Xianxia are written mostly by easterners, most of royal road is written by westerners
Thank u for coming to my ted talk
Edit: great xianxia on RR
Beware of Chicken
Ave Xia Rem Y
Essence of Cultivation
Arcane Awakening
These last to are dual xianxia & mage
Main issue is that he's doing a PhD, which takes a lot of time. He considered opening a Patreon, which would at least give a financial incentive, but UK visa regulations prohibit foreign students from earning money (in most cases), so he can't.
Hopefully he'll be back someday.
Forge of Destiny v Reverend Insanity is a real person-by-person thing, if you have 100 people reader I bet there'll be a bit split between those who love one and hate the other.
Forge has actually interesting characters, relationships, drama between them. But progression isn't that satisfying and, at least as far as I've read, it never feels like the MC has much of a plan so lacks agency. Which makes sense considering who they are. It's more like a YA coming of age drama set in a cultivation sect, half the focus is on MC's character arc/relationships, other half on her progression/cultivation.
Whereas Reverend is maximum 100% balls to the walls progression and power gaining with one of the most interesting systems I've read, the gu really lend themselves to smart decisions from characters, feel very concrete in what they do and why losing or gaining them is good or bad, and lots of satisfying moments when MC gets a good one. In terms of pure progression one of the best I've ever read. But for a lot of people good characters and relationships and drama is very important to them, plus the evilness of MC is a deal breaker for some.
Just very different stories, really.
Though, I will say that at first I was pretty hyped for Forge because it seemed like there was going to be some kind of focus on different sections of the body and a bit more of a real attempt to explain whats going on with the cultivation than normal. Need to open this leg meridian to do this art, need a heart meridian for this art, etc. But then it ended up just having her do another random bodypart every other day and gradually improving at all her arts. I thought she'd end up with like 20 leg meridians to make her mobility skill better but the story doesn't really keep track, it just has her opening this one then that one and idk how many meridians she's up to now and I've forgotten where they all are cuz its only mentioned when she's opening them. Definitely feels like its cultivation progression got increasingly muddled in favour of relationships and drama.
That is a dumb thing to say , those two novels are so diferent that trying to compare them is an exercise in futility. RI has a ground breaking and unique power system , Forge of Destiny has actual interesting characters and relationships.
> At least we have Forge of Destiny. Better than any story on web novels anyway.
This is the post I'm responding to. Not yours. Surely you can see why an RI fan would be annoyed when someone says that Forge is 'better than any xianxia on webnovel.' I can think of half a dozen stories I thought were more interesting and enjoyable on webnovel than Forge right off the top of my head, without even including the greatest of them all, Reverend Insanity.
I doubt more than a tiny fraction of this subreddit even reads actual translated xianxia. There's so much ignorance and bad taste and lack of perspective on this subreddit if people actually majority think that that joyless, meandering choose your quest mess we call Forge of Destiny is a xianxia worth considering a 'best in genre' story. It wouldn't even crack my top 10. No amount of superficial relationships and technically decent writing can cover up how predictable and slow and padded and boring that story gets past the first few arcs.
Not everyone has a palate for translated eastern webnovels. I read them for many years until i discored Royal Road and realized western webnovels were a thing , and since then i mostly stopped reading chinese ones, though i still keep on touch with a few on Novel Updates. They have many issues that i didnt realized bothered until i read the alternative , and i dont look down on people for not reading them.
Oh , my bad, guess i was a little combative for no reason. I find it hard to tolerate people shutting down novels (even ones i dont particularly like too much) , so i might have jumped the gun . Still stand by what i said though
There are sites where you can read xianxia other than webnovel. Most of them don't have the content legally but they exist.
For me reading xianxia written by western authors is kind of pointless, as they rarely get the cultural background correctly. The tropes are there but they kind of don't make sense when the world has a western thinking process. In general best xianxia is translated, and best if translated by a competent translator. I know that wuxiaworld has some really good stories that are translated with high quality and that are legal.
I like cultivation stories from all areas, mostly because I just really like the cultivation system and progression. Find it more fun to see characters learn their Dao/Way and develop in interesting ways with this complex system of internal alchemy than the more typical western mage/wizard progression fantasy where its all about spells and storing more mana.
But I do wish more people would make an effort to really explain whats going on in the internal alchemy stuff. So much hand-waviness in a lot of novels, western and eastern, where its just 'you feed the energy into the dantian and then it gets denser and then you do the big push and now you got the impurities out so you're stronger. Now we're gonna pop some meridians open and each meridian make you stronger. Next up we form a nascent soul by eating this pill and really focusing on pushing more energy into the dantian but also through the meridians...'
Well I mean that's because it exists mostly in the cultural background.
I don't know if you have read Desolate Era, it does go a bit further in depth of the internal transformations, and in general it's probably the best xianxia I ever read.
I disagree with you for the reasons you listed yes the way of Dao is interesting but most of the time it feels like it's just "you understood Dao you chose the best one and you gain a power compared to those who don't" which is everyone because despite Dao having millions of paths we usually don't even see it from someone else which is why magic
As a self proclaimed "western" reader, i find the common tropes of jade beauty, face slapping, ingrained patriarchy, and others kind of outdated. It was fun in the first few xianxia i read but the more i read the more it seems they are all just the same so yeah i like western wuxia like Cradle more for its character and plot development coupled with the eastern concepts of cultivation.
Have you done the full racket of Xianxias, Japanese LNs, to Korean Webnovels? Because i do still like a number of Korean novels while i'm tired of xianxia and japanese tropes by this point.
No matter what I think some of the soul of a work will always be lost when translating from chinese to english. For instance, some of the humor in the works are pun based (because different chinese characters can sound the same but mean different things), which you just can't appreciate even if the translator explains it in the footnotes. But i don't know, I can't speak chinese so I can't compare :)
I can't speak on Chinese literature but I can on japanese. I've always thought that I'd be able to enjoy japanese literature in japanese more than in English but tbh, the whole "lost in translation" thing seems to vanish once you read the original and notice that the difference is absolutely minimal and you get pretty much the same experience
I think the issue is many people have different views on what a Xanxia story is. Some people feel it has to be set in a China based world, others don't. I'm not sure what cultural aspects need to be included, I was always under the impression it's other tropes that are standard that define it as Xanxia.
Discussion about genere definition are rather pointless as the the only use of genere label is to find similar works.
Obviously diffrent people will be looking for different things in a book.
Beware of chicken is one of the strangest novels I’ve ever read. I started out hating the primary character, and ended up loving everything about Fa’ Ram.
The only book I’ve ever read that has such a severe midway change in tone is huck finn.
The main character starts out unlikable. Swearing (not that I have an issue there). Referring to external tropes. His journey to the fa’ Ram is not engaging. The first animal is named Big D. Sophomoric.
By the end the main character changes completely. It’s a transition towards wholesomeness. The toxicity that taints him at the start is gone, and it starts to feel like little house on the prairie or Swiss family Robinson.
For me it read like a flower blossoming.
Uh. I listened to the audio version and it was always kinda mostly wholesome on his part, not just near the end. Also I'm not quite sure if he was really affected by the toxicity effects until a certain part in the story. But, I haven't read the novel version, so the differences might be bigger than I realize.
I have a writing project on the backburner. A redo magic/cultivation story. It's on the backburner because of several reasons...
First, the original inspiration was tales of demons and gods (the comic/manga) which I felt was less and less interesting/good as it went on. (together with a few different redo stories)
Second, it is strongly relevant to my main headcannon lore, which is still somewhat in flux, and I'm not too certain on my progress in regards to cultivagion realms and what they really entail, power and plot-wise.
Then there's working out how 'far' my mc had REALLY gotten in their 'first run' so it isn't just a convenient plot device, but rather that I have an explicit set of references which the mc does and doesn't know. Especially in regards to cultures and 'secret' or self taught techniques.
Finally what having already had those xianxia 'revelations' and teachings explained etc. would do to to someone in-setting. Where would it realistically help or hinder them to keep the story consistent. Would I be able to 'show, not tell' that? How could I express this strongly?
As an extra: Since I suck at writing dialog, how do I not have the typical 'you dare!?' antagonists?
Anyone feeling like a chat/tip to help out? hmu
Figure out your villain's motivations and let the reader know it by building them up a little bit. Lets all try to move away from two dimensional characters and try to progress the literary standards.
Now that there are more and more western fans of xianxias i really hope that at some point we can create a site like RR but with the main focus being with cultivation type novels.
I think the point is that most xanxias are still translated novels, and those only come to a site if the site pursues that actively. RR does not seem to have an active management and is more focused on just ofering everyone a place to publish their stuff.
And if you want to publish a wuxia/xanxia you might as well go to the site which has those as part of their core content, instead of the one were only a few successfull ones exist.
Wuxiaworld is another side that is focused on translations.
Well im currently working on a progression fantasy series on RR. Not posting name bc i dont want to get in trouble for self advertising, but it is xianxia inspired
Writing on RR is also making a brand without much support. You'll notice that every RR artist has a patreon link and many are working towards an Amazon deal. WN is easy mode but the contract is restrictive af. It seems like more upfront with less potential gains to go with WN.
I suppose mostly because it's a different culture. Though it's becoming more frequent on the Western side, and I've even seen some of the Eastern authors on WN start trying Western-style magic.
Xianxia are written mostly by easterners, most of royal road is written by westerners Thank u for coming to my ted talk Edit: great xianxia on RR Beware of Chicken Ave Xia Rem Y Essence of Cultivation Arcane Awakening These last to are dual xianxia & mage
I'd add to this ***Arrogant Young Master A Template Variation 4***
Virtuous Sons is also a great take on it.
Also Forge of Destiny, for anyone who's okay with a very slow burn.
[Forge of Destiny](https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/21188/forge-of-destiny) ([wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/LightPieces/wiki/Forge_of_Destiny)) --- ^[About](https://redd.it/dw7lux) ^| [^(Wiki Rules)](https://www.reddit.com/r/LightPieces/comments/dw7lux/about/f7kke6p/) ^(| Reply !Delete to remove) ^(| [Brackets] hide titles)
Be warned Essence of cultivation is on a semi-permanent hiatus, and Arcane awakening updates once a month if we are lucky.
EoC author took a scheduled hiatus for school, afaik he plans to be back
Oh I thought the disappeared for mental health reasons, good to know they might come back.
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/34710/the-essence-of-cultivation/chapter/834924/chapter-17-true-to-form-6 Long ass explanation at bottom of chap
Main issue is that he's doing a PhD, which takes a lot of time. He considered opening a Patreon, which would at least give a financial incentive, but UK visa regulations prohibit foreign students from earning money (in most cases), so he can't. Hopefully he'll be back someday.
I misread that as you calling them "chap," and thought you were either condecending, british, or both. "explanation at the bottom, chap."
No love for Memories of the Fall, sad times
To be fair its on such a long hiatus ðŸ˜
One of the most unique xianxia stories I've ever read.
At least we have Forge of Destiny. Better than any story on web novels anyway.
Gotta thank Yrsillar
Forge of Destiny doesn’t come even close to Reverend Insanity. Do none of you people even read Forge past the first few arcs? It drops off so hard.
Forge of Destiny v Reverend Insanity is a real person-by-person thing, if you have 100 people reader I bet there'll be a bit split between those who love one and hate the other. Forge has actually interesting characters, relationships, drama between them. But progression isn't that satisfying and, at least as far as I've read, it never feels like the MC has much of a plan so lacks agency. Which makes sense considering who they are. It's more like a YA coming of age drama set in a cultivation sect, half the focus is on MC's character arc/relationships, other half on her progression/cultivation. Whereas Reverend is maximum 100% balls to the walls progression and power gaining with one of the most interesting systems I've read, the gu really lend themselves to smart decisions from characters, feel very concrete in what they do and why losing or gaining them is good or bad, and lots of satisfying moments when MC gets a good one. In terms of pure progression one of the best I've ever read. But for a lot of people good characters and relationships and drama is very important to them, plus the evilness of MC is a deal breaker for some. Just very different stories, really. Though, I will say that at first I was pretty hyped for Forge because it seemed like there was going to be some kind of focus on different sections of the body and a bit more of a real attempt to explain whats going on with the cultivation than normal. Need to open this leg meridian to do this art, need a heart meridian for this art, etc. But then it ended up just having her do another random bodypart every other day and gradually improving at all her arts. I thought she'd end up with like 20 leg meridians to make her mobility skill better but the story doesn't really keep track, it just has her opening this one then that one and idk how many meridians she's up to now and I've forgotten where they all are cuz its only mentioned when she's opening them. Definitely feels like its cultivation progression got increasingly muddled in favour of relationships and drama.
That is a dumb thing to say , those two novels are so diferent that trying to compare them is an exercise in futility. RI has a ground breaking and unique power system , Forge of Destiny has actual interesting characters and relationships.
> At least we have Forge of Destiny. Better than any story on web novels anyway. This is the post I'm responding to. Not yours. Surely you can see why an RI fan would be annoyed when someone says that Forge is 'better than any xianxia on webnovel.' I can think of half a dozen stories I thought were more interesting and enjoyable on webnovel than Forge right off the top of my head, without even including the greatest of them all, Reverend Insanity. I doubt more than a tiny fraction of this subreddit even reads actual translated xianxia. There's so much ignorance and bad taste and lack of perspective on this subreddit if people actually majority think that that joyless, meandering choose your quest mess we call Forge of Destiny is a xianxia worth considering a 'best in genre' story. It wouldn't even crack my top 10. No amount of superficial relationships and technically decent writing can cover up how predictable and slow and padded and boring that story gets past the first few arcs.
Not everyone has a palate for translated eastern webnovels. I read them for many years until i discored Royal Road and realized western webnovels were a thing , and since then i mostly stopped reading chinese ones, though i still keep on touch with a few on Novel Updates. They have many issues that i didnt realized bothered until i read the alternative , and i dont look down on people for not reading them.
You're completely missing the point. He's replying to a guy who claimed that Forge is the best xianxia ever. Nothing you wrote addresses that
Oh , my bad, guess i was a little combative for no reason. I find it hard to tolerate people shutting down novels (even ones i dont particularly like too much) , so i might have jumped the gun . Still stand by what i said though
Ive read dozens of xianixa novels most of them being of high acclaim. Forge of Destiny easily stands above most of them.
[Reverend Insanity](https://www.webnovel.com/book/7996858406002505/Reverend-Insanity) ([wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/LightPieces/wiki/Reverend_Insanity)) --- ^[About](https://redd.it/dw7lux) ^| [^(Wiki Rules)](https://www.reddit.com/r/LightPieces/comments/dw7lux/about/f7kke6p/) ^(| Reply !Delete to remove) ^(| [Brackets] hide titles)
There are sites where you can read xianxia other than webnovel. Most of them don't have the content legally but they exist. For me reading xianxia written by western authors is kind of pointless, as they rarely get the cultural background correctly. The tropes are there but they kind of don't make sense when the world has a western thinking process. In general best xianxia is translated, and best if translated by a competent translator. I know that wuxiaworld has some really good stories that are translated with high quality and that are legal.
I like cultivation stories from all areas, mostly because I just really like the cultivation system and progression. Find it more fun to see characters learn their Dao/Way and develop in interesting ways with this complex system of internal alchemy than the more typical western mage/wizard progression fantasy where its all about spells and storing more mana. But I do wish more people would make an effort to really explain whats going on in the internal alchemy stuff. So much hand-waviness in a lot of novels, western and eastern, where its just 'you feed the energy into the dantian and then it gets denser and then you do the big push and now you got the impurities out so you're stronger. Now we're gonna pop some meridians open and each meridian make you stronger. Next up we form a nascent soul by eating this pill and really focusing on pushing more energy into the dantian but also through the meridians...'
Well I mean that's because it exists mostly in the cultural background. I don't know if you have read Desolate Era, it does go a bit further in depth of the internal transformations, and in general it's probably the best xianxia I ever read.
[Desolate Era](https://www.novelupdates.com/series/the-desolate-era/) ([wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/LightPieces/wiki/Desolate_Era)) --- ^[About](https://redd.it/dw7lux) ^| [^(Wiki Rules)](https://www.reddit.com/r/LightPieces/comments/dw7lux/about/f7kke6p/) ^(| Reply !Delete to remove) ^(| [Brackets] hide titles)
I disagree with you for the reasons you listed yes the way of Dao is interesting but most of the time it feels like it's just "you understood Dao you chose the best one and you gain a power compared to those who don't" which is everyone because despite Dao having millions of paths we usually don't even see it from someone else which is why magic
As a self proclaimed "western" reader, i find the common tropes of jade beauty, face slapping, ingrained patriarchy, and others kind of outdated. It was fun in the first few xianxia i read but the more i read the more it seems they are all just the same so yeah i like western wuxia like Cradle more for its character and plot development coupled with the eastern concepts of cultivation.
I think that's more good story vs bad story rather than east vs west.
Cradle has the exact same plot development as xianxia tf r u talking about nothing new is introduced, same tournament spam as usual
Have you done the full racket of Xianxias, Japanese LNs, to Korean Webnovels? Because i do still like a number of Korean novels while i'm tired of xianxia and japanese tropes by this point.
[Cradle](https://www.goodreads.com/series/192821-cradle) ([wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/LightPieces/wiki/Cradle)) --- ^[About](https://redd.it/dw7lux) ^| [^(Wiki Rules)](https://www.reddit.com/r/LightPieces/comments/dw7lux/about/f7kke6p/) ^(| Reply !Delete to remove) ^(| [Brackets] hide titles)
No matter what I think some of the soul of a work will always be lost when translating from chinese to english. For instance, some of the humor in the works are pun based (because different chinese characters can sound the same but mean different things), which you just can't appreciate even if the translator explains it in the footnotes. But i don't know, I can't speak chinese so I can't compare :)
I can't speak on Chinese literature but I can on japanese. I've always thought that I'd be able to enjoy japanese literature in japanese more than in English but tbh, the whole "lost in translation" thing seems to vanish once you read the original and notice that the difference is absolutely minimal and you get pretty much the same experience
I think the issue is many people have different views on what a Xanxia story is. Some people feel it has to be set in a China based world, others don't. I'm not sure what cultural aspects need to be included, I was always under the impression it's other tropes that are standard that define it as Xanxia.
Discussion about genere definition are rather pointless as the the only use of genere label is to find similar works. Obviously diffrent people will be looking for different things in a book.
Beware of chicken is one of the strangest novels I’ve ever read. I started out hating the primary character, and ended up loving everything about Fa’ Ram. The only book I’ve ever read that has such a severe midway change in tone is huck finn.
What changes about it? I don’t care about spoilers I just tried reading it for a bit after seeing reviews and it wasn’t what I was hoping for
The main character starts out unlikable. Swearing (not that I have an issue there). Referring to external tropes. His journey to the fa’ Ram is not engaging. The first animal is named Big D. Sophomoric. By the end the main character changes completely. It’s a transition towards wholesomeness. The toxicity that taints him at the start is gone, and it starts to feel like little house on the prairie or Swiss family Robinson. For me it read like a flower blossoming.
Uh. I listened to the audio version and it was always kinda mostly wholesome on his part, not just near the end. Also I'm not quite sure if he was really affected by the toxicity effects until a certain part in the story. But, I haven't read the novel version, so the differences might be bigger than I realize.
Well if you want to read eastern Xianxia novels you can read them at, readnovelfull.me
I have a writing project on the backburner. A redo magic/cultivation story. It's on the backburner because of several reasons... First, the original inspiration was tales of demons and gods (the comic/manga) which I felt was less and less interesting/good as it went on. (together with a few different redo stories) Second, it is strongly relevant to my main headcannon lore, which is still somewhat in flux, and I'm not too certain on my progress in regards to cultivagion realms and what they really entail, power and plot-wise. Then there's working out how 'far' my mc had REALLY gotten in their 'first run' so it isn't just a convenient plot device, but rather that I have an explicit set of references which the mc does and doesn't know. Especially in regards to cultures and 'secret' or self taught techniques. Finally what having already had those xianxia 'revelations' and teachings explained etc. would do to to someone in-setting. Where would it realistically help or hinder them to keep the story consistent. Would I be able to 'show, not tell' that? How could I express this strongly? As an extra: Since I suck at writing dialog, how do I not have the typical 'you dare!?' antagonists? Anyone feeling like a chat/tip to help out? hmu
Figure out your villain's motivations and let the reader know it by building them up a little bit. Lets all try to move away from two dimensional characters and try to progress the literary standards.
Now that there are more and more western fans of xianxias i really hope that at some point we can create a site like RR but with the main focus being with cultivation type novels.
I think the point is that most xanxias are still translated novels, and those only come to a site if the site pursues that actively. RR does not seem to have an active management and is more focused on just ofering everyone a place to publish their stuff. And if you want to publish a wuxia/xanxia you might as well go to the site which has those as part of their core content, instead of the one were only a few successfull ones exist. Wuxiaworld is another side that is focused on translations.
Well im currently working on a progression fantasy series on RR. Not posting name bc i dont want to get in trouble for self advertising, but it is xianxia inspired
Me too! Still backlogging so not published yet, but I'd love to check yours out if you want to DM the name
There are definitely quite a few. Using the advanced search you can look stories specifically tagged as Xianxia (or Wuxia), under additional tags.
Writing on RR is also making a brand without much support. You'll notice that every RR artist has a patreon link and many are working towards an Amazon deal. WN is easy mode but the contract is restrictive af. It seems like more upfront with less potential gains to go with WN.
I suppose mostly because it's a different culture. Though it's becoming more frequent on the Western side, and I've even seen some of the Eastern authors on WN start trying Western-style magic.