CHARACTERS

Aya (Colorful, Woven Silk)

Aya's father, Lord Akira, was slain in battle on the day of Aya's birth. Grief stricken, Aya's mother died days later.

Raised in the distant Akira winter castle by faithful, but severe, retainers, Aya learned independence at an early age. Her only friend... Takeo, sole son of General Isamu who died fighting fiercely to protect his beloved Lord, Aya's father.

The two children shared endless secrets and dreams in the many hidden places within the vast neglected gardens of Akira castle. From earliest age Aya had sworn to herself, always, to protect her beloved Takeo.

Aya's power - the art of cleaving matter with intricately woven cosmic strings - she learned on her own.

Takeo is a modest boy, unaware of his own formidable strengths. He worships Aya, practices relentlessly with his sword to protect his friend and only love from any and all danger.

But deep in his heart Takeo wonders, how can Aya care for this lowly being that is Takeo?

Energy-hungry industrialists of a long extinct petroculture designed Ji-Gumo's forebears to harvest hydrocarbons to fuel their failing engines of commerce. Then... they unleashed them across the parallel universes.

But the spiders evolved, severed connection. They developed an insatiable taste for organic matter. Like the wildcatters of old, Ji-Gumo is ever in search of the next great gusher of food and fuel.

In Aya's and Takeo's Land of the Rising Sun, Ji-Gumo and his swarm of robotic spiders find boundless reserves of succulent living flesh.