Web novel in progress - YOUKAI MOKUSHI (feedback wanted) [UPDATED]

GanjiMEX said:
can't judge much since it's a single chapter, but it has nice world building and rie seems like an interesting character. i like it, but for myself giving an opinion i'd need 4 or 6 chapters to give my proper thoughs

8/10, if this is your first time writing something it's good. keep it up, perhaps this will get a LN version lol

Partyu said:
You should double-check when using words that may or may not need hyphens. (e.g. well-maintained, in fact)

Partyu said:
Try to describe and establish appearances more thoroughly, instead of just using words like "samurai-looking." Rie's "long, open black cardigan" and other details about her should also be described earlier in her introduction, so that the reader gets a good grasp of what she looks like. Same for the other characters and the locations.

Partyu said:
Instead of always using dialogue tags (e.g. said, cried, groaned, called out, began) to cap off sentences with dialogue, it might be better to just simply describe what the character is doing, or their facial expressions/body language. This adds description and prevents your sentence structure from becoming repetitive - not every sentence featuring dialogue needs to describe how the character is talking. Plus it's easy to run out of unique dialogue tags really fast lol.

Partyu said:
Quotations within quotations should be in single quotation marks. (e.g. 'Four Divine Kings')

Partyu said:
Onomatopoeia shouldn't be in quotations unless a character is making that sound. If you use onomatopoeia, it should probably be italicized and/or placed in its own paragraph. But it might be better to just describe the object that is making the sound and/or how it is making it. Same for signs - you can describe the material they're printed on, the size of the font, the wear and tear, what they're placed/taped/nailed on, stuff that will help ground the text in the setting.

Partyu said:
Atarashii Jigoku kind of threw me off as a city name. Maybe Shin Jigoku instead? To me it feels like the difference between new York and New York, if that makes sense. But take this with a grain of salt lol

Partyu said:
Hairdresser oni is a cute idea and I always appreciate scissors being used as weapons

Kii_Ibarra said:
I've always had trouble with hyphens, honestly. My English teacher always used to tell me I used too many, so I dialed it back. Perhaps now I've dialed it back a bit too much? Lol

Kii_Ibarra said:
You might be right, but I kind of wanted to avoid using "Shin Jigoku" since that's already the name of a location in Touhou Project, which is a series that heavily inspired YOUKAI MOKUSHIROKU.

Kuroni_Kuru said:
My main issue is with the formatting, although as you explained at the start of the post that's probably just because it was copypasted from Word. Other than that I only have minor nitpicks, most of which Partyu already mentioned.

Kuroni_Kuru said:
The writing style itself is rather unique (I personally like the omission of detail, it leaves more to the readers' imagination).

Kuroni_Kuru said:
I also love how every character's name seems to be a pun. (I'd be very surprised is Rie Satou isn't a satori, LOL.)

Kuroni_Kuru said:
If you're looking for suggestions, then I'd maybe suggest changing You's name to Gen/Gendou/etc. (as a play off "ningen"), although I assume there's probably a pun in "You Tachibana" that I'm just not seeing... I'm guessing he's called You because the story is written in the first person, in which case may I suggest changing it to "Yuu"? LOL.

Kuroni_Kuru said:
I'm not really sure what else to add. Uh... Rie best girl?

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Tachibana doesn't really feel that surprised of what's happening, This random girl knows information about him, Another girl tried to throw scissors at his forehead and they're both fighting this guy with a fish tail and a long mustache trying to cut his mustache.
The readers are in Tachibana's shoes, They don't know what's going on, I think making him more surprised or confused would be more appropriate, Right now he feels like he deals with these situations on the daily.

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Also, I hope the fact that his name is You doesn't confuse people, I think it could make for some interesting double meanings tho, Like in foreshadowing or something.

Nalusa_Falaya said:
I think the fact that he's looking for youkai is pretty unique, In many Isekai, fantasy
or supernatural shows, The MC's just thrown into the mix without him caring, Tachibana wants to be thrown into the mix tho, He seems enthusiastic and curious to know more about Rie and Kii

This is pretty intriguing ngl, I want to know more about the world, I want to know more about Tachibana, I want to see the correlation of the oni and samurai fight to the story

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Edit: I second Partyu's point on describing appearances

Iciyx said:
I'm not very adept with writing n such so think of me as an average reader. I will start by saying that the story and ideas are great. The subtilty of the way some details are introduced is very good. I think generally this is a good read.

Iciyx said:
I did find a few things confusing though... for example in the prologue of this chapter, when the girls' arm gets chopped off I feel like her emotion isn't relayed well enough. The situation seemed chaotic for her with utter shock, yet she somewhat calmly says: "My arm!?" instead of
MY ARM!! A simple change like this would've kept me interested since it's so much more fitting for this scene. It stopped me from continuing and got me thinking if I misread something instead, so I had to go back to re-read that part.

Iciyx said:
Onto the next part - - I don't know where you wanna go with this--like is it a book? manga? I don't know since it seems like both and not one over the other. I think if you wanna go places with this story, you should establish it yourself whether or not its a book or manga. This story looks like a lot of work put into it so I don't think you would want it to just be a "story" with an identity crisis.

Iciyx said:
I also dislike how the story is mixed with random Japanese. Like why does kii say "ningen" instead of "human"? The honorifics are ok like chan, san, kun and so forth but these random Japanese words better have meaning behind them if you continue it in the story like that. Otherwise it's just distracting to me and ruins my flow.

Iciyx said:
In the end, these are only minor details to me. Your story is quite good and I would like to see the second chapter when it gets polished up. :D

TheZilla said:
On the other hand, have you heard of Scrivener? Many authors use this.

Thigh_Tide said:
If it's aligned centre in the Word document as well, it shouldn't be. Left, with indents to start each paragraph and speaker is proper form.

Thigh_Tide said:
You have Ellipses used quite often. Not incorrectly, but it's a generally a good idea to use them as little as possible. The same is true for stammering or using all-capital text, it's usually better to use narration to express such speaking.

Thigh_Tide said:
Exposition is incredibly important. As it stands, you're only using footnotes, many of which are in completely bizarre locations - you only address that Oni are sometimes called Ogres in English towards the end of the excerpt, when that's something you should mention within the actual body of the text, and nigh immediately as it begins.

Thigh_Tide said:
In that same vein, you need to consider the existing knowledge you expect from the reader. You can't ensure they know what a Mary Jane or Dali mustache is, so it's better to actually describe their appearances.

Thigh_Tide said:
Honourifics. Just as with Ellipses, you can have them, but you should endeavor to not. If you're writing in English, using a holdover from Japanese just breaks the flow. (For that matter, are they actually speaking Japanese in-canon? You could address it, and mention the protagonist noticing the Honourifics in narration, this way both getting them in whilst keeping the sanctity of dialogue.)

Thigh_Tide said:
Mentioning the Moon and aliens currently reads like a completely unnecessary detour, assuming they don't actually appear later on (as I said, I can't accurately say without knowing).

Thigh_Tide said:
As for the Moon, calling it Luna is odd. Is this supposed to be a slightly alternate world, or a normal one (minus the Youkai of course)? If it's the latter, it would be strange to call it Luna rather than the Moon. If it's the former, then i should be more apparent in other respects. Show a US flag with 48 stars, mention a country like East Brazil, just some other details to clue the reader in that things are different.

Thigh_Tide said:
We don't get to see enough of Atarashiijigoku. As it stands we know nothing about it other than it's in Japan and it's got Youkai. What you could do is spend some time just to describe it; is it by the sea or in the mountains, is it modern or old-fashioned, is it rich or poor, and so on.

Thigh_Tide said:
Towards the end you have a day pass incredibly suddenly, right in the middle of the paragraph. You must always accompany a scene change and especially a major shift in time with a new paragraph, and usually a line break too.

Thigh_Tide said:
There needs to be a lot more done with the protagonist, and every character for that matter. For instance, ask yourself; Why did he pick Youkai for his thesis? What do his parents or friends think? What does he already know about Youkai? What do his parents know (Having met there, I assume they're Youkai themselves or something along those lines)?

Thigh_Tide said:
And though not as important as everything else, you need to be very careful when describing the protagonist getting dressed in the morning. As it stands, you're veering slightly into Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way territory.

Kii_Ibarra said:
Thanks to everybody's feedback, I've (slightly) updated YOUKAI MOKUSHIROUKU's 1ST NIGHTMARE (GHOST TOWN). My original post has also been updated to reflect these changes. Hopefully it reads a bit better now

That said, I know it's still far from perfect, so any critique/review/feedback/etc is still greatly appreciated

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Umm, Are you gonna post the 2nd chapter/nightmare when you complete it, And if so, Can you tag me when you do so ?

I'm interested in reading it tbh

Kii_Ibarra said:

Rie pointed to me, “Your next line is ‘Are those horns real?’ right?” she smiled.
I turned back to Kii, “Are those horns real?” I did a double take and looked back over at Rie with my jaw hanging open, “How did you…?”

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Finished the 2nd chapter/nightmare

I like it more than the previous one tbh, I'm glad we got some slow time with the characters and the convo between Kii, Rie, You and Duu is my favorite part so far.

Nalusa_Falaya said:
I'm interested to see the relationship between Kii, Rie and Duu, And what makes You special that Rie told him about being Youkai.

Nalusa_Falaya said:
I don't have much to say, This chapter was more magnified than chapter one, Which was pretty packed with info, I'm glad you slowed down things for us to get to know the characters but at the same time planting some "build up seeds" for next events

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Although, There's something I don't get, Was Gojou outside the barbershop waiting for her arm to malfunction ? Or did he know when it'll malfunction, Like some type of expiration date or intentional bug or smth ?

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Also, This is probably too soon but I'm interested in chapter 3 lol

Kuroni_Kuru said:
I'm sure someone's probably going to tell you that You should be more shocked that someone removed their entire head, but given what he went through the day before, I don't really see why this would surprise him, LOL. Perhaps a "huh?" or "eh?" might fit, but this is only really a minor nitpick.

Kuroni_Kuru said:
I see what you did there. Nice JoJo reference, LOL. Man, finding the exact quote in that large text wall was a real... "nightmare". ;)

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Thanks for the clarification on the Gojou and Tengu masked guy, I probably should've understood it sooner

The wolf looked to the moon an let out a loud howl, as if begging every nearby person to look at it and…

“Was this mean human bullying you?” she cooed, pinching Daisuke on the cheek as he giggled.

Kuroni_Kuru said:
Wow, Gojou is such an awful person. Is it wrong that I want to see more of him, LOL? He kinda reminds me of Daichi Kitaumekawa from Happy Sugar Life.

Kuroni_Kuru said:
As for complaints, uh... I spotted some grammatical errors.

"An" should be "and". I assume this was just a typo?
There was another one that I found earlier in the chapter, but I didn't make a note of it so I'd have to do a reread to find it. Whoops.

Kuroni_Kuru said:
I assume the use of "human" should be replaced with "ningen", as this line is being spoken by a character in-universe? At first I assumed that maybe people from the moon assuming that's where Moonbow is from used the English word instead, but I noticed that she used the term "ningen" later. “Let that be a warning, ningen!” she called back before vanishing into the horizon.

Kii_Ibarra said:
Was the second error the use of "pushed" instead of "pushing"?

Nope, that's intentional! Characters only use "ningen" when directly speaking towards the "ningen" in question. They still refer to the species as "humans" otherwise.
For example...
Kii: "Oi, ningen. I hate you."
Also Kii: "I hate humans."

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Read the third chapter/nightmare, Things are still pretty good.

Nalusa_Falaya said:
I'm starting to like the relationship between Kii and Rie even more, They feel like such a balanced duo that bounce off each other really well.

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Moonbow seems really interesting.

Nalusa_Falaya said:
Excluding the battle between the human and the oni at the beginning of the story, She seems like the first character to convey such an unfair look on humans, I wonder if you'll actually develop this theme, Like if there's prejudice or jealousy between the two "beings", Humans and Youkai. Like how much harmony do they both live in, Especially (At least from what we know now) Humans are technically weaker than youkai

Nalusa_Falaya said:
My only concern for the third chapter is the overabundance of mysteries, It's not too much as of the latest chapter, But right now, We have the Oni and human who were fighting in the first chapter, The sword that could cut an Oni's flesh, The guy with the tengu mask, Moonbow and now we're thinking of questions on the two kids and the wolf attacking them. Asking questions is cool, But if the story continues to offer the tips of threads that'd later get explored, The reader could easily not care about new stuff (Since not many of these are developing) or forget about older questions, I hope in the next chapter we'll either slow down the "mystery seeds" or develop the already introduced ones.

Nalusa_Falaya said:
You don't want the reader to be reminded every few minutes that he knows nothing about this world and these characters, Even if he indeed doesn't, It'll be kind of like explaining quantum physics to a preschooler, He'll feel curiosity at first but apathy or even annoyance later on if he doesn't make any progress.

Nalusa_Falaya said:
I hope my last reply wasn't too negative lol, I'm still really excited for chapter 4.

Jaycer said:
same goes for the word "yeet" in non-dialogue prose

Jaycer said:
LOL, well there are very few pedants out on the market that are as high-quality as I am.

Kuroni_Kuru said:


I'm pretty pedantic myself, but honestly I think the use of yeet is perfectly fine. English constantly evolves, to the point where I would personally consider "yeet" to be a perfectly cromulent word. (The same goes for "cromulent", LOL.) I'm pretty sure certain dictionaries have picked up on "yeet" too...

Jaycer said:
The only reason I ended up including that is because I felt a tonal disconnect with the use of that word in situations that weren't obviously comedic, and I figure if I felt that, other people might, and so it may be worth noting.

Jaycer said:
Alright, here goes. Apologies that this is going to be so long.

Jaycer said:
I'd like to preface this by saying I'm quite a picky reader (and a picky writer) so some of this will surely come down to what is more or less personal preference.

Jaycer said:
I'll start with an overview, and with the positives. I like the set-up, early on as it is. It seems like there's a lot of room for interesting events and people, and what we have already in the first three chapters I think demonstrates a definite ability to fulfill on that promise. Kii in particular I think is a fun character with a strong voice, and there are moments of quite strong character writing with her, Rie and Duu. I don't feel overwhelmed by the elements being introduced yet, but the story is moving quite quickly so I could see that burnout potentially coming should the pace not slow a little bit - might be off here, just a hunch.

Jaycer said:
I would say that many of my criticisms come down to two things: structure, and subtlety. A lot of moments feel a bit awkward - I'll go through them in a moment here - either because of the pacing of the writing or the structure of the sentences themselves. Again, much of that will come down to personal preference: the story is clearly written with a number of anime tropes and mainstays in mind, especially in dialogue, that I find sort of awkward but many people evidently don't (same goes for the word "yeet" in non-dialogue prose). Anyway, with that mostly out of the way, I'll crack through some small notes - mostly about dialogue and character - for each chapter, in order of appearance. You are welcome to throw them into the trash if you want.

Jaycer said:
"Good luck finding people to ask about youkai" is a bit of an awkward line on its own. I really think you could play this encounter quite subtly, considering she's revealed to the reader to be psychic not long afterward. I'd see if I couldn't fit that same sentiment into the line about the shelter - something like "you won't find anyone up here (to talk to about youkai), they're all in the shelter". It'd take some workshopping, but there's definitely something there that I think would sound more natural.

Jaycer said:
I think the first meeting with Rie could use an extra line that sort of drives home her strange nature. You mention she looks striking, although not off-putting. The tail is definitely weird, although the only thing You seems to focus in on is the youkai line. It's kinda like he met a normal girl who said something weird, not a weird girl who said something weird.

Jaycer said:
I'd also move the fact that You checked the earthquake forecast to the top of that paragraph, as well. You want the reader to quickly understand that what Rie said seems to go against conventional knowledge. At the very least, I think I'd put the lines about the potential earthquake warning/earthquake forecast together, as well as the lines about what Rie said and her appearance being odd, instead of having them broken up like that.

Jaycer said:
A quick thing about You's goal here - when he first arrives, he sees no one in the streets, and eventually seems to resign himself to the fact that no one's around and that he should look for his hotel. After the encounter, however, he goes back to looking for people to talk to about youkai, even despite learning that at least SOME of them are in the earthquake shelter, wherever that is. Especially considering it's becoming night-time rapidly, I feel like his goal should be to figure out where the shelter is at best, or just head for his hotel at worst.

Jaycer said:
I have to assume that "Cynthia in the sky" is a reference to something, either later in the story or another work entirely, but it sort of makes You seem a little deranged when he's naming celestial beings and ranting about aliens so suddenly.

Jaycer said:
How come You gets the scissors thrown at him? He's just sort of around. In the 2nd Nightmare, Duu intimates that You was actively inconveniencing Kii and Rie here, but all he did was cower and spectate as far as I can tell.

Jaycer said:
Another little tweak to make the writing about Rie more subtle is to Gin just say "So it's true, then," and not say "you are a psychic". It's evident from her first scene that she can read minds, and that's solidified when Gin demands that she stop reading his mind.

Jaycer said:
The spacing and physicality of the fight with Gin is a little murky. I wasn't sure where they were standing or how far apart they were - it took me off guard that Gin could lunge and reach Rie quickly, and again when Kii was suddenly behind Gin.

Jaycer said:
Short formatting thing - put a couple line breaks between the end of the fight and You waking up in his hotel to establish that it's a separate part and not a weird time skip mid-scene (especially since that scene ends on an unresolved action).

Jaycer said:
You's reaction to abnormal things is a bit inconsistent. At first, he thinks Rie's comment about his mission is a little strange; he then watches a woman with horns (even if they're just "cosplay") bodyslam a massive man who had just previously said that Rie can read minds, and he seems to have no reaction to this. By the time that Kii claims that Rie and herself are youkai, I feel like something in the back of his head should probably start to buy it - so when he plays it off as a joke and then acts like it's an earthshattering revelation, it kinda feels like he wasn't paying attention. Could be as small as changing him saying "Good one!" in ignorance to something like a nervous "Okay then,".

Jaycer said:
I'd cut down the "last-time-on" segment to start at "Did I forget to tell you? We're youkai!" That'd be enough to jog people's memories of last chapter, and has enough info from there on to continue the dialogue. That's up to you, though (everything is up to you).

Jaycer said:
The baseball-team-losing metaphor seems way too low-stakes for Rie reacting to the fact that she's going to see the man who sexually harasses her again, and this is coming from someone who has had very visceral reactions to sports teams losing - it just feels like two different emotions.

Jaycer said:
The tengu-man paragraph is a little heavy-handed. I don't think many people read the phrase "Nah, that can't be true" and think "maybe they're right" - they're always wrong.

Jaycer said:
“If this were a story, this is where things would get interesting…” makes me cringe, sorry. I hate when people in a story are like "whoooaaa dude this is almost like a story!!" You can keep it equally as sinister and foreboding by simplifying it - something like “A new human? Interesting…” with that same plotting grin.

Jaycer said:
Those footnotes are pretty crucial in this chapter, so I'd assume they're intended to be part of the final product. It's justified, the story being in Japan with mostly Japanese characters and all, but considering it's written in English a lot of these references or jokes would alienate people.

Jaycer said:
The description of Moonbow's clothing took me a second to fully comprehend. It's a bit awkward to read, so I'd toy with it and see if you can't make it flow a little better. Something about using "topped off" for a belt is weird, as well - not sure why.

Jaycer said:
Is there a car coming when Moonbow leaps to catch the toy, or does she do that just for fun? She's clearly an odd character (she immediately decides a child is a blight on the planet worthy of cleansing for some fairly petty bullying, all things considered), so I'm not necessarily saying that's a fault. I just kinda wanna know.

Jaycer said:
Gojou saying "Fine, oni, you win," is a bit odd considering there's no real confrontation between them in this scene so far - Gojou was messing with Rie the whole time, so unless that was specifically to get at Kii (or they have some sort of ongoing battle over the arm repair/upgrade, which you should imply), there's nothing really for Kii to "win".

Jaycer said:
If that is the case, though, it might be better to have Gojou say something like "Alright, you've made your point," (she does quip about the arm malfunctioning) although that might be a little too casual for a man whose hand has just been crushed.

Jaycer said:
Unsure what it means when it says that Kii "jumps" behind Gojou, especially either cutting his tie in the process or having cut his tie shortly before. A strange maneuver.

Jaycer said:
The wolf end the end has time to howl and then bite the kid, all during the time the kid was trying to turn and run. Might make sense to either A) have the wolf howl AFTER it has bitten the kid, or B) have the wolf howl and then chase down the kid (this is probably my vote, that's a pretty harrowing image).

Jaycer said:
Kii quips that she's "not even 1150 yet," which seems like an extremely specific milestone for someone who lives for at least a thousand years (this is definitely me nitpicking)

Jaycer said:
I'd drop "to view earth from above" and just say "commercial space travel" in Gojou's list - there'd be no reason he would specify that unless it's something very few people know about

Jaycer said:
Hope I don't come off too harsh here, just trying to jot down everything I noticed. Keep it up, I'm intrigued to see where it goes!

Kuroni_Kuru said:
Honestly, I'm surprised no one else called that out sooner. TBH, Kii and I have been privately betting on how long it would take someone to notice, LOL.

Kii_Ibarra said:
I sort of intended to invoke the anime/manga trope where a character jumps from one point to another (usually accompanied with a sword-slashing sound effect and a flash of light) in the blink of an eye.

Kii_Ibarra said:
At this point he still sort of thinks, despite what Rie told him, that they are robots, which are fairly commonplace in the world of YOUKAI MOKUSHIROKU

Kii_Ibarra said:
Yeah, perhaps that's true, but I kind of wanted to shake up my descriptions a bit and Rie's character fact-file (I've mentioned these before in other responses, TLDR: I really should've included them somewhere in the original post) mentions the fact that she's a fan of baseball, so...

Kii_Ibarra said:
Not to be that person, but... You is right. They're not a tengu, lol. The tengu mask is symbolic, although I can't quite go into what it symbolizes without spoiling stuff, lol...

Kii_Ibarra said:
I sort of intended for it to be cringey. As more of this character shows up I hope it will become apparent that they're embodying the "acts threatening but is actually a huge dork" villain archetype. They're kind of chuunibyou-ish, I guess

Kii_Ibarra said:
Perhaps because a belt goes around the bottom of the body and not the top? Ba-dum tss! Seriously though, perhaps "accessorized" would sound better?

Kii_Ibarra said:
The reason she jumps is so that the toy doesn't have time to hit the road, sort of like a dog catching a stick mid-air when playing fetch.

Kii_Ibarra said:
Ah, was that not clear? My bad. Kii and Kaiji have probably done this same spiel many times at this point (this being the third time in 2121, as Kaiji states) and he's definitely trying to overcharge her.

Kii_Ibarra said:
I feel option B is already pretty much what happened, which should hopefully be clearer from a police report in the next chapter

Kii_Ibarra said:
If it helps, Kii's exact age is 1130.

Kii_Ibarra said:
I was sort of worried without the caveat that readers might assume he meant visiting other planets/moons/celestial bodies, which would definitely create a few plot-holes/logic fails later in the story..

Jaycer said:
I apologize that some of my remarks kinda became less focused by the end, I burn myself out sometimes on stuff like this, considering it took a good few hours to compile and reword. Half the time when I finish a decently-long writing session, I've got a pounding headache and an empty brain, lol.

Jaycer said:
Fair enough. My one note there would be that the story in You's section is told in 1st person, so it seems like a personal comment from him, rather than about her - like he's the baseball fan. Honestly, the shifting from 1st to 3rd person might be an issue for some people but I didn't even notice it until thinking about that.

Jaycer said:
Oh yeah, I understood it was a mask at the time. What I mean more is that the figure is maybe a little too obviously watching them. Which is fine, of course, but maybe a little less mysterious than a shrouded figure who only might be watching you.

Jaycer said:
Probably!

Jaycer said:
I had thought that might've been the case. At that point of my notes I think I was a little to hung up on stuff that was weird, which does not necessarily mean "needs fixing" lol.

Jaycer said:
plus, if she's "won" this third time, does that mean she did not the past few times?

Jaycer said:
From there maybe you could do a little expository drop - "you'd think we'd be able to visit other planets by now," or something - and go from there. I don't know the characters well enough to know how best to put that into dialogue, but that's the sorta path I would go.

Kii_Ibarra said:

Forgive me for asking, it's just that I've been "burned" before, so as to speak... Where exactly does that link lead/what does it do?