Home
Creators
Search Recent Missing Random
Posts
Search DMs Popular Hash Lookup Tags Random
Importer
Import FAQ
Register Favorites Keys Review DMs Logout
Community
Telegram ThePornDude
Home Creators Posts Import Register Favorites Logout

Seeking feedback (Patreon)

Published:
2018-04-23 17:23:34
Imported:
2026-06

Content

What's your interpretation of the following line?

Puppy, to Wisteria:
"Well of course you're exhausted, you used up a lot of aura last night."

I'm essentially trying to figure out if I want to use the word "aura" or replace it with some other word and would be really keen to know what impressions you get :)

Thank you very much for any thoughts you can share <3

Comments

Mild Lee Interested

Maybe simply "energy" or "power" would work - with the context indicating magic. You burn energy through hard work, magical or physical, and using the same term normalises magic in the context of this world. "Well of course you're exhausted, you used up a lot of energy last night" sounds fine. We know she used it up practicing magic - either from context or because we saw her doing it in a previous panel. No special term is needed. Besides, leaving it ambiguous could be fun if we didn't see her using magic - leaving the reader (or the other characters?) wondering just what was she up to last night to use up so much energy...

Babel

I feel like simple, quantitative words, such as energy, are usually a more comfortable fit with readers when describing something depleting, because running out of energy is something most people naturally understand, either in terms of their physical or mental energy and their ability to do things, thus intuiting how it's depleted (thus becoming tired), or in terms of something measured, like electrical energy (or hunger, in a rough sense), which gives a similar intuition (becoming empty, or running out). "Aura" might not give the same image, as it may be seen as something qualitative. As Mild says, you might compare two people's aura, or someone's aura over time, and describing it with things like "dullness", either as a kind of visual, almost colour-like quality (loses its vibrancy perhaps), or as a shape-like quality (maybe something sharp or elastic has become dull and inert). Both of these work, and can reflect what the people of Aerial Magic see and know about the magic they use. Perhaps it's subjective to the user, and comes from their personal understanding, or maybe it's more universal, based on the actual nature of the magic or an ingrained culture. Usually, having distinct words for magic makes it seem special within the world's culture, the same way maths and science develops its own terminology, and are then only slowly integrated into normal speech. Thus it may seem to be something for an elite class or the educated. Inversely, using common words can give rise to the feeling that it's a totally natural part of the world, the same as getting tired from physical labour, and "belongs" to most people as a concept (even if it is beyond their means and cannot use it, they are still familiar with it).

walkingnorth
>>11798216

Thank you so much! I'd been very caught up in the idea that I wanted to use a unique-ish word, for ~aesthetic reasons~, but you make a very valid point about normalizing magic. I'll have to mull this over, I'm thinking 'energy' and 'essence' could both work quite well. Thanks again for all your thoughts, much appreciated!

walkingnorth
>>11831449

Thank you so much, this is a great help! Reading through this has given me heaps of food for thought, and I'm reassessing the sort of language I want the characters to use when talking about magic. Thanks again!