蘇りの魔王 – Read Me

About the Author

“I am a novelist (technically speaking). I write novels on 『小説家になろう[‘Become a Novelist!’ syosetu.com/]』. http://mypage.syosetu.com/233968/ I write for various genres. Alphapolis is currently publishing my novel, 『平兵士は過去を夢見る[A Common Soldier Dreams of the Past]』. I would be happy if you picked up a copy.”

[Note: I’ll probably be trying my hand at 平兵士は過去を夢見る, and probably getting a copy of volumes 1 and 2 once a few other things I want release. I don’t use Honto, so for me it’s cheaper to buy things in bulk. Perhaps volume 3 will be out by then. Anyway, here’s someone else’s guide to buying (a.k.a. supporting Oka)]

 

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On furigana, kanji and readings

How Japanese works is that for each word, you have a certain way of writing it. Usually this comprises a number of Chinese characters, each with a set of meanings. Because of this, occasionally you’ll come across a new compound, let’s say 白羽 for example. Though you can guess by the meaning of the individual characters that it means something like ‘white wings’ or ‘whtie feathers’, but without previous experience, you can’t say for sure what the word is. Because of that, they came up with furigana, which are little reading aids. You will sometimes see them as ruby text.

However, as we all know, light novel writers are mostly massive chu2s just like we are, and there is now a trend of ‘abusing’ this furigana system to give unnatural readings using furigana to a set of kanji characters. Occasionally they’re used to give extra meaning, or even double meanings. They’re also sometimes used when the author wants to use a word from another language, whilst making it easy for the Japanese reader to understand.

For example…

As you can see here, the furigana is ‘virgin child’, but the kanji is 穢れなき使徒[‘undirtied apostles’]. So it means both ‘virgin child’ and ‘undirtied apostles’. Or perhaps just ‘undirtied apostles’ if you feel the guy’s knowledge of English is dubious.

 

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On terminology format
Kanji{Reading}

e.g. ‘Rival{Friend}’ means that written as ‘rival’, but read as ‘friend’
e.g. ‘Sky Shaking Earth Thrust{Sky Piercer}’ means the kanji might say something like ‘天震地刺（スカイピアッサー）’ and is read ‘Sky Piercer’.

The first time it appears, I will definitely write both the meaning and readings, but thereafter I might write solely the readings. For example, say there’s a sentence that reads,

‘And so the man ate up the stalwart iron{orichalcum}, and fled. For he was of the ancient race{elves}.’

The meaning would be,

‘And so the man ate up the stalwart iron, and fled. For he was of the ancient race.‘

but reading it aloud, with your mouth, it would be,

‘And so the man ate up the orihalcum, and fled. For he was of the elven race.’

Thereafter, I will probably write only ‘orihalcum’ and ‘elven’.

 

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Shorthand formats

[]: TL note
[Note:]: TL comment
[※]: ‘Google it’

 

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Terminology thus far [Tentative]

Misc.
魔素 – magic essence [ether]
魔法 – magic
魔術 – magecraft

魔法使い – caster
魔術師 – magician
魔導師 – magus

Races
魔族 – demon race
[Note that the word ‘魔’ means both ‘demon’ and ‘magic’, so at the same time this term means ‘magic race’. Because of the way Japanese-adapted western fantasy has progressed, as well as the JRPGs that stemmed from the 80s Japanese tabletop games, all the way up until the newest Dragon Quest or whatever, the term 魔族(mazoku) at once provokes the imagery of demons in RPG in their little demon world and whatnot, but also the image of a race particularly adapt at magic.

Depending on the series/franchise, 魔族 can range from magic adept “human” races, all the way up to purple-skinned dudes with three heads andbull horns.]

人族（ヒューマン） – human race [human]
古族（エルフ） – ancient race [elf]
巨人族（タイタン） – giant race [titan]