A new Japanese learner takes on JRPGs

Words/kanji learned: 戻る: to come back いらっしゃる: to come, to go. To be doing (a previously connected verb). すべて: everything 解決する: to resolve, to settle 気を付けて: take care, be careful 無事に: safely 陣営: camp of supporters, battle camp たどり着く: to arrive

Today, we wrap up the conversation between モニカ and カタリナ. It's about 3 screens worth of dialogue – which is short by JRPG standards, but is still going to take a bit of time for me to parse through.

To set the scene: after the previous conversation, モニカ quickly changes into her adventuring outfit, and the two characters talk to each other a bit more:

モニカ： 「カタリナ。。。。 お兄様が戻って いらっしゃれば、 すべて解決するわ。」 カタリナ： 「モニカ様も お気を付けて。 無事にミカエル様の陣営まで たどり着いてください。」

戻(もど)って: to come back. (Connective form of the verb 戻る.) いらっしゃれば: conditional form of いらっしゃる, which can mean “to come / to go” – but if it follows a “て” form verb (it does), it changes to “to be doing”. But wait, what's this conditional form stuff? Here's a quick link, which I'll need to review later. But it basically means “if” is being applied to the verb here. すべて: everything. WaniKani taught me this as 全て, but Jisho says it's often written as kana alone. 解決(かいけつ)する: to resolve. 解決 is a noun meaning resolution, settlement. The する ending makes it a verb – する itself is an “irregular” verb that attaches to nouns just like this. Here's a good link about it. Katarina... my brother, if he returns, everything will be resolved.

お気を付けて。 気(き)を付(つ)けて: take care, be careful. Monica-sama should also be careful. (Even though カタリナ is speaking directly to モニカ, she still addresses her in third-person. It's more polite than using a “you” pronoun, but I need to look more into exactly why – and when you can still use “you” when needed.)

無事にミカエル様の陣営まで たどり着いてください。 無事(ぶじ)に: safely, successfully, without mishap. 陣営(じんえい): camp, but with the connotation that the people there are supporters. Can also mean military camp. たどり着(つ)いて: connective form of たどり着く, to arrive. Safely, up to Mikhail's camp, arrive – please.

And that finishes this conversation! もにか departs the room via a hidden exit in the mirror, and カタリナ has her own scheme to enact.

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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Words/kanji learned: では: “then” or “well” at the beginning of a sentence 所: place 知らせ: news 走る: to run 待つ: to wait 行き: go 危険: danger 分かる: to understand でも: informal however/but まま: as it is ここにいて: stay here し: and what's more 一石二鳥: two birds, one stone 手: hand でしょう: it seems あなた: “you” pronoun (use cautiously) ここ: here いる: to be なる: to become 気づく: to notice ように: in order to; so that できるだけ: as much as possible 長い間: long time, long interval ね: eh? yes?

Today, we're gonna get as far as we can with the conversation between モニカ and カタリナ.

カタリナ： 「では私がミカエル様の所へ知らせに走いましょう。」 モニカ： 「待って、私が自分で行きます。 危険なのはわかっているわ。 でも、このままここにいては男爵に捕われてしまうし、 一石二鳥の手でしょう。 あなたはここで、 私がいなくなったのを気づかれないようにして。 できるだけ長い間ね。」

では私がミカエル様の所へ知らせに走いましょう。 では: Think of “then” or “well” at the beginning of a sentence in English. 所(ところ): place. 知(し)らせ: news, word, tidings. I learned 知 by itself on WaniKani as “know”, but that's just part of this word. 走(はし)いましょう: to run, with a polite verb ending. I'd learned 走る on WaniKani earlier, and this is the same verb. Well then, I, to Mikhail's place, with the news, will run. (I'm not sure how the “に” particle after 知らせ works here yet)

待って、私が自分で行きます。 待(も)って: connective form of 待(も)つ, to wait. 行(い)き: go. I learned this already from both WK and DuoLingo, but it's the first time we've seen it here. Wait, I myself will go.

危険なのはわかっているわ。 危険(きけん): danger, dangerous. I think the な and の make this a noun. わかっている: the ongoing action form of 分(わ)かる, meaning to understand. Why not kanji, though? I understand it's dangerous.

でも、このままここにいては男爵に捕われてしまうし、 でも: informal however/but. まま: as it is, remaining in a state. Together with the determiner, we get このまま – with this as it is, with things as they are. ここ: pronoun for “this place” near the speaker. ここにいて: seems to be a phrase meaning “stay here”, using the pronoun above. Jisho had trouble with this phrase. A different site called Reverso helped here. し: a particle that means “and what's more”, and is a conjunction to the next part of the sentence. But if you stay here,

一石二鳥の手でしょう。 一石二鳥(いっせきにちょう): this is actually a loan phrase from English, and you get exactly zero points for guessing what phrase it is. I'll tell you that 石 is stone and 鳥 is bird. The phrase can be used any time you accomplish two benefits via one action. 手(て): hand. でしょう: it seems. You can achieve two goals at once by your hand, it seems.

あなたはここで、 私がいなくなったのを気づかれないようにして。 あなた: the “you” pronoun. According to Wikipedia, this is rarely used since it can sound condescending – but in this case, it's a princess talking to a subject, so that might make it OK here. ここで: the “here” pronoun, as seen above, with the “at” particle. いなく: negative form of いる, which has several possible meanings – most commonly “to be” (as applied to living things, not inanimate objects). なった: past tense form of なる, to become / to result in. The の turns it into a noun. 気(き)づかれない: negative form of 気(き)づく, to notice. ように: in order to, so that. して: Jisho indicates that this is a particle that probably means “by” or “as” – but maybe other things too. With you here, and I'm gone (“not to be” + “became” seems to mean “gone”) – they won't notice [that I'm gone].

できるだけ長い間ね。 できるだけ: expression meaning “as much as possible” 長(なが)い間(あいだ): expression meaning a long time or long interval ね: particle indicating that they expect the listener to agree, like “eh?” or “yes?” For as long a time as possible, yes?

I probably should do smaller chunks of dialogue – this post got longer than I intended.

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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Words/kanji learned: 部屋: room 大変: major incident, disaster どうしました: What's wrong, what's your emergency? 様: extremely polite suffix for a person's name それ: pronoun for a thing near the listener

The scene changes back to モニカ in the hallway. She's just overheard the plan that ゴドウィン and the Chancellor are enacting, including the part where they intend to capture her. Without any dialogue, she walks away from the throne room towards カタリナの部屋(Katarina's room – I learned 部屋(へや) from DuoLingo). (The route she takes is also helpful for us, since we see the layout of the castle. We'll need to know it.) She goes into Katarina's room, so at last we can see the character we've chosen to play as! The conversation begins:

モニカ： 「カタリナ、大変なの！」 カタリナ： 「どうしました、モニカ様？」 モニカ： 「それが、ゴドウィン男爵と大臣が。。。」

(While looking these up, I discovered two different 漢字 that look very similar to my untrained eye: 様 and 樣. In this case, 様 is correct.)

カタリナ、大変なの！ 大変(たいへん): as a noun, this is “major incident; disaster”. It can also be an adjective or an adverb. The の at the end “nominalizes” the phrase, whatever that means. “Katarina, disaster!”

どうしました、モニカ様？ どうしました: What's wrong, what's your emergency? 様(さま): the -sama suffix. カタリナ is addressing モニカと very politely.

それが、ゴドウィン男爵と大臣が。。。 それ: this is a pronoun for a thing near the listener, could be literally translated to English as “that” (although “that” has more meanings of course). 大臣(だいじん): cabinet/government minister. This is in reference to the “chancellor” from the earlier entries. I called him “chancellor” because that's what he's named in the official English translation – but thanks to this project, I now know his true rank in the government of ロアーヌ! (He still doesn't seem to have a name, though.)

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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Words/kanji covered: 時: hour 時に: by the way 私: I/me こと: a bunch of possible phrases 事: see こと above 忘れる: to forget 分かる: to understand いざ: now, well 切り: end

It turns out that I got the screenshots from this conversation out of order when I was viewing them in my Steam collection. I'll have to be more careful about that in the future. Anyway, let's finish this conversation!

Chancellor: 「その時には私のことをお忘れなく、」

その: the “determiner” again, we've seen it before. 時(とき)に: by the way, sometimes, precisely then. 時 is the kanji for an hour, also. 私(わたし): DuoLingo covers this one pretty early on, and you probably hear it a lot in animé too. It means “me”! こと: this can be read multiple ways, but Jisho suggests 事(こと）. The tenth definition is fitting, because “you should; I advise that you; it's important to” seems like something the chancellor would say. Also for several of these definitions, Jisho notes that the word is often written with kana alone, so it makes sense then that we'd see こと instead of 事. 忘(わす)れなく: don't forget! This is a form of the verb 忘れる, which means to forget. In total, it seems that the Chancellor is asking ゴドウィン to not forget him.

One more bit from the Chancellor! 「わかりました。 いざというときの切りふだですな。」 わかりました: We learned わかる on WaniKani as 分かる, and it means to understand, or to be understandable. Replacing る with りました makes it past-tense and positive, so “I understood”. いざ: now, well. という: this one is complicated. Here is a good article about it. I need to make more sense of this later. とき: this is one of the readings of 時, time. 切(き)り: end. ふだですな: a bunch of verbs, I can't make much sense of them. Machine translation offers too many possible results. The Chancellor is saying something about understanding now and a time's end.

It seems fitting, then, that we wrap up this conversation here. Next time, モニカ will return and カタリナ will make her first appearance! And I'll hopefully get the dialogue in the correct order!

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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Words/kanji covered: もう一つ: one more 捕える: to catch 男爵: baron いや: no/yuck 閣下: your excellency

Godwin approaches the 玉座 and sits right down on it. Quite bold of him!

Godwin: 「もう一つ、モニカを捕えておくように。」 Godwin and chancellor both: Chancellor: 「ゴドウィン男爵、いや、ロアーナ侯ゴドウィン閣下。」

My time is short today, so we'll roll with this.

もう一つ、モニカを捕えておくように。 もう一(ひと)つ: This can mean several things, like “one more” or “quite” or “not quite”. 捕(とら)えて: A conjugation of the verb 捕(とら)える, which means “to catch”. The ending える indicates that the verb is in the “る” verb group. おくように: This one gives me some trouble. Jisho gives the おく part as 置く, meaning “to put” or “to place”. Several sources also give ように as “like” but that doesn't seem to fit the sentence well. So we can read this as “One more thing, let's catch モニカ”. I'm almost certainly missing grammatical nuances here.

ゴドウィン男爵、いや、ロアーナ侯ゴドウィン閣下。 男爵(だんしゃく): baron. 男(だん) is a relatively early word on WaniKani and means “man”. 爵 is one we saw earlier and means “baron” but doesn't seem to be a whole word by itself. (Incidentally, here they are using ゴドウィンの名前 – Godwin's name – a bit earlier than the English version does.) いや: seems to be a bit of onomatopoeia. Wiktionary offers up several possible meanings. I suspect that the second etymology is intended, but I think the sentence is more amusing with the first etymology. 閣下: “your excellency” Baron ゴドウィン – no/yuck; your excellency Marquis ゴドウィン of ロアーナ!

This was a fun entry! We should be able to finish this scene on my next update.

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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Words/kanji covered: 今夜: tonight, this evening 決行: carrying out, doing ２度: two times 僅か: a few 兵: soldier 出陣する: go into battle 押さえる: pin down, hold down 手の打ち様がない: seems to be a phrase that means “be helpless”

I have returned! Today we will begin a relatively lengthy bit of dialogue between two characters. We don't know their names yet at this point, but in English they are later referred to as Godwin and “the chancellor” so I'll call them that until I encounter their 日本語 names.

As a reminder, モニカ is listening to 声 (one or more voices) from the 玉座の間. We, the player, now both see and hear the dialogue that she's listening to.

Godwin: 「今夜、決行しよう。」 Chancellor: 「ええ、こんなチャンスは２度とありません。」 Godwin: 「ミカエルはわずかな兵と出陣している。 このロアーヌの町を押さえてしまえば、 ミカエルも手の打ち様がない。」

That should be a good amount of work for today at least!

今夜、決行しよう。 今夜(こんや): tonight, or this evening. 決行: carrying out, doing. しよう: need to figure this out via verb conjugation. Godwin is saying something will be done this evening.

ええ、こんなチャンスは２度とありません。 ええ: yes こんな: machine translation gives me “like this”. チャンス: pretty clear English loan word here ２度(２度 or にど): two times ありません: polite negative form of ある. So the chancellor politely says “Yes, we don't have two chances like this.”

ミカエルはわずかな兵と出陣している。 わずか: a few, a little. Can be written as 僅か, with identical pronunciation. 兵(へい): another word for soldier. We already learned 武人, which also means soldier, when we chose our 宿星 earlier. 出陣(しゅつじん)している: this is a conjugated form of the verb 出陣する, which means to go into battle. 陣 can mean “camp” or “battle array”. 出 is taught very early on WaniKani, so you probably know it means “exit”. The conjugation indicates that the verb is an action that is ongoing. Mikhail-topic, a few-adjective soldiers-and, presently going into battle. Mikhail is going into battle with a few soldiers.

このロアーヌの町を押さえてしまえば、 この: this introduces a new 日本語 concept to me, the “determiner”. It attaches directly to a noun – see this site for a useful breakdown. If you know Esperanto, この functions very much like “tiu”, instead of “tio” or “これ” which is a pronoun that stands by itself. English would use “this” in both instances. 町(まち): village. 押(お)さえてしまえば: connective form of the verb 押さえる, which means to pin down or hold down. The てしまえば part seems to mean “once you (do the verb)”. Once we hold down this village ロアーヌ, ...

ミカエルも手の打ち様がない。 手(て)の打(う)ち様(さま/よう)がない: this one's giving me a hard time. 手 is hand, 打 is hit, and 様 is “like” or “similar to”. The phrase can be found several places by searching for it, but it's hard for me to parse it out. Machine translation gives me a few possibilities, that the entire phrase means “be helpless” or “beyond one's control”. Mikhail also will be helpless.

That concludes the first three screens' worth of dialogue for this scene! There's about 3-5 more screens to go.

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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I have found some great-looking resources on Japanese grammar, and I very much need to review these sources. I will be back, though!

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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Words/kanji covered: 兄: older brother お兄様: older brother, but respectful 大丈夫: all right, in good health かしら: I wonder? 玉座の間: Throne room 声: voice したような: I don't know this and I need help 誰: who

Resuming from the previous day, we pick up at: お兄様は大丈夫かしら

お兄様(おにいさま): Respectful phrasing for an older brother. 兄 alone means older brother, and both お and 様 are added for extra respect. You might recall who もにか's older brother is. 大丈夫(だいじょうぶ): All right, in good health. かしら: “I wonder?” This is equivalent to かな, but かしら is used more by women (according to Wikipedia). So that's something I'll need to be mindful of!

So: “I wonder if my respected older brother is in good health” would be an awkwardly phrased English version of this.

玉座の間から声がしたような。。。

玉座の間(ぎょくざのま): throne room! I love this one – the first two kanjis are “jade” and “seat” and they mean “throne” together. 間 means room, so this is “throne's room” – but we'd say “throne room” in English. 声(こえ): voice. したような: I'm having a hard time with this one. From Wikipedia: “Na or naa at the end of a sentence is a variant of ne, implying more reflection.” I'll roll with it. That leaves したよう as the verb of the sentence. However, I can't find this thing anywhere. Machine translation gives me “as if” and “like” depending on how much of the sentence I give it. “From the throne room, like voices...”

“だれかいるの？”

First of all: no kanji here! In searching, I find that this is a somewhat common sentence, sometimes written as “誰かいる” – which would mean “is somebody there”? The の ending here is another part of feminine speech. Apparently の in this case can be used with falling intonation for a statement, or rising intonation for a question. I'm guessing that もにか would say this with rising intonation here. Anyway: 誰(だれ): the pronoun “who”. いる: a form of “to be”.

That takes us to the end of the first scene! Next time, we'll listen in on the voices from the throne room, and probably actually meet our 主人公 soon after!

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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Words/kanji covered: いやな: unpleasant/disagreeable 天気: weather だ: casual です

Today, I'm going to get into Katrina's intro. It's the shortest intro sequence, but there's still quite a bit of dialogue, and it begins now!

I'll start with the very first scene and work my way through only a few lines. I'm still very new to 日本語 grammar, so this will take some time.

The scene: inside a castle on a rainy night. A woman – モニカ, not カタリナ – looks out of a window.

モニカ： 「いやな天気だわ。。。 お兄様は大丈夫かしら」

モニカ then walks over to a large set of double-doors and listens.

モニカ： 「玉座の間から声がしたような。。。 だれかいるの？」

And then the scene changes.

Let's break down the grammar here!

いやな天気だわ。。。

いやな: this is an adjective. Japanese has multiple classes of adjectives – い-adjectives and な-adjectives seem to be the first two classifications people learn, and fortunately for us, this is clearly an example of a な-adjective! It means “unpleasant” or “disagreeable”.

天気(てんき): means weather. The kanjis mean “heaven/sky” and “mood/spirit/atmosphere”.

だ: this is the casual form of the well-known verb です – see this link.

わ: I'm not certain about this one, but Wikipedia says it's a particle that establishes an emotional connection.

So armed with our findings, I conclude that this sentence is saying “the weather is disagreeable”, and that モニカ has an emotion about it.

My time is short today, so I'll cover the rest in the near future. Thanks for reading!

#learningJapanese

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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Words/kanji covered: 得意: strong point, forte 武器: weapon, asset 剣: sword 大: large 小: small 槍: spear 弓: bow 体術: martial art 決定: decision/decide

Now, for a part I've been looking forward to: weapon selection!

First, let's get the upper-left prompt done. 得意武器 seems to be two words – 得意(とくい) means one's strong point or forte, and 武器(ぶき) is weapon or asset. Notice that 武 makes its second appearance here – in the last post, it was part of 武人(ふじん, soldier). We know everything else here – the game is asking us to choose the weapon we'll specialize in.

For weapons, we have nine choices. Let's get to it immediately!

剣(けん): sword. (The kanji can also mean blade, or clock hand.) 大剣(たいけん): large sword. 斧(おの): axe. 棍棒(こんぼう): club or stick. 小剣(しょうけん): the kanji indicates small sword. In-game, these are épées and rapiers. 槍(やり): spear. 弓(ゆみ): bow. 体術(たいじゅつ): martial arts. なし: nothing.

I choose bow.

Now we go to the final confirmation screen:

Here we see a bunch of statistics and a prompt to confirm our decision. At this point, I'm eager to get to the game, so I'll skip all of the statistics for now. I will note the prompt at the bottom uses a new verb – 決定(けってい), which requests that we decide. The decisions are yes or no. I've usually seen “no” written as いいえ, so だめ is new to me.

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Author: @WolfeReader@freeradical.zone

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