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They are because of Fuwanovel. DOES NO ONE READ THE DAMN MOTTO

The best villains are the ones that clearly aren't villains at all

One Thousand Lies has been released officially today on Steam, please check it out: http://store.steampowered.com/app/463390/ It's free as always so download it even if you only wanna complete that Steam pokedex For those that have already played it, I would appreciate if you could add your own reviews to the page. Feel free to be sincere with those review, after all for me the most important thing is for you to be truthful... (/Claire off)

[GxB] [Suspense, Romance, Friendship] Mature content Full Game released: https://letigame.itch.io/up-until-the-end Story This was supposed to be an ordinary day, in an ordinary life. But it isn't. You were in the town library, reading a good book when,,,,You don't really remember. You know you passed out. When you wake up, you are surrounded by flames! Will you get out of danger? Will you create bonds with your companions? And maybe, will you find love on the way? Characters Some screens Features You incarn the namable protagonist. There is no sprite for her, since I wanted the player to identify to the character. - ~ 105 000 words- One romanceable character- Multiple endings- Original Art - Free ( Pay what you want ) The demo is approximately 20-30 minutes reading. About This is a game entirely made by myself and tt is the first visual novel I'm making, but I hope you'll enjoy playing it ! I don't work very fast because of my job so thank you for your patience Full Game released : https://letigame.itch.io/up-until-the-endWhat is new in this version : Release of the full game! Finally, after 4 years of development I’m happy to say that the full game “Up until the end” is released! I hope you’ll enjoy it Thank you again for your patience! Progress Story : 100%Sprites : 100%Backgrounds : 100%CG : 100%GUI : 100%Sounds and Music : 100%Programming : 100%First Proofreading: 100% Second Proofreading: 100% Beta Testing : 100% Edit after beta testing : 100% Please give me some feedback ! -Did you enjoy it overall? What did you like the most in the demo ? -Who is your favorite character and why? -Who is your least favorite character and why? -What do you think of the protagonist ? Can you relate to her ? -What is your opinion of the artwork? -What do you think of the story so far? -Was it something that bothered you about the game? -Did you find any typos or spelling mistakes? -What would you say needs the most improvement? -Do you think you'll play the finished game once it's released? - The protagonist doesn't have a sprite. Did it bothered you? Did it help you to relate to her or would you prefer her to have one? -Any other comments? Thanks Feel free to share any comments, advices or questions ! I would be grateful to know your opinion:) Links Tumblr : https://www.tumblr.com/blog/letigame Twitter : https://twitter.com/LetiGame Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/UpUntilTheEnd/ Updates: 30/04/2016: Demo released. 30/06/2016: Backrounds and Erika sprites. 24/07/2016: Matt sprites. 13/08/2016: New version of the demo released. 22/10/2016: New backrounds, new question for the survey and 47 000+ words count. 20/10/2017: Story and proofread COMPLETE. And update of the presentation cards. 12/11/2017: Programming and improve of Erika's sprites. 21/11/2017: Programming and refine of the GUI. 30/11/2017: A lot of programming. 09/01/2018: Improvement of Matt's sprites and programming 09/01/2018: Improvement of Amanda's sprites and background of the main menu + some programming 11/02/2018 : Version 1.2 of the demo released! 07/03/2018 : Progamming and drawing of a background and a CG. 24/03/2018: Progamming and drawing of two characters sprites + 3 background and a CG. 17/04/2018: Progamming and drawing of two CG. 16/05/2018: Drawing of 3 CG and 6 backgrounds, a little programming. 19/06/2018: Some programming, drawing of 6 CG and 4 backgrounds. 02/07/2018: Drawing of 4 CG and 1 backgrounds, a little programming. 16/07/2018: Drawing of 2 background, 4 CG and some programming. 30/07/2018: Programming, drawing of a lot of CG and some backgrounds. 26/08/2018: Polishing code, sprites, backgrounds and CGs. 22/09/2018: Polishing code, sprites, backgrounds and CGs. 17/10/2018: Polishing and testing. 02/12/2018: Polishing and testing. 05/01/2019: Polishing and testing. 03/03/2019: Testing finished, polishing while first betatesting. 12/05/2019: Polish and edit while first beta test. 24/08/2019: Edit while proofread. 07/12/2019: Proofread done, release date of the full game coming! 14/12/2019: Release date announcement! 29/01/2020: Release date announcement! ( Day) 23/02/2020: Release date approaching 28/02/2020: Release of the full game!

I'm with Clephas here. I like antagonists who are complex beings with the sorts of goals and aspirations that actual people would have. Real "villains" in history that changed the world (like Hitler and Stalin) had complex ideologies and gave a righteous spin to everything they did that commanded the respect and admiration of their followers. And in many ways, the reasons people followed them were even more complex. Too many JRPGs pit you against 1-dimensional lackeys who are stripped of all character except their role as plot devices. I find this the most boring trope of all. If you want to portray corruption, portray corruption--not a Disney trope.

Confession: I just had a moment of sheer 'oh fuck' when I accidentally copy/pasted/sent something to someone on FB about the merits of shipping. This was followed by beautiful relief, as she was revealed to be an ardent shipper herself. My thin façade of public decency is retained for another day.

I really liked Squealer in Shinsekai Yori as a villian. He had a well fleshed out backstory with clear motivations and his actions are subjective. http://shinsekaiyori.wikia.com/wiki/Squealer

Pretty much.

Welcome to the forums! Hope you enjoy your stay! You have pretty good taste in VNs Have a moe:

I'll pave the way for the next generation of VNs in the american market

Mod edit: Just ask any questions related to japanese here (sentences you're stuck on, points you can't wrap your head around, etc). In the case of sentences try to provide a brief context (what's going on in this scene, what's the line before and the line after that one...). Use that thread for finding and asking about resources to learn japanese. You can ask for help here for japanese sentences you are stuck on, preferably fan TL related stuff. To make it easier, paste in some context for the line you need help on (e.g. provide couple of lines before & after the one you are stuck on) made this post because i saw peipei's intro thread and then i remembered, we don't have one of these yet! -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I ask this question because everyone has their favorite villain. What in your view made a villain. I want your thoughts on 3 types of villains. 1) The Hero - A villain who is ruining everything for what they perceive as "the right thing," but in reality, fucks everything. Examples would be : Hero stops an army from finishing off X general and instead allows him to leave causing a 10 year rebellion. 2) The Fallen - A Hero (most of the time) that has a series of bad events lead them to do bad things (sometimes reluctantly.) Example would be: A sith that sucks at being a bad guy until they purge all their good tendencies. 3) The Evil Incarnate - These guys are evil for evil's sake but tend to either be boring monsters with no motivation OR masterminds with extreme motivation. Magneto would be an example of this. He is evil because we are not mutants and he wants to kill all non-mutants. I am sure some of my examples can be altered a bit but you get the jist of it. Let's start the dialogue!

Hello~ I've probably been aware of Fuwanovel since 2013, and for the last year or so, have exclusively used the site for walkthroughs, VNTL information, and perhaps reading a few of the blog posts (ever since vntls.org stopped updating once upon a time). I'm a fairly introverted (INTP-A, for those familiar with that type of thing) 25 year old. Being exposed to Visual Novels has been an interesting journey, i must say. In a gaming lul, i decided to pick up Katawa Shoujo on a whim sometime in late summer 2012, and i was blown away on how much such a thing could actually immerse me (I didn't sleep that first night, and managed to read most of the VN in one day). At the time, i had barely any knowledge of what a VN was, as most was heard second hand on various discussion boards, and the little i thought i knew was pretty unflattering (I assumed most VNs were Nukige-like, and had little story/character substance). That opened me up to trying out Fate/Stay Night, Steins;Gate, Ever17, Muv-Luv + Alternative, and a plethora of others that i grew to enjoy. Coincidently enough, between highschool and katawa shoujo, i hadn't really watched much anime, and going through Katawa shoujo actually rekindled my interest in that medium as well, haha. I've probably read enough to where i'd have a hard time making a top 5, but If i had to choose a top 5 (in no particular order), they would be the following: Cross†Channel Ef - A fairy tale of the two. Ever17 -the Out of Infinity- Muv Luv + Alternative (Specifically Alternative) Steins;Gate Some honorable mentions would be Rewrite, Majikoi, Grisaia, Fate/Stay Night, and Sharin no Kuni But yeah, Making topics aren't my strong point, so hopefully this serves as some kind of bare-bones introduction. If there is anything anyone wants to know, feel free to ask and i'll try to answer it to the best of my ability.

That's me . I've only read F/SN (which I loved) and Tsukihime . Melty Blood is also a sort of VN (though it's mostly a fighting game) so there's that too . I suppose you could say I'm a Type-Moon fanaitc in general . Nice to meet you and I'm open to recommendations .

False. As long as burger places consider raw onion a condiment, it's going to stay #1 on my Condiment Shitlist. But coleslaw isn't winning any awards, that's for sure. Next person always asks for a receipt.

I don't think this is the same thing like Palas said. Palas case would be evil for evil's sake without any reason. But someone who is evil for evils sake already made himself a slave of human moral values and therefore inferior to Lovecraft's beings. But what makes Lovecraft's beings so fascinating is that they are beyond morals - there might be a reason for their actions but they are so different that a mere human would not be able to understand them. Lovecraft himself once made a statement that he considers the Great Old Ones 'amoral' beings. The Great Old Ones just give a damn about humans, they are just a tool or nuisance for their real intentions which just happen to be devastating and horrifying for humans.

I can like all of these, with the right setup, but I'll elaborate a bit on the one Palas mentioned since that might be my favorite. Totally incomprehensible evil can be oddly fascinating, if done well. The best example I know of for this is any villain designed after Lovecraft - Elder Gods, Others, and so forth. When done well, this kind of horror theme can lead you down some paths you otherwise won't see. I don't think this kind of villain necessarily suffers from the problem @Clephas just mentioned in his point 3 there, because the fact that they don't have a character or an explanation are part and parcel with their nature. If you really drive it home that they are alien and Other, you can get the reader pretty pumped up about making sure that villain doesn't get its way. That said, you need a pretty strong commitment to darkness in the story to pull this kind of villain off - if you're not willing to have this incomprehensible evil, for example, kill or rape a main character just to prove how incomprehensibly evil it is, then you're probably not going to sell it hard enough, and it's just going to come off as boring. But when the stakes are raised high enough, I at least find it to be very effective. Deus Machina Demonbane was far from my favorite VN, but its villains fell firmly in this bucket. Some of them were kind of lame and more like the third grouping, but some of them were top-notch, especially the ones who were least comprehensible, most Other.

1) It would be more appropriate to just call this one an antagonist, since they can't really be called a villain, strictly speaking, lol. 2) I'm not terribly fond of this one, because it implies a black and white world view (ala Jedi) that has no practical connections with real existence. 3) Most of the worst stories have a villain of this type, because there is no need to explain his actions. After all, he is evil, so there is no need to make him a real character, lol.

lol that was fucking shit. Seasons 1-3 were great. 4 was meh, 5 was shit. This first episode was just... horrific. Literally nothing happened. And I cant wait for another fucking season of people wandering in a god damn desert. This show went down the drain the moment they took the political drama out in favor of MOAR SHOCKING MOMENTS for people to jizz all over on social media. Now its shocking moments with no context, or straight up murder for the shocking moment. Basically, there is no substance anymore.

1) I don't really agree with this "in reality" part, mainly because the point of said "hero villains" is to present an alternative "reality" and so what is right or wrong is entirely subjective to which side you end up falling on. Thus, whenever I see a villain of this type trying to achieve something, I don't have to necessarly agree they're fucking everything up, but rather they're doing their best to achieve their end goal. As for my personal opinion on these types of villains, they're probably my favorite precisely because, if done well, they present you with a plausible alternative way to look at things. 2) This is entirely personal, but I normally don't really like these types of villains. Maybe it's because I just haven't seen one done well but most of the time I just can not understand their motivation and I feel as if they fail to understand basic logic when going rampant. Sure trauma can deeply affect a person, but it's still very hard to me to emphatize with these types of characters. 3) I usually don't like these because they tend to just be filler in order to pass the spotlight onto the heroes. You could make an interesting mentally damaged villain, but I highly doubt they will be interesting if there's no form of background behind them.

1) This leads to a lot views on psychology and philosophy, and it usually ends up as being battle of the wits, so I very much like these kinds of villains. 2) My favorite type of villain. They tend to think as the hero, but with a dark twist. But I hate half-baked villains in this category. If you're going this route, you better make him/her legitimately evil, no reluctance, just evil. Also plus points for being like the hero. 3) Most common of these. My opinion hugely varies based on the villain itself. Most often than not, if the villain's personality is great, I'll like this type.

VNs in the west still make me cringe

So can I just request a key on twitter and get it for free?

Hi guys! After some posts and wandering around this forum both in threads and chat, I think it's time to introduce myself to everyone, since I actually never did to begin with. I remember my first post being a shitty question about starting a fan translation project, even though I don't know japanese (typical noob post, lol).That post encouraged me to learn japanese though (I'm taking classes right now). Well, I go for the pseudonym of Aizen pretty much everywhere I go, since I'm a hopeless fanboy of his ever since I watched Bleach's Karakura Arc. Bleach was in fact the first anime I ever saw (which was actually only a year ago) and since then it's my favorite of all times. I discovered anime around a year ago, and ever since then I've been hooked to every genre available (yes, I find interesting genres like otome and yaoi too). The first time I knew about visual novels was while watching Seitokai no Ichizon, when the protagonist was playing a bishōjo game in one of the scenes. I though those kinds of games only existed in anime, but after a little research I found out that they were very real, and that there were hundreds, maybe even thousands of them. My first visual novel was A Profile (which I actually absolutely despise now), and from there I tried other titles (most of them are pretty famous; Katawa Shoujo, Majikoi, Grisaia no Kajitsu,Noble Works and Kara no Shoujo for example). The first time I became interested in translations was while I was playing throughout the Noble Works game. I knew it was translated, but what I didn't know was that the translation was done by fans, and let me tell you that I thought that the work they did with the game was incredible. I looked for the group responsible for the translation (which is The Oxford Comma is Superior subs) and I was impressed by their dedication and effort that they put into the project (I actually look up to them). Seeing this amount of dedication made me want to contribute to the community too, and it has made me want to learn to become a better writer, to improve my english, as well as learning how to extracting game's texts (I still find it pretty difficult but I'll sort it out little by little) and learn how to design websites (Oxford Comma Subs' website looks sick in my opinion ). Summing up; I hope I can become a known contributor to the community in the future, that the team I'm currently setting up (Luna Translations) someday achieves the godly level of The Oxford Comma is Superior Subs , and I'd like to inmerse myself in this community as much as I can (pretty much being up to date with the Visual Novel Translation Scene, involving big companies like Sekai Project and fan translation teams like Rinjibou Translations for example). Finally, I just want to thank everyone in this community. People here are very friendly, and even though I'm a little bit of an airhead sometimes I hope we can all get along well. I'll end up with Aizen's Shikai release, which is badass: Kudakero, Kyōka Suigetsu.

I dont mind that reviewers got their copies early, what is annoying is little/no communication from SP and how a release of "March" has turned into "sometime in April" which will probably turn into "May"

Yes I get that, but the fact that the digital product is pretty much done, and is actually playable, yet we, the backers, get no word on when its coming out on how they are doing progress wise, yet people who simply want to review it, get the key for free. Also, there has been no direct reply from them on the kickstarter page since febuary 4th, yet people are asking questions left and right with concerns. But when someone asked on twitter for a FREE game key, they got a response instantly. The only thing we get is cryptic updates that everyone can access, with "we are working on it, will be released in april. Maybe." The way they are handling this is a little bit off. Give the backers some form of update on how things are going. (What is happening with the physical editions for example?)

So any news on this? maybe @DavidB knows something... I mean, I know I'm not a reviewer or anything that important I only helped with the funding of the game...where is the game???? btw my apologies in advance if this is another of those things you can't talk about for reasons that cannot be said...

5k... I think this time they are doing even worse than the last time and that's something really hard to achieve...

Veera is in Germany right now, so once she gets back and has some time to whip up graphics for the Kickstarter page it shouldn't be too long. I already have all the text for it done. Maybe the second or third week in May? I also intentionally left a gap in between this and the Kickstarter so people have a chance to read it and spread the word. As for that heroine, I'll do my best in case the project is a success! Lastly, thanks again for filling out the survey. And I'll keep that offer in mind! Have fun! Glad you're excited about it - I am too.

Fine then

I think it's a bit late for to post this here as I already posted two times in this forum but whatever. Hi, I am Caio000, I am mostly a lurker who sometimes feel a urge to post something and so I decided to introduce myself here just to say hi however this will be a long post, when I decide to talk about myself I tend to talk a lot so I apologize in advance if this post is too long. I am somewhat of a antisocial who feels lonely easily, as you can see from my profile I live in Brazil but not the Brazil I wanted to live in but this doesn't matter here, my interests are mainly anime, light novels, games (especially JRPGs), visual novels, family trees (especially the messed up ones, the more messed up the better) and history (please ignore the fact the last two has nothing to do with the others). My tastes are varied and I can pretty much read anything that has at least a nice story although I love good and awesome stories my standards are somewhat low and a have a liking for harem stories (I know, it's a trash liking) since I read Koihime before that I was indifferent at best. My interest in the 2D world goes back to my childhood, even though I didn't know what anime back was then I liked them better than others cartoon and was because of anime I became interested in visual novels. I discovered visual novels because of my cousin, when I was younger and didn't have a computer I always watched my cousin play games in his computer, there was time he played True Love which interested me (by the way, I was quite surprised when he reached a h-scene and I became so nervous I left the room). Years later when I had a computer I remembered about True Love (VNDB) and decided to play it myself, after search it in internet I discovered visual novels I became immensely interested in them. I guess my first visual novels after this was Narcissu which I read in 2012 or 2013, it was translated in Portuguese but I eventually became frustrated with the lack of visual novels translated to Portuguese and decided to learn English reading visual novels translated to English and taking my English lessons in school seriously (I become one of the best in English of my class). Since then I read many visual novels however I started paying for them relatively recently when Sekai Project started publishing them in Steam (moenovel doesn't count) because of the regional pricing and because I finally realized how wrong piracy is (piracy is too much common in my country), I plan in future pay for the visual novels I pirated. The only visual novels I played untranslated were 0verflow’s visual novels because I had to know all about this family tree no matter what even though what I knew of Japanese was the little I learned in some video classes I downloaded (I dropped it in the third or fourth class), in the beginning I used mostly machine translation but eventually I used only JParser to translate word per word, I was a bit surprised the much of Japanese I learned using it. Currently I am doing an actual course of Japanese to stop being a peasant who only reads visual novels in English and became one of these elusive elite who talks about Dies irae, Muramasa, Sakura no Uta and such(though when I learn enough Japanese I am more likely to drown myself in moeges than anything else). In this forum I am usually lurking around the Visual Novel Talk reading people comments on news, principally if it's news that'll make people salty. It's quite entertaining (I am actually trying to forget I am a bit salty too). I guess that's it... Maybe this post is a "little" too big. Is it okay post something this big here? I apologize again for it. Anyway, although I probably won't post frequently here よろしくお願いします。

senjou no maou and probably any of the rance titles the protagonist is a cocky bastard lol

YOU MEAN THERE'S MORE? 1 minute later: Was not disappointed. Top effort guys [2].

When are you planning on launching the KS? A single heroine isn't bad but I'm hoping to see more of 4th floor girl. Hopefully as a heroine but a side character with decent screen time is good enough for me too. For some reason I'm oddly interested in her. I did it but I don't how much help it'll be. And no problem! If you ever want some more feedback from me then hit me up on reddit or on twitter.

Cool that you liked it! Feels good to make at least a decent impression on those who feel similarly about many OELVNs as myself. And yeah, those are two of the main issues with the current engine. Definitely migrating the project elsewhere if the Kickstarter is successful. Tough question at this point. Here's an answer, but I won't promise it's a good one: I don't mind writing heroine routes. At this stage I have some ideas for at least one full heroine route on top of the true route. The question is whether or not I'll have the time/money to do so. Depending on how the Kickstarter goes, I may or may not have heroine routes. The true route will definitely be prioritized though. Such a messy answer, but yeah. I want to, though! Another difficult question, haha. You see... she's not your average heroine (as you may have guessed), which complicates things. I'm not sure how much more I should tell you, but I'd love to explore her character further. I see what you're saying, fair point. I figured I'd win some points with certain people with that, so that's basically why it's there. It was fun to write too, hehe. That'd be great - haven't gotten all that many form responses yet. Thanks for everything man.

Err.... No? VNs don't get translated in a month.

Strictly speaking, Visual Novels aren't so much becoming popular as getting closer to mainstream media in the eyes of readers and gamers, rather than just being the smallest portion of the otaku market. This is mostly because of the release in recent years of a disproportionately large number of non-ero VNs, which lowered the hurdle for playing them for a lot of people. However, on the other side of things, that also means that VNs will never be much more popular than they are now...

Man, this one was a journey. Fate/ stay night is the longest visual novel I ever took to read. Taking over a year, while I read several games in between. At first I was turned off by the text covering the whole screen the entire game. the prologue didn't really get me hyped for anything, and magic seemed really complicated. And stupid. And the main character was weak sauce. But then I got back into it, I don't know how, or why buy I started up again last week and I finished it today. All of it. At 4 in the morning. I suddenly was captivated by the world, the characters and the way Shirou got stronger. From learning about Saber's past to Archer being the embodiment of Shirou's beliefs, to becoming part machine, part blade to stop a unbeatable dark force, your underclassman. And then the Tiger Dojos. Oh my god the Tiger Dojos. Now I've got a couple of questions for those who played the game and loved it. And also a question regarding certain unlocks... So--- 1.What is your favorite route? Is there a generally best considered or main route, or are there wars over which one is better? 2.Are the animes any good? The only thing I've heard of Fate/ stay night before playing the game was my friends discussing the anime. 3.Um... I think I am missing the opening video for Heavens Feel route... the movie section seems a bit barren with only two videos... 4.Also, is there suppose to be two normal endings for Heavens feel? I can't seem to get the second oneno matter how hard I try...help...

They are becoming popular in the West because people in the West are playing them and enjoying them and then trying to get other people in the West to play them and enjoy them With the hopes that one day VNs will be universally popular all over the World, to infinity and Buzz Lightyear

They are?

Coeus, The Fallen Prince – The long lost Titan Coeus, once known for his intellect and reason was cursed for delving too deeply into the forbidden arts of the ancient bloodlines. Because of his lack of the necessary precautions used by Nun’s people, Coeus was overtaken by a spirit known as the Devourer. When he acquired the curse, he did not tell anyone. Over time, his mind slipped due to the hunger of the curse. It needed souls. One day he lost control and killed an Anunnaki, draining it of its essence. Marduk was outraged and Kronus investigated the situation. When Coeus lacked reason and attacked the others, Kronus knew something was wrong. He seeked the council of Nun and Nun decided Coeus should be destroyed. Kronus, pitying his son, decided to instead imprison him. Marduk did not like his decision but agreed when Kronus allowed the Anunnaki to build the facility to guarantee he would never escape. Nun never knew he was kept alive, locked underground and chained for 1500 years. But now that the rift is unstabilized, the quakes have broken the chains on the prince. He is still imprisoned but how long could the facility last without the beast restrained?

VNDB About a year ago I decided to translate the cryptic opening scene to Dark Blue, a short murder mystery VN with netorare elements. I did this just to show that I could. After the recent controversy with the Monobeno project, I became curious whether others would consider my work "up to snuff". I've always assumed that unless a translation was near professional quality it would not be welcomed by the fanbase. What follows is a mostly unedited translation I wrote relying on the translation suite I typically use while playing Japanese eroge: text hooker, JParser, EDICT, and ATLAS (a machine translator). I translated this before moving onwards in the game, so it's quite possible I missed foreshadowing or other elements; it reflects my understanding of the scene as I was reading it. A video containing the scene can be found here, if you'd like to watch the scene while reading along. Dark Blue Intro Scene Translation ？？？「私も、最後に君に伝えておこう」 Old man: I have one last thing to tell you. その男は、革張りの椅子に腰掛けながら、青年へと向けてそう口を開いた。 While sitting in the leather chair facing the young man, the man opened his mouth. ？？？「なんですか？」 Young man: And that is? ？？？「確かに呪いなどがあったかどうかはわからん」 Old man: Whether it was a sort of curse or not, I don't know for certain. ？？？「だが、現に我々は狂い、自分を保つためにあらゆる方法を模索して来た」 Old man: But what I do know is we've been groping in confusion for a way to preserve ourselves. ？？？「その結果がこれなのだ」 Old man: And the result is this. 何ら恥じることなく、男はそう断言する。 Unashamedly, the man declared so. 正面にいる青年に対して、恥じる様子などひとつとしてなかった。 Facing the young man in front of him, there wasn't a hint of shame in his visage. ？？？「自分達は最善を尽くしたと？」 Young man: "We did our best", eh? ？？？「意志が弱いなりに、我々はやれるだけのことをやってきた」 Old man: In our weak-willed way, we did what we could. ？？？「そういうことだ」 Old man: That is all. ？？？「……失礼します」 Young man: I've heard enough. もう話すことはないと言わんばかりに、青年が部屋のドアのほうへと向かう。 With nothing else to say, the young man faced the room's exit. その表情には嫌悪が浮かんでいて、誰も近づけない刺々しい雰囲気が漂っていた。 A disgusted expression on his face, an aura of inapproachability surrounded the young man. ？？？「君は運が良かっただけかもしれんぞ」 Old man: It could be you were just lucky. 青年がドアノブに手をかけようとしたとき、男がそんなことを言った。 As the young man reached for the door knob, the man said this. ？？？「人生など、何がどう転ぶかわからんものだ」 Old man: In our lives, there's no telling when or how the fall will come. ？？？「君にだって、私達と同じになる可能性はあったはずだ」 Old man: Even you--you could have ended up like us. ？？？「そのことを覚えておきたまえ」 Old man: Remember that. そう言って、男は煙草を口に運んだ。 Saying that, the man brought a cigarette to his mouth. だが、彼の目にはもう青年の姿は映っておらず、どこか遠くを――懐かしい過去を見つめるように双眸を細めていた……。 But in his eyes the figure of the young man was reflected no longer--the pair of eyes narrowed as they looked into the distance, as if gazing into the nostalgic past. [i also posted an edited version of this post on my personal blog]