I created this story five years ago, with a friend. It had a simple plot: in 1566, Samurai warrior Kytoro Minamyoto slew his rival, the half-demon Yoshiro. Twenty years later, Yoshiro returns from the grave to seek revenge, by killing Kyotoro's family, leading Kyotoro to seek revenge against Yoshiro. We made a short film, starring us as the two samurai (me as Kytoro, him as Yoshiro). A year later, we made two sequels, "Sorrow of the Samurai 2: the ressurections" and "Sorrow of the Samurai 3: all hell breaks loose". We started a fourth, "the final battle", but never got past the first two scenes. Overall, it was cool. Simplistic, but cool. Now, I am restarting the story, and adding a much greater plot. First off, I have created a whole mythology to go along with the story: In the beginning, two omnipotent deities, called the Constant Primaries, created the universe. Out of this, they shaped Earth to be the perfect environment for thier great experiment: humanity. The various conflicts of humankind would shape the destinies of life itself. One conflict would shape the destiny of all mankind. There will be two great warriors, the Destructor of Man, and the Savior of Man. These two warriors are the only creatures whose fate is not known, not even by the Constant Primaries, Time and Nature. After creating life, and allowing natural cycles of evolution to take it's course, the Primaries created a pantheon of Gods, to govern various aspects of nature, the elements, and behavior. At the top rung are the Elder Gods, representing the main elements of the world: Fire, Earth, Water, Weather,and Wind. Next are the Major gods. These consist of various subsidary roles of the elder gods, such as the four winds, subserviant to the Elder God of Wind, or stone and fauna, subserviant to the Elder God of Earth, or Raijen and Denjin, thunder and lightning aspects of the weather, in additon to other major aspects of life, the God of War, and Death, better known as the Grim Reaper, as well as the god of the Sun. Next, are the minor gods, who govern various aspects of the beavior of living beings, such as Hades (Lord of the Underworld and God of Darkness), or the goddess of love, or the god of greed, and the god of the Arts. Then, there are demigods, very powerful beings capable of death, but very hard to kill. They hold no real dominion over any aspect, but act more as messengers between the gods and humanity, taking the forms of Prophets (Buddha, Confuscious. in our history) or as Antiprophets (Abraham, Iesus, Moses, in our history). The demigods have influenced human beliefs greatly. After demigods are living beings, immortal and mortal. Vampires, High-Demons and High-Beats are immortal, but can die from decapitation. Mortals, of course, can die. All mortal beings have a spirit, or a soul, which is taken by the Reaper to the underworld to be judged according to thier actions, rather than beliefs. In addition, every mortal's death is determined by fate. Whatever happens inbetween is entirely up to the living thing, but they are going to die when fate determines them to. The only two creatures whose deaths are not known by fate are the Destructor and the Savior, Yoshiro and Kyotoro respectively. The story actually begins in the midst of a war between two great alliances near the end of 1562 to early 1563, and the first part of the story is actually a prequel to Sorrow of the Samurai, entitled "War of the Samurai". One alliance is the Bushido Alliance, Clan Takeda, Clan Hojo, Clan Mori, Clans Imagawa and Tokugawa, and a few smaller clans and factions. Takeda's top general, a great warrior named Kyotoro Minamyoto, is the protagonist of the story. They oppose the Demon Alliance, led by Oda Nobunaga, and his allies Uesugi and Shimazu, and a few smaller daimyo. The half-demon Yoshiro is Uesugi's top general. Through the story, the Bushido alliance defeats Yoshiro's troops and finally besieges Oda's castle at Kyoto, leading Oda and his family to commit suicide, mostly because Shimazu defects of the B.A, as does Hideyoshi. Once Oda, the Demon Lord, is slain, the allied armies march towards Uesugi, taking it easily. The two forces have a major showdown at the island of Sado. In this battle, Kytoro beheads Yoshiro. Twenty years later, 1585, Hades continues his plot to conquer the earth with a human as a proxy leader. To this end, he ressurects Yoshiro. Yoshiro comes back to the earth with assorted demonic powers, and slays Kyotoro's family. Kyotoro,now a respectable dignitary and nobleman in Kyoto, returns to find his home gutted by fire, his farmlands ablaze, and his family and fieldhands slaughtered. He embarks on a quest of revenge that takes him from Kyoto to Kyushu, and to the ancestral manor of Yoshiro's family. It is in the courtyard of that castle that the final battle is waged, which ends in Yoshiro's, again, decapitation, and Kyotoro committing seppuku to rejoin his family in elysium. Two years later, 1587, a demon sorcerer ressurects Yoshiro, who kills him. Yoshiro then travels to the Gates of Hell in Mount Fuji, and enters hell. Around the same time, a distant cousin of Kyotoro ressurects him, and informs him that he and a small group of warriors devoted to defending Japan agains the demon hordes, had seen Yoshiro. Kyotoro then goes after his rival. Meanwhile, in hell, Yoshiro murders Hades, and absorbs his power. This makes Yoshiro a full-fledged demon, and a very poweful one at that. He takes command of hell, after a short conflict with Hades' son, who flees to exile in the heavens. Yoshiro and Kyotoro fight a short duel, during which Kyotoro is wounded, and goes into hiding. This is when Yoshiro brings his demon army into Japan, and consolidates his power, assassinating the Emperor, and holding the Imperial Family hostage, and destroying the armies of the Japanese. He then invades Korea, and sweeps through China, Southeast Asia, Siberia, and Central Asia. Kyotoro comes out of hiding to confront Yoshiro, and in another battle, Kyotoro's left arm is severed. He flees, and hides, again. I will get back to you about the third part, for it deserves a full post all it's own.
Now. Part Three. "All Hell Breaks Loose", or, as I am calling it now, "Hell's War". It starts off with Yoshiro obtaining the Black Diamond Armor, an immensely powerful armor, with dark powers, and it enhances Yoshiro's power exonentially. After Kyotoro goes into hiding with a small band of followers, Yoshiro initiates his grand strategy. In 1595, he forces the gates of hell in the other continents open, and sends his demon hordes across the plains, and into Russia. The Russians are overcome quickly, but bloodily, and soon Poland is the next target of invasion. The fleeing Russian soldiers and refugees join Polish and Lithuanian forces and fight against the massive Demonic Armies of Yoshiro, who now has a loyal apprentice, heir, and top General, a silent and deadly Chinese demon-warrior known as Dark Alden, who has ashy black skin, and dresses in a pitch-black ninja uniform. He has trained Dark Alden to use dark energies to lethal precision and power. Another one of Yoshiro's top henchmen is the fire demon Develin, the son of the God of Fire. Because of this, the God of Fire supports Yoshiro, as does the Gods of weather, lightning, greed, spite, strife, war, and chaos. The other gods take a stand against Fire, and a war erupts between the other gods, and the etherial planes are now filled with battle, assassination, and destruction. The Constant Primaries do not get involved, and simply watch, and they know that no one will attempt to fight them, seeing as how they could obliterate all life and even existence as we know it. Most notably, Death himself fights alongside the other gods, in opposition to Yoshiro. Death, as a force of nature, wants to maintain the balance between life and death, and Yoshiro's war is creating an influx of dead, upsetting the balance. On earth, the war drags on across Poland, Russia, and the Balkans. Protestants and Catholics unite to defeat the demons. The christians are confused and horrified to find that thier crosses and priests can do nothing in the face of the demons. Thier armies of mercenaries and peasants are forced to fight for thier survival, as Yoshiro's demon hordes utterly destroy everything they can find, and take destruction to a level unseen before. Soon, by 1605, the Islamic Ottoman Empire had been overrun in Anatolia, and sought aid from the Christians of Europe. It became a dark and bloody time for the continent. Leaders and generals were assassinated everywhere, civilians were victims of a genocidal campaign by Dark Alden, and entire cities and towns were razed. In Japan, people lived in oppressive condition, almost an enslavement, and anyone who dared to oppose him was ruthlessly executed. Kyotoro, despite this, staged an insurrection, and rose to fight Yoshiro. In several battles and fights, his band of samurai, warrior monks, and ronin managed to survive, but in one surprise enounter, which cought them off guard, Kyotoro's entire army was massacred, and he was captured. He managed to escape, but wound up on the far side of the earth, in central Europe. He decided to do what he could to aid the Europeans, and the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II welcomed the Japanese general into his court. Kyotoro manages to slay Yoshiro's general, Develin, gaining the anger of the God of Fire. The warfare in Europe dragged on until 1631, when the Demon armies made a great offensive, and forced the Europeans to flee to the Elbe River, and in 1641, to the Rhine. In this dire time, Kyotoro returned to Japan, along with a German Landknecht, Albert von Hohendorf, and a French Knight, Jean-Louis de Lourney. He made a journey, along with his two companions to a sacred island off northern Japan, to retrieve the White Diamond Armor, the counterbalance to the Black Diamond Armor, and the Sword of Light, the sacred blade capable to slaying the user of the Black Diamond Armor. It is there that he kills Dark Alden, Yoshiro's second-in-command, who is nearly as powerful as his master. During the deadly battle, de Lourney is grievously wounded and dies on the ship back to the mainland Japan. The ship is wrecked, by the Sea God, an ally of the Fire-God. Kyotoro and Albert miraculously survive, and are beached on Kyushu. They immediately begin preparing for the final rebellion, and the final battle between good and evil.
alright...whydo yu consider 'minor gods' are 'god of darkness' 'lord of the underworld'? why are you fascinated by Samuri?
Why do I like the Samurai? I on't quite know, it's just something about them, an air of mystique, and thier whole death-before-dishonor philosophy is very intriguing. Now, exactly what do you mean? Why is Hades a minor god? Because he deals in matters of human and [/i]mortal[/i] behavior and actions. The elder and major gods mostly focus on forces of nature, as the laws of physics and nature are stronger than the laws of humans.
Now, Sorrow of the Samurai IV is the epic conclusion to the whole story. The three facets of the war, the conflict in Europe, the chaotic fighting between the gods in the etherial planes, and the rebellion in Japan, all come to thier conclusion. Several battles would be shown, including a few in Europe, culminating in the final battle at Mount Fuji, between Yoshiro in his most powerful form and Kyotoro. In his most powerful form, Yoshiro is a minor god. He's incredibly powerful. Kyotoro and him do battle on the edge of the mountain, which is erupting, and it finally ends with Kyotoro cutting off Yoshiro's arms, and beheading him, and then slaying his spirit, finally killing him. He then kicks the body and the head into the volcano's magma, and all of the demons instantly disintegrate. Kyotoro is made Seii Taishogun by the Emperor, and they attempt to rebuild what has been destroyed by the evil forces of Lord Yoshiro. Meanwhile, Europe is also in shambles, the faith of the Christians and Moslems are shaken, and from the ashes of destruction, they must attampt to find some semblance of normality and repair tbe damage. In the heavems, the Constant Primaries call a peace to the fighting, and grant those who fought on the side of the God of Fire amnesty, provided they never attempt this again. With Hades and Yoshiro dead, the Contsants place Hades' son, Yenma, on the throne of Hell, and they strive to maintain a balance of life and death. The minions of hell are to no longer attempt a conquest of the earth or any other realm. With humanity saved, the Destructor Yoshiro slain, and the demons destroyed, Kyotoro, who has saved mankind, hands the Shogunate to the Tokugawa family, and lives out the rest of his life on his farm, in peace.
Well, yes, that little bit I did take from LotR. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! But, hey, did LotR have Frodo fighting Sauron to the death, with katanas? No.
There's been over 70 views and only a few replies. Come on, people. I'd like to hear some opinions, suggestions, etc.
well, some constructive advice. i tend to not agree with your mythology. it seems to separate 'mortality' from 'immortality'.....use references from prepatriarchal mythology, which are more liberating
Well, in a fictional mythology with gods, of course there are seperate classifications and realms for "mortals" and "immortals". I just thought of the whole thing kinda just winging it, more like. I just based it off of Greek, Roman, Shinto, and Norse myths.
personally, I think you've come up with the bassis for quite the epic. Ever considered doing them animated? would probably be alot cheaper and do more justice to the vision. I am currious about one thing. You mentioned immortals, such as vampires, yet in your description you have little mention of anything other than demons and half demons. The ommission of any mention of angels leads me to believe that you refer mainly to japanesse demons. So, I am currious that: If your intention with your mythology is to offer your viewers an alternative that incorporates traditional mythologies and beliefs, why not have the 'immortals' of those different belief structures more incorporated in the end wars. Different 'immortals' in different locals: Angels and demons in europe, chinese dragons in china, animal spirits in north america, vampries and werewolves, etc..
I was planning on writing a story first, and then doing an animated-kinda movie thingy. As for your question: well, the many demigods are the closest things in there to "angels". There are dragons, various spirits, and many odd monsters and creatures around the world, but they mostly live in secrecy and are hidden from people, and humans are mostly too ignorant to care. Ancient peoples, however, knew of these beasts and recorded them in cave drawings, and later books, which founded the basics of mythological creatures. Example: drakes, or dragons, in the SotS story normally hide in caves, and have established social hierarchies, like wolf packs, anda clear idea of morality and ethics, which is one of the primary reasons most drakes live in caves or lake bottoms: they don't want to be tempted to violate thier ethic by slaying humans...though there is the occasional "lone wolf" that kills but is eventually slain. Same way for many other beasts in the SotS universe.
You realize, of course, that if you have a mind for noveling, you have enough material right there for a good 10 -20 books....
i like it, you should write it up properly in a single post and put it up here with all the final details and plot scenes, i would like to read it, peace
Well, it's meant to be in just five parts: War of the Samurai Sorrow of the Samurai Sorrow of the Samurai 2: The Ressurrections Sorrow of the Samurai 3: Hell's War Sorrow of the Samurai 4: The Final Battle And I'm currently finishing up part 1 (War of the Samurai).
yeah, but those are the movies you are talking about. Go multimedia with it. Movies, books, videogame, maybe an animated series too. Hit all the markets. Toy lines, etc. It could be the next big thing, if developed right. Think vampire hunter D meets kenshin with the marketablity of pokemon.
No, I mean, I'm writing the books currently. But, hey, damn good idea. I could make a shitload of cash off this if done properly. In additon to this series, there's a whole 'nother set of shit that happens after this: since Yoshiro's armies brought Europe and Islam together for survival, it leads to better understanding between the two. The memory of Yoshiro's reign of terror is deeply ingrained into the minds of Koreans, Chinese, Southeast Asians, and Siberians, which feeds an anti-japanese sentiment that builds up over some 250 years, erupting into the later Asian War of the 1900s, and etc. ...
Hmm, I was thinking more along the lines of Shogun: Total War meets Onimusha 2... In additon to this series, there's a whole 'nother set of shit that happens after this: since Yoshiro's armies brought Europe and Islam together for survival, it leads to better understanding between the two. The memory of Yoshiro's reign of terror is deeply ingrained into the minds of Koreans, Chinese, Southeast Asians, and Siberians, which feeds an anti-japanese sentiment that builds up over some 250 years, erupting into the later Asian War of the 1900s, and etc. World history is altered entirely, obviously.
look mate your asking for opinions, and people are going on about films multi media etc, but what it all comes down to is can you write? Have you got some stuff from a chapter of one of your books, if so post it up
