The Boy With No Leg

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Erother
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Joined: Tue Apr 01, 2014 11:23 pm

The Boy With No Leg

Post by Erother »

Blaring noise, surronding me, was there some kind of nuclear attack? Maybe dinosaurs? Blearly eyed I desperatly look around for the source of panic, only managing to disturb my nest of blankets and old clothes. Unable to free anything but a hand I bash anything remotly anything shaped.

Suddenly, silence....

It was only my alarm clock's evil screams that disturbed me in my peaceful slumber... It now lays vanquished on the floor, never to torment a soul again. However there is sadness in a loss of this evil doer because now i have no way of getting up on time... I also have no idea of how late I am, it's never "How much time until class starts?" It's, "What period is it?" or more commonly spoken in the morning, "What day is it?" I now am left with the task of unraveling myself from the spider web I call my bed as I awkawrdly worm myself out. Finally with my prision broken, I set to the task of dressing a boy with only one leg.

This boy is me, how I lost my leg will be told in due time for the sake of pacing in this so for, mellow dramatic story. I first must bath myself then perform other hygenics and then finally put on that bear trap I call a leg then finally get dressed, all the while hopping around like a moronic penguin. After all this I gracefully stumble out the door, ramen cup in hand walking towards the school building where hopefully i haven't missed much.

On school grounds it remains almost perferctly silent, with no noise to be heard with the expection of the squeaking and squaking of a boy's metalic friend and his quiet slurping of Crab flavored ramen, which have been boiled to perfection in their steroform house. But as all things are fleeting, like body limbs for example, this silence was broken by a particularly annyonying classmate yelling from an impossible distance only to be heard clear as day.

"YOSHIO-SAN WHY AREN'T YOU IN CLASS?" Echoing all across campus. Simply deciding that it would impossible to respond from this distance I simply keep walking towards the source of noise, much to my displeasure but I suppose a lecturing from a teacher would be worse than endearing this yelling, slightly.
As the metallic doors make head for the arrival of a tardy student, the thundering of a distant student can be heared, which floor the student was on, remained a mystery to anyone who dared ponder the question.

Suddenly, with the malice and noise of a steaming train, a slightly taller than average student appeared, threating to trample anyone who dared cross her path. Her destination? Myself with the purpose of disposing of my life. Simply assuming she would at least slow down when nearing her target I simply wander off to the vending machine nearest to me and purchase myself a drink as a small reward for being in the school building before noon, almost.

How wrong I was.... Instead of slowing down or trying to move out of the way, the Steam Train decided that speeding up was the only logical option. Hit with the force of a jackhammer, I slammed into the wall. As I try to scream out for mercy, I am only met with a groan of oxygen leaving my body. Deciding that ecsape is the only option left now, i crawl on all threes, waddling towards the nearest classroom, at least hoping someone will be able to testify for my murder.

No such luck as I am dragged off the floor and put on my feet along with protest of my metal friend.

"Yoshio, most people, when they see a mad woman running, get out of the way... Therefore this is your fault, wimp."

My fault?

"Most PEOPLE.... don't run in the hallways and possibly endanger student's lives... though as I can't expect as much from the Steam Train, can I?"

This response is greeted with a hefty kick to the stomach and much too angry pyschopath blocking way.

"Don't call me Steam Train, my name is Masako and you know it."

"Okay Masako-sama, I dee-"

Pain shoots through my entire body, I can't feel anything, oxygen refuses to enter my body, I feel like just collasping on the floor. I think Masako-san is saying something, but I have no idea, the pain is just too much... finally when the pain ends and my mind works again, I feel myself being lifted upwards.

"Come on, let's get you to class."

And with that, a boy with only a leg goes to Physics with a girl with only an arm.

*Author Note*
Hello everyone! This is my post and fan fiction on the Katawa Shoujo Forums!! YAY!! I hope you enjoyed my writing, feel free to point any mispellings and just in general, helpful cricitism. I'm not very well versed in Japenese traditions so I'm not sure if two friends calling each other by the first name implies romantic relationship or not. To clarify, they, as of right now, have not confessed any feelings to each other or started dating... KK? I'm going to wait until making another segment of this to see how it does. I do not have plans of ditching this but I have a feeling my style of writing for this will change over time. Feel free to leave suggestions or whatever, I just hope that this won't complety suck for everyone because of my horrible spelling.
Silentcook
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Re: The Boy With No Leg

Post by Silentcook »

Since you're not well-versed in Japenese (sic) traditions I'd advise you to let all the honorifics go.
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Mirage_GSM
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Re: The Boy With No Leg

Post by Mirage_GSM »

Well... I sure hope your writing style will change (i.e. improve) over time, because right now it is quite atrocious.

As for your question, no, calling each other by the first name doesn't imply a romantic relationship in Japan, but you should heed SC's advice anyway. If you're unfamilliar with how honorifics are used, you'll make quite a lot of blunders when it comes to people other than your two lovebirds as well.

Pointing out every misspelling would necessitating quoting almost the entire chapter, so I suggest getting a proofreader.

The most useful suggestion I can think of is this:

Cut back on those metaphors!

Hard.

You hardly ever say anything directly. There's no bed, there's a "nest of blankets." The alarm clock doesn't ring, it "screams evilly." It is not broken, it is "vanquished." Then suddenly the bed is a "spider's web", then a "prison." He's ot dressing himself, he's dressing " a boy with only one leg" ...

And that's only the first two paragraphs! I almost stopped reading right there.

It's okay to use something like that once in a while, but the way you're doing it, it seems like you're desperately try to be funny.

It's not funny. For the reader it is annoying and most of all strenuous. If your reader constantly has to translate every sentence fragment back to understandable English in his head, they will never get into the "flow", instead rereading parts of sentences over and over again.
Emi > Misha > Hanako > Lilly > Rin > Shizune

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TheGoatman
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Re: The Boy With No Leg

Post by TheGoatman »

Erother wrote:Blaring noise, surrounding me, was there some kind of nuclear attack? Maybe dinosaurs? Bleary eyed I desperately look around for the source of panic, only managing to disturb my nest of blankets and old clothes. Unable to free anything but a hand I bash anything remotely anything shaped.| Wat

Suddenly, silence....

It was only my alarm clock's evil screams that disturbed me in my peaceful slumber... It now lays vanquished on the floor, never to torment a soul again.| Being overly dramatic here, by alot However there is sadness in a loss of this evil doer because now i have no way of getting up on time... I also have no idea of how late I am, it's never "How much time until class starts?" It's, "What period is it?" or more commonly spoken in the morning, "What day is it?" I now am left with the task of unraveling myself from the spider web I call my bed as I awkwardly worm myself out. Finally with my prison broken, I set to the task of dressing a boy with only one leg.

This boy is me, how I lost my leg will be told in due time for the sake of pacing in this so for, mellow dramatic story.| Don't do this. Ever. I first must bath myself then perform other daily hygiene basicsI'm not entirely sure if Hygienics is even a word and then finally put on that bear trap I call a leg then finally get dressed, all the while hopping around like a moronic penguin. After all this I gracefully stumble out the door, ramen cup in hand walking towards the school building where hopefully i haven't missed much.

On school grounds it remains almost perfectly silent, with no noise to be heard with the exception of the squeaking and squeaking of a boy's metallic friend and his quiet slurping of Crab flavored ramen, which have been boiled to perfection in their styrofoam house. But as all things are fleeting, like body limbs for example, this silence was broken by a particularly annoying classmate yelling from an impossible distance only to be heard clear as day.

"YOSHIO-SANDon't do this either. WHY AREN'T YOU IN CLASS?" Echoing all across campus. Simply deciding that it would impossible to respond from this distance I simply keep walking towards the source of noise, much to my displeasure but I suppose a lecturing from a teacher would be worse than endearing this yelling, slightly.
As the metallic doors make head for the arrival of a tardy student, the thundering of a distant student can be heard, which floor the student was on, remained a mystery to anyone who dared ponder the question.

Suddenly, with the malice and noise of a steaming train, a slightly taller than average student appeared, threatening to trample anyone who dared cross her path. Her destination? Myself with the purpose of disposing of my life. Simply assuming she would at least slow down when nearing her target I simply wander off to the vending machine nearest to me and purchase myself a drink as a small reward for being in the school building before noon, almost.

How wrong I was.... Instead of slowing down or trying to move out of the way, the Steam Train decided that speeding up was the only logical option. Hit with the force of a jackhammer, I slammed into the wall. As I try to scream out for mercy, I am only met with a groan of oxygen leaving my body. Deciding that escape is the only option left now, i crawl on all threes, waddling towards the nearest classroom, at least hoping someone will be able to testify for my murder.

No such luck as I am dragged off the floor and put on my feet along with protest of my metal friend.

"Yoshio, most people, when they see a mad woman running, get out of the way... Therefore this is your fault, wimp."

My fault?

"Most PEOPLE.... don't run in the hallways and possibly endanger student's lives... though as I can't expect as much from the Steam Train, can I?"

This response is greeted with a hefty kick to the stomach and much too angry psychopath blocking way.

"Don't call me Steam Train, my name is Masako and you know it."

"Okay Masako-samaSeriously, please stop, I dee-"

Pain shoots through my entire body, I can't feel anything, oxygen refuses to enter my body, I feel like just collapsing on the floor. I think Masako-san is saying something, but I have no idea, the pain is just too much... finally when the pain ends and my mind works again, I feel myself being lifted upwards.He's missing a leg, what caused this? Details matter, this sounds almost like Hisao but Hisao has a heart condition while the main character seems to only be missing a leg(Emi will tell you how little that matters in the long run(pun not intended)

"Come on, let's get you to class."

And with that, a boy with only a leg goes to Physics with a girl with only an arm.

*Author Note*
Hello everyone! This is my post and fan fiction on the Katawa Shoujo Forums!! YAY!! I hope you enjoyed my writing, feel free to point any misspellings and just in general, helpful criticism. I'm not very well versed in Japenese traditionsI can see that, if you're not well versed in them, don't do them please, it lowers the quality so I'm not sure if two friends calling each other by the first name implies romantic relationship or not. To clarify, they, as of right now, have not confessed any feelings to each other or started dating... KK? I'm going to wait until making another segment of this to see how it does. I do not have plans of ditching this but I have a feeling my style of writing for this will change over time. Feel free to leave suggestions or whatever, I just hope that this won't completely suck for everyone because of my horrible spelling.

*Work on spelling, it's useful to have in life overall and it's pretty much needed to make a story look good, a miss here and there isn't going to ruin the story, but when it gets really noticeable, it's nearly impossible to take the story seriously

*Metaphors/Simile/w.e Cut back on these, in fact, just to be safe, cut them out altogether, one here and there is nice to add flavor, but you can't write a story with just metaphors

*Honorifics/w.e Don't do those, I don't think anyone on these forums does those and they aren't really needed, or wanted for that matter, between that and the spelling I'm left wondering if this was a late april fools joke

*Rough draft, it looks like you typed this story out directly into the forum when you started the thread, and just hit submit without even checking through it, while I don't think having a rough draft, then rewriting the entire thing for a final draft is needed, you should at least check the story before posting it, the longer the segment your submitting, the more you want to check over it. The fewer mistakes, the better, if you plan on writing long stories(or continuing at all) try to find a proofreader to help you.

*Fourth wall breaking. Never do that again. It's very difficult to pull that off without ruining the story, and most people that have tried have also failed, it's best left to certain "odd" type side characters, and even then it's better to simply leave it alone.

That's all for now, if you keep writing after this, then good luck! If not, then thanks for coming anyways!
I'm just a rusty old goat and a poor writer by anyone's standards, so no need to take my advice to heart, and when you do, take a handful of salt with it.
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brythain
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Re: The Boy With No Leg

Post by brythain »

I agree to some extent with the previous posters. Here are some further observations.

1) You can indeed use Japanese honorifics and suchlike. But you should at least do some research first, get a feel for them. Here's a good start: [External Link]

2) It's ok to use metaphors and imagery if you are confident that these things mean something specific—that you're using them to express a particular idea in your head which won't come across weird or wrong in text mode.

3) It is bad to make mistakes that are easily rectified: use a spell-checker (turn your software one on) and a grammar-checker if you aren't a natural editor. Many people are non-native English users and somehow come across as more careful than some native English users. For example, because some English users pronounce 'their', 'there' and 'they're' the same way, they're sometimes capable of mixing their spelling up here and there. So read the text with your eyes, not just your ears. (Edit: as advised by someone else, if you can't rectify easy mistakes, you had better practice a lot first; work at it till you're better.)

4) It's very educational to read everyone else's stuff. Don't do this if you're easily influenced, but there are some brilliant writers here that I've learnt a lot from, in terms of pacing, dialogue, characterisation and style.

All the best!
Post-Yamaku, what happens? After The Dream is a mosaic that follows everyone to the (sometimes) bitter end.
Main Index (Complete)Shizune/Lilly/Emi/Hanako/Rin/Misha + Miki + Natsume
Secondary Arcs: Rika/Mutou/AkiraHideaki | Others (WIP): Straw—A Dream of SuzuSakura—The Kenji Saga.
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Oddball
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Re: The Boy With No Leg

Post by Oddball »

The breaking the fourth wall stuff almost threw me out of the story right then and there.

Also your opening line and the bits about vanquishing the evil alarm gives me the impression of a character who's grip on reality is about right up there with Kenji's. That could make for an interesting story, but it's probably not what you're going for.
1) You can indeed use Japanese honorifics and suchlike.
You can, but you probably shouldn't.

One of the problems with that is we all understand that the characters are speaking Japanese but their words are being translated into English for us. However using terms and phrases like that gives the impression of a not-completely translated work and it makes you look like a massive anime geek/Japaonophile/otaku/weeaboo/Wapanese/insert insult of choice here.
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Erother
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Re: The Boy With No Leg

Post by Erother »

Hello, I think. Thank you for all the advice, the most common of the being that I use a lot of fucking metaphors, and I realize this is a bad flaw of mine. I mostly use metaphors to make for my limited english. Well I'm almost fluent in it, but I still have trouble any higher level words. So in exchange I use metaphors to add to the details but I carried away very easily so I'm trying to fix that. I don't think I'll keep writing this, because if the beggining was terrible, (at least from my impressions) I think even if my writing did improve, you would still have a negative opinion of the story because of this. (Example, Guilty Crown.) I'll maybe try writing a story again in the future, (maybe, possibly) I'll have to study up on my english some more and just in general learn to be a better writer. I appericate the fact the no one just commented, "Your writing sucks ass, kill yourself."
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Mirage_GSM
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Re: The Boy With No Leg

Post by Mirage_GSM »

Erother wrote: but I still have trouble any higher level words. So in exchange I use metaphors to add to the details but I carried away very easily so I'm trying to fix that.
In that case it's interesting that you mainly seem to replace simple words with more difficult ones - see the examples I mentioned above...
Emi > Misha > Hanako > Lilly > Rin > Shizune

My collected KS-Fan Fictions: Mirage's Myths
griffon8 wrote:Kosher, just because sex is your answer to everything doesn't mean that sex is the answer to everything.
Sore wa himitsu desu.
Erother
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Re: The Boy With No Leg

Post by Erother »

It should be noted that pretty much everything but some very basic english, was taught to me through books through out high school. While some of them were desgined to help learn english as a second lanuage, most were just stories and weren't meant to teach English but they helped nonethless. However due to the fact that the books I read used metaphors for pretty much everything, I learned to speak english that way too. So when I say I have trouble using higher level words, I mean that I have a hard time using them in their correct position so they make a logical amount of sense. I probably should've been more speific when I said that, sorry about that.
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GodlyVirus
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Re: The Boy With No Leg

Post by GodlyVirus »

It should be noted that while I somewhat enjoyed your story, I thought it had a LOT of problems, like tons. BUT I didn't regret reading this, it had its moments, all... one of them. I hope you make something in the near future, just... less metaphors
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