Interesting. I thought Tahraim was one of the good guys, but it seems that he has an extreme case of ‘blue and orange morality’. He didn’t refuse to help the collector because it would be wrong, he didn’t help the collector for the same reason he was barely any help to Vash- it would be better for his client to help themselves, rather than receive his own help. Well, that’s unfortunate, I guess- but as I said, far more interesting! I love BaOM characters, you just can’t rely on them completely. And they’re also very dangerous, because they might ‘betray’ the heroes as a roundabout way of helping them- or not. Man, this page hit me like a voleyball to the head.
“Never a dull moment with that one,” Tahraim grins.
“Now then,” he turns to Tynan.
“Now what?! Are you here to gloat?” the storm-god snaps.
“Oh, no!” he says, that is not his plan.
“Gloating is a waste of time,” grins the golden-eyed god.
Some time ago he was approached by an “interesting woman,”
Tahraim turned her down so she wouldn’t stagnate,
But her idea ran through his mind, on and on.
“I never found the opportunity to test it before now, though,”
He sighs to Tynan, in battered body shod.
Raising a two-pronged dagger he asks, “After all, how often
Do you really need to imprison a god?
I’m so happy right now, Tahraim is turning out to be my favourite fantasy trope.
For those wondering what runes are inscribed on Tahraim’s god-binding knife/meat skewer, they read:
SHADOW OF THUNDER and STORM OF TERROR, aka Tynan’s epithets.
So, shock and surprise aside – this is a really brilliant goddamn moment. Like, up until now I saw Tahraim as like, cool but largely uncomplicated because he was helping the protagonists(and I was too invested in seeing what happens next to really think in depth about him), but this completely reframes all of his actions(that we’ve witnessed) up until now! It’s so fun to see!
Wow, and here I thought Tynan’s day couldn’t get much worse.
The Collector tried to commission Tahraim for god-sealing knives? That … actually makes a lot of sense. So Tahraim did turn her down, that’s good, but mostly in a “you’ll be better if you make it yourself way” rather than it being morally wrong, not so good.
Also, I wonder what exactly he means “continue to stagnate”. The Collector now doesn’t strike me as a stagnating type, created those god-napping knives, found a totally unique way to work life magic, renovated at least one of Stone’s hearts. It makes me wonder if she was in a less-than-stellar state when she came to Tahraim.
In Tahraim’s defence, he might not have known the full extent of the Collector’s scheme back then; if he did he might have taken steps to stop her, permanently. Also, of all the gods he could imprison, Tynan is the one he’d get the least objections from. Maybe he’ll keep Tynan in the knife for a few centuries until he learns his lesson?
Seems like Tahraim cares only about people forging their paths and identities, regardless of whether their destination is a good one or not. Or something like that. We’ll definitely be seeing more of him…
Tahraim might be scarier than voidy or the collector. I thought he would be the therapist the team needs but now it looks likes he might just enjoy experimenting, including with people. If I’m right that’s a dangerous wild card to have around.
Okay this is really hard we lost the ‘cinnamon roll’ version of Dr Jolon this way and to this day I can’t read those chapters without crying over the fact that he was so sweet and dorky and he wore glasses and none of it was real. I can’t watch our cryptic hammer guy go down the same path…
Lol i love how this implies he was completely okay with helping this suspicious mortal CAPTURE GODS, it was her personal well being he was worried about! What a swell guy!
I think the worst thing about this is that not even 12 hours ago I came up with an AU where the gods of Aurora were preschoolers and HOW AM I MEANT TO DRAW TAHRAIM AS A THREE YEAR OLD WITH A TOY TOOLBOX AFTER THIS?
RED YOU KILLED MY NEWLY BORN AU WHEN IT WASN’T EVEN HALF A DAY OLD.
I’m kinda concerned about how Tahraim was only concerned about letting the Collector stagnate, not imprisoning gods and doing who knows what with them. Oh no.
But couldn’t this backfire–and badly? If The Collector gets wind (see what I did there?) of another captured god, wouldn’t she do whatever it takes to get her hands on a captive storm god? Or maybe the master of Riddles (if that’s not Tahraim’s epithet, it should be) has a plan. After all, it’s easier to find The Collector if she comes to you.
Tahraim’s main concern is always the stagnation of power. Odd….
Okay, I know we’re all panicking, but I have to say that that knife looks really cool.
I haven’t theorized in a while, but I’m willing to dust off the old thinker for this. Based on what Tahraim says about this commissioner and what that knife looks like, it’s reasonable to think he’s talking about the Collector. If so, it’s interesting that he doesn’t care about the whole “kidnapping god souls” bit because he IS a god and the Collector’s end game is to free Life, which will destroy the world. Maybe not Tahraim’s forge though? Apparently, it’s sort of a pocket dimension that moves around, so it could be out of harm’s way. I don’t know if that’s legitimate. I feel like it’s not unlikely that Tahraim just doesn’t care all that much. His job is to forge weapons, and he does just that. He doesn’t question what he’s making, just what effects if will have in that character’s arc. I kind of feel like that’s the case here.
Also, do you guys think that stealing Tynan’s soul will leave his body behind, like with Vash and Kendal? It’s funny to think about, but I doubt we would have another Kendal running around because the reason Kendal happened (as far as we know) is that his body was too sturdy to die quickly and lasted long enough to become its own thing. I don’t think that Tynan’s incarnation, which is made of clouds and lightning and stuff, will have the same luxury. Though, as previously mentioned, that would be funny.
also @Goldfinch, no, i don’t expect Tynan to leave an empty vessel behind (although that could be cool) since Kendal is a special case. i’m pretty sure that the last few pages just confirmed that his starmetal skeleton is the reason he manifested a consciousness, since he himslef became Vash’s domain when Vash imbued him with starmetal (sourced from the meteor beneath the crater that Vash was bulit in). no starmetal, no permanent vessel
And THAT, my friends, is why you never piss off the ‘support’ staff. Doctors, mechanics, chefs…anyone who knows how to help you in any kind of major or important way also knows how to fuck you up in ways that you really don’t want to think about.
There once was a god named Tahraim.
To forge people weapons is his aim.
But he cares not a whit
What they do with it.
He’s playing his own Neutral game.
Tahraim is a creator, but creation is not inherently good nor evil. I do not believe he’s okay with the destruction of the world- how else would he forge destinies and tools alike? So yeah, he didn’t turn down the Collector because “imprisoning gods bad,” but look at what he said concerning the knife: “How often does one *need* to imprison a god?” Blue and orange morality perhaps, but Tynan is the sort of soul that does not learn from his mistakes, and is all the more dangerous for his rancor and the bitter shame of defeat. So yeah. Magic tuning fork knife gulag for Tynan. But no, I don’t think Tahraim is some Dr Jolon hidden act 3 antagonist.
Well that’s…. interesting
As Stargazing Bookworm pointed out, Blue and Orange morality is a very interesting trope to apply in many stories. And this IS a very interesting way to get rid of Tynan. But beyond the questionable morality behind the action, I can’t help but wonder what Tahraim is going to do with this. He doesn’t seem like the type to fight his own battles, and while he clearly doesn’t care about the morality of letting an imprisoned god float around, a magical lightning sword does feel like the type of thing that would cause someone to stagnate. So is he just going to keep it lying around his forge? Give it to someone he don’t think will stagnate with it? Or some other option that I haven’t thought of?
Since this also raises the question of how these knives actually work. I pulled up the alphabet on the wiki and translated the runes on the knife in 1.1.17, and got “?ASHFAIRBLADEBIN?SI(T?)?G(O?)I…” the rest fades into the blue glow, so it likely continues). But despite the character that doesn’t look like a V, the first part is probably Vash Fairblade, which is one of his epithets, implying that her knife works on similar or the same principals as Tahraim’s (since Sunstorm the Budgie showed us that the runes here translate to Tynan’s epithets). Perhaps they do something with truenames (similar to classical primordial magic), then?
Lots of people saying, “oh noes, Tahraim helped the collector” seem to have missed thepart where he says he turned her down. He didn’t make the knife she used, he probably didn’t even give her any ideas about it, she asked him to make it for her, he said no, and then he decided the idea was interesting and made it for himself.
Well…I was not expecting this.
And while I appreciate and understand Tahraim’s curiosity, the way this is presented makes him seem so….villain-ish.
I guess we’ll see what happens…
(Also, @Stargazing bookwyrm, sorry for sort of stealing your username. As a fellow stargazer and bookwyrm, though, I’m glad there are others out there who share my weird interests.)
Wait….I just re-read it, and he doesn’t seem as villain-y as I originally thought.
He obviously has his own agenda, but what that is….might take us a while to find out.
OH. It’s a good thing he turned her down, or she might be further along in her plan by now. And trapping a mass murderer is a vastly better use of a soulblade than research into omnicidal secrets. Interesting that Tahraim’s soulblade isn’t made of soulcrystal, but appears to be made of regular metal; it’s also interesting that while The Collector’s soulblades look like regular knives, Tahraim’s looks akin to a tuning fork.
In short: beware the nice ones.
Tahraim with his tuning fork soulblade: “I’m going to find out your body’s resonant frequency and melt your insides out with a jaunty horn solo.”
How much Tahraim knows about what the Collector is doing will determine which side/neither it looks like he’s on, but it doesn’t do anything to my opinion of him, I love him either way
also he’s just always so happy to be doing whatever he’s doing it really just butters my croissant
…Well, I can certainly see why Tahraim wanted Vash and the Floof Squad to leave. Vash (and Kendal, if he’s aware at the moment), does not need to see Tynan getting sealed away like that…
(I mean, neither do the Floof Squad, but they wouldn’t have a PTSD-triggered episode…)
I mean, I was expecting Tahraim to drop at least part of his easygoing personality, but I wasn’t expecting this….
It’ll be interesting to see where this is going, though I’m betting on this being the last we see of these two for a while (because this is the perfect place for a dramatic cut back to the main cast). As people have pointed out, there does seem to be a bit of Blue/Orange Morality going on, given the fact that Tahraim interacted with the Collector and thus must have had an idea of what she planned (even if he didn’t understand the full scope of it). On the other hand, his actions could be read a bit like hands-off parenting, given his tendency to push individuals to better themselves but still step in when needed…
Be interesting to take a look into the guy’s head and see what he’s thinking. I highly doubt that this is a villain reveal (I really can’t see him working with the collector), but he does have a bit of The Chessmaster going on, and I’m gonna agree with that True Neutral alignment people are discussing (which would make Caliban Chaotic Neutral, I believe). I wonder what he’s got in his head, imprisoning Tynan like that…
The best bit of the twist is that it doesn’t change anything whatsoever about Tahraim. He’s still a smith and a smith-themed sort-of-teacher. He’s exactly what we thought he was before. He still works to bring out people’s best selves. It’s just that now we see how very deep that goes in him.
Slavery, as like a practice would “give” slaves with names, new names…
Even in real life “true name magic” is a think
I dunno; I like how generous Stargazing Bookwyrn is about it, I guess my question is this
If names cannot be stolen, how is it possible that they are gifted, chosen?
Master of riddles may be a good epithet, like the greek chorus narratively they are an important tool?
I can only imagine how good Tahraim’s “eye” is, he’s doing this mess by eyeballing variables in the algorithm/weave/continuum…
I don’t know if he even has a plan or is playing it by ear, doing it by eye;
Few mental notes about the Collector stagnating (in part @Evil Tree)
She said she’d captured countless mortal souls, and that they had nothing left to teach her. She needed a god to keep learning more about souls, so she went to Tahraim to ask him for a weapon that could absorb and store the soul of a god at its maximum power for maximum learning.
I’d wager she asked for a blade inscribed with Vash’s runes (given that, as others have pointed out, both her blade and Tahraims work the same way. She gave Tahraim that specific idea), but he turned her down so she could figure out herself how to make one. This did slow her down, but if he’d made it, she could have imprisoned Vash and only Vash, and would’ve been back to stagnation immediately. This way she learned how to make more such knives and can capture as many gods as she wants without going back to Tahraim constantly.
Therefore, he solved her stagnation.
Okay okay. I need a character like this. He encourages growth and strengthening of one’s mind, body, and spirit, regardless of whose side their on. That’s so handy for a writer! It’s an interesting case of blue and orange morality, and it means they can improve the quality of the drama EVERYWHERE, especially on the villains and heroes sides. Red kicks ass as a writer.
So he just wants to make the strongest weapons possible. Could be worse. Hopefully that leads him to help the floof squad given all of their potential.
Me over here just CACKLING at all the people who are surprised that Tahraim is kind of a horrible & amoral asshole. Think back for a moment at all the moments where he totally could have provided more direct help to the good guys, but chose to execute some kind of convoluted scheme to MANIPULATE them into improving their situation instead, without their knowledge or consent…what’s that? You thought that was just the casual use of an old character trope that’s been used for millennia as an arbitrary plot device? NOT IN RED’S WRITING BABYYYYY
*ahem* anyway, while I did notice before that this guy was definitely not as nice as he looked, I definitely did not see THIS particular twist coming. Tahraim knows the friggin’ Collector?! And @Momkey King you’re right, I’m also really curious what he considers “stagnation” in an immensely powerful Life Mage who can heal the Primordials themselves. And it’s interesting that apparently they have now both independently come up with different(?) ways to make a god-imprisoning knife…I wonder how this one works?
Hmm, it does seem Tahraim agrees to the Frankenstein school of thinking when it comes to science and magic. Instant red flags when he makes a weapon out of a trapped god just cuz why not?
So I’m back after some thinking and some sleep and this may not be that bad.
It never says that Tahraim knew much about the Collector’s plan- it sounds like he only thought she wanted power over gods. And with the making of his own knife, he did it because the idea sparked his creative senses. I get it, because like him, I’m an artist, and I know that feeling all to well.
And he’s not going on a murder-happy quest for knowledge with it, he’s simply trapping Tynan to stop him causing trouble. It never says that he’s going to dissect Tynan or anything barbaric like that.
OR I COULD BE TOTALLY WRONG AND HE’S EVIL
But I prefer to think he’s still the same cryptic hammer guy who got bored and curious one day.
So The Collector probably approached Tahraim once asking him to forge a tool to seal a god, he made it but didn’t give it to her. Tahraim is either going to imprison Tynan since he’s a danger to the world or detain him AND issue him to The Collector. Tahraim is kinda a hard book to read so it could be either one
@Skye I’m guessing Tynan’s thought process started with “Get it over with” to “Wait, who’s this guy again?” to “Get to the point already!” to “OH CRAP!”
Side note, it’s fun to see everyone’s different takes on Tahraim. I’m not reading him as full-blown evil, but he’s definitely more, uh… morally flexible than I initially assumed. Since I’m seeing a lot of Entrapta comparisons, could be interesting if he ends up going through a similar arc. But it’d also be fun if he remains a wild card…
Tahraim’s such an interesting character. He’s got a great personality and his own motivations are understated but give him free rein to poke his nose into any part of the plot. It’s honestly amazing how realised he feels compared to how much actual panel time he’s gotten so far.
So a lot of people are thinking Tahraim helped the Collector, possibly misunderstanding that he explicitly said he turned her down.
But he also refused to help Ignan with getting what’s-his-face out of the mountain, and barely helped Vash when he first asked for a weapon.
So it could be argued that he was being just as helpful-in-the-end with her as he was with them.
BUT… that brings up another possibility:
Tahraim’s ability to “forge” people by manipulating their circumstances to create a desired outcome borders on the realm of precognition, and he is not helping the Collector so much as he is creating and manipulating circumstances to “forge” someone else entirely.
Like, say, Alinua, the only other person who could be said to have touched Life’s mind, albeit via a different means. Or Kendal is an ongoing project of his. Or anyone else. Or perhaps someone we haven’t even met.
That’s the trouble with Precogs. The ends just as often DO justify the means as they don’t, where they are concerned. It’s pretty much impossible to apply the standard Lawful/Chaotic+Good/Evil alignment array to them, and even saying they have an Orange and Blue Morality is quite possibly inaccurate, because for all we know, two Blues of a Precog COULD make an Orange.
A wonderful example of every god in this world being fearsome. Some just choose to be more subtle about it. Leaves you wondering how many powerful tools and people Tahraim’s been working on.
Anyway, he was too busy wondering if he could that he didn’t stop to think about if he should.
So Tahraim says he didn’t make the commissioned weapon because he thought the person asking would “continue” to stagnate. Assuming he meant toe Collector, how is/was she stagnating?
I think it’s her whole plan to resurrect Life, and I do think that she is still stagnating. She’s got herself so focused on freeing Life that she’s given no thought to whether Life actually wants to be freed. Alinua has also touched Life’s mind, is Life’s chosen. And given Life’s reaction to the chimera-maker way back when, I don’t think she’s looking to destroy the world she’s part of in order to be her own person again.
Not to mention that if the Collector did free her, Void’s prison would be weakened, and he’d probably just bust loose and eat her anyway.
So yeah, the Collector is stagnating because she’s stuck on this path she’s chosen, regardless of the harm it will do or even if the being she’s doing it for wants it done.
Tahreim was already a bit iffy, but seeing this completely solidifies to me that they just don’t see morality like regular people. As a forging god, the only thing they care about is shaping people into their highest potential, whether or not that would actually make them happy or improve the world. A sword could be used to defend a city or slaughter one, but either way Tahreim will make it into the sharpest sword possible.
i think tahraim really does just think of every single person as metal to be forged, and knows the best way to forge them, but never cares what side the weapons he makes them into are used by. because why should he care? he enjoys forging them, enjoys watching them forge themselves, and what use would morality be in the forging process? i like him 😀
@icarusancalion- My perception of Tahriam’s philosophic view is that he is more concerned with progress (perfection?/growth?) then stasis thus turning the ‘young lady’ down because she would ‘stagnate’ not caring if he would be a victim or not said device. Perhaps because Tahriam expects someone will ask him for tool for the problem?
I think that Blue and Orange Morality absolutely fits here, for a simple reason: Tahraim is, at the end of the day, a god.
So far we’ve seen various “types” of gods, but they all (possibly barring one) share a particular characteristic: they have a specific, bounded domain. Gods like Vash and Zuurith are classic genius loci, spirits of a location, while Tynan is the god tied to a specific storm (as opposed to “of storms”). Tahraim is one of the more purely “conceptual” sort, and I’m curious to see what eventually happens with Vash (possibilities including ‘fade out’ or ‘re-found Vash’, but could also include shifting domain to something like “hope” or “inspiration”, if such a shift is possible for a god in this world).
So no, Tahraim isn’t good or bad, in the conventional sense, he’s just amoral (for classic morality) by his very nature. It isn’t that he _enjoys_ forging people, per se — but rather, that is just what he _does_. God’s gonna god.
If he weren’t bound by that facet, I’d say that he missed a trick: instead of imprisoning Tynan unconditionally, offer him a chance at a heel-face turn. People fear storms because of the level of damage, and Tynan could even keep that part of his aspect, but downplay it a bit in favor of an alternative: convince areas that need water to worship him in order to get him to come there. Sure, he can’t do that forever, if an area is dry enough he’d have to “recharge” (probably easiest out over an ocean) every so often, but can you imagine how popular he’d be as a drought-breaker? He clearly has that level of control over both the location of his storm and the intensity of rainfall from it. And fear is a powerful force. But you don’t have to completely give up the fear in order to be positive enough that Vash (or any others like him) wouldn’t find it worth the bother to try to hassle you, if you restrict your flooding aspect to those who _don’t_ “give you your due (in worship)”. Being feared _and_ loved is arguably even stronger.
I never thought of it being The Collector who went to Tahraim, I thought it was Caliban (as They/He/She can use ANY pronoun) who knew of Tynan’s rising to power again asking for a way to stop him, or maybe some goddess asking Tahraim for the sword to imprison The Collector. Idk The Collector seems to much of a loner to ACTIVELY seek the help of someone that isn’t the Life Primordial. And, even IF it was The Collector who came to Tahraim, he turned her down, and yeh, not because she’s evil, but if The Collector EVER hoped a god would help her, it would be BEFORE she gained a reputation for kidnapping them, so Tahraim wouldn’t know what she would become. It COULD be a Horace Slughorn situation, where they helped a villan rise to power, not knowing what they would become, and deeply regret and blame themselves for their rise to power, yet noone knows about it, so it’s a guilty secret. Basically, I don’t think Tahraim is a villan here, or working with The Collector. He seems to only use his power responsibly, as he isn’t kidnapping gods willy nilly, he made the sword cause was curious, and only used it when a god was being a problem, and only after he is beaten down, meaning that his sword is not a strong as The Collector’s, the runes on the sword say Tynan’s epithets specifically, which shows the less power thing and strengthens the “Caliban trying to stop Tynan’s second rise to power” theory.
Ooh that’s interesting
Uh oh
In Red’s words – “well THAT ain’t good”
I’m suddenly having second thoughts about this guy
finally got here!!!
also he knows the lady…
interesting
lmao wait till vash discovers that tahraim commisioned his own prison
For mobile readers.
Alt-text: this scene does not pass the reverse bechdel test ?
Image source: tool
PLOT TWIST?????
DID THE COLLECTOR MEET WITH TAHRAIM???
oh wait he didn’t do the prison orb he just made the knives. i’m dumb lmao
Oh sh*t! That’s very twisty!
Is Tahraim aware who that woman is and what happened to Vash?
Also, where did she get it then, if not from him?
Also also, I guess I was kinda right last week to worry about Tahraim “sorting out” Tynan.
@Sig He didn’t even make the knives, he turned her down. He just made himself such a knife…
Ah yes. The good old “I’m a really helpful genius but my sense of morals is a little ehh”.
Also known as the Entrapta.
SOUND THE ALARMS HE’S LAWFUL NEUTRAL!!!
An interesting young woman that wants to imprison gods? Who could that be…?
Tahraim is fabulous. I’m not sure exactly what’s going to happen next but I’m excited for it
OHHHHHHHHHHHH MY GOD HE HAS NO MORALS IT CANT GET BETTER
also. “shed continue to stagnate” girl stop being the reason plot happens please
Interesting. I thought Tahraim was one of the good guys, but it seems that he has an extreme case of ‘blue and orange morality’. He didn’t refuse to help the collector because it would be wrong, he didn’t help the collector for the same reason he was barely any help to Vash- it would be better for his client to help themselves, rather than receive his own help. Well, that’s unfortunate, I guess- but as I said, far more interesting! I love BaOM characters, you just can’t rely on them completely. And they’re also very dangerous, because they might ‘betray’ the heroes as a roundabout way of helping them- or not. Man, this page hit me like a voleyball to the head.
Even though, it seems, that Tahraim met the Collector… I’m interested to see how this plays out
That last panel literally make me shout out loud. Excellent paneling, Red
Tahraim is the absolute embodiment of the alignment “True Neutral” and I am 100% for it
“I am making tools, that’s what I do. Whether you use that hammer I made to break a knee or build a shelf is on you.”
Tahraim, presumably. Also, is he channeling Etri the Dwarf here? (the version played by Peter Dinklage)
The COLLECTOR asked him for a weapon?!??! Wtf!!!
“heyyyy buddy; what if I told you that you could be *just like Vash*? would that make you feel better?”
by the way I decoded the runes and here’s what it says:
On the left side: SHADOW OF THUNDER
On the right side: STORM OF TERROR
Can someone translate the writing on the edges of Tahraim’s knife?
Tahraim ain’t here to talk things out
He just has this idea he’s been thinking about
“Never a dull moment with that one,” Tahraim grins.
“Now then,” he turns to Tynan.
“Now what?! Are you here to gloat?” the storm-god snaps.
“Oh, no!” he says, that is not his plan.
“Gloating is a waste of time,” grins the golden-eyed god.
Some time ago he was approached by an “interesting woman,”
Tahraim turned her down so she wouldn’t stagnate,
But her idea ran through his mind, on and on.
“I never found the opportunity to test it before now, though,”
He sighs to Tynan, in battered body shod.
Raising a two-pronged dagger he asks, “After all, how often
Do you really need to imprison a god?
I’m so happy right now, Tahraim is turning out to be my favourite fantasy trope.
TAHRAIM??? EXCUSE ME???? D: you turned her down “so she wouldn’t stagnate”???????
For those wondering what runes are inscribed on Tahraim’s god-binding knife/meat skewer, they read:
SHADOW OF THUNDER and STORM OF TERROR, aka Tynan’s epithets.
Tahraim.
Tahraim…
Tahraim what did you do? Have you helped The Collector in the past?
If he is, in actuality, an ally of hers – masterfully done hiding his potential threat to the protagonists behind such a calm, helpful, wise demeanor.
How ironic that the very type of tool that made Tynan’s return possible is what ultimately leads to his defeat.
TAHRAIM PLEASE DON’T BE A BAD GUY… PLEASE
Oh cheez, this just got very scary. Now I’m left with Questions™
Also, weirdly enough, I’m very early. 🙂
So, shock and surprise aside – this is a really brilliant goddamn moment. Like, up until now I saw Tahraim as like, cool but largely uncomplicated because he was helping the protagonists(and I was too invested in seeing what happens next to really think in depth about him), but this completely reframes all of his actions(that we’ve witnessed) up until now! It’s so fun to see!
Wow, and here I thought Tynan’s day couldn’t get much worse.
The Collector tried to commission Tahraim for god-sealing knives? That … actually makes a lot of sense. So Tahraim did turn her down, that’s good, but mostly in a “you’ll be better if you make it yourself way” rather than it being morally wrong, not so good.
Also, I wonder what exactly he means “continue to stagnate”. The Collector now doesn’t strike me as a stagnating type, created those god-napping knives, found a totally unique way to work life magic, renovated at least one of Stone’s hearts. It makes me wonder if she was in a less-than-stellar state when she came to Tahraim.
In Tahraim’s defence, he might not have known the full extent of the Collector’s scheme back then; if he did he might have taken steps to stop her, permanently. Also, of all the gods he could imprison, Tynan is the one he’d get the least objections from. Maybe he’ll keep Tynan in the knife for a few centuries until he learns his lesson?
Oh dear. D:
Seems like Tahraim cares only about people forging their paths and identities, regardless of whether their destination is a good one or not. Or something like that. We’ll definitely be seeing more of him…
thanks this is terrifying
Tahraim might be scarier than voidy or the collector. I thought he would be the therapist the team needs but now it looks likes he might just enjoy experimenting, including with people. If I’m right that’s a dangerous wild card to have around.
Okay this is really hard we lost the ‘cinnamon roll’ version of Dr Jolon this way and to this day I can’t read those chapters without crying over the fact that he was so sweet and dorky and he wore glasses and none of it was real. I can’t watch our cryptic hammer guy go down the same path…
Lol i love how this implies he was completely okay with helping this suspicious mortal CAPTURE GODS, it was her personal well being he was worried about! What a swell guy!
I think the worst thing about this is that not even 12 hours ago I came up with an AU where the gods of Aurora were preschoolers and HOW AM I MEANT TO DRAW TAHRAIM AS A THREE YEAR OLD WITH A TOY TOOLBOX AFTER THIS?
RED YOU KILLED MY NEWLY BORN AU WHEN IT WASN’T EVEN HALF A DAY OLD.
I’m kinda concerned about how Tahraim was only concerned about letting the Collector stagnate, not imprisoning gods and doing who knows what with them. Oh no.
Okay, THAT was unexpected. Kudos on a well done twist, Red!
Oh. Just when I thought Tynan was saved.
But couldn’t this backfire–and badly? If The Collector gets wind (see what I did there?) of another captured god, wouldn’t she do whatever it takes to get her hands on a captive storm god? Or maybe the master of Riddles (if that’s not Tahraim’s epithet, it should be) has a plan. After all, it’s easier to find The Collector if she comes to you.
Tahraim’s main concern is always the stagnation of power. Odd….
Okay, I know we’re all panicking, but I have to say that that knife looks really cool.
I haven’t theorized in a while, but I’m willing to dust off the old thinker for this. Based on what Tahraim says about this commissioner and what that knife looks like, it’s reasonable to think he’s talking about the Collector. If so, it’s interesting that he doesn’t care about the whole “kidnapping god souls” bit because he IS a god and the Collector’s end game is to free Life, which will destroy the world. Maybe not Tahraim’s forge though? Apparently, it’s sort of a pocket dimension that moves around, so it could be out of harm’s way. I don’t know if that’s legitimate. I feel like it’s not unlikely that Tahraim just doesn’t care all that much. His job is to forge weapons, and he does just that. He doesn’t question what he’s making, just what effects if will have in that character’s arc. I kind of feel like that’s the case here.
Also, do you guys think that stealing Tynan’s soul will leave his body behind, like with Vash and Kendal? It’s funny to think about, but I doubt we would have another Kendal running around because the reason Kendal happened (as far as we know) is that his body was too sturdy to die quickly and lasted long enough to become its own thing. I don’t think that Tynan’s incarnation, which is made of clouds and lightning and stuff, will have the same luxury. Though, as previously mentioned, that would be funny.
ayo what the fuck
note: this is what a TRUE neutral looks like. god i love tahraim, the magnificent bastard. god i love red’s writing
also @Goldfinch, no, i don’t expect Tynan to leave an empty vessel behind (although that could be cool) since Kendal is a special case. i’m pretty sure that the last few pages just confirmed that his starmetal skeleton is the reason he manifested a consciousness, since he himslef became Vash’s domain when Vash imbued him with starmetal (sourced from the meteor beneath the crater that Vash was bulit in). no starmetal, no permanent vessel
And THAT, my friends, is why you never piss off the ‘support’ staff. Doctors, mechanics, chefs…anyone who knows how to help you in any kind of major or important way also knows how to fuck you up in ways that you really don’t want to think about.
welp… to whoever predicted that the collector would steal Tynan’s soul — you weren’t right, but you weren’t wrong.
There once was a god named Tahraim.
To forge people weapons is his aim.
But he cares not a whit
What they do with it.
He’s playing his own Neutral game.
Tahraim is a creator, but creation is not inherently good nor evil. I do not believe he’s okay with the destruction of the world- how else would he forge destinies and tools alike? So yeah, he didn’t turn down the Collector because “imprisoning gods bad,” but look at what he said concerning the knife: “How often does one *need* to imprison a god?” Blue and orange morality perhaps, but Tynan is the sort of soul that does not learn from his mistakes, and is all the more dangerous for his rancor and the bitter shame of defeat. So yeah. Magic tuning fork knife gulag for Tynan. But no, I don’t think Tahraim is some Dr Jolon hidden act 3 antagonist.
Well that’s…. interesting
As Stargazing Bookworm pointed out, Blue and Orange morality is a very interesting trope to apply in many stories. And this IS a very interesting way to get rid of Tynan. But beyond the questionable morality behind the action, I can’t help but wonder what Tahraim is going to do with this. He doesn’t seem like the type to fight his own battles, and while he clearly doesn’t care about the morality of letting an imprisoned god float around, a magical lightning sword does feel like the type of thing that would cause someone to stagnate. So is he just going to keep it lying around his forge? Give it to someone he don’t think will stagnate with it? Or some other option that I haven’t thought of?
Since this also raises the question of how these knives actually work. I pulled up the alphabet on the wiki and translated the runes on the knife in 1.1.17, and got “?ASHFAIRBLADEBIN?SI(T?)?G(O?)I…” the rest fades into the blue glow, so it likely continues). But despite the character that doesn’t look like a V, the first part is probably Vash Fairblade, which is one of his epithets, implying that her knife works on similar or the same principals as Tahraim’s (since Sunstorm the Budgie showed us that the runes here translate to Tynan’s epithets). Perhaps they do something with truenames (similar to classical primordial magic), then?
Lots of people saying, “oh noes, Tahraim helped the collector” seem to have missed thepart where he says he turned her down. He didn’t make the knife she used, he probably didn’t even give her any ideas about it, she asked him to make it for her, he said no, and then he decided the idea was interesting and made it for himself.
Well…I was not expecting this.
And while I appreciate and understand Tahraim’s curiosity, the way this is presented makes him seem so….villain-ish.
I guess we’ll see what happens…
(Also, @Stargazing bookwyrm, sorry for sort of stealing your username. As a fellow stargazer and bookwyrm, though, I’m glad there are others out there who share my weird interests.)
Wait….I just re-read the page, and maybe he isn’t as villain-y as I thought….
He really has his own secret agenda that no one else gets. Yet…
Wait….I just re-read it, and he doesn’t seem as villain-y as I originally thought.
He obviously has his own agenda, but what that is….might take us a while to find out.
Ah yes, sealed evil in a can! Can’t go wrong here!
To those asking if he’s talking about the Collector, the clues point to Caliban
OH. It’s a good thing he turned her down, or she might be further along in her plan by now. And trapping a mass murderer is a vastly better use of a soulblade than research into omnicidal secrets. Interesting that Tahraim’s soulblade isn’t made of soulcrystal, but appears to be made of regular metal; it’s also interesting that while The Collector’s soulblades look like regular knives, Tahraim’s looks akin to a tuning fork.
In short: beware the nice ones.
Tahraim with his tuning fork soulblade: “I’m going to find out your body’s resonant frequency and melt your insides out with a jaunty horn solo.”
How much Tahraim knows about what the Collector is doing will determine which side/neither it looks like he’s on, but it doesn’t do anything to my opinion of him, I love him either way
also he’s just always so happy to be doing whatever he’s doing it really just butters my croissant
Hey comment scrollers! I wrote some fanfic inspired by this page -> https://archiveofourown.org/works/41516358
@The Bookwyrm: eh, it’s not like it’s my real name, and besides, names can’t really be stolen anyway, so you’re cool. 🙂
…Well, I can certainly see why Tahraim wanted Vash and the Floof Squad to leave. Vash (and Kendal, if he’s aware at the moment), does not need to see Tynan getting sealed away like that…
(I mean, neither do the Floof Squad, but they wouldn’t have a PTSD-triggered episode…)
I mean, I was expecting Tahraim to drop at least part of his easygoing personality, but I wasn’t expecting this….
It’ll be interesting to see where this is going, though I’m betting on this being the last we see of these two for a while (because this is the perfect place for a dramatic cut back to the main cast). As people have pointed out, there does seem to be a bit of Blue/Orange Morality going on, given the fact that Tahraim interacted with the Collector and thus must have had an idea of what she planned (even if he didn’t understand the full scope of it). On the other hand, his actions could be read a bit like hands-off parenting, given his tendency to push individuals to better themselves but still step in when needed…
Be interesting to take a look into the guy’s head and see what he’s thinking. I highly doubt that this is a villain reveal (I really can’t see him working with the collector), but he does have a bit of The Chessmaster going on, and I’m gonna agree with that True Neutral alignment people are discussing (which would make Caliban Chaotic Neutral, I believe). I wonder what he’s got in his head, imprisoning Tynan like that…
Oh no he’s talking about the Collector.
The best bit of the twist is that it doesn’t change anything whatsoever about Tahraim. He’s still a smith and a smith-themed sort-of-teacher. He’s exactly what we thought he was before. He still works to bring out people’s best selves. It’s just that now we see how very deep that goes in him.
Question of the Day:
What do you think is going on in Tynan’s head right now?
“names can’t really be stolen anyway”
Slavery, as like a practice would “give” slaves with names, new names…
Even in real life “true name magic” is a think
I dunno; I like how generous Stargazing Bookwyrn is about it, I guess my question is this
If names cannot be stolen, how is it possible that they are gifted, chosen?
Master of riddles may be a good epithet, like the greek chorus narratively they are an important tool?
I can only imagine how good Tahraim’s “eye” is, he’s doing this mess by eyeballing variables in the algorithm/weave/continuum…
I don’t know if he even has a plan or is playing it by ear, doing it by eye;
Ari
AAAAAAAAAHHHAAA NOOOO
TAHRAIM NO
Few mental notes about the Collector stagnating (in part @Evil Tree)
She said she’d captured countless mortal souls, and that they had nothing left to teach her. She needed a god to keep learning more about souls, so she went to Tahraim to ask him for a weapon that could absorb and store the soul of a god at its maximum power for maximum learning.
I’d wager she asked for a blade inscribed with Vash’s runes (given that, as others have pointed out, both her blade and Tahraims work the same way. She gave Tahraim that specific idea), but he turned her down so she could figure out herself how to make one. This did slow her down, but if he’d made it, she could have imprisoned Vash and only Vash, and would’ve been back to stagnation immediately. This way she learned how to make more such knives and can capture as many gods as she wants without going back to Tahraim constantly.
Therefore, he solved her stagnation.
Okay okay. I need a character like this. He encourages growth and strengthening of one’s mind, body, and spirit, regardless of whose side their on. That’s so handy for a writer! It’s an interesting case of blue and orange morality, and it means they can improve the quality of the drama EVERYWHERE, especially on the villains and heroes sides. Red kicks ass as a writer.
So he just wants to make the strongest weapons possible. Could be worse. Hopefully that leads him to help the floof squad given all of their potential.
I am actually most curious about what he means when he says “continue to stagnate”.
Me over here just CACKLING at all the people who are surprised that Tahraim is kind of a horrible & amoral asshole. Think back for a moment at all the moments where he totally could have provided more direct help to the good guys, but chose to execute some kind of convoluted scheme to MANIPULATE them into improving their situation instead, without their knowledge or consent…what’s that? You thought that was just the casual use of an old character trope that’s been used for millennia as an arbitrary plot device? NOT IN RED’S WRITING BABYYYYY
*ahem* anyway, while I did notice before that this guy was definitely not as nice as he looked, I definitely did not see THIS particular twist coming. Tahraim knows the friggin’ Collector?! And @Momkey King you’re right, I’m also really curious what he considers “stagnation” in an immensely powerful Life Mage who can heal the Primordials themselves. And it’s interesting that apparently they have now both independently come up with different(?) ways to make a god-imprisoning knife…I wonder how this one works?
…OH SHIIIIIIIIIII
Hmm, it does seem Tahraim agrees to the Frankenstein school of thinking when it comes to science and magic. Instant red flags when he makes a weapon out of a trapped god just cuz why not?
So I’m back after some thinking and some sleep and this may not be that bad.
It never says that Tahraim knew much about the Collector’s plan- it sounds like he only thought she wanted power over gods. And with the making of his own knife, he did it because the idea sparked his creative senses. I get it, because like him, I’m an artist, and I know that feeling all to well.
And he’s not going on a murder-happy quest for knowledge with it, he’s simply trapping Tynan to stop him causing trouble. It never says that he’s going to dissect Tynan or anything barbaric like that.
OR I COULD BE TOTALLY WRONG AND HE’S EVIL
But I prefer to think he’s still the same cryptic hammer guy who got bored and curious one day.
So The Collector probably approached Tahraim once asking him to forge a tool to seal a god, he made it but didn’t give it to her. Tahraim is either going to imprison Tynan since he’s a danger to the world or detain him AND issue him to The Collector. Tahraim is kinda a hard book to read so it could be either one
@Skye I’m guessing Tynan’s thought process started with “Get it over with” to “Wait, who’s this guy again?” to “Get to the point already!” to “OH CRAP!”
Side note, it’s fun to see everyone’s different takes on Tahraim. I’m not reading him as full-blown evil, but he’s definitely more, uh… morally flexible than I initially assumed. Since I’m seeing a lot of Entrapta comparisons, could be interesting if he ends up going through a similar arc. But it’d also be fun if he remains a wild card…
Tahraim’s such an interesting character. He’s got a great personality and his own motivations are understated but give him free rein to poke his nose into any part of the plot. It’s honestly amazing how realised he feels compared to how much actual panel time he’s gotten so far.
So a lot of people are thinking Tahraim helped the Collector, possibly misunderstanding that he explicitly said he turned her down.
But he also refused to help Ignan with getting what’s-his-face out of the mountain, and barely helped Vash when he first asked for a weapon.
So it could be argued that he was being just as helpful-in-the-end with her as he was with them.
BUT… that brings up another possibility:
Tahraim’s ability to “forge” people by manipulating their circumstances to create a desired outcome borders on the realm of precognition, and he is not helping the Collector so much as he is creating and manipulating circumstances to “forge” someone else entirely.
Like, say, Alinua, the only other person who could be said to have touched Life’s mind, albeit via a different means. Or Kendal is an ongoing project of his. Or anyone else. Or perhaps someone we haven’t even met.
That’s the trouble with Precogs. The ends just as often DO justify the means as they don’t, where they are concerned. It’s pretty much impossible to apply the standard Lawful/Chaotic+Good/Evil alignment array to them, and even saying they have an Orange and Blue Morality is quite possibly inaccurate, because for all we know, two Blues of a Precog COULD make an Orange.
A wonderful example of every god in this world being fearsome. Some just choose to be more subtle about it. Leaves you wondering how many powerful tools and people Tahraim’s been working on.
Anyway, he was too busy wondering if he could that he didn’t stop to think about if he should.
“I’m not here to gloat. I’m here to test my new weapon.”
TL;DR: This is just a test…. Of a very dangerous weapon I made for a very dangerous someone…
So Tahraim says he didn’t make the commissioned weapon because he thought the person asking would “continue” to stagnate. Assuming he meant toe Collector, how is/was she stagnating?
I think it’s her whole plan to resurrect Life, and I do think that she is still stagnating. She’s got herself so focused on freeing Life that she’s given no thought to whether Life actually wants to be freed. Alinua has also touched Life’s mind, is Life’s chosen. And given Life’s reaction to the chimera-maker way back when, I don’t think she’s looking to destroy the world she’s part of in order to be her own person again.
Not to mention that if the Collector did free her, Void’s prison would be weakened, and he’d probably just bust loose and eat her anyway.
So yeah, the Collector is stagnating because she’s stuck on this path she’s chosen, regardless of the harm it will do or even if the being she’s doing it for wants it done.
Tahreim was already a bit iffy, but seeing this completely solidifies to me that they just don’t see morality like regular people. As a forging god, the only thing they care about is shaping people into their highest potential, whether or not that would actually make them happy or improve the world. A sword could be used to defend a city or slaughter one, but either way Tahreim will make it into the sharpest sword possible.
i think tahraim really does just think of every single person as metal to be forged, and knows the best way to forge them, but never cares what side the weapons he makes them into are used by. because why should he care? he enjoys forging them, enjoys watching them forge themselves, and what use would morality be in the forging process? i like him 😀
@icarusancalion- My perception of Tahriam’s philosophic view is that he is more concerned with progress (perfection?/growth?) then stasis thus turning the ‘young lady’ down because she would ‘stagnate’ not caring if he would be a victim or not said device. Perhaps because Tahriam expects someone will ask him for tool for the problem?
I think that Blue and Orange Morality absolutely fits here, for a simple reason: Tahraim is, at the end of the day, a god.
So far we’ve seen various “types” of gods, but they all (possibly barring one) share a particular characteristic: they have a specific, bounded domain. Gods like Vash and Zuurith are classic genius loci, spirits of a location, while Tynan is the god tied to a specific storm (as opposed to “of storms”). Tahraim is one of the more purely “conceptual” sort, and I’m curious to see what eventually happens with Vash (possibilities including ‘fade out’ or ‘re-found Vash’, but could also include shifting domain to something like “hope” or “inspiration”, if such a shift is possible for a god in this world).
So no, Tahraim isn’t good or bad, in the conventional sense, he’s just amoral (for classic morality) by his very nature. It isn’t that he _enjoys_ forging people, per se — but rather, that is just what he _does_. God’s gonna god.
If he weren’t bound by that facet, I’d say that he missed a trick: instead of imprisoning Tynan unconditionally, offer him a chance at a heel-face turn. People fear storms because of the level of damage, and Tynan could even keep that part of his aspect, but downplay it a bit in favor of an alternative: convince areas that need water to worship him in order to get him to come there. Sure, he can’t do that forever, if an area is dry enough he’d have to “recharge” (probably easiest out over an ocean) every so often, but can you imagine how popular he’d be as a drought-breaker? He clearly has that level of control over both the location of his storm and the intensity of rainfall from it. And fear is a powerful force. But you don’t have to completely give up the fear in order to be positive enough that Vash (or any others like him) wouldn’t find it worth the bother to try to hassle you, if you restrict your flooding aspect to those who _don’t_ “give you your due (in worship)”. Being feared _and_ loved is arguably even stronger.
Ohhhhh I trust Tahraim anymore…..
94% sure this has been said before—
CALIBAN NEEDED THE GOD-IMPRISONING THINGY SO SHE COULD TRAP WHATEVER’S INSIDE OF DAINIX?
ah dang it does make so much more sense that it was the collector
never mind
ignore me please
Somehow I didn’t realize that he was talking about the Collector until like 3 rereads.
Wait, I think the woman who asked for a tool to imprison a god was the collector.
I never thought of it being The Collector who went to Tahraim, I thought it was Caliban (as They/He/She can use ANY pronoun) who knew of Tynan’s rising to power again asking for a way to stop him, or maybe some goddess asking Tahraim for the sword to imprison The Collector. Idk The Collector seems to much of a loner to ACTIVELY seek the help of someone that isn’t the Life Primordial. And, even IF it was The Collector who came to Tahraim, he turned her down, and yeh, not because she’s evil, but if The Collector EVER hoped a god would help her, it would be BEFORE she gained a reputation for kidnapping them, so Tahraim wouldn’t know what she would become. It COULD be a Horace Slughorn situation, where they helped a villan rise to power, not knowing what they would become, and deeply regret and blame themselves for their rise to power, yet noone knows about it, so it’s a guilty secret. Basically, I don’t think Tahraim is a villan here, or working with The Collector. He seems to only use his power responsibly, as he isn’t kidnapping gods willy nilly, he made the sword cause was curious, and only used it when a god was being a problem, and only after he is beaten down, meaning that his sword is not a strong as The Collector’s, the runes on the sword say Tynan’s epithets specifically, which shows the less power thing and strengthens the “Caliban trying to stop Tynan’s second rise to power” theory.