Capeworld Collection June 2022–Shisa vs Oni Summer

by on July 1, 2022 at 1:44 am

Introduction

 

Hey, last day of June is still June, right?

 

Not much to report for this month–though what I do have is very interesting.

 

It’s a cosmic mystery how I can have so much time on my hands and yet do so little with it. Oh well, this just means I’ll have to endeavor to do more with the July issue…and get it out on time!

 

Rooted Together Revives

 

 

Like a plant bursting through the frost of winter, Rooted Together returns with The Darkest Hour, and as you might expect going by the title, things are getting a little more dramatic for the Mallum crew.

 

Isn’t that just like a good light-hearted comedy comic about a sweet family in the Netherlands and the mouthy vegetable that adopted them? It lures you in with antics and hijinks and then when the characters have captured your heart, whammo! Down comes the drama hammer!

Hey, it worked well for Bone and I say it works well here!

 

An Interview With Ardi

 

 

This month we interviewed Ardi, the creator of A Story of Fire and currently Wings of Daera. He’s also done art for the Martin’s School section of the site–for instance for Martina Morelli and Tanya Ableman.

 

And a big thanks to Smacky Jackson of Tad Danger and Guardian Giants fame for the art of Azu and Rol throwing down. Japanese demon vs Japanese guardian spirit, who do you think won? Besides the audience, of course.

 

1. Why webcomics? When did you first get into the medium? Why did you decide to do a webcomic as opposed to something else like a novel?

 

Well, like a young taco-enthusiast girl once said, why not both? The truth is that I have been writing novels way before I even started with webcomics. At around age ten I got the need to write down my unusually-coherent dreams into short stories and from there I kept going at it, to the point of finishing a four book fantasy saga (Drassil, you can check it on Amazon if you speak Spanish), a doorstopper mystery novel (which might be posted online in the near future), at least four nouveless and a few dozen short stories. So, after all of that, why did I decide to jump into webcomics? Several reasons, but mostly an artistic block that I could not get rid of and that I believe had much to do with the fact that the written medium felt limited in what it could convey. Most of my stories deal with a lot of action, of visual impact, and while that is by all means not impossible to do in writing, in webcomic it becomes far more direct. There was also the matter of that directness: it’s far easier for me to introduce another person to what I’m creating by showing them a page of my webcomic than to wait for them to get around reading my novels. Who knows, maybe in the future you’ll see me doing the jump into animation! As for when I got into webcomics, officially around 2018, but I had already drawn a few casual comics for friends since I was at least fourteen; one loose adaptation of one of my novels about people trapped in hellish games, and a very long saga that combined essentially Pacman characters with Dragon Ball Z (Can you guess yet that I am from Latin America?).

 

2. What influenced you while writing A Story of Fire? Was there a particular author or artist you took inspiration from?

 

I was reading The Girl From The Other Side by Nagabe and essentially thought: “Damn, I need to create something like this.” It was a spur of the moment thing that had probably been boiling inside me for a while – that very same day I bought a notebook and started drawing the first chapter of A Story Of Fire right there. It’s been a long way since then. Other artists that inspired me were OKAMA, and the manga Usogui in regards to action scenes (Usogui has some of the best action scenes in the medium, greatly underrated manga in the west). The rest of my inspiration? I had been trying to adapt the stories of the Three Evil Youkai’s from Japanese Mythology for a while already, and I found that to be the perfect opportunity. I wanted to make a story that dealt with evil and justice and questioned the extent of it, the extent of forgiveness, and even if self-forgiveness was possible when nothing else is attained. I talked about my artistic inspirations there, yes, but I think this is a good opportunity to mention my thematic inspiration: a person dear to me who met her father after he ran out of her life when she was a child. He asked her for forgiveness, and in no uncertain terms she told him off.

I understood her decision, but also when I heard about it, I started to think, what if he had returned to her the next day again, hoping to reach her? What if he kept trying to reconnect with his daughter again, and again, and again, for years, until the end of his life? At some point, even if she can never forgive him for abandoning her, would it be possible that he can forgive himself? In a way, I ended up translating that situation to Rau and the Priest. A bit of a spoiler warning here but, I made a point that the Priest never actually forgives Rau during the story – in fact, the climax of their relationship is actually him asking for forgiveness to her, being able to see now from where she stood and to empathize with her. Could you really forgive someone who ate your family? I don’t think that’d be realistic in any kind of way. But in the end, Rau’s victory is not him giving her her pardon, nor is it escaping justice in any way, but rather the mere fact that she kept pushing to do good and was willing to believe there was light for her even after she did and went through. Like Tamamo says in the finale, evil and resentment are born from pain, and justice is born from evil. They are all part of a fatalistic cycle in a way, and to take the reigns of ourselves is the point I was trying to make in the story. There is a lot of bravery in Rau despite her cowardice and there is a lot of cowardice in Azu despite her bravery, one could say.

 

3. You’ve mentioned a few times that the world of A Story of Fire was quite larger and more complex than what we got in the comic. What was left on the cutting room floor? Would you ever want to return to the setting?

 

A LOT was left in the cutting room floor, however I stand by my decision to keep the story short and to the point, even if it affected its pacing. I would have liked to develop the wars between oni and the army more, and certain characters like Tamamo had actually quite a few scenes that I had to do without in order to progress the story quicker. Then there is the whole matter of whatever happened with Rau, Malkeil, Tamamo and Douma as they hunted demons for ten years – that’s a whole plot inside my head but I think I already ranted long enough so let’s just say, they go through a lot of hardships to reach the epilogue you saw in the comic. The story would also expand geographically as they had to visit the Yang Empire where Rau’s stepmother lives in order to request her help, new important characters would show up, and there would be aspects of the original story revisited and explored, like who was involved in the princesses murder attempt, what was the deal with King Abe, the witches and the retired demon hunters, or even knowing more about the incident that had the Priest lose his eye. As for me returning to the setting? Quite likely, but in the form of an oneshot. Possibly dealing with some of the other Demon Hunters we didn’t get to meet.

 

4. Why oni? Of all the creatures you could have made the cast, what attracted you to oni?

 

The reason I picked oni was mostly that the rather awful translations I found of Japanese mythology gave them a childish evil vibe that fit perfectly with the story I was trying to tell. Even the most famous oni like Shuten or Ibaraki are named using -doji in their names which seems to translate as “child”. There was also an aspect of the myths I wanted to explore and that was the one of evil, evil as immaturity, then also maturity as being responsible for one’s actions. In A Story Of Fire, to “wake up” from the curse is essentially to grow up, to become responsible for one’s own actions. It is not a coincidence Azu looks for a romantic awakening with Shuten the moment her memories come back, or that both sisters start to grow afterwards. It was hard to put on text, but the way the unawaken oni talk was meant to come out as rather childish, like teenagers speaking. Evil born from innocence. “There is no wrongdoing for oni”, “I cannot do evil for I do not know what that is”, etc etc. Oni presented a perfect opportunity to explore the matter of evil and responsibility, especially the kind of evil that’s caused by previous suffering. And they are also very cool.

 

5. Your art style improved by leaps and bounds over A Story of Fire. One of the joys of the comic is watching how much you improve throughout the book. Can you comment on your progression as an artist?

 

For me, narratives are my priority, and art is something I try to better as I tell my story. Now, what can I really comment about this? I’m thankful for all the help and support I received and keep receiving, from artists around me online who kept pushing me to improve. I know there is still a long road ahead and there shall be one in front of me until the moment I die. A webcomic is wonderful to improve one’s art, it forces you to draw, and draw, and draw, to redraw the same character a billion times, it forces you to draw new things, and new angles, and fight scenes (curse them!) and even the dreaded backgrounds. So as long as I keep creating stories, I hope that my art keeps evolving. But ultimately, deep introspection has already revealed to me I am more of a story person than an art person. Comics are the medium I aim to refine.

 

6. Now you’re embarking on a new comic, Wings of Daera. That must be exciting! In what ways will Wings of Daera be like A Story of Fire? In what ways will it be different?

 

People who read A Story Of Fire will probably have a decent idea of what to expect from Wings of Daera, but they might not imagine how greater the scope on this new story is. For once, I am not limited anymore by self-imposed page-limits and the like, so I aim to work on storyboarding and pacing that allows for a less-rushed, more extensive experience of the story I plan to tell. More characters, a longer narrative, but a few themes will definitely overlap. Redemption and revenge will be a few of them – I am a sucker for a good revenge story. However, while the theme of A Story Of Fire was evil born from suffering, forgiveness and responsibility, the themes from Wings of Daera relate more to obsession, love and one’s own shadow. There is also the theme of the setting, admittedly, ASoF setting is built very in service of the story I planned to tell, while WoD’s has been developed beforehand and has a lot more to learn and explore.

 

7. For fans of A Story of Fire looking to check out Wings of Daera, what should they expect?

 

Do you like trains? And people having intense anime battles on those trains? Then you are going to love Wings Of Daera.