Inochi
Thanks to Tina for the pretty pictures! If you like them, you can find more of her work here.
Welcome to the main page for Inochi. This is a work
in progress about a young man in a place called the Makai, a fantasy land where
magic is commonplace, demons everywhere, and life is hard and sometimes
cruel. Inochi is a story about self-awareness, friendships, loyalty,
slavery, and the true value of freedom. It's a story about growing up,
about becoming a man, about the choices adults must make, about love and about
hate.
When I first began writing Inochi, I based it loosely---*very* loosely---on an
anime/manga called Yu Yu Hakusho. I never intended for characters from
that series to ever make appearances in the story; my main interest was in the
setting, and in certain character types, kitsunes in particular.
Kitsunes are a common figure in Japanese folklore---they are fox spirits, the
children of Inari, the rice god---tricksters and deceivers, similar to Coyote
in Native American folklore. Although they have many descriptions,
generally that of shapechanging beautiful women and androgynous youths, I found
the one
in Yu Yu Hakusho (YYH for short) most to my liking, and so chose that one for
my characters. The physical description of kitsunes is all I took
specifically from YYH; their culture and personal habits/quirks are mine alone.
YYH has doujinshi artists (think the equivalent of fanfic authors, working in a
graphic medium, and considered professionals in their own right) who have
provided us with incredibly beautiful pictures. Seono Shou happens to be my
favorite YYH artist (at the moment, anyway) and if you're interested in viewing
some of her work (purely for research, yes <g>) you can find her gallery
of pictures on the totally absorbing site of Aestheticism.
Go to the main site, click on YYH Doujinshis on the left scroll bar, and from
there, enter into the YYH Doujinshis General Side. Once there, click on
the Tide/Real link on the left scroll bar in the Gallery Section, and you'll be
able to see the wonderfully lovely art. Check out all the galleries while
you're there---the art is fabulous, and they have tons of manga (graphic
novels) already translated. Be advised that while the work is m/m, it's
yaoi, and the dynamics in yaoi are different in many ways from western slash.
Kitsunes are lovely, yes? Now you understand why YYH really caught my
eye. *g*
Inochi started out as a simple idea, and then sorta...grew. That seems to
happen to me a lot, I've noticed. I spent one long afternoon reading tons
of slaveboy stories---in which they all eventually fell in love with their masters---and
thought to myself that I'd like to see one in which the slave *didn't*. I
knew I didn't want a gladiator-type, all brawn and swordfighting skills, nor
did I want someone who was abused, wimpy, or doormat-ish. And so
Inochi came into being.
I originally intended a story of something like twenty pages. Well.
According to Word, I'm at 215 pages, in eighteen chapters. It's very much
a work in progress, and I *will* finish it, because he's my baby, and I will
see it through. *g*
The story has been broken up into chunks of one chapter each---much easier to
handle than one huge text file. Remember, this is a WIP, and so you might
find grammar/spelling problems (though few, I think), and it is subject to
change/revision.
I appreciate feedback or constructive criticism, because in many cases, it
helps me to better my writing, and I'm all for that.
Chapter One Chapter Nine Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Two Chapter Ten Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Three Chapter Eleven Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Four Chapter Twelve Chapter Twenty
Please contact me, or Mickey M, if any of these pages don't load.
Questions, comments, feedback, etc. on the story chapters should be sent to me.
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