The Infinite Labyrinth started out of writer's block.

I have a main series, Silvergates, and I had mostly book 1 done, but I was already having difficulties with book 2. So I was anticipating being in front of the screen, and... well, writing nothing.

So, I said to myself: "Why not write something else. See how a different story goes. Maybe it will unblock your Chi channels and let you Cultivate to the next author's Core level?" (okay, maybe not the last part).

Silvergates is a plotted series. I started with the themes for the four books I wanted, and I usually write the scaffolding before the story: I write the first chapter, the epilogue, and the key points in the middle, then I write the rest, sometimes in a variable order.

The Infinite Labyrinth is a pantser's series. It's a common term in writing, and alludes to writing "by the seat of one's pants". So, I wrote "The Infinite Labyrinth: Recruit", the companion series to get the base ideas I'd use, I spent a few days fiddling with a spreadsheet to see how I'd go to make the game mechanics (By my estimates, it takes around one century to get to tier 10... for a normal professional, that is), and then I sat, and said, "Okay, now what makes the infinite labyrinth infinite", and there I go... write whatever happens.

The settings I had. I had almost immediately decided to make it an alternate-history fantasy version of Earth vs a Labyrinth. It was a deliberate departure from the Silvergates incarnation of the settings, which has modern 21st century Earth faced with access to an alternate world.

I could also use it to fiddle with terminology and use a more exotic one to set the tone. If you have 21st-century adventurers, they'll go about tanks, classes, stats, and all the kind of stuff. But if you have 19th century people? Tanks aren't due for over a century. Class immediately means a very different thing to them, without fifty years of D&D. Even the word "statistics" is barely 50 years old at that point.

My first - and most important - decision was "when does the labyrinth occur?". I could do it in 1800. The Labyrinth occurs, it is brand new, and everyone's trying to figure things out. But I also wanted to toy with "aetherpunk", making a magical-powered version of steampunk. And if you start on day 1, you don't get to use a horseless carriage, driving at night (across barely defined paths - yikes, the Fullmores drive where I wouldn't), you don't allude to Skyships - I'll have to organize a visit at one point - and you can't have too many deviations from history yet.

So, in the end, it's 1818. It's been 18 years since the Gate opened, there's an entire subculture that has arisen, and the availability of Labyrinth materials (alloys that would shame modern composites, yet can be melted and cast like pig iron, silk-thin cloth that is totally impermeable and tear-resistant, etc) and Aether-drawing power sources (light, heat, motion) have accelerated tremendously the Industrial Revolution. There's a London suburb (Gatepost) that is only accessible to Professionals, but someone in St. James Palace can simply run to there, grab stuff at the First Bank, and be back before noon.

In a normal case, the only way I should expose the reader to the mechanics of the Labyrinth is to have them discovered... but it's been 18 years. Surely all the basics are well known by now. The introductory short story is nice, but it's basically a large infodump, with Amelia O'Mangan explaining to the readers - through the company recruits - all you have to know.

So, a noob party dumped in the Labyrinth without access to manuals and having to figure it out without any help. And there you have: The six.

By the way, the cap to party size is six because of Everquest. The "modern, usual" party size everyone seems to use is five because of World of Warcraft. And the "you don't get flagged" for the next zone is a throwback to my first Plane of Tactics raid where we ended up inviting anyone who wanted to come... and there were only 72 flags to distribute for 90 people present (yes, we zerged? So what? It was a legitimate tactics in EQ).

When I started writing the main story, I had basically the first chapter and two interludes... that you haven't seen yet. When the first chapter was pushed on RR, I had five chapters. That's it. Anything beyond the day one was unwritten and completely unknown. I didn't even know anything about my characters, beyond the barest facts on Jonas and Ira (and by then, Ira was the one with the most developed background in fact).

That's a lie, of course. I might not have had a plan, but I could see that there were two mandatory arcs. Discover the rules (arc 1), get reunited with the main Professional body (arc 2). The first part, I built easily. I just had to make up the missing bits of the game mechanics, get a travelogue, abandon crafting (I toyed with classic MMORPG crafting, but abandoned it quickly - you have cooking, that's it), introduce them to the hard fact that, every time they get a new class, they get a new Adjustment (and yes, they get one for every class, not every tier), rewrite in emergency some stuff when it became obvious it wouldn't work.

Seat of the pants writing, for all to see.

Approaching the second arc, I picked up again the people you saw in the first chapter. Don't introduce characters all the time - reuse existing ones whenever possible - is a good rule for writers. Initially, they were there to produce a major fight and scenery. But they also made a great gateway to the omniscient-point view of the parts of the Labyrinth that our noobish tier two characters can't get to and survive yet. I could have used the Louisa Grey team as rescuers, but

1) They were lower leveled, making the return trip slightly slower

2) They had immediate access to Othary, making contacting the Adapted team too quick: they wouldn't have had time to complete three lairs before being saved

So, Cowen the Knight came back, I fleshed her party, made a special character for the healer (the description of an unseen robed figure without any visible body part was pure fancy for chapter 1 - then I had to figure out what was under the robe) and made her an important secondary character, a kind of temporary mentor figure for the six.

The main decision I had to face when writing the story came to a critical point in chapter 35.

Up until the six get back to Gatepost, the Georgian Earth and the fantasy Labyrinth could remain separate without a hitch. But at that point, there was one very important decisions to make in term of the story. When the Adapted Team faced the Great Gate, it could turn out in various ways.

In one direction, the Gate remains shut. The British empire faces an invasion of the French Hordes with a slowly dwindling supply of power crystals for their navy and skyships, no new materials for repairs. The British presence in the Labyrinth has to become THE One True British Empire, with the single goal of retaking the homeland, while Napoleon and his hordes finish the gobbling of Europe, acquire the naval and skyship know-how, break down the Ottomans, and decide whether or not they'll clash with the Chinese or the Americans first.

It is a very, very different story. The British Professionals are, at that point, behind, due to mismanagement by the defunct Royal Labyrinth Society (who was trying to maximize revenue, not get stronger Professionals). They'd need to push themselves (remember the story blurb), find an alliance with one of the three remaining powers. The Americans, despite the Independence War 50 years ago and the more recent one over Canada, are the obvious ones. China was at war with them when the Gate gets closed. The Zulu probably wouldn't help. No, I'm sure they wouldn't. (yes, spoiler alert: it's the Zulus in Africa. I tried to find a more exotic and secret kingdom in central Africa, but it's close to impossible to get a good background for them. So I had to pick the Zulus when I wrote the discussion at the restaurant and it's natural to deduce from the attacks that you have the Zulu wars early, and with Zulu victories).

In the other direction, the Gate reopens, the flow between the Empire and the Labyrinth restores the previous status-quo. It's less apocalyptic, but it also opens up more narrative opportunities. You can have interesting scenes where the six impact the Earth situation - and there's one person in particular who wants nothing but that, as long as the impact point speaks French - you have a more stable Gatepost - imagine trying to adjust the economy of 4500 people without any other output, and everyone is free to leave the Adapted Team do whatever.

It's just that it's an easy way to deal with the growing crisis, and it's also a resolution without a resolution.

But, eh... you can now use properly Jacques Deschanel, the henchman of the Tyrant of France, as a proper nemesis. Of course not a direct confrontation (he's tier seven after all), but he can try all kind of mischief directed at the British Empire and their secret weapon, the Adapted Team.

Up until chapter 35, I could write the current story either way and change very little. But then I had to decide, and in the end, I went for the easy, classic way. I had a different interlude meant as a closure of the arc, but the one in Versailles (which I wrote just after deciding chapter 35) works as an epilogue.

Now, what's in store for the next part?

Well, it's seat of the pants writing. So I have absolutely no idea what happens next.

Okay, it's a lie. There is, of course, a few plot points that are ready to use. Some you can guess, some that are still behind the scenes:

1) The mysterious Gardener. What are Napoleon and Deschanel talking about? There will be further hints in the main prequel story (see below). But you won't meet Nicolas and Annie Gide, at least for a while. There are a few more things to put in place before you can see them.

2) The door behind the Keeper. Chekov's gun rule applies: if there is a closed door and a raid boss guarding said door, it means something. But what, and how?

3) The Artefact Spheres. They're a bit curious, since... well, there's part of the descriptor missing. No "Provides:".

Spoiler: What it used to mean, but no longer

Actually, I don't know how I'll use them. The original version, which, of course, the adjusted six could read just fine, said things like "Provides: +1 Cautious Monolith Milestone".

Yes, it was a consumable that let you use it to gain a free extra Milestone in ANY Profession. +potentials, +1 skill rank. As long as you have enough level to use it (no Adjustment milestone required or prerequisite for the actual Profession) and you know what it is (so you can mentally 'blindly click on use')

But no longer. I've got a few possibilities, I'll see what I use in the end.

4) The fifth Gate. The Chinese mention they stole the designs or their potential assay from the Africans, the French got the gate perturbators design from them... it looks like the Africans have mastered stuff from the Gate well beyond anyone else. So what are they doing in their little corner of the world?

5) In general the rest of the powers. We've seen the Chinese once, and how they approach the Labyrinth (make a shitton of tier 3 professionals to fuel the wars). We've barely scratched the Americans as well - they're starting to get imperial itches. When you say the United States of America, you meant "all of America until Cape Horn", right? Right.

6) The Adjustment status. Or rather, as I call it myself "cheat mode flag". They got cheat mode enabled by accident... and did the British make a mistake in evacuating the unstable gate reconnecting, or should have they let soldiers be caught by the backlash and thrown into the Labyrinth for more Adjustment Professionals? How does one make about more people with progressive Adjustment? And more importantly... did someone do it already?

7) The elephant in the room... the Gate numbers. This is something that will have to be examined rather quickly because there's really no reason everyone is going to ignore the sequences seen by Babbage and others.

I will probably pick some of these points, but not all.

Or maybe I'll address all of them. At the same time? Who knows.

Now, technically, the story will go on a short hiatus. I've reopened the SIlvergates Book 2 docx file, started to write pages (yes pages, plural. Yay!) and will be focusing, at least for a month, on doing that. I'm trying to get a full draft 1 done by the end of March. Probably not happening, but as much as I can. While I write this, I won't write much of The Infinite Labyrinth.

There's a planned set of five side short stories, each of about sixty to eight pages. It's the story of the Gates opening, the first Professionals, the cultural shocks of the Labyrinth on earth, all that. One per Great Gate:

- The Infinite Labyrinth: Tyrant (How First Consul Napoleon, fresh from a military coup over France, ends up dreaming, not of emulating his idol Alexander the Great but surpassing him. For this, he will need veterans of his campaigns, like Italy, where one Jacques Deschanel ended up wounded)

- The Infinite Labyrinth: Knight (Amanda Cowen, a mere assistant to a major British scientist embarks in a quest to help one Blair Habborlain)

- The Infinite Labyrinth: Dragon (An Imperial Princess dreams to escape the arranged marriage with a Mongol warlord that looms and carve a new China. And if you disagree... she can burn you to a crisp)

- The Infinite Labyrinth: Spirits (The realization that when it comes to Professionals, who you were will only count for one thing. Whether or not you enter. White, Black, mixed-race Lenape, it does not matter in the end)

- The Infinite Labyrinth: Mountain (no synopsis until you see the interlude in which appears Malibongwe Meshindi, God-King of the Zulu, laughing at the failure of the french to use the designs of his Chosen ones)

Note that I will open up a separate fiction for the set of five. Its title will be "The Infinite Labyrinth: Origins", and I am probably starting the publication of the first of the five at the same time as I resume the main Infinite Labyrinth storyline. As they're short stories, they're going to be published in a fast clip - all chapters of each story dumped in a couple of days. And yes, that means I have a good chunk of "Tyrant" scribbled, although as raw notes rather than a structured story. I'll have the one featuring Cowen and Habborlain next at one point (probably where one very specific interlude featuring a solo Habborlain comes out, late arc 3), and having the Dragon one next means I'll need probably more xianxia in my story.

For the next arc, I have one specific mechanic I want to explore, some surprises, a bunch of other stuff I really want to hint at, and more will probably pop up as I write, again, by the seats of my pants. But that's probably for late March. I want 80k words at least in Silvergates 2 before the Six cross the Gilded Gate back into the Labyrinth.

There will be some time skips, almost certainly. Even with Adjustment, levelling takes time. I had three timeskips of short duration in arc 1 (getting the last lairs - since it was obvious that Cowen was arriving to save them - the three weeks they spend getting across the Great Line, and the last zones before Gatepost), but I can't really avoid a few more. As you've seen in the non-story chapter just before, normally tier 5 takes around 4+ years to get to. They'll do it in less than two, but that's still over a year and a half from "now". I'm not sure getting to tier 5 is mandatory for the second arc, but almost certainly so.

See you all in a month or so.