Characters / The Echo Chronicles

The Masamune Knights

Bran Kidd

Bran Kidd is the leader of the Masamune Knights and a little bit of a slacker. Though he has a hero complex, he'd rather be sleeping than going on the pathetic missions that the knights tend to get. He is rather accident prone and not very adept with a sword, even though he carries one around.

Tropes associated with Bran:

• Idiot Hero: Short on intelligence, big on heroism. Yup.
• Ki Manipulation: It is revealed he can use this. A power he was unaware of until the reveal.
  • Gets to the point where he USES IT AGAINST HIMSELF; To shut down an imposter claiming his name.

Vincent Shinrin

Vincent Shinrin is the sniper for the Masamune Knights, as well as the only male Shinrin sibling. Vincent is cool-headed and is very close to his younger sister, Belle.

Tropes associated with Vincent:

• Friendly Sniper: He is at least as sociable as the other Knights, if not quite as...rambunctious.

Jake Skyton

Jake Skyton is a member of the Masamune Knights and Bran's right-hand man for most missions. Jake is an alcoholic, wanted criminal, gunslinger, and an unsuccessful womanizer. Jake has a lot of lady troubles including his intense ex-girlfriend Rose and the persistent bounty hunter Reba, who claims to "want his body for profit."

Tropes associated with Jake:

• Handsome Lech: He's a good looking man who regularly fails to seduce any woman.
• The Lancer: He is this to Bran.
• The Gunslinger: Yup.
• The Alcoholic: Yup Yup.

Ace Blitzer

Ace Blitzer is the financial manager for the Masamune Knights as well as the owner of Blitzer, Inc, a small-time weapons manufacturer. Financially crippled by the massive debts the knights of incurred and emotionally crippled by the incompetence that surrounds him, Ace is always trying to find a way to deal with his problems... whether it be steal food from a party to reduce their grocery bill or go to therapy to keep himself from committing mass homicide.

Tropes associated with Ace:

• Crimefighting with Cash: Deconstructed. The collateral damage the Knights cause has crippled both him AND his business.

Clide Stellar

Clide Stellar is the Masamune Knight Medical Officer. He is also a womanizer who sweats profusely when nervous.

Tropes associated with Clide:

• The Medic: His role inthe Knights.
• Overly-Nervous Flop Sweat: Nerves of Steel, he does lack.

Sammi Deblin

Samantha "Sammi" Deblin is the Masamune Knight's communications officer. Sammi runs the com-link system and monitors the knight's locations and vitals while they are on missions.

Tropes associated with Samantha:

• Mission Control: as the Knights Comms Officer.

The Shinrin Family

Yuki Shinrin

Yuki Shinrin is the matriarch of the Shinrin family and the oldest of the siblings. She was missing for 10 years prior to the beginning of the comic. Yuki is the rightful High Priestess of this plane and an amazingly powerful healer. She cares about her friends and family greatly, but sometimes shows it in questionable ways. Yuki is married to a black dragon and has one daughter, Naomi.

Tropes associated with Yuki:

• Manipulative Bitch: Oh my yes. She justifies herself with some variation of the phrase: "Everything I do is for my family."
• Parental Abandonment: Lost her parents when she was quite young. She wants revenge on the man she thinks is responsible.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Can inflict this. She freely admits having done it to her family. Some of whom call her on it.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Gets called on her crap alot. It never sticks.

Belle Shinrin

Belle Shinrin is the middle Shinrin sibling and the only "normal" one. She is a student at South Central University and lives mostly off of student aid. Belle is very close to her brother Vincent, but has a strained relationship with her other two siblings, Rose and Yuki. She is best friends with Bran Kidd and can often be seen loafing around the base.

Tropes associated with Belle:

• All Love Is Unrequited: She keeps trying to tell Bran something important...but keeps getting interrupted.
• Pretty Freeloader: Is this to the Knights.

Rose Shinrin

Rose Shinrin is a bit of a black sheep in her family. The owner of the bar, "The Flying Dart" along with her partner-in-crime Lily Valentine, Rose's only true family is "sweet, sweet money." Rose is beautiful, a master mixologist, and also runs a side business as a powerful potion maker. At one point, Rose dated Jake, but she likes to pretend it didn't happen. She is currently dating Reba Jay.

Tropes associated with Rose:

• Only in It for the Money: Claims her only love is money.
• Alchemy Is Magic: She makes powerful exotic potions.

Allison Shinrin

Allison Shinrin is the mother of Yuki, Vincent, Belle and Rose and is the former high priestess of the third plane. She has a past tied to Cam and died 10 years ago under questionable circumstances.

Tropes associated with Allison:

• Parental Abandonment: Died before the start of the story.

Naomi Shinrin

Naomi Shinrin is Yuki's young daughter that is a human/black dragon hybrid.

Tropes associated with Naomi:

• Creepy Cute: The physical traits from her father result in this.
• Half-Human Hybrid: A resul of having a human mother and dragon father.
• Tag Along Kid: When she winds up involved in the affairs of her family and friends.
• Token Mini-Moe: Her primary function so far has been to be silly and adorable.

Alras Shinrin

Alras Shinrin is the father of Yuki, Belle, Vincent and Rose. He is a master of dad humor and busts myths in his spare time. Alras Shinrin is the husband of Allison Shinrin and died under questionable circumstances ten years ago.

Tropes associated with Alras:

• Parental Abandonment: Died before the start of the story.

The Seru Family

Cam Seru

Cam Seru is the current High Priest of our world. His relationship with the Shinrin family is. . . tense and confusing. He appears to have a connection with Yuki's mother. He is the father of Miyoshi Seru and the ex-husband of Mildred Beatrice Smythe.

Tropes associated with Cam:

• Anti-Villain: Presented by Yuki as a villain to the Knights. But their investigation turns up little to mark him as 'evil'.

Miyoshi Seru

Miyoshi Seru is Cam Seru and Mildred Beatrice Smythe's mysterious teenage daughter. She has a thing for Vincent, loves getting under her dad's skin, and randomly has visions of the future that ALWAYS come true.

Tropes associated with Miyoshi:

• Fille Fatale: Mild example. After getting a vision that a man who is a stranger to her would be appearing in her room, she makes it a point to RUSH to her room. Then she interrogates the man...Then she starts trying to SEDUCE him. This man is VINCENT SHINRIN; someone she has reason to see as a DANGEROUS ENEMY...
• Psychic Powers: Has random visions that ALWAYS come true.

Mildred Beatrice Smythe

Mildred Beatrice Smythe is the high priestess of the 1st plane, which makes her the big boss, or the "Supreme" priestess (She made that title up.) Mildred, also known as Supreme Priestess Smythe or Millie, is a cold and angry woman. She is the mother of Miyoshi Seru and Cam Seru's ex-wife.

Tropes associated with Mildred:

• Authority in Name Only: She made up the title of ""Supreme" Priestess...despite already having an ACTUAL title with equivalent authority.
• Unfortunate Names: Her name makes her sound like an old lady from stuffier times.

2nd Plane Characters

Ava Gray

Ava Gray is the High Priestess of the Second Plane and Celeste's boss. She is brash, rude, has a problem with authority and is generally not very priestess-like. She seems to have a good relationship with Yuki, but Ava is always fighting for her own agenda on what she perceives as "just."

Tropes associated with Ava:

• Action Girl: Shows herself to be ready and a bit...eager...to engage in violence to achieve her ends.
• Nun Too Holy: She is very much out of step with how a priestess should be. How she manages to retain authority in spite of that is not yet revealed.

Celeste Leigh Crofter

Celeste Leigh Crofter is the high priestess apprentice of the 2nd plane and showed up unexpectedly at the Masamune Knight base to help guide them in Yuki's absence. Celeste is sweet and spacey and far more intelligent than most people credit her for. She's also noticeably not human, but her race has not yet been revealed.

Tropes associated with Celeste:

• Arbitrary Skepticism: Claims elves and vampires don't exist. It has yet to be revealed if this is indeed true for all planes.
• Badass Pacifist: The Pacifism Code of her holy order prevents her from initiating violence except under certain conditions. When those conditions are met...
• Yamato Nadeshiko: She has strong shades of it. Prsenting herself in manner both peaceful and demure. The 'touch of iron' is revealed when she's given reason to act outside of her priestess code of pacifism.

Priest Council

Jack Zeras

Jack Zeras is a member of the priest council and is the Head of Internal Affairs. Jack has a strong sense of justice and does not take mockery of the law lightly.

Tropes associated with Jack:

Kali Marah

Kali Marah is the Head of Disciplinary Action on the priest council, which is really just a fancy way of saying dungeon master and executioner. Whenever Kali is involved, rest assure that heads will roll.

Tropes associated with Kali:

• Genki Girl: Quite bubbly and goofy given her role.

Friends, Allies and Enemies

Yolanda Vega

Yolonda Vega is an anger management and family therapist that the knights are forced to see by Ace.

Tropes associated with Yolanda:

Lily Valentine

Lily Valentine is the co-owner of the Flying Dart bar and Rose's best friend. Lily is far more carefree than Rose and lives to have fun instead of to be a slave to the business.

Tropes associated with Lily:

Reba Jay

Reba Jay is a bounty hunter and mercenary. Sometimes she is trying to get the reward money for Jake's capture and sometimes she's working for a force opposing the knights. Whatever the case, she's always willing to stop what she's doing and beat up the knights for a little bit. Currently, Reba works for Mayor Spencer Woodell as his personal bodyguard.

Tropes associated with Reba:

• Bounty Hunter: Her stock and trade.
• Ki Manipulation: Weilds mysterious power to create energy attacks. The same power that Bran Posseses.

Little Girl

The little girl is a recurring character that Jake keeps tormenting. One day she will get her revenge.

Tropes associated with her:

• Sitcom Archnemesis: Her relationship with Jake.
  • "Darn you terrorists!"

Mayor Spencer Woodell

Mayor Spencer Woodell has been the mayor of New Mercy for over 100 years, but appears pretty young for a guy that old. There's some theories about this, but the most prominent one seems to be that he's a vampire. Who can say? He seems to be close friends with Cam Seru and is so determined to cover up information from the Shinrins that he framed the knights for bombing a building to destroy evidence.

Tropes associated with Spencer:

• Disc-One Final Boss: He gets builtup as a major antagonist for a good part of the first book. His..."defeat"...leads into the next phase of the story.
• Really 700 Years Old: He is at least more then 100 years old.
• Our Vampires Are Different: It's not clear whether or not he is one.