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gimme the GOD drat candy posted:world of cultivation is kind of notorious because of how the translator has a firm moral stance. said stance is that translation is objectively bad. so, he leaves as many words untranslated as possible. i find this impossibly funny, but it makes for a very unpleasant reading experience. How can you truly comprehend the cultural significance and importance of a young masters arrogant speech if the translator uses words you understand? Let ge show you the error of your ways!
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Jun 8, 2020 04:13
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Maguoob posted:How can you truly comprehend the cultural significance and importance of a young masters arrogant speech if the translator uses words you understand? Let ge show you the error of your ways! ling ling ling ling ling ling ling ling ling ling
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Jun 8, 2020 04:18
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StrixNebulosa posted:
I imagine china's strict censorship of media makes it hard for there to be many other publishers to go to.
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Jun 8, 2020 04:26
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IShallRiseAgain posted:I imagine china's strict censorship of media makes it hard for there to be many other publishers to go to. Well NovelUpdates lists "zongheng" as the original publisher for World of Cultivation and not Qidian/Webnovel. It looks like physical books are published by New World Press.
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Jun 8, 2020 04:35
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StrixNebulosa posted:I'm thinking of adding City of Sin and Martial World to the roster while I'm at it. I've also read Cradle v1+2 and really enjoyed them, but that was several years ago and I didn't know about webnovels at the time. If you're new to WNs and like xianxia, goon favorite Forge of Destiny isn't quite a WN (being CYOA played by forum post), but is probably relevant to you. There's probably a better way to read it than SV's forum but.
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Jun 8, 2020 05:01
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LibrarianCroaker posted:If you're new to WNs and like xianxia, goon favorite Forge of Destiny isn't quite a WN (being CYOA played by forum post), but is probably relevant to you. It's getting an edited version on royal road afaik I haven't read it yet but it's in the bookmarks
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Jun 8, 2020 05:07
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Maguoob posted:How can you truly comprehend the cultural significance and importance of a young masters arrogant speech if the translator uses words you understand? Let ge show you the error of your ways! you will be so fed up you will go out and learn Chinese instead so you never read a translation again! As according to keikaku!
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Jun 8, 2020 18:37
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I've been reading Plague Doctor on mtlnovel, and the automatic translation does a surprisingly good job. Most of the issues with MTL come from idioms and ambiguity, but it seems to do fine with detailed descriptions of autopsies and surgical procedures.
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Jun 8, 2020 18:52
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Speaking of keikaku, here's a weird thing: something about the prose in light novels - even ones with decent translations - is too awkward for me to read. I can do visual novels, jrpgs, even some japanese literaure but I just can't get through the LN/YA scene, even though I really like Overlord's anime. Compare/contrast with how I'm on chapter 27 of Renegade Immortal now and the prose just feels...easy? to read, where the story may not be great but who cares I'm devouring it like there's no tomorrow. I can tell it's awkward compared to reading proper english, but it's an awkwardness I grok.
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Jun 8, 2020 18:56
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StrixNebulosa posted:Speaking of keikaku, here's a weird thing: something about the prose in light novels - even ones with decent translations - is too awkward for me to read. I can do visual novels, jrpgs, even some japanese literaure but I just can't get through the LN/YA scene, even though I really like Overlord's anime. That will often have as much to do as the quality of translator as the original author. Some run it through machine translation, give it a brief look-over and shove it out the door. Others translate from the ground up and re-arrange things to make more sense. Some of the earlier stories I've read were done better but now it's becoming more popular there's more money involved to do quantity over quality. When you are finished with Renegade Immortal, go read 'A Will Eternal'. It's funny as hell and set in the same 'universe' as RI and a few of his other stories.
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Jun 8, 2020 19:36
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But seriously though, drop Renegade Immortal and read I Shall Seal the Heavens
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Jun 8, 2020 19:36
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Kalas posted:That will often have as much to do as the quality of translator as the original author. This is true - and also I've read enough light novels to know about the huge variety in translation quality. God bless baka-tsuki and its garbage tier translations. Silynt posted:But seriously though, drop Renegade Immortal and read I Shall Seal the Heavens No I'm invested in it now. I'm also planning to read Er Gen's works in chronological order, provided I enjoy them. e: wow. chapter 29 of Renegate Immortal and Wang Lin is an rear end in a top hat. I get that he wants to quit this job and cultivate only instead but being cruel is terrible. StrixNebulosa fucked around with this message at 21:08 on Jun 8, 2020 |
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Jun 8, 2020 20:57
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I wonder what a cultivation novel where everyone isn't a jerk, at best, would look like?
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Jun 8, 2020 22:24
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Forge of Destiny has a fairly pleasant cast.
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Jun 8, 2020 22:55
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LLSix posted:I wonder what a cultivation novel where everyone isn't a jerk, at best, would look like? How about a cultivation novel where arrogant young masters cultivate the Secret Art of Karen. How dare you block my path! I demand to speak to your Elder!
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Jun 8, 2020 23:11
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LLSix posted:I wonder what a cultivation novel where everyone isn't a jerk, at best, would look like? I'm currently reading Upgrade Specialist in Another World and the author seems to be aiming to break the regular conventions. The main character is upright and good, not interested in a harem, is not technically a reincarnation. He cheats the system like crazy though, some things never change. (only 50% of the cast are jerks, and usually end up dead for it)
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Jun 8, 2020 23:22
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i dropped that one when his follower, whose sole ambition was to take care of his hometown and wife, decided to stop doing that and ditch everything he cared about because otherwise the mc wouldn't have a follower any more.
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Jun 8, 2020 23:26
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If you want a fair and pragmatic murderhobo, look no further than Way of the Devil. It's gradually turned into the strange adventures of Lu Sheng plus he has a stable family he takes care of. Also he recently adopted an orphan girl in another dimension and he takes care of her too.quote:"How about this, you're an adult now. I'll allow you to go save the Golden Dragon Tribe every day after you're done with your harp practice. However, you must be back home by eleven. Okay?"
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Jun 8, 2020 23:54
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Jymmybob posted:If you want a fair and pragmatic murderhobo, look no further than Way of the Devil. It's gradually turned into the strange adventures of Lu Sheng plus he has a stable family he takes care of. Also he recently adopted an orphan girl in another dimension and he takes care of her too. People keep on recommending this, but I dropped it early on when he murdered his servants because they refused to stick around and get murdered by some unknown threat.
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Jun 9, 2020 00:10
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LLSix posted:I wonder what a cultivation novel where everyone isn't a jerk, at best, would look like? I think they'd all be foolish but ultimately goodnatured
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Jun 9, 2020 07:13
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LLSix posted:I wonder what a cultivation novel where everyone isn't a jerk, at best, would look like? Cultivation Chat Group, for the most part.
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Jun 9, 2020 15:56
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https://www.wuxiaworld.com/novel/immortal-devil-transformation/xmb-chapter-2quote:“You are extremely smart.” The elder gave Lin Xi another deep look, and then he shook his head. “Turns out you just read too many of those delusional immortal fantasy books.” 
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Jun 9, 2020 17:06
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Megazver posted:Cultivation Chat Group, for the most part. It seems that way at first, but most of the people turn out to be jerks. At least half of the problems in the story are caused by everyone in the group playing "pranks" on each other like launching them into space or stealing their identities. Artificer posted:Forge of Destiny has a fairly pleasant cast. I go back and forth on the morality of that cast a lot. The world has a lot of gray in it, but most people have a reason for acting the way they do. It's easy to forget because of the MC, but for example, Ling Qi's best friend goes out of her way to be generically terrifying to everyone around her, even if they're not looking at her. On a broader level, the Celestial Empire is aggressively xenophobic. There've been a couple of arcs this year that show how even the MC thinks of people outside the Empire as nonhuman and inherently inferior. On the other hand, Cai Renxiang tries very hard to create the best society for people at every level of influence and power and is willing to admit to making mistakes. I don't know. Maybe that is what a cultivation world where everyone isn't a jerk looks like.
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Jun 10, 2020 22:04
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LLSix posted:It seems that way at first, but most of the people turn out to be jerks. At least half of the problems in the story are caused by everyone in the group playing "pranks" on each other like launching them into space or stealing their identities. Pranks are fun, though.
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Jun 10, 2020 22:28
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LLSix posted:I don't know. Maybe that is what a cultivation world where everyone isn't a jerk looks like. Yeah, I think it partly is just a case of the nature of the cultivation; "Be careful what you discard along your Way" is a thing that has come up multiple times, and it seems to be pretty consistent that characters are more morally grey as you get farther up the cultivation scale less out of any actual change in morals and more just "you are more and more defined by your concept and less able to accommodate others even if you want to" - see Cai Shenhua accidentally nearly erasing her daughter's identity because she forgot to turn off for a second, Sima Jiao's figurative and literal loss of humanity as he commits more and more to his reforms (and later complete regret over same once his Way gets completely broken anyway), etc. I think barring the actual evil/corrupt characters everyone's trying to be a good person, they just have, uh, very different interpretations of what that means and/or ability to actually do so. Like, Bai Meizhen explicitly wants to be friendly and approachable like Ling Qi is! She just has all the general baggage of a Bai upbringing and the specific baggage of "her mother was assassinated because the other Bai were insufficiently terrified of her" to deal with. And that her idea of being friendly is "helps you to completely and utterly ruin the lives of your enemies before they can do the same to you." And that she considers no-holds barred fights involving poison acid baths and shaped mining charges to be an excellent romantic encounter (The fact she still has a more healthy romantic life than Ling Qi is not exactly proving her wrong). By her standards, she's doing a great job of being friendly!
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Jun 10, 2020 22:56
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the characters in ccg are regular jerks. what we call jerks in most cultivation wn's are actually murderous, rapacious bandits. that's the basic standard of conduct, too.
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Jun 10, 2020 23:02
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StrixNebulosa posted:On a happier note here's what I'm reading now. I got into the genre via nyaa's LP and now I can't stop reading 'em, they're great popcorn. Welcome to the wonderful world of xuanxia and cultivation novels, it's fantastic. Leave your reincarnation's memories at the door and enjoy the ride. First words on some of the ones you're reading: World of Cultivation: no opinion, never heard or read it. Grand of Demonic Cultivation: This is a yaoi novel. That said, the world building is fantastic and the characterizations are excellent. While I haven't finished it, my main gripe is a couple of the flashbacks are 3-5 chapters too long and had me lose interest pretty fast. One of the shorter novels on your list however to finish. Nine Star Hegemon Body Art: One of my top 3 novels I follow right now, amazing for both its ridiculousness and the characterizations. The 'woke up with memories of a god' thing is a bit of a trope but is executed pretty well in this novel and Long Chen is one of my favorite MCs. He gets good character development and the author does a good job at both foreshadowing plot and developing previous plot threads you might have thought dropped. Stick with it, you'll enjoy it a lot! Renegade Immortal: Put this novel down and start reading I Shall Seal the Heavens instead, or A Will Eternal. This is one of Er-Gen's earliest novels and it shows. City of Sin: Okay so full disclosure, this is a cultivation novel if the author decided gently caress Taoism, D&D is where its at. Perhaps due to the translators in part, one of the best written overarching plot I've seen in a long time, compelling MC and very very interesting world. Has some raunchy scenes that would put some harlequin novels to shame, you can skip these if you really want though. Would recommend. My own personal suggestions (some have been mentioned by others already): Divine Throne of Primordial Blood: Fantastic take of literally developing an entire system of cultivation, with the MC as the crazed scientific researcher founder. A+++, incredibly unique MC and premise that is extremely well executed. Read this now. Heaven's Devourer: I heard you like the Monkey King, Sun Wukong? What if he was in a xuanxia cultivation world and left behind an immortal legacy that cast out prince Wu Yu becomes the recipient of. Another of my favorite MCs, also excellent character development with some pretty interesting moral choices presented to him, as well as great world building. Has my favorite one liner in any novel from the east or west ever. Emperor's Domination: Full Disclosure: don't read this novel. If you were mildly annoyed at Nine Star Hedgemon Body Art's MC suddenly waking up with magical power memories? Long Chen has nothing on Li Qiye. The premise is interesting, but unfortunately the first arc is repeated again and again and again and- you get the idea. Only actually breaks the repetition at chapter 2500 or so, this novel is the literal definition of enjoying the journey and not the destination. A lot of the chapters are filler or the worst part of the genre- people pointing at gasping about thing that's so totally powerful whoa I've only heard stories of it allow them to talk at length about it! Pretty much just about the power fantasy of already being a super ultra giga bad-rear end that everyone walks up to kick the shin of foolishly because they've never seen you before and you have no backing. Also I'd like to hear others opinions on Heaven's Devourer and Nine Star Hedgemon Body Art! When I like something I generally have a hard time seeing faults, though I will admit that the author of Heaven's Devourer made some... interesting choices to progress the plot in arcs. Evil Kit fucked around with this message at 23:39 on Jun 10, 2020 |
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Jun 10, 2020 23:32
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Thanks for the recs! I have to be repetitive again though - I'm now 45 chapters into Renegade Immortal and loving it. I will not stop now!
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Jun 10, 2020 23:42
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StrixNebulosa posted:Thanks for the recs! I have to be repetitive again though - I'm now 45 chapters into Renegade Immortal and loving it. I will not stop now! Biggest thing for this genre is if you love it, read it. I enjoy the act of reading so for the most part even Emperor's Domination is enjoyable for me (though I needed to take breaks occasionally), but there are def some that you just can't put down till it's done or you've caught up with the translator. That said I recommend finding another 1-2 other novels you really like so you can rotate through them to avoid burn out on any one novel. It helps a lot more than you'd think!
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Jun 10, 2020 23:46
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SaffronKit posted:Biggest thing for this genre is if you love it, read it. I enjoy the act of reading so for the most part even Emperor's Domination is enjoyable for me (though I needed to take breaks occasionally), but there are def some that you just can't put down till it's done or you've caught up with the translator. That said I recommend finding another 1-2 other novels you really like so you can rotate through them to avoid burn out on any one novel. It helps a lot more than you'd think! Yup! My full rotation now that I've added two more is: City of Sin: I know you just recced this but I started it several days ago and I'm on chapter 5 now. I love the western feel of it! And the prologue was surprisingly emotional. Immortal Devil Transformation: Four chapters in, still on the fence with this one. I'm enjoying the isekai/xianxia mashup - dead college student now in not-China, and he can use time turner powers - but I'm still so early in that it's hard to gauge. I'm plowing along with everything - I have a full order to my reading daily now. Stick all the bookmarks in my top bar, open and delete them in the morning, and read a chapter (or more) of everything and slowly rebookmark everything. Repeat daily until I finish or drop something. So far I've stuck to it, and even zoomed ahead in World of Cultivation and Renegade Immortal.
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Jun 10, 2020 23:55
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StrixNebulosa posted:Yup! My full rotation now that I've added two more is: You have way more self control than I, I get lost for entire days binge reading. Best of luck, enjoy the rides! Protip if you log into wuxiaworld (you can use a google account if you want), it auto bookmarks to whatever chapter you've read up to. Much less work!
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Jun 11, 2020 00:10
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SaffronKit posted:You have way more self control than I, I get lost for entire days binge reading. Best of luck, enjoy the rides! Self-control? Ehhh. This is how I read books normally - sitting next to me are: - Hundred Years War: Trial by Battle - Implied Spaces by Walter Jon Williams - Anita Blake... 6? 6. Werewolf drama love triangle murder goodness. - Compass Rose by Gail Dayton - Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, a fantastic travel book - and loads more! always be reading. So it works out to I read paper books when the lights are on, and xianxia books when my folks are watching tv and the lights are off.
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Jun 11, 2020 00:18
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SaffronKit posted:World of Cultivation: no opinion, never heard or read it. I have mixed feelings on WoC. The bad: The translator just straight up refuses to translate a pile of key terms, and it's really annoying, at least for the first few chapters. TBF after 5 or so chapters the terms got stuck in my head and it was fine, but still. Utterly pointless added difficulty for readers. Also, the ending is really, really, rushed. The author literally sums up the second half of the final arc in 2-3 chapters. The good: Except for the ending, it is an enjoyable novel overall. The author does a good job of making a living world, with constantly growing characters and factions. One of the biggest weaknesses I've noticed in cultivation novels is their worlds tend to be static, almost like a video game. The MC gets stronger and stronger, while all the people and organizations around them essentially have a set power level, and get forgotten by the time the MC moves on to the next arc. They also have a bit of the DBZ problem where there's the Strong MC, and all his allies are glorified cheerleaders. WoC does a really good job of having the world keep pace with the MC. His friends and teammates (and enemies) all grow along side him, keeping up as he moves forward in the world. The major factions also change and adapt as the world changes too.
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Jun 11, 2020 02:03
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Also you can't skip on mentioning how World of Cultivation has spent at least 25 chapters focused on farming of all things. Our hero starts off with a motivation to get better at growing crops, and while he's beginning to seek power for other reasons, farming is still the key.
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Jun 11, 2020 02:07
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fyigimme the GOD drat candy posted:emperor's domination is a very repetitive story. the mc pops in, feigns weakness while making ridiculous baseless statements about how awesome he is in public, and then is immediately loathed by most people. except, all that bragging was true and he's functionally omniscient and omnipotent. on the rare occasions his personal power level is behind the curve, he borrows some from whatever mystical doohickey is nearby. so then he starts gleefully murdering all the people he baited into attacking him, with no benefit to be had aside from his own enjoyment.
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Jun 11, 2020 02:38
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I think I gave up somewhere abit before 2000 chapters on Emperor's Domination. It was entertaining watching Li Qiye curb stomping everyone simply because he's literally been-there-done-that throughout all of history, but the cycle just kept repeating itself with more powerful people involved. Li Qiye so far has been the smuggest bastard in any xianxia series I've read.
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Jun 11, 2020 04:51
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StrixNebulosa posted:Also you can't skip on mentioning how World of Cultivation has spent at least 25 chapters focused on farming of all things. Our hero starts off with a motivation to get better at growing crops, and while he's beginning to seek power for other reasons, farming is still the key. Fields of Gold is a reincarnation story where the protag has a magic stone from a xianxia setting in what is otherwise an extremely normal historical setting which she uses in her constant quest as a peasant girl to not starve by growing better crops or healing ordinary wounds. Beware, her other superpower is being a good cook and there are very detailed descriptions of delicious food
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Jun 11, 2020 06:03
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So hey you know those xianxia WNs where the protagonist is terribly wronged, reincarnates and sets out to get revenge~~? You know, that one specific scenario which I swear I've seen done like half a dozen times at this point? Does anyone have one where the protagonist has a female friend? Like, one? A single female friend? Not a mentor or a younger sibling or a background character who exclaims breathlessly when she does something cool? A friend. An equal. An ally. I will settle for a respected rival or frenemy. Anything. Help me out here. I'm reading the Demoness' Art of Vengeance at the moment and it's killing me. e: atelier morgan posted:Fields of Gold is a reincarnation story where the protag has a magic stone from a xianxia setting in what is otherwise an extremely normal historical setting which she uses in her constant quest as a peasant girl to not starve by growing better crops or healing ordinary wounds. Maybe this will suit, idk.
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Jun 11, 2020 15:21
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KOGAHAZAN!! posted:So hey you know those xianxia WNs where the protagonist is terribly wronged, reincarnates and sets out to get revenge~~? You know, that one specific scenario which I swear I've seen done like half a dozen times at this point? Lot of females in Forge of Destiny. The cultivation CYOA game I am running here has a bunch of girls in it too. More now than at the start, though. Notably, both have female protagonists. Ummm, I guess Mother of Learning with... Taiven(spelling?) might fit the bill? I don’t know if you’ve read Katalepsis, it’s not a cultivation story but it has a female friend. Also a female protagonist. I can’t think of any translated ones that do. Everything I listed was written in English. I can probably think of a couple other English web serials if you want? LLSix fucked around with this message at 15:46 on Jun 11, 2020 |
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Jun 11, 2020 15:43
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I think they're specifically looking for xianxia and/or revenge do-over ones? The one I read and posted about just now in the wholesome isekai thread is one of those, although I was kinda bored because of all the "second son/eleventyeth prince" poo poo that all of these seem to do. I don't know if this is where they're going with it but I suspect that the character they just introduced 90 chapters in might be such a friend, because while the main character is a do-overer, the new character that befriends her appears to be an actual isekai protagonist (which is funny, because everything to that point was fairly mundane and more about internal politics). She was only just introduced so I can't say for sure, but if we're going to see the time looper and the outworlder hang out, I'm hoping it will be the kind of friendship you're describing.
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Jun 11, 2020 16:05
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