Hello.
I'd like to start, before I get overly dramatic and personal about it, by simply thanking you, reading this, whoever you are, for, hopefully, getting to this point after having read the rest of Ultimatum. Truly it means the world to me to have even a small handful of people have read my story from start to finish and gotten to this point where I can address you personally. It's been a long, challenging road getting to this point, and I cannot express enough gratitude to the readers here on Royal Road who have encouraged me, silently or otherwise with a follow and favorite, a rating or a review, to actually finish this story. I wrote this for me, and always have, but if it wasn't for the engagement and encouragement of readers like you, I fear that this work would have taken me much longer. I thank you for the push!
As some of you who may have interacted with me more directly over Discord or seen some of my forum posts may or may not know, Ultimatum took me a very, very long time to write. Seventeen years, in fact. I started it when I was 13 and now I'm about to be 31 before I know it, and after all this time, the story I envisioned so long ago is finished. True, it no longer resembles that story I came up with as a teenager beyond a cursory base level, but, at its cure, it is still very much the same story. It's just that the changes made to it have been a result of my aging, learning, changing and tweaking bits and pieces as I go along.
You may be wondering why it took so long to write this, and some of you reading this may already know. At least in part. But for those who don't, this version of Ultimatum is actually the fourth draft of the story. The first and second drafts, those I started writing as a teenager, were lost when 2 separate computers of mine blue screened. What some of you who know this may not know is that I actually lost more than just Ultimatum in those blue screens. When I was younger, I was a more prolific writer who had stories started in many genres with a plethora of characters and tales I wanted to tell based on numerous ideas I had at the time! When the first computer blue screened, I lost all of them. Ultimatum was the story I most cared about though as I was the furthest in that, so I started its second draft on a laptop I got at 16. Then when that died on me, I was very, deeply depressed about all things writing, and didn't write a word for 5 years.
Despite the hiatus, Ultimatum was never that far from my mind. I'd think about it, even if I wasn't actively writing in it, get ideas, and let them germinate. As I was finishing high school at the time, I also had advanced English and literary lessons that I could draw on to help improve as a writer, and after school, I continued to self educate via a rather beneficial and plentiful amount of youtube channels and videos about various subjects of writing and story craft. The major benefit of having spent so long working on a single story is hindsight, and I can say this much with absolute certainty at this point: I am not an especially talented writer.
It's not that writing as an art form doesn't come naturally to me. It's just that I look around and do research and read all of these works by other authors of considerable acclaim who I aspire to be like one day and see the way they use words to convey ideas and meaning and, looking back at my own 17 year journey getting to this point, I realize that have... rarely achieved the level of artistic prose that I would like. In many ways I'm unsatisfied with what I wrote and want to improve it. But who doesn't empathize with this beyond those rare talents who just get it right on the first or second try? I'm certainly not one of those. What I am, though, is a writer who has put in the work into his craft. I've done the research. I've applied the knowledge I could to the best of my ability. And I am most certainly a better, stronger writer than I was when I started at 13.
And as time went on, I reframed my losses as an opportunity. Aspects of Ultimatum, that is Ultimatum that I have posted here on Royal Road, were not originally part of its story but were, instead, incorporated from ideas I had from previous stories that were lost on that first computer. Rather than entirely letting them go, I took those lost bits of ideas and folded them into the framework of Ultimatum. And in the process? It became a better story.
The story of making Ultimatum is one of inches that stretch out into miles. When I started writing the third draft after my 5 year hiatus, I took it slow. I planned ahead rather than writing everything on the fly as I did in the first and second drafts. I took aspects of what I had and fused them with new ideas I came up with along the way. I planted seeds that I hoped would bloom into plot relevant points of discussion further into the book, and when I got a new idea, I'd pause, think about how to incorporate it, and rewrite as necessary to make sure that it made sense. I applied the lessons I learned from my schooling and my personal studies. I took my time. I chiseled the story out of marble that was depression, set backs, losses, time management, and things in life getting in the way of my work. Whether that was finding a job, moving to a new place to live, forming relationships, losing those relationships, grappling with bills and buying cars and taxes. In the time it took me to write Ultimatum, I've been homeless. I've been as far west as Washington state and as far south as the Gulf of Mexico. I've lived with friends. I've lived with family. I've lived by myself. I've had multiple jobs. I've tried being an entrepreneur in a field I was knowledgeable about. And in all that time, all those events, whether consciously or subconsciously, actively or passively, typing out words in a document or writing a quick note on a scrap of paper in my car, I worked on Ultimatum.
Now, it's finished. Well. The story is written, anyways. As of me writing this, there are still PLENTY of edits that I need to make. Many of which were pointed out in suggestions in the comments of these chapters, some which were told to me directly, and others where I myself know where the story needs to be improved. It's not finished, per say, ready for publication, but it is written, in full, for the first time ever. And I couldn't have done this as quickly as I did without, in part, you, reading this now.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
When I started posting my work on Royal Road, I was once again in a bad place in life. Depression was high, prospects were low, and I was just trying to get by with my sanity in tack. And for the first time, I decided to try and find somewhere online for people who write books and share them with others. I couldn't tell you why I didn't think of it before. I suppose I always simply envisioned myself purely as a traditional published author, who would send a copy of a manuscript into a publishing company and wait to hear back from them if they wanted the rights to put it to print or not. Sharing it online... simply never occurred to me, partially because, like many of you I'm sure, no one who I tried to share my work with in reality seemed to want to read it. Oh, some people said they would read it, and may have even read the first chapter. But beyond that? I received little to no feedback from those around me. They simply seemed not to care. So, part of me, perhaps, thought that would extend to anyone I tried to share it with, anywhere. Typical depressive discouragement, I suppose. But, in that place in my life, post COVID, trying to survive, writing was one of my only solaces.
So, I decided, why not? If even one person gave me some feedback, I'd appreciate it, and maybe getting eyes on my work would motivate me to write more.
So I shared what I had. 7 chapters at the time. And then I continued to write, while also posting on the forums.
It started slowly, but, I did start to get some feedback from others. A comment here, a reply to my post there. Positive feedback that came in semiregularly for the first time really ever. It wasn't much, but it kept me going. Little drinks of water after spending years in a desert. It was... unbelievably refreshing.
Eventually, I got into the groove of writing regularly again. Thinking more about the story, the plot, how it all fell together, and ideas and plans I had had in my head fell into place rapidly as the words finally left me and went onto the page. Once I got started and had some motivation beyond just my own personal want to finish what I had started (the ever addicting dopamine of positive feedback! What a wonder drug!), it was easy. And before I knew it, I was... done.
Now here I am, at the journey's end... except it's not the end. Not really. Ultimatum may be finished, but the story itself is far form over. From the beginning, all the way back when I was 13, I knew there were going to be more than one book in this story, and now that the first has been finished, I see that the finish line is really just the first lap on the track. And after spending a year and a half getting to this point from where I was, I feel in shape and ready to run some more! The next book, Exodus, will be begun to be written shortly! But first, I have to edit and finalize Ultimatum, of course.
And I'm only here because of you. At the time of my writing this, my story only has 24 followers and 11 people who favorited it. Paltry numbers compared to some of the behemoths here on Royal Road. I've never been on the Rising Stars list and my story's overall rank is somewhere in the high twenty thousands. I am not a big name here on Royal Road, and may never be (although, I suspect part of my issue is simply one of formatting, but that's hardly the point of this so I shall say no more of it!) Yet, despite this, when I look at my follower and favorite numbers, I try to imagine myself in a room with those 24 people, those 11 people, and I realize that that's a pretty full room! Sure, it's not even enough to fill up a small library for a book signing, but that's 24 people, 11 people, who have wanted to see where my story was going from start to finish, despite how unpolished it is. 24, 11 people, who believe in the potential of my work. And I am a certified idiot when it comes to promotion! My chapters are enormous by Royal Road standards, I have absolutely no clue how to advertise my work and what to focus on in order to effectively advertise the story I'm trying to tell, and just look at the cover and title! I'm not an author who is telling your typical LitRPG, Cultivation, Harem Progression Power Fantasy like seems to be so popular on this website, the very foundational building blocks of its existence!
And even still. 24 people, 11 people, made it this far with me. Hopefully from start to finish. Hopefully despite the lackluster quality of my work. Hopefully because they believe that I can do better, that my work deserves better, that they, too, want to see where the story of William and Mr. Wink and the brothers Ganymede, Mordred, and Bayamon end up and the mysteries I have alluded to and hinted at and they want to see the larger picture that still as of yet exists solely in my head!
I simply cannot express enough how much it means to me to have 24, 11 people have come this far. And even if this is as far as some of them go, it's meant the world to me that they helped get me here, even though most of them are simply a number on a screen, who didn't comment, who haven't rated. Sure, some of them have been more vocal than others and have interacted with me directly and talked about my work, and to them I have nothing but endless gratitude as well, but even the silent numbers... I can't say enough how much they mean to me.
If you are one of these numbers, or if you are not, and you have come this far to read this, thank you. Truly, sincerely, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for reading my story. The only thing I ask of you in return, although some of you have done so much more, is that, if you have gotten to this point where you are reading this Afterward, please consider rating or reviewing my work so that others can see it. It doesn't have to be a rave review. You can be as brutally honest as you like. The brutality helps me improve! And I want to get better. But if you have made it this far and have not yet rated or left a review, I ask you kindly to do so, so that I can get some measure of your thoughts and feelings of my story, I can reflect on them, and I can do better in the future going forward as I make my edits to Ultimatum and as I move on to write the sequel Exodus. If you wish to do more to support me, consider joining my Patreon, Maleperduis, which is linked on this page. As of now, it is still free to join, and as I said back in chapter 19, it is still free to join. I'm sure I'll think of some ways to monetize my story so that especially generous souls who want to share their hard earned money to make sure that I am supported by my writing can do so, but as of now I'm still unsure what paid tiers would look like and how much they cost. The major benefit to joining is that you will have access to chapters 24 hours before I post them here on Royal Road! So, if you like my story and want to read it before anyone else, Patreon is where you can do so.
Once again, I want to thank you all for getting here and to helping me get here. I've finished one lap around the track, and there are at least 6 more than I plan on doing. Shall we see how far I'll go together?
