You Like?

Written 9PM 03/15/2016

Before forgetting, I wanted to write some notes about this story, so I can post these when the judging is finally done. Because judging usually takes a long time.

First, I would like to thank all the judges for reading and then giving their honest opinion of this work, and secondly I would like to thank my two betas Glow and Nuclear once more. The work is a lot better because of you two.

Moon’s Corral has been a work in progress since 09/14/2014, though I never actually wrote anything until the contest started. It all began from this:

http://bosel.blog64.fc2.com/blog-entry-2987.html

Basically, its was a thought experiment on jbbs about “What would a Nasuverse version of the Kaguyahime look like?” At that point, Kaguyahime was already confirmed to exist in the Nasuverse, via CCC. One theory in this thread was that she was a True Ancestor who came down to Japan from the Millennium Castle. Her mystic eyes charmed all her suitors, and her blood, being able to create Dead Apostles was the elixir of immortality.

It was this last part that served as the starting point for my story. Instead of creating Dead Apostles, what if the blood of the Moon could cure the bloodlust of vampires? And what if you tied it back to Tsuki no Sango? With this idea, I flipped through the manga to see just what each suitor was after and found one was after a tree wearing sapphires. Lightbulb, there’s one in South America. And the story was born.

The title came from a store that I never go to but always see. It’s called Corral. It sounded a lot like Coral, so I thought it’d be funny. When I actually looked up what Corral meant and tried to apply it the premise in my mind, I came up with The Fird and the ability to write out The Fourth magic from my story which would make things a lot easier. The title itself refers to The Fird, the situation the suitors are in, as well as the Princess’s situation.

Conceptually, Tsuki no Sango is said to be “Tsukihime 3000” and “Kaguyahime,” what I tried to do was write a “Far Side,” of that, to create a story about the suitors of Kaguyahime and the reasons why they all are courting her. In that sense I had hoped to write the “application” of the love that was described in Tsuki no Sango. At the same time, the events of Tsuki no Ori are happening parallel to Tsuki no Sango. The story starts the same night Tsuki no Sango starts and ends in the middle of Tsuki no Sango.

With that in mind, I tried to recycle the themes of Tsuki no Sango in Tsuki no Ori – the declining world and humanity having given up. It turns out that love is what saves the world in Tsuki no Sango, creating a chance for humanity to flourish once more. In Tsuki no Ori, it’s love that destroys the world, yet at the same creating the possibility of change, to break out of the stagnation. This world will not move to the Land of Steel. This is definitely not a Notes x Tsuki no Sango crossover, this story is just an explanation of what the suitors in the Tsuki no Sango manga did. Also, the Sisters do end up beating ORT. I have no idea how they would do it, or how many die; however, since Tsuki no Sango lasts for about a month and Tsuki no Ori is just one day, the world definitely survived. Neither does The Thirst end up converting the entirety of the planet’s soul into magical energy. The planet is definitely closer to death than it was, but it’s not dead, therefore, ORT’s confusion.

In giving a reason why the five suitors have access to Magic, it just worked out that way. In the beginning, one would have Avenger, Enhance’s sword and another used Demonaition, other than The Fird, the others were pretty much a mess. At one point, I wanted to even give someone projection. That’s when I realized, instead of projection, I could give him a fragment of the First, and like that I rattled out the other Magics because I realized 5 Magics, 5 suitors. However, if they all had Magic where would the Magic come from? Six Sisters, five suitors. So what are the Sisters doing? What is the Sixth Sister doing? Etc etc. And like that the story started to mature.

The final piece of the story was the motivations of each of the suitors. The Forth was easy; since he would use The Second, I decided to pay homage to the mentality of the seers in the Nasuverse from Mirai Fukuin. When Solomon hit the shelves I was kind of spooked, but I decided to roll with it anyway. The Forth was created to be beaten by The Fifth, but who would be the Fifth? I couldn’t decide that until the end. I knew that my antagonist had to be the one to face The Fird in the final act. He would also need enough power to defeat a dragon and he would also have to fight this guy who could replicate himself. I gave him The Third after remembering about souls. So then who would use Blue? Well The First was going to be a zealot trying to have Crimson Moon back. The Second was going to be a seer. The Third was the antagonist. The Fourth, the protagonist. So then the Fifth had to be Arishima.

The Thirst’s motivations didn’t come until the first part was written. His entire character came to me on a plane ride. It was quite cathartic. Sounds really pretentious. What he does against the Fifth was something that I should probably explain. After Anthropology one day, I decided to ask GD if bacteria have souls. Siriel said that because they don’t have self-recognition, then they don’t. And then mew and me started talking about if vampires even have a microbiome. During this discussion, I remembered something from Case Files.

Spoiler:

霊。
ただし、これは一般で考えられているような魂とは別のものだ。かつての人格パターンを記録として残しただけ のエネルギー、と言った方がいいだろうか。中国のタオイズムで一般的な認識であり、精神を支える「魂」と肉 体を支える「魄」は明確に区別して扱われ、大地にへばりつけのは「魄」とされている。
この場合のれいとは、まさしく「魄」であった。

Spoiler:

Spirit.
It is generally considered something that is different from the soul. It's okay to think of it as the energy of the remaining record of a person's personality. In China's Taoism, it's generally recognized that the soul supports the mind, and the SOUL supports the body, treating the two with a clear distinction. It is believed that the SOUL is the one that clings to the earth.
In this case, it is obvious it was the SOUL.

Heaven’s Feel is

materialization of the soul

魂の物質化

. But I liked the idea so I decided to include

SOUL

魄

as well, having The Thirst convert his microbiome’s SOULs into magical energy. I have no idea if Heaven’s Feel actually affects the SOUL.

The Fird was the last character that was named. There are no good homophones for Third. However, I found this picture book about a fish, bird hybrid called a Fird, and since the Fird can turn into whatever animal he wants, it was perfect. I have no idea where Judge would get a Regression. Yes, that was an asspull.

As an aside, Ekidney is not a typo, ekidney sounds like a mistake someone would make, and The Thirst is definitely someone who would make such a mistake.

That valley created at the end of the story is meant to juxtapose the crystal valley ORT lives in that’s right next to it. Also, it refers to an inverse Mt. Fuji where the Emperor burnt the drug of immortality Kaguyahime gave him. It is the end of the Kaguyahime myth as well as this story, in one the emperor abandons immortality because of loneliness, here the opposite happens.

Either way, thanks for reading this entire blog post if you kept with it and I hoped you enjoyed the story. Questions, comments, feedback, are appreciated.