I didn’t get any story writing done, but I was working on a breakdown of the daily progress of Rio and Ellis down the Warrior’s Road. As you might imagine, with Ellis setting the pace, things aren’t going to go quite as briskly as Rio would want. My first run through was allowing for one off-day a week, but this came up almost 400km short of the mark, so I turned those off-days into half-days, which Ellis certainly isn’t going to like. I now have a good 100km surplus, but I still have to account for the assorted bumps along the road. Because I already have a little lead time on RttW, I may spend a little more time sorting things out a bit more. Stay tuned.

You know that I like to let chapters sit a while before I go back over them prior to posting, but I also want to reduce delays to the schedule, so this time I pushed through to the end of Chapter 2 of CoP and went right on to review, prep and post it. I would then go on to write a bit on Chapter 3 to give me a little head-start on next cycle and did some reworking of the outline. I’d like to have all the chapters named and it’s already looking like I need to expand things by a chapter or two. I’m also having to decide if I want things weighted so much toward the final battle or if it’d be better to do something closer to a monster-of-the-week approach to build steam. These are things I intend to work on a bit more before switching over. Stay tuned.

I managed to get through the first section of Chapter 2 of CoP, but I didn’t even get to the second. There were a few things chewing up my time, but I really didn’t have much excuse for not finishing. I’m going to try to finish it tomorrow and go for a same-day release or just shift the release schedule by a day, as I’d really like to get things done relatively on-schedule. Stay tuned.

I made a little progress on Chapter 2 of CoP. Again, not as much as I would’ve liked and, again, for the same reasons. I only have a bit to go in the first segment and the second shouldn’t be too long. Stay tuned.

I made a little progress on Chapter 2 of CoP. Not quite as much as I would’ve liked, but work is keeping me hopping a bit, then I crashed out in the evening. I was doing some of the logistics, so that does contribute a bit. Anyway, I’ll try to make up for lost time. Stay tuned.

I managed to make some nice progress on Chapter 2 of CoP and filled in a bit more of the world map. Meeting my deadline is looking rather feasible at this point, so all that’s left is to make it happen. Stay tuned.

I did some work on Chapter 2 of CoP and fiddled around on the Korushi Calendar a bit, too. I originally planned for Chapter 2 to pick up the next day after the cut to the present in Chapter 1, but I changed my mind when I came up with a better opening to introduce the audience to Ellis. It’ll be interesting introducing the other Protectors from his perspective, so that’ll be this week’s fun. Stay tuned.

I powered my way through Chapter 1 of CoP as promised, and while I was letting it sit before reviewing and posting it, I picked up Colony Flipper and worked on it a bit. I was also doing a fair bit of work in peripheral materials, setting up the educational backgrounds of the younger Protectors.

Because the Kingdom of Murabit is inspired by Morocco, it has a French-style education system with six years primary and six years secondary education (divided into upper and lower halves). While doing their training, Protector Candidates take enough equivalent general education coursework to get their certif (certificat d’études primaires) and satisfy the Kingdom’s compulsory education requirement, but also cover secondary education up to Year 12 so that they can get their baccalauréat, but it’s fairly rare for them to go on to university, which would have to happen after induction into the Protectors proper or if they transfer into the Auxiliary. Three of the younger Candidates–Rio, Kirik and Eiri–were held back so they could be placed in the same class as Ellis (the Child of Promise, who we’ll be properly introduced to in Chapter 2), while the young precog Soren skipped grades to be placed in the same class. While Rio is Ellis’ personal bodyguard, he has three other Protectors in the near vicinity at school and often two or three more maintaining surveillance at more of a distance. Originally I was going to let the character progress in school at a normal rate, but I decided it was more in line with the Protectors’ thinking to have additional coverage in the classroom rather than have the other Protectors distributed in other parts of the school where it would take them longer to respond in the event of an emergency.

Anyway, if I can find the time, I may do a little more work on either CoP or Colony Flipper before switching over to RttW o Monday. Stay tuned.

I devoted most of my available time in the morning to writing on Chapter 1 of CoP and got through the second section. I intended to make my way through the third section in the evening, but I was overcome by a maelstrom of variable consciousness, so no further progress was made. I usually like to let a manuscript sit for at least a day before putting it up, so I’ll either push the update schedule back a day or just try to get the chapter out as I finish it. We’ll see. Stay tuned.

Wednesday was really busy and so I conked out before I could get any writing done, so yesterday I appropriated a little time I probably would’ve otherwise dedicated to grading papers to making headway on Chapter 1 of CoP. I was hoping to get more done in the evening, but that didn’t happen. However, I did do some simulations of the rest of the second section of the chapter, so I should be able to get that done fairly quickly, and I’m thinking of keeping the third section a bit on the short side, so I should be able to meet my deadline. Stay tuned.