Textbook Example

1. Even some of the monsters...

The story so far
Megumin has jumped the gun and fired off her daily one-use cast of Explosion. Aqua, with her infinite wisdom, has cast False Fire, a spell specifically designed to attract monsters.

While context is often important, for today’s line, you don’t have to be an ardent fan of the series to know there are problems. Let’s break down the corresponding Japanese line and see why.

ほら　見て、
hora mite
[Look see,]

This component of the sentence, in which Aqua is drawing Kazuma’s attention to her handiwork, is absent from the English. This isn’t problematic by itself, and there are valid reasons for choosing to omit it. However, its inclusion as “See!” or “Look!” is a better option if we consider Aqua’s character; she likes to show off, she’s usually proud of her ‘accomplishments’, she can’t read a room to save her life, and she craves attention.

爆裂魔法　に　驚いて　逃げ出した　モンスター　も
bakuretsumahou ni odoroite nigedashita monsutaa mo
戻って　きた　わ。
modotte kita wa

It is common in games for longer Japanese sentences to be split over several lines. This likely aids readability for Japanese people, too. Important sentence information tends to come at the end of a Japanese sentence, and a relative clause, as we have here, puts the secondary information at the start.

So first, lets look at the important point of the sentence:

モンスター　も　戻って　きた
monsutaa mo modotte kita
[monsters also returning began]

The particle mo tells us the sentence is about the element that comes before it, and that what is said is also applicable to another similar element. In this case, monsters. We can think of it here as a “too” or “also” without worrying about the unspoken element (which is also monsters).

Modoru is a verb meaning “return” and kuru is a verb that means “come”. The basic usage of verb + te kuru considers kuru to be an auxiliary verb. It indicates the start or continuation to a point in time of an action. In that usage, we can think of this as “began to return”.

There is also another usage in which kuru is used as a main verb in addition to the preceding one. The nuance being that the indicated action is experienced by the speaker or someone that they empathise with. That is, the speaker is closely involved in the action mentioned. We could argue that this applies here; Aqua is the cause of this situation.

As there will be little change to the English in this example, it doesn’t matter too much which interpretation we go with. So, we’ll stick with the basic meaning, giving us: “Monsters are coming back”. Don’t worry about the missing mo, we’ll add that back later. For now, let’s compare what we have to the English localisation (also reduced to the same basics): “Monsters are coming”, and it’s clear the meaning of the primary verb (modoru) has been lost.

What about that secondary information?

爆裂魔法　に　驚いて　逃げ出した　モンスター
bakuretsu mahou ni odoroite nigedashita monsutaa
[explosion magic by scared and ran away monsters]

In this usage, the helpful particle ni marks what or who has caused the outcome being mentioned. We can generally think of it in such cases as being the same as the English “by”. So now we know that bakuretsu mahou or “explosion magic” has caused something.

Next, we have a couple of verbs, odoroku (surprised, scared) and nigedasu (run away, flee). When you want to join verbs together, the first verb is conjugated to its te form. The tense to be applied to the verbs is indicated with the last in the line. In this case, it’s in past form as we’re talking about a single catalyst event (Megumin’s latest casting of Explosion) that has already happened relative to the rest of the sentence.

Thanks to identifying the important information earlier, we know these verbs are acting on the monsters. That gives us: “monsters (who) are scared by and running away from the explosion magic”.

If we recall the English line used in the game, “monsters who didn’t get drawn in by the explosion”, an obvious problem jumps out at us when compared to the Japanese. That is, we have a complete reversal of what Explosion did! This English implies that Explosion caused monsters to come to where Kazuma and gang are, and that Aqua’s False Fire has summoned those that Explosion failed to bring in.

As a result, the English localisation completely misses the point that Aqua’s False Fire not only pulled in NEW monsters but also those that had just legged it for the hills in fear of being obliterated by Megumin’s Explosion.

Lastly, we have one piece of the sentence remaining.

わ。
wa

The wa particle used at the end of the sentence here is a marker of female speech; it has no direct English equivalent and for the purpose of this line, we can ignore it.

Let’s put it all together!

We could also go with:
Sure does! Look! Even monsters that fled Explosion are coming back!

I hope you found today’s Textbook Example interesting. Please join me next time as we dive into another line! Thanks for reading.