Eagle of the Forest Path

Actually, on this one I think canals are viable. It's a mountainous city, so canals would by necessity include water locks. When the water in a lock descends, that could produce a lot of noise, depending on how the water is expelled from the lock.

Well, since Adonalsium was intentionally shattered by an outside force, you could say every Shard is artificial.

Okay, Graffiti. It's been around longer than you'd think, actually. It doesn't take spray-paint to make graffiti. Try googling "ancient Rome graffiti"(for a more recent example try "Kilroy was here"), or watching the opening credits for Rome(tv-show from a couple of years ago) there's also that scene in Life of Brian. Basically, in the story people just scribble on the walls sometimes, with whatever the have handy: charcoal, a piece of chalk or a stick of coloured wax, a jar of ink (coloured or not) rarely paint... If it's confusing, maybe there's another term I could use. If I can't find one I like it'll stay as graffiti, though. I screwed up on Sen Hamellus. That was originally going to be the Dhé's name and I apparently didn't replace it everywhere. Mea culpa. Will be more careful about that sort of thing.

Fine by me. Though Minerva was actually the Roman version of Athena. Artemis got turned into Diana.

Fusilli Conchiglione Farfalle Orechiette Cappelini Canneloni Linguini Spaghetti Macheroni/Macaroni Tagliatelle WLIU, name 10 Roman gods (bonus points if you link them to their Greek counterparts).

+1 on the 'portable ballista' issue, if you want to describe it as larger and heavier than your regular, standard-issue crossbow, I suggest 'arbalest'. I liked the counting seconds sequence at the beginning. Lumi describes the murderer as "it" all the time; I understand that you don't want to reveal at that point whether the figure is male or female, but using 'it' in a conversation in that way feels a bit contrived. Also, since you reveal it's a man just a bit later in the same chapter, basically the first guy they talk to about it, I don't see much point in making the figure's gender a mystery. I'm curious to see how the story will develop.

General Like I told Asmode- & Manda-mon. I'll rewrite the prologue so there's no POV character at all. That should also allow me to fix most of the other issues at the same time, hopefully. Well, the motivation for the guy's actions is kinda gonna be one of the 'big reveals' later on in the story. I'm planning on putting foreshadowing/clues into the chapters between this and the reveal, so readers can try to discover it themselves. Including the motive in the prologue would really mess that up. I'll try to make it seem less petty in the rewrite, though. Right now, I'm not too bothered yet about finding agents or actually publishing, but maybe somewhere down the line... so thanks for the advice. As you went It's actually not "partitions", but "patricians", a social class in ancient Rome, as opposed to plebeians. I took a lot of elements from that culture for the worldbuilding, so calling the upper class simply 'nobles' wouldn't have felt right. I'm trying to work on the whole convoluted, over-comma-ed, phrase, but that's just how I naturally write. It's a hard habit to get out of. Well, if I'm having an incognito, clandestine meeting for likely nefarious purposes, I wouldn't be too keen on having an audience, would you? I'll expand on that if I can, though. Drat, I was really pleased with the term Fury Priest, too. I'll poll some local readers (aka family and friends) to see what they think, maybe come up with an alternative. For your remarks on"show, not tell". I hadn't really noticed that yet myself (that's why authors need outside feedback, right?) but when I do my POV rewrite of the prologue, I'll pay some extra attention to that. Thank you for your feedback, Kaisa. There are some really good points in there.

I get where you're coming from with the POV, but if I tell you his name, there wouldn't be much of a mystery, now would there? I'm willing to forego reader connection to this particular character, he's one of the 'bad guys' after all, but if it's bothersome I'll try to work something out. Maybe redo the entire prologue in 'cinematic'? Motivations Some good points there, will fix them as much as possible. There are reasons for some of the things you bring up. I can enlighten you about the priestess, it's sort of in her 'mandate' that she can't refuse a 'transaction', but mostly she knows the guy is lying through his teeth about his reasons (basically everyone does). One of the reasons the clients have to go masked is so the FP can't figure out why their targets are being, well, targeted, that way they can convince themselves that they deserve what's coming to them. (Though some really don't give a rat's back end) Purpose To be completely honest, the prologue isn't strictly speaking necessary, but I had this image of the scene, so I really wanted to get it on paper. Scene break I put it there to separate out the summoning sequence, if it's confusing I'll remove it. Thanks for pointing it out. City You'll get an outside view of the city in Ch.1. Spoiler: It's not wholly underground. One of the things I usually enjoy about fantasy books are the maps, but maps for this particular setting are going to be a challenge, to say the least. The graffiti is just graffiti, mostly. The man's crib sheet mainly references images that were there already when the FP set up shop. If there's no suitable image at any one intersection the FP might draw one themselves, or if they're feeling lazy just draw an arrow (which is risky) or just note "next intersection go left" on the crib sheets (which can get confusing really fast). Mandamon: will try to 'archaicize' the language a bit. About the transaction, the guy's not completely sure he should be doing this, the shiver is because this is the point of no return; after paying, he can't change his mind any more. I'll try to find a way to indicate his feelings some other way, but that might not be necessary after the POV rewrite to cinematic. I'm glad both of you liked it, so far. Thanks for the feedback.

Hello all, This is my first submission to Reading Excuses. It's the Prologue to Jet Black Medium, a Fantasy Mystery that I hope to get to around 50-60 k words. I think I got a bit too involved with the worldbuilding aspect, so if there's something that's not clear or confusing (description or terminology) please tell me? Please enjoy. E.

Hello Excused Readers. I'm really uncomfortable with self-introductions but let's give it a shot anyway. My real name is Arne (which is ancient Germanic for eagle, guess what my family name translates as) and I'm from Belgium. I have a lot of interests, the main one being Fantasy fiction. I also read some sci-fi, detective/mystery, and the occasional thriller. I'd love to read the classics (my uncle gave me War and Peace once) but I usually get stuck before I hit fifty pages (thirty if it's a small font). Next to Brandon Sanderson, I'm a fan of Terry Pratchett, Isaac Asimov, Robert Jordan and Deep Purple. I tend toward elaborate world-building and usually have trouble coming up with engaging stories to place in them. I decided to bite the bullet and just start writing one not too long ago, and I'm guessing 90% of the world-building I did won't ever get into the story, but que sera, sera, right? Well, here's hoping that writing for RE will teach me to reach a balance. E. PS: I'll be using EotFP for naming files, mails, etc., my full username is a bit unwieldy.

Could I submit on the 30th, please?

Haven't you got Nightblood's power backwards? IIRC, he consumes the investiture from the wielder, not from the target.

That really happen to you, Sule?

There's also crucifixion and the lance of Longinus... or do those two cancel each other out?

This is really interesting so far, I don't have anything to note story-wise. I do have some nitpicks, though. (I'm using § to denote paragraphs, as in every time you used a double enter) §1 To me, "in time with" indicates a repeating event, maybe replace by "along with"? §5 That second sentence is not clear, "hard luck" (as I've always heard it) means bad luck, I don't think it would be bad luck to find decent food. It would both be hard and lucky, under these circumstances. §6 Add in a comma after artists, I think. Robinski would have to confirm that. §15 What's a taenosil? From what follows (the breaking into pieces) I assumed it was some sort of fruit or vegetable until I got a few paragraphs on. You could replace "broke it..." with "broke the <adjective> <noun>..." to make it clear immediately. §32 Should be "There aren't enough hours..." since I get the impression that Lasila would pay close attention to (so-called) proper grammar. (I'd accept this from Varinen, though) Finally, about those double enters, I hate to be blunt, but that's just bad formatting, especially during the conversation. I know most people would say it doesn't matter to the story, but breaking up the text like that actually makes it harder to read, whether the reader realizes it or not. You'd be a lot better served by a first line indent, which leaves using a blank line available for the more important subdivisions of a chapter.

uhmmm... RAFO?

Well, there's one more type I can think of, the Reluctant User (though there must a be a better name for it). The type of wizard who hates his own powers and refuses to use them, or at least tries to (think Rand in The Great Hunt), either because of social stigma, because of personal trauma or because the power is overly (self)destructive or downright evil. Bonus points if the person in question can't help but use the power (i.e. the nuclear bomb guy from Heroes). These characters tend to be too 'tragic hero' for my taste, but that's just personal preference.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dominion Check out the related terms too. Anyway, due to the fragmented nature of the Dor, I don't think it's possible to assert that any one of the Selish magic systems is linked to either shard specifically, or even that it's more Devotion than Dominion or vice versa.

Eagle (hah!) Tern Sparrow Flamingo Albatross Hummingbird Raven Cockatoo Thrush Gull or Seagull Bat (just kidding ) Kiwi (not kidding) Partridge Pheasant Quail Robin Penguin Ostrich Duck Dodo WLIU name 10 invertebrates (try not to repeat the same... 'variety'... too much, no need to stick to the same Phylum)

Standalone works in an existing world are a difficult proposition. You'll have to find a balance between explaining the world enough for new readers and not so much that it becomes frustrating for those already familiar with the setting. IMO you're actually off to a decent start for that. For me it's not so much the mead itself that clashes with the 'sophistication' of ice sculptures, but that people apparently drink from horns, which is awfully, uhm... 'rustic'. I'm not sure the easiest way to resolve the inconsistency is to class up the drinks. You know your setting better than anyone, is it necessary that they be ice sculptures? Maybe wood or stone would work equally well?

The sound of hoof beats 'cross the glade, Good folk, lock up your son and daughter.

Blood and ashes! A reply! Both answers are correct, so take it away, Mat.

It is definitely possible for some attributes, namely the 'Human' attributes. That is basically what happened when the Koloss started reusing spikes after TLR's death. I'm not so sure about investiture-based attributes, like allomancy and feruchemy, but I don't see any reason why they should be any different.

It's not so much about the spiritweb being too damaged for multiple spikes as it is about the body being too dead after the first one.

No offence, but I really hope they don't do the voice over, after a couple of episodes that's going to get incredibly annoying, at least to me. The opening sequence is one aspect where I think everyone can agree that the 'HBO-treatment' wouldn't be a bad thing. If they get the same team that did the GoT intro, I expect to see something amazing, though hopefully not just copy-pasting it onto Randland.