Okay, experience has been tabulated, and the results are in!
As expected, both Miya Hatori and Noku advanced easily to 9th level. I presume that Hatori is advancing as an Oracle and Noku is advancing as a Fire Lord?
In addition, Gorvak made it to 9th level by the length of the hair on his face (a few hundred xps) and Isaku made it to 9th level by the thickness of the calluses on his hands(very few xps!) -- so a total of 4 characters made it across the line. I believe Isaku has plans to advance as a Monk, while Gorvak may be undecided -- Barbarian, Bear Warrior, Foe Hunter, all are reasonable options for the mighty korobokuru, a prestige class being especially appropriate if he is going to be spending a few extra days in training (i.e. Mike won't be available next session).
Meanwhile, Soshi Ashiko and Hiruma Mulan are both in the "~1000 xp to advance to 9th" range, and then Til'k'check is a fair distance away from advancing to 9th, and Zenako is still quite a distance from 10th. So after the session on the 16th, Ashi and Mulan should be able to advance, as long as they don't get themselves killed during the session -- pretty much everyone else will probably not advance at that point, unless more than normal quantities of foes are defeated...
All characters going to 9th level, note that you do indeed get a character feat, which can be taken (in Drakara, house rule) either before or after you select the class you wish to gain, so for instance it can be used to satisfy a prestige class requirement.
All for now... -- Ernie III / DrakaraGM