love to, these are... Gothic fantasy, gothic horror style fantasy, so not a horror novel, a fantasy novel, but in a gothic fantasy, like Innistrad, if that means anything to you.

Oh, I would also really would love to do holiday books; I've wanted to do those a long time.  Halloween, I love that aesthetic, I'd love it for a fantasy novel.  Christmas, I love that aesthetic, I'd love it for a fantasy novel.  Something like Nightmare before Christmas, but as a setting for a fantasy.  I think it would be really neat.  The problem with that is it feel like I would have to come up with holiday analogies for the other two seasons, because we have winter and we have fall.  I just think it would be cool.  I think it would be neat to have a character that has Christmas magic, right?  I think it would be fun.  So yeah, standard sort of ideas that I kick around.  Those are all sort of things that appeal to me.  But if I could write anything right now, it would probably batting one of those around until it felt like it clicked and then I would go with that.  

The funny thing is, when I consider writing a new thing, I kind of go around in circles.  I go around between, "Ah man, is this too much like Cradle, is this not enough like Cradle?  Is this the kind of thing people expect from me?  Is this a thing they expect too much?  Is this..."  And I get up in my head a little too much.  It's funny, because when I look at other creators who have that mentality, I don't care of it's too similar, or not similar enough.  Just do something.  It's fine.  So I know that's the attitude I should have.  And it is probably the attitude that I will actually go with.  But it's just...  It's hard.  I still go round and round about it.  That's it. 

There's a part of me that says... so I'm playing Stardew Valley right now, ConcernedApe, that's the developer of this, last week announced his next project, which is called Haunted Chocolatier.  And it basically is a gothic, or lightweight horror themed chocolate factory.  So it is sort of like a whimsical Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, mixed with ghosts, mixed with Stardew Valley.  And what it looks like right now, and we have very little information about this so it could end up being completely wrong, but what it looks like right now, is effectively Stardew, but with a different, more fantastical theme.  And I love that.  I think that's great.  I wish people would just keep doing what people like from them more often.  I also think people should just straight up copy people more often.  I don't know why there aren't more knock offs of Harry Potter, weirdly.  Even though there is tons of school fantasy, I'm like, why aren't there more Harry Potter knock-offs?  Because there are tons of Twilight knock-offs.  But as much as I say that, then I think, yeah, but that would that be fun for me?  Is that what I want to do?  Then again, I think about the chance to start over on Cradle and redesign it from the ground up, knowing what I know now, and that appeals to me.  So, it wouldn't be Chinese cultivation novel inspired now, by the way.  Probably.  It would Probably have more different inspirations or conventions, not so much from the Chinese cultivation side of things.  It's just, you know.  I've done that.  So it would be a different thematic inspiration, if anything.  That's my answer.

One of the character types I've wanted to do for quite some time is a, because I haven't done this before, is a nobleman.  Do like a noble.  Someone who is born into a noble house.  Someone who was born into more privilege and luxury, because that is something that I just haven't done before.  So my characters tend to not be there.  So, technically, Lindon is born into, like he's in a well off family, right?  Well, for Sacred Valley, right?  But the bottom of the bottom of the barrel in Cradle context.  So it's more something that they would face unique challenges and start in a very different place.  So that would be an interesting aspect to play with.  That's all.  Just be a little different.  That's it.  (responding to chat)  No, Eithat doesn't count, and here's why: Eithan is not the primary protagonist of the series.  So it's Lindon I'm comparing to, Lindon and Simon I'm comparing to.  Because of course I've written characters who are noble before.  Mercy is.  

Questioner

Are there any items or artifacts that you would describe as the Excalibur of Cradle?  Something that legendary?

Will Wight

Yes.  One of the things I went and did originally is I went and designed other threats that are potentially existential threats to Cradle that aren't the dreadgods.  So I went through and did that.  And I think that is one of the only things that made it into the books from that is a reference to the plague that killed a monarch, Sha Leiala.  It's really like a biological weapon that sort of developed itself.  But there's a couple of those.  And there are a couple of references, I think in Reaper, I think there are a couple of references, to legendary weapons that aren't from Cradle specifically, but are other legendary weapons.  I wish I could off the top of my head give you a run down of a legendary weapon from Cradle, but I can't.  But there is stuff like that.

Questioner

Do you have an idea how long the last 2 books in the series will be compared to Wintersteel? Looking for as much Cradle left to read as possible!

Will Wight

No.  I don't know.  I think, I suspect book 11 will be a little bit shorter than Wintersteel.  Probably, my guess, and please don't hold me to any of this, this is just a guess, I don't know, is about 120, 130, thousand words.  Kind of like Reaper.  That's were I think book 11 will be.  Book 12 on the other hand, being the last book, one of the things I have, my personal taste, is that I wish the end of long series had a lot of epilogue, had a lot of falling action.  Because you're really doing the falling action not just for one book, but for the whole series.  So I would like to see the resolution for what happens to a bunch of people.  Therefore I intend to wrap up the plotline of the final book before the end of the book.  Normally of course, I'm very structured about hitting the climax of the story then getting to the sequel as soon as possible.  But in this case that's not going to be my philosophy for the last book.  So how long will the last book be?  I don't know.  As long as it needs to be?  Kind of?  I normally do not have this philosophy at all, but in this case my philosophy I'm going to try to put everything I can in it, because we're leaving.  Before I go out the door, I want to wrap everything up.  So it might not be massively bigger than the other books.  I don't know; it depends on what I feel like I need to wrap up.

Questioner

What Final Fantasy Summon would Lindon and crew be represented by?

Will Wight

Honestly, I've played a lot of Final Fantasy games, bit I'm not familiar enough with the series to say.  Well, Orthos would be Bahamut.  I would say that.  100%.  It's just him; that's who he is.  Other than that, I don't have a good answer to that.

Questioner

Back when Sesh was telling Sophara that he'd be fine with her as long as she fought like a dragon regardless of whether or she won or lost, was he being sincere?

Will Wight

Yes and no.  Yes, he was expressing a sincere thought that he has.  As long as his philosophy is brought across, and she honors him and doesn't shame him as a dragon, and she makes him look good, then yeah, he was going to be happy.  On the other hand, he does have to deal with the consequences of what happens when she loses, so he would still be irritated.  He's not known for his restraint.  But he wouldn't punish her.  It's one of those things where if she had done well and Mercy had just done better, then it's like, ok.  She wasn't going to get punished for losing to Yerin at the end there.  That wasn't going to happen.  Because how the heck was she supposed to win?

Questioner

As a reader and listener on audible the most memorable moment for me is when Fury advances to monarch. As the author do you have a similar moment?

Will Wight

There are a lot... Really, it's funny, because of course it's different for me, writing the scenes, but most of the scenes that stood out to you, also stood out to me.  Because I was like, oh, those stood out to me, I need to make them stand out to the reader.  So that's why I did it.  So you have something like the Dross scene at the climax of Ghostwater. and that is something that obviously stood out to me.  I went into the book saying, I need to make this pop.  Then I worked really hard to make it pop.  So did I have the same experience you did?  No.  Because I was not feeling this big revelation, I was going, the reader needs to feel it.  So then I set it up.  But in terms of the stuff that really hit me to write, in terms of the moments that stood out to me as a reader, it's really a lot of the ones that stood out to you I think.  The Dross moment in Ghostwater was definitely one of them. 

Off the top of my head, the one that immediately comes to mind, is Lindon's showdown with his family in Bloodline.  Because of course, that was a fairly recent book.  And that was... I felt that scene.  It mirrored an earlier scene.  I felt like Lindon really would be that awkward.  One of the things that has frustrated people about that scene is there were a number of other ways Lindon could have handled it.  And, yeah, there were.  But what I like about it, is he's feeling like he is back where he was before.  And he's not, but he feels like he is.  And I feel like that's real.  That's something that stood out to me.  And because I felt, I don't know, I enjoyed it more?  It felt more memorable to me?  It was just something that I guess I empathized with Lindon a lot there.  

Other scenes that really stood out to me...  Yes, there is a bunch of them from Reaper.  I'm not even kidding.  There's a few scenes that aren't even close to the end that really really stood out to me.  And they are really memorable to me.  Also, because that's the book I finished most recently, it is a lot clearer to me.  The problem is I can't talk about those, dang it.  So this is a land mine question.  There's a few of them that aren't even deep into the book.  They are fairly early chapter stuff, but I can't talk about them, dang it.

Questioner

Do any of the Iterations have standard holidays?

Will Wight

Yeah.  Yeah, first of all, the iterations, they all have some kind of standard holiday.  But one of the reason I did the Traveler's Gate short stories a few years ago, I did them around the holidays, is that Amalgam, the Traveler's Gate world, has a seasonal calendar.  At least Damasca does.  So therefore, the turning of the seasons is always marked by a holiday.  And I did that both so you could have a sense of time that was sort of memorable, and so I could make a time line really clear.  But that means they have a winter holiday.  They have a spring holiday.  They a fall holiday and a summer holiday.  Everything kind of revolves around those.  So the have a lot of seasonal holidays. 

So if this person is asking if there are any cross-iteration holidays, not sure.  I think seasonal holidays tend to be, most cultures have seasonal holidays.  So I would suspect, and this is probably how I would work in a holiday series, I would suspect there would be some sort of resonance in the Way, because it's such a commonly held concept.  So there would be some icon, so to speak, that would be reflective of what fall is, and what a fall holiday is, so you would end up getting some sort of blend between Halloween and Thanksgiving, that is almost a universal holiday, then there would be one of those for each season.  So that is probably the way I would do it.  (responding to chat)  The Santa icon.  Yes, that would be what it is.  It would be something like the winter, I mean you wouldn't, there wouldn't be a name for it.  It's not like an icon you manifest.  It's just a concept in the way.

Questioner

Would you consider doing a collection of short stories after book 12 while you figure out what you want to write next?

Will Wight

I actually intended... I really don't want to spoil anything for Reaper, dang it.  But I have intended to write some short stories, that cover in gaps in the books, going back several books.  But especially scenes where you might expect some more slice of life chapters it this was a web novel.  But it isn't so you don't get them.  And you know how much I love slice of life.  I don't.  Bit it's good fodder for short stories.  I just don't like novels or movies being paused in the middle.  But that's the kind of thing I've considered; going over Cradle, and kind of doing almost like a collection of bloopers, but more like a collection of moments from different points in their lives.  So prepping for the Uncrowned Tournament, working for the Skysworn back a few books ago, in between books, that kind of thing.  That's the kind of thing I'd like to do.  And then of course just writing some random other short stories would be fun.  I'm going to write nothing but slice of life after Cradle.  That or a lot of romance.  You can hold me to that.

Questioner

Do objects forged with authority become more powerful if the person who made them gains more authority afterwards?

Will Wight

Yes, they do.  So, the question there is, if someone with authority makes a powerful, monarch level weapon, or a device like the Abidan would use, and they gain more power afterward, does the item also gain in power?  And the answer is yes, it would.  So honestly, the same thing is true of bloodlines.  So if someone inherits a bloodline power from a herald, and that herald then advances to monarch, that bloodline power will then get stronger.  It is more that, conceptually you are a descendent of this person, then it is you inherited it genetically.  Because of course they are not genetic powers, they are spiritual programs.  So yeah, that's the answer.

Questioner

How do spirits reach herald? 

Will Wight

Ah, good question.  How do spirits reach herald?  Because the only way we've seen someone reach herald is to separate from your remnant, so how does someone who starts off as a spirit, basically just a remnant, how do they advance to herald?  I'm trying to remember what I've established in the books already, dang it.  Why haven't you guys read Reaper?  I don't remember how many things I've established, and how many I haven't established yet.  Well.  So...  What can I say?  Spirits, remnants, anything that is going to advance to herald, they develop a physical body first.  So they are spirit, and they develop a body around themselves.  Then they still have to separate the two entities out and advance to herald normally.  It's just that they get to that point, they get to the peak of archlord, with a developed enough spirit to separate, well it's more like they developed enough of a body that their spirit can then separate.  So it's almost the reverse of how a sacred artist would do it, where they have got to get to where their spirit has a clear and firm enough existence to separate, this is the spirit's body has to be real enough for their spirit to separate out.  So their you go.  

Questioner

Which sibling is your favorite?

Will's brother (offscreen)

Rebecca.

Will Wight

Sam just said Rebecca.

Will's brother (offscreen)

There's no hesitation there.  I mean, to be real.

Will Wight

What are you talking about?  You said there was no hesitation there.  That's not true.  I don't have a favorite sibling.

Will's brother (offscreen)

No, for me.  

Will Wight

I have a favorite brother and I have a favorite sister.  Oh, for you.  No, your opinion makes sense.  Yeah, that definitely should be Rebecca.  That's the correct answer.  That's his answer.  Mine too.  He was correct to pick Rebecca.  I don't have a clear answer.  I don't.

Questioner

Portals - Some are tinged blue because of the Way and others with the user's madra. Why?

Will Wight

So, the question is, some portals are blue because they go through the way, and other portals look like the users madra.  There's a more nuanced answer to this question.  I don't know how much I can go into without getting super weirdly technical.  But it's almost a, it's sort of a style, a method of transportation.  So there are people like Charity, who exercise their authority by going through the medium of their techniques.  They use their madra to move through the Way.  There is also a difference between short range teleportation and long range teleportation.  And others tear open the Way directly and walk through.  So someone like Northstrider could do whichever of those he felt was most appropriate.  And then there are pros and cons to each approach.  There are also others that mask what they are doing in their madra.  So it looks like they are teleporting you through a technique, but in reality they are just opening the Way and taking you through.  So one of the constants of that, is unless you are deliberately masked somehow, you are always going to notice the Way if you are going a longer distance.  Even when its used through a technique.  If you are not being teleported that far, relatively speaking, you might not be able to perceive the blue fabric of the Way.

Questioner

If Mu Enkai and Akura Shira fought to the death who would win?

Will's sister (offscreen)

I love that their just trolling you now.

Will Wight

I’m just sipping some more tea.

Will's brother (offscreen)

Who would win? All the readers.

Will Wight

Who would win? I know who would lose: me.

The real answer, of course, is that Akura Shira would juggle Mu Enkai. I mean it wouldn’t even be close. But, the meme answer is that they’re both transcendent beings who can never come into contact with one another for fear of shattering reality.

Questioner

Since Heralds can regenerate their body like a sacred liver, can they cut off pieces of themselves to use as dead matter in soul smithing?

Will Wight

I mean, they could. That’d be painful and highly inefficient, but that is something they could do.

Questioner

If you were asked to finish ASOIAF, would you say yes?

Will Wight

I would never be asked to finish ASOIAF. That is not something that would ever ever happen.

One of the reasons Robert Jordan’s estate requested Brandon Sanderson is because when he was alive he said “Brandon Sanderson is the kind of guy I would want to finish my books” and there is no way in heaven and on earth that George Martin would say that about me. I would not be, stylistically, the correct person to finish it. Me writing it would feel like a huge departure from the rest of the series. So no, I wouldn’t do it. Because I’d be betraying the expectations of a lot of readers.

However, one of the things I’d always wanted is that I wish other authors would cover other’s books like musicians cover each other’s songs. If I had the time and/or ability to cover ASOIAF, I think it would be very funny, because I’d start from book 1 and it’d be 100% completely different reading experience. So, yeah, I’d do that, if that was something anybody could do or ever did.  That sounds hilarious to me, because Will Wight’s ASOIAF would be virtually unrecognizable.

Questioner

Would Ned become a Monarch?

Will Wight

Yeah, 100%.

Somebody asked me “book deaths that really affected me” and the first one that I thought of was Ned Stark because I read Game of Thrones in High School and I *knew* Ned wasn’t going to die. It didn’t even occur to me that he was going to die. So it’s a very tense setting. Would he be sent to the wall? Probably not, because Jon was already at the wall. Is he gonna escape? Is someone going to free him? Then he gets executed. But what really happened end? Did they fake it? No no… he’s dead-dead.

I was like “you can’t do that do your protagonist”. And I remember it dawning on me, “oh wait, you can”. Because set it up so his whole family and the other factions to follow. So the story doesn’t end. It had a big affect on me.

Questioner

Once all the Cradle books are released, can we buy physical copies of the omnibus editions?

Will Wight

Probably not

Questioner

Are there any odd metals in Cradle other than goldsteel, halfsilver, and wintersteel?

Will Wight

So are there any odd or strange metals other than goldsteel, halfsilver, and wintersteel?  Yes, there are.  There were a few that I came up with, but I didn't want this to turn into a metallurgy thing.  It's one of those things where if crafting with mundane materials had been more of a thing in Cradle, we would have got into this more.  So what were they?  What were the other metals?  It's hard for me to say.  Typically, they are metals that have taken on extra properties based on icons associated with types of aura and events and the latent authority in the world, and these things have caused them to develop powers that interfere with the energy system in some way.  There would be other things like that.  We probably won't get to see them.  I have notes for some of them, but it's just something that probably isn't going to come up.  But those are definitely the most common, I don't want to say common, the most widely used, because they have the most universally applicable effects.  So halfsilver being disruptive and goldsteel physically interacting with things that usually aren't physically interactable.  

Will Wight

Well, it's funny because I was using some Akura naming conventions to make up Shira's name in Bloodline, and I forgot that there was an Akura Shiria in Uncrowned.  So that is probably a little too similar.  The reason it was, is that I have certain rules for making up Akura names, and they were both created through the same process.

Will Wight

Have you ever considered trying to turn Cradle into a TTRPG, either by doing a world book or a source book? We would all love to play in your world.

Will Wight

You know, it's the kind of that I have considered.  I have thought of.  What I think would be fun would be a light weight source book; something that is maybe not applicable to all systems, but is not system specific.  That you could use to, like maybe some iron clad rules you could for making your own paths, which obviously...

So.  Tabletop RPG.  Something like a system you could apply to a GURP system or a Fate Core; something like that, but I, the way I DM, I'm really loose about the rules.  If the rules are getting in the way of you having fun, then the rules are the ones that are wrong.  So I don't really care what the rules are, so long as they have some method of determining outcomes.  So I've never been a rules lawyer kind of guy; it's not me.  So it doesn't really matter to me what system is used.  But I like reading through source books.  And I like using them as inspiration.  And I like using them as tools of creating characters.  It's just fun to have.  So that's the kind of thing I would love to have for Cradle.  The problem is, one of the things people ask me a lot, is how would you play a Cradle character in 5th edition?  The answer is you'd have to really mod something, probably a monk.  It would be super homebrew.  That's the issue.  You could re-flavor a lot of things so it looks like Sacred arts, but it would be under very different rules, so it wouldn't be very much like Cradle at all.  But you could re-flavor a monk to look like Lindon.  That would be fine; the difference of course being monks are terrible, and Lindon is actually good in combat and can kill things.  So maybe re-flavor a paladin as Lindon.

Questioner

Is there a character attribute of one of the main characters that you wish you had either changed or written differently?

Will Wight

Yes, there is, in fact, an extremely core attribute of the main character that I wish I had written differently. And the answer is: Lindon's whole thing about going after the most powerful thing all the time. It's one of his most obvious and recognizable character traits and I really like it but the reason I designed that with him in mind is because one of the things I had initially envisioned with Cradle is really more of a series of looser adventures where he's just going into an independent scenario.

It's kind of like One Piece, actually, where he's just going into a preexisting conflict and sort of inserting himself where he's not wanted. And I wanted the kind of guy that was going to go in there and see that they've got a powerup or they've got a super soldier serum or whatever and they're all fighting over magic fruit that makes you a rubber man or whatever it is. And then he was going to try and find a way of walking out with that. And then that was how he was going to be powerful, right? He was going to be the kind of guy that would go in and get everybody's different powerup and that was how he was going to - instead of one path, he was going to follow a little bit of a lot of paths.

So that's how I designed that and how I intended it to be used. And that, of course, didn't end up being at all where I took the series. So, because of that, while it's a core aspect of Lindon's character, I would probably change how it's expressed if I had known exactly where the series was going to go. And that's why it changes a little bit every time.

Questioner

Did this mean he was going to split his core again?

Will Wight

Not necessarily. I had always kind of intended this to be a dual path sort of thing. As I said, the original proto-Lindon from way back in the day when he was an Abidan trainee, not somebody in one of the lower realms, was going to be that he had a river spirit of order on his left hand and a chaos black dragon spirit on his right. So still a dual opposing paths thing. So that was always the intention. I had considered changing core splitting. I had considered that because it was kind of one of the obvious applications of the abilities he ended up having in the book. So I considered it and I rejected it.

Will Wight

Oh! See this cat?  I do.  Always [inaudible] cat.  Adopt this cat?  Absolutely.  Alright, what am I naming the cat?  Naming the cat.  [inaudible suggestion off-screen.]  It's got to be a Cradle name.  Ruby. Shira?  No.  It's Shira.  [Will's sister approves] I need to just get like one pig or a cow or something, some really lazy animal and name it Ziel.  Make it be friends with the cat.  

Questioner

Do you receive more Kindle unlimited downloads or kindle store buys for your Books? And do more people read or listen to your books?

Will Wight

I don't know the answer to either of those questions.  

Will's brother (offscreen)

Read.  By far.

Will Wight

Read.  Read. 

Will's brother (offscreen)

What was the other one?

Will Wight

Kindle unlimited vs. buys.  

Will's brother (offscreen)

A lot more buys right?  

Will's sister (offscreen)

Far more.

Will Wight

A lot more buys.  A lot more reads.  There are quite a few Kindle Unlimited reads and there are quite a few audio book buys.  I think in general, audio book sales are catching up to ebooks.  So audio book sales are definitely the next big thing.  So they are to ebooks what ebooks were to print, 5 years ago, 10 years ago, but not quite there yet for me.  You go Travis.  Yes, 100%.

Will's brother (offscreen)

Almost 6,000 audible preorders.

Will Wight

Ok.  Oh, is this information I am supposed to be reading?

Will's brother (offscreen)

Yes.

Will Wight

We have had almost 6000 audible preorders.

Will's brother (offscreen)

And almost 13,000... 5,000 audible preorders? And 13,000 ebook preorders.

Will Wight

Ok, we are rounding differently, I guess.  5,000 audio preorders, and how many?  13,000 Kindle preorders.  Something like that.  [responding to chat]  "I definitely always buy both."  Shout out to you grandtorso.  By buying both formats, both ebook and audio book, you have proven that you do indeed have a grand torso.  I certify it's grandness.  This is now Cradle canon, that you have the grandest torso.  

Will's sister (offscreen)

We actually sell more audiobooks than [inaudible.]

Will Wight

All right, so I'm getting more updates.  This just in!  Apparently, overall, that wwas for preorders, overall, we have sold 56%...? In the last year, in 2021, 56% of our sales were audio.  So there you go.

Questioner

Can you earn points after you ascend?

Will Wight

One might say you earn more points after you ascend than before.

Questioner

How high up does the Atmosphere go on Cradle? 

Will Wight

To the top.

Questioner

Anything cool up there? Like any naturally occurring Island nations? Or a sky version of the EAC?

Will Wight

Actually, yeah.  That is a good question.  So, one of the things that I had initially envisioned for Cradle, there are a couple of things like this, was there was a whole, just like there are ocean civilizations in Cradle, there are sky civilizations.  So not necessarily built on clouds; built on structures that can stay aloft indefinitely in wind aura.  I don't know if you guys, in older editions of DnD, there were silver dragons that were said to make their castles out of clouds that they could manipulate, and that was the kind of thing that I wanted in the skies of Cradle.   But there was also a base on the moon.  There was a whole civilization on the moon that lived there, because there was an ancient, highly advanced sacred artist that could make it to the moon.  Probably jumped there, Saitama style, from one punch man.  And he or she settled this civilization and settled a bunch of people up there.  So I really wanted to have that.  It probably does still exist on Cradle.  I have not filled out the details.  Unless I did and just forgot.  But we're not going to get there, so that is the problem.  But I thought it was fun.  When I was first outlining Cradle, I thought "Ooo, it would make sense to me that people could reach the moon.  Is a moon base too weird for a magical martial arts series?"  Then I laughed at myself.  "Ha, ha, too weird?  Ha, ha, ha, ha.  No such thing."  Then I went on.

Questioner

Favorite Halloween Candy?

Will

This is going to be blasphemous to some of you, but I really like candy corn. [Sam boos] I know, I know, I realize that sounds like a terrible take, but I love candy corn. [Will's siblings' noises] I really like corn. Big fan of candy corn. I realize that's saying... pineapple pizza. Speaking of pizza, I love anchovies, [I] love anchovy pizza. Probably my favorite kind of pizza. I made an anchovy pizza a couple of days ago, and I had the the leftovers for lunch today. So I got a lot of hot takes comin'. The candy corn thing, a couple of things, I really just like it, and, as I as I said earlier about the Halloween aesthetic for a fantasy novel, I really love the Halloween the aesthetic, I love the Halloween's color palette, the designs, the common themes and tropes and icons. And candy corn is just one of those that just look iconic to me. I love Reese's'. That's probably my other favorite [candy].* That's the thing I would probably be happiest to get if I was trick-or-treating, but Reese's don't look as cool,. They are neat, but they are not as ionic, and I think candy corn just says Halloween to me. It's like having a peep for Easter. It just looks like the holiday.

*He said thing here, but I am pretty sure he meant candy.

Questioner

In Skysworn one of the goldsigns was a swarm of eyes. What path does that belong to?

Will Wight

Oh boy.  I do not remember at all.  I do not even remember what you are talking about.  That is a long time ago.  That is a question for Past Will.  I do not remember at all.  I'm sure I had an answer at some point.  I don't know.  Path of the many eyes.  Wasn't that a Futurama joke?  Something...  Oh yeah, the beast of a thousand eyes or whatever.  Yup.  Path of a thousand eyes.  That's it.  That's what it is.  The gold sign is typically called bees not the bees.  It's the path of the cage.  And it involves caging bees.  So, one of the things you do is put a cage around people's head and you summon a bunch of little forged bees inside it.  Another thing you can do with the path of cage that is really interesting is you can break into other people's cages.  So, if there was some sort of national treasure you need to break into the path of the cage would be perfect for that.  You follow a lot of secret maps.  It's really more a thing they do; it's a cultural thing more than a map thing.

Questioner

How did you begin planning for the Cradle series? And who was your first character that you envisioned?

Will Wight

So, I talked about this a little bit earlier.  Cradle, the elements that made it into Cradle, came from a number of different places, but two in particular.  One of them was an Abidan story line that I had planned out to be a completely universe spanning story from the beginning.  And one of them was cultivation fantasy knock-off.  So, it was really when I fused those two together that Cradle came into being.  So, one of the first characters I came up with was Lindon.  Definitely, I did him first because I need to know who the protagonist was.  Then Yerin I kind of came up with, because I was like, if it was a normal cultivation series, there would be a few powers that the character would have, and one of them would be a sword path.  But what I really did, was I made Yerin sort of the standard cultivation novel protagonist, except she's a woman instead of a man.  So that's it.  That's really where she started, then I need a unique way for her to speak.  And a connection to the outside world, so I fleshed her out in that way.  

Then I came up with Eithan not long after that.  I really wanted to get to him in the first book, because obviously he is fun to write, but I didn't make it that far.  So, Eithan was very early.  And the judges.  I had the judges fleshed out long before they appeared in the books.  So, I knew who Suriel was.  I knew who Makiel and Gad...  Makiel, Gadrael, Ozriel, and the ghost, whose name I don't like pronouncing.  Those characters were very vivid to me.  One of the scenes I really wanted to do was... So, when Cradle was initially just the Abidan story line, was that Gadrael was going to be super against whoever the main character was, who ended up being Lindon.  So, he was just going to be super prejudiced against everything he does, and then the more Lindon adhered to the rules, the more he was reluctantly on Lindon's side.  And he was just like, "Yes, I still hate you, but you are correct."  Because he's just a very rules-oriented guy.  So that was one of the things I looked forward to, and that helped me flesh out Gadrael's character a lot.  Which is funny because he plays virtually no role in the Cradle series.  At least so far.  So, he's like, "Yeah, I hate him because he breaks the rules.  So, to the degree that he doesn't break the rules, I don't hate him."  So that's kind of the arc there, I guess.  So, I fleshed out the judges quite a bit, even before I started writing Unsouled.  

So, this is a little bit of a tangent, but as I was fleshing out the system of Cradle... [delivery from off-screen] Ooo, I have more tea!  As I was fleshing out the magic system of Cradle I got some more tea.  [Rebecca says something unintelligible]  Ooo, it's Star Wars tea!  It's a Mandalorian mysterious black tea.  [Rebecca cheers.]  Not sponsored.  If this was Yorkshire Gold, I would grow Super Saiyan hair, and instantly beat Stardew Valley.  That's the next cup.  I need the power of Yorkshire Gold.  [Will sings: Yorkshire Gooold....]  Uh... Anyway.  What was I going to say.  Oh yeah, when I started fleshing out Cradle, one of the first things I wanted to figure out was the magic system, so I had tried out a bunch of different thoughts.  I thought about, I wanted to do a unique spirit thing, and I wanted Lindon to start off weak, so I considered animal spirits, totem animal spirits.  I would tie into icons, and of course the Judges are at the highest end of that.  And Lindon was going to have a rabbit or a little baby deer.  I considered a squirrel, which is one joke that Yerin makes in book 2.  So those were all things he was going to have.  I thougth about tools or weapons being spirits, and everyone was going to have some really cool weapon, and then Lindon was going to have like a shovel, or a little hammer.  Some little practical thing.  Or a bucket.  That was one of the things I considered.  Something with utility, but the opposite of an awesome thing that you would want.  Because I just thought it would be funny.  A few things I thought of there.  And then when I was coming up with the series, I was then of course doing the dual-control thing, I was trying to go, ok, what would be two cool things I could pair together?  But I ended up going with what my initial gut instinct was, which was destruction and, not creation, but more like order based.  Cleansing.  So, there you go.

Questioner

I'd love to know what you think about Warhammer 40k. How do you think the crew would hold up in the 40k universe?

Will Wight

No one holds up well in the 40k universe. So, not well. Warhammer 40k, to those of you who don't know, is the setting that coined the term grimdark. So, anybody can easily die in the Warhammer 40k universe. If the emperor of humanity can die, anyone can (he's technically not dead, but..). How would they fare? Badly. Everyone fares badly. But what do I think of Warhammer 40k? I love the lore. Big fan of the lore. Not a huge fan of most of the games or the books. Some of the books are great, but they tend to get extremely detailed.

One of the reasons why I've said I like the space fantasy or space opera aesthetic more than I like the sci-fi aesthetic is because sci-fi tends to be on the side of... harder sci-fi, harder concepts, stuff that might actually exist in science, and I don't really care about that- my favorite part of Star Wars is the Jedi. I don't care how X-wing hyperdrives work, so there's a lot of that in Warhammer 40k, there's a lot of, "ah yes, this legion has a wide and storied history," and I'm like, "oh cool, I'm good with that," and they're like, "Here it is!" and then for 40 pages they explain to you the entire history of whatever, the Burning Legion. Just kidding, that's from Warcraft, but whatever order of Space Marines it is and that's annoying to me. It's also, like, they get into the detail of how exactly Space Marines work. Oh, I don't care, they're bio-engineered by what is effectively an immortal living god. They're superhuman, you got me. I don't need to know that they have two hearts and six livers.

So, it tends to be irritating to me that- the Warhammer 40k books that I like the most were probably the Eisenhorn books, I thought those were great. [game related mumbling] So that's my sort of breakdown of Warhammer 40k, but I love the lore. Big fan of it. I obviously am not a grimdark kind of guy, so the tone is not my favorite. But I feel like it's so bombastic and over the top with everything that it gets away with it, it's not as serious as everyone in the universe is. Because it's all kind of inherently- a little ridiculous. Which I like. Big fan of that. I'm a big fan of Jojo's Bizarre Adventures, so there is no such thing as too over the top.

Questioner

Are there banks and interest rates in Cradle?

Will Wight

Yes, there are! There is a banking system and a financial system in most major empires, especially those that are backed by Monarchs or other factions. So yes, they are established.

Questioner

I would assume that would be Yerin, in terms of the food thing.

Will Wight

Actually not, weirdly enough. Yerin likes food. She has strong food preferences. In the scene where he and Yerin are at the restaurant [game mumbling] she enjoyed trying the foods more than he did. So that's a fun fact about Cradle characters.

Questioner

Why aren’t Monarchs more liberal with their ability to bring back the dead? Is it a specific skill of Northstrider, too much of a resource drain, or was there something special about the Uncrowned King Tournament to give all the fighters infinite lives?

Will Wight

It is the sort of thing where... if you're not Suriel, you can't reverse time for an entire Iteration. You can't just effortlessly bring people back to life. It is something you can do if you're right there, if you have authority over them, and if they're not that powerful. So, the more powerful somebody is, the more authority it would take to bring them back. [clearing 20 squares in stardew] 

So that's the reason why they don't constantly bring everybody back from the dead. It is impossible to do if it's been too long. One of the issues with that is- we have really seen like Suriel-scale resurrection but not most lower-scale resurrection, and then we've seen what Northstrider did at the Uncrowned King tournament. Well, what he did at the Uncrowned King tournament was a lot easier than just bringing some random person back from the dead. For one thing, relative to him they're not that powerful. For another thing, he is given- lent special authority over this event by the rest of the Monarchs. And, for another thing, he sets that rule at the beginning, and then he's always right there.

So all of that makes it a little easier to do, so it was pretty simple for him to [bap bap bap] resurrect everybody, relatively speaking. Now, Suriel can do almost whatever she wants, so that's- relative to the Monarchs.

Questioner

Could you talk about your personal journey as a writer and an author?

Will Wight

Well, there's so many ways to respond to that, it's hard to do.  And also, I feel like I talk about that a lot.  Most of my interviews and panels generally tend to be things where I talk about my journey as a writer and an author.  So, I'm trying to think of something I can say that I haven't already covered to death.  One of the things I say most often, is it has just been a lot of fun.  It has been a neat adventure over the last eight and a half years, being a writer, being an author.  I've always wanted to write; I've really loved telling stories my whole life.  Storytelling, I really have a passion for-I just really enjoy it.  It's the kind of thing where I am constantly making up stories, and frankly, I think it's amazing I get to do that full time, and it's very cool.  It's always changing.  It feels like I would have gotten bored of it by now-not telling stories, I never get tired of that-but... (Strawberry Festival! *Vows not to buy anything, buys a mahogany chair.*) So I've just really enjoyed it.  Talking about my journey as a writer, as an author.  It's been really fun and I'm grateful to be on it.  It's just really cool.  And that's one of the things that I try to remember a lot, is it's supposed to be fun.  It's supposed to be fun for me; it's supposed to be fun for you.  It's just something that is supposed to be a good time.  So that's it.  There you go.

Now, I will say that writing is not fun.  Writing stories is great; telling stories is great; having a finished story is great; writing is just hard work.  There are some people who just genuinely enjoy the process of sitting down at a keyboard and writing out words.  I don't understand that, because it is very difficult.   So, it's one of those things.  I enjoy telling a story.  There's aspects of it I enjoy, but 90% of it is just... You gotta do your job.  So, there's that.  But I always enjoy the stories, I enjoy the characters, I enjoy making up ideas, I enjoy making up new ideas.  So there you go.

Questioner

What is Lindon's favorite meal? Why? Do the rest of the team have different favorites as well?

Will Wight

Two things I have cut out from the books., regarding people's meal preferences.  One is that Yerin does not particularly like fish.  Doesn't like seafood, just something she doesn't like.  One thing I did include in the books; she gets a little weirded out by creepy crawlies.  Not enough to shut her down.  She knows she has to fight monsters.  Just doesn't like bugs.  So foods that resemble bugs, she also tends to not like.  So that's Yerin's preferences.  In terms of Lindon's preferences, for things that I cut out from the books, is that he doesn't usually pay attention to the flavor of food very much.  He is not a food guy.  He is someone who is passionate food.  He is someone who is "Yes, I eat to fuel my body up optimally."  Now, that doesn't mean he doesn't enjoy trying things.  That doesn't mean he doesn't get pleasure out of a well-made meal, it's just not one of his passions.

Questioner

Are there different zones of the Way that are unknown to the Judges or the Vroshir factions?

Will Wight

Yes, as a matter of fact. Absolutely. It is something that the Judges have theorized; that what they call the Way is actually one branch of the Way. Because as far as they can tell, the Way is infinite, but it gets thin enough that it can't support travel or existence anymore so they can't explore its depths.

But it is strongly theorized by the Judges. They believe that there are, and in fact, there are. There are parallel versions of the Way that they are not aware of. So, there are sort of other parallel universes.

Questioner

What would the emperor from Asylum be ranked comparatively in Cradle?

Will Wight

This is one of those questions that I’ve been asked before and it's hard to answer because relative to his world he’s a monarch, obviously. He's a global spanning superpower that manipulates reality directly. But relative to Cradle, all monarchs in Cradle have specifically designed combat powers and he doesn't. So, he would be much better at fighting on a conceptual level or creating artifacts - stuff that his magic system is better at - but in a straight-up fight, anybody from Cradle would annihilate him. 

 

It's kind of like - is this person stronger than Goku? I mean... no, that’s what Goku's good at, it's the one thing he does - So that's the difference between Cradle and... virtually anywhere else. So, it's hard to say but in terms of his authority and his control over reality and his ability to manipulate things, I would still say he is monarch-level or close to it.

Questioner

Would he be especially effective against a herald because of his intent? 

Will Wight

Yeah, if you ever got into a direct Will-to-Willpower confrontation with him he would be able to crush pretty much anybody - monarchs, probably not, monarchs would be on the level with him - but your average herald or a sage for sure. Again, presumably. It's a case-by-case basis

Questioner

Was the Sword Sage considered an unaffiliated Sacred Artist or did he have an alliance/alligence to a monarch like Frozen Blade with the Akuras?

Will Wight

Yes. The sword sage was considered an unaffiliated sacred artist and as such he would be loosely...but not really... considered protected by Northstrider, thats sort of Northstriders thing.

Questioner

Thoughts on the upcoming Wheel of Time TV show?

Will Wight

Well as I.... 

My siblings both started Both started laughing because I have strong opinions 'cause I love wheel of time and I tweeted this week about the line that Moiraine has in the trailer that it's, she's looking for someone and it's one of the five of you and the five of you being, 

Perrin Mat Rand Egwene and Nynaeve. Well the one thing that we know about the person she's looking for is that it is a man, so it should have been one of the three of you, which is what indeed it is in the books. 

So what I'm hoping is that they are, they're clearly playing it so that you, the viewer doesn't know who the main character is, so hopefully this is an Aes Sedai sort of thing, Aes Sedai like Moiraine are the sorceresses of the setting and they are known for lying without technically lying? 

So hopefully what she has said is something that is technically true. 

It is one of the five of you, and that is something where they're going to be less certain and she has not lied. 

That's what I'm hoping and not that they fundamentally changed the core story of the wheel of time, because if they did that, the fact that it's a man is super relevant. 

To the plotline, because men can't use magic or they go insane, and the savior figure is supposed to be a man who can use magic. 

Who is going to go insane? 

so if they change that I'm going to be, uh... in the struggle zone. 

In terms of my expectations for the series, I have low expectations. 

I always do for any adaptation and it's one of the reasons why I have never been someone who has actively pursued adaptations of my own work, mainly because I just assume all adaptations are bad. 

Will Wight

So I do have a vision of cradle. 

It is the vision that I'm putting in the books. 

I would love for there to be an animated version, especially an anime, would make my life complete, but if I don't get it, Oh well, I know that most adaptations just aren't great. 

And because of that, I've never been enthusiastic about getting my work adapted. 

So that is how I feel about Wheel pf time. 

Do I want the wheel of time to be adapted? 

I don't care. 

Wheel of Time exists in a great format. 

That format being a series of novels, so do I need it to be a TV show no, I don't, but I'm hoping it's really good. 

That would be awesome. 

I would Love for it to be, I thought the adaptation of a Song Ice and fire was great all seven seasons. 

All seven seasons were just fantastic and if it was that quality I would be very impressed. 

How would you feel about a Ruby style adaptation? 

if you're talking about the animation of Ruby? very positively! 

So yeah. 

Sam Wight

How did you feel about Dune will? 

Will Wight

How do I feel about dune? I like Dune a lot, I'm not sure how much I recommend it to other people because it's extremely slow and it doesn't properly end, but for me it was fantastic! I Loved it I was super immersed in it. I really liked Dune as a kid. I thought the Lore was fantastic. 

The worldbuilding was great, the acting was phenomenal. 

The writing was really good. 

The music was some of the coolest I've ever seen in the movie. 

Questioner

Did anyone else notice there's eight seasons of Game of Thrones? 

Will Wight

No there aren't.....

Questioner

You've stated in the past that you include secret bunkers in your settings In the case of an unexpected isekai, where's the one on cradle and what's inside? 

Just in case.

Will Wight

Well, I can't tell you the secret bunker because then if we both got isekai’d there, we would both have access to it. 

I want to also point out that it only responds to my authorization code, so even if you were there, you couldn't open it but, 

I have left secret......but what they're referring to is that what I do is I designed in my setting books for each one of my settings, I design some sort of vault that only I can open in the case that - in the very likely case that I ever did isekai’d - as in “banished” to my own fantasy reality. 

So if some sort of omnipotent dimensional entity makes my setting real and puts me in it, I've already outsmarted them by including secret cheat codes. 

It's like a like a little backdoor cheat. 

So for cradle, because cradle is so big, I have a number of vaults spread around. 

I've got one in Sacred Valley and then I have several under the control of the different monarchs so that if I really needed access to it, I could summon one of the monarchs by being within their territory and saying their name a bunch and then I would have The authorization code to access it and I have all sorts of cheat codes that would help it make it easier to advance and pads that would and iron bodies and stuff that would be easy to acquire and would make my life on cradle easy because I'm not here for an adventure. 

I'm here to stay alive, so that is my answer. 

In elder empire I have vaults in several major cities on file with the consultants guild, so all I would have to do is go into a branch of chapter House of the consultant skill, then tell them my name and they have a file for me. 

So I just want you to know in case you were planning on banishing me to another dimension, that I'm already prepared. 

Case anybody was considering that? 

Unless it's not something I wrote, in which case, I’m screwed 

Questioner

Who are the tide walkers? 

It seems that they're mentioned a lot in this series for us to know a little about them. 

Will Wight

So that goes that goes back to what I was saying earlier. 

Effectively they're just the water sect, you know, but I'm like, yes. 

I mentioned them a lot for us to not , an odd amount. 

But it's like, yeah, I can make him kind of cool and memorable. 

Or I can not. 

And I was Like, yeah, I'll do that even though they're probably not going to play any greater role. 

In the later series, so yeah. 

But the background I did for the Tide Walker sect was I did a background for a war that the coat I clan is primarily a part of in the Blackflame Empire, so the northern border of the Black Flame Empire borders the trackless sea, and that's where the Tide Walker sect comes from and the tide Walker second some of their allied factions are constantly assaulting the northern part of the Black Flame empire, looking to take land and resources from the Kotai effectively, and they have like a big seawall that they're constantly manning.  

That's who they are they're the sect that backs that, but they're bigger and more important than the Black Flame empire is, so that's just one of the many things they're doing.  

So the Black Flame empire, especially the Kotai clan, thinks of them as this malicious collection of fish people and in reality they are a lot more than that. 

They just have a lot of other things going on. 

Questioner

Who is your favourite cut character?

Will Wight

I included all the characters I love the most. 

That's yeah. 

Probably just Lazar, the Arelius family's refiner. 

I liked him. 

He was kind of fun. 

He ended up kind of being a mix of a few different characters. 

Or rather, they end up being him, but I liked him, he was funny. 

He was neat, He was visually distinct. 

I was a big fan of his.

There really wasn't any place for him though 'cause I didn't get detailed into refining. 

Questioner

Any lesser known book series you can recommend?

Will Wight

That's one of the reasons I don't recommend things a lot. 

I don't have a lot of lesser known recommendations. 

If I did, I would sing their praises quite a bit. 

See you have you ever read CS Friedman coldfire trilogy? 

Yes, I love the Coldfire trilogy. 

Well, I love a lot of concepts in the Coldfire trilogy, and I love the first book. 

I think the trilogy is still really good, but I love the first book and a lot of the setting concepts Coldfire trilogy. 

I do like it. 

It's been around forever so I don't have a lot of lower, lesser known stuff that I recommend, otherwise I'd recommended a lot. 

Most of the stuff that I universally recommend, not knowing the other person tastes are the stuff everybody knows already. 

It's Brandon Sanderson. 

It's Wheel of Time and stuff you've already read. 

Questioner

Are you something about the Pioneer iteration concept for a series or story? 

Will Wight

One of the ideas I mentioned before that still I think is a really fun idea is the idea of like, a generational ship. a generation ship. So like a colony ship that's going to another Galaxy or another world or something that's multiple generations. 

So it's meant to sail for 10,000 years and it doesn't have any sort of faster than light travel or anything and I think would be fun because you could do things like bloodline powers or different species, you could have elves and dwarves and whatever on this generation ship, and then over the years they could blend into one species which would be I think it would be cool, just a custom sentient species and well, how would this culture look and what would the magic be like and what fragments were used to make this kinda stuff? I just think that’d be fun. 

Questioner

You could use the diamond veins and symbiote veins at the same time. 

What would you do if they could? 

Will Wight

Not really. 

They would have diminishing returns, so you could technically use them at the same time. 

It would be the kind of thing that would probably just be overkill. 

Questioner

How long did it take you to get used to writing Yerin differently after her fusion.

Will Wight

Here's a tangent. 

I obviously did the little Dragon Ball Z fusion joke second ago, but. 

Fusion is one of my favorite concepts to come out of DBZ. 

I just think that's super neat. 

It's a real intuitive thing to do because you like talk about what one character would be like fused with another. 

It's you can come up with names for em, it's just a, it's a fun mechanic and I like the idea of characters being just straight up combined with one another, I think it's really fun and I would love that to be a central mechanic to a magic system. 

Funny thing is not even a central mechanic to DBZ, it's just another power up. 

But man, I just like it. It's fun. 

So one of the concepts I had for a game like system, is that, uh, you know you always have the ones where some guy is reincarnated into the body of an expert.  

Will Wight

Well, the idea I had is that two rivals effectively all but killed themselves and in order to save himself, one of them has the special ability to fuse things together. 

And that's how he got so strong. And he uses that ability to fuse himself his dying self with the dying self of the other guy and they stabilize, but now we're effectively one person. And that's how he inherited extra superpowers. 

But then he of course has an identity crisis, because which of them is he? And they both hated each other so then it's them trying to pick up the shards of their two broken lives that they destroyed and trying to figure out who they are. I thought I'd be really fun and it would allow me to really play with two people’s different power sets and how they combine and I thought would be really fun. 

So anyway, that's a real offshoot of that. 

How long did it take you to get used to writing Yerin after she fuses with Ruby... 

Not too long. I mean, Ruby already has the same mannerisms and it's really just a differing background sort of thing, so. It was, it was not hard. 

There's only a couple of hints of Ruby. I mean, Yerin expresses herself slightly differently. 

There's a few specific scenarios that she doesn't respond to the way she would before. So yeah, but wasn't that hard because again, as I pointed out, even when she was Ruby it was.... 

She spoke almost exactly the same as year and it was just her circumstances and preferences that were different. 

So yeah, and a lot of her references were inherited. 

Questioner

Does or did the Abidan every bother to research esoteric sacred arts? 

Will Wight

Not really. What the Abidan did was they had...again getting into spoiler territory, oh no. 

They had research facilities that they used to investigate the more fundamental nature of madra why certain aspects are on cradle, why things are, how sage works all that kind of stuff and they tracked that back to the function of The Way and that was really how they got off cradle. 

So in that sense, they did but what they were really doing is they were looking into the origin of how sacred arts work and they were looking for other worlds and they were looking for deeper effects. 

They were almost tracking sage authority backwards in a way. 

But did they research strange types of sacred arts? 

I mean, in their quest to do this, sure, but in the sense of are they trying to create new paths nobody ever seen before? 

No, not really. 

Questioner

You can have conceptual strength. 

Can you have conceptual weakness? 

Will Wight

Oh, what a good question. 

Yes you can. 

So that is again is tied to your origin of existence. 

It's one of those things that...... there are a lot of series that do this...I'm trying to think about one in particular. 

I'm sure Fate does something like this, but it's, if you were a character who derived power from your story in life then whatever killed you would have power over you. 

So Balder the Norse God would have some kind of weakness to mistletoe 

Achilles would have a weak heel, you know, that kind of thing. 

So if you've got a famous story weakness, but because it's not exactly your story that defines you in the Abidan universe, It's the origin of your existence. 

It would be, if there was something that was conceptually opposed to you, or that you particularly were against, in your time. 

That would become something that was particularly effective against you and or would become a limitation of your power or would restrict the amount of authority you can use over it, so yes. 

Questioner

How much of your first draft, would you say survives revision? 

Has it changed throughout your career? 

Will Wight

Well it changes from book to book. 

Some books are more intact than others at the end of my first draft at the end of Bloodline, the fight with the wandering Titan at the end was basically: insert boss fight here. 

There really wasn't a whole lot to it, so I knew what needed to happen there. 

I knew it needed to be the different characters combining their powers, but I didn't want to go blow by blow into it in the first draft. 

So then of course I flesh all that out and wrote the whole ending. 

And so in that case, the first draft and the second draft were very different. 

Because one of them had a third act. 

So that's yeah, it just depends on the end of the book, but, 

How much would you say survives the process? most of it. 

My first draft. 

First of all, I'm generally just a kinda guy who wants to release a lot of books, so if you're gonna release a lot of books you don't redraft and redraft and redraft you sort of use the story that’s there. 

But my first draft tends to establish the story I really am going to use. 

And then I go through and flush it out, so usually instead of cutting, I am adding, so usually I write the first draft and then go in and change anything that needs to be changed of course, and then I usually flesh it out, usually just add more, so most of my first draft survives. 

It's just that the language is cleaned up all, so usually there's at least a few page changes per page. 

I mean, that's conservative. 

Questioner

What is your process for creating magic systems?

Will Wight

So there are a few principles and it would be hard to go over them all. 

A lot of them have to do with, I mean Brandon Sanderson, obviously he's talked about creating magic systems and in a very systematized way, a lot, and he's much better to answer that question than I am. 

But how do I do it? there's a few things I start with. One of the things I start with is the general theme. 

So in cradle, one of the things I like the most about Chinese cultivation novels is that the progression system is tied to the plot the world and the characters, so you get more in tune with yourself and with your element and with the world all kind of together at once. So character development and power development and world exploration are all tied together and it's all part of how the world functions, right? Everybody knows how this advancement system works and that's because of that, that's tied into all aspects of culture and how people think all that stuff. 

So I also knew the sort of vibe I was going for. The aesthetic Magic martial arts right? 

So because we're starting there, that's what lent itself to techniques I wanted there to be something tied to the world, that's what led to Aura. 

So I started off with that and then I started off with what I wanted the characters to be able to do. 

Which then of course the question after that is what can the characters not do? and how do they? 

Do it so the funniest thing is when other people have given me their magic systems to look at. 

I find that one of the things people forget to define early on is what the magic systems can do. 

I'm always so surprised by that because that's one of the first things I start with, but they've heard so much about restrictions that they make sure that there's a large list of what magic can't do and what weaknesses it has that they forget to define its strengths and capabilities, and I'm going, well, that's the fun part Dang it! 

Then for a practical perspective, one of the first things I do after I get the theme down and some of the basic tenants is I try to go now I want to picture how it actually works in world so I.... 

*reads chat question* Do you have a can do attitude toward magic? 

That's exactly right. Can do attitude, ladies and gentlemen. 

You try to you try to go OK How exactly does this work? You try to picture yourself in the world. 

How exactly do you learn about it? What does the Learning Center for this magic look like? 

What are you teaching people? What philosophy is behind you? How do people interpret it? 

You try to really put yourself in the shoes of a character interacting with this magic system, and as you do that, you start to figure out practically how it's used, how it's built, how it's made. 

And then as you model that out, you start to realize what you need and what you don't need. 

Will Wight

One of the clearest examples of that I've ever had is as I was fleshing out the traveler system in Travelers Gate, I realized very quickly that if different travelers can't open gates to other territories, then the sure fire method to beat any traveler of another territory is just go open a gate, go in there and wait until they leave. 

So even if you can't like travel travel which most Territories allow that, so you can just go to a different place and they can't follow you so either Gates needed to be really hard to open and slow to open, which they are for some and they're less so for others like Valinhall travelers usually under most circumstances can't open a gate in the middle of combat 'cause it takes like a whole minute. 

Then there has to be a way that other territories can open so that that allowed me to come up with the concept of Gate crawlers, so most territories now have a method by which they can open other territories gates. So after you open a gate then they can be chased back through so that's the, that's the idea. 

Questioner

What's your choice of caffeine?

Will Wight

I like Monster zero Ultra Dang it. 

I wish I could say I started drinking the zero sugar ones for health reasons. 

I do drink them for that reason now, and I say health..... 

It's an energy drink so it's not healthy. 

But for lower sugar reasons, but I actually started out because it was the one monster flavor I liked. 

And it's really good,a nd it happens to be sugar free, so. 

Yep, so I drink. 

Questioner

Have you ever wanted to build a custom language in your books or tried to create one?

Will Wight

Not really... I did as a teenager, I thought it was really cool. 

And obviously Tolkien did it, and who doesn't idolize Tolkien? wrong people. 

But, I don't like it, It's not a...It's not something....

I mean I like linguistics, it's a fun study it's an interesting area and I have a great fascination with words, but.... 

Actually, constructing a functional language is....Absurd, so that's a ridiculous amount of work. 

It has to be very consistent, and it's the kind of thing that even a very simple language would require way more effort than it's worth so I don't do it. 

Questioner

Out of the hundreds of series I've read this is the one I keep rereading. I really gotta ask you to give me your ego response here but what do you think you brought to the table that makes this series so special. 

Will Wight

Someone said recently they were talking about “So will you know you're really talented at this? What makes you talented?” 

And I said, you know, it's funny that you asked me that question. 

I hate answering, even listening to that question makes me cringe. 

It's it just sounds so.... ick, and this is the kind of thing that's like, what do you think makes your makes your series so special....I don't know, man, you tell me.... 

I don't want to... it's Travis Baldree the real answer. 

That's it, the series wasn't special until Travis and it won't be special after Travis. 

There is nothing but Travis. 

There is only Travis. 

So, that is, that's a very hard question for me to answer. 

I can say, I think what resonates with readers that I like is I'm in this to design something fun. 

I want to design something fun. 

I want to have fun with it. 

I wanted to entertain you. 

That's all I want to do. 

I don't have anything about...It's not about creating a world that works on its own, it's about creating world that's fun. 

It's not about advancing some point that I want to make. 

It is about creating a world this fun. 

So I just want to entertain you. 

I want you to have fun and I think people will respond to that.