The beginning

The story is told in a second person point of view as to immerse the reader within the story. The main character is also the reader. It starts on the planet earth with the development of the MC.

In the year 1517, inside the village of Calhoun. You and your family were living in a farm working 18 hours a day. This involved tending to animals, to the land, and crop management.

Starting early morning, your dad calls you “ (Son/Daughter) wake up, help me with the farm and the animals”. You quickly get up and change and while running downstairs shout “yes dad, i’m coming.". Since you are still a young 7 year old kid, your dad only gives you some basic handiwork such as harvesting, tending to the animals and cleaning.

As you are harvesting crops, the scythe slipped a bit too far and accidentally damaged other crops that weren't ready to be taken. Your father sees this from the back of his eye, his face grows red with anger and shouts “WHAT DID YOU DO?! I TOLD YOU TO BE CAREFUL!! GO BACK INSIDE!!”. Tears roll down your eyes and won't stop, you mumble back “ I’m sorry dad, it was an accident I won't make that mistake again, i promise.”. His face flushed with rage as he points at you shouting “I TOLD YOU TO GO INSIDE!!!”. Everytime you made a mistake, this would happen but this was the last straw. You clear the tears from your eyes, take the closest thing that resembled a weapon and charged at your father will all your might while shouting “YAAHHH!!!!!”. He stops you dead in your tracks with his hand, you could feel the anger through his body as you looked up at his face resembling an angry demon. Out of nowhere, your dad starts laughing and before his slap hits you right in the face, you whisper "sorry…" and pass out from the pain.

You wake up inside the house in your room, the first thing that hits you is the smell of insert food here which reminds you of happy memories and all your troubles fade away. Running towards the smell in the kitchen, your mother greets you with a big smile and says "You have finally awoken dear, I made your favourite food. Dig in". Without a second thought, you eat like there is no tomorrow and before you know it there's nothing left. Using the special technique Puppy Eyes, you ask for seconds. How could a mother resist that, so she gave whatever was left all while keeping that innocent smile that filled you with joy. From that moment onwards, you knew you wanted to protect that smile forever. This would enable you to overcome your biggest fear, your dad.

The next day, you seek a mentor within your village that could teach you how to fight. Knocking on everyone's door, one by one. Everyone shakes their head and closes the door but one. It's an old woman, she leaves the door open as she walks back inside, you are intrigued by her and follow her in. As you enter, the door slowly creaks and closes behind you. Your instincts start to kick in and enter fight or flight mode. A light suddenly turns on and the lady appears in front of you. Shocked by what just happened, you jump back. "Scared already? Maybe you aren't worth teaching after all" she says while sitting down. After regaining your composure, you reply with enthusiasm "I want to learn how to fight, I won't be scared anymore!". She sighs in disbelief and answers "Come here every morning at 5 am to prove it, if you can do that for 2 weeks then I will teach you. Now go away, I have some sleeping to do". You obey and return home impatiently waiting what will happen the next morning.

At 5 am, you sneak out of the house to go towards the old woman's house. The door is open, so you enter while shouting "I'm here and ready" but no answer. You go further into the house, hearing only the creaks from the old floorboards. Feeling a tingly sensation down your back, you turn around to find the old woman dead on the ground. Your jaw drops, your heart pounds so fast that you can't breathe, you drop to your knees and cry while screaming in fear. Once again the light turns on behind you, the old woman laughing at what she sees. Sits down and says "Come back tomorrow, same time". You couldn't believe your eyes, you felt lost and mumbled "whattt is happe…", she interrupts you "if you finish that question, there will be no teaching. Now go home". Mortified about what just happened, you return with a horrified look on your face. However, you couldn't show this to your parents as they would be worried and ask questions. So you hid the face as best you could before you got to your room.

Every morning, you would be traumatised by something different, yet determined to finish you carried on to the 2 weeks were over. There was never a chance to ask questions as she would interrupt each time. On the last day, there was nothing there to scare you. This didn't stop you from being on your guard at all times. The woman smiles and asks one question that would determine whether you were worthy or not "So, what did you learn from these 2 weeks?". You think deeply about the question and answer "I learnt to keep my guard up at all times and to face my fears". Still not pleased by your answers, you continue "I learnt not to be deceived by the first thing I see". She starts to acknowledge and finally replies "You have learnt a great deal but there was one important lesson that you didn't figure out. Do you know why I didn't let you ask any questions?". You realise that if you had received answers to your questions, you never would have come back thinking it was only a prank. As you expected something to happen each time, you grew to understand that you had to overcome the fear of the unexpected. This is exactly what you told her and she nods her head with a smile. "My name is Anna (temp name) and I will be your teacher from now on. I have only one rule, don't question my methods".

Author's Note

This chapter is incomplete.

Please give feedback on what you think of the story, dialogue and is there too much repetitiveness. What could be improved/changed

Reviews

[JayG]

Okay, keep telling yourself that you did ask...

First, the "person" and te4nse you tell the story in has no effect on how real it seems to the reader. If it did, all stories would be written in it. So all you do here is guarantee a rejection before the end of paragraph one. And I say that as someone who owned a manuscript critiquing service, not as personal opinion.

Next, and of the most importance, you're "telling the reader a story." That, too is an immediate rejection, though the reason isn't obvious. What you missed, and what most people miss, is that telling a story is a performance art. How you tell the story—your performance—matters as much as what you say. In person, your tone, the changes in intensity and cadence, body-language and other visuals—like gesture and expression—are critical to making the reader know the emotion within the story. But none of that makes it to the page. Your reader can't know what a line will say until after it's read. And by then it's too late to read it with the proper emotion. Have the computer read the posted section aloud and you'll hear what a reader gets.

And in any case, the reader isn't hoping to learn what's happening in the story. That's a nonfiction technique, and only informs. Your reader wants to be made to feel as if they're living the story moment-by-moment, AS the protagonist. And that's where the immersion you were hoping to achieve with second person comes in.

You have the right idea, but because no one in our school years told us that fiction has its own set of professional skills, skills not taught as part of our school days, you made a common mistake. As Mark Twain said, “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”

And that's what you need to fix, those areas of "just ain't so." Your local library's fiction writing section is a great place to begin.