Hi, Morgan! ^_^
Hi, Latin D! ^_^
> I hope to say farewell to those formatting problems. Also, I can make
the
> chapters as big as I want again!
Good news, indeed. And there were no formatting problems that I could
notice.
So my plan was succesful. Now, I shall RULE THE WORLD!!!! <insert fiendish,
maniacal laughter>
Er, wait a minute... I think that was my OTHER plan... But it is good to
know that my formatting has cleared up. ^_^
> Okay, that's over with. Let the fic begin!
What about...
> But first... I feel I should inform you that previous Ronin Summer
story
> arcs are available at my webpage,
> http://dataraven_659.tripod.com/roninsummer.html
> and at my mirrorpage,
> http://www.geocities.com/Area51Underworld/4709/roninsummer1.html
Ah, here it is! I was worried for a moment there. ^_^
> (See? I CAN remember, if you just remind me often enough!)
Heh. I've succeeded!
Only partially, my good friend. We still have to see if I can remember to
make it a habit. ^_^ Still, I'm sure you won't hesitate to remind me if I
slip up again...
> Now, let's get on with the fic, shall we?
Please!
Before anything else, I want to say that these comments are strictly
IMHO,
so you're allowed to cover your ears and sing loudly if I say something
you
don't like.
Never! I am more than happy to listen to what you have to say. Odds are, I'm
already kicking myself for missing most of it. ^_^
BTW, I forgot to include this in my last C&C, and in doing so I proved
that
we ALL can make mistakes. ^_^
As I am about to prove with both style and panache! ^_~
<SNIP TO THE BEGINNING>
> Chapter Three : Desperate Measures
>
> The sun was just barely beginning its climb over the horizon,
> pinkish haze struggling against the grimy, smoke-filled sky and shadowy
> clouds. Even dawn was a battle in the Dark Kingdom. The first fingers
> of light inched their way along the courtyard of a gutted castle,
> smoke still curling seductively from every open window. The light
> passed over several armoured forms, lying on the cobblestones and
> slowly releasing the last tendrils of black mist from their shattered
> bodies. Broken weapons scattered the ground like pine needles in a
> forest, and a slight breeze toyed listlessly with the tattered remnants
> of a battle standard still clutched in the deathgrip of one yauja.
Beautiful opening, my friend. The aftermath of a battle in all its glory.
Thank you! Mother and her troops don't exactly believe in leaving much
behind, you know. Besides, I've always had a taste for showing the aftermath
of battles and letting my readers guess at the kinds of things that must
have taken place.
I just don't do it often because I know it bugs them. ^_^
But I can't help but wonder whether the Dark Kingdom lost too easily. We
haven't even met all of the 'siblings' yet!
It was simple tactics. This is only about a week after Inner Battles 12,
after all, and most of the yauja at the castle were already weakened from
battling Jadeite. The youma army was just as decimated, and most of them
were disbanded and sent home. (I had Rajura and Kayura talking about this
back in DC 1. I believe she mentions to him that the forces are spread a
little thin).
Mother and her siblings attacked when nobody was expecting them, and had
more soldiers on hand. They may have captured the castle, but the rest of
the Dark Kingdom is still unharmed.
For now.
Poor Masho...
Keep reading, it gets a LOT worse... ^_^
<TINY SNIP>
> "She has been gone for nearly eight hours!" Thraw protested,
> "and I cannot be expected to lead this search alone!"
Here you should use either
...hours," Thaw...
or
...protested. "And...
as the exclamation point signals the ending of a sentence.
Good point! Usually, I don't miss things like that. I guess staying up until
five in the morning typing a chapter kind of guarantees more than the usual
mistakes, huh?
<MINI-SNIP>
> "You do realise," he said, "that if the GREAT Pedri should grow
> impatient, it will be your turn to report to him. Perhaps he'll take
> your other ear, this time, just to complete his collection."
So Pedri chopped off his ear? With brothers like that, who needs enemies?
^_^
This is not a very loving family, in case the scene with Erdge and Pedri at
the end of chapter two wasn't enough of a hint...
> After all, we don't want him returning to a castle that is no longer
> ours, do we?" She gestured, and a large gateway rose from the ground,
> framing a swirling maelstrom of shapes and colours.
Why doesn't she ask the Yoroiden for help? Or the Senshi, for that
matter.
They've all become sort of friends, right?
Naaza has top priority. He could be going "home" any minute, and Rajura and
Anubis have to stop him before Mother and her army grab him. If they were
busy trying to find the Yoroiden and the Senshi, they might miss him.
If it makes you feel better, though, I'll have Kayura mention that they
should get any help they can find, if there's time after they locate Naaza.
> Anubis still looked concerned, but slowly began to inch towards
> the portal Kayura had opened. Rajura reached into his sleeve and
> drew out a handful of what appeared to be eggs. Passing them to Kayura,
> he spoke quickly.
Where does he get those eggs from? Spiders may lay eggs, but I can't...
believe...
Eewwww! That's disgusting! ^_~
Wow. THERE'S a mental image I could have done without, my friend. O_O
Actually, eggshell bombs were a traditional tool used by most ninja. Just an
ordinary chicken egg, opened, emptied, filled with pepper (or some other
powders), and then sealed back together with wax. Rajura seems the type to
use them, don't you think?
As for where he keeps them, they're probably just up his sleeves. Like
Mousse
and his many, many, many weapons.
> "What," Kayura asked, as she pointed at the last egg Rajura
> held, "about the red one?"
>
> "The red one," Rajura said as he held it out to her, "goes
> boom. Be VERY careful with the red one. Do you understand me?"
"Sure, no problem," said Kayura and grabbed the red egg. Or tried to, as
it
slipped through her fingers and began its short descent towards the
waiting
floor...
Mother now ruled the Dark Kingdom.
^_^
Not much in the way of plot, but it'd certainly be unexpected, right?
Well, that WOULD make this one of the longest spamfics ever written... but I
think the crowd with the pitchforks and torches would have a small problem
with me doing it, so I'll just keep on with the original plot, thanks. ^_^
> The yoroi had been almost embarassingly easy to locate, Kayura
Finally, a typo: 'embarrassingly'
^_^
I did mention that I was typing this at three in the morning, right? Thanks
for the save, and I will fix. ^_^
> reflected as she tucked the three glowing orbs into her rags, not
> that she was complaining. Their invaders must not have searched any of
> the upper floors yet, or else hadn't realized the importance of three
> coloured gems with glowing kanji embedded in them.
You use British English, right? I think you should use 'realised' then.
<sigh> I do use British English, since I am a Canadian. It doesn't help that
my spell-checker is in American, and keeps correcting me when I'M right. One
of the reasons I stopped using the darned thing.
Which is a long way of saying "Thanks! Will fix!" ^_^
> Crouching, she kept her body low and tried to follow the path of her
> opponent's weapon with her eyes. The manner in which Vyne spun and
> twirled the length of chain was making it all but impossible for her
> to tell where his next strike would cone from, but she thought... she
Typo: 'come'.
Why so it is! What the heck is that doing in there? Rest assured, I'll have
it caught, tagged, and released back into the wild before I post this to my
web page.
> This, of course, was exactly the move he had been waiting for
> her to perform. With a frim tug from his right hand, he threw her off
Typo: firm
That's _three_ in 20 kb!
Nya nya! ^_^
I deserved that, I suppose. Ah well, what's a guy to do? Other than fix it,
of course, which is already as good as done. ^_^
> balance and pulled her arm away from her body, even as his left hand
> sent the second weight straight for the bridge of her nose. The entire
> maneuver had taken him all of ten seconds, and Kayura barely had time
The same here. In British English, it believe it's 'manoeuvre'.
Darn! It is indeed, or rather it should be. I guess when I go without sleep,
I start typing in American. ~_~
I normally wouldn't point out things these (as I really don't care), but
some of my readers usually advice me to keep consistent in this kind of
thing. Don't worry, I believe it isn't important at all. No person in his
right mind will stop reading because of something like this. ^_^
You are totally in the right, my friend! I usually do my best to avoid this
error, but I guess I slipped up this time around. Happens to the best of us,
I guess, although none of them are ever willing to admit it on the record...
> The object tumbled free from her rags, and she smiled
> behind the cloth that covered her face. That smile fell as she gently
> groped the object she held. Not even a yoroi sphere at all, let alone
> hers. It was another of Rajura's eggs.
Which makes me ask: why didn't she use her yoroi in the first place? She
would have had a much better chance fighting him with it.
Easy : Kayura still had to find and rescue her captured people. She was
trying to be subtle, and whatever else the Oni Yoroi has going for it, it's
as subtle as a hydrogen bomb. If she could beat Vyne quickly and quietly,
she would prefer to. She used the yoroi later because she had already been
found out, and was trying to buy time for everybody to escape.
> At the last second, she gasped as she realised the colour of the
> egg she had thrown. She made sure to hold that gasp as Vyne lifted his
> wing to shield himself again...
>
> ...And the blue shell shattered against his feathered appendage
Have I ever told you I tend to nitpick? Sorry.
I think you ought to write '...and the', as it's a continuing the
previous
sentence.
Okay, if you say so. I capitalised because it was the start of a new
paragraph. Reasons like this are why I bought that Webster's Writing Guide
yesterday...
> "What have you..." Vyne stopped in mid-word and shook his head
> like a wet dog, sinking down to his elbows. "Have," he tried again,
> "you... done... y-you... littl..."
Poor Vyne. He's just lost an ear... or maybe a wing. An eye? Your choice,
Morgan--or actually, Pedri's choice. ^_^
Nope. Remember what Vyne said? It's THRAW'S turn to report. Pedri is the
kind of guy who shoots the messenger. That's why Thraw said what he said a
bit later on, about how "Things go wrong, and I get blamed..."
> She wasn't exactly certain how many more there were to
> go, but she wasn't worried. After all, there were three eggs left...
> and she still had her stick.
Not to say anything about that little yoroi she seems to have forgotten
all
about...
She hasn't forgotten about it. She's just saving her big gun for later, when
she's REALLY going to need it.
<SNIP>
> "Sound the alarm!" He bellowed at the soldiers waiting for him
> in the hallway. Reaching out, he grabbed one and pulled its face close
> to his. "Inform Pedri that we have intruders," he snarled, "and tell
> him that their heads will be on his desk by dawn."
Pedri has a desk? Wow, he isn't a villan, he's a bureaucrat! ^_^
I'm sorry, I have to say it...
There's a difference? ^_^
<SNIP-SNIP!>
> "Yeah," Icestorm said absently. "I mean, unless you, you know,
> count that secret tunnel that Spidey dug in there. And he never tells
> anybody about those!" Noticing the stares she was getting from her
> sisters, the blue-haired girl shrugged. "What? I was stealing some
> cookies from the cookie jar, and I, like, saw him hooking up the door.
> People tune me out. Sometimes they forget I'm there."
When one remembers that Icestorm is Amy's counterpart, one can't help but
wonder what the heck went wrong during the cloning... Because something
went
REALLY wrong.
I don't know. Maybe they took her out before she was done. She seems a
little half-baked to me... ^_~
<SSSSNIP>
> Finally, she found the items she had been looking for. "Shien,
> take Shouen and Kokuen and scout ahead of us. Make sure these bastards
> haven't found the tunnels!" If they had, she thought to herself, then
> Rajura, Anubis, and Naaza were all as good as dead.
And if she kept throwing their yoroi around the room like that, they
would
be in great danger.
She's busy looking for HER yoroi. She isn't really thinking about Anubis or
Rajura's yoroi at the moment. She's probably chuck a Faberge Egg over her
shoulder if she stumbled across it at the moment. She probably owns one,
too.
> Lifting her left hand, she threw the brown egg against the
> floor. As the thick purple smokescreen began to fill the corridor, she
> lifted the second item she held into the air. The kanji of 'Loyalty'
> shone briefly from both the golden orb in her hand and from her own
> forehead as she spoke.
>
> "BUSSO, ONI!"
Ah, here it is. Now we get to see Kayura kick some asses!
But of course! I couldn't very well give Kayura the whole chapter and not
let her kick some asses! It would be OOC! ^_^
<SNIP>
> "Allow me the privelege of silencing this fool, good Baien."
Typo: privilege
Nuts! Believe me, it's fixed! ^_^
<'NOTHER SNIP>
> Baien landed on the floor. His helmet had cracked wide open,
> and he looked down at himself as Thraw continued to pound on the empty
> shell. A thick cloud of black writhed around the two forms, and Baien
> felt a slight twinge of regret.
>
> After that, he felt nothing at all.
That you've made me feel sorry for a youja shows how good this scene was.
Good work!
Thanks. If it helps any, Baien knew he didn't have a chance against Thraw.
He was just hoping to keep the guy busy long enough for Kayura to escape.
The real shame is that even after he did that, she still didn't get away.
<SNIP>
> A swift kick to the leg of one creature drove its knee back the
> wrong way with a satisfying splintering sound, and the fiend dropped.
> The five of its allies that tried to take advantage of her ditraction
Typo: distraction
The worst part is that I noticed this myself exactly forty seconds after
sending the chapter. Don't you hate when that happens? ^_^
> were quickly introduced to the clawed weight that hung on the end of
> her kusari-gama. Tugging on the chain, Kayura retrieved the weight
> and plunged her scythe through the torn fabric that covered one
> creature's ribcage. The weight flew through the air again, and a
> skull cracked like an egg.
>
> "My Empress!" Yoen raced towards her, spinning his bisento like
> a giant propeller and hacking a path through the swarm of black bodies
> that seperated him from his ruler. "This enemy seems endless! Baien
Typo: separated
Ergh, another one! Where do these come from? I'd swear they aren't here when
I send these things... I blame the Typo Gnomes. ^_^
> Kayura smiled grimly. "Head for the kitchen, Yoen! Takenoko and
> I are right behind you!" She lifted her weight above head and hurled
> it into the floor. "QUAKE WITH FEAR!" An intricate web of chains
> burst from the ground and tore through the foes before her. Yoen
> raced for the kitchen, and Kayura peered through the forest of metal
> links until she saw the giant form of Takenoko picking his way
> towards her. Other than a gentle rain of crimson slime, they seemed
> to be alone in the halway. She guessed that these creatures were a
Who needs a spell-checker when Latin_D is reading? ^_^
Me, apparently. ^_^
Typo: hallway
So noted.
> Kayura leapt forward, bringing her scythe blade up for a lethal
> blow. Thraw suddenly whipped his arm in front of her, and the blade
> dug deeply into his flesh. With a laugh, Thraw pulled the weapon from
> her hands, reaching up and grabbing a fistfull of her overcoat.
I think it's 'fistful'.
Yes, it is. I leaned on the "l" key a second too long. That's what happens
when you type too fast, people!
> He hurled her down the hall, and then tossed Takenoko over his
> shoulder. The minotaur landed with a soid thud, and Thraw quickly
Typo: solid
And sometimes, you hit a key that sticks and doesn't register. Another
valuble lesson in not typing too quickly!
> Thraw grinned and beckoned for Kayura to come closer. Behind
> him, the smokescreen was beginning to dissipate. The young empress
> glanced down at her empty hands, then over at the kusari-gama, which
> lay by Thraw's feet. Takenoko was definitely down, his head lolling
> from side to side as he lay on the floor. Thraw smirked and beckoned
> again.
>
> Kayura threw the red egg.
...and everything went boom.
Technically, I believe it was a KA-boom. ^_^
Well, this is it for a new chapter of this wonderful series. I want more,
Morgan!
Then more you shall have, my friend! I'm already plowing into chapter four,
in which Rajura and Anubis begin searching for Naaza, and some actual Sailor
Senshi show up. Hey, this is a Sailor Moon cross-over! It was bound to
happen eventually, right?
Another great chapter, Morgan. For a moment I wondered about Kayura's
sanity, seeing her apparent reluctance to use her yoroi, but other than
that, I loved it, as always. I can't wait to meet the rest of Mother's
children (Tuls and Tytoung, if I remember correctly), or to see what
happened with Naaza. Has he gotten the girl to like him? Has he eaten
her?
^_^
Well, Tuls and Tytoung ought to be worth the wait, but they won't be showing
up right away. As for Naaza... well, you'll have to wait until chapter five
to see how old Snake-eyes is doing for himself.
Please, my friend, keep writing. And keep the chapter coming!
It's a deal! You just keep working on Silent Battles, got it? I'm waiting
for your next chapter!
Bye and good luck,
Thank you and farewell, my friend. Your C&C was as welcome and appreciated
as ever.
Ja ne!
-Morgan Hudson
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