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New Dawn is the creation of Nick The Swing, made after he realized Viandas was a pile of continuity errors which needed a huge rehaul to avoid being even worse than it already was.

At first, it was a shameless Fate/stay night rip off. Matthew at first even looked like Shirou Emiya in all but name, down to appearances.

A rude awakening by a certain troper prompted a redo of the intro, and re-imaging all the character archetypes into something new. Following brainstorming, a good amount of reading online writing guides, and even some pages here on TV Tropes, New Dawn was reborn.

Except with some inspection and innovation, Nick turned things around and made an original plot, many characters who have no basis whatsoever, and even inverted some perceptions about what the characters would turn out to be, such as Shuuji's whole bullying shtick being an act, and having him perform a Heel–Face Turn.

With a sprawling multiverse as the background, we look at the characters.

Matthew Streika started out as a (rather) Ordinary High-School Student, though one with a decidedly un-ordinary past.

Following his witnessing a magical incident between Sorata Eisenman and Adrian the Black Blade, he is drawn into a world he was only vaguely familiar with years ago, and told of a frightening free for all currently on going in the magical world for control of the Holy Artifacts, artifacts of great power which, when brought together, can sew either miracle or calamity.

With Matthew's father thought dead, the young man leaps head first into this new world in order to defend the multitude of friends which just seem to gravitate to his incredibly nice, forgiving and "pure hearted" personality. Not all is well in this group, though.

In between the external enemies, including vampires, angels, demons and magic using felons, and the internal enemies, this group will definitely need to earn their happy ending with blood, sweat, and tears.

The author forgot to post a link to the story here, though.

Tropes:

  • All There in the Manual: A whole World Building thread exists to fill in the backstory and histories of certain characters, even the minor ones typically have some bizarre factors tying them together.
  • An Ice Person: Shira, to the point of qualifying as a Story-Breaker Power. When he uses his Oracion, which is the equivalent of taking a limiter off of magic and manifesting it directly as the representative of internal factors, it becomes even more powerful, projecting an ice mist that can freeze anything in its range.
  • Ax-Crazy: Most prominently Shira, who actually lost because he realized it, and deigned that he wanted to die. There's also Haures and Sandalphon, and Wayne Reverie is definitely not very stable, his minion Nebiros much moreso. Much, much moreso.
  • Barrier Warrior: Nebiros, who uses his barriers to crush, maim, mutilate and otherwise disfigure his enemies into a variety of splooshy, interesting shapes. These attacks are more often than not a One-Hit Kill, due to the nature of Nebiros' barriers.
  • Beware the Nice Ones: Matthew is about the nicest guy you could meet. Just, for the love of God, do not hurt his friends.
  • BFS: Matthew tends to summon a lot of these, using one to defeat three Student Council minions, though it was just a regular claymore. He summons one the size of a construction vehicle to drop on Kyle, and earlier uses one to try to defend himself from Shira's ice attacks.
  • Black Swords Are Better: The Black Blades, very dangerous, cursed weapons made of screaming human souls. They tend to do very, very unpleasant things if they land a hit, and most of them can even affect their wielder in very disturbing ways. The one featured in the book, Vandes' Rune-Blade called Necrosia has the ability to cause instant rot and gangrene on any living thing the blade touches, but thankfully does not affect Matthew in any way due to his peculiarities. If it was not wielded by Matthew, any wielder of Necrosia would begin to hunger for human flesh. And this is one of the weaker Black Blades forged.
  • Big Bad: A tie between Anathema, Wayne and Nebiros, though Nebiros is the Final Boss in a somewhat literal fashion, being a one on one fight between Matthew and Nebiros, enforced as such by Nebiros.
  • Bond Villain Stupidity: Averted by Nebiros, who never assumed any of his minions or even any of the members of the evil Five-Man Band could defeat Matthew, and making plans to deal with that contingency as he sends them out.
  • Broken Bird: Katherine, via Rape as Backstory and a psychotic disorder that was never properly treated, resulting in hallucinations, breakdowns, and ultimately, her own half-crazed mind creating terrifying monsters that hunt down and kill almost everyone who had bullied her...and she is accidentally blamed for their activities, due to some strands of her DNA nearby (hair), and then she discovers her also very messed up brother was not such a bad guy, but he ends up running from her, thinking she is a murderer. The end of the story for her is her father preparing to shoot her in the head.
  • Crapsaccharine World: Yeah, New Dawn looks bright, colorful and funny, but Fridge Horror will tell you this is not a fun universe. There have been five secret wars, there have been three massacres in book 1 already, and should the Masquerade fail, things will not be pretty. When Sorata has an Imagine Spot on the subject, she imagines flayed human corpses, demonic hounds devouring everyone in sight, and a gigantic hole where Washington DC should've been. Not to mention all the traumatic backstories, and some of the secrets that are being kept.
  • Curb-Stomp Battle: Matthew vs. the Heavenly Blades, round 3. He managed to kill a couple of them, and almost killed the rest in brutal ways.
  • Does This Remind You of Anything?: Invoked with the Baptism, which is meant to be an intimate thing between a Meister and his Esper, simulating sex.
  • The Dreaded: Matthew becomes this to Queen Anathema's forces, especially should he go into Mage Killer Mode. Unleashing a horribly brutal and one sided No-Holds-Barred Beatdown on her forces, at two points bisecting two of her elite soldiers, and actually killing The Dragon (he got better), and then stealing the Holy Artifact after making her so called invincible Giant Mook look utterly stupid and then walking away from it relatively better off than when he entered the fight. What is more jarring is that Matthew does not remember doing most of this.
  • Dysfunction Junction
    • Matthew: Suffered from so much, and then there is his backstory, training excessively until he almost collapsed several times, his guardians were made to leave him utterly alone in a big, utterly empty house until he grew up, and then there's what actually happened in his childhood.
    • Shuuji: Was cloned, used as a spy secretly by Anathema, and then he reincarnated into his real body, giving him the charming visions of him slashing himself in half with a sword. His sister, who he had been doing the whole Yakuza Heir thing for...might not even exist. His dad did not even care that he rebelled, and promptly used it to make even more chaos in Sanfield.
    • Sorata: Has a detached brother she used to really like hanging out with, but then he was told that he had to protect a very nice little girl, and following this, he almost never spoke to her again. This was before trouble followed her brother home and she was injured by a demon while he tried to defend his charge. She joined the Espers to get away, and was assigned to Kyrio Streika. This really just says all you need to know.
    • Dex Anthem: Freudian Excuse does not even begin to describe his childhood. He was raised to be nothing but a weapon, to be used and eventually dismantled in the course of battle in the service of his maniacal Mad Scientist of a father. The one time he tried to escape, his best friend was punished in his place in an attempt to drive him past the Despair Event Horizon. His cursing, abrasive personality and his cruel use of his broken powers are all meant to make sure nobody tries to mess with him, as, after what he did to his father after actually crossing the Despair Event Horizon is something even he doesn't want to see happen again.
    • Raikou: How he became a cyborg is so horrifying he cannot bring himself to tell the story without shaking and feeling the phantom pain. And then there's what happened to his girlfriend Sharon Tate Roman. There's also the fact that his current state is almost entirely emotionless, and he cannot even bleed any more, fearing cybernetics may further eat his soul and make him kill his treasured Esper Sheena.
  • Eating the Eye Candy: Damn near everybody does this to Matthew. In fact, the thing that defeated Waylana White was that she was trying way too hard to get a better look. And then J-Antonio shows up a while later, and says...this: "Well, Matthew, you're a lot more handsome than I'd heard." All that results from these scenes is a very uncomfortable Matthew. Even Sorata and Shuuji cop a few looks.
  • Enemy Within: Matthew's alternate personality, Mage Killer Matthew, who is much more ruthless than Matthew is, has no regard for the safety of his friends due to having a skilled healer on his side, is a Knight Templar, and did not even question trying to kill a guy having a heart attack.
  • Fake Memories: Matthew has had fake memories planted in his head, to indicate a different upbringing than what truly happened.
  • Flechette Storm: Matthew does this with daggers, increasing the destructive ability by supercharging them with Mana and thus detonating them when they hit something, and also with swords, as shown during the prologue.
  • Forced to Watch: Well, the other serial killer tried, but did not get very far before Katherine's demon summon killed him.
  • Giggling Villain: Nebiros. And my God, is it creepy.
  • Harmless Villain: What the Heavenly Blades initially end up as in the first book. By the end of the second encounter, Matthew is already snarking about them "setting perception of homosexuality back a hundred years, but being pretty much harmless." The arrival of more dangerous ones ups the stakes and they quickly prove to be Not So Harmless Villains.
  • Heart Is an Awesome Power: Some of the most deadly Spell Cores sound absolutely silly on paper.
  • If It's You, It's Okay: Shuuji is a straight guy who has a girlfriend who will be introduced in book II, but he is also deeply in love with Matthew. He does, though, understand that Matthew is probably not interested in him, and wants his friend / love to be happy. His girlfriend, a highly amused Yaoi Fangirl, will enjoy every minute.
  • Jerkass: Jackson White, oh so much. Its difficult to feel sorry for a guy when he gets injured or kidnapped half the time, but when he isn't, he's usually spreading slanderous rumors about people, emotionally blackmailing girls, and that once, he tried to sexually assault Alina. Good thing Alina is much more than he can handle.
  • Jerkass with a Heart of Gold: Dex Anthem might act cold, curse a lot, and think nothing of killing people, but underneath the veneer of a self professed "monster who just happens to be fighting other monsters", he cares a lot for his new friends. Do not mess with them.
  • Lovable Jock: Matthew himself, issues aside, is a very kind, forgiving and industrious young sportsman who honestly likes to try to see the best in everyone.
  • Manipulative Bastard: All signs point to Kyrio Streika being one of these.
  • No-Nonsense Nemesis: J-Antonio. Aside from flirting with Matthew, he has no jokes, he's not harmless, and he's dead serious about killing Matthew and company, even turning himself into a horrible Eldritch Abomination. Even in death, he made sure Matthew would be mostly unable to move on to his boss and other evil Five-Man Band members.
  • Not Quite Dead: Richard and his gang...only to be turned into cyborg minions by J-Antonio. As frightening as these were, though, the most serious use of this trope is Kyrio Streika.
  • Not-So-Harmless Villain: Okay, Nebiros, we honestly cannot take an insane accidentally cross dressing clown that seriously. And for a little while, it looked like he had managed to bring himself down via insanity-induced stupidity. Oh, wait, what!? He broke out of prison, gathered a new and incredibly formidable evil Five-Man Band? And now he's ripping through the United States military, SWAT included, like a hot knife through butter, all the while planning complete and total omnicide by driving everyone in the country past the Despair Event Horizon at once? "Never laugh at me, Matty" indeed.
  • Psychopathic Manchild: Nebiros, again. Type B and E, with hints of C. This is a villain who is still trying to resolve his high school grudges...speaking of those, he left in high school in 1983, when the final incident occurred. That is right, this giggling, immature mess is thirty seven years old, and still very literally hellbent on killing the people who "did that unforgivable thing..."

YMMV:

  • The Woobie: There are very, very, very few occasions when Matthew actually feels good about himself for very long. He has a huge amount of "Well Done, Son" Guy type issues for a dad he thinks is dead, he has watched his best friend die once already, he has been horribly wounded numerous times, frozen half to death, fought horrifying looking zombies, and now he knows he has a Superpowered Evil Side which is truly merciless and pitiless.

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