Chapter 39: Answering Reader

Answering reader “8Yun-Zi”’s questions about the current plot of this novel…

This morning, I saw the long review written late at night by Senior 8Yun-Zi in the comment section; I read it several times carefully and felt deeply moved and inspired by how thoughtfully it was written.

Since this is the first long review the novel has received in its 18-day solo run, I feel it necessary to write a standalone reply.

The main issue Senior raised is that the protagonist’s personality doesn’t seem like that of an adult, and his actions feel overly naive.

The author is fully aware of this problem, but various factors have led to the current situation.

1. The primary reason is the author’s insufficient writing skill.

Voldemort (Quirrell) is a very cunning man; being deep in enemy territory, he must be cautious in every move. When depicting him, his cunning should be portrayed with sophistication—at the very least, he shouldn’t so obviously act like a villain. But due to the author’s limited skill, the only option left was to fall back on the most clichéd, stereotypical villain archetype.

2. The author is writing a novel for the first time and lacks experience.

This shows in the weak motivation given to the protagonist for seeking out Quirrell. Readers know the plot’s direction, so they feel no urgency—but the protagonist doesn’t. The author also failed to deeply portray the protagonist’s inner thoughts. Since this novel has no system, there’s no way to simply and crudely assign tasks to force the protagonist into action; instead, the motivation for every action must be clearly written. The author has not yet done this well, making the protagonist’s behavior appear overly naive and jarringly disconnected.

This also shows in the author’s failure to fully convey to readers the information and theories the protagonist possesses. Because the protagonist doesn’t know the plot, he currently believes the greatest threat comes from outside, so he doesn’t suspect Quirrell’s villainous behavior. This is information the author failed to deliver to readers—I will take time to revise earlier chapters.

The same applies to the Thunderbird’s eye plot: after its appearance, the protagonist forgot to consider how to handle or use the Thunderbird’s eye—for example, whether to inform Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall for joint study. Of course, he wouldn’t tell them, because he couldn’t explain the origin of such a large volume of precise ancient magical script, and besides, this is the protagonist’s unique advantage. Quirrell only saw part of the protagonist’s recorded ancient script, and he treats the ancient script as bait to lure the protagonist, so he won’t suspect him yet. This plotline will also be revised to make the protagonist’s behavioral logic more coherent.

Finally, let me explain the author’s current thoughts.

The author has always been reluctant to let the protagonist’s power grow too quickly, so I’ve deliberately restrained his strength progression, believing that first year should be about laying foundations—clarifying the underlying logic of the protagonist’s power, not merely upgrading him from Level 1 to Level 10.

But now it’s clear this approach has failed: the novel’s pacing is too slow, and the protagonist’s weakness and ignorance of the plot limit his impact on events, reducing reader anticipation.

Although the author writes out of love, everyone wants better results. To increase reader anticipation, I’ve scrapped my original outline and begun intensifying Quirrell’s storyline, because I believe the dramatic tension between an ignorant novice and a Dark Lord will generate compelling moments and build anticipation. But looking back now, the transition was indeed jarring…

For the first time, I feel my own characters are rebelling against me…

Coding is my main job; writing novels is my side project—but they are vastly different.

Code is frozen text; novels are text with tension.

A line of code, if you tell it to return zero, it will return zero.

But a character in a book, no matter what you tell him to do, he might not obey…

Just as I can’t make Allen instantly learn Expelliarmus, Wingardium Leviosa, or the Disillusionment Charm.

Because every action a character takes must follow some logic…

Some readers might say, “You’re the author—you’re the god of this book!” But I say even gods must follow logic!

Once again, thank you, Senior 8Yun-Zi, for your review. I also welcome more readers to share their opinions—my temper is good, and I will carefully read and learn from every single comment; each one becomes nourishment for my growth and progress!

Thank you, readers, for making it this far. No more words—I’m going back to typing.