Aw, thank you very much! Tbh, most of the process of writing was...picture me sitting at a computer screen after working my full-time job writing 25k words a week for like 6/7 months until I had 700k words of absolute nonsense. Then two and a half years of editing :D
The process of coming up with the actual concepts, though...I already had all of these characters from the ttrpg we play, so it was just a matter of arranging them into a way that made sense for new players, and how someone might get to know them over the course of three acts. It was fun to play with!