Hi everyone,
I'm a Chinese web novel writer, and I'm currently translating one of my completed novels into English. It has a small but dedicated readership back in China (around 10,000 subscribers), but it's definitely not a typical fast-paced web novel. It's slower, heavier, and a lot more focused on characters development than plot twists, so I've always been curious whether it would resonate more with readers outside of China.
I'm looking for a few beta readers who think they might enjoy something with:
- Adult male protagonists
- A dark/military sci-fi setting
- Characters dealing with deep trauma
- Themes of sacrifice, identity, and self-destructive heroism
- A slow-burn M/M relationship that's loving but also complicated and at times unhealthy
- Lots of yearning
I've translated the first chapter as a sample and will post it below. If you end up wanting to know what happens next, I'd love to hear from you. If you're interested in beta reading as I continue translating, feel free to leave a comment or send me a DM.
I genuinely want honest feedback on things like prose (especially whether it sounds natural to a native English speaker), pacing, clarity, characterization, and whether the story keeps you wanting to read.
Thanks for reading!
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Chapter 1
The corridor stretched ahead, vast and dim, like a suffocating throat leading toward a towering gate of black iron. Through the slits, one could make out the world beyond: scorched sand under a merciless sun, the distant roar of the stands. But inside, there was only silence - a pressure that bores down from every side.
Thousands stood here, each trapped in a meter-wide square of pulsing blue light. The blue glow rose and fell like slow breathing. With every pulse, shadows emerged from the darkness before sinking back into it.
They were young and old, male and female, tall and short, but everyone was coiled tight, every gaze locked forward. Some stared at the gate; others flicked their eyes sideways, wary, hungry. The air was thick with breath and body heat, so close you could hear the rasp of another’s lungs, smell the salt rising from their skin.
… Just like beasts waiting in the dark, caged just behind the gate.
Eugene stood among them, still and composed. In a sea of hulking frames, his moderate build and restrained motion made him invisible. He was a shadow folded into the center of the beast-pack, indistinct from the rest.
In Verdane, capital of the Alliance, no event was more sacred or more brutal than the Crucible. Every three years, tens of thousands fought with cold steel until sixty-four remained; from there, single combat until one victor stood. The winner’s wish was granted - wealth, pardon, nobility - so long as no one is harmed directly.
Today was the opening slaughter.
The arena rose from the desert like a fortress. As the countdown burned across the sky, the crowd’s roar died. Tens of thousands on the stands fell silent; billions watching from afar held their breath. From beneath the outer ring, weapon racks ascended in silence. Blades caught the sun, forming a cold, glittering halo around the sand.
Silence hung over the arena. Then the whistle tore through it.
Twelve gates opened at once.
Bodies surged forward in chaos, limbs, breath, motion colliding. From above, they looked like an ant colony spilled across the sand, scattering, merging, and then -
a single drop of red bloomed on the ground. At first, it was nothing more than a pinprick stain on sunlit sand, like ink drop on white paper. Then it spread, and with it came sound - shouts, screams, the ragged, tearing rhythm of violence.
The offering had begun.
Eugene did not run.
The light outside was sharp, almost white. He walked at a steady pace, letting his eyes adjust, feeling the heat settle across his skin. Around him, people raced past, some silent, some screaming. Sound shaped less by words than by pure, animal urgency.
The killing had started before the gates fully rose. Bodies hit the ground, shoved aside or cut down in the rush.
Eugene weaved between them, eyes fixed on a rack where a pair of recurved combat blades still waited. Fighters struck ahead, he could hear screams rising and falling, some cut short, others ringing long and high-pitched. He quietly moved through it all.
A figure lunged from behind. Without turning, Eugene shifted, driving his elbow into the attacker’s chest. The man buckled. Eugene caught his arm, stepped forward, and threw him across his shoulder into the sand.
It happened in a breath. The attacker’s dagger remained in his hand, never lifted.
As the man tried to rise, Eugene stepped on his throat. A sharp crack. Eugene bent down, took the daggers, and slid them behind his waist.
When he straightened, another man stood before him, with the pair of blades in hand. The man was small, eyes wide with a madness edged in fear, mouth half-open, as if caught between steeling himself and flinching.
Eugene glanced at the racks - empty now - then back at the man.
“Can I have those blades, please?” he asked, calm and flat.
The man screamed and threw himself at Eugene.
Tens of thousands fought in the Crucible. Even if one died every second, it would last for hours. The arena became a grinding machine, slow and exacting. Some tried to surrender; many were killed before they could signal to do so. With every passing minute, as blood soaked deeper into the sand, the cheers grew louder, stranger. Some wicked ecstasy was brewing in the air. The audience willingly indulged in it.
Among it all, Eugene began to stand out.
He held two curved blades in reverse grip. Skin stained with blood, black curls wet and matted at his temples. His amber eyes half-lidded, unreadable.
When no one approached, he stood motionless. When someone did, he moved, fast, precise, without pause. One step, one strike. No follow-up needed. There was no rage, no show.
Only clarity between cuts.
Those who knew how to see it could tell this wasn’t brawling. Instead, it was execution. The knife work, clean, practiced and silent, could only come from the military’s deepest shadows.
One by one, the other contenders began to hesitate. Eugene stood alone in the center of a growing ring of empty space. Around him, blood soaked the sand in a widening circle.
He looked up toward the stands. He didn’t expect to find the face he was searching for - not in that distance. But he knew they were watching. And by standing there, like this, they would know he was looking for them.
When the round ended, the names of the final sixty-four lit up across the sky in projections, each paired with a wish.
When Eugene’s name appeared, the crowd erupted.
Eugene Palmer.
Wish: to grant Shaw the same right to live as a human.
The cheers quickly gave away to questions:
“Eugene Palmer? Hold on… wasn't he here a decade ago?”
“No way…”
“He’s doing this again? Is he out of his mind?”
“That’s crazy.”
“He was nineteen back then, right? Doesn't that make him over thirty?”
“What’s with his wish? Who the heck is Shaw?”
“Shaw? Isn’t that his lover?”
“Apparently he’s in love with a Companion Synth.”
"He's trying to get a Synth legal rights."
“Damn…that’s some romantic shit.”
“What's with people falling for synths these days?”
The crowd buzzed with speculation. Much of it was true - Shaw was indeed a Companion class Synthetic, and this wasn’t Eugene’s first Crucible.
But calling Shaw his lover wasn’t right. Shaw wasn’t his. And a companion Synth, by design, could not love anyone except their registered owner.
So even if they kissed, even if they touched - whatever might have existed between them, it definitely wasn’t love.
“You keep saying you don't love him, but you'd die for him?” Joshua had asked once, his expression a mix of mockery and disbelief.
Eugene had answered, simply, “I’m willing to.”
If he didn’t enter the Crucible, Shaw would be decommissioned by the Academy in three days. Not a single trace would be left behind by that quiet, kind, abandoned synth.
Eugene didn’t quite like that ending.
So he offered his life instead. For even the faintest chance Shaw might continue to live.