十二国記: The Twelve Kingdoms
So I finally got the first Twelve Kingdoms novel yesterday, so I stayed up until one in the morning reading it. It was awesome.
The Twelve Kingdoms (Juuni Kokki) is an epic set of novels written by Fuyumi Ono back in the 1990’s. It consists of seven novels thus far. An Anime adaptation was created in 2002 that ran for 45 episodes. The Anime is brilliant, but incomplete.
The series consists of several stories spread around this world consisting of eight kingdoms in a diamond shape, with four islands around the sides. In the center is an island that is the province of the heavens. The basic premise is that the gods created creatures known as the “Kirin”, one of which is assigned to each kingdom and selects the ruler of the country when the previous ruler dies. The title the Kirin hold is called “Taiho”, and they are named after each country, with the name of the country as the first part of their name, and the “Ki” or “rin” from Kirin as the 2nd part, depending on the gender of the Kirin. The only person that the Kirin will obey is the true ruler of the kingdom. The twelve kingdoms are named Hou, Ryu, Tai, Kyo, En, Han, Kei, Sai, Kou, Ren, Son and Shun. The rulers of each kingdom become immortal, as do their servants. The ruler can be killed, but will not die of natural causes. Only if the ruler disobeys the edicts of heaven will he/she fall from power. The main edicts are to be a just ruler and not to interfere with other countries. If a ruler violates these then an affliction known as Shitsudou strikes the country. Weather turns bad, demons appear and the Kirin becomes sick. If the ruler mends his/her ways, all will be ok, but if not and the Kirin dies, then the ruler dies.
This world is occasionally connected to our world via tears in the dimensional walls. These tears are called “Shoku” and are accompanied by storms. When this happens people from our world can be transported into the world of the 12 kingdoms. These people are known as Kaikyaku and have many difficulties, depending on the country in which they end up. The world uses Chinese characters for writing, but the spoken languages is completely different, so Kaikyaku can’t communicate effectively. Also, since they are brought by Shoku, which can cause violent storms, they are sometimes looked upon as curses and persecuted.
The world is a very low-tech world, with no electricity, technology, etc. Instead there is the divine powers of the heavens, and spirits and demons. Another major difference is that children are not born from women, they are grown on trees as pods. The parents pray for a child, and tie ribbons to the special tree, and if the gods bless them, a pod will grow on the branch they chose to tie the ribbon to. It takes about 10 months, and then the child hatches.
The shoku is one-way, from Japan (known as Wa) or China (known as Han) to this world. There are a couple exceptions. Kirin and rulers can travel both directions, and occasionally a child pod is caught in a shoku and taken to our world. The pod comes to rest in a womans womb and the child is born. These people are known as Taika and are never truly at home in our world.
Spoilers Follow
The first novel released in the US follows the story of a girl named Yoko Nakajima. She is a high-school student in Japan, and constantly feels left out and never quite comfortable with her life. One day she starts having nightmares, of creatures in the darkness coming after her. After almost a month of this nightmare, a tall man with gold hair appears in front of her in school, says she is in danger, and swears fealty to her. He says his name is “Keiki” and pulls her onto the roof of the school, where they are attacked by a giant raptor called a “Kochou”. Keiki gives her a sword and tells her to fight. She refuses and he attaches a spirit called Joyou which is a “Hinman” to her, which fights through her body. She then is taken on a flying creature through a Shoku to the world of the 12 kingdoms where she is separated from the creatures and left on her own. She finds that she can understand everyone just fine, and her body has also changed. Her hair color has changed along with her face and body. The story then follows as she crosses the country of Kou, continually fighting the demons who pursue her, and comes close to losing her humanity and ability to trust people in the process. She is saved, both literally and spiritually, by a half-man/half-beast “Hanjyuu” known as Rakushun. Rakushun appears as a waist-high rat that is very intelligent and walks on hind legs. Rakushun saves her from near-death, and accompanies her on her journey. Yoko finally finds out the truth about Keiki, herself and her destiny.
Spoilers End
This novel was a very enjoyable read. It was well written and well translated. I encountered very few editing errors. The novel is hard-bound and the size of a manga. It runs over 400 pages, with medium size font and approximately 1.5 line spacing. Interspersed with the text are occasional full-page line-drawn pictures. It was very well done. I am extremely pleased with this novel and eagerly await the others. Tokyopop released this novel, but unfortunately has no future release dates listed.
Go buy this novel now!
http://www.tokyopop.com/S-1787/1.html
EDIT: I emailed the Press contact at Tokyopop and was informed that Volume #2 will not come out until 2008, and a volume a year afterwards… Lame.