Writing Pokemon Mystery Dungeon - Born from Darkness (Chapter 1 is up...)

[Kaiserchu]

This is my first fiction, enjoy...
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Chapter 1 – Awakening

- Unknown -

“…Will he…?”

“…I see…”

“…Take him to…”

Those few words were all he could remember; the rest of his memory was blank. He couldn’t tell if those words referred to him, or were directed at him, though either way, he still had no other memories. He tried to bring himself round, and succeeded, though he quickly began to drift off again. He struggled to force himself awake, and even then, only two things he saw registered in his mind: that he was on a beach, and that the sky was bright orange. Seconds later, he fell into unconsciousness once more, the last thing he heard was the repeated memory of those words...

- Shedinja Guild -

“C’mon! You can do it! All you have to do is walk up to the gate, and ring the bell!” a Mawile with her jaw-like hair wrapped in bandages said as she stood before the Shedinja-shaped structure with her friend, a young Buneary with a bright pink bow tied to her small, fluffy tail.

The Buneary looked at the building, and set her gaze on the entrance. Where the large Shedinja’s chest should be, was a small opening, closed off by a gate made of oak twigs and Spinarak web string. Above the gate was a bronze bell, which was hung from a wooden sign that someone had painted on these words, ‘Ring me twice if you wish to enter’. This, surprisingly, didn’t make the simple task of walking up to the gate and ringing the bell any easier.

“Seriously Heart? You’re finding it that hard to ring a bell?!” the Mawile groaned, putting extra emphasis on select words.

“But Koto! I…I can’t just walk up there…” the Buneary, Heart, stammered, her uneasy gaze resting on her steel type friend. The two were there to enroll as apprentice explorers, unfortunately, Heart was too timid to attempt to gain entrance, and whenever Koto offered to go in her place, Heart would hurriedly tell her not to go, and that she wanted to go ring the bell.

Koto and Heart had been friends since as long as they could remember, and the two would always fantasize about fulfilling their dream of becoming legendary explorers. Unfortunately, there was a problem, and that was Heart’s notable lack of courage.

“…That’s it! I’ve had enough!” the Mawile shouted, grabbing Heart’s ears with her hand.

“We’re going to ring that bell! Right now!!” Koto dragged her Buneary friend to the gate, ignoring her protests. When they reached the wooden gate, Koto released her grip on Heart’s ears and pointed at the bell, glaring at her friend.

Heart didn’t need her friend to speak to know that she was sick of this, and inside, she was as well; shaking, the Buneary grabbed the string that hung from the inside of the bell, and shook it, making the bronze bell chime. The two friends waited, until loud thumping noises sounded from the other end of the gate. Before Koto even saw anyone on the other side, she spotted Heart making a run for it, wailing.

“…She’s such a coward…” Koto sighed, at this point, she wasn’t sure if she could keep doing this over and over again. The Mawile decided to confront her about what had just happened, and left in order to catch up with her.

- The Beach -

Heart came to a stop when she arrived at the beach. She didn’t know why she lacked the courage to enter the Shedinja Guild, and there seemed to be no reason why she couldn’t go in, she just simply couldn’t do it. The Buneary looked around, and her eyes focused on the bubbles floating in the air, they were illuminated by the sunset, and made them appear bright orange in color. Koto finally managed to catch up with her, and was clearly disappointed in the Buneary.

“Heart! I thought you promised that we would finally sign up as apprentices! Why did you run off like that?” Koto asked Heart, her hands on her hips.

“…I don’t know…I just…” Heart trailed off, her sad eyes watched the bubbles as they floated by. This wasn’t the first time she ran away, in fact, she had done this multiple times in the past week, each time she had been getting progressively closer to getting in, today being the closest she has ever got to entering the guild.

“If we’re ever going to join the Shedinja Guild, you need to work up the courage to stay after you ring the bell! You can’t just keep running off like that! Or we’ll never get in!” Koto gripped Heart’s shoulders with both her hands, before looking into her eyes.

“Why can’t you be braver?!” Heart flinched when Koto shouted at her, squinting as if she had been physically wounded, rather than shouted at. The Buneary freed herself from Koto’s grasp and turned away from her.

“I wish I could-“ Heart was about to tell Koto that she wanted to be braver when she spotted something on the sand. In silence, she slowly approached the object, only it became clear that it wasn’t an object, and Heart gasped the moment she realized what it was.

“Koto! There’s someone unconscious on the sand!” the Mawile’s eyes widened in shock, when she heard Heart calling her, and she dashed over to where she knelt over the body. The two friends looked down at the body of a male Riolu wearing a red scarf, his fur was damp because of the tide. Koto checked the Riolu’s pulse, and looked over at Heart.

“He’s still alive, just unconscious…” Heart exhaled a sigh of relief, but they still had the problem of finding him medical attention. Before one of them could suggest a course of action however, the Riolu suddenly gasped and sat up, shocking Heart and Koto. The two friends managed to calm the Riolu down, as he had been panting.

“Are…Are you okay?” Heart asked the Riolu, he looked at her after a few seconds of staring into space. The Riolu opened his mouth to speak, but struggled to say anything. He took a few more seconds to catch his breath, before he answered Heart’s question.

“No…I can’t remember…”
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...Tell me what you think...

Chapters

 

[Incinermyn]

Like I said when I left you a profile message, it doesn't seem like a bad start. Just there are a few issues I'd like to point out, though.

First off, could you get rid of some of the bolded parts and replace them with italics instead? It's actually against the rules to use them outside of chapter titles, and even though you've broken this chapter into smaller sections, it's something I still have to ask you to do. Likewise, I'd rather you use italics for those few spots of emphasis in the dialogue too since it's considered less distracting in the font.

Those few words were all he could remember; the rest of his memory was blank. He couldn’t tell if those words referred to him, or were directed at him, though either way, he still had no other memories. He tried to bring himself round, and succeeded, though he quickly began to drift off again; he struggled to force himself awake, and even then, only two things he saw registered in his mind: that he was on a beach, and that the sky was clear. Seconds later, he fell into unconsciousness once more, the last thing he heard was the repeated memory of those words...

Here the real concerns I've got are how you use semi-colons over regular periods. Really, I find it best just to try and avoid the semi-colon unless your making a direct combination of two immediately-related sentences and, even then, just when the second sentence starts with (or at least includes) the word "however" or "though." This is just typical in most writing anyways, but not a huge issue...just you may find things look better without a bunch of them, especially in the same paragraph or even occasionally throughout the chapter.

On a side-note, regular colons are really just reserved for sentences that include words like "as follows" or something preluding a list of sorts. In general fiction, though, it's sort of rare to see colons much if at all since they normally distract readers a bit. If you can, you might want to see if you can't rewrite the one sentence you have with a colon in it somehow (but again, it's not a major problem, just a suggestion).

“Seriously, Heart? You’re finding it that hard to ring a bell?!” the Mawile, Koto, groaned, putting extra emphasis on select words.

Commas are sort of tricky, especially if you're new to writing in general and not good with spotting when and when not to use them. In this case, it's just a matter of keeping in mind that you always use them to separate names of people/characters being talked to directly in dialogue (specifically, separating "Heart" from "seriously"), and that the opposite is true when you're actually describing the name of a specific character who is talking since you're actually revealing something important in the context (basically, the ones around "Koto" aren't needed because people need to know the Mawile's name at this point; if it were a future character coming up you were talking about, then it'd be okay, but you're not at this point so the commas aren't needed. Also, it's usually not a good idea to double-up on them right before a spot where you do need a comma like after "groaned"). After that, the only places it's necessary to use commas are while listing or adding a small comment about insignificant details as well as some special case scenarios, but I personally try not to overuse them because some people find them a bit distracting when you're writing fiction.

“C’mon! You can do it! All you have to do is walk up to the gate, and ring the bell!” a Mawile with her jaw-like hair wrapped in bandages was standing said as she stood in front of a large, Shedinja-shaped structure with her friend, a young Buneary with a bright pink bow tied to her small, fluffy tail.

That's just a small suggestion there, since the passage following the dialogue makes no sense as is without either changing the part into a new sentence or adding words describing how Koto said what she did like I showed in this excerpt.

After those notes, I'd kind of like to suggest building up the description of the characters and setting a bit more, if you think you can do that. To me, it seems skimpy, though most people here usually don't mind so long as you've made at least some references to pre-existing characters, objects, and what-not. I, on the other hand, find that developing good descriptive skills helps down the road (but, hey, you said it's your first fic, so don't feel pressured to do more than you feel you're capable of).

 

[Kaiserchu]

Thanks, I've fixed certain things you pointed out, and I'll use your notes when it comes to writing future chapters.