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So first of all, I want to say that I love the air of suspense that this chapter set up. The introduction of the mystery, the buildup, and the payoff were all very satisfying. To say nothing of the fact that I can't believe I missed the foreshadowing with the scallions aaaaa.
Also! I wanted to comment of the fact that you actually faked me out with that spoiler warning! xD Warning for a Gen 8 Pokemon and then having Wooloo show up, I was like "huh, Wooloo was in the very first trailer so it's not much of a spoiler?" So I was then utterly unprepared for this line to punch me in the face:
Just read chapter 2, and I must commend how well you did in introducing Prim's character to us as well as showing us her personality without much info dumping, so kudos on that!
I still feel bad for Ferrycloth, but at least it seems like he's willing to be cooperative even if he's ballsy enough to admit he won't enjoy it one bit. Then again, I get the feeling this pair will grow fond of each other with time. I still can't say for sure where this story is headed, so, I'll have to wait and see.
Just checked out the third chapter. As always, your chapters are short, but sweet. This chapter gave a bit of development to our two main protagonists and we got to see Ferry and Prim warm up to each other somewhat.
The Zoroark in the second half was interesting, even if he was just fodder, and I like how you portrayed him using illusions to creep up on Ferry and abduct him. Even funnier is how Prim slept through all that, but at least she showed up to save the day. As I said, it was an enjoyable chapter and I'm really liking this story a lot. Also, one more thing
hey y'all, thanks for the awesome reviews! i'll be the first to admit that my writing is imperfect and my updates are few and far between, but reading your guys' thoughts on this story is super encouraging, and i've made pretty big changes to my outline based on your feedback, so again thanks a ton! :D gonna respond to some of your guys' thoughts here before i get on with the chapter:
why can't lucario read/why doesn't Prim know this? If they're basically squires to the wanderswords, it'd actually be pretty useful to have them be able to read/write, both for situations like this or so that they could take note of what was happening/send letters on behalf of their knights, so it would seem like something lucario would be trained to do. If it's more of a common "let's disenfranchise lucario as much as possible so they don't rise up against us", then it seems strange that Prim would leave this note in the first place since a societal norm like that would be pretty ingrained in all involved, and especially irresponsible of Prim/whoever taught her for her not to know what her servant can and cannot do.
interesting question! i hinted at this vaguely in the bit where ferry reflects to himself about maps, so i think it's ok to come out and say basically that lucario just can't read, physically. i'm no physiologist so i won't attempt to come up with some scientifically-backed explanation for this, but basically they're just unable as a species to derive symbolic meaning from writing, or even drawings that are too abstract as is the case with maps. this isn't unique to lucario, either—the vast majority of pokémon in this setting, including humanoid ones, can't read either. prim is probably vaguely aware of this, but just hasn't been working with lucario long enough (outside of, like, the sparring they did in their training) to really internalize it. a human squire would probably be superior as far as stuff like this goes, but lucario and other pokémon have their own qualities that make the tradeoff worth it.
That being said, I really loved the cheerful/calmer moments of this chapter. Prim digging for mushrooms and being nice to the innkeeper later, the sirfetch'd being a chivalrous little shit -- you have a really grim overarching world but it's nice to have little bits of time where your characters are actually happy to be in it. Lotta fun this chapter; really digging the extended/multi-scene pacing here!
hey, thanks! this was my first pre-outlined chapter, so i'm hoping i'm able to keep up the pace and tone. this next chapter isn't quite as exciting, i don't think, but i do hope it's a bit less meandering than the first few were. thanks for staying current on this story and offering your thoughts, it means a lot! :D
While I found the exploration of that kind of Pokemon very rich as well as heartwrenching for the shit they get put through in this story, it also begs the question of how the other species influence the world and if they'll either be present in the story. Dragons would be a big one, for instance, and there are many other Pokemon with powers of their own, that would give humans a heck of a time. As Namo pointed out, Lucario are presented as a lot weaker than their game counterparts, so perhaps it's the same for other species as well. Still, the absence of many other Pokemon aside from the Mudsdale and the Zoroark seemed odd, though it didn't get in the way of the story.
we will definitely be seeing more pokémon as the story develops, hopefully in engaging detail seeing as wanderswords are after all effectively monster-hunters. and dragons definitely have their place in any medieval setting... 👀 that said, something i've been keeping in mind about pokémon diversity so far is the impact that pokémon training has on the variety of pokémon we see in canon. in this setting, where only a small subset of pokémon have domestic uses, the number of different species the average person will see on an average day is much lower. most of the cool ones are out in the wild, intentionally as far away as they can be from the civilization that this story follows. but again, given the nature of the wandersword profession, i'm hoping we'll get to see a lot of new pokémon in the coming chapters.
Two is a bit of a tonal issue which might turn some people off, I'm afraid. I've discussed this with you already through Discord, but so far, the tone has been relentlessly bleak. It has provided some great drama so far, especially in the prologue, and I'm starting to see some of the payoffs for it already, but the start of the story for these three and a half chapters have been a bit tough to swallow. Not only has the story started with a Lucario village massacre by an absolute hate sink of a villain, the main Pokemon protagonist has also effectively been sold into slavery, as well as beaten up by his superior in a previous fight and almost killed by a Zoroark, humiliating him in the process twice. Everyone around him, including himself, is rightfully bitter about the world, and what we've seen so far, the world is a huge shithole, which is par for the course for a medieval setting, but still. This isn't reflective of the writing quality, which has been excellent so far, but because of the bleak tone, it also has me wondering how far the story can take it before I lose my interest.
i hear this loud and clear. we talked about this a bit on discord, but this piece of feedback actually had me revising my outline quite a lot, haha. i made a pretty big decision in the last chapter and in this next coming one to address this issue, so we'll have to see how it plays out, but i'm hoping it improves the overwhelmingly depressing tone a bit, hahaha. as i was saying to kintsugi, chapter four is actually the first one i wrote with an outline, and i think it saw a pretty big tone change, so i'm hoping the story will be a bit less gloom and doom from this point forward... i think my default is to just write depressing angsty shit when i'm letting the words flow unplanned. :'D anyway, thanks for the awesome review! your words have definitely influenced the course of this story, and i hope it feels more like something you can follow comfortably from this point forward.
So first of all, I want to say that I love the air of suspense that this chapter set up. The introduction of the mystery, the buildup, and the payoff were all very satisfying. To say nothing of the fact that I can't believe I missed the foreshadowing with the scallions aaaaa.
hahaha, it seems like a lot of people actually missed out on this! maybe calling them "scallions" vs "leeks" or something else more obvious was a bit too opaque? but i think people would have figured it out too soon otherwise. :p thanks a ton for the read and review!
ants deserve rights!!!! even if they're not poké ants. thanks for keeping up with my story, your reviews have been fun to read! :D
now, without further ado, the latest chapter in Sord Girl and Anger Dog! sort of a lowkey chapter this time, setting up for the next few, but also a shorter one. hope you guys enjoy.
The Onion Knight
The Onion Knight
Prim grunted, her muscles straining as she leaned forward to lace up her boot. It wasn’t terribly easy to bend one’s body about in armor, not even in the light leather she was wearing now. She wondered how people managed to go about their business in plate, though she supposed most knights had a squire to assist them by the time they received armor of that caliber. She smiled at the idea of Ferry on his knees, oiling her armor for her, tightening up her buckles. An unlikely situation, and one she wasn’t sure she cared to bring into reality.
Come to think of it, the duck wore plate, didn’t he?
“How do you manage to put your armor on alone?” Prim asked, moving to the other boot now.
“Eh?” The duck turned his head at the sound of Prim’s voice, his armor clinking as he did. “Why, it’s as simple as putting on a particularly bulky shirt, isn’t it? Oho.”
“That was not my understanding,” Prim replied.
“Well,” the duck said, pulling himself to his feet. The sound of it was quite clamorous, what with all his heavy armor. Prim’s eyes flitted to Ferry, who was still curled up on a bed of straw, out cold. “I’m something of a special case, am I not? No greaves for me, no boots. None at all, my lady. I’m so close to the ground, there’s no chance of the average assailant swiping for my legs… And if they did, why, they’re so brittle I suppose I’d be out of luck whether I had armor on them or not, eh? Ohoho!”
The sound of his hearty laugh sent at least a dozen birds from the trees. Prim worried he might prematurely wake some others up, too—Ferry or Mertens, for instance. She gritted her teeth in annoyance. “You’re awfully loud, you know,” she said.
“Do pardon me, my lady. I’m so terribly full of spirit that sometimes there’s nothing I can do to stop it overflowing. Ohohoho!”
Prim sighed and carried on preparing for the day.
Since she had gotten a few hours of sleep while Ferry kept watch last night, she’d taken over his shift after they’d caught the culprit, and had been up long enough to watch the sky bleed from deep black to violet to indigo. It had lightened to a pale blue by now, and the air was crisp and clear. Rays of golden morning light had begun to peek between the trunks of the gently swaying trees on the east side of the field. The grass was all nicely decked in so many little beads of dew, and the sheep had already come out for the morning. Every so often, one bleated softly in the distance between mouthfuls of dripping grass. It might have been a tranquil moment if not for the boisterous duck cutting through the serenity like an especially dull ax.
Prim tied her second boot successfully and then fell slack, waves of relief emanating from her lower back as she straightened it. “What did you say your name was, again?”
The duck’s eyes lit up at the question. “Ser Lauchzelot of Fetscheim, seventh of his name,” he replied, falling into a formal posture as he spoke. “Ser Lauchs, for short. But we are all knights here, are we not? You may just call me Lauchs, if it please my lady. Oho!”
Fetscheim. Prim pressed her lips into a thin line. She might have guessed he was from there, if she’d thought about it. Fetscheim was not so far from the town she had been raised in, actually, and it was the ancestral home of the fetch’d people, of which Lauchs was very obviously one. But that area had fallen to imperial control not so long ago, she recalled, and the fetch’d people had met an unpleasant fate… She wondered what one of their knights was doing here, on the far side of Callouse.
“Laucksalot,” Prim echoed.
“Ah ah,” Lauchs clucked. “Lauch-ze-lot.” The “ch” sounded an awful lot like a quack to Prim’s ears. She couldn’t suppress a small giggle. Lauchs took it in good humor, returning a grin of his own and repeating the sound for her amusement. “And my lady’s name?”
“Primeveire,” she said, not bothering to style it with all the frills Lauchs had. “But you may call me Prim. My partner here is Ferrycloth.”
Ferry’s eyes snapped open at the sound of his name and focused on Lauchs without delay. He groaned and rose to his haunches, looking awfully doglike as he stretched. Lauchs waddled over to him, armor clinking, and extended a wing as though to shake. Ferry just looked at his hand, eyes narrowing in suspicion. Not one to be deterred, Lauchs retracted his wing and gave Ferry a broad smile. “Well met, Ser Ferrycloth!” he boomed.
Ferry frowned. “I’m no ser,” he growled as he stood. The lucario sniffed the air and looked around him, his face impassive. “It grows late already. Let’s return this fool to the farmer and get on with our lives, then.”
Lauchs’ face became a mask of almost comical surprise. “Eh!? Why, you fluffy bastard!” he exclaimed, the indignance in his tone sounding more mocking than anything. Prim thought his spirits were awfully high for a prisoner whose fate was uncertain. “Well, I can appreciate a fellow mon who’s short and to the point, I suppose. Ohoho!”
Ferry gave Prim a flat look. “Let’s go.”
Prim nodded, and they gathered their things despite Lauchs’ reservations. Ferry held onto the gigantic leek sword, and Prim ushered the duck forward at the point of her own blade.
It wasn’t a terribly long walk to Mertens’ house, as they’d spent the night in his field. They were only about halfway through it when a deep growl rang through the field, startling birds from the trees and shaking dew off the grass. Prim’s heart leapt. “There’s something here,” she whispered. She quickly fell into a defensive position, raising her sword and pulling Lauchs close to ensure he didn’t flee. She saw Ferry raise his fists out of the corner of her eye, his ears standing straight up.
“My dear friends—” Lauchs said, but Ferry hushed him emphatically, his eyes intense. “I beg of you—”
“Quiet, man!” Ferry hissed, baring his teeth.
The growl rang out again.
“Forgive me!” Lauchs cried. “It’s me… I’m just so terribly hungry… Normally I’ve eaten a dozen eggs by this time of day, you see…”
The growl came one more time, and this time Prim saw Lauchs’ armor shudder. Ferry stared daggers into Lauchs. The duck let out a shrill quack as Ferry’s fist collided with his face.
“This isn’t justice...,” Lauchs said weakly, massaging his bruising cheek as the wanderswords dragged him to the farmer’s doorstep.
Prim sheathed her sword and rapped three times on the farmer’s door. It didn’t take him long to answer it, and to Prim’s surprise, the man didn’t look tired in the slightest. He squinted wordlessly down at Lauchs, who looked back up at the farmer sheepishly and offered a small wave with his free hand.
“This is the culprit, then?” he asked, looking back up to Prim.
“Sure as the day follows night,” Ferry rasped.
The farmer nods. “Very good work,” he said. “I’m quite impressed. The wanderswords are as professional as ever, I see.” Prim smiled at the compliment. “I’ll go get your payment, then.” Mertens withdrew into his home, not bothering to shut the door behind him, and returned with a respectable pouch that clinked delightfully with each step he took. He tossed it to Ferry, who caught it deftly. The farmer grimaced as he looked to Lauchs again.
“I was hoping it was a feral mon of some sort,” he said. “Something you could rid me of cleanly. But this duck walks on two legs, talks, and swings a sword, by the looks of it… I suppose the law dictates he is yours to do with as you please.” The farmer didn’t seem all too pleased to deliver that news. “I’m an honest man who respects the law. But I tell you, wandersword, if I find this bastard on my property again, my family will be feasting on roast duck.”
Prim found herself disturbed by that comment, but Lauchs and Ferry seemed more unimpressed by it than anything. “Thank you for the payment, old man,” Ferry said. “Have a good life, then.” Then he pulled the door shut forcefully and turned around. He was already beginning to count the coins by the time Prim processed what he’d just done.
“Ferry, what the hell?” she demanded. Ferry turned around to face her, his eyes half-lidded. In that moment, she wanted to smack him with all her might. She tried to be patient with him, she really did, but the way he… He… “You can’t just… Treat people like that,” she sputtered, exasperated.
“You don’t know what it’s like,” he said as though it was the most obvious thing in the world, dropping the coins in his hand back into the purse.
“What are you talking about?”
“You don’t know what it’s like,” he repeated. “Listening to you humans talk about us like we’re second-class citizens, to be commanded and butchered.” Prim opened her mouth to speak, but Ferry cut her off. “I don’t care that the fucking duck is an obnoxious criminal. I don’t care if he’s the most vile scum ever to crawl the earth. The way that farmer talked about him, looked at him, looked at me… You humans don’t treat your own like that. Not even the poorest, grimiest peasant.” His lip was curled by the time he finished talking, baring his sharp teeth, and his eyes were wide with anger. He took a deep breath and calmed himself, lowering his shoulders. “Besides, we’ve received our payment. Our business is done. Now let’s go.”
Prim was at a loss for words. She wanted desperately to say something, anything to him. Anything to put him back in line. She wasn’t wrong—you couldn’t just treat people like that. But he wasn’t wrong, either. She didn’t know what it was like. She had seen just a glimpse, a painful glimpse into the prejudice that Ferry felt every day. He was right to be angry. But that didn’t give him an excuse to act however he pleased, to spit on anyone he felt wronged him, to—
The tense silence was broken by a deep, hearty laugh. Prim’s head pounded at the sound of it. Lauchs’s laugh was quickly becoming her least favorite sound in the world, though in this case she was almost glad it saved her from having to deal with Ferry for the time being.
“Oh, Ferrycloth!” he exclaimed, wiggling his wing free of Prim’s grip and waddling toward the lucario. “I just knew you’d come around to me, you delightful, sulking little bastard! We’re two birds of a feather, you and me!” Ferry did not seem at all pleased with the duck’s overly familiar behavior, but it was the last line that did it for him: “Bring it in, Clothy!”
Not a moment later, the duck was rubbing his beak delicately, a single tear running down his light brown feathers. “I love that untamed spirit of yours,” he croaked. “I’d let you call me Zealot, you know, but it just doesn’t have the same effect…”
“Don’t think for a minute that I’m on your side,” Ferry spat. “We’re still yet to determine what we’re going to do with you. If I have my way, it won’t be pleasant.”
“Come now, Ferry,” Prim said sternly. “Ser Lauchs is a knight. It’s not our place to handle him… uncouthly.”
“As his captors, it is exactly our place,” Ferry replied. “Besides, the farmer says he’ll have the duck’s head if he finds him on his property again. What do you think will happen if we just set him free? I’ll tell you what will happen. He’ll be back by the end of the day, stealing yet another sheep, and we’ll have done no one any good at all.”
Once again, Prim did not want Ferry to be right, not with that tone of voice he used. Yet she found herself at a loss again. If they just let him free, nothing would change. Ferry was right about that much. But… What then? Execution? That seemed needlessly drastic, especially for a mon who called himself a knight.
“Let’s go back to the inn,” Ferry said at last. “I’m starving, and this farmer’s property doesn’t seem like the right place to be anymore.”
Prim gave Ferry an exasperated look, then shook her head and sheathed her sword. “All right. Come with us, Ser Lauchs.” The duck raised a wing to his forehead in a mock salute, and the three of them made their way back to the inn.
It was a short walk, but Prim was glad for the momentary quiet, not to mention the excuse to stretch her legs after a long night of sitting. The tavern was nearly empty when they arrived. Only a few men sat at the tables, slowly sipping at mugs of beer or picking at plates of baked potato.
“Welcome back,” the innkeep said to them as they entered. “Ah, I take it you finished the job, then? Good to see.” He squinted at Lauchs, then wagged a vaguely accusatory finger at him. “Ahh, the duck. I know this fellow.”
“You do?” Prim asked.
“Yes, yes, he came by a few nights ago asking for a room. I turned him away, of course. Now I see I made the right decision.”
Lauchs grumbled something inaudible. Prim wasn’t sure quite what to say.
“We’d like breakfast,” Ferry said after a brief lull. Prim nearly sighed with relief. Curt though he might be, sometimes it was good to have Ferry around after all. He had a way of cutting straight through the pleasantries.
The innkeep nodded, and the three of them situated themselves at a table, Ferry and Prim next to one another and Lauchs on the other side. Ferry leaned Lauchs’s sword on the wall next to them—it stood like an especially tall, pale man, watching over the table.
Lauchs wasted no time pitching his plea. “I’m unsure what a duck’s promise is worth to you,” he said, “but if it spares me my life, I can promise to move on from this town. I have no ties here, you see.”
A few of the other patrons in the tavern turned to face the source of the loud voice, but they seemed to decide it wasn’t worth much attention, and turned back to their food after a few moments.
“Then what are you doing here?” Prim demanded, her tone slightly hushed. She hoped Lauchs might take the hint and quiet down, though it didn’t seem likely.
The duck sighed. “I’ve been making my way down the Lanceroute, you see. I only planned to stop over here for a night, but you heard that fellow at the counter. None of the inns would take in an old duck like me. I ran out of food that night, and have been trying my best to gather more before I set out again, but I’m a duck of tremendous appetite, you see… I keep eating all the food I collect before the end of the day. So I’ve been stranded here for a week now, held hostage by my own stomach. Ohoho…”
Ferry and Prim exchanged a look.
“We could just throw him in a ravine,” Ferry suggested. “He’d starve to death by the end of the day, apparently. Wouldn’t be our fault.” Prim elbowed Ferry and gave him a stern look.
“Why won’t they take you in?” she asked.
“Well, no one takes a solitary mon seriously in this land. Surely you’ve seen as much, oho.”
Prim couldn’t actually recall ever having seen a mon on their own before this. They either lived in tribes, in the wild, or as assistants to humans. She supposed it made sense that a mon on his own might not be treated well. The thought had never occurred to her before.
“I spent the last few years in the Kingdom of Galar, you see. Mon can make an honest name for themselves there,” Lauchs continued. “I suppose I grew too used to that way of living… Here in Callouse, a lone mon is no better than a vagrant. On my own, without a human to accompany me, well… It’s no good at all, ohoho.”
“Then go back to Galar,” Ferry said flatly. Despite his harsh tone, Prim thought his expression looked softer than usual.
The innkeep approached bearing several plates. “Eggs for the lady and her lucario,” he said, stooping to place the pair of plates on the table, “and some scallions for the fetch’d.” His eyes lit up with revelation as he spoke. “Wait,” he added, squinting at Lauchs. “Are you the one who rooted through my garden and took all the scallions?”
Lauchs averted his gaze. “Sorry about that, my good man,” he said, fishing a gold coin from his armor. He flipped it to the innkeep, who caught it in his palm. “A duck has to eat, hasn’t he? Ohohoho!” The innkeep didn’t seem terribly amused, but he seemed to accept the coin after scrutinizing it for a moment and left the table alone with a shake of his head. Lauchs watched with a sheepish expression as the man went, then turned back to Ferry.
“I can’t simply return to Galar, dear Ferry,” he said, crunching on a scallion. “I’ve come here on a quest, you see. I will not throw up my arms in defeat at the first sight of hardship. That’s not the knightly way!” He polished off the scallion, bliss washing over his face as he swallowed. “Listen. I have a proposition for you two. We’re both here in this backwater town, notable only for its placement on the Lanceroute. So you two are headed down the road too, aren’t you?” Neither Prim nor Ferry spoke up, but Lauchs took their silence as affirmation. “Well, I’m on a journey to Shallor, and I could use the company of a local wandersword. I believe you could benefit from my company as well. I’m an accomplished swordsman, as you know, and I’ve been at this knight-errant business for quite some time myself. Don’t you see? It’s destiny that we travel together!”
Ferry’s plate clattered to the table—it seemed he’d been licking the scraps off it. “Absolutely fucking not.”
Prim gave him a pleading look. “Ferry, please,” she said, growing quite tired of his attitude already. And it was so early in the day…
“What?” Ferry snapped. Prim recoiled physically. She was used to his irritability, but this tendency to push back on her was catching her off guard. So far he had for the most part kept his head down and suffered her suggestions, however grudgingly… She wasn’t sure what to make of this change in behavior. “He’s a liability. An extra bed to buy, and an extra mouth to feed—an insatiable one at that. Besides, he’s going to want a cut of the pay for jobs we could very well manage on our own. We don’t need him.”
But he needs us, Prim wanted to say. Yet she knew Ferry wouldn’t care. Would they be better off if she didn’t, either? Still, he had nearly taken them both last night. That kind of expertise raised the bar for the kinds of jobs they could take, and harder jobs meant better rewards.
“Come now, Ferrycloth,” Lauchs said. “Give it a chance. Let’s all go to the next town and do just one job together. You can make up your mind then.” Ferry growled in annoyance but didn’t say anything more. By now Prim knew that was the closest he ever came to concession.
“So it’s decided, then!” Lauchs exclaimed, breaking into a wide smile. “Drinks for my friends, then, innkeep! Ohoho!”
Ferry stood up abruptly. “I’m done eating,” he said. “It’s far too early to drink. Let’s go.”
Not missing a beat, Lauchs stood as well. “Never mind those drinks, innkeep! You’re quite right, Ferrycloth, old chum. But before we set out, there’s a thing or two I need to gather from my camp, if you don’t mind…”
Ferry collected the leek sword and, after Prim paid the innkeep his due, they walked out into the crisp morning air. Prim, for one, was just glad to be outside, far enough from the poor folks in the tavern that they no longer had to suffer through the bombastic duck’s shouting. The next few days were going to be interesting.
- - -
Lauchs’s camp was tucked away in the woods surrounding the town, a bit less than a mile out of the way of Mertens’ farm. Lauchs had made a small clearing here, it seemed—perhaps half a dozen stumps stuck up from the ground, their heads splintered as though the trees they’d once supported had been pushed down rather than cut. Prim’s eyes flitted to Lauchs’ gigantic, blunt leek sword, and decided that that was probably the case.
There was a fire pit at the center of the clearing, flameless and charred black, and all around it were scraps of food. In particular, piles of crispy leek butts littered the ground, hundreds of them, easily. A dozen feet or so back sat a wooloo skeleton, the bones pure white and stripped completely of meat. It must have been the one he’d stolen from Mertens, whose wool he had delivered in a neat parcel to the farmer’s door. Prim couldn’t help but be impressed by Lauchs’ apparent talent for butchery despite the grimness of it.
“I apologize for the mess,” Lauchs said. “I didn’t think anyone else would be seeing this place any time soon, ohoho. I’ll just collect my things quickly, and we can take our leave.”
Beside the fire was a log that looked quite good for sitting, and behind that was a bundle of possessions over to which Lauchs waddled. There was a large wicker basket, probably more than half the size of Lauchs himself, and a fine wooden shield was strapped to its back face—arm straps were fastened to the opposite side. A tall pole stretched from the basket perhaps five feet into the air, and from it hung a long green flag depicting a leek. Lauchs piled a few objects into the trunk—a handful of scallions, his coin purse, a wineskin—and then lifted the basket with some difficulty and worked his wings into the straps, wearing it like a rucksack.
“My sword, if you trust me with it,” he said, extending an open hand to Ferry. The lucario gave Prim an inquisitive look. She nodded at him, and Ferry relinquished the huge leek to its rightful owner, who promptly stashed it in the big basket on his back as though it was a crude sheath.
“Well!” Lauchs exclaimed, flashing a broad smile. “I suppose we’re all ready for the road then, eh?”
“I don’t think so,” Ferry said. Lauchs raised a bushy black eyebrow. “We’ve agreed to let you live. That doesn’t mean you get to skip away from this town without facing the consequences of your actions.” The lucario’s blood-red eyes fixed themselves on the wooloo remains. “You’re going to compensate that farmer for twice the worth of the wooloo you slaughtered. I saw that coinpurse of yours. I know you have the gold for it.”
Prim found herself raising her eyebrows too. She was growing irritated by Ferry’s terseness more than ever, it seemed, and yet at the same time she felt herself shrinking before his assertive presence. Wasn’t she supposed to be the one leading him? She thought back to their interactions with Mertens, with the innkeep. Ferry’s terseness had been the very quality that had saved her from sputtering like a fool when she could find no words. His sense of justice now prevailed when she might have erred on the side of excessive sympathy otherwise. How was she meant to feel? How could he be so crude, so brash, and yet so driven and dutiful?
Lauchs gave Ferry a pensive look, then sighed. “Very well. I suppose it’s only fair. You two caught me red-winged, after all.” He pressed a hand to his forehead, and then ran it down his face, pinching between his eyes. “It will run me most of my gold… But it can’t be helped, I suppose. Better my purse than my head, eh? Ohoho…”
Prim felt uneasy about returning to the farmer after the crude send-off Ferry had given him before, but she supposed there was no way around it. She surveyed the table and, having found that everyone’s meals were eaten up, stood. “Well, let’s go, then. If we want to make good progress on the road today, then we have no time to waste.”
Ferry listless, Prim uneasy, and Lauchs sheepish, the three of them walked back into the woods and towards the farm, leaving Lauchs’ camp and the alabaster remains of the stolen wooloo behind.
- - -
Mertens’ eyes started at Lauchs’ splayed yellow feet and then traced upward, past his gleaming armor; past his wide, sheepish grin; past the great leek blade shooting straight into the air from his rucksack. Finally they settled on the white flag flapping a good four feet above the duck’s head, the green leek emblem occasionally flashing through the folds of the fabric. The farmer did not seem terribly impressed.
“You have brought him back,” he said flatly, refocusing his gaze on Prim.
“Yes,” she said. “We have decided that he will pay you twice the value of the sheep he stole, as recompense.” The farmer opened his mouth to respond, but Prim continued. “We’ll be escorting him out of town, too. You won’t see him again.”
The farmer shut his mouth, then evaluated Lauchs suspiciously. “Well, he’ll be a problem for the next farm he stumbles upon, I think. But so long as he isn’t my problem, I suppose…” Prim sensed that he was dissatisfied with the verdict, but as he’d said himself, it was the duty of the wanderswords to dole out punishment for their captives. Mertens had thus far demonstrated respect for their order—she would be surprised to see him refuse their judgement now.
“Well,” he added, “I’ll place the value of the sheep at ten gold.”
Ferry exhaled forcefully through his nose. “Be reasonable,” he said gruffly. “I’m no friend to the duck, but he at least had the decency to return the sheep’s wool to you. The meat alone isn’t worth more than five at best.”
Mertens gave Ferry a coy look. “Let’s call it emotional damages, then.”
Ferry’s face contorted with rage, but Prim gripped his shoulder firmly before he could react further. “That’s fine,” she insisted. “Mertens, will you accept fifteen? You deserve your recompense, but we have days of travel ahead, and Ser Lauchs’ money is as useful to us as it is to him.”
“Now, I don’t know about—” Lauchs butted in, but Ferry shot him a nasty glare, and he shut up promptly.
“Very well,” Mertens sighed. “Fifteen, then.” Lauchs wasted no time counting out his gold, verbally noting each piece he extracted from his purse. Once he reached the agreed-upon amount, he dumped it into Mertens’ cupped hands and gave the farmer a winning smile.
“Terribly sorry about all the trouble, old fellow,” he said. “I hate to have caused you any distress. But a duck has to eat in the end, hasn’t he? Ohoho!”
Mertens stuffed the gold into his pocket and stepped back, completely ignoring Lauchs’ comment. “May the wind always be at your back, Wanderswords.” He gave one last glare at Lauchs before shutting the door.
“Well, I think that went rather swimmingly, don’t you all?” Lauchs asked, placing his coin purse back in his rucksack as the group made their way off the farmer’s property.
Ferry glared at Lauchs from behind a scowl. “Bastard,” he spat forcefully, as though the word were sour. “I don’t care if you’re a pain in the ass. That farmer tried to shake you down, just because you’re a mon and he thought he could get away with it.”
“Ferry,” Prim said with a gentle sort of firmness, “Lauchs had stolen his property. He was right to be angry. I thought he was quite nice to you last night, pouring you a drink and all.”
“Yes, quite nice until I posed the slightest inconvenience,” Ferry shot back. “The bastard didn’t care about anything I had to say. He didn’t change his mind until you spoke up. Figures, of course, seeing as—”
“My friends!” Lauchs cried out, clapping his wings together. “I paid the man, didn’t I? Let us put it behind us. There is no room for quarreling on the long road ahead of us.”
Ferry growled something unintelligible, but that was the end of it. Prim breathed a sigh of relief. It was almost blissfully silent as they made their way to the Lanceroute, save for Lauchs’s whistling. Even though the whistling grated on Prim’s ears a bit, she was so pleased with the peace that she allowed it. The sun was hanging directly overhead now, shining its rays pleasantly below. A gentle breeze pushed at their backs, and Prim couldn’t help but wonder whether God had heard the farmer’s blessing and willed it into being. She couldn’t have asked for a finer day to walk.
Eventually they found themselves walking through the town, and Prim occasionally stopped to buy an item from a streetside vendor—a block of cheese and a couple apples here, some dried meat and a bottle of wine there.
“Excellent thinking, my lady,” Lauchs said. “One can never be too prepared for the road, eh? Ohoho! Perhaps I’ll do some shopping myself.”
“You’d better hold onto your gold, old duck,” Ferry said. “You’re paying your own way, or you’re sleeping under the stars when we make it to the next town. If you get hungry on the road, you can just take a bite out of that ridiculous sword of yours, can’t you?”
Lauchs’ eyes became dinner plates. “Why, I’ve never heard such a preposterous thing!” he huffed. “A sirfetch’d’s sword is sacred! A gift from the Goddess, an extension of oneself. To eat it, why… That would be like taking a bite out of your own arm!”
Prim swore she saw mirth in Ferry’s eyes. “Such things are not unheard of in times of desperation,” is all he said. Lauchs burst into a hearty laugh and gave Ferry a good, healthy slap on the back. Prim was astonished to see that, though he tensed up, Ferry did not otherwise react.
“Oh, I think we’ll have good fun on the road together, the three of us,” Ferry remarked as they left the town limits. The Lanceroute stretched out before them, an endless ribbon of smooth dirt reaching in both directions until it disappeared into the hills. “Good fun indeed.”
The first sentence I think you can cut. The second sentence I suggest rewording: Their village was quaint, he had to admit, and not all too different in character from where he had grown up... The lucario village is an interesting surprise! I love the details here. Seems like there’s a cultural split between humans and “the other” here even though pokémon in this world are clearly sapient. Looking forward to seeing how that plays out.
new era of positive diplomacy between our peoples." Doran said nothing as they trotted onward. He had some words to say eventually, of course, but they were not for this prattling footman. The lucario opened its mouth to speak again, then hesitated. They made the rest of their way to the chieftain's hall in silence.
At “Doran said nothing” and at “The lucario opened its mouth,” I’d split the paragraph. Even though there isn’t actually dialogue, the focus falls to a new character.
Its walls arched from a stone base to form a semi-sphere of woven wood. Not a proper building in the sense that Doran knew a proper building to be, of course, but it was certainly leagues closer to a civilized structure than the tents.
I was jarred by the sudden switch in perspective character. I’m not sure how else you could convey this information without the head-hopping, unless instead the chief were made to be the prologue’s main POV character watching Doran’s approach. But it seems we’d miss a lot by not having lives like “I am justice” haha.
I wasn’t surprised that Doran took violent action at the end — seemed like his jam from what little we know about him. (Though I was disappointed not to get to see the lucario fighting back! Seems like swords would be a poor match for an aura sphere, psychic blast, or drain punch.) I imagine his choice will have negative consequences. He was oddly compelling, monstrous as he was. I’ll be curious to learn more about the human religion —is this Christianity or something else? Worship of something other than a pokémon would be wild when they’re so obviously powerful, but I’m down to discover whatever you’ve cooked up.
So for starters, this has been probably one of the more unique pokemon settings I've read so far. It's hard to say where the plot is going to go off of the prologue alone, but it feels like one of those fantasy stories where the protag is up against a powerful, corrupted church-state.
Speaking of that church-state, let's talk about the pompous asshole himself. Your choice of words does a great job of lending to his high and mighty atmosphere. And you just know he's trouble from the first sentence. And the narrative continues to build that up, with the amount of soldiers he has with him for what seems to be a small diplomatic mission, to the way he acts like the lucario are inferior. And then just when you think h might just be a run-of-the mill asshole, he goes and makes that order and just. God. You've done a great job of making me hat your antagonist from the get-go.
Anyway, I don't know anything about where the story is going to go from here (it might be worth it to include a brief summary in the op? Because all I was able to gather from it is that it's a fic about a lucario and a lady with a sword, and that it's a medieval fantasy setting). But regardless of that, this prologue does a great job of setting the stage of the way the world is. It's definitely caught my interest, and hopefully, I'll come back to read more sometime in the near future.
Hey there! I've actually been up-to-date on this for a while but never got around to leaving a review, and it's high time to remedy that because yeeeeeees medieval fantasy Pokémon fic. In theory this is just gonna be a quick, all-over-the-place catch-up review since I've already read this and just need a bit of a refresher (and also am a bit scatterbrained atm because preparing to move will do that to a person, I suppose), but we'll see, haha.
And so, my disjointed and occasionally probably inconsequential thoughts, which I'm hoping will be at least marginally helpful/interesting:
Prologue
-Everyone's already covered the fantastic introduction to Doran's character, so instead I'll just tangentially say I'm kinda amused by his choice of steed, given how… well… muddy mudsdale are, heh. Granted pokémon don't have quite the elemental affinities they normally would in this setting, so maybe it doesn't matter, but I imagine it'd take some training to get a pristine white mudsdale to not go stomp through all of the mud. (aah now I have images of a glorious white mudsdale covered in dirt and quite proud of himself and the stablehands panicking to get it cleaned up before Doran notices, haha. Not remotely the point of anything but it's adorable!)
"Indeed," Doran muttered, breaking into a small, skewed grin.
'Nother small thing: "plunging" a sword sounds like a stabbing motion, and while I suppose lucario have pretty thin necks, I'd think a slash/swing/slice/etc. would be a more appropriate head-removing stroke.
Two
Out of curiosity, is there a reason that Ferry's "preparing to leave" scene is in a different chapter than Prim's? It's quite short, and this next chapter isn't substantially longer so it's not like it would balloon out of control to combine the two. And idk, it just seems like it'd be a bit nicer to have the two scenes go together, especially given the fact that they converge at the end there. Obviously it'd be fussy to change now because posting to a forum whoops, but maybe a thought for posting it to other places in the future?
She clasped his hand and shivered at the grainy feeling of his giant callouses.
No "o" in the calluses you get on your hands. (Also a bit funny given they call their region Callouse, heh.)
Three
Yet for all the things they did have, there were hundreds they did not. Prim was all too aware of this. For instance, she thought to herself, they lacked a horse. Two would be ideal, really, if Prim was honest. They lacked gold, too, and would until they completed their first contract. They lacked a map. They lacked a compass. Prim would have been quite glad for an apple, too, if she could get one. Anything crisp and moist and not so damnably dry.
Hm! While handing out a pair of horses to every new Wandersword team is probably not gonna happen (horses were frickin' expensive back in the day, after all), is there a reason that they seem to be lacking so many more basic supplies, like maps? I can understand the wanderswords needing to be self-reliant and all that, but kicking them out with literally nothing just seems… idk, unnecessary? And they get their weapons, which I think? would be more expensive for the camp to part with than maps? I might be wrong on that. Is there an expectation that new Wanderswords will already have this stuff, and it's a sign of Prim's laziness/lack of preparation, or possibly some other disadvantage she's facing (she has that noble name, but maybe her family didn't send her off to training camp with anything?), that she doesn't?
Also: "thought to herself" is redundant, since unless telepathy is involved you can't "think to" anyone but yourself.
Three
He realized the irony of his words, speaking of honor and unyielding
"Speaking of unyielding" reads awkwardly. "Being unyielding" would work if you really wanted to keep the same word, but you could also replace it with a synonym that works in noun form, like determination.
-The whole zoroark encounter was great. I loved seeing its worldview and how that differed from Ferry's, and it was a great way both to show Ferry's inexperience and tendency to beat himself up and a snippet of Prim and Ferry working together as a team to fight the thing. Imagine what they'll be able to accomplish once they've properly warmed up to one another!
And I can't help but think we'll be seeing a bit more about this "hunter of hunters" in the future, hm hm hm...
Four
It seems, in fact, that there were once hundreds of scallions here,
Hm… I can understand expecting contempt given human society's general opinions of lucario, but I wonder whether that's maybe a bit at odds with the idea that Wanderswords are respected(?) problem-solvers around here. I suppose if the institution and any respect afforded to it are older than the subjugation of the lucario then I can understand that, but surely people are at least expecting their local Wanderswords to come with lucario these days, right? I dunno, it's not necessarily a problem; I suppose I'm just curious as to what it actually means to the common people to have Wanderswords around.
Earlier—I think during the zoroark encounter—Ferry said "gods", lowercase and plural, but this is "God" capitalized and singular, as Doran and Prim have said. Was this intentional? We don't really know anything about lucario spirituality/religion, so maybe it is, but it kinda reads like an oversight.
Perhaps the pack had gone out for a wide-area hunt that night.
-I wanted to call out Ferry's memory as a really, really haunting bit, Doran's singing especially. Like. I really don't know what to expect about the humans' religion in general, whether Doran's lyrics are actually accurate to what God is "like" (no telling yet whether it's an actual entity in this universe as opposed to just something the humans believe in), but going straight from "compassion running deeper than you know" to "your blood to ash, your bones to snow" is just… yikes. So creepy, so horrible, and the image of him singing while people are being massacred and babies thrown into wagons... I want this guy to show up again so Ferry can punch him in his fucking face!
Then it disappeared. Ferry’s grasp on its signature faltered completely.
I think you meant Lauchs here, not Ferry? Or did you? On the one hand, idk whether sirfetch'd would eat eggs (Ferry has them for breakfast later and Lauchs doesn't), and at first I assumed Lauchs's "shaking armor" was him laughing at Ferry, after which Ferry punched him mostly out of embarrassment. But this tone of voice doesn't match Ferry's usual tone at all?
“I’m quite impressed. The wanderswords are as professional as ever, I see.”
Should "wandersword" generally be capitalized or not? I feel like in earlier chapters you capitalized it most of the time, but you don't in this chapter.
In that moment, she wanted to wrap her hands around his delicate little neck and watch the life fade from his eyes. She tried to be patient with him, she really did, but the way he… He…
This has kinda been bugging me since the last time I read this chapter—this seems excessive. I get that she was raised in a society that treats lucario/other poké-people as second-class at best, and presumably what's meant to happen over the course of the story is for her to unlearn a lot of that, and I'm sure there are other people who absolutely would choke out a pokémon for daring to speak that way to a human, but… hm. She has at least once thought about "beating" Ferry for having a bad attitude, but I dunno. It just seems like an overreaction for her specifically, especially since Ferry… well, he absolutely was rude, but it just doesn't seem rude enough to justify that sort of thought, I guess? I would consider having her express her annoyance in a slightly less murdery-seeming way.
Furthermore, I'm a little confused about Mertens and Ferry here. In the quote I mentioned earlier, Mertens actually didn't give Ferry a look of contempt even though Ferry was expecting it, and he seemed fairly kind and patient with the both of them at first. And then here, where Mertens casually remarks that he'd be willing to kill and eat Lauchs, like, that's awful, and I totally get Ferry being angry because he empathizes and has had similar treatment in the past, but Ferry draws attention to the way Mertens looked at him when as far as I can tell that didn't happen? It seems like you'd intended for Mertens to have a worse attitude toward Ferry than the way it's actually written currently. I dunno, maybe my quick and frazzled re-read has caused me to miss something, in which case feel free to disregard all this, but that's just the impression I've gotten.
—
Hm… I feel like I've been mostly nitpicky so far—sorry if that's the case. I promise they're mostly small blips that happen to stand out in what's otherwise been a great story to read so far, though! My only overall note is that it does seem to be taking a while to get to the plot proper; other then a general sense of "probably Doran needs to be punched in the face at some point", it's not very clear yet where this whole shebang is headed. But even with that, each individual chapter has been great, with a wonderful odd-couple main character duo, delightful little worldbuilding details, a lot of questions raised about how the world works and what it's going to mean for our characters. What is the Callousian (Shallorian?) religion actually like? Prim's acknowledged God before, as I've mentioned, but she doesn't seem to be particularly pious, so what is her relationship with this religion like? Prim is currently… not as awful to pokémon as other people clearly are (throttling incident notwithstanding); why is that the case, and what's going to happen in the future that really challenges her viewpoints? What's it going to take to get Ferry to lighten up and enjoy himself a little more? What is Lauchs's quest? These are all fun questions that I'm really excited to learn the answers to over time.
(To go off on another tangent, the general thought of an entire kingdom of far/sirfetch'd with noble onion knights makes me unreasonably happy, as someone who has a ridiculous side project that involves pretty much the same thing, haha. Allium could probably do with Ser Lauchzelot to whip them into shape, they're a mess. And yes, I say that even given the fact that Lauchs himself is also a bit of a mess. Slightly less tangentially, it makes me eager to see what other sorts of pokémon societies we'll see in the future! And a bit sad to consider the state most of them will probably be in, alas.)
Also of definite note is the prose—Doran's description, Ferry noticing the tiny pinprick auras of the little creatures going about their day in the stream and the ebb and flow of the sleepers in the barn, turns of phrase like
When the sun receded and the air cooled, the creatures of the night shook themselves from their slumber and crawled out of their dens to hunt.
It's just a lot of fun to read, and overall I eagerly await more chapters whenever they're ready! Apologies again if this is hard to follow or too nitpicky; now that I've gotten this out of the way, future reviews will hopefully be more timely and thorough and hopefully interesting, haha.
She smiled gently at the idea of Ferry on his knees, oiling her armor for her, tightening up her buckles. An unlikely situation, and one she wasn’t sure she cared to bring into reality.
The word "gently" for me conveyed a weird image -- it feels almost wistful, fond of the idea, but the next sentence makes it seem like Prim doesn't actually want this.
This one was also a tricky word for me -- *mint* means a whole lot of shades from blue to green, but most of the non-green shades would be a weird color for grass, and most of the green shades would be similar in color to regular grass, so it seems like an unnecessary modifier.
“I was hoping it was a feral mon of some sort,” he said. “Something you could rid me of cleanly. But this duck walks on two legs, talks, and swings a sword, by the looks of it… I suppose the law dictates he is yours to do with as you please.” The farmer didn’t seem all too pleased to deliver that news. “I’m an honest man who respects the law. But I tell you, wandersword, if I find this bastard on my property again, my family will be feasting on roast duck.”
haha wow this situation is deeply fucked, isn't it? Martens is patting himself on the back for not resorting to what's effectively cannibalism with extra steps on the first time.
The feral system is also something I find intensely interesting. What makes a pokemon classify as feral? Ferry and Lauchs both treat the farmer's wooloo as we might treat regular sheep, and Prim literally calls them property, so presumably the sheep are feral, but Prim acts as if the sirfetch'd species is a "people", so presumably none of them are feral. Is there a visible difference? Are all wooloo feral and all sirfetch'd are not?
“Ferry, what the hell?” she demanded. Ferry turned around to face her, his eyes half-lidded. In that moment, she wanted to wrap her hands around his delicate little neck and watch the life fade from his eyes. She tried to be patient with him, she really did, but the way he… He… “You can’t just… Treat people like that,” she sputtered, exasperated.
I want to strangle my companion and choke his tiny neck until he literally is dead: prim sleep, normal action
The sirfetch'd population (whom she acknowledges as people) gets genocided by humans: prim sleep, unfortunate fate
Ferry, somewhat sarcastically, thank you have a good life: **PRIM WAKE**, YoU cAnT jUsT tReAt PeOpLe lIkE tHaT
I'm very fascinated to see how you unpack all of these characters haha; you've got a really strong mix of perspectives to play with in this group now!
She wasn’t wrong—you couldn’t just treat people like that. But he wasn’t wrong, either. She didn’t know what it was like. She had seen just a glimpse, a painful glimpse into the prejudice that Ferry felt every day. He was right to be angry. But that didn’t give him an excuse to act however he pleased, to spit on anyone he felt wronged him, to—
haha yeah it's not excuse to systematically murder two separate species and enslave the survivors, you can't do that, it's no excuse to act however you please, you gotta play by the *rules* that's just how it is
“We could just throw him in a ravine,” Ferry suggested. “He’d starve to death by the end of the day, apparently. Wouldn’t be our fault.” Prim elbowed Ferry and gave him a stern look.
I like the laconic addition of "apparently" haha, and I see why you like Lauchs so much -- he really adds a lot more to this dynamic and helps bring out the best/worst in Ferry and prim.
Prim couldn’t actually recall ever having seen a mon on their own before this. They either lived in tribes, in the wild, or as assistants to humans. She supposed it made sense that a mon on his own might not be treated well. The thought had never occurred to her before.
Not missing a beat, Lauchs stood as well. “Never mind those drinks, innkeep! You’re quite right, Ferrycloth, old chum. But before we set out, there’s a thing or two I need to gather from my camp, if you don’t mind…”
The lucario gave Prim an inquisitive look. She nodded at him, and Ferry relinquished the huge leek to its rightful owner, who promptly stashed it in the big basket on his back as though it was a crude sheath.
“A sirfetch’d’s sword is sacred! A gift from the goddess, an extension of oneself. To eat it, why… That would be like taking a bite out of your own arm!”
This chapter is a lot of fun, and I think we're starting to really dig into those themes you teased in previous chapters. The recurring focus on personhood in a world with many different types of people is particularly interesting to me, so I'm really excited to see that we're starting to take a closer look at that.
Prim's a strange lens for this, and a lot of her narration doesn't really work for me. There are a few exchanges where she notes that she's never considered what it must be like to be non-human in this human-dominated society (Ferry being angry that Martens doesn't listen to him; Lauchs not being able to travel alone), and she's deeply troubled by these realizations, which I think is a really valid perspective to highlight -- a lot of problems arise not from one person being malicious, but from lots of people being ignorant. But at the same time, Prim's *very* knowledgeable about a lot of other, arguably more wrong imbalances (the implied sirfetch'd eradication, Ferry's second-class citizenship), but the way they're presented in the narrative, they may as well be fun bits of flavor text. It's an interesting study on how people are affected by what is closest/most relevant to them, but at the same time both of the genocides have happened to people whom she's starting to consider as friends -- it's weird to me that she can shrug her shoulders at that but wants to strangle both Ferry and Martens about some (arguably) more casual racism. It's hard to sympathize with her because of this value-reversal, I think: she has some pretty modern takes on inequality/focuses on the more casual interactions but the setting around her is very much still in the not-modern, full-blown slavery and genocide time.
Lauchs is fun. He seems to be either in denial about what Prim thinks happened to the sirfetch'd, or he doesn't know, both of which will be fun options to explore. I like how he tempers out Prim and Ferry, and I think he adds a good third leg to this duo.
Ferry is angry, and I get the feeling that we're supposed to take Prim's side and see that he's being too angry, but I don't fully buy it. His actions are ineffective, but they're also justified, and there's nothing else he can really be expected to do -- he even says it himself; Martens doesn't listen to him unless Prim decides to step in, and she's solidly center-court right now. He's being a dick to people who are being racist to him. It was sort of hard for me to see Prim's "both sides" part of this argument when one side is literally threatening to kill and eat people and the other side is upset at the casual threats of being killed and eaten.
And at the same time this all combines to make a really compelling thread -- issues like this are messy and gross. There's a lot to unpack and it's unlikely that any character is going to have all the right answers, let alone *any* right answers, so when Prim's judging people in a weird way it's fully realistic imo, just odd to read when there's no presented counterpoints in a world that's full of them.
Very good chapter though; I see what you mean by your slow burn comments. Hope to see more soon!
What really stood out to me in this prologue was the sense of direction. A lot of prologues often have a vague feeling, that leaves you not entirely sure what purpose it's serving. In this case, the prologue both introduces us to the world and depicts something very key and concrete--a crucial turning point in the relations between this human empire and the outlying lucario tribes. The characterization of the viewpoint dude was well done. Verging on cartoonish in places, but I think you grounded it every time it went off in that direction.
I see other people have raised these points in reviews, so I don't want to harp on them, but I found the low power levels of the pokemon confusing. The kind of fundamental tension of the main pokemon canon is that pokemon are clearly more powerful than humans, yet humans capture and command them. Having humans that can beat pokemon in an out-right fight makes this world not really feel like the pokemon world to me. I'm also confused by what Negrek pointed out, that the mudsdale is what seems to be a non-talking animal, but the lucario live in a fascimile of human society.
My main world-building question concerns religion (my favorite pet topic in pokefic.) Normally when I see a human-centric religion, I have to ask how it developed, when humans inhabit a world so clearly shaped by identifiable elemental gods. Your depowered pokemon certainly leaves much more room for that, but I'm curious going forward what role the legendary pokemon play in the religious landscape of this world.
And as of his ecclesiastical inauguration exactly nine days ago, there was quite officially no purer, more perfect man of the Lord in Callouse, either.
I like the moment of almost-empathy here and the moment we run smack into the limitations of that empathy. Though the fact that he considers them people puts him way above a lot of pokemon fan fic, alarmingly enough.
A series of scars traced his face, as though from a scratch, crossing a cloudy white eye down to to the tip of his muzzle where the whiskers went silver. Here was a chief who had visibly won his office tooth and nail.
I like this, though the initial bit of the description is confusing. A "series" of scars as if from a single "scratch"? It sounds like you're depicting a single wound that goes from his eye to his muzzle, so what makes it a series? Do you mean something like "Three parallel scars ran from his cloudy eye to the tip of his muzzle, where the whiskers went silver.'
Here was a chief who had visibly won his office tooth and nail. These victories were just as apparent in the way he stood, sizing up the high priest with a wise pair of eyes, as they were in the physical signs of age and extensive combat that painted his body.
Had to read this over several times to get the sense of it. I think the "sizing up" clause interrupts too long. Maybe "These victories were apparent not just in the combat-scars that adorned his body, but in the confident way he stood, sizing up the high priest with narrowed eyes." (I wouldn't say "wise" since this description is coming from Doran's POV. Does he really consider the lucario wise?)
I'm not sure about "glare" here. Doesn't seem like something a chieften would do in a diplomatic situation, and Doran hasn't insulted him yet. Maybe "gaze" instead of glare.
I really liked this moment, where they kind of seem to be on the same page. I wondered if Doran was here to recruit the lucario to fight some other enemies he had, but rip.
He expected it to show him a face knotted and pulsating with unbridled anger, but it did not. High Priest Doran was leaning over the lucario, cape draped at his sides. A serendipitous smile split his face, sweet and serene. His heavy eyelids fell halfway down his knowing gaze, and if Silverfoot didn't know better, he might think the priest was staring into the eyes of a lover. The lucario frowned deeply. The priest's spirit was inscrutable now.
Really liked this moment, where Silverfoot is taken aback and we realize that Doran was hoping for this answer all along. Don't know about "serendipitous" here.
There was no fight. The soldier proceeded and caught the small lucario by the arm. It struggled to no avail as the guard raised his sword underhand and plunged it through the canid's neck. Its head fell to the grass soundlessly, body following shortly afterward. Dark red blood spilled over the field.
"there was no fight" contradicts "it struggled to no avail." I think this sequence might play out a little better if they both stare at him shocked, and the human soldier just gets over it more quickly, stabbing the lucario before the lucario can really react.
So we pick up fifteen years later! That made me at once wonder about lucario life-spans. I'm not sure whether they're much more close to dogs in this world, in which case a whole generation could have passed, or whether they're longer lived, and this change is still recent. I got more the former sense through-out, since the change in their circumstances seems widely accepted. But I am pretty curious how old Ferry is and whether he's only known the current state of things. And what about his parents? There's no mention of saying goodbye to family--perhaps they're already separated at this stage of things, if Ferry is in some kind of training school? Or maybe they're dead 😬
Maybe reword to "Some of the lucario were out feasting, laughing and cheering, and celebrating their culture with traditional songs from their youth." As is I don't get a sense of what "celebrating their culture" looks like, but traditional songs seems like a good candidate for that.
But Ferrycloth had no room in his heart for festivities and joy today. He was in no mood to celebrate. Rather, he was filled with dread. What was the sense in pretending otherwise? He wasn’t going to squander his last moments of liberty maintaining a facade for people he’d never see again.
The no mood to celebrate and filled with dread sentences feel a bit redundant. Think you could tighten to "But Ferrycloth had no room in his heart for festivities and joy today. He was in no mood to celebrate and saw no sense in pretending otherwise. Why squander his last moments of liberty maintaining a facade for people he’d never see again?"
So, do they have the lucario fight without weapons and the humans with? I guess I see how that could end in the human's favor, if the lucario can't really use aura offensively.
Hm, it seemed more from what you described like he was trying not to think at all, rather than reminiscing. I would have appreciated a bit of reminiscing, actually, to get more of a sense of his life over the past years.
“You’re weak,” he said through a snarl as he stood up, water still dripping from his face.
“What?”
“I said you’re weak. Like the rest of them, pissing their last hours away. You’re a sentimental fool.”
“Okay, no need to be an ass about it, I’ll just get going—”
“You’re ‘content’ with the adolescence you spent in captivity like an animal, being trained to raise your fists against your brothers, all to eventually be sold into slavery to some ungrateful human like the object you are?” Ferry snapped. “Fine, go drink and make merry over the end of your free life with the others. You all make me sick, every last one of you.” His lips were curled now, baring his pointed teeth.
“You’re the one who threw yourself into their training. You’re the one taking all of this seriously. You really think you’re better than everyone else because they’re capable of pulling the sticks out of their asses even though you’re the one who’s been treating this whole thing like religion? You’re a hypocrite.”
Interesting, particularly the mention of religion. That was the rationale for subjugating the lucario--are they supposed to do lip-service to the human religion now?
His vision was a rapid blur of red and black, anger so intense it made his head light. He curled his fist again and smashed it into a nearby tree. It crumpled with a resounding crack, splinters spraying from its surface, but did not fall.
Nice description here. I really like the addition that the tree didn't fall. There's a sense of frustration there that echoes Ferry's earlier frustration about not winning the fight. Even in his fury, he's not strong enough to make the tree fall, and is very aware of that fact.
On one thing, he could agree with Quicktail. He had no regrets about the way he’d spent his time. Training, honing his skill, and now burning with rage at the unjust world, fury so hot it was painful to behold.
You've got a fragment at the end of this paragraph and I don't think it's an effective fragment. The paragraph feels like it ends mid-though to me. I think you need a little more here.
The "is" is jarring in a past tense narration. Think you can reword to "That was the way a warrior fought and died. And whether he was serving his own people or serving strangers, Ferrycloth was a warrior.
The Dawn of Adulthood
I like what you did with the titles here and the general parallel of the chapters. Ferry feels his life as a free person is coming to an end, Prim feels her free life is about to begin. The contrast in their circumstances really comes through.
Prim is observant and seems empathetic to an extent, but clearly that empathy has its limits. I was left wanting to get a little more of a sense about why she wants to become a Wandersword. That seems like the kind of thing someone would think about during their graduation.
“Yes. You know what I mean. We’ve been doing this so long, it’s really strange to think of going to bed tonight and not waking up at four in the morning for formation.”
Prim shrugged. “Eh. Not really.”
“That’s because you never woke up at four in the morning for formation, you fucking slakoth,” chimed in Ulric from across the table, a grin splitting his face.
Prim shrugged again. “And yet here I sit, a free woman. Didn’t seem to matter that much, did it?” With that she took a hearty bite of her unidentified meat item.
“She’s right, you know,” Rowan added, half impressed and half depressed. “Reckon she could kick every one of our asses. Probably at the same time. You can afford to sleep in a little when you fight like that, the sergeants turn a blind eye.”
Like dogs playing human. But Prim had learned enough about lucario, both in her training and through her personal interactions with them, to know they were far more than that.
Curious about those personal interactions. It seems like the two groups have been training separately up until now, since Ferry didn't sound like he'd fought a human trainee before. How much have the groups been interacting up to this point?
Why did the transition into adulthood have to be so bloody boring?
The lucario didn’t seem particularly thrilled, either. Most of them stood staring at the ground, tails swishing, fists clenched. Some of them were panting, pink tongues undulating from behind their pointed teeth. Prim thought she was burning up… How hot must they have been under all that fur?
Prim wasn’t going to say it, and it didn’t seem like Ferry was either, but there was a reason Ferry couldn't just walk away.
If he lashed out, or tried to escape, Prim would kill him. It would be quick and effortless. They both knew it, and the brief silence as they walked together back towards town was a nonverbal acknowledgement of that fact. For better or worse, they were stuck together.
Hm, even accepting Prim's ability to insta-kill Ferry, she's got to sleep sometime, right? I think you might want to lean on the larger context of the world here, rather than the idea that Prim would personally do the killing. I assume a lone lucario would be hunted down if it ran away from its "duty."
Maybe stick with "dog" here? That's how she describes them earlier and it fits in with "sulking" and the idea she doesn't see Ferry as a threat more than wolf does, I think.
hey everyone, thanks a ton for your super awesome reviews—seriously, i can't overstate how happy it makes me to see you guys engaging with my writing and posting your thoughts like this. totally makes my day every single time. new chapter incoming, but i'm going to spend a good chunk of time putting your suggestions to work before starting on the next.
I was jarred by the sudden switch in perspective character. I’m not sure how else you could convey this information without the head-hopping, unless instead the chief were made to be the prologue’s main POV character watching Doran’s approach. But it seems we’d miss a lot by not having lives like “I am justice” haha.
hey johto, thanks for your awesome review! most of your advice is pretty cut and dry, so sorry if i'm not responding to a ton here—but this is a really good point! i don't think it fully occurred to me that i was changing perspective here, but i can for sure see how that's a bit disorienting. i'll have to think a bit about how to make it flow a bit better. thanks for pointing this out!
I wasn’t surprised that Doran took violent action at the end — seemed like his jam from what little we know about him. (Though I was disappointed not to get to see the lucario fighting back! Seems like swords would be a poor match for an aura sphere, psychic blast, or drain punch.) I imagine his choice will have negative consequences. He was oddly compelling, monstrous as he was.
glad to hear you found him compelling! i think i ran the risk of maybe making him a little cartoonishly evil here—straddle that line a lot tbh—but i really don't want it to be impossible to take him seriously, so it's reassuring that you think i achieved that balance here. a few people have pointed out how little resistance the lucario gave here, and it's indeed a good point but also an intentional one as pokémon are fairly powered down in this setting. the slaughter was my attempt at demonstrating that, but it seems like it mostly confuses people instead, so i'm going to put some thought into spelling it out a bit more clearly.
I’ll be curious to learn more about the human religion —is this Christianity or something else? Worship of something other than a pokémon would be wild when they’re so obviously powerful, but I’m down to discover whatever you’ve cooked up.
solid point, but hey, never underestimate humanity's ability to consider itself superior to the rest of the animal kingdom! 😝 thanks again for the awesome review, more insight on the prologue is always much appreciated as it's the first glance readers have at my story!
So for starters, this has been probably one of the more unique pokemon settings I've read so far. It's hard to say where the plot is going to go off of the prologue alone, but it feels like one of those fantasy stories where the protag is up against a powerful, corrupted church-state.
Speaking of that church-state, let's talk about the pompous asshole himself. Your choice of words does a great job of lending to his high and mighty atmosphere. And you just know he's trouble from the first sentence. And the narrative continues to build that up, with the amount of soldiers he has with him for what seems to be a small diplomatic mission, to the way he acts like the lucario are inferior. And then just when you think h might just be a run-of-the mill asshole, he goes and makes that order and just. God. You've done a great job of making me hat your antagonist from the get-go.
Anyway, I don't know anything about where the story is going to go from here (it might be worth it to include a brief summary in the op? Because all I was able to gather from it is that it's a fic about a lucario and a lady with a sword, and that it's a medieval fantasy setting). But regardless of that, this prologue does a great job of setting the stage of the way the world is. It's definitely caught my interest, and hopefully, I'll come back to read more sometime in the near future.
hi windskull, i'm glad doran managed to boil your blood! :D i don't write villain povs very often, so it was a lot of fun getting in his head and building up his worldview. good point about updating the summary in the op—i wasn't quite sure where i was going with this story at the outset either, beyond "lucario and a lady with a sword," but now that i've done a bit of planning, i definitely think i can do it more justice. :p thanks for the read and review, hope to catch you again soon! 😁
Hey there! I've actually been up-to-date on this for a while but never got around to leaving a review, and it's high time to remedy that because yeeeeeees medieval fantasy Pokémon fic. In theory this is just gonna be a quick, all-over-the-place catch-up review since I've already read this and just need a bit of a refresher (and also am a bit scatterbrained atm because preparing to move will do that to a person, I suppose), but we'll see, haha.
-Everyone's already covered the fantastic introduction to Doran's character, so instead I'll just tangentially say I'm kinda amused by his choice of steed, given how… well… muddy mudsdale are, heh. Granted pokémon don't have quite the elemental affinities they normally would in this setting, so maybe it doesn't matter, but I imagine it'd take some training to get a pristine white mudsdale to not go stomp through all of the mud. (aah now I have images of a glorious white mudsdale covered in dirt and quite proud of himself and the stablehands panicking to get it cleaned up before Doran notices, haha. Not remotely the point of anything but it's adorable!)
i'm glad you pointed this out! mudsdale are indeed a bit nasty, and keeping them clean is very hard work... for the stablehands. it's all part of the flex, and that goes double since doran's got a WHITE one that he still manages to make look spotless.
Out of curiosity, is there a reason that Ferry's "preparing to leave" scene is in a different chapter than Prim's? It's quite short, and this next chapter isn't substantially longer so it's not like it would balloon out of control to combine the two. And idk, it just seems like it'd be a bit nicer to have the two scenes go together, especially given the fact that they converge at the end there. Obviously it'd be fussy to change now because posting to a forum whoops, but maybe a thought for posting it to other places in the future?
this is a good point. mostly i just did it to sort underscore the parallel themes; i thought keeping the chapters separate underscored that, and i could give them contrasting name, too. but you're right, they could definitely be condensed, and that's something i might end up doing when i go back and revise here soon.
Hm! While handing out a pair of horses to every new Wandersword team is probably not gonna happen (horses were frickin' expensive back in the day, after all), is there a reason that they seem to be lacking so many more basic supplies, like maps? I can understand the wanderswords needing to be self-reliant and all that, but kicking them out with literally nothing just seems… idk, unnecessary? And they get their weapons, which I think? would be more expensive for the camp to part with than maps? I might be wrong on that. Is there an expectation that new Wanderswords will already have this stuff, and it's a sign of Prim's laziness/lack of preparation, or possibly some other disadvantage she's facing (she has that noble name, but maybe her family didn't send her off to training camp with anything?), that she doesn't?
this is a good question, and something i actually did put a little bit of thought into! the main reason the corps doesn't shell out for a bunch of maps is basically that they're not super necessary—the training facility is in a fairly remote area with only a few roads extending out from it, so leaving the area is pretty straightforward, and everyone goes different ways from there. mapmaking is a pretty imprecise art at this point in time, so giving everyone a map of an area wide enough for it to be useful to everyone would wrap back around to being useless, because the map covers such a wide area and is imprecise as a result. the wanderswords are better off asking for directions—the roads are fairly well-maintained and easy enough to stick to, and they can always purchase maps to suit their needs once they accrue a bit of cash by completing jobs
(To go off on another tangent, the general thought of an entire kingdom of far/sirfetch'd with noble onion knights makes me unreasonably happy, as someone who has a ridiculous side project that involves pretty much the same thing, haha. Allium could probably do with Ser Lauchzelot to whip them into shape, they're a mess. And yes, I say that even given the fact that Lauchs himself is also a bit of a mess. Slightly less tangentially, it makes me eager to see what other sorts of pokémon societies we'll see in the future! And a bit sad to consider the state most of them will probably be in, alas.)
hahaha, oh my gosh, i would absolutely love to see this. more pokémon societies indeed coming up fairly soon, fwiw! 😁 tysm for your awesome review, it was an absolute blast to read, and there are a lot of good word choice observations/suggestions in there. super stoked that you're enjoying the fic, i hope it continues to satisfy!
ohoho! it was only a matter of time before he graced the fic with his presence tbh. thanks for your observations about word choice/sentence structure here—looking forward to writing them into the chapter soon!
The feral system is also something I find intensely interesting. What makes a pokemon classify as feral? Ferry and Lauchs both treat the farmer's wooloo as we might treat regular sheep, and Prim literally calls them property, so presumably the sheep are feral, but Prim acts as if the sirfetch'd species is a "people", so presumably none of them are feral. Is there a visible difference? Are all wooloo feral and all sirfetch'd are not?
very good questions! basically yep, all sirfetch'd are people, all wooloo are feral. like i said to phoenixsong above, i pretty much make these decisions as it suits me, but for the most part, humanoid stuff tends toward sapience and animalistic mons tend toward being feral. zoroarks are sort of an interesting case, in the sense that it pretty much comes down to you ask. ferry would probably say that they're people—they have rituals and traditions and a sense of honor, after all, and they can speak; but prim might disagree, because they hunt for their food and don't form communities, and are therefore functionally identical to a common feral predator.
hmmm, not really—at least not one that prim could reasonably depend upon. there's some concept of prison in the sense of like, dungeons and whatnot, but these are mostly exclusive to large holdings like castles and are more often used for political prisoners and the like. my understanding is that, at the time this story (analogously) takes place in, there's really no such thing as "law enforcement" as we understand it; particularly in rural towns like this one, the burden of investigating crime is mostly on the affected parties, and justice is mostly doled out by community councils through fines or corporal punishment. here the wanderswords sort of serve as a unilateral investigative/judicial power; in their absence the farmer would probably have to try and figure it out on his own, or maybe bring it to the attention of the rest of the town and sort it from there.
Prim's a strange lens for this, and a lot of her narration doesn't really work for me. There are a few exchanges where she notes that she's never considered what it must be like to be non-human in this human-dominated society (Ferry being angry that Martens doesn't listen to him; Lauchs not being able to travel alone), and she's deeply troubled by these realizations, which I think is a really valid perspective to highlight -- a lot of problems arise not from one person being malicious, but from lots of people being ignorant. But at the same time, Prim's *very* knowledgeable about a lot of other, arguably more wrong imbalances (the implied sirfetch'd eradication, Ferry's second-class citizenship), but the way they're presented in the narrative, they may as well be fun bits of flavor text. It's an interesting study on how people are affected by what is closest/most relevant to them, but at the same time both of the genocides have happened to people whom she's starting to consider as friends -- it's weird to me that she can shrug her shoulders at that but wants to strangle both Ferry and Martens about some (arguably) more casual racism. It's hard to sympathize with her because of this value-reversal, I think: she has some pretty modern takes on inequality/focuses on the more casual interactions but the setting around her is very much still in the not-modern, full-blown slavery and genocide time.
hm, thank you for your perspective here! i can definitely see what you mean about prim being a strange lens for the chapter and its themes. i wasn't actually thinking about that aspect of the narrative at all when choosing my pov here, focusing more instead on dividing the story "equally" between the characters, but looking back i think that's definitely a mistake. moving forward i'll need to put more thought into things like this, and maybe jump around between perspectives a bit more like i do in the chapter below. as far as her characterization goes, i think some of the stuff you're describing is intentional, and some of it not so much—i'm sort of trying to cast prim as, like... a white-collar liberal here, if that's an apt comparison to make, lol. aware of the injustice, nominally concerned about it, but not really grounded in it. she knows the history because she's learned it, but maybe the implications of it aren't fully clear to her, so she acts in ways mildly inconsistent with her professed beliefs. you mention her false equivalence between ferry's anger and mertens' racism, and i was actually really glad to see you point that out because it's exactly what i was trying to establish there, but you also mention getting the impression that it's intended to be sympathetic, which is not quite the case.. it's kind of a hard line to walk, particularly when she's the pov character, so i really appreciate your feedback here. gonna need to think a bit about how to paint her mindset a bit more clearly here. it's sort of a complex one, and characterization is not my strong suit, haha. thanks a ton for your thoughts on this, it really helps my direction a lot. grillpilled prim confirmed.
so when Prim's judging people in a weird way it's fully realistic imo, just odd to read when there's no presented counterpoints in a world that's full of them.
this is key i think—i was afraid i was making ferry a bit Too Preachy, but if this is how you feel, maybe it's best for me to have him speak up more. i'll definitely be thinking about this. thanks for the kickass review!
What really stood out to me in this prologue was the sense of direction. A lot of prologues often have a vague feeling, that leaves you not entirely sure what purpose it's serving. In this case, the prologue both introduces us to the world and depicts something very key and concrete--a crucial turning point in the relations between this human empire and the outlying lucario tribes. The characterization of the viewpoint dude was well done. Verging on cartoonish in places, but I think you grounded it every time it went off in that direction.
I see other people have raised these points in reviews, so I don't want to harp on them, but I found the low power levels of the pokemon confusing. The kind of fundamental tension of the main pokemon canon is that pokemon are clearly more powerful than humans, yet humans capture and command them. Having humans that can beat pokemon in an out-right fight makes this world not really feel like the pokemon world to me. I'm also confused by what Negrek pointed out, that the mudsdale is what seems to be a non-talking animal, but the lucario live in a fascimile of human society.
hi pen! :D thanks for the awesome review, lots of really solid observations about my word choices here. i have a hard time catching stuff like that, so i'm always glad when people can point it out for me. very glad to hear that you think i managed to ground doran when he veered off into a cartoonish direction—that was probably my biggest anxiety about both the chapter and his characterization, so if it works, that's definitely a load off my back.
your comment about the human-pokémon power dynamic being what makes the pokémon world feel like the pokémon world is interesting, and something i hadn't considered before. i'll definitely be paying that some mind moving forward! for what it's worth, some pokémon in this setting are sapient and some aren't... it pretty much just comes down to my whims, lol, although it's sort of predictable in most cases. if it's vaguely human-shaped, there's a good chance it's vaguely human-brained, too. :p the more feral pokémon (like mudsdale) are more powerful, and wouldn't fall so easily in combat with a human. a lot of this story ends up being about powerful pokémon, so this emphasis on powered-down, human-like pokémon doesn't persist forever, but it definitely lingers in the chapters where i was trying to figure out where i wanted to go with this story, and it's something i should think about when i go back to revise. thanks for the insight, i hadn't looked at it that way before!
I like what you did with the titles here and the general parallel of the chapters. Ferry feels his life as a free person is coming to an end, Prim feels her free life is about to begin. The contrast in their circumstances really comes through.
Prim is observant and seems empathetic to an extent, but clearly that empathy has its limits. I was left wanting to get a little more of a sense about why she wants to become a Wandersword. That seems like the kind of thing someone would think about during their graduation.
hmmm, fair enough! i've been kind of wary about front-loading too much backstory, it's been hard for me to strike a balance. i could definitely do to have her talk a bit more about that here, though. thanks for the review, hope to see you again soon!
hey guys, another chapter at last! hopefully it hasn't been so long that no one cares anymore, lol. super glad to finally have this one out, i think the next couple will be much easier to write. fun stuff coming up! like i said in my review responses above, i'm going to spend some time before the next chapter tuning up what i've got and taking everyone's suggestions home. hopefully by the time the next chapter comes out, the entire fic will be much more cohesive and polished... perhaps even worthy of a re-read!? but for now, we've got this. hope you guys enjoy!
The Man in Red
The three knights embarked on the Lanceroute when the day was half spent and the sun hung at its zenith in the sky. Dusk was upon them when they reached the small roadside village, the one that the shouting was coming from. By then, the darkness was almost complete. There were only three sources of light penetrating the inky blackness of the night.
The first was the wan glow of the moon, just the faintest of slivers perched in the murky sky. Prim was glad to have even that much; fighting against Lauchs with nothing but the starlight to guide them the night before had been a disorienting experience.
The second source of light was the warm flicker of an unattended campfire. The flame undulated pleasantly, undisturbed at the center of a ring of makeshift chairs—barrels, boxes, a stump. Sometimes a log would break and fall into the embers with a crack, prompting a brilliant, skybound shower of orange flecks. It might have been a peaceful scene, Prim thought, for the deaf and unobservant.
The third source of light was the stark, galvanic radiance of the emerald flames shooting from the druddigon’s gullet like vomit ablaze.
One soldier screamed harder than most, and Prim watched him as he flailed in slow motion. His sword arm was drenched in the flaming green fluid. He swung his flaming arm wildly; his sword clattered to the floor, the sound of steel on stone ringing through the courtyard. Drops of fire flew this way and that, onto his boots and toward his fellow soldiers, sizzling and crackling wherever it touched. A few drops landed on the broken blades on the ground—no doubt shattered by the druddigon’s exceptionally tough hide—and it burnt even through those. The other soldiers backed away from their fire-flinging comrade frantically, their eyes wide and dancing with reflections of emerald flame.
A ways behind them stood a man in all red, a fine crimson cape at his back and a tall red hat adorning his head. Red, the color of bishopry. The man bore no sword, and his garb seemed like it might burst into one huge flame if a single drop of the flaming liquid touched it…
Prim knew about dragonsflame. It was insidious stuff. Once you had it on you, there was nothing you could do but try to contain it and let the fire run its course. Hopefully the injuries would be salvageable. Even trying to wash it off wouldn’t do you much good—water just created more fuel for the flame. In flinging the stuff around without a care, the floundering soldier posed a threat not only to himself but to those around him. It would be best to restrain him, if possible…
The druddigon roared, yanking Prim back into reality. “Ferry, I need you to restrain the one with the flaming arm,” she said. The lumbering dragon was making its advance toward the scrambling soldiers now, but Prim managed to pry her eyes off it, looking to Ferry for acknowledgement.
Only he wasn’t there.
She searched around for him desperately, eyes moving as quickly as she could make them, but he was nowhere to be found. Her mind buzzed. “Someone restrain him!” she called, the words flying from her lips before they’d fully formed in her mind. The soldiers snapped out of their stupor and approached him cautiously, trying to stop his frantic movements without coming into contact with the flames leaping off him. Prim didn’t have time to wait and see how it went.
“Lauchs, I need your help,” she said quickly, her heart leaping. She drew her sword, and the sound of it caught the druddigon’s attention. It took several steps to swerve around towards her, thanks to its undersized legs. Small targets.
Druddigon were dangerous foes, but not particularly uncommon in the Callousian lowlands. As a result, Prim had undergone quite a lot of training about dealing with druddigon specifically, but it was all theory. She’d never seen one in person, and it was smaller than she’d expected. She thought it had the proportions of a much larger creature. Normally she’d be pleased to have a smaller foe, but it wouldn’t do her much good in this case…
She tried to Due to their sticky and prodigious flames, she recalled, they only became more dangerous the longer they were agitated. If left to rampage for too long, they could incinerate entire villages. It was essential to take them out as quickly as possible…
“I need you to distract it,” she said to Lauchs, making her way toward it.
Lauchs quacked in surprise. “D-distract it? Pardon, my lady, but if this is part of some plan for a roast duck dinner, I’m afraid I must decline.”
“I won’t let it hurt you,” she said. “Just trust me. Quickly, please.”
The druddigon stood up straight and balled its fist as Prim approached. Its glowing amber eyes locked with her blue ones, the depths of its throat beginning to glow that eerie green…
Whap!
The dragon snorted in annoyance as a giant leek collided with its face. Rather than breaking like the other blades had, it simply wobbled, as if it were made of rubber. Steam rose from the druddigon’s nostrils as it snarled and smacked the leek away. Now that its attention was captured by Lauchs, Prim was free to make her way behind it.
It was said that no blade could penetrate the stony hide of a druddigon. But if that stony hide covered every inch of the druddigon’s body, it would be unable to move. Trapped in its own flesh, like a statue given life. As with any suit of armor, a druddigon’s defenses had chinks in them, exposed areas around the joints that enabled the creature to move.
Prim gripped her sword, heart in her throat.
Here’s hoping I don’t miss…
She plunged her blade into the back of the dragon’s leg. It let out an ear-splitting roar as it staggered, falling to one knee as black blood spilled from the other. It craned its neck back towards Prim, jaws frothing with flame. All she could think to do was drive her boot into its back, forcing it forward. Fire splashed upward as its head collided forcibly with the ground.
Lauchs skittered out of the way, quacking hoarsely as a good-sized blob of flame made a puddle where he’d been standing moments before. The druddigon began spouting flame like it had no other choice—and indeed it didn’t. Prim had to finish the job, now.
She plunged her sword into the dragon’s good knee to ensure it couldn’t get up again, then extracted it and clambered onto its back. She pushed its head forward with her boot, and suddenly its fountain of flame was directed downward—a puddle of green fire rapidly spread beneath it. Druddigon had natural resistance to their own flames, but that resistance was no match for direct, persistent contact. The druddigon shrieked and writhed in pain, nearly knocking Prim off its back as its wings beat wildly.
If I don’t kill this thing now, I’m going to die.
I’m going to die.
She plunged her sword into the back of its neck. It writhed for another moment or two, or maybe a thousand, Prim couldn’t tell—and then it fell slack. The only sound to be heard was the crackling of the flames that remained.
Prim took a deep breath, then pulled her sword out and wiped the black blood it had gathered onto her pants before sheathing the blade.
Lauchs, as always, was the first to break the silence.
“Quite the job you’ve done there, Lady Primeveire!” he exclaimed as he placed his sword back in the basket on his back. “I’ll admit, I doubted you at first, but never again!”
The man in red spoke next. “God’s peace be unto you both. We owe you our lives.” The soldiers broke into assent, though their voices were hushed. They still seemed haunted by the one among them who did not speak, and instead sat a ways off, cradling a crispy arm and choking on sobs. She was glad to see he was alive, at least. Most people who felt the bite of dragonsflame were not so fortunate.
“You owe us nothing,” Prim said. “We were merely doing our jobs.”
Most of us, anyway, she thought sourly, wondering where Ferry could have gone, and why.
“Ah,” the man in red said, “but jobs are often performed in exchange for payment, no?” Prim didn’t protest as he fished out a coinpurse from his robes and counted out an appealing number of coins.
“Many thanks, bishop,” Prim said as she accepted the payment.
“Oh, how rude of me not to introduce myself,” he said. “I am Bishop Andre, of Chevret.”
“Chevret!” Lauchs exclaimed, walking up to them. “We’re just coming from Chevret ourselves. Quite the coincidence!”
“Indeed,” Andre said mirthlessly. “And to whom do I owe the great pleasure…?”
Prim opened her mouth to respond, but Lauchs beat her to the punch. “Ser Lauchzelot of Fetscheim at your service, hedge knight of the court of His Royal Majesty King Henry IV of Circhester,” he said, extending a wing. Andre didn’t seem quite sure how to shake it, but he did his best.
“And I’m Primeveire,” Prim added, feeling quite content to leave all the decorations off her name.
“Well met indeed,” Andre said. “These soldiers are my company,” he said, gesturing at the soldiers, who barely responded. “They’re accompanying me back to my hometown. Seems I should have brought a wandersword along with me, too… But it seems God has forgiven my oversight, and blessed me that you might come to the rescue.” His smile was warm but weary. “I bring news from Dendemille, if you’ll hear it. The church seeks wanderswords to employ.”
Prim arched an eyebrow. Dendemille was just a quarter day west, by her reckoning. The church paid wanderswords well, on the rare occasions that they were hiring. “I’d be very interested to hear more,” she said. “Lauchs, could you find Ferry for me? He should be around here somewhere…”
Surprise washed over Lauchs’s face. “My, I’d hardly noticed he was gone! Some partner I am, eh? I shall get to looking straight away, my lady, worry not.” He gave a stiff salute, and waddled off.
“Soldiers,” Andre called. They looked up at him, still seeming tired and despondent. “I will be off for a short walk with Lady Primeveire. I shall call if I require your assistance. You’ve earned some rest, soldiers—please take it.” They nodded and settled in back around their campfire, which was a fading flicker now. One of them still sat off to the side.
“Now,” Andre said, walking away from the fallen druddigon at last. Prim fell into stride with him. “About that job…”
- - -
Lauchs did not find Ferry right away. He did not find him after fifteen minutes, or twenty, or even thirty. The town was not all that large. It only took him the better part of an hour to scour every alley and walk the perimeter of the village, shouting Ferry’s name and praying for a response.
It took him longer than he preferred to admit to realize that clambering around town shouting loudly should have ruffled a few more feathers than it did.
Come to think of it, hadn’t there just been a fire-breathing dragon rampaging in town square? Weren’t there emerald flames flying this way and that across the courtyard? Why hadn’t that roused anyone from their sleep?
He approached a house and surreptitiously peeked into the window. It was hard to see in the darkness, but it looked like a single room, and there didn’t seem to be anyone in the bed. Hm… He moved to the front door and raised his wing to knock, then hesitated.
Knocking on someone’s door at this hour was inconsiderate in the first place, but in Galar, doing such a thing would earn him the same admonishing it might a human. Here, he feared he might be attacked for such a thing. The humans of Callouse weren’t terribly tolerant of mon, he’d come to learn.
But he’d helped rescue this town from the clutches of a fire-breathing dragon, hadn’t he? And wasn’t he standing here, decked in shining armor? If someone lashed out in anger, why, he could simply flee, and he was quite sure the soldiers would prevent him from further harm.
Yes, that would do. He knocked after all, not just once or twice but repeatedly. Half a minute of relentless hammering passed before he gave up.
Not seeing the harm at this point, he pushed the door open, and it gave without resistance. “Hello-o-o?” he called, waddling into the room, his armor chinking with each step. “Ferry, are you there?” He didn’t suppose the odds that he’d find Ferry in the first house he checked were particularly good, but, well… why not try?
There didn’t seem to be anyone in the house. That wouldn’t have bothered Lauchs by itself, but in conjunction with the town’s lacking response to the dragon attack, he was beginning to grow uneasy. Where was everyone?
He left the house and shut the door, then moved to the next one and hammered on its door, too. No response. He poked his head in and searched for Ferry, calling his name. Nothing.
The next. The next. House after house with no residents, no Ferrycloth, nothing. Just a thin layer of dust coating every surface, and the occasional cobweb in the doorframe. Just what kind of town had they stumbled upon?
As he continued to search the houses, he began to look for signs of disturbance too. A broken window, perhaps, or overturned furniture. Maybe a footprint in the dust, or a broken dish. But there was nothing. Some of the homes were orderly, some of them were messy, but none of them seemed abnormal, at least not to Lauchs’s untrained eye. What had happened here? Where had everyone gone?
Lauchs pushed open what felt like the millionth door. Surely he’d investigated nearly the entire town by now. At this point his investigation was haphazard—he poked his head in, gave a look around, and said, “Ferry?” He barely gave time for a response before ducking out.
But this time, one came.
“What?” came a gravelly voice. Lauchs practically jumped out of his armor, both in surprise and in exuberance.
“Ah, Ferrycloth! Is that really you? By the forest god!” he exclaimed, stumbling into the cottage. Sure enough, Ferry was there, huddled against the wall with his knees pulled up against his chest, his crimson glare boring into Lauchs from across the room.
“What do you want?” he snarled.
Lauchs gave him a look of bewilderment. “Whatever could you mean? We were fighting a bloody dragon out there, Ferry, and here you are in some random house halfway across town! What in the green world are you doing here?”
“Does it look like I want to talk about it?” Ferry barked back. “Do you think I hid away here because I’m feeling sociable? Fuck you. I’ll meet up with you two in the morning. Just… leave me alone.”
Lauchzelot did not budge. Instead, he walked toward Ferry, then put his back against the wall and slid down next to him.
“Ferrycloth,” he said softly. Ferry didn’t jerk away or snap back; he simply remained silent. “We’re both mon, you know. We may not look the same, but we are identical before the eyes of men. Our struggles are one. You don’t have to be so on guard around me, dear friend.”
Ferry gave him a sideways glare. “Don’t try that bullshit with me,” he growled. “We’re nothing alike, and you know that.”
Lauchs cocked his head. “Pray, just how certain are you of that?” Ferry remained silent.
“The fate of your people is the world’s worst kept secret,” Lauchs said. “The fate of mine was kept a bit quieter, I’m afraid. Fetscheim is located in the northwest of the continent, on the shores a day by horse west of Cromlexia. It’s been my people’s ancestral home for as long as history reaches… Fetscheim has always known a Fetch’d king. But these last few decades, the empire’s advance has known no obstacle, has it? I’m sure you know better than most.” Ferry looked up and stared intensely at Lauchs, his expression a hybrid of perplexion and interest.
“My father was King Bertram the Blessed, the last king of Fetscheim. He is dead and gone, I'm afraid, and now a man rules in his stead. A petty duke or somesuch. My brother, rightful heir to the Forest Throne, is held in the dungeons of Shallour. My mother, my cousins, my nieces and nephews… It’s no mystery to you what happened, is it? No puzzle why I’ve spent the last decade separated from my beloved homeland, wandering Galar, servant to a foreign king.” Lauchs paused. Ferry was looking at him intently, and it was only then that Lauchs noticed his eyes were growing quite moist. He cleared his throat loudly. “That day... I shall never forget it as long as I walk this green earth. You know the feeling, I presume.”
Ferry still had no words to offer. Lauchs couldn’t manage offense. “I don’t tell you this so that you pity me, dear Ferrycloth,” he said. “I know you hate the way I live my life, with a smile on my beak and a drink in my hand, but I have found a way to live happily in this world, even after everything I have seen. I tell you all this so that you understand. You need not live your life in bitter solitude.”
There was a long silence after that, certainly longer than Lauchs would have liked. There was nothing to distract him from the memories he’d unearthed now. With a sigh, he made to get up, his armor clinking as he moved.
“The high priest came to my village himself,” Ferry said at last. Lauchs slumped back onto the ground, looking to the lucario. His head was buried in his arms again, but he didn’t stop talking. “He stood there in his damnable fucking robes, whistling while everything I knew burned. When we arrived here, I saw the dragonsflame and the man in his church garb, I smelled the smoke, I heard the screams… I felt like I was there again, trapped in that moment. So I ran, and I hid.” He paused. “I’m sorry.”
Lauchs placed a wing on Ferry’s back, and he tensed up momentarily, but didn’t resist. After a moment, his body relaxed, and he drew a deep breath.
“It’s okay, Ferrycloth,” Lauchs said. “I won’t tell Primeveire. She doesn’t need to know.”
Ferry looked back up at Lauchs one more time, his red eyes brimming with emotion. “... Thank you.”
“Not a problem, Clothy, my good chum,” Lauchs said, flashing a wide smile.
“Don’t fucking push it.”
Lauchs chuckled to himself as he stood, legs buzzing with pins and needles. “Well, we’d best get back out there, if you think you can manage it,” he said. “She’s worried about you, you know.”
Ferry didn’t say anything, but he did stand up, and they left the house together and made their way back down to the town square.
“She was quite magnificent, taking down the druddigon,” Lauchs mused. “I barely helped at all. You’re lucky to have such a powerful partner.”
“Partner?” Ferry echoed. “You mean warden? That power won’t do me much good if it’s used against me the moment I disobey.”
“Ah, nonsense,” Lauchs said, waving a wing. “Your qualms with the system have nothing to do with her character as a person, dear fellow. If that were true, it wouldn’t reflect well on you, either, would it?” Ferry glared at him for that.
“There’s a man who was wounded fairly severely by the dragonsflame,” Lauchs said, changing the subject as the orange flicker of the campfire came into view. “I’ve never been terribly sharp on medicine. Goes straight in one ear and out the other with this old birdbrain, oho. I don’t suppose you could treat him?”
Ferry nodded curtly. “An oran and rawst salve should do the trick. Haban too, if they have it.”
“Ah, Ferrycloth, Ferrycloth,” Lauchs said. “How fortunate we are to have you…”
- - -
The summer air was uncomfortably sticky and warm, even despite the late hour. Sometimes a breeze would push against them as they walked, freeing a few strands of hair from behind Prim’s ear, and she was grateful for it.
“I wish I could tell you I was revisiting my old hometown on happy terms,” Andre said wistfully. “But the truth is that this time, I’m returning against my will. It might surprise you to know that just a week ago, I was Bishop of Dendemille.”
Prim raised her eyebrows.
“What do you know of this region?” Andre asked as they walked.
“Not much,” Prim admitted. “I’m from the west. Our training camp was out in the wilderness, east of here, but they didn’t teach us much about the area. Not much paid work to be found here, after all.”
Andre nodded. “Unsurprising. Even though the empire has grown in these last few years, Chevret remains on its frontier,” he said. “I’ve lived here since I was born. Back then, it was only a small church, and a few scattered farms a few miles apart from one another. I was never much for farmwork, so my path in life has always seemed rather clear to me.” He looked wistful as he spoke.
“I felt much the same way as a girl,” Prim said. “Still do.” Andre gave her a look of mild interest, but she didn’t care to elaborate. He didn’t press the matter.
“I assume you’re familiar with the city of Dendemille?”
“Of course,” she replied. Dendemille was the largest and oldest city in the empire east of the Aquacorde River. Still smaller than any western city, but because the population of the east was so diffuse, the Duchy of Dendemille comprised the largest swath of land of any duchy in the empire.
“It may surprise you to know that until last week, I was bishop of all Dendemille. The largest bishopric in the empire,” Andre said. There was just a drop of venom in his voice.
“Impressive,” Prim said. “It’s an honor to meet you, your holiness.” Andre squinted, apparently not one for frills or flattery. “I take it you’re returning home after being unelected?”
“Not quite,” he replied. “Last week, the high priest relieved me of my post unilaterally. A very unusual thing indeed. I’m returning to my tiny hometown to preside over the church there instead—quite the fall from grace.”
Prim wasn’t sure what to say. Was he inviting her to ask him what he’d done to deserve his demotion? That felt rude.
“No reason was given, if that’s what you’re wondering,” Andre said with a frown. “He even thanked me for my service. I suspect the dismissal had less to do with me and more to do with my replacement. That’s what I wished to speak with you about.” He stopped and sighed, then gave a look around. “Have you noticed anything strange about this town, Lady Primeveire?”
Now it was her turn to take a look around. It was almost silent, save for the occasional flutter of a woobat or venomoth overhead. There wasn’t anyone else in sight, though the warm glow of the soldiers’ fire was visible in the distance behind them. She wondered to herself whether Lauchs had found Ferry yet.
“Nothing in particular, no.”
Andre frowned. “I passed through this village just three years ago, the last time I visited my hometown. Back then, it was bustling with activity. Today when I arrived, there was no one here. It was as if they’d vanished without a trace.”
Prim’s pulse quickened. Now that she thought of it, it was odd that no one had come out to investigate the commotion earlier. Why hadn’t she picked up on that sooner? Wasn’t it her job to notice such things?
“The man the high priest replaced me with is called the Violet Inquisitor. He’s the one hiring wanderswords. I have never heard of him, much less seen him, nor have any of my fellow clergymen. My sudden replacement with this mysterious man… The empire’s expansion since the ascension of High Priest Doran… I can’t help but feel like it’s all related. Part of me wants to relate the emptiness of this town to it, too, though perhaps that’s merely my paranoia talking...” He didn’t say anything for a moment. Then: “I apologize, I’ve been chatting your ear off. What do you think of all this?”
Prim bit the inside of her cheek. What was she supposed to say? It all sounded like a lot of political chatter to her, the exact sort of intrigue she’d joined the Wandersword Corps to escape. She’d dedicated her life to the simple pursuit of putting steel to flesh. When the squabbles of men became involved, her interest waned. So what she really thought was that it was well and fine for Bishop Andre to speculate to his heart’s content, but she wanted no part of it. More than anything, she was disappointed he didn’t have more to say about the job.
She couldn’t say that to the man that had paid her, though, could she?
“What do I think?” she echoed. “I think… that it’s outside the scope of my post to investigate this matter for you, your holiness. And, with all due respect, I’m not sure what it matters to you what someone like me thinks.”
He simply smiled, to Prim’s surprise. “Ah, you’re quite right. Terribly sorry myself,” he said. “Let me put it another way. If I may ask: when you swore your oath of service, to whom did you swear your service?”
“The realm,” Prim answered promptly, wondering where he could be going with this.
“Indeed. Unlike the rest of us in this world, you serve no man, no king, no church or god. I am bound by the vows I took, but your choices are your own. I simply ask that you keep that fact close to your heart, and my words in your mind as you take this job. Would that I could investigate this matter on my own, but… Well, leaving it in the hands of an able wandersword is the best peace of mind I can hope for, I fear. If you ever found yourself in Chevret again, it would do my pride some good to hear if you’d learned anything.” He smiled. “I can only hope that my information helps you make that decision more wisely.”
“Well, I give you my thanks,” Prim said, unsure quite what the bishop was expecting of her. “So this job… The Violet Inquisitor, at the Church of Dendemille.”
“Yes.”
Prim nodded. “Thank you. I shall take your words to heart, Bishop Andre.” She could tell by his expression that the bishop sensed her indifference, but he didn’t press the matter further. Instead, he smiled and nodded back.
“Thank you, Lady Primeveire. My life is in your debt. I suppose we should return to the others now.”
They walked back to the fire together wordlessly, their boots clicking on the stone and Andre’s cape swishing as they went. When they arrived at the fire, the soldiers were all seated around it looking quite a lot more relaxed than when they’d left them. Lauchs was telling some fanciful tale, his gestures dramatic and his face bouncing between exaggerated expressions. The soldiers seemed glad for his presence; some of them smiled, and many of them had mugs in their hand and color in their face. It took her a few moments to spot the one with the injured arm—now it was all wrapped up in bandages, and he sat with the rest of them, looking almost pleased to be there.
Ferry was there too. Anger flared up in Prim’s bosom—where the hell had he been? She had half a mind to demand answers from him now, but that would have to be a discussion for another time. It wouldn’t be right for her to admonish him in front of a crowd like that. He had some serious explaining to do… but at the very least, he was safe.
“They look like they’re enjoying themselves for a change,” Andre said. “I’ll leave them be. God’s peace be with you and yours, Lady Primeveire.”
“And with you,” she replied. The bishop bowed slightly, then retreated into one of the houses without a word.
Prim made her way to her partners and seated herself next to Ferry. He recoiled when she sat, his eyes betraying both fear and annoyance. “We’ll talk later,” she said, and he nodded solemnly.
Once she put Ferry out of her mind, she found herself almost enjoying the fire despite the heat of the night. She didn’t particularly relish its warmth, but as she sat with the others, absently following Lauchs’s story and surrounded by half a dozen cheery faces in the shadow of a hard-won victory, she thought to herself that moments like this were exactly why she had given her life to the Wandersword Corps in the first place.
Yet the words of the bishop persisted in her mind. The high priest. The Violet Inquisitor. She didn’t know what it all meant, and didn’t want to care, yet the thoughts wouldn’t leave her mind. She pushed them away the best that she could—couldn’t it wait a day?—but the task became increasingly possible the more she tried. Was this her fate? To never enjoy the present again, consumed by anxiety about the future?
She let out a sigh and remembered something that she’d been told on her first day of training: one can never be fully at ease when their work is unfinished, and the work of a wandersword is never finished. Wondering what kind of life she’d chosen for herself, Primeveire stared into the fire.
There's training--then there's reality. Ferry's first POV chapter began with his disillusionment over how little his training had prepared him to face human opponents. This one opens with Prim facing a similar realization about just how difficult traveling is, and I enjoyed the feeling of 'level one DnD character' I got from this. Interestingly, though, it's Ferry who ends up the punching bag--again.
Prim felt a little blank-slate to me in this chapter. I would have liked to get more of a sense of what she's looking forward to and what she fears, what's driving her, etc. Her attitude towards Ferry seems to oscillate between "ugh why can't I punch him" and "ugh why won't he talk to me." I do like how you show her confidence being less pronounced when it comes to traveling, which is new to her, vs fighting, which she knows she's proficient in. Feels like you could lean into that more, and have her wishing she had an enemy to fight, rather than all this empty land to traverse.
I was excited to see a zoroark turn up. I liked how you incorporated its illusion ability fooling Ferry's aura sense and the conversation between the two of them, their sense of kinship as predators and where that kinship diverges. I wasn't totally sure why it attacks them, though, since it would recognize both of them as predators/not good eats. The search implies it wanted valuables--do zoroark sneak into towns and sell stuff to buy food?
I'm also curious whether zoroark are used by the empire at all. Seems like they're pretty good at combat and of course would make excellent spies.
This encounter felt like a bit of a wake-up call to Prim and Ferry--life on the road is actually dangerous. I'm looking forward to them interacting with some civilization, though. Curious to see how Wanderswords are received and treated.
A brief note on POV--this chapter seems like it's divided into two sections, the first section being Prim's POV, and the second being Ferry's. The first section head-hops to Ferry a fair bit, thought. Instances noted in the line-by-lines below.
Fledgling wanderswords, fresh from their training, were not given much in the way of equipment or gold. Prim was issued a set of boiled leather armor and a few outfits' worth of walking clothes. Spare what she was wearing, these were tucked away in her rucksack, among some other odds and ends— some dried meat, some cheese, some wine, some water, the like. She was also permitted to keep her training sword, dull edge though it had, which swung from her waist as she walked.
I like the DnD starter's pack vibe this gives. "a few outfits" sounds a little luxurious, though, and wine doesn't sound like basic rations to me. How about, "Prim had been issued a set of boiled leather armor and two sets of walking clothes. The spare was tucked away in her rucksack with her rations— some dried meat, cheese, and a flask of wine she'd saved from the graduation day celebrations. Her training sword, dull-edged but familiar, swung from her waist as she walked."
Ferry had been given even less, though in this heat he was grateful for the lighter load. Fresh wraps adorned both sets of paws, and a skin for water hung at his side. This was more than Ferry had ever owned, and he was glad to have it.
Head-hop to Ferry here. I think you can convey all this through Prim's POV pretty easily. "Ferry had been given even less, though in this heat, Prim almost envied him the light load. Fresh wraps adorned both sets of paws, and a skin for water hung at his side. He'd seemed surprised when she gave him the waterskin--maybe lucario didn't use them. He hadn't been surprised enough to thank her, of course. Prim had known the lucario less than a day, but she'd already given up on expecting any thanks."
I found this a little confusing. To me the characteristics of a Lance are its length and thiness--broadness isn't a trait I'd associate with a lance at all.
Interesting that she's comparing his scathing tone to an intrinsic trait--the blue of his fur. Seems like unconsciously or not, she's attributing his attitude to a racial thing.
It pained Ferry to admit a shortcoming like that, but it was true. His kind carved territory out by scent. The human way of lines on maps, markings on papers, was foreign and incomprehensible to him.
They carried on in silence after that, though Prim was rather happy to have made any conversation with her broody companion at all. He was so awfully standoffish and terse, she could hardly bear it. Making small talk about the trek was something, at least.
"Well, I suppose we should set up camp soon," she said anxiously. The words had been lying on her tongue for hours now; it was a great relief to finally say them aloud.
It was known that the lands around the Lanceroute were sparse and agrarian. But Prim had supposed that if she were the only one going that direction, all the contracts there would be hers for the taking.
May want to make "It was known that" into "Everyone knew" to be a little more active. I could use a little more here--is the implication of sparse and agrarian basically poor picking for Wanderswords? I don't have the greatest sense yet of how their contracts work--farmers need protection too, right? Is the idea that they pay less?
"Are you going to run away?" she asked Ferry, suppressing a yawn. The question was mostly rhetorical. Ferry could try and run if he wanted, but there were only three ways to go: back to camp, where he would be executed for deserting; forward, to a town where he would no doubt be captured and sold as a slave to some other, inevitably less kind master; or away from the road and into the wilds, where wild beasts waited for bumbling blue-furred idiots to traipse into their maws.
She studied his expression. Even for a lucario, he was inscrutable. His hard eyes bored into her searching ones, gaze almost unbearably intense. At last Prim was forced to look away.
"gaze almost unbearably intense" feels a little tell-over-show? I think you'd get the same effect by saying, "His hard eyes bored into her searching ones, until at last Prim was forced to look away."
Ferry frowned; he had known the answer before he’d posted the question, but it didn’t pain him any less. Conditions weren’t fantastic for the lucario at camp, but at least they’d had cots to sleep on. "We should sleep in shifts," he suggested, though it didn't sound much like a suggestion at all.
It was late enough in the day now that the golden sun was glistening off the dew. Ferry saw it acutely from this vantage, his face pressed into the grass. The horizon was a radiant watercolor of pink and blue— in another time, he might have been enjoying that sunrise by the river. But the creature had taken him in the night instead.
I enjoyed the contrast here between the blissful sunrise and Ferry's situation. It did take me a while to pin down what time of day it was, though. "Late enough in the day" does not make me think sunrise or even morning. I thought it was afternoon from that line.
Something moist and rough rubbed over Ferry's fresh wounds. Gods, the thing was lapping up his blood now. Ferry squirmed again, as intensely as he could muster. The zoroark grabbed the back of his head, lifted, and then slammed his face into the ground. The lucario couldn't help but yelp. He was now eye to eye with the dirt. There was a little ant crawling by.
"You know this, yes?" the zoroark repeated. "Your kind does not eat hunters, yes?"
"... No," Ferry wheezed. "We do not eat other predators. It is... unclean."
"Yes," the zoroark said. "Yes. Unclean. You know this. Your kind knows this. I know your kind. You are lovers of the rules. You are very proud, yes?" The zoroark paused. This time, Ferry was quick to answer.
"Not proud. Honorable. We follow the old way. We are unyielding..." He realized the irony of his words, speaking of honor and unyielding as he lay pinned and beaten on the ground, bleeding out of his mouth and bending to interrogation by a patronizingly conversational zoroark. It was hard not to cry. He was ashamed of himself for that, too.
"Yes, honor," the zoroark echoed. "Your kind calls it honor. Our kind, we call it pride. You... You are proud even for your kind. This is why I smashed your head." Another gust of hot breath accosted Ferry's face as his captor laughed at his own joke. If it could be called a joke. "Yes, you are proud, but you are hunter. This is why I cannot be eating you. You understand."
"I wear these wounds as a consequence of my own failure," he declared. "My ineptitude jeopardized us both. It is only right that I should suffer any pain incurred as a result of—"
Oh ho, is this the meme duck I've heard so much about? What an entrance! He really strikes a different tone in terms of his dialogue--I'm curious to see how he bounces off Prim and Ferry. But bracket that, because pre-duck this chapter already had a lot going on. We dig a lot more into Ferry's mind and backstory here. I think my favorite parts of the chapter were those moments where the narrative explored his aura sense. These moments are also really the only moments of tranquillity he has--quite a contrast to the brutal flash-back scene. Having met Prettiest Pony Boy in the prologue, I can believe it.
Ferry's anger is completely understandable--it's not like society has given him any space to grieve, so everything rubs against open wounds. The more mundane moments in the chapter do a good job hammering that home. I do think one place I keep getting tripped up is regarding how much interaction Ferry's actually had with human society. His first chapter gave me the impression that the lucario rarely interacted with humans before being pared off, so I kept expecting a sense of some of these interactions being new (even if expected), whereas the narrative seemed to treat them as run-of-the-mill. Also, mentioned more in the line-by-lines, but I think Ferry's flashback sequence would be much stronger if it was more personal--how he experienced the massacre, rather than a bird's eye summary of the scene.
Before he looked on the new morning, Ferrycloth opened the eye within, and he saw.
It was hard to discern where he was, but it had an unfamiliar feeling to it. Most probably somewhere he had never been before. He was lying face-up on a fairly comfortable bed, certainly much nicer than anything he’d slept on before.
I was expecting a bit more of him seeing with his inner eye, since it's mentioned? He can probably sense that there are a fair amount of people around, right?
It was built from wood, and in fairly nice condition. Another bed like his stood at the opposite side of the room, and a depression on its surface informed him that Prim had slept here last night, too. A window pane on the wall to his left opened up to the bright blue sky. Judging by the position of the sun, Ferry surmised it was either mid-morning or mid-afternoon. Based on the sour taste in his mouth and the heavy deposits of crust in his eyes, he guessed it was the latter.
Damn it. It wasn’t like him to sleep so late. Though it was true that the rest was probably well-needed after his battering the night before, it still felt like he’d pissed half his day away. And he didn’t feel like he much deserved rest after that embarrassing display with the zoroark, anyway.
I felt a bit of dissonance between the analytical nature of the first paragraph (informed/surmised) and the much more chatty, in-POV second paragraph. I think this would read a little smoother if you integrated the description of the place with his reactions.
If lucario can't read, where do his stereotypes about loopy writing = women come from? I'd gotten the sense they hardly interacted with humans at all before his pairing with Prim.
The steps were clearly engineered for humans, so each one was just slightly too large for him. He was forced to hobble down them awkwardly, one at a time, as he made his descent.
Oof. I really like how you highlight the disparity as built into the very structure of things. A lot more effective than the standard "hrr drr mongrel" moment would be.
There were a number of patrons already sipping at their beers and tearing up their chickens, although Ferry thought it was still quite early for such things.
Every single one of them was human, and they were all appraising him with suspicious eyes as he made his way into the room.
Ferry felt his anger swell. “What?” he growled, the corners of his lips raising in a snarl. “Never seen a lucario before?” The humans all casually averted their glances and went back to what they were doing, some of them looking afraid and others irritated. As he descended the final step, Ferry heard someone near the back say something that sounded quite a lot like “fucking mon,” but for his own sake he chose to ignore it.
This scene felt a little cookie-cutter and also a little rushed, as if it were something obligatory to get through? I think for this scene to really land we'd need to spend a little more time in Ferry's skin in the moment, feeling the gazes, and experiencing his unease and catharsis when he snaps. I get the impression from this that he's had this kind of interaction before, but I also don't really see how that could be? Has he ever been alone in a human-dominated space before? Even if he's experienced scorn, it seems like he would have at least not been the only one--the newness of that (if it is new, and I'm not misinterpreting their upbringing) could be a place to dig in.
His expression was smug, yet curious. “You must be that Wandersword’s lucario.” Ferry didn’t return the salutation, instead fishing the letter out of his bag and slapping it onto the bar’s surface.
“I assume you can read,” he said gruffly, pushing the piece of paper towards the man.
The innkeeper’s face fell, probably dispirited by Ferry’s refusal to take the bait. “That I can,” he replied smugly, taking the page up and holding it close to his face.
“‘Ferrycloth, I am out foraging for vegetables in order to repay our debt to this innkeeper. He healed you as well, so please treat him well.’” The innkeeper was wise enough not to remark on that line.
“Well, I’m worried it’s just because I’m looking in the wrong spots, eheh...”
“Mm.” Ferry could understand that self-consciousness, but only because he was a lucario. It made sense for him to avoid situations where humans might sneer at him for admitting weakness. Coming from a human, though, he didn’t think that kind of behavior made very much sense.
He brushed over the forest floor with his mind, caressing the fading signatures of the copper-hued pine needles and grazing the little worms and beetles that crawled under the thicket. There were a handful of vegetables that Prim had missed— scallions, if he were to venture a guess based on their shape and feeling— but not as many as he would have expected.
Still, he probed deeper, straining himself as he ran his consciousness over the ground, feeling its dips and hills. And its divots. Hundreds of tiny divots, almost imperceptible, partially filled with loose, crumbly soil. Divots with lingering traces, however faint, of life that had once inhabited them. It seems, in fact, that there were once hundreds of scallions here, but the vast majority of them had been plucked away.
Really enjoyed this insight into Ferry's aura sense. "Copper-hued pine needles" in particular struck me--I love the sense that these objects are so much brighter and more vivid in his internal eye.
His clothes were unremarkable, though Ferry could appreciate them for their practicality— breathable linen, loose for maneuverability at the expense of fashion.
Much as I love reading about the loose linen garb people wear in midieval fantasy settings (want) I'm not sure Ferry would pay so much attention/ have opinions like this on clothes, considering lucario doesn't seem to wear them?
Prim pressed the back of her sword hand to her opposite hip, then moved swiftly moved her hand back upward and and placed it against her heart. Ferry recognized it as the Wandersword Salute. He’d learned the motion in his training, too, although the policy was that adjutants like him were only allowed to use it with other Wanderswords.
The moon was nowhere to be found; only the dull luminance of the stars penetrated the murky dark. The low light caused Ferry to subconsciously reach out with his inner eye rather than relying on his normal vision, despite the dull ache that came with overuse. He could feel the sheep nestled safely in their barn for the night, many of them sleeping. Orange light spilled from a house in the distance, where Ferry could feel a man eating— probably the farm hand from earlier. The fuzzy mental static of a million blades of grass caressed him from below.
The words were nice, but that didn’t make them true. Ferry knew his lot as a lesser knight, and acting like Prim’s equal wouldn’t make him so, even if he desired it more than anything.
The men, so tall, bearing swords. The lucario didn’t stand a chance. Some of the more powerful ones, the sorcerers, they could fell a soldier or two. Three if they were lucky. None of them lasted forever. The men were so much larger, their reach so much wider, their armor so much stronger. And there were so damn many of them.
The pups were spared. The men grabbed them by their scruffs and threw them in the wagon. Put them in shackles. They were tools now, resources. Ferry had known as much from day one. The soldiers moved the pups out of harm’s way, but they didn’t care if they saw their elders, their mothers and fathers and uncles and cousins, with throats agape, shooting ruby blood into the afternoon air, their limbs torn off and discarded like playthings. Gasping, screaming, grunting, dying.
What would bring this scene even more to life for me would be to get a sense of Ferry's position and physicality during all this. Was he a pup? Then how did the shackles feel? Did he see his own parents killed? Or was he taken away first? Did he see them fight? The current description feels a little impersonal to me, like this wasn't something he actually experienced.
And he stood there, his curtains of platinum blond hair waving gently in the hazy breeze. Framing the piercing blue eyes that sunk into his face. A face like a skull, its skin stretching around its extended lips. Whistling merrily, as though it was watching children at play. Ferry had heard the song before. He knew how the words went.
A loving God, compassion grows
Deeper, wider than you know—
Ferry had never hated someone so much. His anger had not ceased since that day. Raging forever and ever. Every time he closed his eyes, there was his face again, haunting his dreams, his subconscious, his very being.
Oh damn. If I hadn't read the prologue, I might have called this over the top, but yup, this checks out. I'm getting Lannister vibes from this, The Rains of Castamere.
They had begged Ferry and the others to forgive the massacre in the years that followed. It was a necessary evil. Surely they could understand. Many submitted. Many chose to forget.
I'm a bit curious who "they" are. Still don't have the greatest sense of how lucario culture has responded to this. It's such a short time period from the massacre--I'm surprised that Ferry would be the outlier in having this reaction.
But he could not forget the song that day, ringing through the grotesque cacophony of an entire village going to slaughter. Clear and perfectly on-key. Practiced.
Cross his path, incur his wrath
Your flesh to ash, your bones to snow.
"Ruckus" isn't quite what I'd associate with the meeting of metal. Maybe go with something that emphasis the metallic nature he expects vs the metal against wood that he hears?
The projectile struck true. It bounced off the thing’s metallic body with a loud clang— not enough to maim it, but just enough to disrupt its balance It let out a cry as it lost its grip on its weapon. Prim was already running toward it by the time it began its descent.
It squawked in anguish as it hit the ground fast and hard.
Not sure about that "comically." Quacked as a word has a lot of in-built comic implications, but stating it outright felt a bit like the narrative was being forced to swerve into the comic, instead of letting that come organically.
"I'm curious to see how he bounces off Prim and Ferry," I said. Well, I got my curiosity satisfied this chapter and the answer is: delightfully! Lauchs has a really distinctive voice and lends a comic element while feeling more fleshed-out than just 'comic relief.' His wordly experience and in particular, his experience living under a system with radically different caste norms makes him an extremely interesting counter-point and contrast to Ferry and Prim. Ferry in particular shines with Launce to bounce off of. His short-temper and sense of justice get interrogated in a number of different ways in this chapter and I really enjoyed his back-and-forth between feeling aggrieved towards Lauchs and feeling indignant on his behalf. The hint of broship between them at the end was lovely.
Prim's character portrayal continues to be a little weaker for me. Her strongest character traits so far seem to be an aversion to social conflict. I don't really have a sense of what drives her at the moment. I'm also a little baffled on her values. She seemed really thrown by the concept of executing Lauchs, but lives in a world where the casual slaughter of talking pokemon seems to be the norm. I feel like a need a bit more context for her values: Prim seems proud of being a Wandersword, which implies pretty strongly that she buys into the system. When it comes to whatever . . . unpleasant . . . thing happened to Lauch's people, I didn't get a sense of whether she considered it 'too bad they forced the empire to crack down on them through their own behavior' or 'too bad the empire does shit like that.' The former is more what I'd expect.
Overall, it feels like Prim's values as expressed in her internal monologue don't really match the setting. You mentioned above that you're going for a 'white-collar liberal' comparison, but I don't really get the sense that the tropes you're trying to draw on with that really exist in this world. Like, the liberal attitude towards racism and the radical critique of it sort of hinge on the fact that society nominally accepts that racism is a problem, but then people aren't willing to do anything concrete about it. Whereas in the world you've got here, it seems like even awknowledging the current system as unjust would be a radical act. So what exactly does your class of liberals who pay lip service to injustice but don't fight it look like here? (And even if they existed, it seems odd to me that someone who chose to become an enforcer for the empire would belong to that group.) I think Prim's character would feel more compelling to me if you allowed her more space to buy into the system and be an unreliable narrator, and her values overall matched the values of the people around her. That way, any change she has in her stereotypes would feel more earned and grounded in the world. This is already the case in places (like her casually daydreaming about beating up Ferry), but then it's jarring when she's shocked at the thought of executing a dirty rotten sheep-thieving mon.
She smiled gently at the idea of Ferry on his knees, oiling her armor for her, tightening up her buckles. An unlikely situation, and one she wasn’t sure she cared to bring into reality.
Hm, okay, a lot to unpack here. Is she smiling because power fantasy or because 'lol at him trying to do that with his big paws'? I'm assuming a lucario wouldn't be considered a standard squire, so would this really be a situation she could bring into reality? Weirdly, being a squire might be a step up for Ferry, right, because squire has the implication of one day becoming a real knight.
Fetscheim. Prim pressed her lips into a thin line. She might have guessed he was from there, if she’d thought about it. Fetscheim was not so far from the town she had been raised in, actually, and it was the ancestral home of the fetch’d people, of which Lauchs was very obviously one. But that area had fallen to imperial control not so long ago, she recalled, and the fetch’d people had met an unpleasant fate…
Mentioned this above, but I want to know what Prim thinks about this. In this sort of regime, I'd assume there's a generally accepted reason for why that had to happen and that Prim knows it. So I think I want a bit more internal justification here of why that unpleasant fate was necessary, and any balking she has is because Lauchs doesn't fit whatever her propoganda's said.
Lauchs’ face became a mask of almost comical surprise. “Eh!? Why, you fluffy bastard!” he exclaimed, the indignance in his tone sounding more mocking than anything. Prim thought his spirits were awfully high for a prisoner whose fate was uncertain. “Well, I can appreciate a fellow mon who’s short and to the point, I suppose. Ohoho!”
They were only about halfway through it when a deep growl rang through the field, startling birds from the trees and shaking dew off the grass. Prim’s heart leapt. “There’s something here,” she whispered. She quickly fell into a defensive position, raising her sword and pulling Lauchs close to ensure he didn’t flee. She saw Ferry raise his fists out of the corner of her eye, his ears standing straight up.
“My dear friends—” Lauchs said, but Ferry hushed him emphatically, his eyes intense. “I beg of you—”
“Quiet, man!” Ferry hissed, baring his teeth.
The growl rang out again.
“Forgive me!” Ferry cried. “It’s me… I’m just so terribly hungry… Normally I’ve eaten a dozen eggs by this time of day, you see…”
The growl came one more time, and this time Prim saw Lauchs’ armor shudder. Ferry stared daggers into Lauchs. The duck let out a shrill quack as Ferry’s fist collided with his face.
“This isn’t justice...,” Lauchs said weakly, massaging his bruising cheek as the wanderswords dragged him to the farmer’s doorstep.
Read this scene several times feeling very confused but . . . I think you have a rather significant typo? I think it's meant to be Lauchs who cries out about being hungry.
Thank you for the payment, old man,” Ferry said. “Have a good life, then.” Then he pulled the door shut forcefully and turned around. He was already beginning to count the coins by the time Prim processed what he’d just done.
“You don’t know what it’s like,” he repeated. “Listening to you humans talk about us like we’re second-class citizens, to be commanded and butchered.” Prim opened her mouth to speak, but Ferry cut her off. “I don’t care that the fucking duck is an obnoxious criminal. I don’t care if he’s the most vile scum ever to crawl the earth. The way that farmer talked about him, looked at him, looked at me… You humans don’t treat your own like that. Not even the poorest, grimiest peasant.” His lip was curled by the time he finished talking, baring his sharp teeth, and his eyes were wide with anger. He took a deep breath and calmed himself, lowering his shoulders. “Besides, we’ve received our payment. Our business is done. Now let’s go.”
Prim was at a loss for words. She wanted desperately to say something, anything to him. Anything to put him back in line. She wasn’t wrong—you couldn’t just treat people like that. But he wasn’t wrong, either. She didn’t know what it was like. She had seen just a glimpse, a painful glimpse into the prejudice that Ferry felt every day. He was right to be angry. But that didn’t give him an excuse to act however he pleased, to spit on anyone he felt wronged him, to—
Oh wow, that's funny, I didn't even read Ferry's behavior as that rude. You tell her, Ferry!
I'm not sure how I feel about 'She had seen just a glimpse, a painful glimpse into the prejudice that Ferry felt every day. He was right to be angry.' This sort of sounds like the internal monologue of someone who's been told racism is wrong a lot but doesn't really believe it--but Prim lives in a society where this type of racism is considered right. That doesn't mean she has to lack any empathy, but I feel like it would more be in the form of 'yeah that roasted duck comment weirded me out a bit too, but you don't have to overeact.' This idea of prejudice feels a bit like modern language injected into a character who really wouldn't be thinking that way. I think I also wanted more focus in her internal monologue on how his behavior is screwing her over: making her look like she's not in control of her mon, violating Wandersword ethics, etc.
The tense silence was broken by a deep, hearty laugh. Prim’s head pounded at the sound of it. Lauchs’s laugh was quickly becoming her least favorite sound in the world, though in this case she was almost glad it saved her from having to deal with Ferry for the time being.
“Oh, Ferrycloth!” he exclaimed, wiggling his wing free of Prim’s grip and waddling toward the lucario. “I just knew you’d come around to me, you delightful, sulking little bastard! We’re two birds of a feather, you and me!” Ferry did not seem at all pleased with the duck’s overly familiar behavior, but it was the last line that did it for him: “Bring it in, Clothy!”
Not a moment later, the duck was rubbing his beak delicately, a single tear running down his light brown feathers. “I love that untamed spirit of yours,” he croaked. “I’d let you call me Zealot, you know, but it just doesn’t have the same effect…”
“Don’t think for a minute that I’m on your side,” Ferry spat. “We’re still yet to determine what we’re going to do with you. If I have my way, it won’t be pleasant.”
“Come now, Ferry,” Prim said sternly. “Ser Lauchs is a knight. It’s not our place to handle him… uncouthly.”
This felt like arechetypal dialogue for all three here. The dyanmic in a nutshell.
Lauch's is pushing the edges of being absurd here, but it's still feeling grounded to me. I am hoping we get a bit more depth to his character as we get to know him.
This struck me as a very weird thought for Prim to have, considering that capital punishment for theft seems like it would be completely kosher in this world, particularly if the thief is a pokemon. Her reaction feels very modern, and that's kind of jarring.
“We’d like breakfast,” Ferry said after a brief lull. Prim nearly sighed with relief. Curt though he might be, sometimes it was good to have Ferry around after all. He had a way of cutting straight through the tension.
but I’m a duck of tremendous appetite, you see… I keep eating all the food I collect before the end of the day. So I’ve been stranded here for a week now, held hostage by my own stomach. Ohoho…”
Prim couldn’t actually recall ever having seen a mon on their own before this. They either lived in tribes, in the wild, or as assistants to humans. She supposed it made sense that a mon on his own might not be treated well. The thought had never occurred to her before.
“I spent the last few years in the Kingdom of Galar, you see. Mon can make an honest name for themselves there,” Lauchs continued. “I suppose I grew too used to that way of living… Here in Callouse, a lone mon is no better than a vagrant. On my own, without a human to accompany me, well… It’s no good at all, ohoho.”
“Then go back to Galar,” Ferry said flatly. Despite his harsh tone, Prim thought his expression looked softer than usual.
“What?” Ferry snapped. Prim recoiled physically. She was used to his irritability, but not to this new tendency to push back on her. Usually he just kept his head down and suffered her suggestions, however grudgingly… She wasn’t sure what to make of this new behavior.
But he needs us, Prim wanted to say. Yet she knew Ferry wouldn’t care. Would they be better off if she didn’t, either?
“Come now, Ferrycloth,” Lauchs said. “Give it a chance. Let’s all go to the next town and do just one job together. You can make up your mind then.” Ferry growled in annoyance but didn’t say anything more. By now Prim knew that was the closest he ever came to concession.
“So it’s decided, then!” Lauchs exclaimed, breaking into a wide smile. “Drinks for my friends, then, innkeep! Ohoho!”
Their acceptance of Lauchs felt like it happened kind of fast, without there being any real reason motivating it. Prim just sort of . . . feels bad for him? And Ferry . . . doesn't care enough to argue more? Obviously I want meme duck to go with them, I just would like a bit more of a reason for why Prim in particular is down.
In particular, piles of crispy leek butts littered the ground, hundreds of them, easily. A dozen feet or so back sat a wooloo skeleton, the bones pure white and stripped completely of meat. It must have been the one he’d stolen from Mertens, whose wool he had delivered in a neat parcel to the farmer’s door. Prim couldn’t help but be impressed by Lauchs’ apparent talent for butchery despite the grimness of it.
“I don’t think so,” Ferry said. Lauchs raised a bushy black eyebrow. “We’ve agreed to let you live. That doesn’t mean you get to skip away from this town without facing the consequences of your actions.” The lucario’s blood-red eyes fixed themselves on the wooloo remains. “You’re going to compensate that farmer for twice the worth of the wooloo you slaughtered. I saw that coinpurse of yours. I know you have the gold for it.”
Prim found herself raising her eyebrows too. She was growing irritated by Ferry’s uncouthness more than ever, it seemed, and yet at the same time felt he was twice the knight she’d ever be. Wasn’t she supposed to be the one leading him? She thought back to their interactions with Mertens, with the innkeep. Ferry’s terseness had been the very quality that had saved her from sputtering like a fool when she could find no words. His sense of justice now prevailed when she might have erred on the side of excessive sympathy otherwise. How was she meant to feel? How could he be so crude, so brash, and yet so driven and dutiful?
Another really fascinating Ferry moment. He definitely has a strong sense of fairness and it's interesting watching it come out on behalf of someone whom he actively dislikes.
I'm a bit unsure of what uncouthness Prim is reacting to here? Especially since if Ferry is being rude, he's being rude to a fellow mon, and that's very different than being rude to an actual human person, right?
This paragraph of Prim internal monologue feels a bit clunky to me. The idea of 'is this lucario a better knight than me' seems like a pretty damn big thing for Prim to consider and it doesn't feel warranted yet to me. I think this would read a bit smoother if you focused on her surprise over this one instance of Ferry's instincts being better, rather than trying to expanding it out into larger soul-searching just yet.
Ferry exhaled forcefully through his nose. “Be reasonable,” he said gruffly. “I’m no friend to the duck, but he at least had the decency to return the sheep’s wool to you. The meat alone isn’t worth more than five at best.”
Mertens gave Ferry a coy look. “Let’s call it emotional damages, then.”
Ferry’s face contorted with rage, but Prim gripped his shoulder firmly before he could react further.
Lauchs’ eyes became dinner plates. “Why, I’ve never heard such a preposterous thing!” he huffed. “A sirfetch’d’s sword is sacred! A gift from the goddess, an extension of oneself. To eat it, why… That would be like taking a bite out of your own arm!”
Prim swore she saw mirth in Ferry’s eyes. “Such things are not unheard of in times of desperation,” is all he said. Lauchs burst into a hearty laugh and gave Ferry a good, healthy slap on the back. Prim was astonished to see that, though he tensed up, Ferry did not otherwise react.
Ah, do I smell plot? The opening beats of establishing the world and character dynamics seem to be drawing to an end, as we shift into hints of political intrigue with the Red Bishop and the church that suddenly wants Wanderswords.
Ferry's PTSD and Lauch's heart-to-heart with him felt like they really advanced that dynamic; I do wonder about how blase Lauchs is--seems he's been running from this for some time, and I'm curious whether his happy go lucky attitude will be challenged the longer he stays in this area. There was also a fair bit of Prim characterization in this chapter. I really liked the segment where she expresses that she became an Wandersword precisely to not think about social issues (good luck with that, girl!) I am pretty curious about her background and what class of person usually becomes a wandersword. I've had the sense for a while that Prim is upper class. The way the narrative's been holding off on it makes me wonder if there's something significant going on there. I'm a little less sure about Prim's moments of sociopathy during the fight scene--if your intent was to make her come off as really competent I think it crossed the line into something else.
I found the conversation with Andre a bit heavy-handed, particularly the bit about knight's vows. It was putting up these big 'the sinister shit is going down' flags, but I would have liked a bit more of a sense of what he thought lay behind the town being abandoned. And while I appreciate Prim's lack of concern about "political" issues, seems she would be a little more curious about why the town was empty, once she realized.
Since I'm finally caught-up, some bigger picture thoughts on the story so far. The pacing has more or less worked for me-I think the worldbuilding and setting up of the dynamic have been strong enough to animate the early chapters even without any clear "plot", and judging by this chapter, it seems like plot is definitely in the works. I do wonder if Ferry and Prim's initial chapters might work best as a single chapter, better emphasizing the parallels and contrasts in their first day as Wanderswords.
I think the main place these early chapters fell a little short for me was in establishing Prim's characterization. Both her opening chapter and the Bandit in the Night chapter seemed like good places to introduce us more to Prim--her background, her wants, her fears, her expectations. It's felt to me like her characterization has bounced around a bit, particularly in her reactions to and treatment of Ferry. Last chapter she was incredibly irritated at him for no reason, this chapter she's oddly sympathetic towards him for no reason. In contrast, I think you've succeeded at dolling out Ferry's character introduction. Lauchs entering the picture certainly helped with that, and I between the three of them you've created a strong dynamic with a lot of potential.
I'm curious to see what plot you have in store. So many of the tragedies of this world have already happened--just dealing with the consequences of what Prettiest Pony Boy's already done could take a book, but it looks like he's just getting started.
Dusk was upon them when they reached the small roadside village, the one that the shouting was coming from. By then, the darkness was almost complete. There were only three sources of light penetrating the inky blackness of the night.
The first was the wan glow of the moon, just the faintest of slivers perched in the murky sky. Prim was glad to have even that much; fighting against Lauchs the night before, with nothing but the starlight to guide them, had been a disorienting experience.
The second source of light was the warm flicker of an unattended campfire. The flame undulated pleasantly at the center of a ring of makeshift chairs—barrels, boxes, a stump. Sometimes a log would break and fall into the embers with a crack, sending a brilliant shower of orange flecks skyward. It might have been a peaceful scene, Prim thought, for the deaf and unobservant.
The third and final source of light was the stark, galvanic radiance of the emerald flames shooting from a druddigon’s gullet like vomit ablaze.
The delayed presentation of the information here was kind of confusing. It didn't heighten the dramatic effect for me, it just left me kind of lost re why we're getting light sources described when life or death combat is going on. The "village, the one that the shouting was coming from" also struck me as odd because it seems the combat is taking place at the campsite, not in the village itself? The delayed presentation of the dragon fight would have at least been less confusing without the early line about shouting.
The clatter of a sword is a pretty once and done action; the choice of continuous verb seems odd here. You could go, "He swung his flaming arm wildly; his sword clattered to the floor, the sound of steel on stone ringing through the courtyard."
Prim knew about dragonsflame. It was insidious stuff. Once you had it on you, there was nothing you could do but try to contain it and let the fire run its course. Hopefully the injuries would be salvageable. Even trying to wash it off wouldn’t do you much good—water just formed more fuel for the flame.
In flinging the stuff around without a care, the floundering soldier posed a threat not only to himself but to those around him. It would be best to restrain him, if possible…
She thought to call out to the other soldiers, urging them to knock down their flailing brother in arms, or perhaps ask Lauchs to do it—but there was no time. She would simply have to hope the fool didn’t cause too much damage, flinging his flames around. That bastard, she thought, and then she moved on.
Prim kind of comes off as a sociopath here? It's one thing to be cool and analytical but the way she's getting pissed at some one who is literally on fire without feeling an ounce of empathy is hard to read as normal behavior.
Due to their abundance, Prim had undergone quite a lot of training about dealing with druddigion specifically. The dragon itself was smaller than she’d expected, admittedly—it was half a head shorter than her, but it had the proportions of a much larger creature.
The dragon snorted in annoyance as a giant leek collided with its face. Instead of breaking as the other blades had, the leek just wobbled comically, as though it were made of rubber.
She plunged her blade into the back of the dragon’s leg. It let out an ear-splitting roar as it staggered, falling to one knee as black blood spilled from the other. It craned its neck back towards Prim, jaws frothing with flame. All she could think to do was drive her boot into its back, forcing it forward. Fire splashed upward as its head hit ground, forcing its jaws shut.
Lauchs skittered out of the way, quacking hoarsely as a good-sized blob of flame formed a puddle where he’d been standing moments before. The druddigon, dazed but not out, began spouting flame like it had no other choice—and indeed it didn’t. It was time to finish the job.
Prim plunged her sword into the dragon’s good knee to ensure it couldn’t get up again, then extracted it and clambered onto its back. She pushed its head forward with her boot, and suddenly its fountain of flame was directed downward—a puddle of green fire spread rapidly beneath it. Druddigon had natural resistance to their own flames, but that resistance was no match for direct, persistent contact. The druddigon shrieked and writhed in pain, beating its wings wildly and nearly knocking Prim off its back. Lauchs gave it another good smack with his sword, and the dragon fell motionless for a moment, but Prim knew it wouldn't last.
If I don’t kill this thing now, I’m going to die.
Am I going to die?
She plunged her sword into a space in its armor on the back of its neck, the one she'd been instructed to aim for in all those seminars. The kill spot. It felt good for that training to pay off, finally.
“You owe us nothing,” Prim said. “We were merely doing our jobs.”
Most of us, anyway, she thought sourly, wondering where Ferry could have gone, and why.
“Ah,” the man in red said, “but jobs are often performed in exchange for payment, no?” Prim didn’t protest as he fished out a coinpurse from his robes and counted out an appealing sum.
“My father was King Bertram the Blessed, the last king of Fetscheim. He is dead and gone, I'm afraid, and now a man rules in his stead. A petty duke or somesuch. My brother, rightful heir to the Forest Throne, is held in the dungeons of Shallour. My mother, my cousins, my nieces and nephews… It’s no mystery to you what happened, is it? No puzzle why I’ve spent the last decade separated from my beloved homeland, wandering Galar, servant to a foreign king.” Lauchs paused. Ferry was looking at him intently, and it was only then that Lauchs noticed his eyes were growing quite moist. He cleared his throat loudly. “That day... I shall never forget it as long as I walk this green earth. You know the feeling, I presume.”
Ferry still had no words to offer. Lauchs couldn’t manage offense. "I know you loathe the way I live, dear Ferrycloth," Lauchs said with a smile. "With a smile on my beak in a drink in my hand. From where you're standing, it must be the most infuriating thing in the world. But unlike those fat nobles and kings, I don't live this way because I have lived my life in feast halls and feather beds. I do it because I have found a way to live happily in this world, despite everything I have seen and felt. And I don’t tell you this so that you pity me, dear Ferrycloth,” he added. “I tell you so that you understand. You need not live your life in bitter solitude.”
Ah, Lauchs backstory! Well, rip. It's very interesting to see the different ways he and Ferry have dealt with the massacres they've experienced. I do find myself curious whether Lauchs feels, as a member of his people's royalty, any sort of duty to his homeland. If the empire is worried about some kind of uprising enough to hold his brother captive, why not Lauchs as well? Is it safe for him to have returned to this area? Why did he return?
When we arrived here, I saw the dragonsflame and the man in his church garb, I smelled the smoke, I heard the screams… I felt like I was there again, trapped in that moment. So I ran and hid.” He paused. “I’m sorry.”
“Ah, nonsense,” Lauchs said, waving a wing. “Don’t look at it that way. She’s a fine lady, and with plenty of love in her heart to spare. The two of you could make a fearsome team, if only you met her halfway.” Ferry just snorted at that. Lauchs shrugged—he simply wasn’t there yet, it seemed. He couldn’t expect too much progress in one night.
Why is Lauchs so committed to getting Ferry to like Prim? And why should the burden be on Ferry to meet Prim half-way when I don't see any sign Prim is meeting Ferry half-way. She refuses to engage in anything political, but Ferry is the definition of the personal is political. Prim hasn't met him half-way until she acknowledges that.
“The man the high priest replaced me with is called the Violet Inquisitor. He’s the one hiring wanderswords. I have never heard of him, much less seen him, nor have any of my fellow clergymen. My sudden replacement with this mysterious man… The empire’s expansion since the ascension of High Priest Doran… This inexplicably empty town… I can’t help but feel like it’s all related.”
I mean, I'm sure Prettiest Pony Boy is up to no good, but I don't really see what the sinister purpose of an abandoned town is supposed to be. The replacement and the empire's expansion, sure, but the empty town thing feels thrown in--it would be helpful if there was some sense of what Bishop Andre thinks the significance of the town being empty is.
It all sounded like a lot of political chatter to her, the exact sort of intrigue she’d joined the Wandersword Corps to escape. She’d dedicated her life to the simple pursuit of putting steel to flesh. When the squabbles of men became involved, her interest waned. So what she really thought was that it was well and fine for Bishop Andre to speculate and conspiracize to his heart’s content, but she wanted no part of it. More than anything, she was disappointed he didn’t have more to say about the job.
“Let me put it another way. If I may ask: when you swore your oath of service, to whom did you swear your service?”
“The realm,” Prim answered promptly, wondering where he could be going with this.
“Indeed. You pledged your service to no commander, to no church or god, to no ruler or man, but to the realm itself, and the good of the people in it. I simply ask that you keep that fact close to your heart, and my words in your mind as you take this job. And, if you ever found yourself in Chevret again, it would do my pride some good to hear if you’d learned anything.” He smiled. “I can only hope that my information helps you do your job more wisely.”
“Well, I give you my thanks,” Prim said, unsure quite what the bishop was expecting of her. Had he been hoping that she would participate in his strange conspiracy?
Prim's first reaction to that was anger—where the hell had he been? She had half a mind to demand answers from him now, but that would have to be a discussion for another time. It wouldn’t be right for her to admonish him in front of a crowd like that. He had some serious explaining to do… but at the very least, he was safe.
Feeling a sudden pang of sympathy, she placed a hand on his shoulder. Surprisingly, he neither tensed up nor brushed it off. He still hung his head. Prim managed to smile.
I was kind of surprised by how chill Prim is about Ferry disappearing during a fight. I kind of expected her to at least entertain the suspicion that he ran off. I'm not sure why she feels a "sudden pang of sympathy" for him either. She doesn't know why he ran off, so what is the sympathy about, exactly?
She didn’t particularly relish its warmth, but as she sat with her team, absently following Lauchs’s story and surrounded by half a dozen cheery faces in the shadow of a hard-won victory, she thought that moments like this were exactly why she had given her life to the Wandersword Corps in the first place.
The words of the bishop still bounced off the walls of her skull relentlessly—the high priest, the Violet Inquisitor—but she did her best to push them away. The day had been long enough already. The worries of the world could wait just one night.
This struck me as odd, since Prim seemed so unconcerned when he was actually talking to her about this stuff. She brushed it off so thoroughly that I was surprised that it's bothering her so much now.
circling around for ch6! small note; I don't think this made it into your front page table of contents (but there is a threadmark, bless)
This one is fun! I see what you mean about stuff starting to pick up pacing-wise; it looks like a bunch of different plot threads are starting to come together? Overall I feel like maybe this first arc could be a hair shorter (maybe combine the first 6 into 5 or something), but I'm definitely glad that things are picking up. This was the first chapter that it really feels like they're doing wandersword tasks! Their other quests have been sort of the low-level fetchquests that the DM gives you to get from level 1 to level 2 so your wizard gets some exp without immediately dying, sorta thing. It's kind of interesting to read about how wanderswords have all of this cool training and are unique from other knights/sellswords, but at the same time Prim and crew are stuck finding the scallion thief--it was cool to see Prim's training come into play here!
I also liked Ferry and Lauchs' conversation here; I think it was a much needed 1-on-1 thing between the two of them without Prim present. They have a lot in common but a lot of differences as well, and it's interesting to see their two dramatically different reactions to their species' treatment in this world. Duck is a good third member for this trio, not the least because I literally don't see this conversation happening with Prim and Ferry instead, lol.
And then the rest of this review ended up structured around quotes, oops. Some thoughts longer than others.
I liked this intro sequence--it's calm and detached, almost like the viewer is in shock and can't believe what's happening. I think that ties in to the fact that this is probably their first real time in combat, and as a reader it's cool since up to this point, barring the prologue, it's mostly been fun taverns and happy ducks and a bit of racism, but nothing as intensely violent as the opening.
And likewise, good way to drive in the numbing shock. I sort of wish that by the end of the fight I got a better idea of if Prim felt sorry for the soldier who burned alive, if he was anything besides a flailing guy who was going to spread the dragonfire--her "we need to stop him before he catches other people alight" is weirdly removed and unempathetic, which I sort of Get is her main trait by this point.
This sequence and the "she didn't have time to explain the plan" bit before it felt a bit contrived. Her entire plan can be summed up as "I need you to distract it" (which she does), and then I didn't quite follow why Lauchs doesn't assume she's distracting it for a higher purpose, like to stop it from roasting people--they both know they're both knights, after all.
Knocking on someone’s door at this hour was inconsiderate in the first place, but in Galar, doing such a thing would only earn him the same admonishing it might a human. Here, he feared he might be attacked or worse for such a thing. The humans of Callouse weren’t terribly tolerant of unattended mon, he’d come to learn.
The last line feels pretty flippant in contrast with his story later. I couldn't quite wrap my head around what peace he'd managed to find and how it allowed him to continue/how much of his current exterior is a facade, but neither of those really reconcile with this bit of inner monologue--his family got genocided, so "not terribly tolerant" is kind of a descriptor for that, but yeah. Felt more Prim haha.
“Don’t look at it that way. She’s a fine lady, and with plenty of love in her heart to spare. The two of you could make a fearsome team, if only you met her halfway.”
Didn't really get this one, since Prim isn't trying to do any compromising with Ferry, and the times she has, Lauchs certainly hasn't seen. Also felt like a very Prim line, and it feels kind of weird to happen in a conversation between two victims of racial cleansing--just stop being angry about your past and try to please the kind woman who owns you, I guess? It's a spicy take, but I also see why Lauchs has felt compelled to abandon any real tie to his family to try to find his own personal peace--I just hope we see more of what that really means to him. I know Prim's got a lot of learning to do, but Lauchs' stance here doesn't quite feel as wise as his words might suggest.
“I’ve never been terribly sharp on medicine. Goes straight in one ear and out the other with this old birdbrain, oho. I don’t suppose you could treat him?”
“The man the high priest replaced me with is called the Violet Inquisitor. He’s the one hiring wanderswords. I have never heard of him, much less seen him, nor have any of my fellow clergymen. My sudden replacement with this mysterious man… The empire’s expansion since the ascension of High Priest Doran… This inexplicably empty town… I can’t help but feel like it’s all related.” His intense gaze pierced straight through Prim. He didn’t say anything for a moment. Then: “I apologize, I’ve been chatting your ear off. What do you think of all this?”
this felt a bit NPC dialogue--lotta exposition, and then whoop! what do you think? I think a lot of this conversation could've been cut; we don't really learn much new about it, and neither does Prim--maybe there are some details dropped that I missed, but in general the main takeaways are 1) creepy church guy is 2) doing bad things and 3) stuff we've seen is involved?
I wasn't sure what about what Prim's done so far makes him interested in probing her for the conspiracy group? Is the suggestion that other wanderswords wouldn't have stopped to fight the druddigon/don't do their jobs very well, but she's different? Does she accidentally blunder her way correctly through most of his questions?
You pledged your service to no commander, to no church or god, to no ruler or man, but to the realm itself, and the good of the people in it. I simply ask that you keep that fact close to your heart, and my words in your mind as you take this job. And, if you ever found yourself in Chevret again, it would do my pride some good to hear if you’d learned anything.
I feel like this is the crux of the story, but I also wanted to know what realm means to Prim, since she answers with it so definitively here. I imagine she'll end up questioning it very hard, but I wanted to know what she's defending here, or at least what she thinks she's defending.
Overall a really interesting chapter though! Lotta balls are up in the air and I'm looking forward to seeing where they land!
I can't believe I haven't read this fic since last February lmao, but alas I've finally gotten around to reading it again thanks to someone mentioning Wandersword briefly in chat. I'm reviewing the fourth chapter for now.
So far, I continue to enjoy Prim and Ferry's dynamic. I'm glad they're beginning to warm up to each other even if Ferry's still pretty grouchy. I really like the medieval vibe and setting of this fic. We don't have a lot of those around, so it makes this story really stand out.
The fight scene at the end was also easy to read and understand, so that's commendable on your part. We also finally get to meet the objectively best character in this fic. The one and only old retired, but chill quackiness that's Lauchzelot. I hope i can go through the rest of the chapters in the coming weeks!
The first sentence made me think that *all* of the fur would be white, so that threw me a little bit. And you could probably delete either "perfect" or "immaculate", if you want, since they mean about the same thing
And as of his ecclesiastical inauguration exactly nine days ago, there was quite officially no purer, more perfect man of the Lord in Callouse, either.
His pristinely white vestments flapped in the wind behind him, bobbing with each of Providence's great steps. They clung tightly to his frame, accentuating his lithe yet lean build.
This sentence is correct, I think, but I had to read it twice because my first assumption was that "stretched" referred to the tents, not the leather. I wonder if there's an improvement to be made.
The building itself, unlike the teepees erected about the village, was just that: a proper building.
Seemed a bit weird to me, I think you could write it as "The chieftan's hall, unlike the teepees erected about the village, was a proper building." or something like that.
Not a proper building in the sense that Doran knew a proper building to be, of course
That this is referring to the sentence before the previous sentence, rather than the previous sentence, seems kind of weird to me. Like, it might have worked if it were a sentence earlier, basically. I would reposition it somehow or just rewrite it to get rid of the "proper building" part.
As they approached it at last, Doran dismounted Providence and turned to his escorts, patting the grand horse lightly on the shoulder. He snorted and shook his head in response.
I feel like this is a little out-of-order, in the sense that he turns to the escorts, then pats the horse, then the next sentence is him speaking to the escorts. I think it would be a little better if he was described as dismounting, patting the horse, and then turning to the escorts, in that order.
The lucario that had led them there reached out haphazardly and opened his mouth again to speak, but this time Doran shot him a pointed, supercilious look, and gently placed a hand on the pommel of his ceremonial sword, as if daring the lucario to speak.
This seems like a harsh reaction, and it kind of surprised me. I'm not sure why he is so opposed to that lucario getting the chance to speak in this moment in particular (okay coming back after reading the rest, I guess he was just way more of an asshole than I thought lol).
sizing up the high priest with a wise pair of eyes, as they were in the physical signs of age and extensive combat that painted his body.
The elder chief's eyes snapped open. Sharp, icy blue pierced through his milky cataracts and granted him True Sight. He expected it to show him a face knotted and pulsating with unbridled anger, but it did not. High Priest Doran was leaning over the lucario, cape draped at his sides. A serendipitous smile split his face, sweet and serene. His heavy eyelids fell halfway down his knowing gaze, and if Silverfoot didn't know better, he might think the priest was staring into the eyes of a lover. The lucario frowned deeply. The priest's spirit was inscrutable now.
"Lines of weakness. Perhaps if I'd interpreted them correctly from the start, we would have finished this little chat ages ago. They are not symbols of your victories. Memories of hits you have taken, that you could have evaded. They are symbols of your inability to protect yourself. "
This was kind of a cringey monologue to me. "Lines of weakness" sounds particularly silly (as opposed to something like "marks of weakness"). I don't know if that's something you would want to change.
Anyway, initially, I thought that Doran was going to have some potential for redemption (he seemed to have, like, *some* distant respect for the village), but it's looking like I was wrong.
My overall thoughts on the prologue is that it establishes Doran's character (as an irredeemable zealot) very clearly, which seems to be its main purpose. There were a few parts of the narration which did this particularly well, I thought, which I will highlight:
He had some words to say eventually, of course, but they were not for this prattling footman. The lucario opened its mouth to speak again, then hesitated. They made the rest of their way to the chieftain's hall in silence.
Maybe here, it would be good to describe how the escorts seem fearful. Like, are they fidgeting? Tense? Are their faces pale or rigid? Going forward, I would look for opportunities to do that kind of thing more often.
As another random example:
Both the guard and the lucario snapped to attention, stricken with fear.
Finally, a character who hates humans as much as I do. Anyway, I really do like these descriptions for conveying the character's feelings and establishing that humans are apparently overpowered in this universe.
Specks of algae, slow-crawling snails, the occasional school of minnows. All drifting away with the current, not thinking of their destination, content just to move. Ferry lost himself in their amorphous feelings, privately envious of their simple existences.
I liked this bit. I also often wish that I were algae. Also, it's a nice way to get into the character's headspace a little and to demonstrate his aura-sensing power.
His focus on the auras of the river were gone now that his concentration had focused.
"was only off transparency" strikes me as a weird way to say it
Instead of answering, Ferry leaned forward and plunged his hands into the chilly water, drawing a sharp breath at the sudden sting of the river’s touch.
Might be better not to use the progressive tense for "drawing" since it's a pretty sudden/discrete action.
You’re ‘content’ with the adolescence you spent in captivity like an animal, being trained to raise your fists against your brothers, all to eventually be sold into slavery to some ungrateful human like the object you are?
I feel like this sentence might be a bit too long.
You really think you’re better than everyone else because they’re capable of pulling the sticks out of their asses even though you’re the one who’s been treating this whole thing like religion?
I feel like it would read better as "He resolved to spend it..."
Anyway, the narration in this chapter felt a bit more concise to me, which I liked, and there were some nice paragraphs at the start. I just have this sense that the dialogue could be improved a little. Not that I'm a dialogue expert or anything...
Notes on chapter 2
I like how this chapter kind of mirrors the last one, in the sense that these humans seem excited to begin a new phase of their lives, while the lucario in the last chapter were... well, they were also beginning a new phase of their lives, but it's a much more depressing one for them.
I think that Prim's characterization at the start is pretty strong, and I like all the buildup to the arm wrestling match before it ends in the most anticlimactic way possible. It was pretty amusing.
Prim thought she was burning up… How hot must they have been under all that fur?
Well what do you know, just as I suspected. What are the odds. My prediction is that these characters may serve as interesting foils for one another down the line.
Anyway, this seems like potentially a very interesting setup. The relationship between these two characters is definitely going to go *somewhere*, I'm sure of at least that much. Though my first thought is, I wonder if Ferry wouldn't hypothetically just be able to kill Prim in her sleep (okay nevermind, I read further on, and that is explained).
Notes on Chapter 3
I didn't take super detailed notes this time, but the prose was decent I think. However, I'm not totally sure why the zoroark bothered to steal Ferry away to begin with, if he wasn't going to eat him. But anyway, this seems like a decent way to establish that there are dangerous pokemon out there and put Prim and Ferry in a situation where they can build their relationship.
Notes on Chapters 4 + 5
Anyway, I read through chapters 4 + 5, but I didn't really take detailed notes because I kind of just felt like reading... But anyway, I'll say that I think the farfetch'd is really annoying (with all his oh ho ho-ing and the like), and I found myself kind of unhappy that he's sticking around. I could see him developing into an interesting character as time goes on, but I suspect there will be a lot of suffering for me in the meantime, unless something makes him tone it down.
On the other hand, I like how Ferry's relationship with Prim is developing. Kind of feels good to see Ferry take charge a little here, and it makes sense given his personality. Though I think maybe Prim's realization that Ferry was right ("His sense of justice now prevailed when she might have erred on the side of excessive sympathy otherwise") came a little too suddenly.
“Oh, I think we’ll have good fun on the road together, the three of us,” Ferry remarked as they left the town limits. The Lanceroute stretched out before them, an endless ribbon of smooth dirt reaching in both directions until it disappeared into the hills. “Good fun indeed."
Given what's happened, I fully expected her not to.
Anyway, this is a very unique premise for a pokemon story---not something I expected to see. Prim and Ferry's personalities clash in a way that should lead to some entertaining developments in their relationship. I wonder if Prim will set Ferry free at some point? Or he could try to escape to Galar? Not sure. Guess I have to keep reading if I want to find out.
I enjoyed Ferry’s perspective. Breath of fresh air to get a Pokémon POV after fucking Doran the Immaculate, haha. Ferry has an arrogant streak, but probably understandably. It’s how he keeps his head up. I like the name, too—evokes both the iron and the furry warmth.
Ferry recognized its aura even without focusing on it. His ear twitched at the sound of its footsteps.
“Ferrycloth,” it said, coming to a stop behind him. Ferry pried an eye open and turned his head back, sizing up the speaker. Quicktail was a fist or two taller than Ferry, though at the moment he towered over Ferry’s sitting form. His legs were marked with sable stripes, and the fur on his face came to a point behind his eyes, giving him a fierce appearance.
