. Alinua and Falst look up in fright as a star of light shines from above, the Champion’s beam casting everything in white.
. Kendal lifts his sword, stretching out his arm to point it at the Champion, light shining brighter and brighter as he inhales. Then the demigod pauses, hand trembling.
. Nobody dies, he remembers. Not for me. Not ever.
. Are you willing to pay that price?
. “No,” he answers. His hand falls, the sword’s blade pointing towards the ocean far below.
Kendal. Kendal please. He’s about to kill all your friends. KENDAL!
*sigh* why do principles always have to get in the way of things lol
Hmmm maybe Kendal surrendering, or just the act of choosing not to stab him, will get Champion’s attention. And then they can talk and tell Champion and L.D. that they’re traveling to try to fix Erin.
ht tps :/ /do cs. goo gle.co m/ docum ent /d /1R 6QfHiM xjW6 OpdE -pyc 17ZB02 6iCy7 JoUD PKUJvS Szo
Yay I FINALLY managed to get the link able to be seen!
Delete all the spaces before hitting enter 🙂
. Alinua and Falst look up in fright as a star of light shines from above, the Champion’s beam casting everything in white.
. Kendal lifts his sword, stretching out his arm to point it at the Champion, light shining brighter and brighter as he inhales. Then the demigod pauses, hand trembling.
. Nobody dies, he remembers. Not for me. Not ever.
. Are you willing to pay that price?
. “No,” he answers. His hand falls, the sword’s blade pointing towards the ocean far below.
The Champion previously gave him the option to surrender, indicating that if he didn’t the people onboard the ship would perish. Presumably, Kendal surrendering now would prevent the Champion from blasting them. There’s still the problem that the Champion will want to kill Erin, of course… but maybe if he surrenders he might be able to convince the Champion (and/or his Lady) to hear him out. Or at least distract him until the Kraken (or whatever the thing lurking underwater is) shows up and they all have to deal with that.
Yes but see stabbing provides a peculiar dilemma known commonly as ‘morals’, which in turn makes people who have swords reluctant to stab. Of course, more research is needed on these strange things called ‘morals’, but for now that is all I have. 🤔
Do I see that right that Anakin was just going to let Kendal stab him? Did he even notice he was one half-second away from being a kebab?
Also, Kendal, nice memory of a core aspect of your character, but how about this banger: “Some people are cruel. I want to stop them and protect the ones they hurt.”
Please please please do that. Ideally now.
the thing is… michael isn’t cruel, for the entire fight he deliberately avoided hurting the floof squad(sans erin), the whole diadem thing is exactly to stop everyone from fighting and forcing him to defend himself, he came here to kill erin and only him
thing is:due to the brawl with kendal the situation escalated and now the situation forces his hand to make the decision, and this is his choice even if it clearly pains him as shown by last page
True, that’s why I left off the second half of the “People are cruel” sentence.
I’m mainly focused on the other sentence, where Kendal wants to protect people. Standing back and letting this happen seems to go directly against his own goal. I assume he’ll do something on Friday, like kick the champion in the jaw.
Though given the floof squad’s luck, this would redirect his blast directly into the nearby Volcano God.
I hope Kendal has a Plan B that isn’t a convenient Seamonsterattack.
Because it seems there are people to die just about now…
Also is it just me or is Michael a bit to powerful: Massive AoE Debuffs, Magicblades, flight and apparently superstrength rivaling (or surpassing) Kendal – as cool as this comic is, it feels a bit to much.
The thing is, *Micheal* isn’t that powerful. He’s the channel. This is all going to come with a price that will leave him depowered for some long period of time (though I am sure he will still be able to do some of it).
As for Kendal, I think he’s about to activate Starfire in a way that lets him deal with this. Kendal will take the price of stopping Micheal onto himself instead of paying the price in someone else’s blood.
Ya, it’s probably what’s to be expected of a primordial avatar who can actually work with their patron.
Leads to an interesting question: is the difference between Life and the Lady because the Lady has more experience channeling her power through mortal bodies, or because Life is much greater than her and could never do this safely?
Why is he so strong? He seems only human with close Ancient, which shouldn’t give him the power to grapple with someone who can casually break metal and fight giant monsters.
I think that either Kendal is holding back because he doesn’t want to hurt the champion OR his connection to the Lady gave him extra strength in addition ot all the random light powers.
Kendal has all the capacities to swim, and he does know how to walk and talk and breathe, so maybe he just knows already? Erin is almost certainly trained. We’ve seen Falst in water. Tess just sinks like a hippo. Aliuna? I’m not sure. She was drifting for a time, she might have learned in that time. Most likely to have issues is probably Tess and Ali, maybe Kendal too, maybe Vash never considered his vessels might need to swim.
I think Kendal and Erin would do best in just about any environment; Erin because he is literally the Elemental Magus + his tendency to over-plan for most things, and Kendal because he’s just really tough and decently dextrous
Alinua would probably be relegated to just forests as her best environment to do things in, however tired that is
Falst would do great in just about any environment that lets him do his acrobatics seeing as he’s the most dexterous of the party, forests especially but not limited to just those
Meanwhile Tess and Dainix do best in large, open spaces, Dainix because he’s used to it due to living in a desert most his life, and we have clear evidence of Tess doing great in that type of environment from the earlier chapters
So… Yeah
Kendal – Whereever his friends are.
Alinua – Farmland, forest, anywhere with good soil and room to grow.
Erin – Smarts-wise, a library. Combat-wise, a deserted wasteland with no collateral damage.
Falst – A dense jungle would allow him to make maximum use of his mobility.
Dainix – Considering his experience and flammability, a sandy desert would be best.
Tess – WHEREEVER THE DRAGONS ARE. Or a salty wetland. Anything conductive really.
well! really good timing of me to have watched the heroic sacrifices trope talk yesterday! that talked in part about sacrifice of principles and no sacrifice coming at zero cost to others!
It’s possible that those thoughts aren’t entirely his own. We’ve seen before that Kendal does have copies of Vash’s memories. And it’s also quite possible that this somehow ties back into long-running theories of who and what Kendal really is (that being that he is a fragment of Vash’s soul, accidentally bound to the sword long enough to become its own dormant entity, and then pulled into Vash’s incarnation even as he was pulled out of it)
I think some property of gods incarnating activated some lingering spark of life from dead star the starmetal came from. The fragment of Vash thing seems off to me somehow
Maybe it’s because, instead of actually being thoughts, these are memories of what he’s said? “Nobody dies. Not for me. Not ever.” is something he said way back in… chapter 2, I think, and “Are you willing to pay that price?” is what the Champion just said. So maybe that’s why it’s different.
The radiant glow drowns out their bodies
As Falst and Alinua stare
At the star brighter than the burning deck,
Caught before its searing glare.
Kendal raises his blade to the stranger’s throat,
“Nobody dies, not for me,” he thinks,
More than the sword that shares his name,
And to his side it sinks.
I realized about 20 mins ago that I’m supposed to be running a One-Shot today at 6. Well, still a few hours to prep things I guess.
Kendal, we KNOW you’re the best boy and don’t want to hurt anyone but your friends are about to take 10d8 radiant damage, so could you like, at least TRY to stop the misguided Michael guy? Please?
I really don’t know how the floof squad will get out of this, but I’m excited for the possibilities (sea snek, Falst doing light stuff, Dainix absorbing it, volcano god, Tess doing a flying lightning punch, etc). It’s always good to see characters being characters, even if it’s kind of at the expense of the well-being of the rest of the characters.
I think Michael is going to be distracted from doing his one-shot glowey death ray, then VD or the big water snek and fish people will start attacking the boat.
I love the way you can see Kendal’s hand shaking. Nobody (mortal) dies, which includes his enemies, logic be damned. I love the gathering energy around Michael’s mouth, too — once again, I can *hear* the visual effects (is this a me thing? Does anyone else’s brain supply the sound effects when looking at these panels, even without the effect words?)
However, this does leave us with the problem of the GIANT LASER DESCENDING FROM THE HEAVENS, and if killing Michael is off the table, I’m not sure what else Kendal plans to do.
Use the Starfire? I feel like that falls under ‘probably lethal’.
He doesn’t have the leverage to move or redirect Michael.
Use his body to block it? Goddamn it, Kendal, we JUST talked about this. Although it would be in character for it not to have sunk in yet. I’m not sure taking the blow would be enough, though.
Admit defeat? That would mean handing Erin over, and would probably put us right back where we started: the gang running interference while Michael tries to kill him. Plus, that’s not in character for Kendal.
Much more likely, and I hate to say it, he might count on the Void Dragon to block it. Walter’s already made it clear he’ll step in if Kendal isn’t able to protect Erin. Void energy doesn’t seem to be conducive to shields and whatnot (Walter always uses Erin’s power instead), but I’m assuming smashing enough light and void together would cancel each other out. There’s also the possibility that the light will transmute when it hits Dainix…which Walter could then control.
Personally, I’m hoping our big swimming friend beneath the water will appear JUST when the laser would strike, taking the blow instead and prompting a huge O.O from all involved…but I can’t see Kendal taking that chance.
I’ll be on tenterhooks until Friday (PLEASE don’t be a cliffhanger, please don’t be a cliffhanger)
It’s not just you – my brain makes the sound effects actual sounds too.
It will DEFINITELY be a cliffhanger. Every page these last few weeks has been a cliffhanger
The Void Dragon might step in, but I find it more likely Kendal will try to do some desperate thing, like breaking his arm or something.
WHERE IS THE YEET PANEL
Ok I’m a bit confused but what I think is happening is that Kendal is fully surrendering so that the paladin will stop (since he’s partially doing this due to Kendal’s refusal). Then there’s a decent chance that Kendal just gets dropped into the sea while the paladin decides that without Kendal he’s capable of dealing with this without murdering all the innocents. Also have we really still not found the yeet panel??? Where’s the yeet panel???
For mobile readers.
Alt-text: the cruel dilemma of “swords are so cool” vs “stabbing people makes me feel very bad”
Image source: no
tumblr text: a dilemma!
. Alinua and Falst look up in fright as a star of light shines from above, the Champion’s beam casting everything in white.
. Kendal lifts his sword, stretching out his arm to point it at the Champion, light shining brighter and brighter as he inhales. Then the demigod pauses, hand trembling.
. Nobody dies, he remembers. Not for me. Not ever.
. Are you willing to pay that price?
. “No,” he answers. His hand falls, the sword’s blade pointing towards the ocean far below.
Kendal. Kendal please. He’s about to kill all your friends. KENDAL!
*sigh* why do principles always have to get in the way of things lol
Hmmm maybe Kendal surrendering, or just the act of choosing not to stab him, will get Champion’s attention. And then they can talk and tell Champion and L.D. that they’re traveling to try to fix Erin.
ht tps :/ /do cs. goo gle.co m/ docum ent /d /1R 6QfHiM xjW6 OpdE -pyc 17ZB02 6iCy7 JoUD PKUJvS Szo
Yay I FINALLY managed to get the link able to be seen!
Delete all the spaces before hitting enter 🙂
The link didn’t work :(. And yeah, I deleted the spaces
. Alinua and Falst look up in fright as a star of light shines from above, the Champion’s beam casting everything in white.
. Kendal lifts his sword, stretching out his arm to point it at the Champion, light shining brighter and brighter as he inhales. Then the demigod pauses, hand trembling.
. Nobody dies, he remembers. Not for me. Not ever.
. Are you willing to pay that price?
. “No,” he answers. His hand falls, the sword’s blade pointing towards the ocean far below.
Twitter/Bluesky text: time for plan C
“Nobody dies for me, but people can die for my principles I guess”
The Champion previously gave him the option to surrender, indicating that if he didn’t the people onboard the ship would perish. Presumably, Kendal surrendering now would prevent the Champion from blasting them. There’s still the problem that the Champion will want to kill Erin, of course… but maybe if he surrenders he might be able to convince the Champion (and/or his Lady) to hear him out. Or at least distract him until the Kraken (or whatever the thing lurking underwater is) shows up and they all have to deal with that.
NO! (but seriously how are we stopping this thing? Dainix absorbs it? VD deflects it?)
Perhaps this action causes LD or the champion to see that Kendal is more than just a puppet!
Falst unlocks his full potential, rolls it into a ball and kicks it back towards the champion
Dodgeball 2.0!!! Gotta admit that actually made me laugh out loud.
I checked the tumblr and it looks like Kendal will do something and Falst won’t go super. What misery🙁
I’m a-firin’ my lazorrr! – The Champion/ Michael, probably
But I thought swords were for stabbing
Yes but see stabbing provides a peculiar dilemma known commonly as ‘morals’, which in turn makes people who have swords reluctant to stab. Of course, more research is needed on these strange things called ‘morals’, but for now that is all I have. 🤔
Do I see that right that Anakin was just going to let Kendal stab him? Did he even notice he was one half-second away from being a kebab?
Also, Kendal, nice memory of a core aspect of your character, but how about this banger: “Some people are cruel. I want to stop them and protect the ones they hurt.”
Please please please do that. Ideally now.
the thing is… michael isn’t cruel, for the entire fight he deliberately avoided hurting the floof squad(sans erin), the whole diadem thing is exactly to stop everyone from fighting and forcing him to defend himself, he came here to kill erin and only him
thing is:due to the brawl with kendal the situation escalated and now the situation forces his hand to make the decision, and this is his choice even if it clearly pains him as shown by last page
True, that’s why I left off the second half of the “People are cruel” sentence.
I’m mainly focused on the other sentence, where Kendal wants to protect people. Standing back and letting this happen seems to go directly against his own goal. I assume he’ll do something on Friday, like kick the champion in the jaw.
Though given the floof squad’s luck, this would redirect his blast directly into the nearby Volcano God.
I was right. And maybe the creature will come with the unexpected assist
Or wait, maybe its Falst’s time to shine once more.
i mean i’m sure like, cutting his arm off would do the trick, no need to go for the vitals.
I feel he wouldn’t be okay with that either. And champ would likely get lost in the storm and bleed out, maybe.
How does cutting off his arm help when the death beam is coming from his mouth? One way or another, he HAS to kill him on the spot.
People bleed out when they get their limbs chopped off.
More importantly, it’s really distracting.
WHAT?! That’s crazy, I never knew that.
Maybe that explains why that old guy I severed all his limbs off and hid under the floorboards died.
…is that his heart i can hear beating?
I hope Kendal has a Plan B that isn’t a convenient Seamonsterattack.
Because it seems there are people to die just about now…
Also is it just me or is Michael a bit to powerful: Massive AoE Debuffs, Magicblades, flight and apparently superstrength rivaling (or surpassing) Kendal – as cool as this comic is, it feels a bit to much.
The thing is, *Micheal* isn’t that powerful. He’s the channel. This is all going to come with a price that will leave him depowered for some long period of time (though I am sure he will still be able to do some of it).
As for Kendal, I think he’s about to activate Starfire in a way that lets him deal with this. Kendal will take the price of stopping Micheal onto himself instead of paying the price in someone else’s blood.
Ya, it’s probably what’s to be expected of a primordial avatar who can actually work with their patron.
Leads to an interesting question: is the difference between Life and the Lady because the Lady has more experience channeling her power through mortal bodies, or because Life is much greater than her and could never do this safely?
Why is he so strong? He seems only human with close Ancient, which shouldn’t give him the power to grapple with someone who can casually break metal and fight giant monsters.
I think that either Kendal is holding back because he doesn’t want to hurt the champion OR his connection to the Lady gave him extra strength in addition ot all the random light powers.
That ability doesn’t seem like it would come from her purview
Kendal is experiencing the trolley problem D:
THEN STAB HIM IN THE LEG OR SOMETHING DEAR GOD KENDAL PLEASE DON’T LET YOUR FRIENDS DIE IN FAVOR OF ERINS NARRATIVE FOIL
He probably doesn’t want to stab him anywhere
kendal really is just clark kent huh
well time for us to play:wich of the floof squad menbers know how to swim!
Falst and Erin, and that’s a maybe on Erin. But I bet neither of them knows how to swim in the ocean in the midst of a storm like this
Kendal has all the capacities to swim, and he does know how to walk and talk and breathe, so maybe he just knows already? Erin is almost certainly trained. We’ve seen Falst in water. Tess just sinks like a hippo. Aliuna? I’m not sure. She was drifting for a time, she might have learned in that time. Most likely to have issues is probably Tess and Ali, maybe Kendal too, maybe Vash never considered his vessels might need to swim.
Aurora Question #22: What environment would each member of the flood squad do best in?
I think Kendal and Erin would do best in just about any environment; Erin because he is literally the Elemental Magus + his tendency to over-plan for most things, and Kendal because he’s just really tough and decently dextrous
Alinua would probably be relegated to just forests as her best environment to do things in, however tired that is
Falst would do great in just about any environment that lets him do his acrobatics seeing as he’s the most dexterous of the party, forests especially but not limited to just those
Meanwhile Tess and Dainix do best in large, open spaces, Dainix because he’s used to it due to living in a desert most his life, and we have clear evidence of Tess doing great in that type of environment from the earlier chapters
So… Yeah
Kendal – Whereever his friends are.
Alinua – Farmland, forest, anywhere with good soil and room to grow.
Erin – Smarts-wise, a library. Combat-wise, a deserted wasteland with no collateral damage.
Falst – A dense jungle would allow him to make maximum use of his mobility.
Dainix – Considering his experience and flammability, a sandy desert would be best.
Tess – WHEREEVER THE DRAGONS ARE. Or a salty wetland. Anything conductive really.
The Stabby solution: on hold.
Spining Pile Driver into the sea: under consideration.
well! really good timing of me to have watched the heroic sacrifices trope talk yesterday! that talked in part about sacrifice of principles and no sacrifice coming at zero cost to others!
Weird thought clouds. Two Kendals?
Kendal thinks in glowing blue (1-3-5)
I remember that, but they shined different before and the letters were blacl
But it was very early in the story, so maybe some things weren’t finalized yet
It’s possible that those thoughts aren’t entirely his own. We’ve seen before that Kendal does have copies of Vash’s memories. And it’s also quite possible that this somehow ties back into long-running theories of who and what Kendal really is (that being that he is a fragment of Vash’s soul, accidentally bound to the sword long enough to become its own dormant entity, and then pulled into Vash’s incarnation even as he was pulled out of it)
I think some property of gods incarnating activated some lingering spark of life from dead star the starmetal came from. The fragment of Vash thing seems off to me somehow
Maybe it’s because, instead of actually being thoughts, these are memories of what he’s said? “Nobody dies. Not for me. Not ever.” is something he said way back in… chapter 2, I think, and “Are you willing to pay that price?” is what the Champion just said. So maybe that’s why it’s different.
The powerup imminent, the Swordsman readies
But reconsiders his stabbing, and steadies
The radiant glow drowns out their bodies
As Falst and Alinua stare
At the star brighter than the burning deck,
Caught before its searing glare.
Kendal raises his blade to the stranger’s throat,
“Nobody dies, not for me,” he thinks,
More than the sword that shares his name,
And to his side it sinks.
I realized about 20 mins ago that I’m supposed to be running a One-Shot today at 6. Well, still a few hours to prep things I guess.
Whelp, only one thing left to do. Kendal using his legs to grapple a choke hold. NONLETHAL TAKE DOWN!
Good luck 👍🍀
Is this before an “Ok I surrender” or what is Kendal thinking…
…He’s going to move himself into the way isn’t he?
A fun fact about swords is that the pommel is generally made of metal and you can bludgeon someone pretty good with that part.
Kendal, we KNOW you’re the best boy and don’t want to hurt anyone but your friends are about to take 10d8 radiant damage, so could you like, at least TRY to stop the misguided Michael guy? Please?
I really don’t know how the floof squad will get out of this, but I’m excited for the possibilities (sea snek, Falst doing light stuff, Dainix absorbing it, volcano god, Tess doing a flying lightning punch, etc). It’s always good to see characters being characters, even if it’s kind of at the expense of the well-being of the rest of the characters.
… I have a simple one-armed solution but I dunno if hair-pulling is allowed in the mid-air grappling rules.
Just like put the sword in front of dragon bro’s mouth and deflect it
I think Michael is going to be distracted from doing his one-shot glowey death ray, then VD or the big water snek and fish people will start attacking the boat.
I think epic!Poseidon has a piece of wisdom Kendal could really benefit from
I love the way you can see Kendal’s hand shaking. Nobody (mortal) dies, which includes his enemies, logic be damned. I love the gathering energy around Michael’s mouth, too — once again, I can *hear* the visual effects (is this a me thing? Does anyone else’s brain supply the sound effects when looking at these panels, even without the effect words?)
However, this does leave us with the problem of the GIANT LASER DESCENDING FROM THE HEAVENS, and if killing Michael is off the table, I’m not sure what else Kendal plans to do.
Use the Starfire? I feel like that falls under ‘probably lethal’.
He doesn’t have the leverage to move or redirect Michael.
Use his body to block it? Goddamn it, Kendal, we JUST talked about this. Although it would be in character for it not to have sunk in yet. I’m not sure taking the blow would be enough, though.
Admit defeat? That would mean handing Erin over, and would probably put us right back where we started: the gang running interference while Michael tries to kill him. Plus, that’s not in character for Kendal.
Much more likely, and I hate to say it, he might count on the Void Dragon to block it. Walter’s already made it clear he’ll step in if Kendal isn’t able to protect Erin. Void energy doesn’t seem to be conducive to shields and whatnot (Walter always uses Erin’s power instead), but I’m assuming smashing enough light and void together would cancel each other out. There’s also the possibility that the light will transmute when it hits Dainix…which Walter could then control.
Personally, I’m hoping our big swimming friend beneath the water will appear JUST when the laser would strike, taking the blow instead and prompting a huge O.O from all involved…but I can’t see Kendal taking that chance.
I’ll be on tenterhooks until Friday (PLEASE don’t be a cliffhanger, please don’t be a cliffhanger)
It’s not just you – my brain makes the sound effects actual sounds too.
It will DEFINITELY be a cliffhanger. Every page these last few weeks has been a cliffhanger
The Void Dragon might step in, but I find it more likely Kendal will try to do some desperate thing, like breaking his arm or something.
WHERE IS THE YEET PANEL
yeah this is probably fineeeeeee (im freaking out)
Ok I’m a bit confused but what I think is happening is that Kendal is fully surrendering so that the paladin will stop (since he’s partially doing this due to Kendal’s refusal). Then there’s a decent chance that Kendal just gets dropped into the sea while the paladin decides that without Kendal he’s capable of dealing with this without murdering all the innocents. Also have we really still not found the yeet panel??? Where’s the yeet panel???
If only he had a less spiky hilt! Then he could just bop Champion in the head.
Ah yes. My favorite non-lethal take down of my enemies; concussions
U gotta admire rhe arm strength of Michael though. Reminds me of that old video Lindybwige made abou ygritte hesitating to shoot John Snow
TL;DR: To stab or not to stab? That is the question. And the answer is “no”.
KENDAL you FOOL, THERE ARE WAYS to STAB someone WITHOUT FATALLY WOUNDING THEM as long as they receive MEDICAL ATTENTION AFTER
YOU LITERALLY HAVE ALINUA ON BOARD JUST STAB HIM AND LET HER HEAL IT
Kendal oh my god, just kill him already.