Questions, comments, discussions, anything you guys want to talk about--that's what this page is for. Due to the format of the story, comments tend to get spread all over the place, and I'm sure that makes it a little more difficult for you guys to have conversations with one another. So here you go.
Please don't post typo corrections here, though. It's a lot easier for me to see the typo you're talking about if you post it in the comments of the page that it's on.
And of course, new readers beware. Here be spoilers. Um. Probably.
A dark serial novel. Set in a modern fantasy world called Eleg. Mature language. Updates every night at midnight PST by ~400 words.
I'd like to thank everyone who has contributed to TZK's TVTropes page, particularly Ankou and Gitaxias. It's really awesome seeing folks build onto it. :)
ReplyDeleteI'm wondering about the age of Hector. Shouldn't he be close to his 17th birthday now? Assuming there are 12 months per year in Eleg as on Earth. In one of the recent chapters Garovel told Hector that it had been 6 almost 7 months since the start of the adventure. After that it have been one or two months of exploring and restoring Warrenhold. So I feel that Hector should celebrate his birth soon.
ReplyDeleteThey actually haven't been at Warrenhold that long. They've only spent a few weeks there so far. It just seems longer because of all the stuff happening elsewhere. But yes, Hector's birthday will be coming up soon.
ReplyDeleteIf a servent stops the aging can he start again
ReplyDeleteYep. They can stop and start all they like. They just can't reverse the aging process in order to make an old person young again.
ReplyDelete***Possible Spoilers?**
ReplyDeleteI know you mentioned that Hector's substance might not be Iron...Just throwing out a random guess--could it be Carbon? It could technically fit with many things in the story, such as the queen's need for money (he could make diamonds). Also carbon can conduct electricity and can be affected by electromagnetism if there are impurities in it, which is highly likely at his level. It's also extremely versatile, which would be an excellent choice for the main character...
So when are you going to get on letting us know what his element is? I'm guessing that a good opportunity to bring it up might be to ask the scholar Haqq...
Hey i have a few points that i wanna say to you.
ReplyDeletefirst a big thanks and applaus to you sir i am really thrilled for the story readed it in less then 8 hours ( shame that it isn't that far yet)
second point ( possible spoiler is Lynn going to become a servant to in the future to because that would be really cool :P)
and sorry for my langeuge i am not that good at using English
and agian thanks for you hard work.
Thanks, I'm glad you've enjoyed it so far.
ReplyDeleteAlso, 8 hours is crazy fast. You read the whole thing that quickly? Or do you mean only the first ebook?
And haha. Can't tell ya that. :)
i mean the whole thing so yea i am pretty addicted to it now and i am also thinking off giving donations ( sadly i am still in highshool so i need the most can't give 50 euro's but well i will try to squeesh out some bucks at least 5-10)
ReplyDeletebut you haven't answered my question about lynn :P i am just curius about it you know.
but reading it in 8 hours is a mean that it is a really really good novel.
so agian thanks
although i haven't read till the current chapter(still about 20-30 page left).
ReplyDeletebut my theory is
**Possible Spoiler**
hector might possibly be a double materialization element (or more), like the guy who use water jet(drill?) ability.
since hector and garovel only think of the possibility of iron element, hector might use his element(s) as one element.
well either that or some imaginary metallic element exclusive to Eleg.
oh and my thanks to the author for the really good reading material :)
and some resentment to the addicting flavor.. ;)
I think you nailed it.... Carbon and Diamond are both made of the same thing, and carbon is really weak which would explain why everyone has such an easy time bashing through it all the time. It's pretty much the only element on the table of elements that comes with a note mentioning its relation to diamond.
ReplyDeleteMy only question is, why hasn't anyone put it together yet as carbon should rub off on things really easily and I think it would have a different texture than iron.
Well, just finished slowly reading my way through the entire first 8 oaths (slow compared to some) and wanted to offer my thoughts.
ReplyDeleteThe Zombie Knight's good and maybe even great more recently, but it's not fantastic. I'm bad at explaining what I mean with written words but I'll give it a shot.
The daily updates thing of at least a few hundred words thing? It seems to be both the greatest strength and greatest weakness of the story itself. We (the readers) get regular updates and it keeps you on your toes because there are few better motivators than habit & routine, HOWEVER that being said I'm rather suspecting it's also hurting the story as a whole thanks to the tunnel vision it gives you as a side effect. Normally with a web novel like this or similar there's perhaps a few thousands words for a single update instead of a few hundred for one and in those few thousand words they tend to be rich and detailed not just about whatever the main focal point at that time is but also the things around them thanks to them doing full chapters in one go rather than bite-sized chunks.
TZK doesn't really have that, you generally get a few hundred words of directly relevant action and then it stops until the next page then starts and stops etc, sacrificing the fluff and little details somewhat in the process. For the first 600 pages it was fairly bad in particular, the details and explanations of reapers & all things directly relevant to them was great don't get me wrong, but if you were to remove them from the world then you'd be left with air trams (page 15) and an otherwise almost completely unremarkable country with monarchy and plenty of crashed motorcycles - those being almost the only two things of any noteworthiness at all with reapers out of the picture.
It's gotten better in the last 200 pages, thanks both to the word limit increasing so you're starting to write more about the world around the characters instead of just what they're doing at the time and also thanks to the fact that it's been more than five minutes since Hector / somebody was thrown into mortal combat again.
But yeah, what I'm trying to get at is please don't forget to flesh out the world & all things not directly reaper related. Those are great and all but I'd hope there's more to TZK than just that, even if it means a page or two every now and again is more details & fluff than it is anything else (and I'm not talking about witty servant / reaper banter here, though that's enjoyable).
ESPECIALLY in regards to giving characters personality and letting us get to know them better. When you kill off a character I rarely felt anything strongly over it because I hardly knew them from the last 50 pages or so if that - give us their thoughts, their feelings, let us laugh and cry together over hundreds of pages, make us come to love them as much as we love Hector.
THEN you kill them off in cold blood and tear our hearts out in the process.
i thought that the element was decided when they awaken their ability, meaning you either get 1 element or more.
ReplyDeletealthough carbon is a good element, i think making diamonds is just cheating..
i can just think of a lot of use for it. the first thing on my mind is how durable it is as an armor. second, since diamond has no color or 'clear' i thought of using it as a mirror or glass just to make a mirage of himself. i think its extremely effective when combined with soul strengthening(for fooling the reaper's 'sense' if it's possible) and his maze. not mentioning the money problem.
Speculation on hyper states: The reason Harper recovered from his was the integration aspect, which is centred on reversibility. Mutation, however, is permanent. So, a hyper-state that uses the method of mutation might induce permanent changes. Because mutation is so difficult to learn, a servant who experiences it for the first time in a hyper-state is going to do irreparable harm to themselves nine times out of ten. However, a mutation user who reaches hyper-state capability can give themselves permanent tricks based on different powersets, rooted in their biology.
ReplyDeleteUnless 8+ years is enough time for his word limit to increase to 3000 instead of 400, I fail to see the point of your comment.
ReplyDeleteVery thoughtful of you Mr. Frost! This is a nice setting to banter and probably pointing metaphorical knife at each other throat, beware my friend, for I'm a swashbuckler and I don't even know what it means, so what?
ReplyDeleteAnd congratulation for your progressive popularity on Topwebfiction, you earned it
It has nothing to do with my word limit or any tunnel vision therefrom. It's simply my writing style. I like concise prose and a briskly-paced plot. The reason you've noticed a change in the more recent arcs isn't due to the word limit increasing (i'd been increasing it since page 150, by the way), but rather just because the story itself is changing. The plot and narrative and setting are all expanding. You're getting more backstory because it is more relevant now, not because I've changed the word limit.
ReplyDeleteThis was always the plan. Start small, clean, and precise. Then slowly expand into the the big, messy world. This is a serial novel. I'm playing the long game here. I have been since the beginning.
Also, you seem to be under the assumption that my goal is to make you fall in love with characters so that I can kill them off and make you sad. That isn't my goal. This isn't The Walking Dead or A Song of Ice and Fire or whatever other example. But that's not to say I'm trying to avoid doing that, either. For the most part, characters in TZK die because they need to die in order for the story to make sense and progress in a meaningful way. If someone's death does make you sad, then well, that's just how it is. But do keep in mind that when a character dies, it's not necessarily because of how you feel/don't feel about them.
Amplify, you're making a common mistake for situations like this, where you identify a problem, then, instead of making the problem clear, you assume that you know the root cause and focus on that. I think, when you said that Frost needs to increase his word count, you were assuming that the best way to flesh out the setting, deepen the characters, and expand the world is to crank up the words opera update. While these are real problems - any complaint the reader has is a problem, though it's up to the author whether or not to adjust for it - by making your comment about the solution you want, you lose sight of them.
ReplyDeleteIn short, it's the author's job to juggle everyone's nitpicks and preferences. Imagine that you're hiring an engineer. You don"t tell them how to build something. You tell them what you want it to do.
I have a question Frost, you released two chapters on August 17, one of them labelled a donation chapter, and 2 chapters on August 15, one of those also labelled a donation chapter, but no chapters on august 16? Isn't there a 1 chapter a day thing?
ReplyDeleteLike I said I'm not good at explaining myself in written word, I'd have to discuss it face to face to properly explain myself.
ReplyDeleteForget I said anything I guess, I'm not going to bother trying again.
Yeah, there were supposed to be three donation pages on the 16th, but I missed 'em. I explained why in the comments of the first page on the 17th. I also explained that all the donation pages that I didn't get to last week will be added on soon.
ReplyDeleteToday being 21st, I should be able to get out two pages today (one normal + one donation bonus). Hopefully three pages, but we'll see.
Here's a trick for just that. Write several pages ahead of time and hold onto them for rainy days. In fact, if you do that, then you can release a page at the same time every day so people will know when they need to refresh your website.
ReplyDeleteHaha, yes, I am well aware of that "trick." I go through periods of having a backlog and not having a backlog. It's not quite as simple as you're implying it is, but I appreciate the thought.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with that, I've found (letting myself do lots of writing at once then be a little lazier afterwards) is that, if you get writers' block, then you have an excuse: I don't need to write, I have a backlog. And then, that backlog runs out and you need to write. Unfortunately, breaking through writers' block enough that you don't hate every word you type can be rather time-consuming, and by delaying that process, you have a net loss in productivity. More than that, by viewing your writing as something that you can do in bursts, then let lay fallow, it loses momentum. As you've said before, the daily quota is more a way to make you write. In my opinion, moving it in your viewpoint from a daily exercise to a product you can stockpile and release (whether from sense of obligation to your readers or otherwise) changes the way you use, exercise, and release it. Not necessarily for better or for worse, of course. Just different.
ReplyDeleteThat's my two cents, anyway. The way you structure tZK walks a fine line between a serially-released product and a living, work-in-progress project, which I imagine takes a lot more work than it looks like.
Are you the author ? Pls never stop writing this.
ReplyDeleteHmm. Never, huh? Am I allowed to stop writing once I'm dead? Because I suspect I'll start feeling super lazy at that point.
ReplyDeleteMr. Frost, we will find you a reaper. Don't you worry. Which brings up the point of, how many servants are there that got brought back after dying of old age?
ReplyDeletei assume none since if you died of old age if your brought back u would just die again since your body already died of natural cause and even if he doesn't die he wouldn't be as effective since he would lack mobility and strength compare to other servents
ReplyDeletenot sure if you know of it, but i think you might be interested in reddit.com/r/worldbuilding
ReplyDeleteHi I just want to say that this story is awesome, keep up with the great work! I'd just like to note that the font/background of the online version are somewhat disorienting/distracting. However, that did convince me to buy the amazon version, so if that was your evil plan it's working :P.
ReplyDeleteHaha, I appreciate the purchase, but that wasn't my evil plan. My evil plan was to build a secret society of pirates in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. I ended up writing a web serial instead. Not sure how that happened.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I think I've seen that place before. 's neat, though not really for me. Or maybe it's just Reddit in general that's tough for me to get into. I probably should spend more time there; it's a pretty decent place for networking in a very organic fashion. But for some reason, I have a lot of difficulty paying attention to stuff on Reddit.
ReplyDeleteBut that's more information than you probably cared for. Oh well.
mister george M.Frost please tell me that you will update the next chapter i am almost dying to know if he will get that battle armor!!! and secondly thanks so much for this amazing story. And if i ever become a miljonair i will donate at least 100000 dollars, punds euro's whatever you want ! so you will have to post so many chapters here!
ReplyDeleteA big fan!
I'm workin' on it. <3
ReplyDeleteGood. very good. i am not going to sleep until i get that chapter :P or i will spam this coment section full xD ( evil laugh)
ReplyDeleteHey mister Frost i was wondering when you are going to do a bonus week because the story is unfolding so nicely awesome that he gets a shield now!.
ReplyDeletebtw i was just wondering and not demaning in any means.
and thanks so much for the last 3 chapters!
Soon. I don't have a specific date for you, but I'm working on it. I know you guys want more content. :)
ReplyDeletedid you know that the advertising on your page is advertising your page? I suggest making a stink at whoever did that, kinda pointless to advertise your work with your work you know?
ReplyDeleteOh, don't worry. It's just a placeholder image for when no one else has placed a bid. It's merely replacing he default big blank box that would normally appear. I'm not actually spending any money advertising on my own site.
ReplyDeleteGenerally, ads that use Flash will have a back up image to show people that have Flash disabled.
ReplyDeleteI've never seen those images. Usually it's just gray with a little complaint in the middle about disabled Flash. My real question, though, is if they can tell I'm not seeing it and withhold the eyeball money from the site, like with adblockers.
ReplyDeleteNot sure about that, myself. I imagine it wouldn't count if it didn't display, but whatever. It's not a big deal. If you've been noticing any weirdness with the ads on this site lately, it's because I've been tinkering around with them. However, if you start frequently seeing obnoxious ads, then please let me know.
ReplyDeleteCan't recall any here, but a lot of the other comics I read do have Flash ads.
ReplyDeleteGeorge/Mr. Frost.
ReplyDeleteThank you for taking the time to share the journey you have created with the two books I have read. It was refreshing and the characters you created really made the storyline believable and rich with emotional depth. I am looking forward to the next book and Hope you continue to add to this story as time permits. I also look forward to any other stories you might have or want to share with us in the near future.
You are most welcome. I'm glad you've enjoyed the story so far, and I will certainly keep writing it. :)
ReplyDeleteAdded a Quotes page to the TV Tropes entry.
ReplyDeleteOooh. Sweet. :)
ReplyDeleteAnd I see you've doing a lot of cross-linking to other pages, as well. Thank you very much for that, especially. Really helps the story get more exposure on that site.
Hey Frost, you know how ads can tell if you have ad blockers? Can Flash-based ones also tell of you have Flash disabled? I don't have a blocker, but I always keep Flash set to ask permission because ads that use it are intrusive and chew up bandwidth.
ReplyDeleteI'm gonna laugh hard if Lynn confesses to Hector and he actually panics so hard he gets a heart attack. Good times for Garovel.
ReplyDeleteIsn't the second element something you gain after a long time?
ReplyDeletecarbon makes sense because diamond is just a really advanced version of carbon.
The story has had him building up his talent with materialization rather than anything else, forcing him to use that and only that. The author is doing that because to make diamond he probably has to have a ridiculous ability in materialization first.
This could also be used to solve the queen's money problems. Hector can destroy anything he creates, but who says he has to. Just make a tonne of diamonds for the queen and she pays off her debts.
I'm guessing he's a bielemental, forming some alloy or another. My best guesses right now are steel (in various poorly-formed incarnations), tungsten carbide(about double the density of iron, but much stiffer, and comes as a gray powder pre-compression), or invar(iron-nickel alloy, highly resistant to deformation by heat).
ReplyDeleteHe is in the beginning stages of his novel still got 8+ years to go he has only done 1 so about 10%. Give him time
ReplyDeleteIts kind of funny, I'm Gitaxias on TVTropes, and I don't actually remember adding much to the TZK page. Of course, I have a memory span that suggests that at least one of my great grandparents was a goldfish or ferret, so that doesn't mean I didn't. You're welcome anyway, and keep up the good work.
ReplyDeleteA few quick questions about perception of souls:
ReplyDeleteWhy do servants see reapers as so big, when Cisco has demonstrated that one fits comfortably into a closed hand without being crushed?
How do reapers see other reapers?
What does it feel like to ferry a soul?
Are souls conscious as they wait and are then ferried?
I don't think Cisco was holding a whole reaper in his hand. For instance, I could grab you by the arm and drag you around, but you're still human-sized.
ReplyDeleteI have a theory!!!! Shouldn't be too many spoilers, but just in case, *Spoilers*.
ReplyDeleteSo, I think that Sermong(is that the proper spelling) is either an alteration or materialization user. He's really powerful, so either he naturally has a strong ability, or found a loop hole to develop one. This leads me to the cross roads, either he's an alteration or materialization user.
If he's alteration, I definitely think he uses strong nuclear magnetic force, as he could disassemble any attack that uses atoms thrown at him, and if you take liberties with the properties of the force, he could use any element so long as it's around him. Only the alteration class abilities would be of any harm to him, rendering him the strongest.
If he's materialization, then a second theory of mine has to play in. I think he could be in a permanent state of pan rozum, allowing him to use the other abilities. We have yet to see how far it can really go, but it could be possible for him to learn new elements through transfiguration. This theory operates under the presumption that materialization users power is derived from a force that can control atoms and what they are, allowing that user to possibly learn new elements given enough time.
But thats just a theory, an amazingly awesome web series theory.
You should put somewhere the ranks in Vangaurd from foot soldier to Supreme Leader (Sermung).
ReplyDeleteI was wondering, we know animals have souls in Eleg, but do reapers have to ferry them across the void as well and\or can they take them on as servants or are they just weaker in some fashion or just generally different?
ReplyDeleteWell.. he's called crystal titan.. so i presumed he's either transfiguration or materiallization.. And it has to be carbon isn't it.. carbon can literally be almost anything..
ReplyDeleteIt seems like most of the later chapters have been ignoring hector. I mean i love the story so far its just that the main character's appearances seem to be few and far between.
ReplyDeleteNot sure exactly where you are but the current arc is a lot bigger than just Hector. Don't worry though, I fully expect Hector to find his way into the middle of everything. Remember, he and Garovel have the distinct inability to mind their own business lol
ReplyDeleteI get that there more people in the story other than Hector, but i feel like there's just too many POV changes.
ReplyDeleteThat's...kind of impossible with how the story opened up...
ReplyDeleteThere will be times when Hector falls out of focus for a little while. The story isn't only about him, and I feel it's more believable/realistic/interesting this way, rather than him just being the center of attention all the time.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, a lot of the story IS about Hector. Or in other words, even when he's not around or not playing the largest role in a given arc, it's really just a matter of time until that changes.
Ever considered having a Patreon?
ReplyDeletewhenn is new chapter
ReplyDeleteGeneral Information
ReplyDeleteI currently update the story at least once a day by ~400 words. I've chosen to do this not because I expect readers to actually read each new piece as it is posted, but because it helps me keep a good writing pace. Additionally, I will put out extra pages whenever someone is kind enough to make a donation (see the "Donate" page for exact details on that), and sometimes for holidays as well.
I agree with the previous comments. I actually just
ReplyDeletesummarize/stream the parts that is not immediately effective to Hector. The
current arc with the sand/rain is personally really dull. I am more interested
in Hectors life. The title is 'Zombie Knight' and the synopsis is about Hector.
Meeh...
I actually really like the font and background. Looks to be that recently a lot of people like me prefer dark backgrounds when reading on computer screens or at night because it places less strain on the eyes. To each his own, right?
ReplyDeleteI am starting to catch up to this serial. I a m currently in the 8th
ReplyDeleteoath (please, no spoilers up to the 7th, folks).
Anyway, I've noticed you haven't been updating for a while and not as
regularly as before. Is there something wrong? Are you feeling
demotivated or are you busy with real life?
I'll be honest, half the fun of reading this fiction is reading the Author's comments and responses. I've laughed so hard.
ReplyDeleteYour work is awesome! I can't stop reading it! Gotta buy all the e-books^^
ReplyDeleteHi, first of all I would like to express my profound respect for your work and the fact that you were and still are providing it for free to all people.
ReplyDeleteI stumbled upon this story on a forum discussion and have been since hooked to the originality of the plot, Unfortunately I stopped reading last december because I simply lacked the time, but I remarked as some others that you have been idle this year compared to previous ones, what happened ?
Anyway, I just saw the donation link, I'm donating to my top writters on 'patreon.com', so if you could make an account, It would make managing the donations easier for me and some others I imagine.
Thanks.