If the maid girl wants to help clean, then I’m not opposed, but I am worried about the missile Mimi. It seems docile, but I’m still not sure about the danger it could pose. A sentient missile is weird enough, but that’s not the issue at hand.

The glare in the robot girl’s eyes makes me wince.

“W-what’s your name?”

“My name’s Ruukoto, creation of the brilliant Professor Okazaki!” She puffs her chest out with pride. “This is my friend Mimi!” she says as the missile floats above her hand, gazing at me with its lifeless, black eyes.

“Professor?” I point the light away from Ruukoto. “Does that sound familiar to you, Komano?”

The komainu scrunches her face and twitches her nose. “Oh yeah! Miss Reimu did something with her!” she says, staring intently at Ruukoto as the gears churn in her head. “It’s really close. I think—Oh! This girl is part of that ‘thing!’”

“What thing?” It’s cute watching her put so much effort into this, but again, she isn’t making much sense. I appreciate Komano’s help, but she doesn’t have to strain herself so hard.

“You know, a ‘thing.’” Her tail wags vigorously as she jumps up and down. “Uh, it’s… the incident. Right, it was an incident! There were brochures! A-and tourists! Miss Reimu got Ruukoto from that Professor person!”

[x] Try to calm them both down.

Getting some PC-98 here, eh.

[x] Try to calm them both down.

Why can't we all get aloooong?

[X] A stroll somewhere exotic. We could compare our philosophies and spells.

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[x] A stroll somewhere exotic. We could compare our philosophies and spells.

The party is tempting, but she wanted to enjoy her presence to the fullest no?

Also the idea of both philosophies finding common ground is very intriguing.

Next Thread: >>42837

[x] He apologized first to the girl.

Big OOF

[x] He apologized first to the girl.

https://www.touhou-project.com/shrine/res/42979.html
Link to next thread

[x] Surely she was overthinking. She pressed on.

possibly a bit too late but w/e

>>42641
I hadn't gotten far before I ended up falling asleep, so I'll accept it.

Thread 2 >>42643

hope to see you again sometime

>>41806
I'll miss you. Thanks for the good work.

asdasd

>>42124
Bumping because it deserves to be seen.

Most thoughts I could offer have already been conveyed elsewhere. All I'll say here is that I hope this gets going again because I enjoy reading it.

>>42124

If I was you facing the same writing impasse, I would have had Banki break up with Eggman, and then taken the story into a multi-perspective dating-sim/waifu war. Keeping Banki on the backburnrs in yandere stalker mode just to add some conflict and spice.

Hmm. Might as well amend that.

This Parade is now officially dispersed. If I had to pinpoint a culprit, it’d predictably be my person. I began writing this story without a real story to tell. The nebulous premise of “A man attempts to find out why his youkai drinking buddy suddenly refused to meet with him anymore” and the perspective switcheroo gimmick I’d counted on to carry it weren’t strong enough, losing even my own interest over time, and in my overconfidence, I failed to anticipate that. I fell, as it were, for the classic blunder.

Apologies to anyone who was still holding out hope. At the very least you and I got a Minamitsu scene out of the ordeal, which counts as a definite achievement in my book.

Is this the Coldsteel the Hedgehog crossover episode?

✱

>>/at/39637

✱

Next thread: >>41996

>>42244
Sorry for the lack of updates. Shortly after the last update, I got an exam, which was followed by an internship. Going to have another two exams lined up once I'm done with this internship. So I spent my time writing on Priest of Hakurei instead, to at least try and maintain a stable schedule.

As for advice. I'm always up for getting some advice, to help improve. SoL is my weakest topic, so I need as much help as I can get to write stories that will be engaging to read.

I feel like a big part of the appeal when it comes to slice of life is the characters. While plot and character goals are important as a driver for character interactions, when it comes down to it, it's more important to make those character dynamics and interactions enjoyable than it is to progress those goals. In regards to that, I feel like some of the more recent updates on the thread fell into a trap of treating characters as less "opportunities for characters to interact with one another" and more just "ways for the protagonist to complete his goal" - the story focused less on the characters themselves, instead placing focus on what they ultimately accomplished, largely breezing through the things they did to get there. I think the biggest issue you tend to struggle with is how you seem to jump from one encounter to the next, without covering any of the space in between or giving characters a chance to breathe and bounce off one another without any particular intent. You can get away with this style of storytelling more easily in a story like Priest of Hakurei, where the main appeal is the sense of action and the fight scenes, but imo Slice of Life generally aims to accomplish a much slower sense of pacing.

That said, I also feel like you're selling yourself short a bit! A number of updates (such as the drinking party starting at >>41324) do a decent job of just letting characters bounce off one another, giving the reader a better sense of them as people.

If you'd like an example of Slice-of-Life done well (imo at least), I'd point you towards A Fairy's Tale (starting at sdm/28203); it's the story that introduced me to THP in the first place, and while it definitely has quite a bit of plot, it also generally does a great job of building and developing its characters through simple interaction. The story has done an amazing job of sticking with me over the years, and (actual spoilers) still has me upset about Monica's roommates.

Sorry it took so long for me to reply, by the way. Life kinda happened to me, and I was o

>>42264
To be fair, I was getting burned out on the last few updates of the contest, and they were far from the best I could have done. I'll concede that.

I understand that SoL is a more character driven type of narrative. I'll argue that there are only few successful stories that aren't character driven, because it's much harder to get readers invested in a world than characters. (Which kinda sucks, cause I would love to show off the Gensokyo I've been building these last few years, but rather than dumping all that info in exposition, it's better to only explain the small fragment that's currently needed to know. From there, it's just about staying consistent and slowly revealing information as it's needed. Might do a massive info dumb in a thread of it's own, if I get around to compiling it in a way where it looks like it's written by Akyuu.)

>That said, I also feel like you're selling yourself short a bit!
Right. See, while I think I can make interesting characters, I'm less confident in being able to use them to their full potential. A lot of details are hammered out either by applying the logic of my verse to them and seeing how they would thrive in the world, other details are hammered out by looking into details and asking as many questions as possible.
An example of this would be Keine and Mokou. In my verse, youkai are the natural predators of humanity, (summarized) meaning that there are very few youkai that have any good grace with the humans. Instead of just applying that fact to Keine, I tried applying it to her as a child and explored that idea, which lead to her being abandoned by the village, for one reason or another, and being taking in and raised by Mokou, giving the two of them a relationship I haven't seen in the fandom before. I pitched it to my proofer/editor and we fleshed it out in more detail. In my opinion, this little bit of backstory will add a lot to both their characters and their relationship, but I doubt I can make full use of it without shoe

[X] To spar.
-[X] Loser has to sleep at the opposite abode.

[X] To spar.
-[X] Loser has to sleep at the opposite abode.

Next Thread: >>41628

[X] walk toward her, seeking to reconcile.
--- [X] Reassuring.

[x] walk toward her, seeking to reconcile.
--- [x] Reassuring.

[X] walk toward her, seeking to reconcile.
--- [X] Reassuring.

“—Hitomi,” I say, reaching toward her even when I’m so far out, “you... Listen, I...”

Nothing makes sense in my head. Hitomi doesn’t look at me, even when I’m close to her. I keep my hand raised, thinking about what I could do to make her feel comforted.

... Well—

“The world is bigger than this.”

Her ear perks up.

“Hitomi, don’t think that... some stupid, thoughtless brats make up the whole thing. Don’t think they even make up the whole Village. Listen... I may be a youkai, but I didn’t decide to stay with you because of how you look. I stayed with a human child because I found her... cute. As a person she was cute... and kind-hearted, and I just...”