For mobile readers.
Alt-text: erin has been THINKING and now it is time for erin to be TALKING again and nobody is happier about it than erin
Image source: sorry
. “I am neither useless nor helpless, Dainix,” Erin says, looking up at him with tired eyes. “But I am sorry.” He takes a deep breath, looking away. “I planned to handle everything myself, and when I couldn’t, I… I hurt myself in the attempt, and am weaker for it. I asked for trust from all of you and gave none of my own. It was foolish, and even if we had succeeded it would have been in spite of me, not because of me.
. “I can’t ask you to rely on me again… But I don’t intend to make the same mistake twice.”
. “All right.” Dainix sits down. “I know it’s tempting,” he says, “But I’m glad you’re not giving up.”
. “And I’m glad I don’t have to diffuse a second self-pity angst spiral in one day,” Tess says.
. “I AM capable of resolving my own emotional issues on occasion.”
. “If nobody’s killing anyone, I’ll go get our golden boy and see if we can find Alinua on our way back.”
. “Be careful. The Paladins may know our capabilities by now.” Erin raises his hand to his chin as Tess leaves the cave, adding more quietly, “And if my theory is even half right… we need to stay as far from them as possible.”
Is it just the “murder” part or are we talking more the “voidy will be very upset if he thinks he’s cornered and I can’t stop him from being very upset”
Really interesting to see this facet of Dainix. He felt he needed to confront Erin, and did, but as neutrally and concisely as possible. And after hearing Erin out, he affirmed his decision and let it drop. I think it would have been fascinating to see him leading his Ravvan team.
I have experienced a lot of different leadership in both civilian and military life.
The good ones were those who could talk calmly but directly about a situation, and then move on when mistakes were acknowledged and it was clear that the person who made the mistake was on a path to not making the same mistake.
The bad ones were the ones who got angry and shouted a lot, like the mistake was a personal attack or something. Which is a good way to have less obvious ‘mistakes’ happen that are designed to make them look bad without casting bad light on the person making the ‘mistake’.
Damn, that was really some introspective and unbiased analysis of his own action by erin. His character development is right there for us to see! and kudos to dainix for actually being nice and understanding instead of him giving a fired up speech to erin like we all expected. I love this comic so much
This exactly… so refreshing. I would only add that Erin has always had a certain level of honest self-awareness, it’s just not a side we get to see very often in the plot, especially when he’s faced with a problem he thinks he can solve.
If Tess gave him a more thorough rundown of what happened on the boat (which she had to have, given his knowledge of Dainix’s void corruption), what do you guys think the odds are that he deduced the void-light transmutation on his own? …oh! Also, do you guys think Falst will relay what happened with Dainix transmuting the Void or that he has Light magic?
Well I don’t think falst will say that in this situation (though if he does then it will great). I think Falst doesn’t know enough about paladin magic to really confidently open up , the next page will probably be just speculation about what paladins will do next, the void dragon reacting to this paladin threat cuz remember, erin told to void dragon that he will deal with the paladins if VD stopped being a problem, and now he’s not really living up to that. And red posted a storyboard of erin confronting a paladin a while back so they will be discovered! I’m so excited for this chapter
Surrender was never really on the table in the first place when you carry around a primordial apocalyptic deity bend on destroying the world to free itself.
Oh good, he’s actually aware of it and Dainix isn’t going to pummel him about it. Pop culture has conditioned me to expect a conga line of friends being angry at Erin and verbally beating him up over it while he beats himself up over it every time it gets brought up, with the end result being everyone being angry and miserable with nothing productive actually happening.
Fortunately, Red is a better writer than that and actually has her characters grow over time.
Is it too early to tell Erin it’s too late to plan and that Kendal and Alinua are going to have to pull out miracles out of their nonexistent sleeves to save them? Or is another shoe gonna drop first?
Let’s not count volcano guy out just yet, either. He might enjoy a good brawl with the Paladins (sure they wouldn’t), and helping out his new bud just adds to the fun times.
It’s about time these three compaired notes about the palidin fight. Erin missed a lot of important stuff while he was out of commission:
Falst managed to break the diadem (2.3.13), and Dianix’s demon learned some super important stuff about void, light and their connection (“essence of hunger”, and all that).
It’s a shame Dainix can’t easily remember what the demon gets up to.
Realized his mistake and apologized? Tess must’ve grabbed a shapeshifter of some kind because this ain’t Erin. Either that or that loss was far worse than I remember.
Oh wow, that was… quick and painless. I was almost hoping for more than that.
But Erin is actually right, and in a new and interesting way. He’s apologising, he’s taking responsibility, but he’s also not letting Dainix take his anger out on him. “I am neither useless nor helpless, Dainix” is actually the most powerful line I’ve heard from him in a while.
That said, the question of “Does Erin only THINK he’s in charge?” still hasn’t really been directly answered. I hope it will be down the line; it’s all well and good Kendal saying “Nobody’s in charge.” but problems like this will continue to reoccur until it’s been addressed.
I think in the long run we are going to have our paragon Kendal become the acknowledged leader (he doesn’t think of himself as a leader because he doesn’t see how others react to his determination and paragon/heroic nature). I think he’s also physically the strongest, making him the Strong Man.
Erin will blend the “smart guy” (which he clearly is) and “lancer”, which means he can offer up clever plans and continue to bicker with Kendal.
Alinua is clearly the Heart, but she is also a contender for most powerful. She just finds using that power to its full extent distasteful, or perhaps a little traumatizing.
Our boys here don’t fit tightly to the five-man-band archetypes. Skilled warriors with special power sets. Though I guess one leans toward the swordsman (spearman) archetype, and the other is closer to a rogue.
I mean, I’m happy to take Kendal’s answer at face value and say, no, no one person is the designated leader of this party, even if Erin thinks otherwise. And no one has to be, as long as they become more open with each other and work together better. I’m reading this as a step toward Erin perhaps starting to realize he’s not the only one calling the shots, and shouldn’t be.
Well, if we use Red’s own analysis of “The Leader”, then Kendal is the Leader because he’s the connecting point between pretty much the entire group. Tess is a lot more connected to Erin, and Falst/Dainix is a growing bond, but other then that it’s all about Kendal.
I think k the team can and SHOULD make ‘nobody’s in charge’ work, they’re all intelligent adults, but they’re going to have to stop doing things like [I let Erin think he’s in charge] and [it’s hard to explain things to him so I just do them and let him figure it out after]. Our Floof Squad can be a great team, but they’ve got to put some more work into it. (But they’ve all known each other for what, a week or two?)
Of course Erin is happy to be talking. He does like to talk, and enjoys the company of his own voice.
Thankfully, that’s not the limit of the company he likes, but he does get carried away at times.
I have a character of my own like that, but he at least has the experience to know when to cut it short. Erin occasionally tries to explain things during a time of doing things, which happens because he wanted to be cool and not explain everything beforehand because he thought he could handle it.
Explain things during down time, and if new things come up mid crisis, you will hopefully be trusted enough that people will just do things if you say “New plan! A go here, B go there, and C go to this thing.” Erin makes it hard for others to feel that confident in his judgement.
I wouldn’t be so sure Tess as there’s some daylight and emotionally compromised party members left; still time for more self-pity angst spirals to defuse.
Love the expressions on Dainix as he silently listens to Erin; he’s disappointed in him for his past actions, but recognises his genuine guilt. Once the apology is over, he moves from standing over Erin to sitting down with him, now an understanding has been reached. It’s the little details that make quiet scenes like this.
… Well that went a lot better than I was expecting/dreading; looks like Erin made good on his word to think after he woke up, and at least a chunk of that was on self-reflection.
This is good, with Erin both humbled and determined to change, Dainix has a good opportunity to try and work the gang into a more effective team. If anything Kendal may be the problem now if he keeps up his habit of acting solo during godly matters.
“If my theory is even half right” and the other chunk of Erin’s thinking has been about their enemies. I’m not sure how much Tess has told him about the boat, but if she mentioned Kendal’s immunity to Tam’s diadem and the unexplained presence of Void in Dainix, he may already be joining the Light-Void dots together.
This would be a great time for Falst to explain his version of events, but given his attitude and health that’s not guaranteed. Which may be very bad indeed from Erin’s “need to stay as far from them as possible” remark. Falst has light powers, but so far he’s gone unnoticed by L.D. and her forces; if he’s discovered by her, then he could be a beacon for the Paladins to follow, maybe even an unwitting spy.
Prediction for next week: This looks like a good ending for a scene change. Could they cut to:
a) The Paladins as they discuss their plans for finding the gang, maybe have an injured Tam try and direct them despite the protest from Priora and other healers. (since he’s an Erin parallel it would be fitting)
b) Kendal moving on after his convo with Rakhn and meeting Tess after she leaves the cave. Or vice-versa.
or c) Alinua in the ocean, maybe the Northern Wyrm is explaining her rivalry with Rakhn, the Paladin forces, or both as why she cannot help Kendal right now. She may also recommend Alinua waits until the Paladins have passed before surfacing.
To point c) specifically, I actually believe the end of chapter 5 takes place after this. Like, the chronology of the last few chapters looks like this:
End of Ch. 4: “what happened to the boat?” -> flashback to Alinua’s perspective of what happened, lead into 5.
End of Ch. 5: “[Kendal] is beyond my help.” -> flashback to here to explain why and how Kendal is in trouble now.
Possibly. We don’t know the exact time-frames between what’s happening on land and under the sea.
No idea how long Alinua was out cold or swimming to N.W.’s temple, how long Kendal and Falst were floating in the vine pods, we can’t even use the sun or weather to sync them up.
Oh. Oh, that confrontation defused a lot more smoothly and maturely than I was expecting. I really thought Dainix was going to just lose it, based on the previous page, and Erin’s sincere, self-aware apology was a pleasant surprise. Looking forward to seeing how they work together and pull through.
The boys look so damn tired in those first two panels. Unsurprisingly so, given… *once again gestures in the general direction of this arc*
“I AM capable of diffusing my own emotional issues on occasion”, I could wear that on a t-shirt XP
I see Erin has been spending a chunk of his Thinking Time on where HE went wrong, not just WHAT went wrong. But he looks so surprised to see Dainix meet him where he is, instead of further blame. I have to wonder if Dainix wanted to see if Erin would double down again…or if he was ready to see things as they actually were. The first would make Erin a further liability…the second makes him a teammate. And Dainix is no stranger to being overwhelmed by situations you try to handle on your own, either.
…And yes, Erin, staying away from the folks who want to murderize you is generally a good plan. Unfortunately, you seem to keep forgetting that the universe hates you in particular.
This is what I love about Erin. Even from the beginning, he’s at least had the emotional intelligence to be aware of and, on rare occasions, compensate for his massive character flaws. It’s charming, in a frustrating way.
Just for awareness, reading on phone, the “tails” on the speech bubbles are extremely thin and hard to see, making it hard to see who is saying what. Zooming in solves the problem, so no big deal; just thought you might want to know (my apologies if not).
The way Dainix immediately calms down the second Erin takes very real accountability is amazing. I expected him to stay angry and even thought it’d be rather justified, but I underestimated what exactly Dainix was looking for in that confrontation. He didn’t want a fight, of course he didn’t want a fight, he just wanted to make sure Erin understood the situation. Dainix was also just having a bad time in general and I love the fact hat seeing Erin be accountable seems to have made him feel better. And, AND, ERIN BEING ACCOUNTABLE YAAAYYYYY!!!! I love character development!!!!
Very proud of Erin for this!!! That was very well done!! It is so hard it is to pull yourself out of— and stay out of— that kind of self-destructive angst spiral while still taking responsibility and learning from your mistakes. This was overall a very satisfying page to read <3
Impressively cool head on Dainix, really. I think most people would have found it hard to not yell at least a bit at Erin.
Like I had no doubt that Erin was about to apologize, for all his hubris he has not been unwilling to acknowledge when he’s fucked up, but I also kind of 100% expected some raised voices here, and Dainix would have been well within his rights to tear into Erin for a bit for not realizing all this soon enough to not land them in a horrible mess. But no, absolute levelheadedness here. He sees Erin realizes he fucked up, figures there’s no point to fighting after the realization has already been had, and sits down so they can start planning.
I know we make jokes about Dainix and Falst’s “tactical” excuses, but that is definitely some impressively tactical mindset!
I also can’t help but notice the “I know it’s tempting but I’m glad you’re not giving up” line. Because I once said in a previous Erin strip that honestly in his place if I’d had the streak of constant failures and punches to his self-concept Erin has been having for most of the comic (seriously, when was the last time anything Erin did actually made things better?) I’d probably have been like “okay, you know what, Kendal, it’s clear nothing about this is going to work, just stab me quickly and let’s be done with this” several chapters ago. Dainix seems to have worried about Erin being in about that mindset, sounds like? But thankfully it seems sisterly throttling into sense is a buff with decent duration.
i know this is a low bar, but i love characters being allowed to be upset with each other without it blowing up into a whole thing! erin admits wrongdoing and dainix doesn’t have to blow up to make his point known! healthy communication!
I got the sense in the last two pages that that’s not erin. A little too easy to get along with. The void dragon is cuning. And they’re in a cave. Voidy can’t leave, but he doesn’t have to give erin his body back
Counterpoint, in Erin’s words: “you’re as subtle as a rock to the face.”
This isn’t the void dragon, everyone would know. (Also Red is really good about not using the character-specific speech bubbles deceptively. If this was the dragon, he would have his own speech effect visible.)
I was very worried on Wednesday that Dainix would blow up on Erin, but I really should have had more faith in Red blowing bad stereotypes out of the water.
My entire for you page has been only of two things— Jjk Maki being an absolute beast of a fighter, and the human spirit penguin. Now the question of the bag is would tess ever can just 1v100 the enemies?
Gotta unsplit the party
The GM appreciates this. (was giving so many hints)
Yay soup!
For mobile readers.
Alt-text: erin has been THINKING and now it is time for erin to be TALKING again and nobody is happier about it than erin
Image source: sorry
. “I am neither useless nor helpless, Dainix,” Erin says, looking up at him with tired eyes. “But I am sorry.” He takes a deep breath, looking away. “I planned to handle everything myself, and when I couldn’t, I… I hurt myself in the attempt, and am weaker for it. I asked for trust from all of you and gave none of my own. It was foolish, and even if we had succeeded it would have been in spite of me, not because of me.
. “I can’t ask you to rely on me again… But I don’t intend to make the same mistake twice.”
. “All right.” Dainix sits down. “I know it’s tempting,” he says, “But I’m glad you’re not giving up.”
. “And I’m glad I don’t have to diffuse a second self-pity angst spiral in one day,” Tess says.
. “I AM capable of resolving my own emotional issues on occasion.”
. “If nobody’s killing anyone, I’ll go get our golden boy and see if we can find Alinua on our way back.”
. “Be careful. The Paladins may know our capabilities by now.” Erin raises his hand to his chin as Tess leaves the cave, adding more quietly, “And if my theory is even half right… we need to stay as far from them as possible.”
Tumblr text: ok enough emotional maturity back to the fantasy webcomic
Bluesky text: clearing the air
This alt text made me laugh out loud. I find it extremely relatable for… personal reasons.
Is it just the “murder” part or are we talking more the “voidy will be very upset if he thinks he’s cornered and I can’t stop him from being very upset”
At long last, it’s time for some theorizing.
Really interesting to see this facet of Dainix. He felt he needed to confront Erin, and did, but as neutrally and concisely as possible. And after hearing Erin out, he affirmed his decision and let it drop. I think it would have been fascinating to see him leading his Ravvan team.
It’s honestly a very good leadership skill.
I have experienced a lot of different leadership in both civilian and military life.
The good ones were those who could talk calmly but directly about a situation, and then move on when mistakes were acknowledged and it was clear that the person who made the mistake was on a path to not making the same mistake.
The bad ones were the ones who got angry and shouted a lot, like the mistake was a personal attack or something. Which is a good way to have less obvious ‘mistakes’ happen that are designed to make them look bad without casting bad light on the person making the ‘mistake’.
Now I need to know what Erin’s latest theory is.
Damn, that was really some introspective and unbiased analysis of his own action by erin. His character development is right there for us to see! and kudos to dainix for actually being nice and understanding instead of him giving a fired up speech to erin like we all expected. I love this comic so much
This exactly… so refreshing. I would only add that Erin has always had a certain level of honest self-awareness, it’s just not a side we get to see very often in the plot, especially when he’s faced with a problem he thinks he can solve.
*john mulaney voice* I didn’t know he knew how to do that
Pride
Is my problem
I know that’s right
But that don’t solve it
I don’t like favors
I don’t like debts I can’t repay
I don’t like making
Anything less than my own way
I’m loving Erin’s character arc so far.
Ooh, theory time! It’s been too long.
If Tess gave him a more thorough rundown of what happened on the boat (which she had to have, given his knowledge of Dainix’s void corruption), what do you guys think the odds are that he deduced the void-light transmutation on his own? …oh! Also, do you guys think Falst will relay what happened with Dainix transmuting the Void or that he has Light magic?
Well I don’t think falst will say that in this situation (though if he does then it will great). I think Falst doesn’t know enough about paladin magic to really confidently open up , the next page will probably be just speculation about what paladins will do next, the void dragon reacting to this paladin threat cuz remember, erin told to void dragon that he will deal with the paladins if VD stopped being a problem, and now he’s not really living up to that. And red posted a storyboard of erin confronting a paladin a while back so they will be discovered! I’m so excited for this chapter
The unearthly, bishonen wind settles, there will be no Dainixsplotion! Erin’s face in that middle panel is <3
Also good heavens I love Tess an inordinate amount!
Looks like it’s a no for my “tactical surrender to get to Helm” theory.
Also, yay, character development, we must make sure to praise him. Good job, Erin!
Surrender was never really on the table in the first place when you carry around a primordial apocalyptic deity bend on destroying the world to free itself.
I mean, they’ve already resolved to kill him without trial, if Tam is any indication
Oh good, he’s actually aware of it and Dainix isn’t going to pummel him about it. Pop culture has conditioned me to expect a conga line of friends being angry at Erin and verbally beating him up over it while he beats himself up over it every time it gets brought up, with the end result being everyone being angry and miserable with nothing productive actually happening.
Fortunately, Red is a better writer than that and actually has her characters grow over time.
Yeah, you can really tell that wherever Red grew up, it certainly wasn’t middle-class southern California!
The tone of the whole comic is becoming…A LOT more dire as the Paladins and their Dragon Storm/Thunder/Wing/Whateveryouwanttocallit approaches…
Is it too early to tell Erin it’s too late to plan and that Kendal and Alinua are going to have to pull out miracles out of their nonexistent sleeves to save them? Or is another shoe gonna drop first?
Let’s hope it’s not too late.
Let’s not count volcano guy out just yet, either. He might enjoy a good brawl with the Paladins (sure they wouldn’t), and helping out his new bud just adds to the fun times.
It’s about time these three compaired notes about the palidin fight. Erin missed a lot of important stuff while he was out of commission:
Falst managed to break the diadem (2.3.13), and Dianix’s demon learned some super important stuff about void, light and their connection (“essence of hunger”, and all that).
It’s a shame Dainix can’t easily remember what the demon gets up to.
Realized his mistake and apologized? Tess must’ve grabbed a shapeshifter of some kind because this ain’t Erin. Either that or that loss was far worse than I remember.
Oh wow, that was… quick and painless. I was almost hoping for more than that.
But Erin is actually right, and in a new and interesting way. He’s apologising, he’s taking responsibility, but he’s also not letting Dainix take his anger out on him. “I am neither useless nor helpless, Dainix” is actually the most powerful line I’ve heard from him in a while.
That said, the question of “Does Erin only THINK he’s in charge?” still hasn’t really been directly answered. I hope it will be down the line; it’s all well and good Kendal saying “Nobody’s in charge.” but problems like this will continue to reoccur until it’s been addressed.
I think in the long run we are going to have our paragon Kendal become the acknowledged leader (he doesn’t think of himself as a leader because he doesn’t see how others react to his determination and paragon/heroic nature). I think he’s also physically the strongest, making him the Strong Man.
Erin will blend the “smart guy” (which he clearly is) and “lancer”, which means he can offer up clever plans and continue to bicker with Kendal.
Alinua is clearly the Heart, but she is also a contender for most powerful. She just finds using that power to its full extent distasteful, or perhaps a little traumatizing.
Our boys here don’t fit tightly to the five-man-band archetypes. Skilled warriors with special power sets. Though I guess one leans toward the swordsman (spearman) archetype, and the other is closer to a rogue.
I mean, I’m happy to take Kendal’s answer at face value and say, no, no one person is the designated leader of this party, even if Erin thinks otherwise. And no one has to be, as long as they become more open with each other and work together better. I’m reading this as a step toward Erin perhaps starting to realize he’s not the only one calling the shots, and shouldn’t be.
Well, if we use Red’s own analysis of “The Leader”, then Kendal is the Leader because he’s the connecting point between pretty much the entire group. Tess is a lot more connected to Erin, and Falst/Dainix is a growing bond, but other then that it’s all about Kendal.
I think k the team can and SHOULD make ‘nobody’s in charge’ work, they’re all intelligent adults, but they’re going to have to stop doing things like [I let Erin think he’s in charge] and [it’s hard to explain things to him so I just do them and let him figure it out after]. Our Floof Squad can be a great team, but they’ve got to put some more work into it. (But they’ve all known each other for what, a week or two?)
Mhm. Hence the “as long as they become more open with each other and work together better.”
Kendal is not an adult he is like 2 weeks old. Lol
well, there goes tess, leaving erin, falst, & dainix alone- just as the chapter cover foretold.
what could go wrong
Of course Erin is happy to be talking. He does like to talk, and enjoys the company of his own voice.
Thankfully, that’s not the limit of the company he likes, but he does get carried away at times.
I have a character of my own like that, but he at least has the experience to know when to cut it short. Erin occasionally tries to explain things during a time of doing things, which happens because he wanted to be cool and not explain everything beforehand because he thought he could handle it.
Explain things during down time, and if new things come up mid crisis, you will hopefully be trusted enough that people will just do things if you say “New plan! A go here, B go there, and C go to this thing.” Erin makes it hard for others to feel that confident in his judgement.
oh my gosh it’s dainix
oh my gosh its Erin
oh my gosh it’s Tess (Tess is leaving 😭)
oh golly bye tess
cor blimey it’s the back of falst’s head
Yay no double angst spiral(red mustve made a mistake, they shouldnt be conscious of the angst rollong off half of the charas)
I wouldn’t be so sure Tess as there’s some daylight and emotionally compromised party members left; still time for more self-pity angst spirals to defuse.
Love the expressions on Dainix as he silently listens to Erin; he’s disappointed in him for his past actions, but recognises his genuine guilt. Once the apology is over, he moves from standing over Erin to sitting down with him, now an understanding has been reached. It’s the little details that make quiet scenes like this.
… Well that went a lot better than I was expecting/dreading; looks like Erin made good on his word to think after he woke up, and at least a chunk of that was on self-reflection.
This is good, with Erin both humbled and determined to change, Dainix has a good opportunity to try and work the gang into a more effective team. If anything Kendal may be the problem now if he keeps up his habit of acting solo during godly matters.
“If my theory is even half right” and the other chunk of Erin’s thinking has been about their enemies. I’m not sure how much Tess has told him about the boat, but if she mentioned Kendal’s immunity to Tam’s diadem and the unexplained presence of Void in Dainix, he may already be joining the Light-Void dots together.
This would be a great time for Falst to explain his version of events, but given his attitude and health that’s not guaranteed. Which may be very bad indeed from Erin’s “need to stay as far from them as possible” remark. Falst has light powers, but so far he’s gone unnoticed by L.D. and her forces; if he’s discovered by her, then he could be a beacon for the Paladins to follow, maybe even an unwitting spy.
Prediction for next week: This looks like a good ending for a scene change. Could they cut to:
a) The Paladins as they discuss their plans for finding the gang, maybe have an injured Tam try and direct them despite the protest from Priora and other healers. (since he’s an Erin parallel it would be fitting)
b) Kendal moving on after his convo with Rakhn and meeting Tess after she leaves the cave. Or vice-versa.
or c) Alinua in the ocean, maybe the Northern Wyrm is explaining her rivalry with Rakhn, the Paladin forces, or both as why she cannot help Kendal right now. She may also recommend Alinua waits until the Paladins have passed before surfacing.
I think the coming week will stay at the cave, maybe with a quick Paladin POV on Friday once they reach the shore.
To point c) specifically, I actually believe the end of chapter 5 takes place after this. Like, the chronology of the last few chapters looks like this:
End of Ch. 4: “what happened to the boat?” -> flashback to Alinua’s perspective of what happened, lead into 5.
End of Ch. 5: “[Kendal] is beyond my help.” -> flashback to here to explain why and how Kendal is in trouble now.
Possibly. We don’t know the exact time-frames between what’s happening on land and under the sea.
No idea how long Alinua was out cold or swimming to N.W.’s temple, how long Kendal and Falst were floating in the vine pods, we can’t even use the sun or weather to sync them up.
Oh. Oh, that confrontation defused a lot more smoothly and maturely than I was expecting. I really thought Dainix was going to just lose it, based on the previous page, and Erin’s sincere, self-aware apology was a pleasant surprise. Looking forward to seeing how they work together and pull through.
The boys look so damn tired in those first two panels. Unsurprisingly so, given… *once again gestures in the general direction of this arc*
Why commit the same mistake twice when there is a vast world of hitherto-uncommitted mistakes just waiting to be explored?
Lol!
I just love this world so much. *smooshes them*
“I AM capable of diffusing my own emotional issues on occasion”, I could wear that on a t-shirt XP
I see Erin has been spending a chunk of his Thinking Time on where HE went wrong, not just WHAT went wrong. But he looks so surprised to see Dainix meet him where he is, instead of further blame. I have to wonder if Dainix wanted to see if Erin would double down again…or if he was ready to see things as they actually were. The first would make Erin a further liability…the second makes him a teammate. And Dainix is no stranger to being overwhelmed by situations you try to handle on your own, either.
…And yes, Erin, staying away from the folks who want to murderize you is generally a good plan. Unfortunately, you seem to keep forgetting that the universe hates you in particular.
This is what I love about Erin. Even from the beginning, he’s at least had the emotional intelligence to be aware of and, on rare occasions, compensate for his massive character flaws. It’s charming, in a frustrating way.
Just for awareness, reading on phone, the “tails” on the speech bubbles are extremely thin and hard to see, making it hard to see who is saying what. Zooming in solves the problem, so no big deal; just thought you might want to know (my apologies if not).
Found the comic, read the archive, bought the book, and shared it with my 11yo. He’s halfway through it already.
Just wanted to say thanks!
Well would you look at that! Morale improved!
Dainix and Erin reached Support Rank B!
(Support Rank C was back after they escaped Zuurith)
The way Dainix immediately calms down the second Erin takes very real accountability is amazing. I expected him to stay angry and even thought it’d be rather justified, but I underestimated what exactly Dainix was looking for in that confrontation. He didn’t want a fight, of course he didn’t want a fight, he just wanted to make sure Erin understood the situation. Dainix was also just having a bad time in general and I love the fact hat seeing Erin be accountable seems to have made him feel better. And, AND, ERIN BEING ACCOUNTABLE YAAAYYYYY!!!! I love character development!!!!
Very proud of Erin for this!!! That was very well done!! It is so hard it is to pull yourself out of— and stay out of— that kind of self-destructive angst spiral while still taking responsibility and learning from your mistakes. This was overall a very satisfying page to read <3
Impressively cool head on Dainix, really. I think most people would have found it hard to not yell at least a bit at Erin.
Like I had no doubt that Erin was about to apologize, for all his hubris he has not been unwilling to acknowledge when he’s fucked up, but I also kind of 100% expected some raised voices here, and Dainix would have been well within his rights to tear into Erin for a bit for not realizing all this soon enough to not land them in a horrible mess. But no, absolute levelheadedness here. He sees Erin realizes he fucked up, figures there’s no point to fighting after the realization has already been had, and sits down so they can start planning.
I know we make jokes about Dainix and Falst’s “tactical” excuses, but that is definitely some impressively tactical mindset!
I also can’t help but notice the “I know it’s tempting but I’m glad you’re not giving up” line. Because I once said in a previous Erin strip that honestly in his place if I’d had the streak of constant failures and punches to his self-concept Erin has been having for most of the comic (seriously, when was the last time anything Erin did actually made things better?) I’d probably have been like “okay, you know what, Kendal, it’s clear nothing about this is going to work, just stab me quickly and let’s be done with this” several chapters ago. Dainix seems to have worried about Erin being in about that mindset, sounds like? But thankfully it seems sisterly throttling into sense is a buff with decent duration.
i know this is a low bar, but i love characters being allowed to be upset with each other without it blowing up into a whole thing! erin admits wrongdoing and dainix doesn’t have to blow up to make his point known! healthy communication!
I got the sense in the last two pages that that’s not erin. A little too easy to get along with. The void dragon is cuning. And they’re in a cave. Voidy can’t leave, but he doesn’t have to give erin his body back
Counterpoint, in Erin’s words: “you’re as subtle as a rock to the face.”
This isn’t the void dragon, everyone would know. (Also Red is really good about not using the character-specific speech bubbles deceptively. If this was the dragon, he would have his own speech effect visible.)
I was very worried on Wednesday that Dainix would blow up on Erin, but I really should have had more faith in Red blowing bad stereotypes out of the water.
My entire for you page has been only of two things— Jjk Maki being an absolute beast of a fighter, and the human spirit penguin. Now the question of the bag is would tess ever can just 1v100 the enemies?
Ooh, do we have some Erin Exposition Hour?
“And nobody is happier about it than Erin.”
And Erin does not look happy about it. For once.
This feels more like ‘relief happy’ than Erin’s usual ‘smug/pride happy’
The dramatic lighting!
“I’ll go get our golden boy,” says the woman with skin made of literal gold.