1.20.9
on January 13, 2023
at 3:00 am
when you come from a society of 100% pyrokinetics you get the “mine safety” talk EARLY
Aurora
A fantasy webcomic. Updates M-W-F.
when you come from a society of 100% pyrokinetics you get the “mine safety” talk EARLY
Hahaaaa i love this page, Falst night vision confirmed!! Makes me wonder what his intro arc was like from his perspective
For mobile readers.
Alt-text: bro he was in prison for half a year you’re LUCKY you only got almost kicked in the face
Image source: fire
Dainix awakes, and is naturally worried
Without fire they’d best go, lest they be buried
Off topic, but What is everybody favorite kind of younger race? Mine are swampstriders
Ick.
Yeah, I’ve had some dangerous experiences with bad air. You don’t mess with it.
Oh no, now I’m wondering how all this chemistry stuff works with only six elements…
So in the real world, fire is a chemical reaction between a fuel source and oxygen that creates carbon dioxide and water. Living things need oxygen to survive, because our bodies use it in various chemical reactions. But in Aurora, oxygen doesn’t exist, and Fire is its own element.
This raises a couple of questions. 1: We know that people in Aurora need to breathe, but why, exactly? 2: In what way does Fire “burn up” breathable air?
Let’s start with the first question: Why do things in Aurora need to breathe? We know that living things comprise of a mixture of the six elements, and that includes Wind. Perhaps wind plays an important role in combining with other elements to perform various tasks within the body. But the second question is still puzzling. How does Fire prevent air from being breathable? Is it something to do with how Fire dissolves into Wind?
Help me out here guys
We know fire has transmutative properties, perhaps when combined with wind it creates some dangerous new combination, similarly to how all elements together combine to create adamant. If you want to know for sure though maybe ask Red on her tumblr? She asks questions there, just make it clear in the question that you’re asking how it works in universe and not trying to insert real life physics into her fantasy world, she hates that
I’m sorry, but where did you get the non-existence of oxygen? Like where does that come from?
Aurora doesnt function on real world physics or chemistry so it doesnt have oxygen
I would say that some form of chemistry exists, but altered by the inclusion of the six elememts.
Privpi- Sunstorm is getting confused with story details that conflict with that person’s scientific understanding how things work in our world. I agree with Goshawk that Sunstorm’s confusion does NOT help us enjoy the story. Red’s profile states her major in college was math so I am sure she understands the difference, Such discussions does not help me enjoy the story, but I am but one ‘voice’ among many here. Don’t let me (or anyone) detract from your enjoyment of the story!
We know that Fire, Lightning, and Life can sink into or ‘hide’ inside Water, Stone, and Wind. Suppose that hydrogen gas, or methane or whatever natural gas Dainix is concerned about is Wind imbued with Fire. Suppose that coal is Stone imbued with Fire, and crude oil, Water imbued with Fire. This is Fire’s elemental matter, since the Primordial body isn’t as corporeal as the others.
Furthermore, we know that Fire is the element of transmutation, and very similar to Void, the element of consumption. I imagine that in order to exist, Fire needs to be constantly transmuting or consuming some sort of substance, which is basically how real chemistry works anyway; Fire is, at it’s core, a very bright, very hot chemical reaction. The difference between Fire and Void is that Void consumes everything and produces nothing, whereas Fire consumes anything and always produces something else.
Fire needs fuel and oxygen and burn, so in Aurora logic, I’m guessing Fire is fuelled by any elemental matter that a mage can find, since there’s always trace amounts of methane and combustible gas in our atmosphere, and consumes Wind (Oxygen) and transmutes it to Wind (Carbon Dioxide). If Fire encounters further elemental matter/fuel, especially such concentrated, volatile substances as gas, oil, or coal, I doubt a Fire mage can do much to stop Fire eating that too, except at the highest level. Fire would transmute these substances to Carbon Dioxide/Wind explosively, since the energy released during the reaction/transmutation is the actual explosion/Fire, not the substance itself.
What’s funny is that I studied A-Level Chemistry for two years, and now, as a filmmaking student, this is literally the only thing I’m going to use it for. I bet Red knows that matter can neither be created nor destroyed, and she’s written Void out of spite for Thermodynamics.
i don’t think that’s even necessary to explain the existence of non-breathable or dangerous gas. we have canon different kinds of rock in the auroraverse (i.e. metals and gems), why not different types of air?
I know that Aurora does not operate under our world chemistry, but for the sake of argument bear with me..
As far as I can tell (on google) most of the elements on the periodic table have a combustable gaseous form of some kind.
Because the floof squad smells, hears, ect. I feel like it may be safe to assume some form of (breathable?) particulate facilitating all that. Fire in our world always needs fuel and air to burn, and it seems like fire (non-magical) in Aurora needs at least fuel to burn as well (even if that fuel is anger). It seems likely that fire (non-magical) needs air as well. So, whatever non-oxygen air they breath is statistically likely to be combustible, and/or there are pockets of highly combustible aerated substances in the caves that can act as fuel and the air gets consumed that way.
That or maybe fire and wind use up the same stuff from the atmosphere and can’t cohabitate for very long.
Honestly, while I’ve never explicitly thought about it before, I just don’t think of the Primordial Elements as the same class of thing as our chemical elements, so I don’t see any contradiction in both existing. They are different ways of dividing up the world.
We already see in-comic other examples of characters differentiating substances without discussing their specific Primordial Elemental composition. Star Metal is it’s own recognizable thing. I don’t find that less strange than oxygen being its own recognizable thing.
I agree with you; it makes much more sense to divide the magical elements (fire, wind, water, etc.) and the physical ones (oxygen, hydrogen, etc.).
i don’t know why this is the thing we’re being hung up over when we’ve fully accepted the existence of other complicated shit. like if there was a venomous snake we wouldn’t question the existence of venom, even though its highly unclear what would combine to form it (life and water sure but also everything alive has life and water so no.) we’d just be all like *handwaves* AH ITS LIFE SHIT.
why isn’t wind given the allowance for a wide range of different materials? we already know gems and precious metals are canon too, why can there be several kinds of rock but not several types of wind????????
Meanwhile, Red is probably internally screaming over this whole comment thread; I’ve seen from her Tumblr page that she’s sick of all the questions that conflate Aurora logic with real-world physics and chemistry to minute detail. Personally, I’m not sick of it, I just won’t participate in it either.
When one has “elements” like this, usually the magic elements are a metaphor even if manifested literally, and you still have chemical reactions still going on behind stuff. I.E. magic fire is usually courage or Willpower when bamfed up, but normal fire still needs the regular stuff.
Ok, I know this page is totally unrelated, but I had a theory and I don’t want to forget it….
So the Void dragon can’t hurt Kendal because he is make by Vash right? But he CAN hurt/influence all ‘Twin-Made’ creatures because there is something of HIM in them, which is why he is a danger to the rest of the floof squad. So somehow, part of the Void dragon had to have made it’s way into most of Aurora’s population.
My theory is that one (or both!) of the dragons are the ‘parents’ of the Twins!
Also, the twins are, well, TWINS, which kind of implies a birth, so someone has to be a parent
I know it is a little thumb-tack and string-y but I was reading back through the Archive and it seems to check out. What are everyone’s thoughts?
I enjoy this much more. Thank you!
That actually makes a lot of sense. Although it’s still unclear how the Twins were born, they must have some connection to the Dragons. I would guess, as Gods of Creation, they exist necessarily, and were created from the very idea of creation, the same way a City God is created when their people develop a cultural identity, or a Forest God is created when they become a stable ecosystem, habitat, or simply have enough trees.
Perhaps they were created as a result of the Primordials creating Adamant, or the Void Dragon plotting to escape? If The Lady’s sole purpose is to prevent the Void Dragon’s escape, I doubt that she would want to create the tools for him to do so.
Judging by the first couple pages, it also seems that VD had some hand in the creation of most life.
Mainly the creation of the elder races, all the other stuff was mostly just the Twins doing their own thing
This theory makes a lot of sense. If Walter is the twins’ creator then it explains how he could have commanded them to create a vessel for him in the prologue. I doubt they would have agreed otherwise since Walter being what he is at full power would lead to all their creations being destroyed, which based on their respective lore page is against their desires.
I’m not sure why he needed a vessel tho (Then again thats a different theory for elsewhere and I might just have missed something)
He needed someone who could command the elements to free him from his prison.
Fire isn’t the only thing that can use up all the oxygen in an enclosed space. Not that it applies here, but iron or steel constructed enclosed (and sealed) spaces, like in between a ships double hull, can have all the oxygen removed from the atmosphere just through the process of rusting. There has been cases of workmen dying from asphyxiation by entering long sealed spaces filled with “dead air” that haven’t been properly vented.
Smokey Dainix: Only you can prevent mine fires.
Falst, I know your teeth must be sharp, but have you considered using the blade part of Dainix’s spear for cutting the cables? It may be a bit awkward to handle for the task, but it would be far more hygienic.
It makes total sense that Ignan culture would make teaching about fire safety a priority, even to their non-mages. Also makes for a sensible power limitation story wise to keep tension high; we may see something similar with water and/or being on a wooden boat during their ocean trek to Helm.
Prediction for next week: Dainix is freed and they use that glowing thing from the automaton as a light source. Then a discussion about how to get out, potentially interrupted by more crawlers and/or automatons.
It’s actually kinda surprising to see the issue of oxygen in confined underground areas brought up in a fantasy context. I’m just so used to video game logic where this kind of things is basically never implemented, even in hardcore survival stuff, air is air is air and you can’t get monoxide poisoning or hypoxia as long as you’re in air.
I personally, enjoy that it was brought up. Seems like a great way to keep up tension and explore potential limitations to magic. Like now we know that even magic fire needs air of some kind, with emotion (like anger) acting as fuel
this is in reply to an earlier comment by sunstorm the budgie, who I can’t figure out how to reply to. My theory is that breathable air is simply a molecule of wind and life atoms. Fire likely transmutes it from wind and life to something unusable. If earlier theories about fire transmuting elements into their opposites is correct, this would be lightning and stone. the lightning is most likely given off as light, while the single stone atoms form smoke. just my speculation, but this would fit how we have previously seen these elements act.
I’m a big fan of their eye colors being used for their sound and motion effects- yellow for Falst and orange for Dainix.
I have occasionally had the pleasure of being waked up by a cat gently swatting my face. Can confirm the instinctive desire to swat back, especially if it’s early in the morning.
There once was a deep, dark cave
Where two intrepid heroes brave
Were trapped in the dark
And can’t make a spark
Because breathable air they must save.
wait characters in fiction are alowed to have common sense? since when? well props to danix i guess
TL;DR: A rare instance of common sense
A no-magic dungeon crawl? This’ll be interesting; time to see all that wilderness survival, monster hunting, and gladiatorial training pay off.
Dang – both of the lads are bruised, battered and Dainix is tangled up in a net of cables. Why are they both still so cute?
“There’s a rockslide piled up in the chute behind you, and these cables are tangled in it. Seriously, how’d you even GET this stuck? And what’s this? A lampshade? How the heck did your foot get tangled in a LAMPSHADE, of all things? Why is it even down here?”
what does this mean
OHHHHHHH
Oh good, glad the joke still hit, @scorch.
For those who don’t get it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1gzqtwrutw&list=PLDb22nlVXGgcljcdyDk80bBDXGyeZjZ5e&index=72
This is so funny but I don’t know who I would show it to that would understand
You know, I’m not sure that Dainix could do a controlled amount of demon-ness at this point. He wouldn’t want to go full demon because he’d be out of control in a dangerous situation and the possible explosion thing, but we haven’t seen that he’s able to limit the transformation to just his arm or something. It would make sense, since he hasn’t mastered the art of exploding yourself in battle yet.
“hasn’t mastered the art of exploding yourself in battle yet”
Erin: Amateur
So is the glow in their eyes purely artistic or can they see each other’s eyes in the dark Looney Tunes-style?
Dainix: Only YOU can stop forest fires ?
OH MYGOD hhrhhrhrgrhghrgrh <- real footage of falst chew rope
What?! Chemistry and fire safety?! What are these doing here?!
I’m gonna need the preschool ignan mine safety course complete with rhymes and songs and Cartoon Carbon Monoxide and Cartoon Volatile Hydrocarbons and how Cartoon Oxygen *loves every ignan* but she is shy and doesn’t play well with VH and will run away if ignans Don’t Play Nice.
For some reason, this scene makes me want to ship Falst and Dainix.
Hey I’m finally caught up!
Honestly I’m absolutely loving this series so far! I always know it’s good when my brain makes an OC for the setting that I can’t stop thinking about lol
Can’t wait to read more!
god damn dainix got them strong leggies
Did I read the entire comic in a day instead of studying for imminent finals? Why yes… But do I regret it? Nope
As a student of mining engineering, can definitely confirm that fires underground are extremely bad news. Even when you’ve got proper ventilation, you’ve also got confined smoke that fills up everything downwind of the fire source. I worked as an EIT one autumn in ventilation and each of us had to design a fire drill for the mine. “A vehicle catches fire and starts burning on X level at this intersection, what do you do?” For most of the mine, the answer is “go to the refuge station (which has direct fresh air and is designed to be structurally stable enough to be the part of a mine that doesn’t collapse even in a worst case scenario) and wait for the all clear and/or rescue team”, but for the folks who are actually caught in the path of the smoke the answer is “grab some of the burlap we have on the walls for this reason, make a tent around you and an outlet for service air (that is, the pressurized air line for pneumatic tools), crank it open and rely on the positive pressure in your burlap tent to keep the smoke out.” Which is kinda intense… And yes, the air in those lines is breathable, specifically because of this backup plan. It’s not going to smell very good, because it gets a bit of lubricant in the pipes every now and then and it isn’t fully bled out except during a major maintenance overhaul or a major breakdown…but it’s oxygen (in not-insane concentrations) and if you’re in this situation, getting oxygen is the problem.
Well I re-read the whole comic this week after I stopped checking it regularly a year ago.
I love it so much. Thank you Red for creating it.