#beta says

[cyb-by-lang]

Happy birthday beta-sama!

Aaaa. Thanks!

I'm actually celebrating for the first time in like years so these messages are super nice rn ^-^.

-beta

[cyb-by-lang]

Do you happen to have plans to formally publish the Terramir stuff? Personally, I'm really intrigued by the worldbuilding and characters that you posted on here.

Does she? DOES SHE???

Listen. Lang would have to actually finish anything to do with the Terramir gang! She'd have to actually WRITE them. (Hint hint.)

I'm pretty sure she hasn't actually written anything in Terramir since before the last time she updated CYB.

But yes. Absolutely. Once she actually gets around to writing the story and finishing it... Which at this rate will be next century lmao. Lang's been working on some incarnation of those characters since at least 2007.

- a very very impatient beta who wants the update on those characters too

[cyb-by-lang]

Question. If Kei is reborn in a world and finds someone she deems as attractive, would she accept if they would confess or would she reject it since she dated Kakashi in her past life and has some guilt(?) or smth.

I think it’s a case-by-case basis kind of thing, really. If Kei has continuity with her previous incarnation, such as being born into the same world when her love interest from the life before is still around? Probably would go and see what’s up before deciding, though generally reincarnation/world shenanigans tend to be fairly slow processes. On the other hand, a life with zero connections to the previous one (see: current Kei in CYB), she’ll be forced to move on by circumstance if nothing else. She’s had to do it once already in chapter 112, really.

Meta joke, courtesy of Beta: “Kei’ll end up with whichever anime character the author thinks is hot.”

And at that point they’d quite thoroughly roasted me, and we were too busy laughing to continue.

[cyb-by-lang]

Following that anon’s questioning (and by proxy, your and Beta’s delightful answers) which mdzs/the untamed characters do you two deem as hot?

Long answer below the cut.

Lang: 

Wei Wuxian’s actor in The Untamed is cute, as are those for Wen Qing, Luo Qingyang, and Jiang Cheng. 

But on the whole, I wouldn’t be inclined to pair Kei with a single one of them, because of a) age issues due to generation gap, b) various Plot Shenanigans that kick all of their asses, and c) actual literal death. Also, WangXian OTP 5ever, etc. 

Side note, though: Lan Xichen’s actor in the live action drama reminded me instantly of one of my uncles if he was like forty years younger, and I can’t unsee it. It’s hilarious. 

As for the donghua designs for like, alternative interpretation, the whole thing kind of bothered me somehow. I ended up feeling like I was watching a mid-2000s anime in between all the kinda clunky CGI and the oddly overdetailed designs. I spent a fair amount of time going, “...I can feel where the budget went a bit thin here.” Especially during the various extreme close-ups that locked the camera on, say, one character or another’s eyes. 

As for the manhua, I got uncanny valley’d by several characters. It was weird. 

Beta:  

1)  My aroace ass literally doesn’t even have a concept for “hot” like. I just do not get it. And not everyone does. So like… hey fyi, not everyone experiences romantic and/or sexual attraction and you shouldn’t assume everyone does. 

2) I’m faceblind and literally spent the first watch confused as to who the fuck everyone was because why do they have to all wear the same fucking hairstyle and sect colors. Like. I literally got to the end of the show and went “who the fuck is that???” when they had Jin Zixun and Su She get their plot threads resolved.  (I think it wasn’t until my third watch I realized who they were… which officially made me more forgetful of them than wwx.)

That said. Xichen is the one character I could pick out of a scene on my first watch regardless of his outfit or guan because he exudes Elf-ness in a way that none of the other characters do. So all I needed was the elf-vibe to appear and I knew it was him. And the donghua and manhua designs always make him look very kind. Like a peaceful cow. He was less identifiable in that one. ( Lwj got lost in the lan clan when there was more than one of them in white around, but when around the rest of the group, very easy to pick out. Good design on his own, bad when around the copies.)

The black and red color scheme for our main character was an excellent design choice because even though I had no idea who anyone else was. I could pick him out no problem. The mask also really helped. No-one else wandering around wearing that.

And we can’t forget the angry grape. If there was a purple  >:(  in a scene I was generally pretty good at finding Jiang Cheng. (also he was one of the very very few to have the single bang thing as opposed to two of them, which helped.)

Jingyi and Sizhui in all incarnations need to be more distinct from each other because you want “lans who aren’t twins but look it” you got it here. Fucking same guans and sect uniforms and hair (CQL only). The animated and drawn versions at least give different hair because when they draw things they don’t expect you to be able to tell people apart by their faces (same face syndrome).

(This is turning into a “how to make your characters memorable enough that they are visually distinct”… so I’m gonna stop. But not before I point to the guan and go that was a fucking amazing system for identifying people once I was able to match the various ones to the people.)

[cyb-by-lang]

Two questions one: what was the writing decision making process behind damaging Kies chakra Network. And Two: what happened to cold calling?

Beta: Is the question the decision about why it was originally damaged? or why the damage was actually retained within the narrative and left Kei disabled rather than being magically fixed?

If it’s the first it was probably something like Lang going “fuck, how do I get rid of this?” and then some figuring out how to get rid of the curse seal that resulted in going super nova.

If it’s the second. It was because the result of that wrecked kei’s chakra system on that arm. And by naruto-land standards that left Kei disabled. And magically curing disabilities so the character isn’t disabled is like... disability representation 101 of things you don’t do. (Also something I’m very opposed to.) So like. We didn’t do that. We left Kei disabled. Because disabled characters deserve to exist as disabled.

(As for cold calling... Lang wrote herself into a corner and ran into what happens when I try to write fanfic which is basically “AAAA I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I”M DOING HOW DOES CANON WORK?” due to not really having seen the show.)

Lang: Specifically regarding Cold Calling, the epic cliffhanger it is so known for suffers from two issues: Hammond doesn’t do much for the back half of the story despite being the ranking officer, and Sam going for the weapon means SHENANIGANS.

Until I go back and retcon the thing, it’s probably not going anywhere.

[cyb-by-lang]

So far, you're one of my favorite authors and I'd really like to know how to write well （≧∇≦）I can't seem to describe things/feelings/events all that clearly and I would appreciate it if you would leave a tip! Arigato *\(^o^)/*

Warning: This post is going to be a giant pain to read if you’re on mobile!

The easiest way to start describing things is to try to dig into the character’s perspective. “What would this particular person notice?” is the single biggest question when writing from a limited POV.

Kei, for example, likes riffing on other people/things when not focused on assessing threat levels. Also, it’s a lot of fun to utterly ruin language with extended metaphors that derail halfway through, because that’s how the character thinks. She notices details around her because almost everything is a simile to her, and there’s nothing she can’t gently mock.

Contrast, say, Hamlet. There’s a guy who’d literally pick up a dude’s skull while hanging out in a graveyard to wax philosophical about the guy it belonged to, while at the same time later managing to stab his almost-father-in-law by accident while trying to murder his uncle. He stops the entire play multiple times for a soliloquy, and that still jives with how much the plot itself calls him on not acting on his concrete knowledge.

There’s a joke on this site that Hamlet’s thoughtfulness is what ruins his life. Othello, over in another Shakespeare play, is destroyed by his impulsive nature. Swap their relative positions, and they thrive. But the way they think is demonstrated through what they point out in monologues and dialogue. 

But, if instead you are focusing on just getting the raw details out and plan to fuss with characters’ observational skills later, see below:

Per Beta:

Practice. Find what’s missing from your descriptions, then write shit intentionally focusing on that element until you do it naturally.

Then isolate the next element and repeat.

Also, there’s sharing your stuff and getting critique… but that’s scary.

But also: if you’re critical enough of your own writing you can get to where i am with minimal input from others.

Critique is the scariest part, tbh.

Per @abalisk

Telling yourself your bad at something is going to make you bad at something. You gotta fucking own it.

But also what does the POV character see? Taste? Smell? Feel? Describe the senses and draw from personal experience to help you paint a picture.

Like think of a forest and describe what defines a forest to you. The smell of pine and sweet odor of rotting leaves. The taste of cold air… obviously you don’t have to describe every scene like this but it can help set a mood

And the way you describe things only matures with time and practice. Reading other fics or books can help because you can study up on descriptive language, even as you are enjoying a story.

There really is no do or don’t in writing, just write what feels good and correct to you.

Side note: Going into too much detail about too many things is called “purple prose.” Using too few details is “beige prose.” Most writing exists comfortably between the two extremes, and it sounds like you’re worrying you’re on the latter end of the bell curve.

Another thing I do is roughly work out a scene, assigning dialogue to characters or whatever. Then I go back over it later (usually about a day after) and add in conversational details or character’s narration asides afterward.

Example:

“You seem to be adjusting well,” Ayame said.

“I’m used to grunt work like this,” Kei replied, hefting the second, equally-insensate demon(?) onto the oar.

“Are you sure you don’t mean ‘other humans’?” Ayame asked.

Kei shrugged. “Anyway, gambling ring busted. What’s next, Ayame-san?”

Bit scant on the details, eh? Let’s go back over that with more attention paid to how the characters think and act.

“You seem to be adjusting well,” Ayame said, as she dragged Kei’s most recent arrest into an alleyway. Her oar hovered nearby, and this particular apparition wasn’t strong enough to break plastic zip-ties during the trip back to the Spirit World. 

“I’m used to grunt work like this,” Kei replied, hefting the second, equally-insensate demon(?) onto the oar. Sure, they were a little denser than humans of the same size, but neither Kei nor Ayame paid much mind to that. “Teeth aside, I don’t think either of these two were really much of a threat to humans.”

“Are you sure you don’t mean ‘other humans’?”  Ayame asked.

Kei shrugged, then readjusted the drooping shoulder of the shirt. Urban camouflage was such a pain. “Anyway, gambling ring busted. What’s next, Ayame-san?”

I didn’t really go around and describe the entire landscape around them, because the focus was on character action. The environmental details were relegated to paragraphs without dialogue elsewhere.

But yeah! A couple different approaches you can take a stab at.

Have fun!

[cyb-by-lang]

Girls like punching things and sharp objects

You can't go wrong with a training dummy and a sword.

- ninja gift advice

[cyb-by-lang]

Hey, I've been following your stories about Kei and i just wanna say I think you're really cool, and have (partially) inspired me to write my own kinda self insert OC story set in the BNHAverse. I'm kinda coming to terms with how deep down I'm embarrassed by wanting to do stuff like this. Do you have any advice for me? Do you ever suffer from embarrassment and if so how do you deal with it...

Generally speaking? Even if you’re feeling like you’re struggling, most people can’t see that struggle. They see the final product of your labors, whatever form it takes, and see it as a complete thing that sprang fully-formed from your head. Sometimes, you just need to take that leap of faith and go for it.

Per @abalisk:

Just talk to people about it.It’ll always feel embarrassing until you just decide “fuck it” and don’t care anymore

Negative self-talk is self-defeating, basically. People assume that if they don’t see nervousness, it’s not there. Run with that assumption and jump right in.

Or you can do what Beta does:

Hide behind the scenes and let Lang take all the credit.

Os is actually a really good writer, but this blog is for fanfiction and that is not their preferred sphere. Os’s preference is “hella worldbuilding and original fiction.” :p