Hikaru Shidou, in the manga Mahou Kishi Rayearth, is a young girl from Tokyo who travels to the magical realm of Cephiro to become the Knight of Fire... we've already seen one of the other Maho Kishi in SoS. Which begs the question, just where is everyone's favorite scion of wealth/baker of sweets, Umi Ryuuzaki?

Berk Watkins
Student of Quantum Bogodynamics...

Um...not on screen yet? ;)

-- Juniper

"Lift the world's lid!" ... "For the Revolution of the Restaurant!"
-- Saionji and Miki

Solnoid-

Still stuck in the Bowels of Hell that is Camp Roberts, CA.

she's off stage right, waiting for Q

It's not the same one as is mentioned in Checkmate; it's not the same lake. The one in Checkmate isn't on an island, it's on the shore of Vortigern's Lake, which is a good two hundred miles from New Avalon and much, much smaller than Lake Daniels.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/

It's not necessary background so much as it was an attempt on my part to do a -short- UF piece. *sigh* I better stick with the 400K & up monsters, looks like.

Redneck

Red wizard needs money badly...
www.wlpcomics.com
White Lightning Productions - don't tell the Pope

Good - nice, moderately developed (for an introductory piece) characters, a good (if short) plot, and an interesting direction for future writing.

Not so good - lack of any real context. Who are these people, why are they important, and why should we (the readers) care about them? How does this relate to the rest of the documented parts of the UF universe (no pun intended or implied).

I like short stories - they're often the glue that binds the longer ones together, and/or the spice that adds flavor to the epics. And I think this one works as a short story - it's just out of place without something more to attach to - whether long or short.

You've created a rather interesting character here, one that I like, who fits into the general pattern of UF rather nicely - she's human (even if she isn't biologically), and she's someone I'd like to see more of. So the question now is what, Redneck-san, are you going to do with her? She has the potential to fit in with the rest of the Duelists at DSM if Gryphon wanted, or she could interact with him on a martial arts-related level, or she could branch out on her own.

No matter what size it is, I hope your muse sees fit to write more of her. And I'll happily read whatever you do post when it arrives!

Offsides

#include <elaboration.h>

#91;...#93; in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.
-- David Ben Gurion
EPU RCW #pi;
#include <stdsig.h>

You know, It took me a while to realize it, but Offsides hit it right on the head... Its a very good piece, it just feels incomplete without understanding how its going to tie into the rest of UF. I had the same problem with Type Mismatch error.

___________________

Jer told Vaughn about me. I am once again a victim of Murphy's law...

I'm just talking here, but the impression I got is they're gathering the Rayearth Knights in New Avalon. Or it could just be cosmic coincidence, or Red deciding to do something with Hikaru, since Fuu's around after all. Definitely feel it's a story that will lead to something, and a good beginning. BTW, Redneck, the New Avalon filk was cute, I liked that B-)

TRB

"You are... what you do... when it counts." -The Masao

If I didn't make the reader care about Hikaru Shidou, without regard to any greater UF connections, or if I didn't make the reader a tiny bit more aware of what life is like for a new arrival in New Avalon, then I've failed as a writer with this story.

>You've created a rather interesting character here, one that I like,
>who fits into the general pattern of UF rather nicely - she's
>human (even if she isn't biologically), and she's someone I'd
>like to see more of. So the question now is what, Redneck-san, are
>you going to do with her? She has the potential to fit in with the
>rest of the Duelists at DSM if Gryphon wanted, or she could interact
>with him on a martial arts-related level, or she could branch out on
>her own.

I personally have no plans to do a sequel about Hikaru's further adventures in New Avalon, if that's what you're asking.

Redneck

Red wizard needs money badly...
www.wlpcomics.com
White Lightning Productions - don't tell the Pope

Did I spell that right?

I would like to see more of these characters, but if there's no intent on continuation, that's life.

On the bright side, we did see the difficulties and culture shocks associated with packing up and starting completely over, though I'd guess over half the issues were from a lack of open mind about the occasion.

Eh, guess I'm rambling again. I'll cut it short here.

IMO, you did that just fine.

>
>I personally have no plans to do a sequel about Hikaru's further
>adventures in New Avalon, if that's what you're asking.
>

I'm just hoping to see more of Hikaru. Some time, anyway. I like the character, and I hope that she's got an interesting future planned for her.

Peter Eng
--
No hurry, I've got five years I can spend doing other stuff. Maybe six.

You did for this reader, but, at the same time, you've got the whole weight of this universe's inertia going against you. So it's not surprising that readers are wondering about Hikaru's connection to the larger UFiverse, especially since Fuu has already shown up.

> or if I didn't make the reader a tiny
>bit more aware of what life is like for a new arrival in New Avalon,

That you most definitely did, especially in regards to nonhumans having to deal with the quirks and peculiarities of a locality built around the expectations and ideas of a particular branch of Terran humanity.

So you haven't failed here; what you've mostly run into is the fact that almost all of the EPU works released this calendar year have been Symphony of the Sword, and it requires a major mental shift to overcome that inertia on the part of the reader, especially when there are cues within the story that can be interpreted as connecting it to the UF metaplot more strongly than it is.

-- Sean --

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