Dreamland Review Archive

Return of the 13th Zodiac (V)

[ By doing this sentence structure, you get to infer that he's the host and his name is Lu Baiyu without outright having to have a sentence saying "He's the host." The use of the word contestants also hints that this is a contest / competition, without having to say that it is one. My only problem is the part of "his eyes focused on the two contestants" which is like... repetitive with the next paragraph's "their gaze fixed on the stage" That's because I ran out of ideas on how to describe the host hahaha. ]

I think the whole section of Shu Yue being used to be a part of the audience and the whole explanation of sparring could be integrated better? Again, it kinda cuts off the flow of the scene. It starts with a high momentum, but then you click a pause button to explain stuff then play the scene again. That's how it feels with the current structure. What could be done is put the information through context clues. Perhaps have the host talk? Like, "This is the nth battle of today's competition! Whoever wins shall obtain the legendary soul-binding scroll!" or something along those lines. It makes for more natural exposition and makes the scene continuous rather than choppy.

I do like the characterization of Shu Yue even just from this first chapter. She definitely seems like someone who is confident and smart, with a relentless energy to get what she wants. She's also observant and analytical and I like how you showed that in the battle scene. The analytical personality of Shu Yue definitely makes the exposition in the battle make sense. I'm just going to warn you to not go overboard with it however, as it can cut the flow of action scenes if you put too much of her analysis in there.

Other than initial exposition, I do think the rest of the chapter's exposition is fairly well-integrated. Like firstly, the ranks thing and the world's perspectives on warriors and magi. The subtle introduction of Xiao Ran is also nice as well as the hints to her goal which will drive the story.

Chapter 2

First off, I already noticed you used the adverb "softly" two times fairly close to each other. Adverbs aren't inherently bad but it's definitely noticeable if you use the same one just after you used it. Be careful of redundancy as it can affect the flow of reading for some people. You can also look at your sentence structure if it's too repetitive. For example, when you were describing Xiao Ran, I felt that your structure was a bit repetitive.

Xiao Ran had been Shu Yue's assigned bodyguard since she was six years old. He was five years older than she was. He was a hybrid of a fox spirit and a human.

The last two sentences repeat the structure of "He was this." making it a bit clunky to read. It could be edited to make it flow better by removing the redundancy of the structure. For example:

Xiao Ran had been Shu Yue's assigned bodyguard since she was six years old. He was five years older than her and a hybrid of a fox spirit and a human.

Or

Xiao Ran was a hybrid of a fox spirit and a human. He was her assigned bodyguard ever since he was eleven and she was six.

Or something along those lines. You can play around with it to be honest.

The story behind the bamboo sword is definitely interesting and I do love that you give us a bit more background to Shu Yue's family, which I believe is important. Because so far, I can see that her family is a huge reason for her motivation to pursue this goal of hers. So as the reader, we need to be shown the bonds she has/had with her family in order to feel more connected with Shu Yue and root for her goal. We need to feel the same desperation Shu Yue has in restoring honor to her clan's name.

Other than that I do love the various worldbuilding you've done in this chapter and how it made the world feel more alive. The belt thing was cool and I love using such a detail to signify strength, especially for later chapters. I do wish you gave us a bit more perspective on how much six hundred gold coins are worth? Give us some comparison, like how much does the average middle class family here earn? Because just giving us these high numbers yet no scale to compare it to makes it a little hard to swallow.