Chapter 1 A Year-End Chat

Unknowingly, another New Year is approaching. The editor suggested that since I've been burying my head in writing for another year, it would be best to write something and communicate with the readers at the end of the year—I thought about it and felt he was right.

Actually, I'm not very good at writing these "chat chapters." Those familiar with me should know that I can bury myself in writing, but it's too difficult for me to write such a serious "communication letter." After all, my completion感言 (ganxiang, concluding remarks) is only one sentence—even these hundred or so words have taken me half an hour, so please bear with me if there's anything incoherent later on.

Since I first started writing in 2010, I've written four full-length novels in more than ten years, and now I've achieved some success. I'm very lucky to have finally realized my childhood dream: to be a writer, to write stories I like, and at the same time, have many people like the stories I write. The realization of this dream is because so many readers are willing to walk with me, read my stories, and like my little imagination—life is long, and it's difficult to find a few like-minded people on such a long road, even if they are temporarily like-minded or like-minded in a specific field. Fortunately, I have been very successful in this matter.

I'm really happy that so many people are willing to read my stories, and I'm also honored that my stories can bring happiness to so many people—happiness is one of the most precious things in life, and I'm so glad I've made it happen.

*Deep Sea Embers* is my most successful of the four long novels so far. To be honest, this result is a bit beyond my imagination—I tried some new things in this book, and wrote a lot of content that I had been conceiving in my mind, but only had the opportunity to add to this book (such as the xie men (heretical sect) elements in the grotesque route, such as creating a protagonist camp with all members as bosses from the perspective of the enemy). I am very happy to see that so many people like these things—it seems that it was indeed the right decision to set the direction of "boss-level protagonists forming a xie men gang in a bizarre world."

However, some readers who are following the updates should have noticed that the main story of *Deep Sea Embers* has actually reached its later stages recently—although there is still some distance from the end, it is indeed time to wrap it up.

Old readers who are used to my first three long novels may feel a little surprised. After all, according to my previous length, a book would take three or four years to write, starting with five or six million words. The current length of *Deep Sea Embers*, with more than two million words, seems too short compared to *Xi Ling*, *Abnormal*, and *Dawn*.

The reason for choosing to start wrapping up at this moment is partly because writing long novels is really tiring, and my energy is indeed not as good as it was ten years ago. It is impossible to keep gnawing on long novels forever—this will inevitably affect the quality of the writing. On the other hand, it is because this is the length that was planned from the beginning of *Deep Sea Embers*—after writing three long novels in a row, I want to try a new plot structure and length control to see if I can still write a good story in a shorter length.

If I can, then I will have the opportunity to construct more worlds before I retire—after all, no matter how many ideas I have, I am afraid that life is too short. If I really follow the speed of one book every four years in the past, then how many ideas will be buried in regret...