Outside of the rookie aren, Galizure met and shook hands with Teriesh, the leader of most powerful squad. Teriesh pulled the handshake into a hug. It was weird seeing the two most powerful leader hug. Their presence together, made even my gut shift in unease. I half expected someone to faint form these two, or be frozen in ice. As I looked around I noticed everyone around was squads of demon hunters, thankfully. They were staring at them, some even had a bloody nose.
Deciding last minute to have some fun with the rookies, I sent off to their preparations center. I looked up at the templeish looking building. The main body had a large square room with a slanted roof. In the middle of the roof a building with bells and archer outposts were there. The purpose being for real defense and the rookies trials. Below the slanted roof a good story or two there was two different rectangular rooms, each off the side of the main room, with very slight roofs hitting the wall of the main room. I headed for the left side rooms first.
"You can't be in here, and you know it" A angry teacher yelled at me.
"relax I came here to help."
"Last time you 'helped' you broke a rookies arm"
"And who fixed it?"
"Well you, buttt"
"Look sorry about that, I had just ingested the power's of new demon. I wasn't use to controlling his powers and it just slipped a little. But I have no new powers this time" A slight smirk growing on my face
"Oh a little huh, I'm pretty sure even mister Galizure might not have been able to defend against that."
"It's alright, I'm not forcing anyone to do anything."'
"Alright fine... you win, but be careful." She gave me a glance of warning
"Alright listen to me, I'm a elite. If you want practice or pointers you can come to me. But if it's pointers, well I may find something fun to do" I said trough everyone's mind.
I could hear the sigh's , followed by the footsteps. And as I knew all the demon hunter teach's burst through the door.
"Ughhh," they all said, "fine"
I chuckled to myself. My eyesight zoomed on a student.
"So it's true, the demon maiden is here. You wanted fun, I'll give it to you. Come fight me."
"You sure?"
"Yes."
"Very well."
"Ishim, no" the teacher snapped
"Let him have his fun." I said and gave a pleasant smile.
I teleported me and him, into my own personal world, a demonic world. A world I took form a tier one demon.
"Welcome to my world. Here's the rules, first person to become unconscious wins. At which point, you'll be teleported back to the school."
"Dam it demon, your on."
I trapped him in demon stones. He struggled, in vain unable to release any powers or even move. He could only breath, and only if I wished it.
"Demon you say. Some of us aren't born with demon hunting powers you know. I was not. So I made myself my own powers. The power's I was born with, I transformed it, into its perfect fighting form. This unusable power is now a elite abilities. I was not destined for this life, so I made myself a demon to be accepted." I realised my power enough for him to speak.
"No one should resort to demon's for powers. Your no better than those you creatures."
"I can get where you're coming from, honestly. But I'm not a demon. I remain human beneath these demonic marks and blood. If I wasn't I would not have been burnt form my food the other day. I have made sacrifices to have your birthright. So don't call me a demon for getting what you have without a thought.
"You should have put your fate in our, the demon hunter's hand."
"Fate, huh. Fate, the light, god. That's what you light infused people tell me. Well you rookies, my leader tells me to take my own fight, my own, to become a god myself. So I did."
His eyes light up with understanding, A trait i've only seen in the elites. I let him down
"I'm sorry." he barked betweened coughs. "I no longer want to fight, so knock me out."
I shook my head, and I transported him out of here. I sat there and launched demonic energy all around me. I scream a demon screech even I shuddered at it. My world was engulfed with demon flames and energy. I paused and then threw bomb of demonic energy and it blew up in the distance, like a planet exploding. It's sheer force would have been felt in the main world,Loïc, due to the teleportation of the young warrior. I turned my world to a clam demoin world again, no flames. And the spikes and wings and flames and scales that had appeared on my body, unaware to me, disappeared. As I entered to Loïc.
The stares were sharp, but not as sharp as my blades. I shrugged it off. "Sorry" was all I said. No one dared to add anything to it.
"I'm heading toward the arena. Feel free to ask me anything, though."
My legs were walking before I realized it. I walked into the main room and found the dimension my squad was viewing from. Jumping form the empty floor, I opened a door to the viewing dimension and landed in a luxury seat, nearly a throne.
I sat next to Galizure and Leo, never have wondering before now why I sat right to Galizure. I mean the event today has proven I was a bad public face for the group, but there I sat toward the right of him. I let the thought go, thinking it will lead to nothing.
The show went like any others for a few events, the highborn, the arcanist, the knight and sword. It was a more specialized group for this graduate, with only three being in the misc group. As that would entail the angles were a big group. And by far in the way the one that was the leader in terms of power and leadership skills, was the boy who challenged me. "Naarinil" the announcer said, as he introduced him.
"Who's that kid to you" Galizure said
"He challenged me to a duel," Galizure cut in "When, how?"
"Relax just a few hours ago, he didn't even get a spell off. But,when I told him everything, the reason for my powers. He understood not as quickly as you, but he clearly hated me before that for my powers. If he understood that then there is hope for others. Or at least I hope I am at least, so I'm bringing down this team reputation at least.."
Leo, not Galizure, was the first to console me. He put his hand on my shoulder and say "You will never drag this team down."
Galizure and Adonael followed lead repeating his actions, we were a power house. Though most elite groups had eight to seven thirsty people, we were ranked second. For good reason two, we favored quality over quantity.
We returned our attention to the battle going on, first for all a free for all. I could see Naari Riel was the most powerful, but power doesn't mean survival in a battle field.
As soon as the battle started he played it low, lying multiple defensive spells several of which would kill any animal who enter its past, and certainly make any of these kids faint. Good take the glory near the end, make squads see your cunning and well as your power. I found myself cheering
Ten more were quickly knocked out leaving six left. Naaririel cast a spell most angel leader's would struggle to kill. The Nar'thrall I spell in which that let out a massive amount of holy energy send it that flexed around nearly all defensively making it hard to counter. Plus it was fast making it hard to out run. It makes for a good base spell to modify at our level. But at their level, it could easily kill them, if they were no protections against it. In that one move it knoced of four people. The other remaining two looked at him, he was tired and they clearly thought it was worth teaming for him.
“I thought I could take all of you, I’m can't use it very often so I don't know the limits of it and,” he staggered for a moment and I knew I was to blame, “never mind it was a mistake. It’ll ruin my chances with elite squads, but I’ll won’t lose this.”
I had the same thought process. He then pulled out two blades, they were mostly normal however it had a very slight curve almost slant to it. It was also slightly shorter than most, only slightly larger than a dagger. It had gems enchanted to it in another dimension. It had the power presence comparable to a lesser elite.
“A katiou dagger, very rare and ancient indeed. There are only two people who use it, me and Teriesh. If he knows who to use them, it means one thing, he is very powerful indeed. And is not light dependent like most.”
“Aren’t you light dependent?”
“It’s a term the high angels use, it means they believe too much in the teaching of what most call the light. But most of those teaching are a test to have them learn the truth. And even if we wanted to change it we couldn't. Things like fate, prayer’s, they not entirely false,, but if you break free of it then you will be more powerful and more real. You will become a high angel, but that depends if he can change the fate of those dagger’s there, with or without it’s gems. There are only twelve high angles and two use those dagger’s and it is the top two. If we can use them, I think it will be worth picking him up.”
We murmured our agreements, he believed in fate just this morning, but he understood what I said. has he ever used those before, can he use those?
Fast, but slow enough that it would be too easy to doge or reflect or do anything I wished to. But that was me for them, for rookie demon hunter, even the protections in place may not be enough to stop permanent damage. He had turned his dagger's into large spears, changed the fate of the dagger's. I stared as both contents had fainted. I used the power of a demon to analyze the power of the damage. And although that demon which I had used for its analytic power said to kill them, I turned its power off for now and raced down there. Using the power of a another demon and the power of a mage, a power I had yet to use even in front of my squad, I healed the two wounded soldiers. However as the spell finished as my powers started to intertwine with one another within my body, my hands where I had cast the spell form.
My hand burned, it was torture to use the power of a ra'oxa after so long,made much worse when I had combinded the two together. I still had yet to find a way to make it so my demon power and other power could work together without making me nearly faint. I just needed to find the right demon or thing to do it. My mind narrowed on the pain, in the distance I could hear my squad's voice. But I just sat there focusing on that pain. It was too much, I needed to leave now before I hurt someone. And I disappeared into my world, where I confronted that poor angel, demon hunter before. Where I had used the powers of a demon, which he hated so much against him. Where I had changed his life into something else. He had to get into a elite squad or those new beliefs about demon powers and fate, my squad's believes would get him into trouble. My brief moment of guilt left me as the pain once again filled my hands and arms, spreading through my body.
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140,667 Literary Works • 673,588 Reviews
Hey Oxara! Just to let you know, I read chapter one also, so I sort of know where this chapter is coming from. I'm just gonna jump right in.
First things first, I don't quite understand. That is the most important thing. Your readers must be able to understand at least one dynamic of the story. They need a base of knowledge to build upon as they continue to read. If they don't get that, odds are they'll stop reading your story altogether. I think you have a really good idea, but I don't think you executed it well. The frame of your story is good and your sense of vocabulary is good, but there are some very important things missing.
1. The Background
I don't know if anyone else addressed this, but I feel it's probably the biggest thing missing. You have some basic information, but even that is fleeting. You talk about their powers, but where their powers came from is a mystery to me. There were some parts of the story that I felt almost addressed it, but none of them finished the job. I also don't understand the finer points of the hierarchy. What makes someone a High Angel? What makes them a demon? What is really the most important difference between the elites and the rookies? Does everyone have powers? And where does your character come from. She needs a little more background. She needs, to some extent, to be understood. Even just a mention of her past, the reason she wanted to become a demon hunter in the first place. You did attempt it: "to be accepted", but that entire conversation with the boy could use some clarification. It provided a lot of background, but it was kind of difficult to understand what the characters meant. I would suggest rewriting it from the point of view of the rookie, just for your own benefit, not as part of the story. It might give more perspective to you, as the writer.
2. The Conflict
I feel like there isn't enough conflict. The biggest conflict seems to be your character's desire for people to understand her versus the world's current judgement of her. The truth is that an even bigger conflict would help speed up this process. Think: what will make the world accept her? what could she do? Find a way for her to resolve the conflict and begin introducing that path early. She's come this far and she thinks her best hope for the world to accept her is to change a rookie's point of view? That's how it seems to me and it feels like more of a step backward than forward.
3. The Setting
Obviously the setting isn't missing entirely, but details are missing that would make the setting easier to grasp. What does it look like? How is it different from other places? Why are they there? I got something about it being in the clouds in chapter one, but I think there was a change in setting for chapter two? What do the different places look like and what are the things we need to know about your world? You did better at establishing the setting of the demon world than you did of establishing the actual world.
I don't mean to be harsh and maybe I'm way off, but that's just proof of how little I understood. I think your story could be really great with some more work. Thanks for the story!
Hey again!
Nit-picks:
Why the "thankfully"?
I'm guessing some of this is said by this Ishim person? This is really confusing before the name is introduced and I have to go back and try to retroactively apply who was talking to figure out the importance of what was said.
In a fantasy story it is always crucial to give very specific description of stuff that doesn't exist in the real world, because it's a big act of imagination to picture something you've never seen before. What do these stones look like? How big are they? How do you trap someone in them? Do they fall from the sky?
Why are they having this argument all of a sudden? It seemed like a good-natured match before.
Galizure cut himself off?
Overall:
Okay, so I just want to summarise what I think the plot was here because the pacing was so fast I'm not actually sure. Your main character challenges a rookie to a duel, during which they explain that they are part demon - they did this in order to gain the powers that some other people get naturally. The duelist was won over and is now in some way showing support for demons in his attempt to become an elite.
Honestly I think this could be at least two chapters. The duel happens really fast. It starts so casually then one thing the MC says seems to start the disagreement, which becomes a huge argument and gets diffused, all the space of just a five or six lines of dialogue. Then the second half happens pretty much immediately with no context of what's actually happening.
I think the way to slow this down is a) cut down on the number of significant things that happens - eg save the special knife thing for a later chapter and b) every time something happens just take a moment to explain someone's facial expression as they react, or your main character's thoughts about it or something.
I've briefly mentioned it but this was just way too much information all at once. As soon as I'm introduced to a new element of worldbuilding there's like 3 more with it. It took me til a little bit into this chapter to realise they were in a training academy. The existence of this academy, its name, its place in the world, its purpose, should all have been explained in the last chapter to setup the basis for this story.
It's also difficult when so many of the details are explained through speech. Characters all have more information than me, so they will never explain all of the necessary information. Imagine someone told you that their school gave out too much homework. You then told them that that sucked and there's a sympathetic moment. Imagine I'm an alien and I don't know what homework is, I'm not going to get the significance. Your characters are saying things about demons that I don't understand because there's so many different ways to write demons, so I really struggle to keep up.
I think this could go in the direction of maybe the Bartimaeus books, if you've read any of them? They're quite light-hearted, but every so often make a really hard-hitting point. But it needs to be a lot smoother to read and easier to understand, in order to get engaged in the plot and care about the characters.
Hope this helps,
Biscuits
Hi there and happy review day!
Changes are in bold
This is a very jumpy start to a chapter, try to slow it down and take some more time with your description.
Again, slow it down. You've changed very abruptly from your character feeling uncomfortable to deciding to have some fun. Try and make the transition more smooth.
This whole section needs work - the best way to learn how to write is to read. See how other authors do speech between characters and then come back and have another go.
You've sold yourself really short here. You have the opportunity for this great action scene, to showcase your character's prowess and you've just rushed straight through it. Search for posts on 'show not tell' in writing and maybe you'll find something to help you.
This whole thing is way too rushed. Slow it down, decide what you're trying to say and develop your plot further. You have an interesting premise, but you're not doing it justice by racing through at top speed. Try to show, not tell and have another go. I'll be happy to read a second attempt.
Let me know if you have any questions
Icy.
So I am pretty new to writing, well writing to any degree of seriousness. And doing this for my LMS doesn't make it easy not to rush it. I am not trying to say that I should rush through it, just that I did. But I don't think all of this is just because I rushed through it, I think one is kinda me just not realizing something wrong or it feels rushed or something like that. Though now that all of you have pointed this out to me I really do plan to sitting down for the next chapters and reading it trying to make sure everything is not rushed.
It turns of show don't tell, I was really trying to do that. In fact I already have read a bunch of stuff on it, but I am having trouble putting it into effect. I mean I know I need to work on a lot of things in all of my pieces, and I am really trying but as you can tell it just comes out poorly done.
as I keep reading your review and keep thinking about this, I don't know if it's due to lack of experience or something else. But I am going to try to pay attention from now on so thanks.
I think it helps to have things pointed out so when you go back and edit (when you have more time) it makes things a little easier. You'll also find it's way easier when you get to the end of your novel and know everything that's going to happen. Don't worry too much, as everything will come with practice. You've got a good plot coming along, everything else will follow
Hii oxara, welcome to yws.
Sweta here, I am going to give my review on your work.
The storyline is great. It's catchy and captivating. The overall story is good. And although it is too long it worth it. There are some places you forget to close the inverted comma. And somewhere I found you were rushing, take it slow. There is some grammar mistake I think so. But that is okay with me.
Update soon and if you need help. you can ask too. Great work dear friend. Keep it up. Waiting for another update.
And if you find something wrong with my opinion just ignore it.
Ah no, Most of this is somewhat rushed as it is my LMS. And most of it has only the most bare of edits before I post. My second draft should feel more refined, but that is a long way's away. Though I have never really Committing to a long project and really refining anything before so it really is all new to me. Anyway I agree with you for the most part, and Thanks a lot.
You are doing a great work. And I hope you continue this.