Yuletide 2020
Oct. 18th, 2020 04:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marsdragonTHE FUTURE
IS NOW
General notes first:
Feel free to not include every character I requested in the same story. This would be impossible in multiple cases, so don't even try. Hell, feel free not to include any of them, I've got requests like that. Add any you think are necessary for the story too. Just do as you will.
I like: gen, worldbuilding, and noncon*, so let that guide you as you will. You pretty much can't go wrong by investigating some aspect of the world in a canon-typical fashion. I also enjoy canon-divergence AUs (what if this happened instead of that), unusual formats (epistolary, in-universe documents, interactive fiction, etc), in-universe history, and thinking of how game mechanics work in-universe.
*prompts not listed here for brevity, but check out my nonconathon letters for ideas.
I dislike: non-canon-divergence AUs (coffeeshop, etc), fluff with zero conflict or tension, M/f noncon, sex/gender headcanons, characters being passive or weepy messes.
In general I try to not be too demanding, and if you want to write something that ignores all my prompts, go for it. I'd rather you write something you enjoy than force yourself into a prompt you don't care about. Everything not explicitly forbidden is allowed and yes I know what I'm setting myself up for here.
Check the other entries for previous letters; I've asked for all these canons before and would still be into all those prompts. If I didn't ask for something again here that doesn't mean I don't want it, it means I forgot.
If you need to pick up a canon quick, here's a rough order of time investment from least to most: Psychic Force > Fatal Fury (minimum) > Curse of the Moon > Giant Robo > Darkangel Trilogy > Fatal Fury (deep) > Voltes V
Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon
Zangetsu, Robert, Dominique, Hachi
So right off the bat: I'm perfectly happy with Curse of the Moon 1 fic, there just wasn't enough room in the form for Miriam/Alfred/Gebel. But I'd still enjoy fic of them hanging out with Zangetsu, either in 1 or 2.
Speaking of CotM1, Nightmare Mode is fascinating for me, and I'd love fic of Zangetsu being the Demon Emperor. His castle was really cool and fun to fight through, and I'd be into anything exploring his control over it. Alternatively, little incidents from the cast going through the castle and Zangetsu warming up to his demon-touched pals would also be good. (I loved them showing up to help out in CotM2 and all their interstage animations being extra friendly, and showing how they got there would be great)
I loved the interstage animations, made fighting through all those stages worth it. Expand on any, add some new incidents, slice of life of fighting through a demon castle. It's all good. I'm also for picking up after any of the various endings, including the bad/weird ones. I love that.
Character backstory is also good - how did Zangetsu and Robert meet previously? How did this ordinary soldier get into fighting demons? How did Hachi lose his leg, and where did he get that giant suit of gothic power armor? How has Dominique's backstory changed from Ritual of the Night...she's a completely different character, so is that different experiences or different reactions to the same experiences? Feel free to reference RitN here!
Or other character interactions from the game. The argument over Hachi's name (what did Dominique want to call him?), Miriam and Zangetsu finding the (non-demonic skeleton) moon rabbits, cramming everyone together on a moonship and manning the guns, how they got off the moon at the end, what Zangetsu does now that he's no longer a demon hunter and in fact all the demons are gone...I'm into all of it.
And I still love monsters, so anything about monsters will make me happy. Leaving this pretty open, but I love all the weird, crazy monsters in this game and would greatly enjoy something about them.
How to experience:
Well, both games are available for every modern platform and they're like $10-$15 each, so go for it. Be warned though: Curse of the Moon 2 is really hard. Like, really hard. Absolutely fair, but holy shit is it mean. Curse of the Moon 1 is much easier.
Let's Plays:
Playlist containing both games, complete but has commentary
Longplay of CotM1 normal mode
Longplay of CotM1 nightmare mode
No one seems to have done longplays of the weirder variants.
Curse of the Moon 2 longplay with true ending. Doesn't have the weird variant route I played because I didn't sacrifice to get a better ending on episode 2, so that sucks!
Director commentary on CotM2
Fatal Fury
Terry, Rock, Geese, Billy, Grant, Kain, B. Jenet
So most of these are very directly related to the main plot and all of them have some sort of connection to each other. I'd love to see those explored more. Drunk and angry Billy constantly trying and failing to beat Terry up after Geese's death? Kain trying to recruit Billy? Geese and his rogue body double? Just pick some characters and throw them together. I'm always here for more stuff exploring the fact that Terry adopted the son of the man he killed, or Grant and Kain's friendship, etc etc.
B.Jenet is the odd one out here, because she's not really part of the whole Southtown saga. But she's great and I love her, so just let your imagination run wild! How about a heist? Assembling her pirate crew? Going to a fancy party as part of a heist and running into someone from her past? She's just such a fun, wacky character, any sort of silly adventures would be great. For something more sad, I thought it was interesting how she did try to reach out to Kain a bit in her ending. It's not a ship, but her trying (failing?) to kick some sense into him would be interesting.
Exploring Southtown a bit would be really fun. It's a setting that really gets built up over the course of the games, so I'd love to see anything expanding on it. Local issues, tourist's guides, reporters trying to chase characters down for interviews, why there's a Second South a few miles east...go for it.
Or just characters and the weird bits of bio that SNK gave them. I really like that SNK gives everyone favorite foods, music, hobbies, skills, etc, so just pick one of those. How did Grant get into pottery? Does Kain read the high-brow stuff his character design would suggest, or is it all doorstopper fantasy novels? Rock learning to play guitar, Geese picking up and dropping a dozen hobbies, Terry evolving from his regular series bio to his MOW bio...it's all good.
I really like how fighting games can get kind of "choose your own canon" with each character having contradictory stories, so feel free to explore that. Pick up after Billy wins in Real Bout, or have Gato win Maximum Mayhem and force Rock and Kain to deal with that. Go wild!
And if all else fails, there are two ten-year timeskips where everyone would've been wandering around. Explore that.
How to experience:
The covered games are Fatal Fury, Fatal Fury 3, Real Bout Fatal Fury, and Garou: Mark of the Wolves. These are all avaliable via Arcade Archives or by emulation (MAME, WinKwaks), but be warned: SNK knew damn well their job was to eat your quarters and tuned the difficulty accordingly. WinKwaks has a cheat file that will help, but MAME or Arcade Archives are just set the difficulty down and do your best.
Memories of Stray Wolves will catch you up on the important stuff up to Mark of the Wolves.
Playthroughs:
Fatal Fury: Terry
Fatal Fury 3: Terry, Geese
Real Bout Fatal Fury: Terry, Billy, Geese
Garou: Mark of the Wolves: Rock, Terry, B.Jenet, Grant, Kain
Additional wrinkle: SNK got...creative with their translations in the 90s. I've done a lot of comparison work on my personal site, and rest assured that Real Bout and Mark of the Wolves don't really lose meaning so much as tone/phrasing.
Just ignore King of Fighters, it's a different continuity. ...but fans mix them up constantly so if you look at the wiki they're not going to really bother splitting out the timelines. Sorry.
Giant Robo
Komei, Dr. Kusama, Genya, Alberto, Cervantes, Hanzui, Kusama Daisuku, Sunny, Taisou, Youshi, Zangetsu
Giant Robo is my favorite anime of all time and I will be there for literally anything you want to do. Go wild. If you have any story sitting in the back of your mind, bring it out. I want to hear it.
Any sort of interaction between these characters would be great, especially ones who don't get to interact in the OVA. There's so much of the GR world we don't see, so any of them could've met at some point. Pick a few and go nuts.
Or any sort of character backstory: how did they get to where they are in the OVA? Even though we see a lot of, say, Genya or Daisaku's backstories, there's still so much more that's left unsaid. What was anyone doing before they joined BF/IPO? Fill in the gaps a little!
Or I love the GR world, so anything exploring that would be wonderful. A bit of daily life? What's everyone doing when the world isn't in danger? How about using psychic powers or robots in an ordinary way? Or explore the inner workings of BF or the IPO: there must be so much in the way of logistics that go on behind the scenes. How about training? We have kids growing up on both sides of the conflict, how are things like education handled? Just pick a bit of the world and go for it.
Or how about a character going on a smaller mission than we see in the OVA? The Ginrei OVA has a normal mission for Ginrei and Tetsugyu, I'd love to see something like that for any of these other characters. Either a successful mission or a failed one, they'd both be interesting.
How to experience:
There's a Blu-Ray available in the US/Canada and it's gorgeous. If you're outside the US, it's out of stock, or don't want to drop 60 bucks on my say-so, there's always other means. (you want the E.G rips)
Laserdisk linear notes, with lots of extra details about the characters and setting.
Extra info that's literally friend-of-a-friend, so take or leave it as you will. Might inspire some ideas, though.
Psychic Force
Keith, Burn, Wendy, Regina
Look, I love Psychic Force. It's the thing I got into when I was 13 and engraved itself on my soul. Do anything. I don't care. I love this canon with all my heart and will go along with anything you want to write.
Keith/Burn is first and ultimate OTP, so if you want to write a shippy fic congratulations, this is the only shippy prompt in the entire letter. I'm for anything here, from things actually working out to horrible tragedy like in the game. I will never get tired of someone tearfully clutching their dying beloved after causing their death. Never. Or something pre-canon, when they were actually happy for once in their lives. Whatever!
I really like Wendy and would love to see her bouncing around the world. Backstory with her sister? Coming to NOA? What she was doing in 2011? Going back home afterwards? (does she even have a home to go back to?) She and Patty never meet up in the games proper, but they probably wouldn't kill each other if they did, so that would be cute to see.
Regina is also interesting to me. I'd love some of her backstory, more of her relationship with Carlo and their...slightly differing ideas on what it is, or what she's doing in 2011. She seems to know Wendy from before, did they get along then or was it always a bit fractious? She also seems to know Gudeath, same question. Or let her blow shit up as part of NOA's plans, I'm for that.
I'm going to say the same thing I said for Fatal Fury: I love how fighting games are kind of "choose your own canon" with whose story you follow, so feel free to run with that here. Burn finding Keith after Wong's route? What Regina was doing on Carlo's route? (hey, maybe she's not dead after all! That would make things awkward!) Etc, etc.
How to experience:
Links to playthroughs, the OVA, etc
If you want to actually play it then you're going to have to emulate because everything is wildly out of print.
Voltes V
Kentarou, Kenichi, Heinel
I can't explain why I suddenly got really obsessed with a show I watched two years ago, but I did and here we are. I'm for any sort of exploration of what happens after the series - a lot goes down in the last episode, and a lot kind of gets glossed over as a part of that! Like the part where all these characters find out they're related in the last 10 minutes of the last episode and then Heinel kills himself three minutes later. Let everyone deal with that, either in terms of immediate aftermath or some time afterwards. Who goes and gives Heinel's grandparents the news? Because that's gonna be awkward. Or heck, let Heinel live and actually deal with everything he did. Or don't and just let him chill with his family I'm totally fine with that too. (Let Kentarou hug all his kids! Let the Gou boys play with Heinel's horns!)
Or just Kentarou/La Gohl trying to set up this new revolutionary government and dealing with all those troubles/challenges, because there's going to be a lot. Any local rulers taking the opportunity to try and split off? How to handle any planets that Sanbasil did manage to conquer during that expansionist phase? Dealing with the old bureaucracy now t hat everything's been turned upside down, but the thousands of civil servants necessary to run a space empire don't just appear out of thin air?
Kenichi (and brothers) dealing with being half-Boazanian after things settle down a bit would also be interesting. Any interest in weird space France culture? Do they get to go visit regularly? What happens on Earth now everyone knows there's aliens?
Or backstories, worldbuilding, everything I asked for in the rest of my letter.
How to experience:
Free streaming in the US/Canada on RetroCrush. Outside US/Canada uh...we've got old subs on archive.org or the old Filipino dub on archive.org. Both of those translations are...not good. You'll get the general idea, but there's a lot of nuance that's obscured and at some points the lines are the exact opposite of what the characters are saying. Sorry.
Darkangel Trilogy
Erin, Aeriel, Irrylath, Oriencor
I love this setting and would like to see it explored more. Aeriel and Erin on their journey to restore the world? Irrylath and seeing the world's restoration from the sidelines? Oriencor and her backstory/rise to power? Anything with the strange, beautiful magic, if it's used for good or for ill.
Or I'm also into tales, lore, history, propaganda, etc. Things Oriencor grew up hearing about the Ancients, or spread about herself. What kinds of stories Aeriel hears about her journey, centuries afterwards.
Or...Erin is mortal, Aeriel not so much anymore. What happens when Erin gets old? Can Aeriel make her a new body, and would they even wish to do so? It's something that would come up, and there's lot of complexities associated with the idea. Something exploring that would be very interesting.
Honestly, anything exploring the world and magic would make me very happy, so just go for it.
How to experience:
Check your local bookshop (I think it's out of print again though) or alternatively there are Kindle editions.
IS NOW
General notes first:
Feel free to not include every character I requested in the same story. This would be impossible in multiple cases, so don't even try. Hell, feel free not to include any of them, I've got requests like that. Add any you think are necessary for the story too. Just do as you will.
I like: gen, worldbuilding, and noncon*, so let that guide you as you will. You pretty much can't go wrong by investigating some aspect of the world in a canon-typical fashion. I also enjoy canon-divergence AUs (what if this happened instead of that), unusual formats (epistolary, in-universe documents, interactive fiction, etc), in-universe history, and thinking of how game mechanics work in-universe.
*prompts not listed here for brevity, but check out my nonconathon letters for ideas.
I dislike: non-canon-divergence AUs (coffeeshop, etc), fluff with zero conflict or tension, M/f noncon, sex/gender headcanons, characters being passive or weepy messes.
In general I try to not be too demanding, and if you want to write something that ignores all my prompts, go for it. I'd rather you write something you enjoy than force yourself into a prompt you don't care about. Everything not explicitly forbidden is allowed and yes I know what I'm setting myself up for here.
Check the other entries for previous letters; I've asked for all these canons before and would still be into all those prompts. If I didn't ask for something again here that doesn't mean I don't want it, it means I forgot.
If you need to pick up a canon quick, here's a rough order of time investment from least to most: Psychic Force > Fatal Fury (minimum) > Curse of the Moon > Giant Robo > Darkangel Trilogy > Fatal Fury (deep) > Voltes V
Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon
Zangetsu, Robert, Dominique, Hachi
So right off the bat: I'm perfectly happy with Curse of the Moon 1 fic, there just wasn't enough room in the form for Miriam/Alfred/Gebel. But I'd still enjoy fic of them hanging out with Zangetsu, either in 1 or 2.
Speaking of CotM1, Nightmare Mode is fascinating for me, and I'd love fic of Zangetsu being the Demon Emperor. His castle was really cool and fun to fight through, and I'd be into anything exploring his control over it. Alternatively, little incidents from the cast going through the castle and Zangetsu warming up to his demon-touched pals would also be good. (I loved them showing up to help out in CotM2 and all their interstage animations being extra friendly, and showing how they got there would be great)
I loved the interstage animations, made fighting through all those stages worth it. Expand on any, add some new incidents, slice of life of fighting through a demon castle. It's all good. I'm also for picking up after any of the various endings, including the bad/weird ones. I love that.
Character backstory is also good - how did Zangetsu and Robert meet previously? How did this ordinary soldier get into fighting demons? How did Hachi lose his leg, and where did he get that giant suit of gothic power armor? How has Dominique's backstory changed from Ritual of the Night...she's a completely different character, so is that different experiences or different reactions to the same experiences? Feel free to reference RitN here!
Or other character interactions from the game. The argument over Hachi's name (what did Dominique want to call him?), Miriam and Zangetsu finding the (non-demonic skeleton) moon rabbits, cramming everyone together on a moonship and manning the guns, how they got off the moon at the end, what Zangetsu does now that he's no longer a demon hunter and in fact all the demons are gone...I'm into all of it.
And I still love monsters, so anything about monsters will make me happy. Leaving this pretty open, but I love all the weird, crazy monsters in this game and would greatly enjoy something about them.
How to experience:
Well, both games are available for every modern platform and they're like $10-$15 each, so go for it. Be warned though: Curse of the Moon 2 is really hard. Like, really hard. Absolutely fair, but holy shit is it mean. Curse of the Moon 1 is much easier.
Let's Plays:
Playlist containing both games, complete but has commentary
Longplay of CotM1 normal mode
Longplay of CotM1 nightmare mode
No one seems to have done longplays of the weirder variants.
Curse of the Moon 2 longplay with true ending. Doesn't have the weird variant route I played because I didn't sacrifice to get a better ending on episode 2, so that sucks!
Director commentary on CotM2
Fatal Fury
Terry, Rock, Geese, Billy, Grant, Kain, B. Jenet
So most of these are very directly related to the main plot and all of them have some sort of connection to each other. I'd love to see those explored more. Drunk and angry Billy constantly trying and failing to beat Terry up after Geese's death? Kain trying to recruit Billy? Geese and his rogue body double? Just pick some characters and throw them together. I'm always here for more stuff exploring the fact that Terry adopted the son of the man he killed, or Grant and Kain's friendship, etc etc.
B.Jenet is the odd one out here, because she's not really part of the whole Southtown saga. But she's great and I love her, so just let your imagination run wild! How about a heist? Assembling her pirate crew? Going to a fancy party as part of a heist and running into someone from her past? She's just such a fun, wacky character, any sort of silly adventures would be great. For something more sad, I thought it was interesting how she did try to reach out to Kain a bit in her ending. It's not a ship, but her trying (failing?) to kick some sense into him would be interesting.
Exploring Southtown a bit would be really fun. It's a setting that really gets built up over the course of the games, so I'd love to see anything expanding on it. Local issues, tourist's guides, reporters trying to chase characters down for interviews, why there's a Second South a few miles east...go for it.
Or just characters and the weird bits of bio that SNK gave them. I really like that SNK gives everyone favorite foods, music, hobbies, skills, etc, so just pick one of those. How did Grant get into pottery? Does Kain read the high-brow stuff his character design would suggest, or is it all doorstopper fantasy novels? Rock learning to play guitar, Geese picking up and dropping a dozen hobbies, Terry evolving from his regular series bio to his MOW bio...it's all good.
I really like how fighting games can get kind of "choose your own canon" with each character having contradictory stories, so feel free to explore that. Pick up after Billy wins in Real Bout, or have Gato win Maximum Mayhem and force Rock and Kain to deal with that. Go wild!
And if all else fails, there are two ten-year timeskips where everyone would've been wandering around. Explore that.
How to experience:
The covered games are Fatal Fury, Fatal Fury 3, Real Bout Fatal Fury, and Garou: Mark of the Wolves. These are all avaliable via Arcade Archives or by emulation (MAME, WinKwaks), but be warned: SNK knew damn well their job was to eat your quarters and tuned the difficulty accordingly. WinKwaks has a cheat file that will help, but MAME or Arcade Archives are just set the difficulty down and do your best.
Memories of Stray Wolves will catch you up on the important stuff up to Mark of the Wolves.
Playthroughs:
Fatal Fury: Terry
Fatal Fury 3: Terry, Geese
Real Bout Fatal Fury: Terry, Billy, Geese
Garou: Mark of the Wolves: Rock, Terry, B.Jenet, Grant, Kain
Additional wrinkle: SNK got...creative with their translations in the 90s. I've done a lot of comparison work on my personal site, and rest assured that Real Bout and Mark of the Wolves don't really lose meaning so much as tone/phrasing.
Just ignore King of Fighters, it's a different continuity. ...but fans mix them up constantly so if you look at the wiki they're not going to really bother splitting out the timelines. Sorry.
Giant Robo
Komei, Dr. Kusama, Genya, Alberto, Cervantes, Hanzui, Kusama Daisuku, Sunny, Taisou, Youshi, Zangetsu
Giant Robo is my favorite anime of all time and I will be there for literally anything you want to do. Go wild. If you have any story sitting in the back of your mind, bring it out. I want to hear it.
Any sort of interaction between these characters would be great, especially ones who don't get to interact in the OVA. There's so much of the GR world we don't see, so any of them could've met at some point. Pick a few and go nuts.
Or any sort of character backstory: how did they get to where they are in the OVA? Even though we see a lot of, say, Genya or Daisaku's backstories, there's still so much more that's left unsaid. What was anyone doing before they joined BF/IPO? Fill in the gaps a little!
Or I love the GR world, so anything exploring that would be wonderful. A bit of daily life? What's everyone doing when the world isn't in danger? How about using psychic powers or robots in an ordinary way? Or explore the inner workings of BF or the IPO: there must be so much in the way of logistics that go on behind the scenes. How about training? We have kids growing up on both sides of the conflict, how are things like education handled? Just pick a bit of the world and go for it.
Or how about a character going on a smaller mission than we see in the OVA? The Ginrei OVA has a normal mission for Ginrei and Tetsugyu, I'd love to see something like that for any of these other characters. Either a successful mission or a failed one, they'd both be interesting.
How to experience:
There's a Blu-Ray available in the US/Canada and it's gorgeous. If you're outside the US, it's out of stock, or don't want to drop 60 bucks on my say-so, there's always other means. (you want the E.G rips)
Laserdisk linear notes, with lots of extra details about the characters and setting.
Extra info that's literally friend-of-a-friend, so take or leave it as you will. Might inspire some ideas, though.
Psychic Force
Keith, Burn, Wendy, Regina
Look, I love Psychic Force. It's the thing I got into when I was 13 and engraved itself on my soul. Do anything. I don't care. I love this canon with all my heart and will go along with anything you want to write.
Keith/Burn is first and ultimate OTP, so if you want to write a shippy fic congratulations, this is the only shippy prompt in the entire letter. I'm for anything here, from things actually working out to horrible tragedy like in the game. I will never get tired of someone tearfully clutching their dying beloved after causing their death. Never. Or something pre-canon, when they were actually happy for once in their lives. Whatever!
I really like Wendy and would love to see her bouncing around the world. Backstory with her sister? Coming to NOA? What she was doing in 2011? Going back home afterwards? (does she even have a home to go back to?) She and Patty never meet up in the games proper, but they probably wouldn't kill each other if they did, so that would be cute to see.
Regina is also interesting to me. I'd love some of her backstory, more of her relationship with Carlo and their...slightly differing ideas on what it is, or what she's doing in 2011. She seems to know Wendy from before, did they get along then or was it always a bit fractious? She also seems to know Gudeath, same question. Or let her blow shit up as part of NOA's plans, I'm for that.
I'm going to say the same thing I said for Fatal Fury: I love how fighting games are kind of "choose your own canon" with whose story you follow, so feel free to run with that here. Burn finding Keith after Wong's route? What Regina was doing on Carlo's route? (hey, maybe she's not dead after all! That would make things awkward!) Etc, etc.
How to experience:
Links to playthroughs, the OVA, etc
If you want to actually play it then you're going to have to emulate because everything is wildly out of print.
Voltes V
Kentarou, Kenichi, Heinel
I can't explain why I suddenly got really obsessed with a show I watched two years ago, but I did and here we are. I'm for any sort of exploration of what happens after the series - a lot goes down in the last episode, and a lot kind of gets glossed over as a part of that! Like the part where all these characters find out they're related in the last 10 minutes of the last episode and then Heinel kills himself three minutes later. Let everyone deal with that, either in terms of immediate aftermath or some time afterwards. Who goes and gives Heinel's grandparents the news? Because that's gonna be awkward. Or heck, let Heinel live and actually deal with everything he did. Or don't and just let him chill with his family I'm totally fine with that too. (Let Kentarou hug all his kids! Let the Gou boys play with Heinel's horns!)
Or just Kentarou/La Gohl trying to set up this new revolutionary government and dealing with all those troubles/challenges, because there's going to be a lot. Any local rulers taking the opportunity to try and split off? How to handle any planets that Sanbasil did manage to conquer during that expansionist phase? Dealing with the old bureaucracy now t hat everything's been turned upside down, but the thousands of civil servants necessary to run a space empire don't just appear out of thin air?
Kenichi (and brothers) dealing with being half-Boazanian after things settle down a bit would also be interesting. Any interest in weird space France culture? Do they get to go visit regularly? What happens on Earth now everyone knows there's aliens?
Or backstories, worldbuilding, everything I asked for in the rest of my letter.
How to experience:
Free streaming in the US/Canada on RetroCrush. Outside US/Canada uh...we've got old subs on archive.org or the old Filipino dub on archive.org. Both of those translations are...not good. You'll get the general idea, but there's a lot of nuance that's obscured and at some points the lines are the exact opposite of what the characters are saying. Sorry.
Darkangel Trilogy
Erin, Aeriel, Irrylath, Oriencor
I love this setting and would like to see it explored more. Aeriel and Erin on their journey to restore the world? Irrylath and seeing the world's restoration from the sidelines? Oriencor and her backstory/rise to power? Anything with the strange, beautiful magic, if it's used for good or for ill.
Or I'm also into tales, lore, history, propaganda, etc. Things Oriencor grew up hearing about the Ancients, or spread about herself. What kinds of stories Aeriel hears about her journey, centuries afterwards.
Or...Erin is mortal, Aeriel not so much anymore. What happens when Erin gets old? Can Aeriel make her a new body, and would they even wish to do so? It's something that would come up, and there's lot of complexities associated with the idea. Something exploring that would be very interesting.
Honestly, anything exploring the world and magic would make me very happy, so just go for it.
How to experience:
Check your local bookshop (I think it's out of print again though) or alternatively there are Kindle editions.
