A Musical Note: Yoroiden Samurai Troopers, "Burning/Kaos' Theme"

In 1988, the anime Yoroiden Samurai Troopers debuted in Japan; it was later translated to American TV as Ronin Warriors. For a 1995 dub, it wasn't bad, though it very strangely changed the names of the main characters... but not to anything really more American. 

Samurai Troopers was a God-Warrior show, similar to Saint Seiya and Shurato, but in some ways superior to both; the main characters were people from modern Japan and spent a lot of time there, even if their enemies were ultimately from a demonic afterlife dimension ruled by the demon lord Arago. 

The show had a lot of influence on both myself and my fiancee, later wife, Kathleen. Among other things, the Troopers became the focus of considerable fanfic work that merged with our Saint Seiya fic universe to make an interesting crossover universe. They were both certainly inspirational to many things in my own universe, which will be most clear in my work-in-progress Godswar. 

However.

Possibly the single most influential piece of music from a soundtrack ever in my life came from Yoroiden Samurai Troopers. Not necessarily my favorite piece -- though it was for a while -- but the one that, because of its associations, became intimately intertwined with one of the most important parts of my universe -- the ancient soul mage Konstantin Khoros. 

Yoroiden Samurai Troopers' action is entirely guided/manipulated by the plans of the ancient Shugendo monk Kaos, and "Burning" is his theme.  I had created my own manipulative mage, Konstantin Khoros, years before I saw Yoroiden Samurai Troopers... and for our fanfic we found that it was interesting to have Khoros later turn out to be Kaos (or vice versa, depending on how one viewed it). There were a number of similarities, though my original Khoros showed his actual origins very clearly in his early dialogue and in his physical appearance, which were very deliberately reminiscent of Nero Wolfe. 

But I came to rather like Kaos' general appearance, so when I finalized Khoros, I kept much of his original character, with added features, but made his appearance a callback to Kaos, down to wearing a large hat that somehow always obscured his features (I do not believe that we EVER saw Kaos' face at any point in the series). 

Konstantin Khoros, as anyone who's read the Balanced Sword trilogy knows, is the Master of the Game, the manipulator who tricks even the gods and demons into playing things out the way he has planned. We see him in Demons of the Past and each of the books of the Balanced Sword (Phoenix Rising, Phoenix in Shadow, Phoenix Ascendant), and even in Paradigms Lost. His handiwork is found throughout my main writing universe, because he is playing the most dangerous long-term game against the ultimate adversary. I have to make sure I am in the exactly correct frame of mind to write him, and to do that...

... I play this piece.