So I was expecting Jagganoth to be lying here, but I timed one minute from the moment he said it, delivering the dialogue at what I felt was a normal pace with pauses where appropriate, and what do you know?
Exactly one minute is up!
“Only then will I be able to finally burn away this midden heap permanently.”
Note, *permanently*. This implies that he’s already able to burn creation to the ground, but it won’t *stick* for as long as 1 METATRON still lives.
The jailor is the key. Kill him, and you’ll be free.
The Red God claims to see further than anyone else in the room, yet the laws of narrative symbolism demand that, being physically blind of one eye, his grasp of the wider picture be similarly limited.
Also Jagganoth, who wants to break free of Time, is named after Jagganath, an avatar of Vishnu, who embodies Time itself. The irony is duly noted.
Aside from our good friend Odin who Episilon pointed out, there is the archetype of the blind oracle who loses the ability to see things normally for the ability to see things that are usually impossible to see.
That said, Odin was as much a god of war as a god of poetry so I think the Jagganoth’s eye is more Odin-y. It’s Jadis who’s the oracle.
11th hour exposition is better than no exposition at all, so I’m happy we have this moment. Jagganoth is by far the weakest antagonist in this story. It’s a pity we didn’t get more insight into him prior to conflict.
Jagganoth has built himself on so many philosophic presumptions of what suffering is and what needs to be done about it, a pitiable creature truly. Also the fact he wants to erase himself as the final act of fixing the universe is a convenient way of not having to live with the consequences of rewriting reality.
Erasing himself as the final act to escape all consequences is the modus operandi of every suicide bomber ever. Jagger is loathsome and pitiable, and his concern for anyone else’s pain is baloney.
Your midday is someone else’s midnight, someone else’s sundown and even someone else’s sunup. Do you know that time is a simultaneous 4 corner square that rotates to a 4 day time cube within 1 – 24 hour rotation of Earth? You are educated stupid and unable to know Nature’s 4-Day Time Cube Creation.
Alright I gotta say it: This is… kinda lame. Like, on the one hand Jagganoth shrugging it off instantly because invincible means invincible would’ve at least been true to form even if it meant that last forty-odd pages were basically meaningless. Having Jagganoth actually be defeated would have forced the rest of the book to dig into the dysfunctionalities and sins of the Demiurges as a whole, which would’ve been tricky but potentially interesting, even if it completely trashed all the buildup for Jagganoth.
This? This is just a worst-of-both-worlds middle ground in service of characterising a Jagganoth as like, Thanos 2: Thanos Harder. The dude was honestly more interesting when he seemed to want to burn down the world just because he was incandescantly angry. Big Smart Man Who Wants To Kill The Universe To Save It should be a writing crime at this point. Yes, tell me how existence is misery and you will save us all by hurting us, oh thoughtful angry man. It was garbage when the MCU did a big dumb crossover for it, it’s garbage now.
Hmm. True. Maybe we will explore why he thinks the universe is suffering and he will realise his own suffering is not the fault of God. Bad tropes exist, but they can be subverted.
What gets me is that all the Demiurges working together (excepting Gog-Agog who’s been curiously passive this whole time) with the help of Aspected Chaos, and the best they can achieve is to bind him for ONE F*CKING MINUTE!?! Sorry, I’m not buying it. Maybe Jaggy should change his name to Mary Suegganoth?
GA isn’t really a fighter like Jaggy is. Physically, he could blow her body apart in a moment.
It’s just the fact that she’s almost impossible to get rid of that nobody bothers. Kill one body, she gets another from a servant. You’d have to kill just about everyone in any world she’s been to to ensure she’s permanently gone.
If she actually wasn’t verifiably insane and actually worked on her martial and magical skills, she’d be killer in a fight and even give Jaggy a run for his money.
Well we kinda were told it wouldn’t work. We were told why it wouldn’t work. There’s nothing convoluted or contrived about Jagganoth simply being the strongest Demiurge when it’s been established for several chapters.
Being a Mary Sue is about the rest of the story jumping around itself to remain centered on a single boringly unflawed character.
Or alternatively, being a Mary Sue is about the rest of the story insisting that a character is flawless, despite their flaws. It’s when the narrative bends towards the character in spite of their actions, rather than as a result.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with a villain having a philosophical reason why they think omnicide is good. Thanos’s problem was sort of that his philosophy made no sense.
Isn’t the point that he honestly believes he can rewrite the universe at a fundamental level in order to remove suffering? And that he believes that’s worth the bloodshed it would take.
42 Fragments the Universe Beyond All Reintegration
Yes, and in a place where “reality” is just the most compelling lie, he might be capable of the rewrite … unless a stronger will oppose his. But if the other will be exactly as strong as his, the result might be true weirdness: a universe that is both rewritten and not rewritten at the same time*; or one that flip-flops between the states; or one that is tangibly different according to who’s viewing it.
* Yes, I know about quantum superposition of states and the Copenhagen interpretation. This is not that: KSBD doesn’t need QF to include weird shit.
Imagine being Smart Angery Titan, so hell bent on annihilation that you make a deal with God’s Scribe to become invulnerable. So you can burn it all.
You succeed. It’s finally over.
You awaken, trapped somewhere deep in the mind of your child-self, doomed to relive a truly miserable existence. Eventually, finally, this version becomes self-aware enough to tap into the accumulated experience of their past iterations – preserved through the cycles by Metatron’s feathers. So you can be the “Dust man of his failures” when the myth doesn’t go how he likes.
Over and over, you burn the universe and think you’ve won, only for near-omnipotent beings to spin the wheel of time again, forcing you to relive the worst the universe has to offer.
Finally, after who knows how many loops, you see it – the very source of your invulnerability is the power that keeps the universe trapped in this cycle of suffering.
What do?
Kill the scribe, destroy the very paper it writes upon, and erase yourself – because you have become an invulnerable anchor around which time may try to manifest again.
I think this is why Jag is so far beyond the others… he may not remember them, exactly, but he’s benefitting from the experience of ??? cycles. It’s unique to him, due to Metatron’s feathers.
Oh, also, I’m fairly certain that it will be Allison who ends up fulfilling Jagganoth’s plan, with some slight modifications. Allison will meet/become YISUN, possibly after acquiring the keys of the other demiurges. She will unmake the world and rebuild it largely as it was before but with some improvements.
Poor, silly old thing. He’s something of a broken wheel himself. He has my sympathy though not my empathy, for I don’t think omnicide’s the noblest route to take in correcting divine mistakes.
Someone turned him into a killing machine long ago, set him running and forgot to turn him off, and now it’s all too late.
If only he read the last message left by god to his creations he might have had a bit more good humor. In giant flaming letters: “SORRY FOR THE INCONVENIENCE”
Never had I been so perplexed by my fear of a child thinking the worlds could be fixed by emptiness as when the warring titan spoke. Such a terrifying fool
SHOW HOG
Thus the hog-worshippers, who pray to the divine meat-and-two-veg, descend upon the new page like vultures preying upon a fresh cadaver.
Calm down, Thanos!
STRATEGIC COCK CLOUDS!
The fog of war hides the Frog of War.
So I was expecting Jagganoth to be lying here, but I timed one minute from the moment he said it, delivering the dialogue at what I felt was a normal pace with pauses where appropriate, and what do you know?
Exactly one minute is up!
Unless they’re speaking far faster than the human-standard 3 words per second.
Not only does Jagger speak very quickly, his voice sounds like Sponge Bob.
Jaggbob Nopants is the only fusion which can truly compete with Aspected Chaos.
Damn, you’re right actually. Wonder if he’s done or not?
“only then then I will I be able to”
dude had a stroke lmao
So is this a DBZ minute or…
my favorite trope is the trope where the guy with the biggest muscles has the biggest brain
Yeah, literally
I am afraid that, as ancient and secret “just talk” may be, it will not work in this case. The big guy seems pretty hell bend on ending time itself.
“Only then will I be able to finally burn away this midden heap permanently.”
Note, *permanently*. This implies that he’s already able to burn creation to the ground, but it won’t *stick* for as long as 1 METATRON still lives.
The jailor is the key. Kill him, and you’ll be free.
I hear thunder, pitter patter…
Time to go.
Jaggy is a small child who thinks he’s “a big boy”. He will be broken, again.
God I just want to fucking peel her.
She’s full of stars.
Searle will not admit he’s done.
The room speaks chinese; not the one
within. The substrate is Token.
Rhyming Wax Head is the Song of his People.
The Red God claims to see further than anyone else in the room, yet the laws of narrative symbolism demand that, being physically blind of one eye, his grasp of the wider picture be similarly limited.
Also Jagganoth, who wants to break free of Time, is named after Jagganath, an avatar of Vishnu, who embodies Time itself. The irony is duly noted.
Odin would like a word with you on the symbolism of missing an eye.
Fair point. Notice, however, that Jag’s eye is not “missing”. It’s just blinded.
Aside from our good friend Odin who Episilon pointed out, there is the archetype of the blind oracle who loses the ability to see things normally for the ability to see things that are usually impossible to see.
That said, Odin was as much a god of war as a god of poetry so I think the Jagganoth’s eye is more Odin-y. It’s Jadis who’s the oracle.
Re-reading my own comments, I can’t believe I got Vishnu and Shiva mixed up. I shall do penance.
It is still ironic that Jagganoth, named after an avatar of Vishnu, is the one who wants to destroy everything.
Talk No Jutsu!
11th hour exposition is better than no exposition at all, so I’m happy we have this moment. Jagganoth is by far the weakest antagonist in this story. It’s a pity we didn’t get more insight into him prior to conflict.
You wrote “Only then then I will be able”. Typo?
Jagganoth has built himself on so many philosophic presumptions of what suffering is and what needs to be done about it, a pitiable creature truly. Also the fact he wants to erase himself as the final act of fixing the universe is a convenient way of not having to live with the consequences of rewriting reality.
In a timeless reality even erasing himself is meaningless. He always and never existed the whole time.
Which has always been true, because Reality is a Lie.
Such a beautiful Lie. I will miss it when it is gone.
Erasing himself as the final act to escape all consequences is the modus operandi of every suicide bomber ever. Jagger is loathsome and pitiable, and his concern for anyone else’s pain is baloney.
That title page with the Demiurges in their prime is slowly starting to make sense.
Your midday is someone else’s midnight, someone else’s sundown and even someone else’s sunup. Do you know that time is a simultaneous 4 corner square that rotates to a 4 day time cube within 1 – 24 hour rotation of Earth? You are educated stupid and unable to know Nature’s 4-Day Time Cube Creation.
Thus spoke Gene Ray!
Alright I gotta say it: This is… kinda lame. Like, on the one hand Jagganoth shrugging it off instantly because invincible means invincible would’ve at least been true to form even if it meant that last forty-odd pages were basically meaningless. Having Jagganoth actually be defeated would have forced the rest of the book to dig into the dysfunctionalities and sins of the Demiurges as a whole, which would’ve been tricky but potentially interesting, even if it completely trashed all the buildup for Jagganoth.
This? This is just a worst-of-both-worlds middle ground in service of characterising a Jagganoth as like, Thanos 2: Thanos Harder. The dude was honestly more interesting when he seemed to want to burn down the world just because he was incandescantly angry. Big Smart Man Who Wants To Kill The Universe To Save It should be a writing crime at this point. Yes, tell me how existence is misery and you will save us all by hurting us, oh thoughtful angry man. It was garbage when the MCU did a big dumb crossover for it, it’s garbage now.
Hmm. True. Maybe we will explore why he thinks the universe is suffering and he will realise his own suffering is not the fault of God. Bad tropes exist, but they can be subverted.
What gets me is that all the Demiurges working together (excepting Gog-Agog who’s been curiously passive this whole time) with the help of Aspected Chaos, and the best they can achieve is to bind him for ONE F*CKING MINUTE!?! Sorry, I’m not buying it. Maybe Jaggy should change his name to Mary Suegganoth?
Gog-Agog has no choice but to be passive.
GA isn’t really a fighter like Jaggy is. Physically, he could blow her body apart in a moment.
It’s just the fact that she’s almost impossible to get rid of that nobody bothers. Kill one body, she gets another from a servant. You’d have to kill just about everyone in any world she’s been to to ensure she’s permanently gone.
If she actually wasn’t verifiably insane and actually worked on her martial and magical skills, she’d be killer in a fight and even give Jaggy a run for his money.
Well we kinda were told it wouldn’t work. We were told why it wouldn’t work. There’s nothing convoluted or contrived about Jagganoth simply being the strongest Demiurge when it’s been established for several chapters.
Being a Mary Sue is about the rest of the story jumping around itself to remain centered on a single boringly unflawed character.
Or alternatively, being a Mary Sue is about the rest of the story insisting that a character is flawless, despite their flaws. It’s when the narrative bends towards the character in spite of their actions, rather than as a result.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with a villain having a philosophical reason why they think omnicide is good. Thanos’s problem was sort of that his philosophy made no sense.
“Smart, strong villain with a credible motive” isn’t a writing crime; it’s writing 101.
Isn’t the point that he honestly believes he can rewrite the universe at a fundamental level in order to remove suffering? And that he believes that’s worth the bloodshed it would take.
Yes, and in a place where “reality” is just the most compelling lie, he might be capable of the rewrite … unless a stronger will oppose his. But if the other will be exactly as strong as his, the result might be true weirdness: a universe that is both rewritten and not rewritten at the same time*; or one that flip-flops between the states; or one that is tangibly different according to who’s viewing it.
* Yes, I know about quantum superposition of states and the Copenhagen interpretation. This is not that: KSBD doesn’t need QF to include weird shit.
Jagganoth wants to return to the comforting madness of timeless space o_o
Imagine being Smart Angery Titan, so hell bent on annihilation that you make a deal with God’s Scribe to become invulnerable. So you can burn it all.
You succeed. It’s finally over.
You awaken, trapped somewhere deep in the mind of your child-self, doomed to relive a truly miserable existence. Eventually, finally, this version becomes self-aware enough to tap into the accumulated experience of their past iterations – preserved through the cycles by Metatron’s feathers. So you can be the “Dust man of his failures” when the myth doesn’t go how he likes.
Over and over, you burn the universe and think you’ve won, only for near-omnipotent beings to spin the wheel of time again, forcing you to relive the worst the universe has to offer.
Finally, after who knows how many loops, you see it – the very source of your invulnerability is the power that keeps the universe trapped in this cycle of suffering.
What do?
Kill the scribe, destroy the very paper it writes upon, and erase yourself – because you have become an invulnerable anchor around which time may try to manifest again.
I think this is why Jag is so far beyond the others… he may not remember them, exactly, but he’s benefitting from the experience of ??? cycles. It’s unique to him, due to Metatron’s feathers.
This is a really cool idea, regardless of if its right or not.
This is good. I hope you’re not wrong.
Oh, also, I’m fairly certain that it will be Allison who ends up fulfilling Jagganoth’s plan, with some slight modifications. Allison will meet/become YISUN, possibly after acquiring the keys of the other demiurges. She will unmake the world and rebuild it largely as it was before but with some improvements.
She’s already got all the keys, I believe. Every other demiurge has a copy of some subset of her keys.
aspected chaos is so beautiful, i love her design!!
Poor, silly old thing. He’s something of a broken wheel himself. He has my sympathy though not my empathy, for I don’t think omnicide’s the noblest route to take in correcting divine mistakes.
Someone turned him into a killing machine long ago, set him running and forgot to turn him off, and now it’s all too late.
If only he read the last message left by god to his creations he might have had a bit more good humor. In giant flaming letters: “SORRY FOR THE INCONVENIENCE”
Paraphrased from Douglas Adams great work.
Hitchhiker’s Guide is so wonderful and full of genuine wisdom like so many other great works of comedy.
Jagganoth is a Berserker? Interesting idea. But isn’t this whole instance of reality just a simulation that Zoss has run Time and Time again?
Jagger, you are no Zoss!
I wouldn’t say that its a simulation, well, no more a lie than intended anyways.
Let it go Yuan. You can’t control the wheel. You cannot break it. The only thing you can do is pass the future onto others.
The whole goal *is* to break the wheel, it’s just that one who masters it cannot break it. Jagganoth is on his way to mastery.
Never had I been so perplexed by my fear of a child thinking the worlds could be fixed by emptiness as when the warring titan spoke. Such a terrifying fool