Outdated Chapter 1 - Huntress

A thunderous roar shook the very ground the wyvern stood on. Trees rattled as it ran through the forest with a terrifying speed. Ravaging through the thick forest growth with ease, without a single trace of its momentum being seized by the vicious terrain. This foreign beast of tremendous power was nothing more than a prey for a certain magus. A type of mage whose powers exceed common sense, mostly due to their inhumane ways of acquiring such powers they’ve been mostly branded as heretics and even those who have never committed any atrocious acts, are closely monitored in secret. Such is the fate of those who chose eternal damnation for power.

Though this was not the fate of this girl who flew through the air in pursuit of the monster running away. Her dark robes flew through the wind in a mystical manner as orbs of light appear around her and with a quick gesture of her hands, they quickly sank beneath the earth. From where the orbs sank a small pulse could be felt not a moment later, roots of trees that were once unmoving came rampaging out the ground at a speed even faster than the magus’s flight and into the wyvern’s legs. It formed a brutal vice around its limbs and slowly penetrated its scales even if the wyvern could tear through some of it, it was not long until it would be overwhelmed by the number of roots within an entire forest.

Finally catching up to the wyvern and the roots she sent, the magus floated down to the ground to see her catch closer. Visibly exhausted from the feats she had displayed, her pose staggered a bit. Unsurprisingly, the wyvern has yet to forfeit its life. Even through the constant constriction being outputted onto it, the ground still shook with constant tremors from its wild thrashings in its attempts to escape. A few roots would break and dislodge, but quickly replaced by a new set of stronger ones. It would seem that the wyvern’s attempt in escape would all be in vain, but this match was a lot closer than it had seemed as whether the wyvern could sense it or not, the magus is weakening. The constant reapplication of newer roots was a very draining process and she could feel her consciousness slip ever so slightly.

Her face paled as her knees started to weaken from the sudden loss of energy. She could not win a battle of endurance against the wyvern.

She slides out two scroll from her bag, one expensive looking scroll and the other looking quite cheap. Her fingers trembling and sweat pouring down the scrolls. She then proceeds to cast a spell. The first scroll, the cheap one, was used to gather moisture in the air to a single spot, creating a decently sized water-bubble just a few feet above her head. Next, she imbues the other scroll with an absurd amount of mana, but in doing so she gave up all the chances she had in constricting the wyvern. Things were certainly out of hand, but she shrugs her shoulders and whispers to herself, ‘There have been worse’.

Now, the roots and vines no longer moved. They were nothing more than ordinary plant life after the source of mana was cut. The wyvern quickly broke free from its bonds and scrambled hastily to get back up, though it had already been too late. The few seconds it took for the beast to escape the overgrowth, was enough for the magus to cast a spell to end their small skirmish.

With about a dozen blue orbs now circling around her, her fingertips now channeling an unspeakable amount of power that seemed to come from the orbs around her. The tips of her robe started to catch fire even her fingertips starting to burn. Enduring the pain, she holds her tongue knowing not to break concentration. Finally, the orbs flicker out of existence for their purpose had been completed. Now, a thin bright ray of light appeared for only but a moment. It struck through the wyvern’s head, penetrating its brain and leaving it dead. Any spectator would’ve been awestruck at the incredible display that had just unfolded.

The bark from trees a few meters away from the magus had been torn off. A clean hole the size of an eye was visibly piercing through the wyvern’s skull. Even the caster herself was not safe from her own reckless spell. There were small burn marks through her entire body specially the hands. Even her robe had caught on fire and with the caster unconscious it’s almost certain that the fire would soon catch on to the rest of her body.

*plop*

With her consciousness being fully gone, her mana output vanished and the ball of water floating above her head popped. Drenching her wet, but more importantly extinguishing the fire.
With that, this little magus had come through with her small task for today. Though leaving behind such an awkward scene to gawk at.

A suspiciously dressed girl lying unconscious on the forest floor who’s both been burned and somehow drenched right beside a dead wyvern with a background full of destroyed terrain.

It would leave anyone who didn’t know the context to be very confused of what has transpired here. Thankfully, there was one other person, unbeknownst to the magus who had seen the entire thing unfold.

Author's Note

Thanks for reading and making it this far. Please leave a comment positive or negative, it doesn't matter as long as it is within reason.

edit: rewrote this and chapter 2. hopefully a better read than before.

Reviews

[SANDS]

after reading this I understood why u (that's on purpose :P) felt my mini poems needed more work! I write them when I'm bored at work while you obviously put a lot of thought into it. it's awesome, to be honest, the many descriptions you used allowed my mind to draw the exact image of the fight and I wished it was a book because the huntress intrigued me!

[MantaStyle]

It is a book! Hahaha. It's chapter one of my book. It's different from the poem that I wanted you to read, but thanks for reading my chapter and I'm glad you enjoyed it.

[SANDS]

what was the poem? and where can i find your book?

[MantaStyle]

Its all in my profile. My writtings.

[JayG]

Well, you did ask, but I’m not going to make you happy. Still, still since it’s holding you back, and a problem you won’t see till it’s pointed out, I thought you would want to know.

In this, from start to end, you’re talking to a reader who can’t hear you, and, you’re performing for a viewer who can’t see you. And because you are, lots of thongs happen that you won’t notice,

First: all trace of the emotion you place into your voice when you tell the story is gone. All the reader has is what the punctuation and word meaning suggest. And the meaning they get isn’t what you intend them to get because they have no access to your intent. They get what the words suggest to the THEM, based on THEIR life history. Have your computer read this aloud to hear how different what the reader gets is from what you hear as you perform for yourself.

Added to that, all the life in your performance: expression changes, gestures, and body language are tossed away, too. What's left. The words of an external, dispassionate observer, focused on providing an informational experience. But when you read you want to be made to feel, and to care. In a horror piece you don't want the told that the protagonist feels fear. You want the writing to send a chill down YOUR back. And no way in hell can our report-writing skills do that.

The short version: You can’t use the skills of verbal storytelling in a medium that doesn’t reproduce sound or picture. You didn’t catch this problem because when you read the narrator’s voice—your voice—is filled with exactly the right emotion. It changes cadence and intensity to make the story live…for you.

A second, and related problem is that you know the story and the people. When you begin reading you know the backstory for the characters. You know where and when we are. You know the setting, and who we are. So for you, every line acts as a pointer to images, action, and more, stored in your mind.

And because you know all that, and see it in your mind as you write, you’ll leave out things that seem too obvious to mention You’ll talk about what’s happening in the setting but not give the reader necessary elements of that setting. But when you read your own work it’s all there, filled in as you read, making it a problem you can’t fix because you don’t see a problem.

But the reader? All to often, every line acts as a pointer to images, action, and more, stored in *YOUR* mind. And without you there to clarify…

Look at the opening, not as the author, but as that reader who lacks all context you don’t supply or imply:

• A thunderous roar shook the very ground the wyvern stood on.

The “very” ground? Is that different from shaking the ground? And: “The wyvern?” you speak as if the reader can see it. And of more importance know what characteristics you intend for a mythical beast they may never have heard of. My point is that there’s a good chance that in response to this line the reader will say, “Huh?”

That confusion can be fixed if the next line clarifies. But it doesn’t. So as we move on the beast lives in your mind, but not the reader's.

• Trees rattled as it ran through the forest with a terrifying speed.

Wait…. Trees “rattled?” How in the hell can a tree rattle? There are no loose parts. Shake, yes, but not rattle. And of more importance, how can the beast be running when you just told the reader it was standing and the ground was moving? You might have seen it run off, but the reader still has it standing. And what happened to that roar? You mentioned it as if the reader knows what’s going on, but they don’t know anything and ae wondering why something so important that it's mentioned in the first line vanishes.

And why is a flying beast running? Makes no sense. And, what in the pluperfect hells is “terrifying speed.” I regularly go 75 miles per hour and I don’t find that terrifying. But that aside, to be terrifying there needs to be someone who is shocked, and observing it, or it’s not terrifying.

• Ravaging through the thick forest growth with ease, without a single trace of its momentum being seized by the vicious terrain.

Why do I care that in an unknown place a beast I know nothing about is tearing up the forest easily, for unknown reasons? If I don’t have context for what’s going on and why it matters, who cares?

In the first paragraph nothing happens. Instead, I get a lecture that makes no sense, on things I’ve not been made to care about. And to try to make that lecture more interesting you’re piling on superlatives like, ravaging, vicious terrain, tremendous power, etc. You’re close to purple prose, and trying to dress up the telling, but it only gets in the way.

As I said, you won’t see the problem, because you CAN hear the emotional delivery, and you perform as you read, something the reader can’t do.

Here’s the real problem: Because no one tells us different, we naturally assume that the term “writing,” that’s part of the profession Fiction-Writing refers to the report and essay-writing skills we worked so hard to master in school. But it doesn’t. What we pretty much all forget is that all professions are learned IN ADDITION to the general skills we’re given in school as they train us in the skills employers find useful. So we leave our school days exactly as qualified to write fiction as to captain a cruise ship. It's why the current rejection rate in the publisher/agent's office is 99.9%.

At the moment the writing skills you own are meant to report and explain, which is what you do here. But as E. L. Doctorow observed, “Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader. Not the fact that it’s raining, but the feeling of being rained upon.” At the moment you’re giving the weather report. And that’s what you need to fix.

The local library system’s fiction writing section can be a huge resource. Time spent there is time wisely invested. But as a shortcut, here’s a link to the best book on the nuts-and-bolts issues of creating scenes that sing to the reader that I’ve found: Dwight Swain’s, Techniques of the Selling Writer. It’s an older book, but I’ve found none better…or for the most part, close to it. Use the leftmost button to select the format your reader requires.
https://ru.b-ok2.org/book/2640776/e749ea

For a kind of preview, most of the writing articles in my WordPress blog (linked to at the bottom) are based on the techniques found in that book.

So… was this the kind of thing you were hoping for? No. Who would? But the problem isn’t related to your talent or potential, or how well you write. In fact, your wordsmith skills are better than most. It’s a matter of having the tools the pros take for granted. Remember, since the day you began to read you’ve been choosing fiction that was created with those professional skills. You won’t see the decision points or why the author did “this” and not “that.” But you see and expect the result of that, just as others expect it in your work. And that’s the best argument I know of for acquiring a bit of a writer’s education.

So dig in. You’ll probably spend a lot of time saying, “But why didn’t I see that. It’s so…it’s obvious. That’s fun till the tenth time, when you switch to, “What in the hell is wrong with me that I missed something that simple!” And you’ll love it when the protagonist becomes your co-writer.

So hang in there. And keep on writing.

Jay Greenstein
https://jaygreenstein.wordpress.com/category/the-craft-of-writing/the-grumpy-old-writing-coach/

[MantaStyle]

That's a very long review. Thank you for that I really appreciate it.

As to summarize what you had said:

1. I should try to make the words I put to make more sense to someone who doesn't know the story. I should make someone feel the emotion I feel when writing instead of telling them it. I'll definitely put a lot more time in seeing the story in a reader's eyes instead of mine.

2. A very pick consistency in the overall story which is something I am improving on. I tend to place my focus on inconsistencies rather than the smaller ones but having someone point it out does make me realize how much better I can make things to be.

I'll try to actively improve! Thanks this is just the type of comment I wanted to have. I will definitely try out all your suggestions and books and links.

[JayG]

The deal is that everything I mentioned as being a problem is the result of using the writing skills we're given in school in an attempt to write fiction. But they're nonfiction skills, meant to inform, and so, can't work when the goal is to make the reader feel. Continue to use them and no matter how hard you try, and no matter your intent, nonfiction skills will yield something that reads like nonfiction.

For all we know you're oozing talent from every pore. But talent is only potential—the ability to learn something more easily than most. A talented but untrained person has no advantage over one without talent. In the words of the great Ernest Hemingway: “It’s none of their business that you have to learn how to write. Let them think you were born that way.”

So pick up that book I recommended. It's free, and the best one I've found to date. After all, if you're not willing to devote a week or so to acquiring some of the tools of the profession, can you view yourself as a serious writer?

[DustyPegasus]

It saved my time. He said it all.

[Coyote Poetry]

Very good beginning. I liked the story line and the set-up of the story. I liked how you used the description, making the reader see the interactions and the surroundings of the characters. I wanted to read and know more. A very interesting start. I will keep reading.
Coyote

[MantaStyle]

I'm glad the chapter got you interested in the story! I'm new to making long stories so I try really hard to make every chapter worth reading because as a reader I dislike "throw away chapters" by that I mean chapters that can literally be ignored and the story wouldn't be any different.

[Coyote Poetry]

You did well. The story line and events. Kept my attention.