This is where the book ends.
To be honest, I'm really reluctant to stop here, but it's something I can't avoid. At this point, the situation of this book is beyond saving—if I keep dragging it out, it'll just fall apart completely.
On one hand, the income from this book isn't even enough to cover the bare minimum. Even when I tried adding extra chapters during the May holiday, it didn't help at all. I couldn't even make twenty yuan a day.
From a practical perspective, writing novels is supposed to be a way to try and support myself. But if I can't even do that, then there's really no reason to keep going.
On the other hand, the plot and power scaling in the later stages have completely collapsed. I tried to fix it, but it's obvious I couldn't save it (ᗒᗩᗕ). The collapse of the story is like a landslide—once it starts, you can only wait until it stops on its own.
So, I truly don't have the strength to keep this book going. All I can do is learn from the mistakes, and start over from scratch!
...
Looking back, compared to my previous works, this book did show some improvements, though of course it also had plenty of shortcomings.
At the start, the book had a fairly clear outline for a simulation-type story. Compared to the last two novels, my writing was more practiced, and although the ending was rushed, at least it was somewhat reasonable.
But when I reflect on it, the flaws stand out even more.
For example, in the beginning, the main character's strength was written in a way that leaned too much toward being suppressed. And because simulation stories inevitably involve the protagonist failing in simulations, it constantly led to readers dropping off.
By the middle of the story, I noticed this trend from reader feedback, and I tried to make adjustments.
At first, it seemed to work. I changed the shorter simulations into much longer ones—sometimes spanning forty chapters or more. This reduced the frustration from the protagonist constantly dying, while still allowing his strength to improve in a believable way. It also gave room for interactions with the main storyline characters.
This was around the part with Iwagakure.
But this method created an even bigger problem—it caused the story to drift away from the original outline, and the overall tone of the book slowly began to warp.
To keep the story moving forward, I had to keep adding secondary settings, which gradually diluted the original worldview and feeling of the fanfic.
Even though I tried hard to avoid it, the plot inevitably veered toward a xianxia-style "cultivation and endless power battles" direction.
Personally, I really dislike those endless back-and-forth clashes where the "Dao" itself feels erased—especially when there's not enough buildup behind them.
But as a fanfic with a hastily added secondary setting, there wasn't much room to lay proper groundwork or revise things. Otherwise, I would've ended up with third, fourth, and fifth layers of settings. And honestly, that would've been even worse than the collapse of the power scaling.
So, in the end, once the story spun out of control, I ended up writing the exact kind of thing I least wanted to see.
This became a painful problem in the later stages of the book. I could endure the early chapters—hundreds of thousands of words with no one paying attention. But writing this kind of thing? Just one chapter already felt unbearable. It was like forcefully burning out my brain. At that point, it was better to just end it quickly.
So, this is it.
I'll take the lessons I learned here, strike while the iron's hot, and start a new book. This time I won't give myself any word count limits. I'll just see how far I can go and what level I can reach.
Finally, I wish all my readers the best—may your studies and careers go smoothly, may you all find your place, and achieve your goals!!!
(T/N: Thank you for reading all the way to the end. When I first started working on this fic, the only thing on my mind was the word "simulator." I really wanted to try my hand at a fanfic with that concept. Honestly, I usually don't translate fanfics with ratings this low, but this time I made an exception.
I started regretting it once the power scaling brought in gods, domains, and all that stuff, it's pretty tough for me, and not the kind of story I usually work on. On top of that, I'm not a native English speaker, and dao-cultivation fics aren't really my style.
Still I believe if you start something, you should finish it, especially when there are readers waiting for the chapters. So if you're one of those readers, I hope you enjoyed!)