i just want a cultivation story that explores theme rather than powering up

I'll probably write my own when I get a new laptop but as it is we have nothing that explores cultivation worlds from anything but the future supreme being, I just want to see a short story from the pov of a peasant or something like that, how they act and behave in a world where a random guy could destroy them with a finger flick.

in fact we only get semi-decent character interactions in slice of life's, even then the mc is either OPP or has some cheat.

 

just because you read shitty novels doesn't mean every novel out there is bad
just read one of those :
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/31837/everybody-here-is-a-cultivation-idiot
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/38155/fighting-to-be-kind-in-a-cultivation-world
https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/28578/unfathomable-senior
https://www.novelupdates.com/series/cultivate-your-sister/ + mtl
bl warning : https://www.novelupdates.com/series/devil-venerable-also-wants-to-know/
gl warning : https://www.novelupdates.com/series/ah-senior-brother-is-actually-a-sister/
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the reason most chinese novels start good before they turn extremely bad or they turn into just collecting harem/-reverse harem- members -whether the MC is a male or female- is because chinese people enjoy this type (have bad taste in novels , they don't care much about the plot as much about how many members is there in each MC's harem) no offense man

 

oh that sounds really interresting !!!!!!
please tell me if you ever write one , i wanna read it

 

My advice about this, if there is a story you want to read, but it doesn't exist, write it yourself!! Sounds like you are already on that though~

 

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how about adding a misunderstanding/misunderstandings + comedic undertone while writing your novel
it would be quite hard but it should help popularize your work
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and you need to understand that most mortals would bow down when they meet immortals , as a matter of fact in ancient china people worshiped a "race" known as xian https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xian_(Taoism)
-immortals- and according to the chinese legends mortals would kowtow instinctively when they meet xian -immortals-
Immortals/sects don't interfere in the mortal world, otherwise they will face calamity
-take Heaven Official’s Blessing for example-
and must not allow mortals to know about the methods of cultivation as a basic rule
if your sect's cultivation method became known to even farmers then your sect is about to fall to ruin , since anyone can analyse your cultivation and find it's weak points

 

How about Way of Heaven? It's the contrary of a peasant point of view, it is the dao of Heaven's point if view

 

You'd be way better off reading proper wuxia instead of xianxia for this kind of thing. Mind you, wuxia isn't really about this kind of thing either because it's so much more about social engagement. However, those stories are almost never about how much power the protagonist acquires either.

 

Looool okay someone loves to generalize without reason

 

how many good novels with great potential ended up becoming harem collecting novels and totally ignored the plot ?
1.https://www.novelupdates.com/series/devils-son-in-law/
2.https://www.novelupdates.com/series/bringing-the-farm-to-live-in-another-world/
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How does this say anything about everyone in China when it's just a few novels from mostly the same genres?

 

all I'm saying it's matter of market and chinese consumers that would pay money to unlock novel chapters don't care about the plot as much as they care about the harem members of the novel .

 

If you look at JJWXC, you have to pay to read pretty much every novel lol. It's not NU where most translations are free. Of course there are some people (obviously not all "Chinese people" lol) who'd "pay to read it", as you put it. Just like how there's literally thousands of people on NU who read/enjoy the translations of those noevls so much.

Your original statement was just plain narrow-minded.

 

I'm thinking either low level cultivator guard or some kind of maid/aid that way it opens up interactions with mortals and cultivators,dunnoif ill add comedy or go straight for the depressing aspects.

thanks for the shout out

 

Hm... I understand what you're looking for, but the genre is literally all about powering up. It's like saying you want a BL novel that explores gay culture without a relationship between men in it.

And if the main character isn't strong enough, he can't really explore the world. So if he doesn't cultivate and become stronger, he needs to be strong from the beginning.

I recommend instead of a series about one character, a series of short stories about different characters in the same world. There's a "protagonist" who is cultivating and becoming the strongest, there's a sect leader who's old and given up on being stronger so he's just trying to protect his sect from the waves of the protagonist, a low-level city guard trying to make ends meet without offending a powerful cultivator on accident, etc. Write a slice of life about the side characters and how each of them is affected by the "hero's journey" instead of writing about the protagonist himself.

 

This is why I say that wuxia is a good alternative. Despite what some people may think, this genre isn't about powers or powering up. Instead, it's a social genre about how people relate to one another and to organizations given the mores of the jianghu society.

 

Specifically, once an author signs a contract with a publisher they lose the rights to decide how their story will progress, and their editors cater to the audience that pays.

 

Uh, that's not how editorial control works. Editors and publishers will give ideas to the writer, but the writer is still the one who chooses whether to implement them and how to do so.

 

Chinese publishers have scary bad contracts and will pull the original author off a profitable title if the editor's instructions aren't followed.

 

That happens with every publishing contract unless the writer is editor proof. Writing is supposed to be a collaborative affair.

 

any recommendations?