In Progress The Lands which Remained

[Thorne]

I like writing.
I really do.
But I question whether I am good at it or not.
The following story is my first serious try at writing a fictional story that is not a RP, so I think that I am excused if it is extraordinarily bad.

But I don't think it will be that bad.

The story takes place in a fictional world of my creation, as thus most things will seem alien, I bet.

Either way I should post the actual story now.

And yes there is no dialogue in the first chapter but there will be in the next ones alright?

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Chapter 1: A field of flowers
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Blue flowers.

Sky-blue flowers covered the plains as far as the eye could reach. A warm, gentle breeze blew, causing them to sway slowly. Amongst the flowers, a wide cobblestone path stretched in a straight line over the plains, creating a grey stripe in the blue cover that laid over the ground.

If you had walked on the cobblestone path, you would most likely have noticed the grand tree that stood by itself amongst the flowers. The tree was a peculiar one, as the bark was coloured greenish blue, while the leaves that adorned its top were dark crimson. But perhaps the most peculiar part was the sleeping boy who rested under the branches, leaned against his backpack.

This boy was covered in ash-grey fur, except for the area around his mouth, where the fur was white. His face was feline, with two triangle ears placed at the top of his head. And a fuzzy tail decorated his behind. Despite this, his body was built like that of a human. A spear, almost twice as tall as the boy, was shoved into the ground next to him. Unaware of the world around him, the boy slept peacefully in the shadow of the tree.

The name of this boy was Nabi Hisainel

Soon, Nabi was awakened by a humming noise and something tapping his pink nose. He opened a dull blue eye to find a serpentine creature flying in the front of him. The emerald green snake looked at him with its big, yellow compound eyes, while the rapid movement of its fly wings kept it floating in place. He noticed that the flying serpent carried a letter in its mouth, which he grabbed and began ripping open as the snake, whose mission was now accomplished, flew off once again. Nabi instantly recognized the formal, yet very decorative handwriting in the letter.

To Nabi Hisainel
We have received news about a group of bandits terrorizing a small village west of Hiimelgard. Since your most recent task had you going to Reinstad, your current position should be relatively close to the village in question. In addition, it is worth to mention that the leader of the bandits is an infamous criminal by the name of Laderi Faal. You are authorized to kill if you find it necessary in this task.
Sincerely
Throon Tetragrammaton

Having read through the letter, Nabi threw the it away, and it was picked up and carried away by the wind. He pulled himself up using the spear that was stuck into the ground, and stretched a bit.
He was short, even for his age, and was in addition rather scrawny. His shirt consisted of two pieces of cloth, one was dark scarlet, the other was snow white. They were kept together with several metal rings and bared his midriffs. His pants had a similar design, and he wore no shoes at all.

He threw the backpack around his shoulders, and ripped the spear out of the ground. Walking through the flowers, Nabi broke through the wall of blue and walked unto the cobblestone path, and started following it, using his long spear as a walking stick.

 

[Blazie]

It certainly seems interesting; I want to know more about this totally crazy world where trees are blue and red. There are ways to make improvements, though.

the sleeping boy who rested under the branches, leaned against his backpack.

Leaned does not work in the context; you either need the word "who" or change leaned to leaning. The essence of what you're saying right now is "the sleeping boy who rested under the branches(,) leaning against his backpack." The word "leaned" would fit with the word "who" in front of it (I know it's a part of speech but my memory fails me). Like, "the sleeping boy who rested under the branches who leaned against his backpack."

tl;dr Change "leaned" to "leaning". I talk a lot.

The biggest thing for me was your descriptions. They were good in wording, but they seemed to be plunked in there for the sake of describing things. You need to work them in so that the reader gets a clear picture, but you don't stop the flow of the story to do it. For example, the paragraph when you're describing how he's covered in fur and the paragraph after Nabi gets up are pure, cut-and-pasted description. It isn't as interesting to read as the actual story, and you don't have to tell the reader everything immediately. If you pile on the details the reader get lost, but if you give the basic, most obvious things now and give details as the story goes on. (Though you shouldn't wait until the end of the story to mention his eye colour or something.)

You could incorporate the description of his body in various places, like when you mention the boy sitting beneath the tree and when the green serpent-thing comes up to him. You could speak of him "using the spear to support his scrawny figure as he rose" or something instead of suddenly stopping the story and saying "he was scrawny and short and his clothing looked like this." You made a start on improving when you wrote "Soon, Nabi was awakened by a humming noise and something tapping his pink nose. He opened a dull blue eye to find a serpentine creature flying in the front of him. " This keeps the action going, but gives us details about Nabi.

(As a side note, scrawny generally doesn't bring images of tall or even average-height people, so it isn't completely necessary to say "short" if you're going to say he's scrawny right after.)

Also, I don't understand his clothing. The way you described it, I'm seeing two pieces of cloth wrapped around him with rings connecting the front and back, and red/white striped pants. When you said that the pants had a similar pattern, it was confusing because two pieces of cloth held together isn't really a pattern. It's just colours. Either elaborate on the clothing or just give a shorter, more generic explanation that can be built upon during the story. (Also, it is not midriffs, it is just "midriff"; the S is unnecessary.)

Also, I find it hard to believe that the cloth is snow white. I mean, he's sleeping under a tree. From the way the message was worded, I can assume that this isn't uncommon. It also seemed like the clothing was fairly old. So why would the cloth be perfectly clean?

I don't blame you for this (i.e all of the descriptory stuffs), since in RPs you just type down all of this information and barely have to mention it inside the actual RP.

Walking through the flowers, Nabi broke through the wall of blue and walked unto the cobblestone path, and started following it, using his long spear as a walking stick.

Your use of "and" doesn't really work for me. It would work if the first one connected two things that were usually presented in a pair, but that isn't usually written. Replace the first "and" with a comma and you're good to go. Except for the "unto"; I think you want "onto", meaning placing yourself on top of something. "Unto" means "to" (like, I give this review unto you; you can't say I went unto the store.) It has other meanings but "to" is by far the most common.

Overall I am liking this and I can't wait for the next chapter. =)

 

[Thorne]

Thanks Blazie.
I'm not a native English speaker so I suppose that this kind of writing is still rather tricky to me. I'll consider your advice in the future, perhaps rewriting this first chapter as well.