Lil' Blue
Lindon and Yerin go to an "educational dream tablet viewing" a.k.a a date.
Tievel
If we ever get a scene or story about those two going on a date, I definitely want it to be Yerin who plans the outing. Because I imagine that would be hilarious.
OrgnlDave
How would Lindon be any less hilarious? he knows nothing about the world or women?
Will Wight
I know I’ve said this a lot, but it bears repeating: the main reason there hasn’t been overt romantic development in Cradle thus far is because it’s hard to find space. Not my unwillingness to write it. There just aren’t many purely character/relational scenes in the whole series. So I need to either make room for those, thus potentially altering the fundamental formula of the series thus far, or find a way to work the same level of relational development into plot scenes. I’m trying the second one, but it’s hard.
OrgnlDave
Actually Will, that's the perfect way to introduce it, Yerin x Lindon kissed between books, but when we get to Underlord, she's pulled back because her blood shadow tried to kill him or something and now she's struggling with it or SOMETHING LIKE THAT totally works it into the plot, see?
Will Wight
I would love to do that, but my challenge is doing more character/relational development in scene. Have to step up.
OrgnlDave
I think that the plot synopses of your novels could use some work.
Will Wight
Re:synopses, I know, I just hate writing them. And the synopses for sequels don’t matter to almost anyone, so it’s hard to take them seriously. Only the first book really matters, and even then apparently not much.
TransEmo
I have to ask Will, does the sword sage have a name? I’ve been assuming it’s Tim until proved otherwise.
Will Wight
He does. It is Tim.
(Not to take us too far back on topic, but just to be clear: the Sword Sage does have a name, it will be used in the series, and it isn’t really Tim. Let your meme-y hopes die.)
It’s Timothy. He didn’t like nicknames.
Puppet Master
Hey Will, Valin short stories!
Will Wight
Will replied with this image.
OrgnlDave
Ooh, would it be really mean to ask what your biggest regrets in the Cradle system are? cough sword sage death cough
Will Wight
It’s not the Sword Sage’s death. My only regret regarding his death was not having Yerin in Book 2 clearly say “BOY THIS WAS SUPER WEIRD YOU GUYS,” just so people would know I didn’t make a mistake
OrgnlDave
I don't know, she doesn't really know what a Sage is capable of even still he doesn't seem like the type that would lecture a young girl on how his body works
Will Wight
Yeah, that’s why it wasn’t in there initially. But it confuses readers, which means I probably should have handled it differently.
Lil' Blue
Why could Yerin read London's Unsouled badge if she never heard of the concept and can't read?
Will Wight
The Unsouled badge has a single symbol from the old language on it, and it's established in Blackflame that Yerin can read and/or recognize some of those symbols, because they're used in cycling manuals.
Lil' Blue
As a followup Will, I'd buy that if Yerin said "Empty?" which is what the character means but she said "Unsouled?" She didn't know what that concept meant and there were definitely none in the Heaven's Glory school. So, did she see other Unsouled and that's how she knew?
Will Wight
She said she’d never heard of that concept before reaching the Valley, not before meeting Lindon.
CaptnThumbs
Do other nations have the knowledge and the resources required to produce Underlords with greater ease than the Blackflame Empire?
Will Wight
Yes, other powers can produce more Underlords than the Blackflame Empire. Not ALL other nations/factions, but some.
Terrible
If Yerin picked up a hobby, what would it be?
Will Wight
Yerin would be into competitive games.
kruppe12
What effect, if any, would an Empty palm or Madra Bullet (eithan's core - breaker) have on a non-madra user? Could it scramble a reader's senses or some such, or would they just look at you funny?
Will Wight
Just look at you funny. If Lindon Empty Palmed Simon, Simon wouldn't even feel it.
The Last Reader
So is their another part the Heaven Earth Purification Wheel(HEPW) because Eithan's explanation for the name sounds slightly off
Will Wight
There is, but I'm not sure what you mean about Eithan's explanation.
Terrible
If a Sage or higher level Sacred Artist world-hopped over to Amalgam and got access to a Territory, could they Incarnate?
Will Wight
Yes.
Terrible
If so, would they be corrupted, or...
Will Wight
Depends on the Sage's powers and their control over them. It's possible that they could remain themselves, but simply draw more deeply on the Territory. They could potentially siphon the entire fragment of a world that formed that Territory, leaving it a powerless husk.
manty65
How do monarchs usually prepare for a fight against a dreadgod or another monarch.
Will Wight
That will absolutely be shown in the series, so I won't comment on it here.
Walter
Why don’t people and things leave remnants in EE and travelers gate? It all seems like a connection to the way, and I’m trying to figure out where the elders play into it all vs the Abidan, but I have been wondering why there’re no remnants
Will Wight
Remnants are a consequence of the Cradle energy system, not a function of the Way, so they're tied to Cradle and are not universal.
Walter
How is Reading advanced? Is it like on Cradle?
Will Wight
Reading isn't trained like the sacred arts because the magic system is a lot harder to quantify than the sacred arts. A madra technique literally starts to crystallize in the practitioner's soul as a binding, so there are measurable and observable effects. Reading is much more difficult to boil down to a tangible process.
Walter
Was the emperor so strong because he had 1500 years to practice or because of the heart?
Will Wight
The Emperor is strong both because he's naturally gifted and because he's had so long to grow and practice.
Walter
Can you improve your reading beyond application of a skill?
Will Wight
Yes, you can improve your Reading.
OrgnlDave
With people being divided over the characters... Which book you choose first is 50/50 In a book that combined the two stories, if you read for a while and it switched POVs to one you liked, you could get into it But you're stuck with a bad taste in your mouth if you didn't like the one you randomly picked and probably won't try the other
Will Wight
Yeah, I’d have no problem believing that, but it doesn’t seem like a ton of people tried one and not the other. I’m not trying to figure out why people didn’t like Elder Empire—because by and large they did, at least in comparison to my other series—but why they didn’t try it in the first place. I have some operating theories, but idk if I’ll ever know.
Puppet Master
I think Calder is shallow and unrelatable.
Will Wight
I learned a lot about characterization in the EE series (and frankly I could stand to carry over more of those lessons to Cradle), and one of the things I learned is that people form very strong personal opinions about the different protagonists. One of the most common complaints against Shera is that she is shallow and unrelatable, because she’s effectively an emotionless superwoman, while Calder is more complex and relatable because he has more relationships. But then there are plenty of people who say the reverse.
It’s caused me to think about relatability and the role of the protagonist differently. Which is cool!
Walter
I also need to know if great elders used to be people, since kelarac talks about when he used to be a merchant.
Will Wight
The Great Elders were never people in the sense that you mean. But there is a human origin to them all.
