Will of the Immortals and Founders Edition w/Jay Krauss

Welcome And Guest Introduction

Welcome everyone to In Other Worlds, the LitRPG Game Lit and Fantasy podcast. I am your host, Jess, and today we have Jay Krause. Jay, how are you doing?

I'm doing pretty phenomenal, all things considered.

Will Of The Immortals Setup

You have four series out right now. I do. So we're mostly going to cover Will of the Immortals, which is a current series. We will also talk about Mask of the Immortals. And then we will also touch on Founders Edition. But you also have a sci-fi series, which has one book out. So we'll I want to start with Will of the Immortals. So give us just a kind of a quick overview of that book.

So that series mostly follows Leon Yeager, who was a 16th-century German knight who is uh issaked into a world full of magic gods and monsters and forced to figure out how to survive in such an environment. Um it's uh cultivation lit RPG Bray Progression Fantasy. Um got a whole crew now, but it starts with just Leon.

So we'll probably really only touch on book one because I try to keep it moderately spoiler-free. Sometimes there's light spoilers, but for the most part, I try to keep it pretty ambiguous. Uh so why did you choose a 16th-century German knight?

Well, I was watching, or was I reading? I think it was in light novel I was reading. And uh Japanese light novels tend to have protagonists that are kind of uh weak-willed, to put it nicely. Um and I was just getting irritated because everything the MC was doing was stupid. It's like if you just had a backbone, if you just, you know, if you if you treated this like someone who is confident in themselves, you'd be fine. None of this would have happened. I was like, well, I I want I want that story, right? But I want it with someone with confidence to some degree and a backbone. And I was like, well, I could write that, why not? And at the time I was writing backstory for a video game that I'm still working on and will probably never be finished, but you know how it goes. Um, and one thing led to another, and I was like, well, what about like what about like a knight, you know, classic fantasy? But what if I put him in like a almost you know, Eastern inspired fantasy world? And I I love cultivation books, it's pretty much all I used to read. And so here we are.

I know he doesn't spend much time in his current world, which is Earth, uh, before he gets Isakai to his new world. Did you have to do any research on 16th century German Knights, or did you just kind of wing it because it was such a small part of the book?

Um, well, it certainly is nice that it touched a small part. Um, but you know, my wife and I are both in the SCA. We've both both done, you know, some of the historical stuff. And, you know, I wear armor probably more frequently than I ever should. So that part was easy. Um, so I didn't do a ton of research, which I'm sure my reviews will tell you, but uh, you know, I feel like I I can be forgiven for cutting a few corners because it's it's ultimately about the adventure that happens after he leaves Earth. You know, you get a chapter on Earth and then that's about it.

So, how many books do you think are gonna be in this series?

Currently I have the spines for 16.

Fantastic. Who knows? Maybe it'll be more. I mean, you are a panther.

So yeah, I was getting kind of worried the other day, actually. I'm hoping I can get it done in 16 books, but you know, we'll see.

I mean, I would imagine with the spines creating a picture, if more needed to be added, I wonder if it's possible for the artist to just be like, all right, well, I guess I'm just gonna add like another little bit to the end of this.

Yeah, I have talked to Morpheus, the artist, and I said, hey, you know, does this need to happen? And initially we had planned for 12, and so he's already already added four. What's four more? Really?

Yeah.

I mean, in the grand scheme of things, you know.

What's four more?

Just one more book.

We'll just send him a check. It'll be all right.

I know who my favorite character is. I've got two, actually. I have two favorite characters. Uh, who was your favorite character in this story to write?

Why A German Knight Hero

I mean, Leon is very much he's not a self-insert necessarily, because he's a lot of my father. My father's middle name was Leon. Um, so that's where I got the name. But we're we were both we're both relatively stoic people and fairly confident people in some regard, not socially, but otherwise. And so a lot of that is me and my father. So that's fun to write in in some ways, but it's also very self-reflection-y, which is not as fun. Um I probably have the most fun, especially in the first book, with Hannah, who is based on uh one of our one of our closest friends, my wife and my closest friends, Hannah, um, who will be at LitRPGCon this year, by the way. I'm bringing her with me. It's very exciting.

I can't wait.

I I probably enjoy that the most because I get to kind of play them off of each other, which is where a lot of my negative reviews come from. I don't like that, but I love it. I I think that you gotta have that dichotomy. You have to have not only in your characters the dichotomy of sort of complexity, even of you know, humanity, because people, your characters are should be people. They should have a little bit more complexity than I just want to kill stuff. You know, there's more to it, there's gotta be motivation. But then within your your group, and even within just interactions, you should have the ways that people clash or work well together. And in this case, Leon needed Hannah for sure, in a lot of ways.

Yeah. One of the first people that he meets in this world is the farmer and his daughter. And that's when you learn he gets kind of his first quest is to go and rescue this farmer's other daughter, who ends up being Hannah. And yeah, the the relationship between the two of them is so funny to me. I can feel like I feel like I can hear Leon's internal just sigh every time.

He sighs, but he loves her. You know, you can't.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, they they end up becoming very close. So they do. That's did you? I mean, she her and uh Satao are two of my favorite characters. Did you expect? I can only imagine that Hannah is is a fan favorite.

I think you're wearing her merch. She's probably pretty popular now.

Yeah, I I am. I am wearing uh the Hannah merch. Uh, I also have the earrings, which are fantastic. Did you expect her to become such a fan favorite?

I didn't expect her to show up in the book. I like the way I write is very in the moment. I I write character first, world second, because I feel that if your characters suck, it doesn't matter how cool a backdrop you put them in front of, no one's gonna care. Whereas if you have really fun characters, the world can be a little boring if you if it has to be, and readers will still follow along because they like the people they're reading about. And so so many of the very important characters in this series, Hannah and Satal included, were not intended to be anything more than a single scene. Sato was supposed to be just a shopkeeper initially, and now he's he's got his own series. So who knows what's gonna happen, right? Uh but Hannah was gonna be, you know, the first rescue, the first showing Leon sort of saving the princess, but the princess turned it out to be Hannah. So, oops. But as I was writing the character, I realized sort of in their first few interactions who I was basing the character on because it wasn't my initial plan. Um, and then I I messaged her and I was like, hey, so if I put you in this book I'm writing, that'd be cool. She's like, uh duh, I'd be offended if you didn't, because you know it's Hannah. And uh that's all the uh you know agreement I needed. And so here we are, you know, eight books later.

And that sounds very on point for Hannah.

Oh, she's she is being like when you won't meet her at the con, you'll understand she she is a little chaos gremlin, but she is Hannah for sure.

Building Fan Favorites Like Hannah

I'm excited to meet her. Uh maybe I'll have her sign book one.

She I have had her sign a couple of copies um in crayon because it had to happen. And so a couple of lucky people already have uh the twins signed book one of me and Hannah having signed it.

That's hilarious. Yeah, I'm definitely gonna have to have her uh sign the book.

Oh, she'll love that. That's entirely up her alley.

So you have mentioned in past interviews uh that with this not being your first uh series, but um kind of being your first main series, that your writing has improved a lot as you have written the subsequent novels. Uh do you think that there's anything that you would go back and change being this like having this many books out so far and and with how much your writing has improved?

I think that any author would go back and change stuff about book one and their series, especially their first series, because the sci-fi series that we spoke about is certainly not what I would consider my best work. It's my first ever like finished book, and I kind of rushed the ending. Steel Foundations was my first full-length, you know, it's like 515 pages or something. Never thought I could write a 500-page book, but I did it in 18 days. It was a fugue state. But because I wrote it in 18 days, and then me and my wife edited it in two days and tossed it on Amazon. There's plenty that I would I would change, but I won't because it it is what it is, right? That's that's my journey. I'm not gonna go back and try to correct those things. There's plenty of things like the way that Leon speaks evolves throughout the series, in that he loses all of his contractions, he becomes much more formal in a way, which I feel embodies sort of his vibe much better than the first book. There's certain things like that that I would I would would go back and change if I was so inclined, but I don't think that that's the right thing to do.

Well, but also I think that that might be just a good way to explain how he grows and learns in this new world. Like, you know, he came from Earth where our speaking and and the way we do things is so different.

Right.

And he ends up in this new world. So that that growth from you as an author, the way you write the character can also be the growth of the character throughout the story as he grows. And oh, yeah.

And as you get to know him as the writer, I think that's the most important part. I play DD with my characters. I have to know them very well and what makes them tick. So I can just throw stuff at him and then write down what happens. I don't write books, I write incident reports. I throw my characters into a room with somebody and see what happens. And so yeah, you definitely learn your characters over time much better than when you start, obviously, unless you I don't know, plan, but I don't do that. Um and of course, my my biggest cop-out is that you know he's technically speaking German, which is being translated into common, which is being translated into English. So really I'm off the hook.

Yeah.

It's just a mix-up and translation. That's all it is.

Pantsing Chaos And Rubber Ducking

Exactly. Yeah, totally, totally not my fault.

So so being a panther like you are, have you ever uh like written yourself into a corner where you were just like, I have no idea how I'm gonna get myself out of this?

All the time, but more annoying is when my characters write themselves out of a corner. I've had moments where like you've you've played like Skyrim or Oblivion, and yeah, you kill a quest giver, and you get the you know, the threat of fate has been you reload your save or you can't continue kind of thing. But I don't have that. I don't have a scum save. So I've had characters be killed by my characters, and they were supposed to be like in my head, oh, he's gonna send them here to do this. And suddenly that person is dead. I'm not gonna go back because like it happened, you know, it wasn't me, but it happened, and now I gotta figure out how the hell I'm gonna either get them where I thought they were going, or if we're going on just a wild tangent. And normally it's option two. So I'm just as shocked at what happens as you guys are most of the time.

That's wild to me.

It's pretty fun.

That form of writing to me just seems wild, but I think that's because I just don't, you know, I love DD and I love I love role-playing games and I love tabletop games. I love all kinds of gaming. Uh, but I just don't feel like I have the active enough imagination to ever write like that, I don't think.

It is, I don't recommend anyone write the way I write. I mean, volume aside, I don't recommend anyone try to write fully pants. And even so, I've I've as I've gone on, because now I'm balancing multiple series, I do have like, I wouldn't call it a plan. I have notes. Because sometimes I'll have a thought and like, hey, in a couple of books, this needs to happen. And if I don't write that down, it's gone. And so my I have, you know, I have notes, I have what I consider a plan before I start a book, but I never actually go back and read it while I'm writing it, which is makes the whole thing pointless. But you know, I do it because it makes me feel better. Um But yeah, it's uh when I speaking of writing yourself into a corner, because that was the question, and I'm gonna answer that. Um, when that does happen, I go on a drive with my wife, and I I'm I'm a programmer and I will be until next week. But there's a concept in programming of rubber ducking where you literally talk to a rubber duck, right? And you explain your problem.

I'm familiar with that, yeah.

You explain your problem to the rubber duck, and just in explaining it, usually you either get a thread to pull on or you solve it completely. And I rubber duck my wife all the time, and she just sits there and it's like, yeah. Oh, and then sometimes I get completely stuck and she saves me. So, you know, it's a good, it's a good partnership there, you know, because I'll be like, I don't know what to do from here. Look at what these people did to me, you know. And then she's like, Well, why don't we? I'm like, yeah, or and then so we'll go back and forth and we'll find a solution. And you know, that's the only way that I can sort of get the wheels spinning again sometimes because it can be a struggle.

I like that you rubber duck that off your wife.

Yeah, it it really helps. It it does. Plus, you know, business miles, you gotta get those where you can.

With you being such just kind of an extreme panzer, do you know roughly how you want the story to end? And you're just letting them tell it as you get there?

Pretty much. There's a lot going on behind the scenes in my head, especially in regards to the gods and you know how they meddle in everything. So as the reader is sort of watching the slice of life go by in my head, I'm keeping track of what the gods are doing and how it's going to impact them going forward. And so I know how Will of the Immortals ends. In fact, I've basically written the final scene in my head. I have it down, I know how it's gonna end. I know how the Immortals Mask ends because it ends about 20 years before Steel Foundations. And so it is, it starts 2,000 years prior, but in that last book, we're going to show how we get to where we are and how Sato ends up where he is. And anyone who's read that series know he knows he has a long way to go to get to happy go-lucky grandpa. He goes through some stuff, but yeah, I I know how they end, but I don't know how long it's gonna take to get there. And that's sort of what we were talking about, not knowing how many books it's really gonna be. Um, at least 16 at this point. And you know, I feel like 20 books is just too much for most people to even want to read. So I'm worried that I'm gonna end up in that, you know, window where people don't even want to touch it because it's just too long. But I got a story to tell and I'm gonna tell it.

I I don't know, man. There are some series out there that are pushing 30-something books that I read.

Well, apparently my sh my books are really short, so maybe I can I can afford to you know double up.

I wouldn't say your books are very short.

I swear, every time I release a book, I get at least one review that says, loved it, but it was too short, write faster. And I'm like, Well, my brother in Christ, I release eight books plus a year. I don't know what you want from me.

Yeah, you do churn out books like it's nothing. Like you just really churn them books out. But I mean, I guess that's a good thing. That just means they enjoyed it so much that it's they just want to keep it.

Immortals Mask And Satau’s Prequel

I'd rather not hear this book took forever and I hated it. So I mean, we take it, sure.

All right, Immortals Mask then is the next series that you have out. And this is kind of the prequel to Will of the Immortals, but it follows a different character. So you follow Sat Tao, who he is the leader of a guild in Will of the Immortals, but I don't remember which guild it was. I think it's like an alchemy.

He's an alchemist.

So why did you choose Satau to get his own series?

Well, around book five, and actually this it sort of involves what I was talking about. We we went on a drive and I was stuck on something, and we were talking it through, and we realized something that happens in book five, that is rather revealed in book five to be the case, and everything sort of snapped into place, and we're like, wait a minute, that makes total sense. That explains everything. Oops, like those moments of what I live for when I realize that I've written something that even I didn't know connected, and then finally it connects. I'm like, wait a minute, that totally makes sense, and then here we are. And once I realized that what that big reveal was, I realized he had more story to tell for sure. Um and so I wanted I think it was a patron of mine that asked if I was gonna do a prequel on SATAW, and I was like, oh I could try. And then one thing led to another, and I realized it's a much darker series. SATAW is he definitely goes through it. It is it is rough, and the last book was rough to write, but we're sort of coming out of that arc to some degree, so I'm looking forward to starting book five. But that's sort of where we ended with that is we realized that he was more than he seemed, far more than he seemed, and I had more story to tell for him.

To try to be as spoiler light as possible, uh Leon Yeager, he in Will of the In Will of the Immortals, he uh constantly wears his helmet. Like he never takes it off when there are other people around. Uh not even to eat or drink. And it's because he feels that he is disfigured and no one's going to want to see him because of the scars that he has from a fight that he got into when he was younger, which is in the very beginning of the book. So it's not like that's huge major spoilers. Um, but you find out later uh that Setho also has a scar, and you find out why that is significant in the book. I won't say why, but you find out why, which goes a long way, I think, towards helping Leon get over him being uncomfortable with the way he looks.

Absolutely.

And apparently he's a big fox. Apparently, right the ladies, the ladies love him, even with his math helmet on. The ladies love him.

Big guy in armor, you know, what's not to love, right?

Right. So it makes sense that Satau would really have gone through the ringer um in his past.

Yeah, and it actually in book one of the Immortals Mask, you find out where he got his scars from. So we start with that. And uh yeah, uh, I won't spoil any of that. It's it's worth it though. Halfway point through that book is is a doozy, but it's uh it's a good one. I think if you've gotten used to who Satau is in Will of the Immortals, especially if you've gotten past book five, that's usually where I tell people to start on the Immortals Mask, because you sort of have you have a good idea of who he is now. And when you go back to who he was and see where he came from, you will go, how the hell did we get from here to here? Um, but that's my job to tell you, and we're getting there.

That was actually going to be my next question. If you're already reading Well of the Immortals, at what point do you start Immortals Mask? That'd be right after book five, then you could kind of do what I tell people.

I mean, I I've done my best to try to make sure that neither one is required reading for the other, because I don't want to end up in a situation where someone feels like to get the most out of a 20 book series or a 16 book series, you gotta read a 12 book series first because nobody's starting that. Unless they really think they're gonna like it. And even then, probably not.

So I mean, speak for yourself. I've I've started a lot of long series, I've done it too.

But I feel like the majority of people are gonna look at like 30 books and go, you know, no.

Um And it's quite an investment.

So that's normally what I tell people. Um but they sort of enhance each other rather than you know, require they call to each other a lot. You'll see a lot of references where certain things that are not explained explicitly in one are explained explicitly in the other. Yeah, that's sort of the the idea behind that is to to play them at the same time, but not require either one.

So that one is you said ending roughly about 200 years before 20. Will of the immortals.

About 20 years before.

No, about 20 years, and it's 2200.

It's about 2000 before. I'm bad at numbers.

This is why I don't write lit RPG. I'm bad at numbers.

Why I write cultivation, I'm not good at numbers either.

Yes, it starts a long time before Will of the Immortals, and then it's kind of closer.

Right.

That's I'm going with numbers bad. I know they have both have twos in them. So I'm assuming since it's ending roughly 20 years before uh Will of the Immortals, you kind of know how that one's gonna end too.

Oh yeah. I I have the the final scene in that. It's gonna, it's gonna, it's gonna hit. I'm telling you right now, I'm thinking about it. I'm like, oh, it's gonna be so good. But I get the tingles every time. Every time I think about it, I'm like, oh, that's gonna be so good. I better not screw this up.

And we all have to wait so long for it. Oh yes. Although with the with with how fast you write, it might not be that long.

I'm looking at middle of 2028 at the latest in my current release schedule to have them all out.

Wow.

I mean, it could be sooner than that. I should have them, I don't know. I I kind of lost my lead writing Founders Edition, so I I don't know exactly where I'm gonna end up, but I'll have them all finished before then for sure.

Speaking of Founders Edition, that is the next book you have coming out.

Close.

Oh, it's not okay. So you have one you have one's so the Founders Edition is coming out April 17th. Right. So it's in a month, roughly. Give or take a day.

April 2nd is the next release for Wool of the Immortals.

Oh, okay. So not the next one, but close enough.

Certainly the next series coming out. I hope. I don't think I have another one on the back burner at the moment.

So you already have two main series that you're writing, and one that is, I guess, kind of on the back burner right now. If you're gonna continue it, I don't know. You have said in the past that you were going to write the second book. Don't know if that's still a plan.

About privateer.

Yeah.

Well, I we can talk about privateer first. So starting at a downer before we go with an upper. Um my father was one of my biggest supporters in my writing. He always has been. He's a he was a big musician and artist. You know, he's very into the arts. And uh he was diagnosed with cancer shortly. I started the book about a year before he was diagnosed, and we had about six months from diagnosis to him passing. In that six months, I wanted to finish the book, right? I wanted to get a physical book in his hand before he passed. And I managed it. I got it done. It's a short book, it's like 200 and something pages. It's it's tiny. But I finished it, I got to read it to him in the hospital, you know, big moment, you know, all that good stuff, hallmark moment. But since then, I took, after he passed, I took like a year and a half off of writing. I just couldn't, you know, I didn't have it in me. Right?

I didn't feel like you're talking about it.

I mean, that's because that was kind of the wind out of my sails. And I think him sort of influencing or informing the main character, Wool of the Immortals, was what allowed me to get back into it. And I've I've written half of the next book in the Private Cheer series, but I wrote that before I quit, really. I tried, right? And I've walked back a couple of times and tried to sort of pick it back up. And I just, I don't know. Writing is such a such an odd thing. You have to be in the right headspace, you gotta be correct emotionally to be effective, at least the way I write, and I just couldn't, I couldn't do it. So eventually, yes, I will be continuing that series, but it it'll take some time. I have to get sort of I gotta get over some, I gotta get to therapy, I think is what I have to do.

And then uh I mean, I think that's true of everyone, really.

Sure. Everyone should be in therapy. You gotta talk it out.

But it's true of everyone. I did it after my dad passed and it helped. So I think that's true of everyone.

So that that series, you know, that's my first attempt. Um I mean, I mean I wrote stuff, little short stories or started whole books forever. But that was the first one I finished. But I finished it because I had to. And so, you know, that's why it sort of rushed at the end. I got it out. Done, it's not the best, but it's done.

But it served the purpose that it needed to serve.

It did.

Founders Edition And VRMMO Return

Founders edition. Book one. Um I I think I'd read somewhere that the series name is going to be Founders Edition. Uh, book one is Lighting the Forge. I'm actually uh starting that today. Um I've heard some amazing things about it so far. Uh that's gonna be coming out April 17th. Give us kind of a rundown on this one.

Well, the motivation behind this one was that I had to have it, I had to write it. And just sort of, I think it was top of December, I realized that the story that I've been kicking around in my head for like a year prior needed to come out. And I had built myself a couple month lead on my two series, because I've been writing a book a month up until that point. So, you know, what a hundred and something thousand words a month is a lot. But I was like, I've got I'm gonna take December, I'm gonna take December off, and I'm gonna write a book. And that book ended up being almost 200,000 freaking words because that's just how it works, I guess. Um, I want, I miss the old, old school lit RPG in some way. I miss VR MMO. Um, I love like the Titan series or Michael Chatfield series, all the the classic, what I consider the classic lit RPGs, where it's you know getting trapped in a in a VR game kind of thing, almost sword art online kind of deal.

Um that's such a good little sub-genre of lit RPG.

It is, and it's how a lot of them started, especially over in Russia. That was a big thing. And sword art online kind of influenced that, but you know. Um, so I I want to bring that back. I missed that, but no one was writing them anymore because on Reddit, apparently they say it's awful and they won't read them anymore. But I don't care, I'm writing it anyway. And I figured, well, if no one's writing it, I'm gonna write it. Why not? And so the series follows a man who I think we can all relate to, who's been chained to a desk his entire adult life with a job he hates. And I mean, this is the first, the first like three paragraphs. I'm not spoiling anything. Um, he is diagnosed with cancer and has very short time to live. Um in his testing, one of the doctors signs him up for this experimental thing where he can be placed. Well, the doctor doesn't explain anything to him. He gets a call from a company and they're like, hey, are you interested? And he's like, Well, I guess, tell me more. And long story short, he gets sent into a VR MMO, which is virtual reality massively multiplayer online game for people who are gonna ask and I know they will, before the game launches. So he's a a founder of the game. I'm a big gamer, so the the term founders edition, you know, you're gonna open your wallet normally in real life. But in this he's a he's a founder of the game, and he gets in before even the alpha players do. Um and so he he doesn't care about the game, he doesn't care about you know uh being a hero. He just wants to find like a place to put a fire a fire pit up and sit and think, right? Because he's been chained to a desk his entire life, basically. Um, he becomes a miner and we go from there. So it's very crafting, very slice of life, VR MMO. There's combat, of course, because I can't not, but um you know, sort of building a little life for himself in a way that I know a lot of us would love to be able to do.

Put me in a game, let me just have my house and I'll fish and I'll hunt and I'll have a garden and my books, and I'll be good.

Exactly.

But of course I don't need electricity, I can have candles, and I'd be good.

So the first like 800 pages on this book are you know him sort of building this new life, that first book, and then we're gonna start seeing players join, and they will not understand that he's a player, they think he's an NPC, and so he'll have spent you know two years or something leveling by the time the game launches. And so we'll have lots of fun interactions later with like him and these uppity players that think he's just an NPC. I'm really looking forward to that. I'm looking forward to getting back to to book two once I finish Will of the Immortals Nine, because I want to see him just obliterate some some idiot. Um it's gonna feel good.

Yeah, I mean, the opportunity there for fun is just never-ending, I think. Especially if they think he's an NPC. Oh, because you know, people you get those gamers who will talk to an NPC any way they want because they think what are they gonna do?

Well, I see that there's gonna be like two types really. You're gonna have like the role players that will treat him like a normal person, and then you'll have like the the power gamers that just treat him like a set piece, and you'll have a lot of interesting things go on there, and I'm I'm looking forward to it. I really am.

That's gonna be good. So, what made you choose a dwarf? And I'm not complaining, I love dwarves. Give me a dwarf in a book, and I'm in. Like it's one of my it's my favorite race, it's my favorite fantasy race out there. Love dwarves. Why a dwarf?

You know, I don't I don't know that I have a concise answer there. I guess I could spitball and say, you know, he as a as a human, before he goes into the game, he's always been sort of tall and lanky and he hated that about himself. Um, and but of course he's been sickly, and so he's weak and he's tired all the time. And so when given the choice, he he's like, I want to be strong and healthy. Like, I don't care about anything else. I don't want to be so tall, I don't like towering over people. And so that sort of brings him to the race he picks, which again, that's like chapter three, you're fine, uh, of 60 something. Uh, but uh I guess I could say the funny thing and be like, you know, I'm apparently very short and I wanted to embody myself in in the in the book, but you know, I think it's also I'm not actually short, and I want to do the opposite thing because you know, no, not everybody needs to be a super tall. I'm not super tall, but you know, not everyone needs to be super tall and and whatever positive qualities someone might attribute to a main character. You know, sometimes you want to be uh a short dwarf that's got a little bit of a belly and a pickaxe, you know, why not?

I mean, they're my favorite, they're my favorite race. With three series now going on, how are you allocating time to each series? Like, how do you decide which book you're writing next?

Well, up until this point, I've just been switching up between the two. And if I write, you know, Will of the Immortals, and then I write the next Immortals Mask. And it's it's nice because they are very different in tone. So I was able to kind of, you know, palette cleanse between them. And Founder's Edition is again very different from both of them. It's closer to Will of the Immortals than it is the Immortals Mask, but it's also, you know, there's there's stakes, but are there, you know? Like, so I don't know going forward. I mean, I did just quit my job. So my last day is a week from today. I'll have more time. So I guess we'll see. Um, currently planning to kind of juggle what I've got going on. I may not do four full books in the Immortals Mask every year like I was planning to. I may extend that out a little bit. Will of the Immortals, I'm still doing four books a year because you know the public demands it. But I will be trying to put a couple books of you know, founders edition in there. And frankly, if it really takes off, I'll just write more. I don't know. I'll figure it out.

I mean, now that writing is going to be what you do full-time, you could do instead of eight books a year, 16 books a year.

I could. I could, but then I'd get even more people saying I use AI, which I don't. So I don't need that necessarily. I did write book eight, William Mortals. No, book seven of William Mortals, which was 121,000 words in 10 business days. So I only write during the week, Monday through Friday. I don't write in the weekends because that's my time. I have to have my time. I started off writing seven days a week, and I was like, I can't it's not, it's not tenable. I can't do it. My mental health was uh horrific, and so I decided look, I'm not doing any work on weekends. I write on the weekdays, which of course coincided with having a full-time job. So things have been fun. But anyway, I wrote in 10 days, but two weeks, or 10 working days. Like 10,000 something words a day. Never again.

That's wild.

I blame Sourpatch Hero. It's Tommy's fault.

How is that Tommy's fault?

It is Tommy's fault because he realized that my writing anniversary was coming up from when I started writing, which was September, well, August of 2024. So I've only been writing for like 18 months. Um, and he was like, Well, how many words have you written so far? And I was like, I don't know, 880,000. And he goes, So one more book? One more book? You can get to a million words through your first year? And I was like, God damn it. And so at that point, I knew not very lofty. Right. I had to. I had no choice in the matter at that point because yeah, I mean, I'm gonna hit a million words in my first year writing. Why not? Here we are. I did it.

That's wild.

Yeah, I wanted to die a little bit, but I did it.

I mean, yeah, especially with taking weekends off, which I honestly think is super important, and I'm glad that you decided to do that. Not only is it good for you, but like your family too. Oh, yeah. Because they get time with you.

Yeah.

And I I, you know, my evenings right now, my schedule is still awful because I get up at like five to start writing because I work during the day. So I get up at five, write till nine or so, have my work day. I write during my lunch break to finish up the 5,000, 6,000 words that I need to do per day. Because I do 5,000 words a day, which is fun. Um, and then in the evening I do all the social media stuff. I get the you know, editing done. Well, my wife does all my editing, but I get my like covers editing and all that stuff in the evening. And normally, you know, I sit on the couch with my wife when I'm doing that because I want to spend time with her. Um, but she is my full-time editor now. So she's home all the time. I'm home all the time. So we do get time together, which is nice. But the weekends are certainly for us because yeah, it's a lot. It'll become a little less, but it's still a lot.

How did you find lit RPG?

I couldn't tell you what the first one I read was. I I really enjoyed, like, you know, I said the Titan series, He Who Fights Up Monsters. Um, I have not finished DCC. I started DCC when it first came out. I read the first two books, and then I got it because that's how it happened. I haven't been back. I have such a hard time going back to series because I feel like I have to start from the beginning because I don't remember what happened. Started not reading synopsis. So eventually I'll get back to that one. Um, I know that I'm gonna get crucified for that, but it's fine. Um I've read most of the series out, or at least a good whatever books were available when I was in that, you know, in that series. A lot of times they've now have doubled the books, and I just haven't gotten back to it yet. I haven't finished See You Fight Some Monsters yet either. I'm, you know, I'm struggling. I used to read 300 books a year, and now I'm lucky to read 30 because I've been writing. Well, I mean, you're writing eight, so yeah, it's it takes a lot more, it's a lot more effort to to write a book than to read it, shockingly. Um but I really got into cultivation novels, like really poorly translated Chinese cultivation serials. Those those are my like candy for the last few years before I started writing. So that's really why I decided to do cultivation for Will of the Immortals, because I love those things. They're all the same story. Like it's like Romeo and Juliet is the same story in like eight different, you know, movies, but probably more than that at this point. But they're fun, right? Like all the regressing, the regressor MCs that you see in LitRPG are based on Chinese cultivation MCs, because that's the basis of like 80% of Chinese cultivation novels is a regressor going back. Immortal Alchemist Returns, whatever. That's what got me into the cultivation side of things. And litRPG was just sort of, I really enjoy it as a format. I'm one of those people that does not believe litRPG is a genre so much as a format, because you can use it for anything. It's about how you display the information to the reader more than it is any sort of cohesive genre trend, because you can have litRPG sci-fi, you can have lit RPG fantasy, you can lit RPG romance probably. Who knows? You know, you grow up.

Yeah. Well, I mean, so harem is the next would be, I guess, an example of litRPG romance.

Sure. Yeah.

Because they've it's got stats.

You know, plus one to charisma or whatever it takes, right? Stamina, maybe. But yeah, I I've always been fascinated by litRPG. And you know, I've loved reading it. And so when I started writing, I was like, well, I want to be able to, you know, show my stats. I want to be able to show the progression. And so here we are.

Banned Books And Reader Access

I like it. So your books have been banned in Malaysia. At least. I don't know if it's been any other countries.

I think it's like 29 countries so far that I've I've counted.

Is it something about your books in particular? Or is it just like I wish I was that cool.

No.

Just a lot of books, a lot of books are banned.

And so in those countries that ban any books referencing gods or magic, um, LGBTQ, of course, is a no-no. Um there's a whole list that I went through and I checked like every single box. So I was like, oh, no wonder. Um but apparently I can send them mail and request a review of why they banned me, and they'll send me mail back telling me to fuck off, basically. And I want to do that just so I can put them on my office wall because I think that would be fantastic office decoration.

I do too. That would be fantastic. Like people have their diplomas.

No, I've got I got my books are banned here and here. Yeah, I haven't figured out how to do that, but I have heard that you that's it's doable. And I really want to get like the official letterhead of Malaysia. Like, no, we hate you.

I love that. So if people in those countries wanted to read your books, how like is that just something they'll never be able to do, or is there a way around that?

Or well, um I guess legally speaking, no.

No.

And as far as Amazon is concerned, I would never condone that people in those countries with no access go to a PDF rip-off site and read it that way.

Of course not.

No, that'd be terrible.

Not at all. That makes sense though. That that that's why they would ban it.

Yeah. Yeah. Any any mention of those of those themes will get you like Harry Potter's band there because it's magic. You know, any any mention of God's band seems seems really depressing, but you know, I get it, I guess.

Maybe it won't always be like that.

We can only hope.

Con Appearances And Book Launch Plans

Yeah, we can hope. Where are you gonna be this year? Where can people see you? You're gonna be at LitRPG Con.

I'm gonna be at JordanCon.

You're gonna be at JordanCon.

Yep. Um actually next weekend going to hang out with Seth Ring in um Charlotte to learn from him. And then we'll be going to JordanCon. Oh, the 17th is when JordanCon starts. So I'm launching the book on the day that JordanCon starts. So I have a whole case of books, as well, several cases of books coming to uh to throw at people, thanks to you. Um and then I'll be at uh Little RPG Con. I don't have anything else on the books, but I'm I know how this goes. You know, give me a moment.

I mean, I'm sure there's gonna be some like small, maybe indie book fair or oh yeah, Tommy something that pops up.

He's like, hey man, we're going here this weekend, and it's like some abandoned factory in Richmond. It's like, all right, I guess we're going there.

I mean, that's good though.

Yeah, we sold some books last time, but he he does the whole have you seen uh was it How I Met Your Mother?

Mm hmm.

You know the Have You Met Ted that Barney does? Uh have you met Ted? That's what what Tommy does to me all the time, and it drives me crazy. You think he loves it? The funniest thing in the world. And so he'll be, you know, we'll be sitting at the table and he'll be like, hey, have you seen this guy's books? And I'm like, no, look at this guy's books, don't look at my books. And then, you know, we don't make any sales because we scare people away. But it's fun, regardless.

You're just yelling at each other's books.

Pretty much. Yeah. No, no, read that guy. No, read this guy. Yeah.

I mean, then just read them both. So I have one more question for you. Well, I mean, technically it's a couple questions, but before I kind of wrap us up, uh, is there anything that you wanted to talk about or um anything that you wish that I had asked?

I know this isn't going out live, so it loses some of its effect, but you will be the first person that I announce the voice actor for Founders Edition 2, if you like.

Sure.

Yeah, the audiobook is complete. It is already submitted to ACX, it's already approved. It'll go on pre-order April 1st, and it'll launch the same day as the ebook and physical, which is exciting. And it'll be performed by Daniel Woznewski.

Ooh, I love that guy.

Oh, me too. And he absolutely killed it. It is incredible.

He does such a good job.

Yes. I had one of my alpha readers listening to it today, and he he messaged me and he was like, wait, who's the female voice actor? And it was like, no, that's Dan too.

Yeah, he's good.

Yes, he is very good. He's really good. I was lucky to snag him. I had him in mind the entire time for the narration. And uh when he learned that, he was like, no one else is having this book. This is my book now. And so we made it work.

Yes. So yeah, that information will uh most likely be out before uh this episode is.

Yes, I meet with Rec tonight, and that is live, and I'll have to announce it there. I know.

Yeah, yeah.

Technically speaking, you were the first. You know.

Uh this will go out on the 30th. Uh close. So that's still still good.

And on the 30th, everyone listening can go to Audible in like two days and pre-order the audiobook.

Yeah. And I will include the link to the books in the video description. There's also my first audio.

No publisher this time. Not scary at all.

I think it'll do all right.

It'll be okay. It'll be fine. Probably. It'll be fine. Maybe. We'll see.

Final question. If you could choose uh what would your main stat or ability be? If you had stats or abilities.

Like DD, like strength, endurance, agility.

Yeah, we can definitely do just the basic. We don't have to get, you know, fancy or outrageous.

Well, I mean, the problem is if you if you min-max too hard, you end up completely screwing yourself on other stats. But if I had to pick like a primary, like my heart says strength because, you know, of course, but my mind says wisdom, which of course. Um I'm gonna go endurance.

So you like dual stat?

I'm gonna go endurance. Yeah, we're gonna split the ends.

Yeah, sorry, you said endurance. Yeah, we'll go endurance. So not any of the first two. Exactly.

We can't trust those people. My heart and my mind, those aren't to be trusted. We're going with the body, and that's endurance. I don't want to be tired anymore. I'm tired.

You know what? I get that.

Plus health. I get that. My back won't ache. I it's all wins, really. You know. I can read more books if my if I don't ache when I wake up in the morning, and then I can get more intelligence and wisdom, right? Hit the gym. Yeah. You know, I recover faster. Frankly, now that I think about it, endurance really is the stat of choice. You know, willpower is like the stat, which is why Leon is incredible, because his willpower was ridiculously high when he started. But not going by that, endurance.

Where To Find Jay And Closing

Yeah, you've got me convinced. Endurance is the way to go. All right. So where can people find you online?

I have a website, jkraus.com. I am on Facebook. That's probably the easiest way to get updates. Um, I have a Patreon. All proceeds of the Patreon go to local animal shelters and food banks. Um, so I post twice a week there. Uh book chapters twice a week, I post more often there too. Um, Discord is by far the best way to get a hold of me, because I probably won't see any other notifications. Um, but I have a Discord. It's all on my Linktree, which I'll probably just provide you because that'll be the easiest way to do this.

Yeah, I will definitely uh typically I do all the individual links. Uh, but yeah, a link tree is much easier. So I will include the link tree in the video description and everyone can just go from there. That makes it a lot easier.

It does. I only have to remember one URL, you know.

All right. Well, Jay, thank you so much for coming on the show. Thank you, everyone else, for sticking around. Uh, I will include the links to Jay's information in the video description on the audio-only podcast and on the YouTube video. So he'll be super easy to find. Uh, if you want updates on upcoming episodes or some of the unedited episodes, you can find me on my website, iowpod.com, sign up for the newsletter. And that's everything I had. Thank you, Jay. Thank you, everybody else, and keep leveling up.