Nikki and Zeeal.
Beyond the Veil
is the story of Emperor Nicodemus Aurelius, ruler of three galaxies, and dead for three centuries. Up until a hapless team of explorers stumbles across one of his supercomputers and the machine downloads his and his four most loyal followers' minds into their bodies.
Unfortunately, the damned computer put him in the body of a woman.
However "Nikki" doesn't seem to mind that much really, all she wants is to get her Empire back, and she'll do whatever it takes to do that.
Beyond the Tropes:
- Alt Text: Experimented with in chapter six.
- Author Appeal: The original artist, Beowulf, tended to draw Nikki and other female characters with large busts to invoke Buxom Beauty Standard. The current artist, DreamTaker, usually draws them with a bit more realistic proportions.
- Blind Jump: At the end of the civil war the Emperor's flagship, the Titan, jumped into the void between galaxies, carrying his corpse with it. Centuries later a crew of professional "Jumpers" find it.
- Body Backup Drive: Zeeal stored backups of Nicodemus and his inner circle for later downloading.Nobody remembers what it's like to die. I am responsible for that. I saw what happened when my scientists used "dead memory" on a clone blank. My law declared the punishment for ever trying that again would be death by torture... To last no less than a month.
- Bounty Hunter: The Jumpers run into one dressed in full battle armor named Dolor, apparently sent by Uriel. He does give them an opportunity to come quietly.
- Cleavage Window: Nikki sometimes has one, as seen above.
- Dude Looks Like a Lady: Zakeriah, and quite Camp Straight.
- Also Feyd, Elder God of Fear and Pain.
- Fully-Dressed Cartoon Animal: All the furry characters.
- Gender Bender: Body-snatching version.
- Second Law of Gender-Bending: "Nikki" is given the opportunity to inhabit a clone of his old body, but says she prefers her new one.
- Third Law of Gender-Bending: And she acts rather girly for someone who spent over 400 years as a man. Even taking her second-in-command Joshua as a lover.
- God-Emperor: The seemingly primitive planet on which the first few chapters take place is ruled by "The Divine Asta", and the locals know the coup as a distant war of the Gods. And it turns out that even out in the "civilized" universe Nicodemus has a secret cult of Resurrectionists.
- God Guise: Apparently how the Empire rules the planet.
- Immortal Ruler: Nicodemus Aurelius was one, Uriel is one, and it seems like many of both their regimes' elites are immortal as well.
- Machiavelli Was Wrong: Nikki seems to realize that fear is not enough to ensure the loyalty of her top lieutenants. Though she has no problem terrorizing the peasantry, granted in an elaborate Monster Protection Racket
- Rape, Pillage, and Burn: "Is it... rape the children, burn the women, and take the loot?"
- Really 700 Years Old: Nicodemus Aurelius is 721 years old, and has experienced 419 of them. Most of the major players in galactic politics are similarly old. And even Briggs is over three hundred.
- Title Drop: The inscription on Nicodemus Aurelius' tomb.
- The Usurper: Uriel, who seized the Empire from Nicodemus.
- Villain Protagonist: Aside from being a body-snatching would-be Galactic Conqueror Nikki casually threatens Joshua with mutilation and creates a monster to terrorize the common folk as part of her plan.
