Master Kami walked up the familiar hill through the mountains of Kumano; headed towards the temple he stayed at, when he heard a piercing scream that echoed down the hill he turned his head to see several people, all dressed in dirty torn clothes running up the hill, several were covered in blood.
"Are they being attacked?" He thought to himself, he heard what sounded to be like heavy hoofs coming up and over the hill, he saw Samurai riding imperial horses, they slashed and stabbed the people running with swords and long spears, trampling dead bodies, crushing them into the dirt. Kami could not stand to see such disrespect for the dead; he unsheathed his blade, and jumped in front of the bodies of two dead girls, whose bodies were about to be crushed by the man who had killed them.
"Lay down your sword" he said calmly "if you do so. I won't hurt you" he smirked.
The Samurai had no intention of doing as he was told, he lunged at Kami, and thrust his sword forward with the intention of killing his opponent, before the weapon made contact Kami swerved slightly to the left, and brought the blunt end of his blade down on the back of the man's neck, before the man hit the ground, Kami grabbed him, spun him around to face him, and broke each finger, then hit him on the head, knocking him unconscious.
"I warned you" he said, as the other samurai froze, and stared at him, then shifted their gazes to their fallen comrade, they started to retreat over the hill, till not a single person was left, he looked around and saw many victims flee from the bloody scene.
He started to dig graves for the ones who died, as he got around to the final few, he saw a small figure rise from a pile of dead bodies, only to hall back onto it's knees and sob quietly.
"Hey, you" He called out, moving closer to discover a boy who looked to be about ten or eleven year of age. The boy sat there for a moment, then spoke, "They're all dead," he said, eyeing each grave "why?" he said.
Kami felt a little bad for the boy, "I don't know why," he admitted, "but what I do know, is that you must remember the ones who lost their lives fondly" he told the boy, he turned away to leave, but stopped when he heard the sound of a dagger being unshealthed, he turned to find the boy holding a knife to his throat "That fool wants to commit suicide!" he shouted in his mind as he ran, took the knife from the boy, and brought his fist down on top of the boys head.
"ow!" he shouted, bringing his hands up to rub his head, "what did you do that for?" he said.
"Because dying isn't the answer" he scolded, "you must live for the ones who can't now, live a life they could not" he hoped the boy would change his mind, and if not he at least tried.
"But I'm a slave" said the little boy, "I have no rights to live" he stared at the bodies.
Kami didn't know what to do, but then he got a brilliant idea, "Then why not leave your slave life, and come with me?" he said, the boy turned his head to him and stared at him in confusion, "I am a sword master, if you come with me I will teach you everything you need to know, you will have a a reason to live" he promised, he even unshealthed his sword to let the boy examine it.
Kami got to his feet and started walking away, pleased when he heard the sound of small feet following him.
"What's your name?" the boy asked.
"You will address me as Master, but if you must know my name is Kami" he replied, slowing his pace when he heard the boy stumble., "why not tell me your name now" he said.
"It's Kuro Nakada" the boy says, "But I don't want to carry that name anymore" he clenched his little hands into tiny, tight fist. Kami stared at the boy, then sighed, looking down at the trembling boy.
"Then I, as your master, shall give you a new name" he said, he started fiddling with his fingers, as if that helped him think "what should I name you?" he thought to himself "Kenji, Hina, Sasuke" Kami thought on, "this is harder than I thought" he admitted, then a smile crept onto his face, he spun around to face the boy, "Your name shall be Yoshi" he said.
"Yoshi" the boy echoed, repeating his new name until it felt natural on his tongue, "but what about a last night?" he asked.
"When you complete your training, I shall let you pick your own last name" Kami said as the boy smiled, and pulled ahead of Kami, happily walking up the mountain, Kami smiled and hurried to catch up with his new apprentice.
The tale has begun; Yoshi's story is just beginning.
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125,020 Literary Works • 672,861 Reviews
Hi there! Told ya I'd stop by and review
Normally when someone is thinking, it's written in italics. So this can be written the same way but it'll look like this: Are they being attacked? He thought to himself. And then it'll be easier for readers to distinguish between thoughts and dialogue.
This is one huge run on sentence. So obviously you'll want to split it up into many different sentences. I know that it's hard to make action scenes flow sometimes, but you always have to make sure you don't write run-ons. It's easy to understand what's going on here, but it's hard to read grammatically. My brain is screaming "No! Not another comma!" xD But seriously, work on finding places to break up the sentences. I'd suggest putting a period after these words (this is in descending order as you read the paragraph): Kami, opponent, neck.
So if you're going to have a really intense, "scary" character, you have to make sure that he/she does things that make sense (for lack of better word). For example, read what I've quoted. Here the rest of the samurais, warriors who are big and tough, well maybe not that big but anyway, and aren't scared easily. But here they freeze and run away after watching Kami fight one soldier. Wouldn't at least one of the remaining samurai, if not more, be stupid enough to fight Kami as well? What made the samurai Kami killed so darn special? Get what I'm saying here? This scene would work much better if Kami had killed one of their leaders. That would most definitely leave a lasting impression on the rest of the samurais and sent them scurrying back home.
I have so much respect for Kami. It might seem like a little thing, but the fact that he is so keen on honoring the dead and burying them all is so noble. Any other person, me included sadly, would probably leave the bodies so someone else could clean them up and bury them. That really brings out a lot about his character.
You have a great start here. I really like this idea you've come up with. Not to mention I am completely in love with Kami already and it's only the prologue! He's such an awesome character and I can't wait to see how he lives his life. He's so caring, but he's still a great fighter and warrior at the same time.
Now since this is the prologue, most of what I'd comment on will be for none. For example, there's barely any plot I can analyze, since the plot hasn't really started yet, and there isn't much characterization since some things aren't shared in the prologue. But I will give you some advice as to what to do in the chapters as you go along.
Characterization is always important. Most people I talk to say that they loved reading a certain book because of the characters. Readers want to connect to the characters and really feel the way they do. Keep up the good characterization that you've started here with Kami. I would like to know how old he is and what he looks like. I'd like to know the same about Yoshi. You'll want to add that in early in the first chapter, but make sure not to force it. Describe their looks at a time that you think will be right. For example, any downtime in action is a good time to do this. Or if they're fighting someone, describe how their [insert color here] hair was sticking to their forehead from all the sweat. Or how Kami's [insert color here] eyes were focused totally on a certain point.
Let me know when the first chapter comes out!
Keep writing!
**Noelle**
Hey there! Welcome to YWS, and Shane here to review
Alrighty, so you've got yourself an amazing idea for a story. Like, honestly, this has the potential to rip out my heart and make me squeal a little bit. You've got a Samurai who saved a young slave boy from, uh, Samurai warriors with less positive intentions, and he's going to mentor the kid, and. Well. Excellent plot idea.
However, I want to talk to you about your execution of the story. I don't usually do grammar nitpicks, but there was a lot here that needs to be pointed out if you're going to take this novel seriously. For starters:
Comma splices. A comma splice is when you have a comma separating two independent clauses. I'll highlight the examples in bold: the last word of the first clause, the comma, and the first word of the second clause. After, I'll show you grammatically correct ways to write the sentences out, using a different method for each splice:
So. To fix a comma splice, you can do a few things: a) change the comma into a period; b) change the comma into a semicolon; c) add a conjunction <and, but, because> and a comma
For example:
1) Are they being attacked? he thought to himself. He heard what sounded like heavy hoofs coming up and over the hill.
2) He heard what sounded like heavy hooves coming up and over the hill, and on them were Samurai riding imperial horses.
3) He saw Samurai riding imperial horses; they slashed and stabbed the people running with swords and long spears, trampling the dead bodies and crushing them into the dirt.
(disclaimer: I tweaked the wording a little bit in order to make them flow with the new method).
So, basically, if your comma is separating something that could be a sentence by itself with another thing that could be a sentence by itself, you don't want to put a comma there!
Secondly:
This one's brief, but I noticed that you used quotation marks around thoughts. This isn't totally unacceptable, but often confuses the reader; the 'proper' way to convey thoughts is through italics. Italics are also used to add emphasis (instead of multiple punctuation marks or capital letters), often to indicate that someone stressed a certain word or yelled.
Thirdly:
Dialogue! Here, I just wanted to say that every time a new person speaks, you need to put it into a new paragraph. For example, if you had something like:
it would be incorrect, because both speakers have their lines in the same paragraph. The grammatically correct way to write this would be:
See what I mean?
Also, quick tips about punctuating dialogue: You should pretty much always begin the dialogue with a capital letter, just like the beginning of a sentence. After the dialogue, however, if you're using a dialogue tag (such as "s/he/they said"; "s/he/they screamed"; "hissed Sam", etc), you shouldn't capitalize the letter, and the dialogue (unless it's a question) should end in a comma, not a period. If you're not using a dialogue tag (ie: if you finish your dialogue and add "She sighed and stepped back" or "Sam shook her head" or something), you need to end the dialogue with a period, and start the following description with a capital.
For example:
is incorrect. The grammatically correct way to write this would be:
And that's all I have to say! The quality of your writing could improve, but I think that as you read more and write more, your skills will evolve a good deal
Good job and keep writing,
~Shane
That prologue is rather nice, it gives a good starting point and introduce quickly two main characters. But besides what Dreamy already point I'd like to add a thing. About the "broke each finger". For me it was a bit too much. It's ok to show that Master Kami is a really good (and quick) fencer, but that part sounds excessive to me. Because you don't break ten fingers in an half second (especially to someone who isn't inconscious). I guess it looks too much like a manga. And even if I like a lot manga (especially Kenshin) writing isn't exactly the same and character doing the same fantastic things often sounds ridiculous. Besides, you need to keep some extra-abilities of Master Kami for later scenes where he can show all his might.
Hello Alpha! First of all, welcome to YWS!
And I'm here to review your "beginning of legacy" xP Okay, so you have an interesting story line but at the same time you got too many typos and grammatical errors. Let me just show you what they are.
So this is where you let your readers know about the commotion that's taking place. This particular scene is very important for the story, 'cause following this is where your hero gets introduced. It's like the "root" to the story. But when you look at the description you've given, it feels "lacky." I'd recommend you to do some "build up" But don't over do it, 'cause it can put off the readers. Or you can just re-phrase this sentence.
This is a thought, right? Use italics to convey their thoughts that would be dramatic and less confusing.
People are running with swords?
Usually, comma is cooler than full stop.
You have said "intention" twice here. Why not take one out? And a man plunging with his sword will intend to kill, obviously. So, replace some other word with "intention"
This was confusing to an extent. You say contact, but with whom? And you don't have to cramp everything in a single sentence. Make use of the full stops. xP
You got to re-phrase this.
You don't necessarily have to mention the boy's age. You can go with "small/little" adjective description.
Without the comma there, I think the whole meaning what you intended is misunderstood. It means that the people lost their lives fondly. xD
Down and top? It's hard to imagine.
You should capitalize your first letter, you've missed that in many occasions.
Club these two since they are whole new continuing paragraph.
And that's it. This was a good piece. Correct all your minor mistakes and it'll go. Also, go through your work and edit it yourself.
Keep writing!
Cheers!