An idle word-magic journey Version 1.0 · iPhone and iPad

Write the word.
Awaken the road.

Begin beside a soft-pastel Water Sprite, then write Simplified Chinese to awaken more companions and shape meaning-matched magic while companions auto-attack. Active damage rises and fades in one readable vertical stream above the enemy, without labeling which ally caused each hit.

shuǐ 水 water

dà 大 Grow

Soft-pastel beginning · stained-glass finale · written word magic

A self-contained first chapter for adults and older teens beginning Mandarin

Ink Caravan

Water Sprite begins beside you and attacks once every second for one base damage while the app is active. You can also tap the active battlefield to deal one damage per tap. Combat and stage progress pause when Ink Caravan is closed, backgrounded, or otherwise not active. Writing is the accelerator: recall a companion’s defining word, strengthen a companion or spell, or complete a due review to turn practice into visible power.

Pinyin appears above visible Chinese throughout the game. Original ambient music accompanies each visual world. Tap the speaker for an available Simplified Chinese system voice at normal or slower speed—without recording your voice.

$9.99 USD 9.99 one-time paid download · no subscriptions or in-app purchases

200 stages Soft-pastel stages 1–100 · stained-glass stages 101–200

25 terms 44 distinct Simplified Chinese characters · Pinyin always visible

Offline No account, ads, analytics, tracking, or backend

Explore app support ↗

Two visual worlds

Pastel warmth becomes stained glass.

Soft-pastel monsters inhabit stages 1–100. Stained-glass monsters take over stages 101–200, ending with the adult boss in the moonlit church.

Active-screen idle

The trail moves while you are there.

Core battle, writing, companion strengthening, review, and saves work without a network connection. While Ink Caravan is active, companions attack automatically and each tap on the battlefield deals one damage; combat, boss regeneration, and stage progress stop whenever the app is inactive.

Clear companion combat

Every hit shares one readable lane.

The icon-only Caravan panel places two companion cards in each row, hides companion level labels, and calls the improvement action Strengthen. Active combat damage appears above the enemy as one lightly overlapping vertical stream of unsigned whole-number values; new values enter beneath older values, float a short distance, and fade without a minus sign, decimal, oval, or visible per-ally attribution.

Fourteen pastel allies

Write a name to grow the caravan.

Ink Caravan includes fourteen permanent soft-pastel allies: Water Sprite starts unlocked and thirteen later allies awaken by writing their defining names, including nine chapter-matched species-name allies introduced from stages 20 through 100.

Semantic word magic

Meaning becomes the effect.

Writing 来 calls an ally. Writing 大 enlarges companions. Each spell turns the word’s meaning into a visible game action.

Recall with support

Study, hide, retrieve.

New characters begin with a visible stroke guide, then move to recall. Assisted completion remains available, with reduced practice credit, when a learner gets stuck.

Persistent mastery

A new route keeps the words.

After the stage-200 adult boss is defeated, a new route resets combat progression while preserving vocabulary mastery and prior character exposure.

Private by construction

Your writing stays on the device.

Expected-character feedback runs locally. Raw strokes are not saved or transmitted, and the app has no developer-operated server.

What this chapter is

Ink Caravan is an original idle game with a focused written-recall layer. Its first chapter includes a 200-stage campaign, one starter plus thirteen unlockable permanent companions, eleven meaning-matched abilities, and twenty-five words or short phrases.

Stages 1–100 use soft-pastel scenery and monsters. Stages 101–200 shift into stained-glass environments and enemies. Within each ten-stage cycle, themed mobs fill stages 1–4 and 6–9, a junior boss appears at stage 5, and an adult boss appears at stage 10.

Nine proper species-name companions join that progression: Strawberry Hamster at stage 20, Cloud Sheep at 30, Dandelion Duck at 40, Honey Bee at 50, Clover Frog at 60, Bamboo Panda at 70, Acorn Squirrel at 80, Tulip Dancer at 90, and Coconut Crab at 100. Write each companion’s Simplified Chinese species name to awaken it.

What it is not

It is not a complete Mandarin course, grammar curriculum, official HSK product, fluency program, OCR tool, arbitrary handwriting recognizer, or calligraphy assessment. Practice uses bundled expected-character stroke templates, and mastery is tracked for each whole word or phrase.

System voice

Optional playback uses an available zh-CN system voice. Voice availability and pronunciation can vary by device. Ink Caravan has no spoken input or pronunciation grading.

Verified release facts

Core battle, writing, companion strengthening, review, and saves work without a network connection; combat and stage progress pause whenever the app is not active.
The launch curriculum practices 25 Simplified Chinese words and short phrases using 44 bundled expected-character stroke templates, not general handwriting recognition.
Ink Caravan includes fourteen permanent soft-pastel allies: Water Sprite starts unlocked and thirteen later allies awaken by writing their defining names, including nine chapter-matched species-name allies introduced from stages 20 through 100.
Active combat damage appears above the enemy as one lightly overlapping vertical stream of unsigned whole-number values; new values enter beneath older values, float a short distance, and fade without a minus sign, decimal, oval, or visible per-ally attribution.
Written words create immediate meaning-matched effects, such as 来 calling an ally and 大 enlarging companions.
After the stage-200 adult boss is defeated, a new route resets combat progression while preserving vocabulary mastery and prior character exposure.
Game and practice records stay in local app storage; Ink Caravan has no account, ads, analytics, tracking, or developer-operated backend.

Support

Gameplay, writing, audio, saves, and troubleshooting.

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Privacy

Exactly what stays on the device and what is never collected.

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Acknowledgements

Bundled Hanzi data attribution and complete license.

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