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#Post#: 455--------------------------------------------------
Five Body Blade
By: Tara Date: February 22, 2016, 7:40 pm
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You're probably all interested in seeing a creation of mine that
I take seriously. The cannibal is just a manga adaptation of a
narrative adaptation of a poem I wrote. And FNO is definitely
nothing serious.
Five Body Blade, perhaps more well known as Dark Lineage, is
based on early 17th century Japan when Nagasaki officials began
executing citizens that had converted to Christianity after
Japan declared the religion illegal. These christians were
discovered through a law that required every citizen to have a
document saying they treaded on the Fumi-e, that is, a mandatory
practice of stepping on an image of Christ or the virgin Mary.
In the world of Five Body Blade people gain supernatural power
from their weapons. Therefore, stronger weapons, means more
power. The grade of a sword for instance, one to five bodies,
makes a great difference, and because five body blades are
scarce but in high demand, craftsmen employ questionable methods
to ensure their quality. The one to five body classification is
obtained by testing the blade on criminals. In this case, the
people convicted of practicing a religion called Trinitee, or
Trinitians, in which its followers pronounce their faith in Lord
Trinity which had been deemed illegal by the emperor. A five
body blade would be able to cut through 5 bodies in one stroke.
Some blades stop at the fourth body or earlier and these would
be considered less powerful.
Five Body Blade follows a once Trinitian girl who seeks out
bloody revenge against five people after coincidentally finding
a powerful sword that had yet to be tested. When her family was
tried she stepped on the fumie, being child who knew no better,
and her family was executed after they refused. She doesn't know
why they were killed, she only remembers that the katana used to
kill them was classified as a five body blade.
[spoiler=sample
storyboard]
HTML http://memberfiles.freewebs.com/26/20/44652026/photos/undefined/StoryBoard.jpg[/spoiler]
Although quite uncharacteristic of me, I actually don't have a
plan for this story.
#Post#: 456--------------------------------------------------
Re: Five Body Blade
By: 変態 Date: February 22, 2016, 9:15 pm
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Since the setting is in Japan with real events mixed in it, it's
better to have a knowledge about Japan's history; specifically
that era and culture. If you'll ever make this into an on-going
story/manga, better research on the history.
For the sample page part, the sword could be resting somewhere
deep and obscure other than on the open lawn like for example
an old and abandoned shrine or inside a collapsed cave-temple.
#Post#: 491--------------------------------------------------
Re: Five Body Blade
By: Crackhead Johny Date: February 24, 2016, 2:05 pm
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[quote author=変態 link=topic=57.msg456#msg456
date=1456197346]
For the sample page part, the sword could be resting somewhere
deep and obscure other than on the open lawn like for example
an old and abandoned shrine or inside a collapsed cave-temple.
[/quote]
Or impaled in a stone where only the chosen one could pull it
out!
As 変態 said, you will need to know the history.
While blades were tested on executed criminals (they were
generally dead for testing as it made it easier, since live
people do not like to be tested on) the blade's owner/future
owner would not do the testing as it was not honorable. Once the
owner has the blade they are not bringing it back.
Now when you get to the dishonorable practice of a blade's owner
testing their blade on people, you meet tsujigiri or cross roads
murder.
If you get the historical accuracy wrong you would be in big
trouble with an American Otaku as well as any Japanese who reads
it.
So let me make sure I'm understanding this.
What we have is an orphan in a time where the child would have
been purged, along with their family, for the crimes of a family
member. This orphan was lucky not to get purged. Since no one
would take a complete leper like that kid in, it is even more
lucky this orphan somehow didn't starve.
This orphan's parents were insanely lucky to have been executed
by a blade that happened to cut through them and 3 other people
who were all nice enough to hold real still, so as to help give
the best test result, before the blade was given to its
purchaser or as a gift to gain favor.
Even more lucky if someone actually got the blade maker to
permanently shame themselves by doing the execution.
Or did someone bring in a crazy rare blade, one suitable for a
high level noble, just to execute some incredibly low level
criminal scum, and thus shame the blade and its owner? What
would have happened if any of the 5 struggled and the blade was
seen to not cut through 5, like it was supposed to?? How
embarrassing.
Then this orphan of the incredibly lucky family, happens to find
an incredibly valuable carbon steel blade stuck in the lawn,
rusting. We know the blade maker probably knew it was 4 body if
not 5, since he knows his job. That is real luck.
Seriously, in a world where so much love, ritual, and time was
spent caring for these venerated blades, here is one
disgracefully stuck in the lawn. It is like finding a .50
Barret out on the lawn.. No, thinking of the value of the blade
it is more like finding a Veyron with it's keys in it, abandoned
in your driveway.. No, more like finding a nuclear weapon
abandoned in the local dog park.
She will then use her complete lack of training combined with
this awesome abandoned blade to wreck vengeance upon the low
level executioner who's job it was to test the blade (unless
they got the blade maker to do it). Maybe one of the blade
maker's apprentices tested the blade? Maybe the other 3 are the
janitors who had to feed her family's bodies to the dogs?.
The case seems cut and dried, so probably not the low level
magistrate who sentenced them. Maybe the emperor who knew
nothing about the family's execution but did write the law on
the advice of his Shinto advisers, is the target? Maybe the
whole chain of command down to the lowly executioner? No, that
would be way more than 5.
Lucky that the five body blade that killed her parents is now
with some rich noble somewhere else or she might have to fight
an equal blade with her found blade.
Maybe I'm wrong in guessing the revenge was about her parents
death and it was actually about something else?
#Post#: 494--------------------------------------------------
Re: Five Body Blade
By: 変態 Date: February 24, 2016, 9:46 pm
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Aside from the sword testing which is already a huge topic,
there are still others to note such as their government,
tradition, practice/behavior, society etc. It does need a lot of
research so to avoid inaccuracy.
[quote author=Tara link=topic=57.msg493#msg493 date=1456359066]
The girl, her name is Esashi -until I find a better one-[/quote]
If I'm not mistaken, most female names within those era starts
with a letter "O" like Ohatsu, Oimine, Okuni, Onao, Otomaru,
Otoyu etc. They also do not carry their family's surname. But
I'm pretty much sure they have other basic names too.
Some historical manga that you could reference with:
Shigurui (nudity, violence/gore warning)
Vagabond (seinen)
Semi Off-topic: I read someone's story summary with Japanese as
characters and setting but it flows completely on western
practice. It was really weird to read and I feel like the author
just wanted a Japanese characters and setting just because. It
was giving off a weeabooish ambience and I know you don't want
your story to be like that.
#Post#: 495--------------------------------------------------
Re: Five Body Blade
By: Lumaria Date: February 25, 2016, 1:58 am
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The idea definitely needs research.
Looking at the storyboard already set off some alarms. Kids
casually looking finding a sword in the middle of the field is
raising more questions then it giving us an idea of how the
world feels.
Additionally the design of the blade doesn't look well thought
out.
This one will need not only extensive research on history but
you will also be near fluent in Japanese if you intend to name
the blades. Just like in Bleach and in Naruto where they have
special names and attacks, you will have to do the same and most
likely all Japanese. Not only will the names be Japanese, but
they have to be extremely clever. Names have to fit the name
when it comes to attack/weapons. Some even have wordplay and
double meanings.
I dont think this is one you can casually pick up. But if you
have no goal start off with creating a goal for a character.
[quote author=Tara link=topic=57.msg455#msg455 date=1456191606]
You're probably all interested in seeing a creation of mine that
I take seriously. The cannibal is just a manga adaptation of a
narrative adaptation of a poem I wrote. And FNO is definitely
nothing serious.[/quote] This has got to be the most
disappointing and predictable statement yet. I bet, if you took
all your stories seriously, you could flesh them out better.
Also if you want to learn how to write better, don't defend what
you don't take seriously. Work on it and try to understand the
flaws. Even if you don't agree, see why the person brings it up.
#Post#: 498--------------------------------------------------
Re: Five Body Blade
By: Crackhead Johny Date: February 25, 2016, 10:27 am
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[quote author=Tara link=topic=57.msg493#msg493 date=1456359066]
It takes away from the idea of her being chosen.[/quote]
Is being chosen important to you? If so, why?
With chosen you get to know that no matter what happens, you can
just keep yawning because the MC will be fine, because they are
chosen.
Chinpo was knocked down by the mighty blow, his face bloody, his
body broken, his consciousnesses was fading fast, as his eyes
closed for what was probably the last time, he felt something
stir inside. Before he could tell what it was, he was embraced
by the dreamless sleep.
With Chinpo's defeat the battle was lost and the people of the
village, doomed.
Suddenly Chinpo's body stood back up, glowing and burning with
inner fire as Chinpoko, the 9 nosed aardvark demon, that had
been bound inside Chinpo when he was an infant, took control.
Now the fight would really begin.
*BARF*
[quote]In this world where there's such a power struggle between
less efficient and more efficient weapons, I would theorize
testing would be very important. I envisioned the executioner
would do the killing, and that the smiths were under a lot of
pressure by the ruling class to produce five body blades.
[/quote]
For this we have to look at craftsmanship and production plus
supply/demand.
A master sword maker will tend to make the best blades. When he
makes one he will know how good it is. Testing is just the
proof/sales pitch.
The master sword makers will be famous and very powerful. In
this case "a lot of pressure" would be greed for even more
money/land/whatever.
If you want uberweapons, they control the supply.
What are you going to do, take their uberweapons with your puny
weapons?
Now, as for finding the blade.
There is a long history of pulling swords out of things after
you find them.
HTML https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gram_%28mythology%29,<br
/>
HTML https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excalibur,
etc.
How about she steals it from someone.
Main characters never steal their super weapon. It would be too
unwholesome and roguish.
An even bigger show of the importance of the vengeance, is if
she steals the sword from someone who is not on the vengeance
list.
She already has bloody vengeance planned, why not tack on some
theft? Han Solo her up a bit.
The 5 body blade could be what she has to defeat in the end and
the best she can steal is a 4 body blade. Yes, you could have
her steal the first 6 body blade that no one knows has been
created but again, at this point she is cheating by bringing the
gun to a sword fight.
#Post#: 500--------------------------------------------------
Re: Five Body Blade
By: &#22793;&#24907; Date: February 25, 2016, 8:34 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=Lumaria link=topic=57.msg495#msg495
date=1456387138]
Kids casually looking finding a sword in the middle of the field
is raising more questions then it giving us an idea of how the
world feels.
Additionally the design of the blade doesn't look well thought
out. [/quote]
I believe the story is still a WIP thus, the plain details.
[quote author=Lumaria link=topic=57.msg495#msg495
date=1456387138]
This one will need not only extensive research on history but
you will also be near fluent in Japanese if you intend to name
the blades. Just like in Bleach and in Naruto where they have
special names and attacks, you will have to do the same and most
likely all Japanese. Not only will the names be Japanese, but
they have to be extremely clever. Names have to fit the name
when it comes to attack/weapons. Some even have wordplay and
double meanings. [/quote]
That would be nice if OP is gunning for shonen/fantasy.
She hasn't mentioned anything about it yet though.
[quote author=Crackhead Johny link=topic=57.msg498#msg498
date=1456417642]Chinpo[/quote]
LOOOL!
---
Anyway, I've thought of a workaround to lessen the heavy
research part: turn it into modern day + fantasy.
MC's parents got killed by a gang because of debt. MC sneaked
into a [Insert Mystery Place Here such as Antique Shop, A
Church's Hidden Altar, Catacomb, etc] and found the sword.
Training + revenge mode begins. Like what CJ mentioned, there
could be other swords that existed too.
Just a suggestion.
#Post#: 502--------------------------------------------------
Re: Five Body Blade
By: Lumaria Date: February 26, 2016, 10:35 am
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[quote author=Tara link=topic=57.msg501#msg501 date=1456464455]
When Naruto was translated to english the names of many attacks
were translated as well. For instance: Pain's "Almighty Push."
To an American audience what does it profit them to call
Itachi's attack "Yasaka Magatama." The Magatama isn't a part of
our culture and they wouldn't know what "Yasaka" means, and
there's no way to relate it to what the attack does unless you
already have an idea what the words mean. All the meaning in the
name to them comes from the visuals of the attack. "Almighty
Push" tells us a lot. Shira Tensei, or however it's spelled in
romaji, doesn't make it very clear what Pain is doing. I would
have thought you'd advocate for English names of attacks,
Lumaria. I think there's almost no reason for me to actually
have anything in Japanese. Except, perhaps, the characters'
names.[/quote]
You're thinking English. If you have anything set in Japan, then
you're going to have to do more work. And this has everything to
do with how their language is set up.
Bleach focuses on using specific kanji when naming their
zanpakto and almost usually comes in furigana (katakana designed
to help young kids to pronounce the kanji) because they are
using them in conventionally. Naruto also uses certain names.
And even in the English stick with the Japanese naming
conventions. Why? Because it doesn't remove the possible
translations it has. Some of them are very direct too.
So I don't understand why you would say the only thing that
needs to be Japanese is the names. You are basing your story
after a historic event (even if it's not literally trying to be
exactly that time period).
[Quote]
Naruto, for instance, mentions "shinobi" but it's not
historically accurate at all. Orange clothing is given to
prisoners to make them as visible as possible even at night, and
a ninja wears black because they want to be as invisible as
possible especially at night. Naruto calls himself a ninja, but
he loves to wear orange clothing. There is value in
understanding Japan for this story because the more I take from
Japan, the less I have to create for this story. [/quote] yes,
wearing orange isn't historically accurate but it's obvious
Naruto wasn't trying to be strictly "Japanese". It was a series
that created a world around Japanese culture and a bit of
others.
Still just because you provided this example doesn't change what
you said before.
[Quote]
It's not necessarily important to me she that is the chosen one.
Incidentally, I do like the idea of her stealing the weapon as
well. I remember a documentary I watched about shinobi said they
were simple farmers by day and ninja by night. The ninja would
be trained in secret starting from when they were very young,
and that a young ninja's first mission, or something to that
effect, was to steal a samurai's sword, and that would become
their weapon. Being employed into a group of shinobi rebels does
help solve the problem of where she gets her training and it
gives her the right skillset and the means to take down high
ranking officials, like the magistrate.
As for other swords I was thinking even bigger than 6 body
blades. I would imagine the emperor may have something like a
100 body blade.
[/quote]
The word use of "the chosen one" is so infrared into western
culture. It is not a term that many eastern prophecies or
stories use.
But if you intend to make it as if she's stealing it rather than
being chosen, then look into finding more story aspects that
could compliment the idea of stealing it.
For example: in bleach, ichigo in a sense stole shinigami powers
in the first arc. But since it's his first time, he didn't know
how to use his abilities so much. He didnt even know he had a
shikai or bankai.
I normally don't want to feed you direct examples. But...beating
around the bush hasn't helped you at all lately.
Also I looked all over the internet. Couldn't find the meaning
of 6-body blade or 100-body blade.
#Post#: 503--------------------------------------------------
Re: Five Body Blade
By: Crackhead Johny Date: February 26, 2016, 12:30 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=Tara link=topic=57.msg501#msg501 date=1456464455]
I chose to write this because I found japan's persecution of
Christians to be interesting to learn about. And its rarely
touched on. There's quite a few genocides of Christians, but
this one was done in such a unique way and very near the
medieval time period. Which is obviously my favorite time
period. [/quote]
If this is to be a strictly American piece it gives you more
flex when it comes to naming things and other errors. If this is
ever meant to be viewed in Japan.. Well, lets just say that
manga like "Battle Raper of Nanking!" and "The Man from Unit
731!" are not going to sell well in Japan.
Also with the popularity of Christianity in Japan, consider how
unsuccessful the campaign was.
Then there is the fact that Christians love their oppression
propaganda, so you will have to really check your sources to see
what level of atrocity you are looking at.
Quick research makes this "genocide" laughable. 395 Christians
killed in 88 years or ~4.5 Christians per year. More were
probably killed each year by horses and far more certainly died
of disease.
Also consider the most of the info comes from one piece of very
slanted Catholic propaganda (consider how they say "obtained a
relic" and not "took home human body parts").
For executions in feudal Japan 4.5 people per year is not even a
blimp.
While the church has a fetish for persecution (when they can
claim they were persecuted, not when they persecuted others
HTML http://necrometrics.com/pre1700a.htm#20worst),
for the most
parts Christians were treated with kid gloves because the black
ships and other missionaries brought in weapons and money. Sure
when they said "Our god is more powerful than the emperor and
you should obey us not him!" things didn't go so good as at that
point money can't save you. Basically every so often they got
full of their own power and would take things too far and get
slapped down for it.
So for the MC's family to have been killed for being Christian,
you are really playing the long odds.
[quote] Naruto calls himself a ninja, but he loves to wear
orange clothing. [/quote] I thought this was because he was
mentally handicapped or special needs? Hence the popular name
"Narutard".
[quote]It's not necessarily important to me she that is the
chosen one. Incidentally, I do like the idea of her stealing the
weapon as well. I remember a documentary I watched about shinobi
said they were simple farmers by day and ninja by night. The
ninja would be trained in secret starting from when they were
very young, and that a young ninja's first mission, or something
to that effect, was to steal a samurai's sword, and that would
become their weapon. Being employed into a group of shinobi
rebels does help solve the problem of where she gets her
training and it gives her the right skillset and the means to
take down high ranking officials, like the magistrate.
[/quote]Be careful of ninja documentaries. Some of them are done
by ninja fetishists for ninja fetishists.
While they may have started out as poor odd jobs farmers, being
sent to do stuff because they were worthless and needed money.
It became a business, this is how you hear about things like the
Iga, Koga, and Chinpo clans even today.
Sure they still farmed (not the ninjas who did the ninja work,
unless they were between jobs) but this was because they owned
land and if you owned land and didn't have someone farm it, you
were an idiot as land grows food and food was money.
Also think of what being ninja trained brings to the table for
the MC. WAY less fighting. If she can poison someone instead of
fighting and exposing herself, she will. "Lets see how a
bazillion body blade fares against 'stabbed in your sleep'"!
[quote]As for other swords I was thinking even bigger than 6
body blades. I would imagine the emperor may have something like
a 100 body blade.
[/quote]I would be very careful about scaling. For a real story
you might be able to go 1 over what was known and have it work.
If the emperor has a 100 body blade you have real problems. You
have entered the DBZ zone, this is very bad. "If the main
character doesn't block the strike, the universe will be
destroyed!!" kind of bad..
Also think of how silly the test for 100 would have to be. Guest
executioner Usain Bolt runs past 100 people with the blade held
out to the side. Guest executioner Johny Knoxville jumps off a
building onto a pile of 100 people with the blade..
Another fact of scaling is that if a 100 body blade exists, a 5
body blade is sad and pointless just because people understand
numbers. Production says the person who can make a 100 body
blade can make many similar blades.
Then you get to the expected cliche where the MC's teacher or
someone else can beat a 100 body blade with just a wooden
training sword!
#Post#: 506--------------------------------------------------
Re: Five Body Blade
By: Crackhead Johny Date: February 27, 2016, 12:32 am
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[quote author=Tara link=topic=57.msg505#msg505 date=1456553486]
and he alone makes for such an interesting story about
crafstmen.
[/quote]
He alone..
No, Masamune love?
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