Zirrboy
Fueled by anger
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- Jan 25, 2021
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Hmm, let me ask for a favor then. I have long given up on improving my opening since I am trying for something. Well, I just want some input on my fight from chapters 39-46. I would like some input on maybe how I could have made it more interesting perhaps.
Nothing is as tempting as the forbidden, so when you said I shouldn't bother with the exposition, I prepared to focus on that explicitly (in addition to the fight scenes of course), but to be honest, I quite liked the early chapter as they are.
At least in the cultivation novels I read, the MCs either have no concrete goal in the beginning or a grand one that they are then denied, so a down-to-earth youth who leads a common life in expectation of inheriting his father's profession was quite refreshing for me.
Same goes for his family. Usually you either have the choice between tragically broken, abusive/arrogant or simply absent.
Not everyone stronger than him is demeaning, the "comedic relief" friend gets some romantic development of his own instead of endless jokes about his horrid courtship....
So before I delve into the issues I have, let me start this off by expressing my gratitude for the many subtle changes to established tropes that make your allegedly run-of-the-mill story all the more enjoyable.
System
At its core certainly an unique idea. Pulling trash means nothing while the "good" rewards are only as good as the attention they bring him. A double-edged sword in so many ways that (I think) you tried to expand it to the affection system.But for me at least it ended up somewhat confusing instead.
The changes, as far as I understood them, reflect both "attention", meaning overall fixation, and "sentiment", meaning like/dislike.
Having to guess which one is reflected is an interesting addition for sure, but "affection" is mostly synonymous with sentiment for me here. I suggest renaming this to "interest" if you don't mind the effort or inconsistency, as this word can mean both depending on context. The only thing that would need to be sacrificed is the "Oh, but it can also mean that" scene.
This is primarily my personal opinion, but naming it after sentiment when for his manhunt system the attention aspect would be more relevant unsettles me somewhat.
Also, you never establish the "units" of affection. All of them are multiples of 100, but I still have no idea what that translates to.
And lastly, there's the obligatory "why doesn't he". When he gets the system, his first thought is holing up to grind, which the system curb stomps with the announcement feature. But really, what is stopping him? With the jungle, this world seems empty enough to remain out of range. A good location might be harder to find, but not impossible. And a reward that costs him his neck is always worse than one he can keep without worry.
Characters
Liu Xun, seems somewhat inconsistent in his love for his family. I did mention this in the comment already, but I find his longing to be a bit hypocritical when a sect that he is yet to join is worth a thought in regards to the fireball but his family isn't. Showing has a bigger impact than telling, so with this blatant disregard for their lives, I can't bring myself to buy all the favorable reminiscence.In addition, becoming melancholic too early diminishes returns imo.
Using such thoughtfulness and emotionality on a peerless young hero and thus turning a fair lady's respect into adoration is best done in the wake of a big event for maximum impact.
You mentioned wanting to make him a scholar, so ig that's the reason you included it, but on that note is the issue of the ax. Kind of an "unscholarly" weapon and a demonic technique to boot.
This discrepancy could become a central part of his character, but right now it feels more like two separate things entirely.
Millie, overall, is well done and I don't see any issue with her being his permanent companion; She has sufficient potential to remain interesting even when (going off your author notes about "not requited but potentially more than one") you decide to bring in "country-toppling beauties" for ego stroke. Just, same as with Liu Xun, don't shoot all your shots early. I agree that character development was due when you started being serious about it, but overcompensation rarely does any good imo.
Plot
You have a lot of character baits.- Out of the seven Liu juniors that invite him to eat, you have one generic romance (Muyue, jade this and that paragraph) and one generic adversary (Ruanfeng, nagging). Neither persists and none of those speaking upon their introduction are with the MC past the restaurant
- Qin Yeqian beats Muyue, so I was expecting her to be romance in her place (He betrays his clan for her), but she just slides into the background as Millie takes the spot (Up until the final battle at least)
As much as I am intrigued by the idea of giving the people around the protagonist their own relationships, I think right now it isn't exactly used to its full potential.
You have dynamics, like Langsheng and Wuyue constantly bickering, but little in the ways of development as of yet. If you want to sacrifice people for character development, use them instead of your important main characters.
Fighting
Now after all this ranting nobody asked for, we finally get to the thing you actually want feedback on. From what I understand, you want the battles to be the main part of your story.The issue with that is the fact that you are writing a book, not directing an anime or movie. Battles are the stakes they decide over, not the bashing, hacking and casting, at least not solely.
This is the reason people tend to make "How dare you not lick the ground I tread"-young master characters. By building up negative sentiment for the adversary, the author makes readers care about the result of the battle. This emotional investment can't be replaced no matter how well you write the actual fight.
Other things work as well, of course. Even the threat of death and decent gains through the demonic beast blood, so long as they are stressed, like you have with Wuyue's fall.
How you bring in variation and stakes is up to you of course, but the "oh, roadside animal ambush" fights definitely need to become rarer.
Next up is "mechanical description". As with the last point, you seem to be on the part of improvement already, but I'll stress this explicitly so you can focus on avoiding it.
Of course you can't have a fighting scene without describing what's going on, but I advise you to cut down on the detailed descriptions of his moves. With all the pivoting and stance changing going on in your early scenes, it feels as though I'm reading him doing dance practice instead of a fight to the death.
The way things are written will always influence how readers perceive them. Long, convoluted descriptions will make the fight feel much slower and controlled. This is good for showing off the MC's battle prowess, but the "thrill of combat" will suffer in equal measure.
If a scene should portray tension and speed, make the sentences shorter, perhaps add something of a "trance" where the focal character takes in details.
TL;DR: All the fights are arbitrary and without effect while the benefits he obtains require no fighting. That's your problem imo.
All this and a few other things are explained in this writing blog, which does a much better job at it than I do, but simply leaving the link would seem a bit snobbish, so I tried to summarize it for your case as best I could manage.
The last part is redundant imo. It's not too big a problem, but similar descriptions of intent are present throughout your work.“So while you were unconscious, Xuan Tie carried you for about half a day before we found this cave. You should be thankful to him, he has done you many favours.”
Indeed. Senior Xuan had been a huge help to Liu Xun, from his timely save to his assisting afterwards.
Liu Xun couldn’t help but feel like he really owed Senior Xuan a big favour.
This is the line I'm bitching about in regards to his family.Liu Xun realised this trump card was too effective that he would most probably only be relying on its passive effect. Or else when he joins a sect and the sect faces a threat, he would not be able to utilize it. That is unless he planning to wipe out the very sect he is trying to protect.
This is a good idea if you want to stay low-key, but Liu Xun has to go all out multiple times throughout their journey, so apparently bridging even more stages would imo bring more attention to him than less, perhaps even raise doubts whether he has ways to conceal his strength.Furthermore, Liu Xun also did not want to reveal his full strength with his concealed cultivation base.
The group then slowly traversed the cave.
He was a woodworker a few days ago. Taking the risk that you already know this and simply chose to disregard it for aesthetic purposes, I will tell you that long hair gets in the way of physical labor, (which is why it was a sign of status in ancient china) meaning that he should have his cut short.A gentle breeze ruffled across Liu Xun's long hair, gently caressing it as it flowed past.
Terminal velocity is the equilibrium of acceleration and drag, so this is actually the right term I think.Each spin came with greater momentum and speed as the ax slowly approached its terminal velocity (as if something like that exists in my fiction, more power= faster, but basically the fastest Liu Xun could handle at the moment). The ax then slammed down onto the lizardman defender with enormous force!
With US measurements, this is simply wrong. And while there is a "foot" measurement in china that differs from it, I recall it being shorter than the US foot.He was now barely 6 feet (3 meters)
Ch 36.5 denotes proficiency at 16%, 37 at 14% again
An lastly a few things about the lizardfolk fight.
Stone is rather brittle if sharpened to the point where it can serve as a cutting weapon. Thus (imo) defeating the purpose of sabers.
Then there's the glaive. I don't know whether this was simply a typo, but irrc they were up to 3m long for <1.8m medieval humans, so imagining a 2.5m giant swing a glaive around that's about half that size is somewhat strange.
So he knows what that means? Could simply be the pill ofc, but I found it peculiar.[Lizardman (Qi Stage 3) is attacking from 2 o'clock (club).]
[Lizardman (Qi Stage 2) is attacking from 6 o'clock (claw).]
[Lizardman (Qi Stage 5) is attacking from 4 o'clock (claw).]
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