A Note from the Author



Well, that's it, "Crimson String Book I: Siblings of the Sword" has come to a close. I hope you readers have enjoyed reading this fic, I certainly enjoyed writing it. Anyway, the entire trilogy was originally intended to only be thirty chapters long, but I scrapped that idea because I didn't want to make another "Twin Dragon Arc" (which was my first Rurouni Kenshin fan fic written three years ago) which was all compact and things were rushed. As a result, I had to split the concept into three books in order to get every single detail down without rushing things. The entire "Crimson String" trilogy is actually just one episode for a four part series with Mina called "The Mina No Ryu Saga." "Twin Dragon Arc" was supposed to be episode 2 of the entire four part series, but it will no longer be part of the story as I will be rewriting it so that it will be more detailed and include scenes I couldn't put in the original, such as a fight between Misanagi and Misao and a brand new villain. The "Twin Dragon Arc" remake will be under the new title of "Twin Dragons" (the name may change if I can think of something better), it will be written at the same time as "Crimson String Book III: End of the Line" as both fics are on the very same time line.

There are a few things I'd like to point out on the characters of this book. Mina's real name, Tachibana Minako, is actually a tribute to two characters; Tachibana Ukyo from the Samurai Showdown games and Minako (A.K.A. Sailor Venus) from Sailor Moon. Mina's character design (yes, I have made sketches of her and some of the original characters, if you want to see them leave you e-mail along with a review [the files are about 1500 kb so a normal hotmail account probably can't hold it]) is based on three characters; Himura Kenshin's (obviously) basic form and speech patterns, Baiken from Guilty Gear X for her kimono design and scar placement, and Mitsurugi Ryoko from Samurai Girl Real Bout High School for her basic form and bad temper. Azumi Shion's name is a tribute to two characters; Azumi came from Kiribyashi Azumi from Samurai Girl Real Bout High School, and Shion came from Uzuki Shion from the upcoming RPG, Xenosaga. Shion's design was based off numerous characters, some I don't even know their names but have found pictures of them on the net. The only characters' names I can remember that she's based off of are Kiribyashi Azumi from Samurai Girl Real Bout High School (obviously), and Naru from Love Hina (I dunno, it's mainly their "antenna hair" I copy from, other than that, Shion looks pretty original to me). Kajima Tetsu was a character I borrowed from my sister, you readers may remember him from her fic titled "All I See is Black and White," although he's less of a jerk (if he even is a jerk at all in this fic) than he is in her fic. His appearance is basically the same as the one he was given in "All I See is Black and White," but he's not as muscular and he's obviously not some angry drunken guy, plus both of his eyes are black. Misanagi the Flying Arrow is not of my own creation, she was in the actual Rurouni Kenshin anime in the "Divine Elixir Arc." She was a pretty cool character, although the storyline to the "Divine Elixir Arc" was terrible, I just had to make up for that by putting her in my fics.

Well, I guess you're all tired of reading my ranting and all that, so I guess I'll let you go. Well don't leave just yet, on the next page are some random snippets of the next two books, along with snippets of "When Angels Lost Their Wings" (co-written by Crystal of ff.net) and the rest of the "Mina No Ryu Saga." I'm not telling you which snippet's from which fic, you'll have to figure that out for yourself. So other than that, that's it for now, see you all in "Crimson String Book II: A Rurouni's Path." Later!