End of the paper and leave request
"Anyway, that's the style of the story."
This is the first sentence I would like to offer to readers who have finished reading the first volume.
Although the plot will continue to reverse and change, the tone of this article is basically the same as this volume. Finding hope in despair, finding light in darkness, and the magical girls bringing miracles to this world are the main themes of this book.
Thank you for reading the first volume of "Off-Duty Demon". I am the author of this book, Arc Salt. After two months, we meet again in the main text summary.
Oh, you ask what the after-get off work demon is? This is the abbreviation I came up with for this book, after all, the title "A[LI]CE: Get Off Work, and Become a Magical Girl" is really too long.
I briefly introduced myself in my previous remarks on the launch of the book, so this time I will not talk about myself, but talk about this book.
First, in the first part, let us summarize the first volume: "Blue Delphinium in the Cage".
Let me first talk about the parts of the book that I am most satisfied with.
When I first planned this book, I didn’t think of a complete plot, but rather some scenes that made me feel “Wow, this feels very magical girl-like.” So I worked backwards from these scenes to figure out what the story of the book should be, and eventually came up with an outline for the book.
Two of these scenes are placed in the first volume.
One of them is a middle-aged man running in the dark to save his daughter. Before the battle, he shouted the word "transformation" in an extremely cold and vicissitudes tone, and then turned into a magical girl.
I thought this would be a scene that had a very Kamen Rider feel, but it was used in the theme of magical girls, giving people a sense of misplaced beauty, so I used it without hesitation.
The second scene is in the hall in the dark, where the magical girl fights with her rebellious old teammate while talking nonsense, and then kills her old teammate with tears in her eyes.
This scene must be very familiar to everyone - it was inspired by a classic scene in "Puella Magi Madoka Magica", and in this article, this is the final part of the story between Delphinium and Hongsi, but I did not reproduce the original idea here.
At the beginning, I created the character of Hong Siyu, actually intending to make her a pure traitor who would be liquidated by the protagonist. Even in the initial setting, the culprit of these events in Fangting City was actually this "corrupted old teammate", and there was no such person as Moss.
But as the plot outline became more complete, I gradually discovered a problem - what does this have to do with the three little ones? It couldn't be that they were sleeping at home and the problem was solved by Delphinium, right? In addition, it was also because I was a little soft-hearted: I felt that there was no need for Hong Si and this character to die like this, so I changed the plot.
After the changes were completed, it became what it is now. It was not that the old teammates betrayed him, but that the old teammates were manipulated - the mastermind behind the scenes should be a pure villain and a punching bag, who was beaten up by the protagonist to vent the anger in the readers' and my hearts.
Of course, these are all stories that happened before the book was published.
It is actually very difficult to reproduce the perfect scene in the conception into a book. After actually starting, I found that there were still many shortcomings in the outline. I could only continue while improving it.
My original plan for the first volume was not as complicated as it is now. In my imagination, it was a short process of the protagonist returning - daily life - discovering the mastermind - fighting the boss. But the two words "daily life" in the outline are really the devil. After I spent a lot of effort to perfect this part, the length of the first volume inexplicably became what it is now.
In the original design, I thought of a seemingly super cool rhythm for the first volume: "The main plot is about daily parenting, and the hidden plot is about tracking down the murderer and reasoning." It sounds very idealistic - and it is indeed the case. After I started writing the book, I soon discovered that I couldn't continue writing the reasoning line at all.
Because the plot advancement of the reasoning line is destined to be more informative than the daily line. If I run two lines in parallel, readers who focus on the main line will only feel that the daily drama is rather cumbersome; readers who focus on daily joy will feel that the reasoning line destroys the joyful atmosphere. Regardless of the reader's preference, the reading experience will not be very good.
This contradiction manifested itself in the early stage of the article, around Chapter 30. Before that, I had actually been practicing the principle of dual parallel lines. But after Chapter 30, when Delphinium encountered the pupa-level beast for the first time, I realized: I can’t write like this.
So I decided to make some changes right then and there: I cut out all the dark lines of reasoning and replaced them with periodic major events to push the plot forward.
This is also why the main storyline of this book, starting from the Sparrow War, is so lengthy each time - I have a lot of information that was cut off and piled up in the main storyline, which should have been explained in the reasoning line.
And because writing is just a side job, I really don’t have much time to revise the outline. This is the direct reason why I couldn’t find the feeling for a while after it was put on the shelves, and it did lead to a decline in quality for a period of time. Fortunately, the scenes that served as a source of inspiration for me - the confrontations with my old teammates - did not go wrong, and they ultimately presented a quality that was relatively satisfactory to me.
By the way, because of the tone of the first volume, when I was writing this part of the plot, I actually thought about stupid questions like "If this was a seasonal anime, what kind of theme song would it have?" What's even more stupid is that I found it out. The song I chose is "Shadow Graph", which is also the OP of the TV animation "Bogie Boy". Readers who are interested can go find this song. When listening to it, combined with the scene of Delphinium moving forward in the dark hall of the Strange Policy Bureau, it is probably all my fantasies about this issue.
In short, after this incident, I have truly experienced the consequences of having high expectations but poor skills. The so-called "two-line parallel" was a reckless attempt due to insufficient estimation of my own abilities. I probably won't dare to do this again in the short term.
I can only say thank you all for your unwavering support. Many readers continued to encourage me when I was down, which kept me going. Thank you very much.
So, let’s look back and talk about our future plans.
The planned length of this book is about four volumes, among which the first volume is probably a relatively short one, at least it is definitely shorter than the second volume, so you should understand that the content of the second volume will be relatively richer.
After all, in the first volume, in order to conceal Moss's conspiracy, I was actually restrained in explaining many settings and failed to unfold them thoroughly; so in the second volume, the core part of this book - the magical kingdom will be truly presented to you.
If the text of the first volume still contains certain non-fantasy elements, then starting from the second volume, when the focus of the plot shifts toward the magical kingdom, the concentration of fantasy elements in this book will rise sharply.
Just from what I explained in the epilogue, I have revealed some of the details, but this is not all. New teammates, new old acquaintances, new gem scepters, new claw marks, and a large number of new characters will also make their debut.
There is also a new character who has not been mentioned in the previous article, but I like her very much. This new character will be very important in the subsequent plot and is closely related to the protagonist's choice of the code name "Delphinium". I hope you will like her.
Also, after entering the second volume, because the number of supporting characters will increase significantly, I may then solicit supporting characters from readers in the book review section: that is, the code names and abilities of the righteous or villainous magical girls. I will select the more interesting characters and add them to the text, and I hope that interested readers will participate.
It is not advisable to spoil more content, so I will just mention it briefly. Please stay tuned.
That’s enough of the small talk. I’ve said almost everything that needs to be said. Although I have so much to share with you about this book, I’ve finally managed to hold it back and put all the content into the main text step by step. I hope that you will witness this story with me and enter the second volume of this book: "Cornflowers on the Top of the Tower".
Finally, I have some bad news. I will be taking four days off in the coming week, which will last until the end of this week, and I will start updating again next Monday.
The purpose of taking leave is to adjust my work and rest schedule and to perfect the outline. After finishing this volume, I am so exhausted from my busy work and rest schedule that I really need some time to regroup.
I would like to apologize to all the readers here, but please understand that I also hope to present better quality texts to everyone.
Let us meet again in the conclusion of Volume 2.
[PS1: In the interval between the completion of the first volume and the start of the second volume, the book club will hold a fan submission event to celebrate the completion of the first volume and Lin Xiaolu's birthday. Everyone is welcome to submit fan fiction or fan art. The prize will be a hanging painting of Delphinium. Please pay attention to the activities of the book club for details. 】
[PS2: Credits]
[Because I had been in seclusion for a while writing the book and had not paid any attention to reviews and news about the book, not only did I not interact with the reviews, I also did not even thank the readers who supported the book and gave me rewards. Previously, because of my ostrich mentality, I felt a little embarrassed that I forgot to make up for it. Now that this volume is finished, it seems that I should express my gratitude to the readers. 】
[First, thank you to all the readers who gave me tips: I am deeply touched that you spent extra money on top of your subscription to express your recognition; secondly, thank you to those readers who have been actively speaking in book reviews and even creating fan fiction. You have enlivened the discussion environment, and in-depth posts have become an indispensable part of the reading experience; finally, thank you to all the managers who organized activities in the book review area and managed negative reviews. You have worked hard. 】
[There are also some readers who switched to genuine products from unspeakable channels. I am also very grateful that you chose to pay for my subscription. 】
[Finally, attached is a list of thanks for the rewards, including all the alliance leaders of this book so far and the readers who have rewarded this month. As for the readers who gave me rewards last month or even the month before, I am too lazy to go back to the previous list and count their names one by one. Anyway, please forgive me, thank you, I love you. 】
[Thanks to the leader Platinum Tower, Billy the Corn-Eating Cat, Bolish Cash Box, Stone Walk, Yue Youmeng, Yuying Wuqing, sinmem, Sheogorath, evilvirtuous, Ichijo Ayami, Mo Lingyin, Feiqiu, ICP, Dragon Floating Girl, Book Friend 20190816065554496, Love Warrior Oscar Wilde, Hasegawa Riko, Konjac Warrior, New Count Nishizawa, Abdomsisn, and Vanilla for their support. 】
[Thanks to Cai Xiyuan, Luohe G, Protein Sadness, Boring Day, Wild Darts, Book Friend 150222174457308, Whale Coffin Priest, Yue Xin, This Pitfalls of Romance, Slowly Lazy Fish, Magnetic Field Crazy Man, Desolate Wolf, Cynabal, Starlight Companion, The Belief in the Heart is Your Magic, 3zh_bth, lrsks, Book Friend 20190522234944231, Top of Time and Space 23333333, Book Friend 20220116044921725, Book Friend 20230321222442970, Book Friend 160 514164911252, great style, coffein, book friend 20221230200310688, book friend 20221206024313067, book friend 20220824204355094, book friend 20220910220236188, book friend 20220505064914405, funny guy who eats salted fish, idler reading, book friend 20220321211457804, dead, waiting for He Qing, book friend 20190313160324533, reward from Bolishai’s money box. 】
(End of this chapter)
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