Anyway not sure this story is still alive but I went and reread your other fanfic and I know that one's dead but I think some of the things I said may still be relevant to your future writing endeavors, so good luck with that and I hope you have fun writing/not writing/whatever.

Pretty awesome start
Candice had me cringing at first but she's grown on me
She kind of has a lot to learn about American History though
Of course I do sympathize with her in the soy sauce debate
The duel was spectacular, with a great back and forth flow and excellent dialogue
I love plants but I to see a Main Character with an original deck
You always did have some cool cards
Perhaps your three Gods will show up? Idk fingers crossed
Anyway as for the writing itself it was mostly good
Though an entire paragraph to explaining the stone lions seemed a bit much, maybe if it had been dialogue it would have fit better,
Not that it's a deal breaker, I know sometimes exposition is the only way forward at times
For now I shal wish you great luck with this story!

Since you've been so kind as to leave reviews for my work, I shall do the same.

First up, the bad. Nothing immediately stands out wrong, though a re-read showed that you have a bad habit of leaving out periods in a lot of sentences. When you and you beta edit, go and make sure that you have all the proper punctuation.

In the same vein, you seem to be comma happy, which isn't a bad thing, but can be a bad habit because then, you wind up with somewhat choppy sentences, that leave the reader a bit of a mess, when they're done.

To cut back on commas, substitute periods. There's no reason to take a bunch of tag on sentences together when they can all stand on their own.

As an example, the 'The flames sent Ken into a frenzy' paragraph is a lot unnecessarily spliced together sentences. An improved version of it would like this:

The flames sent Kren into a frenzy, struggling to get free with all of his might. But he was unable to break free from clearly stronger men holding him, one even grabbing the back of his head to keep it in place as Xu Fu took a step forwards. The orb of fire hung on his outstretched hand, burning almost hungrily as it drew closer to Kren's face.

Don't be afraid of stopping a sentence and starting a new one.

Now, the good

I like the setting. Always been a history student of varying degrees over my life and this kind of plot always makes me happy.

Your cast is still small, but Candice is a good apple so far. Spunky, observant and obviously light-hearted. If it keeps up, I may start to wonder if she's related to the Springweathers. (Though haven't see any signs of Shadow-blood or Duel Spirits...yet. :P)

It was an enjoyable enough duel, nothing too suprising but it was one driven more by its characters than the card game, which isn't a bad thing. This is only the first chapter, so nothing really to critique here. It's a promising start. Goblin Coliation Army was something of a fun surprise, so I'm gonna have to ask to borrow that off to you.

I also have to ask where in Shadowchasers timeline this fits, since 'Backwater' is ten years after 5Ds, etc, etc. Though this is mostly curiosity on my part.

The Mercury Emperor...bit of a twist to throw him out in the first chapter, as to how/why he's returned since it does come out of the blue. To be fair, he might not be the villain to this piece as we know very little about him and his goals and intentions.

All in all, a promising start and I look forwards to more.

This has a feel of the Mummy movies to it. It'll be interesting to see where this goes. A good start. Keep up the good work.

You know, there's always some mixed feelings whenever I see a new Shadowchasers story begin. On one hand it's exciting to see another layer be added to the slowly growing fictional setting started by Cyber Commander and continued by a small but dedicated group of writers (which it brings me no small amount of pride to count myself among despite my issues with promptness LOL), it's also the chance to see things from a different angle, be it setting or writing style. On the other hand, only a few of these new stories ever seem to get up off the ground, I've seen several would be additions to the Shadowchasers mythos that peter out after only one or two chapters (again, I do not mean to sound like a hypocrite, I am well aware of how long it's been since I posted).

However I have very fond memories of Dueling Unlimited (I still find myself hoping you might continue it someday) so I have higher hopes that this story will play out to its conclusion then the other stories that have come and gone so far, especially since the first chapter turned out quite well all things considered. If it makes you feel any better, you probably have no less an understanding of China then I do of England, but thus far the setting seems relatively faithful, not to mention sprinkled with a bit of lampshade style humor about certain stereotypes.

The main plot involving Qin Shi Huang is very promising, and actually brings to mind the third Mummy film, which I still think could have been pretty good had they tried to put some honest to god effort into the storyline, at least that was how I felt up until the Yeti kicked a man like a football *ahem* but yes, I see the foundation for several interesting plot twists so I'm already intrigued, which is a good sign. I also thought Candice made for a good member of the team to introduce us to, as while she's clearly a little rough around the edges, there's still a very capable young woman and a talented duelist at heart, and while Hitsuji was, as CC said, a throw-away villain, the twist of having an underling be really in charge of an operation and not the seemingly obvious big bad is always fun, so he filled the role of an opening enemy nicely.

The duel was pretty by the numbers, but there were still some fun wrinkles to spice up two archetypes that have by now grown pretty familiar to me, I was delighted to see someone FINALLY recognized the potential Gamushara has in a Goblin deck, and I had completely forgotten about Soul Fusion, quite the potent little addition to any Fusion deck I must admit. Goblin Coalition Army was a fun boss monster, and rather amusing in its depiction, but I can't help but think 500 attack per banished monster seems a bit underwhelming considering the trouble Hitsuji went through to summon it. Personally I think having it gain 600-700 per Goblin would have allowed it to be an easier way to get the payoff of a high power late game monster, as well as maybe the ability to draw a card each time a monster moved to defense mode of its own effect, but this was by no means a dud I assure you.

Candice's Plant deck was effective, but really there wasn't anything we haven't already seen before in a Plant build without straying into an archetype, but of course its always possible you're saving the rest of her deck for later duels so It's hardly a deal breaker either way, as that was still a solid use of the type's ability to swarm the field from the hand and graveyard, and I might have a few ideas of my own to suggest as well. All in all this looks promising, I'd make sure you double check grammar and try and balance explanation with action, but other then that? Good start my friend _

Okay, I did not see that coming...

Anyway, a good start to the fic, I look forward to seeing more.

Okay, you already know my opinions, but I might as well post a review. The setting is fantastic, and clearly a lot of research was done. Candice makes for an awesome character (similar to Ace) so long as she grows and matures, and Hitsuji made for a good starting antagonist to warm up the readers. For the most part, amazing work.

However, I still must address the grammatical problem of closing quotes without sentence-ending punctuation. It IS distracting. But other than that, you're good to go.

Wow, first reviewer, I think.

Okay, first of all, the setting, somewhat unique. China isn't exactly the place these days where you find stories of heroic fantasy.

Of course, Candice may not qualify as a hero, at least not yet. Anti-hero, maybe. (Not that it's a bad thin, of course. If the angle you're trying to pull is the "arrogant cop who has to be taken down a notch", then maybe you're doing a good job so far. So far.

Not much to say about Hitsuji. Guy was a throwaway villain at best, but I see you got right to the point in the subplot, and MAN... This is a biggie. (Arrogance? That was the whole reason this guy built that place.)

Anyway, like I said before, this opens a world of possibilities. I encourage creativity and hope to see a Shadowchaser story in a whole new light with this one.

Let's see where it goes.