While working toward finishing my longest Rayearth fanfic, Sanctuary, I have been going back through the earlier chapters to fix things that bugged me about them, and to also get them to vibe correctly with the later chapters, since I didn't know the whole plot when I first started writing and it is very obvious on a reread right now. 

I will be adding some notes to chapters with big changes as I update them, but I also thought it would be fun to do a more detailed post with what I've changed and why, as well as my thoughts about the chapter. I miss the old trend of author commentary from the LJ days. Why not use this space to do that for my fanfic.

If you are coming over here from AO3 and would like to chat in this thread as I post updates and commentary, you are more than welcome to join the forum to do so. Registration is open, but it has to be manually approved before you can start posting, so it may be a wait of a day or two for me to log in to see the notification for approval unless you shoot an email to the forum email account or my personal one on AO3 to let me know you need in. It's a spam measure, sorry for the inconvenience.

Commentary Posts by Chapter:

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4

At the beginning of the manga, Umi wails about Cephiro's lack of Haagen Daz, which feels slightly incongruous with her dislike of sweets, but I suppose not all ice cream is particularly sweet.

What sort of ice cream flavours do you think she likes best?

On the topic of ice cream, what sort of flavours do you imagine the other characters might enjoy?

Do you think any character in particular might be too lactose intolerant to enjoy ice cream?

So, I just started playing for the first time two weeks ago. Despite not playing for the last week, I've already put in over 60 hours, and I have gotten married, we have one baby so far, and I'm halfway to finishing the community centre.

It's been a really nice distraction during a rather stressful week.

Anyone else playing?

2 June 2024, TMS announced that they would be releasing a new Magic Knight Rayearth anime series.


A rough translation of the text in the teaser:

「CLAMP」 is working on
A legendary isekai adventure story
Shidou Hikaru
Ryuuzaki Umi
Hououji Fuu
30 years since the anime broadcast
Once again, the girls with be able to meet
A new anime project begins now!

Let's use this thread to share info about the new series as we learn it.

Discussion about hopes and expectations should be kept in New Anime Discussion

So, some of us already talked about little about this in the Discord server on the day, but what are your thoughts about the new anime announcement?

What do you hope will happen or expect to happen in the new version of the series?

It's difficult to believe that this forum is 19 years old this year. In the last two decades, I have made very few changes to the features I set up when I very first created the forum on an impulse, so it was more than time for a proper refresh.

Here is a list of what I have changed and why:

Created a custom registration agreement and added a privacy policy
For basically the entire life of this forum, we have been rolling on under the default SMF registration agreement. This is not necessarily compliant with the various internet laws that have come into place since I chose to install SMF on psynos.net in 2006.

The Rules
Like the registration agreement, this forum has also run on several barely altered versions of the same rules I roughly sketched out in the very first week of this forum's life. This week, I have completely rewritten the rules to make them more clear and to cover the new requirements for social platforms.

2-Factor Authentication
Now, I cannot take credit for this change, but I feel like it is worth mentioning. The newest SMF update brought with it the option to set up 2FA using an authenticator app. This can be set up in account settings.

New Themes
One of the most obvious changes to the forum is the removal of the original theme. It was out of date and did not work with the newest version of SMF.

All of the new themes are responsives, so the forum is now more easily accessible on mobile devices. And both Boru (the default theme) and NameX have easy to toggle dark/light modes.

If you still want the dark vibes with multiple accent colour options like the original theme, you can choose the NameX theme in the Look and Layout section of your account settings.

Category & Board names
Anyone who joined the forum before this month would know that the title of the various sections of the board were titles of the various image songs. I had chosen to do this because the forum's entire layout was inspired by a Witch Hunter Robin forum that I was frequenting at the time, and that forum had labeled all the sections with episode titles. While this worked well enough, the unclear section names were confusing to some.

All boards and categories are now clearly labeled with their topics and the descriptions have also been updated for clarity. Any topics that no longer fit within their board have been moved to a more appropriate location.

Mature Fanart
Because of new regulations that assume children will join despite breaking the rules by lying about their age, I am locking NSFW fanart behind a moderated age-gate. While I do not believe that beautifully drawn naked bodies count under the pornography rules, I am not taking chances.

Private Messaging has been disabled
This choice is related to the same regulations that led to age-gating nude fanart. I do not believe that any of the long-term members of this forum would be inappropriate with underage members that may join in the future, but even as the administrator, I cannot see others' private messages unless they have been reported for moderation.

With the future release of a new anime that could potentially lead to an influx of new members, I felt it safest to just remove that vector for potential abuse for the time being.

Changed the post-count membergroups
Previously, your post count changed your member group to be one of the various Cephiran titles that had been put in an order based on my own preferences. I have since decreased the post-count groups by two and have changed the names of them to steps to reach Cephiran citizenship.

The new post-count based groups:

• Tourist
• New Arrival
• Visa Applicant
• Visa Holder
• Permanent Resident
• Cephiran Citizen

For those who liked having the titles, there are now optional member groups that can show up with your avatar above your post-count based rank. These are the translations of the Cephiran titles and can be found in your account settings in the Primary Membergroup dropdown menu.

The new optional membergroups:

• Illusionist
• Mage
• Priest
• Smith
• Summoner
• Swordsman

This is not a completely comprehensive list, but it is the changes long-time members will most likely notice.

It seems like every time I look away for too long we get another influx of bots. The most recent round came in and started posting links to who knows what.

To combat this, we are back to moderator approval of new accounts. I have also added a dozen security questions. New members will have to answer three randomly chosen ones at registration.

There is also a new favourite character(s) profile field that is not only required at registration, but longtime members will be prompted to fill this out if they wish to make changes to their profile. I hope you don't mind this too much. It just seemed like a good measure to help weed out bots that make it past the security questions.

I hope the other options above would let me lift mod approval in the future, so there isn't so much of a barrier to pass before new members are able to post, but we'll see.

I've lost access to my account, what do I do?
If you cannot reset your password because you have lost access to your email account since you created your account, please contact us at cephiro@psynos.net.

There's an issue on the forum, what do I do?
If you think something should be changed or improved upon on the forum itself, please feel free to make a topic or contribute to an existing topic in Help & Feedback[url]http://.

If you believe someone's post is in violation of the [url= https://cephiro.psynos.net/index.php?topic=650.0]Rules or Terms of Service, please report that post to the moderation team. 

You can find the option to report a post to the moderation team under the MORE... option.



Then let us know what rule or term it violates.



The moderation team will review it as soon as possible.

How do I change my username?
You cannot change the username you chose during registration, but you can change the name others see by changing your display name in your account settings.

If you still would rather change your registered username, please email cephiro@psynos.net from the email account associated with your forum account.

This email should include:

• The subject line: "Username Change Request"
• Your current username
• The username you want to change it too

This change will be made for you as soon as possible.

How do I change or remove my optional Membergroup?
In your account settings, you can access the Primary Membergroup dropdown.



Whatever option you choose here will show up under your name beside your posts. Choosing (no primary membergroup) will remove that line from your sidebar display.

How do I delete my account?
There are several options for deleting your account. Please see Account Deletion Requests for more details.

Hello, welcome to the Cephiro Forum!

Before participating in forum discussion, please read the rules below as well as the Terms of Service and the Privacy Policy. The rules are not necessarily comprehensive and are subject to change. If you have feedback or suggestions about the rules, please let us know in Help & Feedback.


All posts should be in English for moderation purposes.
Discussions about the various translations of the series with quotes are more than welcome, but the majority of text in posts should be in English.

I. Conduct

Be respectful and considerate of other members of the server.
Racism, sexism, transphobia, homophobia, Islamophobia, antisemitism, and other general hatred and hostility will absolutely not be tolerated. Neither will distasteful comments about mental illness, disability, assault, violence, or gore

No character hate posts.
Your loathed character is likely someone else's favourite character, possibly for the very reason you dislike them.

No shipping wars.
One of the wonderful things about Magic Knight Rayearth is how the variety of characters and their interactions with one another make it easy to pair characters off in dozens of different combinations, so the chances of someone shipping a pairing you don't like are quit high. Let's be respectful of this harmless difference in opinions.


II. Profile & Signature

Keep your profile and signature appropriate.
All the customisable sections in your profile, such as personal text and your avatar, should be kept appropriate for all ages.

Keep signatures short and accessible.
This means no long paragraphs that take up a third of the visible page and no flashing gifs.


III. Content

Keep your posts readable.
While there are many different colours and fonts available to use in your posts, try to avoid using bright colours that are difficult to read for the bulk of your post.

Try to keep sexual discussion in Mature Discussion.
While the topic might come up in discussion in other boards, any explicit discussion should be moved to Mature Discussion.

Keep sexual discussion text only.

NSFW fanart is only allowed in Mature Fanart.
Keep this art on the tasteful nudity side of the mature rather than explicit sex. (To do our best to be compliant with new online safety regulations, access to Mature Fanart will require age verification. Contact us at cephiro@psynos.net if you are willing to prove you are over 18 to request access.)

Don't make current event specific posts.
While it is obviously impossible to completely shed the reality of the world and the events happening around us, let's try to keep discussion of them off the boards. Let's try to keep this place an escape rather than a place to vent.

Credit art that is not yours.
If sharing art for discussion that you did not make, you MUST credit the artist by sharing their name and a link to their social media or other web profile. The artist reserves the right to request it be taken down, especially if they did not give permission for it to be shared.

Do not share any art or fiction made by generative AI.

Do not share links to merchandise that uses CLAMP's art without permission.
When in doubt, remember that officially licensed products will be announced on CLAMP's social media channels and website, https://clamp-net.com/.

Avoid discussing piracy or linking to pirated content.
This even includes linking to those big manga aggregator websites when recommending mangas. If you want to suggest other members read a manga, simply share the title and author and they can work out how they want to read it themselves. 


IV. Forum Etiquette

Replies should make a contribution to the conversation.
Try to reply with at least a whole sentence or two, rather a couple words.

Stay on topic.
Keep your replies related to the topic of the starting post. If, while replying to a thread, you feel the urge to go off-topic, consider starting a new discussion thread instead.

Different topics should be their own threads.
If you have multiple unrelated topics you want to discuss, start multiple topic threads. Do not combine a half-dozen discussion topics in one post. Starting multiple different discussion threads does not count as spamming the forum.

Wait 36hours to double-post.
Due to the slow nature of discussion in a small forum like this, it is not uncommon to have a new idea that would lead you to respond to a thread where you were the last person to respond. For the first 36 hours of that last reply, consider simply editing your last reply instead.

• The exception to this rule would be posts in a thread that is tracking your progress through a game or a creative endeavour.

V. Warnings and Bans

To keep the forums a safe and welcoming space, we have to respond to rule breaking.

If you break or deliberately ignore the rules, you will receive a warning. Your 3rd offence will result in a ban. You will always be notified the moderation team with an explanation about why you received a warning or a ban.

You will be banned immediately without warnings if you:

• Spam forum-wide
• Attempt to dox or make violent and disturbing threats/advances towards any individual
• Created a new account to evade a previous ban

We offer three different account deletion options:

• Do It Yourself
• Forget My Name
• Scorch the Ground I've Tread

Option 1: Do It Yourself
This is the simplest, fastest, and most straightforward option, and — as it says on the tin — you can do it yourself.

This is the option to choose if you simply want to delete your access to the forum. Every post you have ever made will still be on the board for anyone to read and respond to.

Be aware that your username will remain on your posts. This will be the username you registered with and not the display name you may have chosen later.

To delete your account, open your account settings and click on the Action tab to find the 'Delete this account' option.



You will need to enter your password to complete the deletion.



Once you've done that, all that will be left of your account is a guest account with your old username

->

Option 2: Forget My Name
This is the first of the two moderator assisted account deletions.  It's very similar to the Do It Yourself option, where all of your posts and quotes of your posts stay intact for other members to read and interact with, but your username is changed in the database to Vanished Member and all quotes of your posts will also be edited to reflect Vanished Member as the name of the member quoted, essentially merging all of your posts with any other posts from  deleted accounts that chose the same deletion method.

Editing quotes is a manual process, so this may take several days to complete one the process is started.

Option 3: Scorch the Ground I've Tread
This is the most comprehensive deletion option, but we do not recommend it because of how it will affect other members on the forum.

This option is a full deletion of every post you have ever made, every topic you have ever started, and a manual deletion of every quote that was ever made of any of your posts.

Obviously deleting every post will derail and likely remove discussions that other members may be enjoying. But you have the right to be forgotten, and we will do our best to remove every trace of your posts on the forum.

How to request an account deletion
You may reply to this topic letting us know which type of deletion you wish to request. Once your request is completed, we will delete your reply to this topic.

Or you can send an email to cephiro@psynos.net from the email account associated with your forum account.

This email should include:

• The subject line: "Account Deletion Request"
• The type of deletion you are requesting

This is the thread to discuss your questions, comments, and happy thoughts about the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Everyone knows my fic tends to lean toward various forms of accidental baby acquisitions, so this would be a related topic. While it will contain some sexual discussion, I don't think it should get too detailed to warrant a move, but if it does, I can migrate it to Rarabai.

What are your thoughts on contraception in Cephiro?

Personally, I tend to end up with a playlist that helps me get into the mindset of the story I am writing. Some are easier to make soundtracks for than others.  I thought it might be nice to have a thread where we can share links to our playlists for others to listen if they like.

Rayearth rayearth rayearth rayearth rayearth rayearth?

Rayearth rayearth rayearth  rayearth rayearth, Rayearth rayearth rayearth.

Rayearth.

I mean, this was me trying to work out how old Hikaru's brothers are, but I do wonder about Kuu too.

If we take the fact they are all 14 and in 2nd year of Junior High, it must be March, and this is the end of year trip, or something. Thus why everyone is kind of bummed it's at Tokyo Tower. That means they are probably in 3rd year by the time the second arc begins, and still 14.

Our starting point is that Hikaru is 14 as long as this happens before June (June-Sept they'd be in summer uniforms).

What we know (or can ascertain): Kakeru seems to be the youngest. Masaru is the middle. Satoru is the eldest.

Kakeru is in a school uniform in the opening scenes. I would imagine this puts him somewhere between 1-3 years older than Hikaru. So he must be somewhere between 15-18. I personally would think somewhere around 16-17? So two years older?

Masaru is wearing street clothes. (I'm not sure if this is because he doesn't do the whole working in the family dojo thing, or if he is just chilling that morning.) His personality still seems very young, and energetic. So he probably is still a teenager, or at least very early 20s, but I want to put him at 18-19.

Satoru is in hakama. He just strikes me as being much older than the others. Like mid to late twenties old, which seems to suggest there is a larger gap between him and Masaru than between the other three, but perhaps his demeanor is influenced by their father having left when Hikaru was small. 

I keep debating on dropping 2-3 years between them, which would only put Kakeru in school still.

Anyone else have any thoughts on sibling ages?

Somariel shared this on the chat and we didn't discuss it then for reasons. The original post I saw came from birdsquirrel on tumblr:

every ot3 has these very important roles:

person a, who runs headlong into crazy bullshit
person b, who acts like they're too sensible to run headlong into crazy bullshit, but is really just as bad as person a
person c, who actually tries to avoid running headlong into crazy bullshit, but keeps getting dragged into it by the other two anyway

Whether or not you believe Cephiro has a concept of marriage, you probably accept there is some form of courting or dating in Cephiro.

What do you think those particular traditions might entail?  Or what sort of traditions have you written?

There are a number of characters in Rayearth. I am sure we all assume they must have pasts that include families of some description, but we don't get any of that information in canon.

When inventing families for fanfic, I am sure we all have gone through the various car lists and things. I thought it might be nice to have a thread for collecting related car names to the ones used for the characters.

For those who need ideas for names of foods and other items to add to their Cephiran worldbuilding There are a few things listed in the Materials Collection.

プラグ- Puragu (plug) - Size of a basket ball, Red, very juicy. Like a big strawberry. Grows on vines around uinka trees.

ウインカー - Uinkaa (Winker/Blinker) - Soccer Ball sized cherries. OK to eat, but the juice is like milk.

ニトロ - Nitro - Soccer Ball sized. Looks like grapes. Grow under ground like potatoes, on vines.

パワステ - Pawasute (power steering) - Flat bread made from the outershell of Taabo

ブイ•テ_ツク - Biteku (v-tek) - Middle is tasty like pudding. Grow on coconut-like trees. (This is one of Presea's favourite's)

ターボ - Taabo (turbo) - Size of a walnut. Shell with a soft bit in the middle. The middle tastes like almonds. The outside is ground into flour for bread

ギア - Gia (gear) - Size of a handball. Cheese plant. Grow on vines on the ground.

Down and I (well mostly Down) decided it would be fun to do a crack shipping event over the twelve days of Christmas. A time to share any prompts, headcanons, meta, fic, or art for all the nonsense pairings that don't get as much love during the year.

It's mostly on Tumblr, but we can also make a collection on AO3, if anyone is interested in sharing anything over there.

If posts on tumblr get tagged with "#12 days of rayearth crack" I'll reblog them to fuckyeahrayearth to share with the rest of the fandom.

You can also post links to your posts, or even prompts and meta directly here to share with us.