Sendicard

Notice of Vacation (June 1st to June 15th)

I've noticed in recent times that most of my work on this story has become obligation. It's about finishing it, not writing it, and not abandoning something so many people love.
There was a time when I drastically loved this story, and in my heart I think it deserves that Sendi, not the current one.

While editing Chapter 131 or 132 (huge changes in those by the way I'll be doing an early changelog after I get 133 up) I saw Sakura reference that she can either join the political game...

Chapter 152 - Arc 10 - Living For Others

Yet another chapter that was hard. I've found it's hard to write for this story recently, which is causing the side stories to fall further behind.

I'm feeling more motivated than ever but not for this story which is very awkward. Thing is, and I realized this while making a sandwich earlier. I haven't taken a vacation from the story in like half a year. I've only taken three period since the story started, and I'm supposed to be doing one every arc.

So, before I start soul sear...

Interest Poll

So I'd like to start doing a little more with the Patreon. I know "patron numbers are going down" is an odd time to start caring more but I think emotional capacity wise, I'm in a much better place than I was before. Creativity still waxes and wanes but from a pure "I'm okay" idea, I'm here.

And with that, I'd like to involve the people supporting me a little more. I don't just write this for me, I write it for everyone reading and me. I think it's an important distinction. While I ten...

Chapter 151 - Arc 10 - Why Are You Still Here?

This chapter fought the shit out of me, which is a shame because it was pretty important.
A part of it was not knowing exactly what was going into it, which is something I can actually fix. I've been meaning to make a mind-map of this arc like I did the Chunin exam for kind of a while and I think it's finally time. Gonna do that.

Another issue is my fiance and I are going through some changes in how we do things. My entire creative cycle is designed around him so when we fuck shit up...

Chapter delay

Was gonna post this morning and just not bother with the notice but here we are, my beta needs to sleep and I'm still editing it myself.

I can physically force the words on the page but I can't just will it to be good, I need to spend a lot of time and care going over it and even then the best I can do is take every idea I do have to its natural highlight. My soul feels a little stiff, as weird as that sounds, and I needed a little extra time so that I wasn't just dropping slop in your ...

Jiraiya and the Hokage: Pre-Chunin Exam meeting

I chose not to post this right away to avoid an issue and actually completely forgot about it.

Whoops.

This takes place pre-chunin exams, and sheds a little light on the Hokage's position, Jiraiya's, and what exactly is going on there.

---------------------------------------

The Hokage’s not one for games, but that never stops him when his student is in town. Jiraiya of the Sannin, great sage of toads, sealing master galore, no matter how many titles he gathers he wi...

Chapter 150 - Arc 10 - Pre-ordered Hugs

Things are moving along and I am happy. While not the biggest chapter, I no less enjoyed this one a lot. Next week we can get into some more action, and the week after that I think Naruto's back? Some might say "why are you even doing this if they're all just going to win" to which I say, why do you read a comic book? It's about the journey and the developments along the way, not the obvious fact that I'm not killing off half the cast because it'd be funny.

------------------------

Chapter 149 - Arc 10 - The Game: Different Perspective

There's a specific line in here I'm not sure anyone will see the significance of until it comes up later. I'm okay with that.

Sorry this is so late. I actually had it done a while ago but my computer broke and it took a while to get working so... you know how it is.

Thank you for your support.

-----------------------------------------

The dirt beneath her feet is black and scorched and crunches beneath her feet. It doesn’t look like dirt, it doesn’t particularly f...

Chapter 148 - Arc 10 - The Game: Live a Little

I liked this one, I think this came out pretty okay.
Beta's mad they have to wait till next week.

Thank you for your support.

-----------------------

Being desensitized to something doesn’t mean you seek it out, it just means you’re used to that thing enough that it doesn’t get a real emotional response from you anymore. It’s finding a normally abnormal thing so normal you just don’t care while others may freak out or even panic over it. A man that walks through...

Doing Right By Her Parents Pt 2, The Spar

So, I've kinda wanted to do something like this for a long time. Sakura's parents have a very unique place in this story but because of how technically early in the train of events we've been I haven't been able to show it at all. Arc 9 is where their eccentricities and complex backstories were really supposed to start being shown/hinted but I ended up never having the time to swap to them, which I'll be changing in the edits.

Nothing in this is actually that important, I can't really ...

Changelog 127-131 (Clocktower)

The Patreon chapters have been edited up to 131, even if 129 is currently what the public has access to, because CH 131 is extremely important and needed very urgent fixing. I always strive to do my best by my supporters and if doing a little extra work early - turning a 3500 chapter into over 6K in this case - can do right by you all, I want to do that.

----------------------

CH 127 - Lots of flavor text added, a lot of text fixed up. Orochimaru references that he knows what's go...

Chapter 147 - Arc 10 - The Game: This Is In Fact, a Death Game

We're finally at 201 guys, sometime in the next week we'll drop below 200, and I'll- do absolutely nothing about it. A big part of figuring out the new schedule was understanding that this story cannot be as much of my income as I want it to be, and I needed to adjust to reality. So we're good to not even look at that number until it drops to like 150, at which point I might have to pull back a little bit. Not a lot. We'll figure it out when it happens. The lowest this story would ever drop t...

Mebuki: Bonding with Haku and Neji

I have wanted to write this one for so freaking long. Holy crap.

Thank you for your support, and please enjoy Sakura sharing the braincell.

---------------------------------------------------------

Mebuki has no regrets moving all these random boys in. Even beyond being the son she’s always wanted, Naruto’s a delight. He’s emotional, available, loves hugs, and does so many chores she finds herself unsure of what to do when she’s not being a ninja. She’s mostly ret...

City Planning with a "Random Dude"

This one takes place waaaaay back, it's been on the poll for like 6 months.
Remember when Sakura was constantly doing city planning research during Arc 3 and to a lesser extent Arc 5? That.

Thank you all for the support, and enjoy the side story!
---------------------------------------

Rubbing her head, Sakura can’t help but groan. Reading books in the library used to be so stress relieving and now she just wants to burn everything and bury her face in the table she’s si...

Sakura Dress Up Game: Hinata

This one was really fun. Aliya recommended it after a comment Hinata made in a recent chapter, and I was just like "yes, I do want to write that, let's put it in the poll."
Then I forgot to put it in the poll and here we are I wrote it anyway. My $10 patrons are my peeps.

I did sneak some lore in here, always do.
Enjoy the cute.

-------------------------------------------------

“Oh, wow!” Konoha doesn’t have sidewalks, but it does have side paths that take you ri...

Chapter 146 - Arc 10 - The Game: Plans Always Seem To Burn

This was a good one. I like this.
That's about it, great time, good start, good mid twist, good ending with Kiba.
Yeah I'm happy. Enjoy.
Thanks for the support.

-------------------------------------------------------

Making dinner has always soothed Haku’s nerves, it’s too bad recently there’s so much nervous energy going through them that it’s not enough. He scoops the rice out and settles it in a bowl, all eight portions. The sauce comes next, as well as a littl...

Village Arrest: Doing Right by Her Parents

I've wanted to do this one for a while, it just hasn't been interesting enough to get all those votes. Either way, I really like this one.

It actually has a part 2 setup at the end, not sure if that'll ever get voted on... Either way, thank you for reading!

-------------------------------------------

Sakura’s not sure how her parents are, and that’s a problem. For starters, she lives with them, secondly, she’s moved several other people to also live with them. With so...

Chapter 145 - Arc 10 - The Game: The Mountain Notification

4400 words or so, big ol chappie.
I am so glad I had this one outlined already. Getting sick really screwed me up, I guess that's the problem with tight schedules.

Really giving the side characters a focal point here. This arc is largely about them, before Arc 11 switches back to a Sakura focus.

------------------------------------------------

“Ugh, do you ever just sit and wait for something bad to happen?” Sakura asks, sitting back in a comfy chair and contemplating...

One day delay again

So last week I posted the chapter for sure I wasn't gonna need to delay. I was sure of it.
I was so sure I went out and boasted.

I then proceeded to get very sick. There was this one day I woke up with a nocturnal spasm (think charlie horse) and I didn't even feel it. I was just like "this is happening I guess."
I was so numb this week my roommie made me a spicy chicken sandwich with spiced sauce and peppers on top and I didn't notice, I was just like "This might be chicken."
...

Side Story Ideas

So currently I'm pretty behind on side stories, and in part that's because I'm struggling to come up with ideas. When I initially made side stories, especially weekly side stories, it was intended as a way for me to show how Sakura got certain skills or explore dumb ideas.
As Side Stories stopped being What Ifs, the dumb ideas kinda got removed.

As it became obvious people aren't all reading the side stories, showing how she got anything but small unimportant skills that won't reall...

Chapter 144 - Arc 10 - The Game: The Item Shop!

Thank you for being patient with me.
As I said in the discord, I do tentatively think this might be the last late chapter for quite some time. I'm mostly caught up on things, and my stress levels are way down.

The beta and I had some fun discussions about this chapter, and we'll be brainstorming a lot this week to come up with items and skills and other stuff to introduce after the timeskip next chapter. I don't see a reason to go through this day for day, I don't think the story w...

Gonna be a day late

I want to get back to warning you all since it's one real update a week now.
Due to being behind on other things and work I sort of forgot. Like I know that sounds crazy but that's what happened.

I've started working at a good rate again after another mental health situation, and things feel good, and I'm catching up to most projects fast. But working my hardest means if I miscalc or get distracted, I suddenly realize I got 8K of comms done and two side stories this week, but forgot...

The Second Festival Date

This one's been done a few days, the Beta had some personal issues to take care of.
This was requested by one of the $10 patrons directly, and did get voted on recently.
I think I did a good job, though I will admit something feels off. I hope everyone enjoys it.

----------------------------------------------------

“No, that’s bad.” Yet another day bored and stuck at home, Sakura finds herself working on her drawing skills, which really means she’s failing horrifical...

Inoichi's Perspective: Confronting Mizuki

So this one's a little odd. I put this on the vote literally like 8 months ago. It was intended to hint at a lot of stuff while giving a little bit of context. Except it's been so long that a lot of what it was intended to do has already been revealed quite directly. Then there's some questionable decisions here, a little bit of development for Inoichi, and while I wouldn't say I'm iffy it's less vivid than when I had initially planned it.

I think it's the consequence of putting these ...

Changelog (122-126)

Significant changes this time. Now that 143 just released here and 126 released publically, it's time to do our 5 chapter review.

Ch 122 - Mostly flavor text, but I did add in a reference to Sakura thinking about a clone based explosive tag contingency plan. That should make things less sudden later.

CH 123 - Changed the flavor text around Ino's thing to be a little more strenuous, changed some flavor text and dialogue to feel a little more natural.

Ch 124 - Fixed up Karin'...

Chapter 143 - Arc 10 - The Game: "They're dumb!", Feeding the Dog

This is actually another example of why the once per week, super chapters are good.
I had a bad week. I've argued with my fiance, I've been way too obsessively drawn into Noita, I've had a lot of work to do. All in all my mental energy has been pretty low, but I was able to take a couple hours out of every day and write this chapter because it was just one chapter.
Then I was able to do the same and edit things, one scene at a time. I changed the order a scene is in to make more sense, ...

Chapter 142 - Arc 10 - The Game: Waking up To The Sun's Warm Grace

This is a little later than I wanted but it was for good reason. I used some of the free time gained by not doing two chapters to give this an extra long look over. Except while I was doing that suddenly everyone in my life needed my attention all at once. It's good to be loved, I guess...

I'll admit I was worried the quality difference wouldn't make up for the loss in content even with the extra words, but I can say with certainty that it's a huge difference. The biggest thing more tim...

Figured it out/Focus shift announcement

So I was writing CH 142 and 143 for Arc 10 and almost immediately realized they felt different. Snappy, cute, fun. I was genuinely blown away by how much better they felt, which of course made me realize how bad Arc 9 felt to write.

To put it simply, Arc 10 is fun, and Arc 9 isn't.
I've been wondering why losing so many Patrons has bothered me so much I can't stop thinking about it. After-all, I don't write this story for profit. It's been a theme the entire time, this story is a hu...

Chapter 141 - Arc 10 - The Game: Finally Understanding What's Going On

(Skip to --- for chapter)
So, people agreed pretty hard that I should just continue. Of 8 voters only 2 said they would like me to redo some stuff, and upon chatting with one of the two on Discord they said they could honestly go either way, and several people told me to just continue without actually voting. I had a couple people contact me to tell me that it's just a bad time financially for them and they will be back, and I think in general the loss of patrons is a mix of financial reas...

Introducting the Dog

(Discord inside joke seen in title)

I had this one a few days ago but I sorta barraged the Beta with a lot of stuff all at once and, well that's sort of on me. They think it looked fine though, just a cute, lighthearted bit about the dog and Sakura and the family.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Sakura waves at Kiba as she enters the Inuzuka compound. She’s come to meet with Tsume and pick up her dog, but by the way the boy is standing near t...