Picked Up Martial World

Discussion in 'Novel Pickup Request' started by criticalmind, Jan 7, 2016.

  1. criticalmind

    criticalmind Enter Chunni Name Here

    Joined:
    Oct 20, 2015
    Messages:
    945
    Likes Received:
    656
    Reading List:
    Link
    Name: Martial World [武极天下]
    Raw Link: http://www.ranwen.org/files/article/17/17150/
    Why It Should Get Picked Up:
    It's by the same author as 'True Martial World', which is currently being translated by Gravity Translations. I've been trying to read MT'd version of this, and it is just as good. Puttty translated the first 3 chapters, but it's been inactive since October.
    Description :
    Lin Ming, a talented man for martial arts wanted to audition for Tian Yun Wu Fu with a girl named Lan Yunyue, she was his childhood friend since young and they both have a small crush on each other. But on the day of audition, Lan Yunyue did not come, which left Lin Ming in curiosity. He later found out that a guy who is rich and talented, named Zhu Yan helped Lan Yunyue.
    --------------------------------------------------------------------

    Okay so that isn't a complete description. Basically, the MC finds a magic cube that contains memories of some really huge experts and then uses those to do the usual xianxia stuff.

    See http://www.novelupdates.com/series/martial-world/ for the Novel Updates page.
     
  2. raven

    raven What to type?

    Joined:
    Dec 11, 2015
    Messages:
    878
    Likes Received:
    1,052
    Reading List:
    Link
    yep yep........+1
     
  3. Pluriscient

    Pluriscient Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 3, 2015
    Messages:
    210
    Likes Received:
    217
    Reading List:
    Link
    Oooh, new novel~~~ sounds good! +1
     
  4. Aure94100

    Aure94100 French Cultivator from the No-Time Sect

    Joined:
    Nov 14, 2015
    Messages:
    277
    Likes Received:
    106
    Reading List:
    Link
    Interesting but ... quite simple. Well, it's a classic xanxia. What's important is : is the writting good ?
     
  5. Dreken01

    Dreken01 Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Nov 15, 2015
    Messages:
    322
    Likes Received:
    161
    Reading List:
    Link
    I was hoping some would get on this.
    The first few chaps have been translated, so you can go check them out, but it has been stalled for a while. So currently hoping some lone will pick it up.

    You sir have received +1 Internets.... :eek:
     
  6. Cruelflix

    Cruelflix Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 3, 2015
    Messages:
    64
    Likes Received:
    20
    Reading List:
    Link
    I actually want to see what this novel is about, have not read the released chapters atm, but i kinda feel that it might have a spot in my reading list... hopefully someone can pick it up :)
     
  7. Razorace

    Razorace Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 12, 2015
    Messages:
    123
    Likes Received:
    67
    Reading List:
    Link
    I took the liberty of translating the prologue/introduction (from the raw index, the literal translation would be introduction - *magic* cube, but the magic+cube when used together in common context would actually point to the Rubix's Cube rather than a magical cube, but then again I don't think it was meant as a pun from the author's side), just to see what it's like and maybe get some feedback if yous want to see more/regarding translation quality etc.

    So without further ado, here is the chapter:
    Introduction - Magic Cube - 引子 魔方

    Dense gales of snow and artic winds scatter across the endless icy plains, countless shards of frost are whipped by the chilling winds, colliding in mid-air, chilling to the bone, as if trying to freeze ones’ soul.

    This is the Falling Snow domain of god’s territory, the domain has persistent snow fall, water droplets instantly freeze up.

    Above this barren field of ice, at some time, few dozen hail stones, as if suffering from some kind of binding, rotates together to combine, gradually forming a centrifuge; at the centre, a veil of light similar to mercury materializes, in the next moment, a women wearing thin, navy blue dress appears.

    The woman of prominent stature, with overflowing dark hair, is permeated with a pure, divine aura throughout her body, liken to a crystalline lotus in full bloom on the snowy plains; only her face is pale, a trail of blood could be seen hanging from the edge of her lips, ruining her original nonchalant and charming atmosphere.

    As the light-veil disappears, the woman omits but a mouthful of blood, her spirit increasingly ill.

    “Elder sister!”

    A crisp, female voice appears out of the air, a white ball of light flies out from the woman, forming the body of a young girl, “Sister are you okay?”

    “No problem.”

    The woman in navy blue dress waves her hands; already suffering from heavy injuries, forcibly breaking through space, covering great distances to another domain of god’s territory, only served to worsen her injuries further.

    “Where is this?” the woman in navy blue dress asks.

    The young girl takes out a thin jade tablet [1玉简], her concentration instils within, says: “Sister, we’ve arrived at Falling Snow domain.”

    “Falling Snow domain?” the blue dress woman’s balance of mind changes fleetingly, thereupon exhales a sigh: “God’s domain’s three thousand domains, I’ve traversed countless times, but never have I guessed that I would ultimately escape to Falling Snow domain, my original name is Mu Qian Xue [2慕芊雪], this is the Falling Snow domain, Falling snow*2 [see footnote], perhaps this is my place of fall……”

    “Elder sister, it won’t happen, we……” just as the young girl sought to continue, at that moment, a huge energy disturbance reverberates through empty space; the next moment, the space as if torn apart by a huge invisible hand, a man wearing black walks out, standing upright in mid-air.

    As the young girl sees this person, her complexion instantly undergoes a huge change, unable to continue her words from before.

    The black clothed man has a handsome and aloft appearance, only the pair of blood red pupils makes him seem somewhat savage, he sees Mu Qian Xue and lightly laughs: “Your highness holy maiden, we meet again.”

    Mu Qian Xue has a strong, cold complexion, even though she predicted that the other party would give chase, but she did not think it would be so fast.

    The man says: “Your highness holy maiden, I’m also disappointed in things progressing to this step, I couldn’t help but destroy the Qian Yu holy ground. Training till our level, there is nothing under heavens which could not be obtained, we pursue solely the extremities of power and eternal existence, how about giving me the divine crystal cube, you and me duo-train [3], fathom the cube’s secrets together, exist with heaven and earth (live forever), so?”

    Mu Qian Xue circulates the divine power within the body, replies in a cold tone: “No point in saying useless things, Tian Ming Zi, you can destroy Qian Yu holy ground, but you shall pay a severe price if you wish to kill me.”

    “That so? Then I can give it a shot.” The man referred to as Tian Ming Zi seems not to be bothered, flipping his right hand, a traditional pagoda appears within the palm of his hand, this is HuangHong divine treasure god sealing pagoda, can be used to seal gods and demons, and also can be used to contain tens of thousands of warriors, half a month ago, with the help of said item collected more than ten thousand of various powers’ masters to appear at Qian Yu holy land, destroying it.

    Tian Ming Zi tosses the pagoda into mid-air, along with eye piercing golden rays, ten thousand masters appear in Falling Snow domain, within moments the whole sky is covered densely by figures.

    Ten thousand people standing mid-air, observing the two isolated, helpless females on the icy plains, within their eyes are but a subdued coldness.

    Upon seeing such a scene, the edge of Mu Qian Xue’s lips curl into a sneer, this is the moment she has been waiting for, YouMing holy land, HunYuan holy land, GuLang palace, XueAo island……you collude to erase Qian Yu holy land, then today, I shall at the expense of my soul, bury you all along with me!

    Tian Ming Zi says: “Mu Qian Xue, I respect you, also admire your strength and otherworldly talent, but right now, suffering from heavy injury, as well as facing ten thousand god’s territory masters, you don’t have half a chance of victory, why not hand over the divine crystal cube, and I spare you and your (younger) sister’s life.”

    Mu Qian Xue does not acknowledge what she heard, from a sudden thought, a grey rectangular block covered full of black inscriptions of only one inch squared volume slowly emerges from her palm, this object is the divine crystal cube which caused the disturbance throughout the whole of god’s territory.

    Mu Qian Xue focuses all of her divine force into the divine crystal cube, even though the cube has only been in her possession for under a year, but she still managed to fathom some of the cube’s esoteric utility, perhaps this the crystallization of soul of a true god from legends of the past, it contains the horrific power to annihilate any soul, however with Mu Qian Xue’s power, is unable to control this power, even her own soul would be swallowed and sealed by the divine crystal cube.

    “YueEr [4], don’t resist.”

    “Sis?” [shorthand feels more natural here] The young girl does not know what Mu Qian Xue intends to do, but at that moment she was covered with a veil of light, it’s the light from breaking through space.

    Mu Qian Xue must first send away her younger sister, because as soon as the taboo power of the divine crystal cube activates, all the souls of the surrounding living will be swallowed and crushed, this is also one of the reasons why she couldn’t use this taboo power in QianYu holy land.

    “Huhu, thinking of sending away your sister? How can I let you succeed?” Tian Ming Zi clasps his hand to form a spell-seal, intending to freeze ten kilometre of the surrounding space, at that moment, his complexion changes ever so slightly, the divine crystal cube within Mu Qian Xue’s hands seems to be gathering a power which sends shivers to the very depth of his soul.

    This is…Tian Ming Zi’s thought lapses, the formation of spell-seal slows, he feels a crisis which threatens his life.

    The balancing force of heaven and earth suddenly because volatile, forming a centrifuge directly above the divine crystal cube.

    “As the soul for ignition, borrowing the true god’s power, souls be exterminated!”

    Mu Qian Xue clearly and coldly utters this line, subsequently her body dissolves into specks of star light, soul and consciousness completely dissolving into light, absorbed into the cube, seeing this scene, Tian Ming Zi’s complexion greatly changes, without any hesitation he opens the space, seeking to flee, but at that moment, the terrifying power above the cube exploded.

    Akin to a supernova, the space around shatters like thin papier-mâché, the ten thousand masters in the Falling Snow domain only just realised the approaching life and death crisis, the majority capable of traversing through space tries to flee into the nether, but it was already too late, the surrounding space was destroyed by the horrifying power, huge hurricanes sucks them in like paper confetti [it seems the original author has some fetish with paper, despite it not being the most fragile of objects...], and their bodies turn into dust after disappearing, souls were twisted into pieces by the (wind) storm, these soul fragments were sucked into the cube by the centrifuge.

    The large scale collapse of space has turned the corner where Falling Snow domain resides completely into dead territory, here resides the spatial storm which destroys everything. However, that divine crystal cube, after swallowing all the soul fragments, was also sucked into the spatial storm, drifting into the nether……

    ……


    Footnote:
    In general - I'm not too familiar with how people TL names in Xianxia and also maybe some of the combat side nouns/pronouns (since almost all of my reading centers around JP LN/WN and originally some historical/harem CN WNs or published CN novels of ages past, as well as the simple fact that I simply don't need to read English translated Chinese content since I can read Chinese...), therefore, please help me out a little here if you have any ideas in the standard nouns/pronouns or format they come in, in English.
    1. 玉简– the first character玉 translates as jade(stone), while the second character简 as a noun would refer to (most likely) the type of (bamboo) sticks used close to a form of means of messaging (letters) in ancient China. Therefore the rough idea is some thin piece of rectangular jade with a gradual incline at one end (think of a long trapezium).

    2. 慕芊雪– the last character of her name is snow, and the overall, the name vaguely translates (literally) to “to raise/collect – exuberant and overflowing/dense (typically foliage/plants and naturally growing greeneries) – snow”. Because the domain they are transported to has the meaning falling snow, it relates to how the character herself (with snow as part of her name) would (ultimately) fall there.

    3. Here the author uses双修, which to my knowledge has sexual connotations.

    4. 月儿– I’m not aware of how other Xianxia TLs do this, 月essentially means Moon in this case and 儿 is like a cute shorthand (equivalent to shortening used in nicknames), but literal translation has connotations of child/offspring. What I used in the passage is essentially the pinyin equivalent.

    I hope you enjoyed the chapter.

    Personally, I'm undecided as to whether continue translating this series, the three main reasons against being:
    1. It's not something I really enjoy reading.
    2. There are 2k+ chapters, it would most likely take me around ~3 years if I translated at the same quality, and I prefer to finish what I start.
    3. I really want to read some Japanese WN/LNs which has been dropped, and I'm somewhat proficient at MTLing (about grade-school level Japanese), so there is the option of becoming a MTLer... though since obviously my CN->EN translations would be of higher quality, I'd also kind of want to avoid that.

    Therefore, even though this is the wrong section, I would like some recommendations/suggestions for translation from Chinese, just to see if I like it enough, maybe motivate myself to translate properly instead of succumbing to MTLing Arifureta to the ending >_<
    I prefer something R-18, not too many historical references but preferably not xianxia and also no shoujo-esque city romance stories.

    Once again, thanks for reading.
     
    Last edited: Jan 14, 2016
  8. Ashkante

    Ashkante Active Member

    Joined:
    Oct 24, 2015
    Messages:
    8
    Likes Received:
    8
    Reading List:
    Link
    I would like to say that firstly the only way you wil ever complete a novel in translating it is if you really, really like it. So my advice is not to start any novel that you don't want to see the ending off as you will get bored of it quickly.
     
  9. Razorace

    Razorace Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 12, 2015
    Messages:
    123
    Likes Received:
    67
    Reading List:
    Link
    Yeah, I do feel that is the case, so I'm now trying to find something which interests me I guess. I want to read the series as I translate (since I don't know what happens here, I won't know whether I will like it or not). I tried this out also just to see if there are any issues with the change in style of translations that I usually do, published papers instead of web novels, and also how much I enjoy it (I guess?). Well it was better and faster than my initial estimates but still too slow for 2k chapters (doing around 1.5k words per 2 hours). Also might give incentive to some others to pick this up now that it's properly compiled from introduction to chapter 3.
     
  10. Slimikyi

    Slimikyi ^____^

    Joined:
    Nov 19, 2015
    Messages:
    795
    Likes Received:
    1,449
    Reading List:
    Link
    I wrote a review for like the first 150 chapters or so. The author is a slow author, not in a bad way. But he is rather detailed and goes on about many not-so-important things (at least in my eyes). In the True Martial World, he wrote a note about people criticizing him for dragging out the ending or the last bit of the novel. So, I don't know what to tell you. Don't expect an action pack or fast paced story is all I can say?

    If you somewhat enjoy this novel, I suggest just translating maybe 10 chapters or something and then proceed into something else you like. It's a longer teaser and hopefully long enough that someone will be able to see the goods points and think about picking it up.
     
  11. Cupcake Ninja

    Cupcake Ninja [Kind Sage][Lord Benevolence][ The Great Paragon]

    Joined:
    Nov 19, 2015
    Messages:
    5,991
    Likes Received:
    8,159
    Reading List:
    Link
    From that last sentence. . . Will there possibly be NTR?
     
  12. Razorace

    Razorace Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Dec 12, 2015
    Messages:
    123
    Likes Received:
    67
    Reading List:
    Link
    Okay so I kinda made a temporary wordpress.
    https://razorace.wordpress.com/
    Intro: https://razorace.wordpress.com/martial-world-toc/martial-world-introduction/
    Chapter 1: https://razorace.wordpress.com/martial-world-toc/martial-world-chapter-1/

    I skimmed through Bunny and Puttty's TL for the first three chapters and noticed there are quite a lot of inconsistency (which I also have perhaps), and issues with terminology and beyond so redid chapter 1.

    EDIT: Dropped and free for anyone to pick up, probably going to do something different soon...
     
    Last edited: Jan 14, 2016
  13. tegaraq

    tegaraq Member

    Joined:
    Nov 13, 2015
    Messages:
    24
    Likes Received:
    4
    Reading List:
    Link
    Pick it up please!! :)¢