abbadon, thank you for the violence you are about to inflict. we exult in and are exalted by your scenes of holy havoc.
fuck the old gods, who deserved their deaths. fuck the new gods, who rule nothing. fuck yisun, whose smoldering flames barely sustain reality. GLORY TO THE GOBLIN, THE PROGENITOR AND LORD OF ALL CREATION!
the ending of the words is ABBADON. look upon his works, ye fortunate few, and be maimed by his glory.
A saw pulverizes through a thousand tiny cutting teeth.
Royalty is a single blade, and obliterates oneness. It is the atom beneath the atom, the edge of no dimension, the song of a wind being mutilated against it.
Royalty requires one stroke. Only one. It never ends.
Despair, o trees of all the Universes. Cry, o heads of all mortals. All life ends to this single cutting motion.
A saw with a thousand tiny teeth is actually a file, though they can still cut cleanly and smoothly.
A saw with two hundred little teeth cuts cleanly enough to produce dovetailed joints precise enough that no glue is necessary.
A saw with one hundred teeth can produce two boards and copious amounts of dust where one board once sat with remarkable speed.
As for the direction they cut in, rip teeth will only do this on the push or pull normally unless filed with significant slope.
On the other hand, a crosscut tooth can actually work in both directions but are usually raked to present a more aggressive profile in the pushing or pulling direction respectively, to improve the effectiveness with which they slice fibers than they do on the return stroke which is when the dust is usually cleared from the kerf.
Joinery is a continuous sawing motion.
Ultimately, this is a gamble. And the thing about gambling is, there are a few rules. You never gamble in a game in which you don’t know all the snags to the rules; and Ki Rata, aside from being a terrible, incredible combat style, is grossly unstudied, I guarantee you not three people in that ring know the full extent of Ki Rata. You never, never put up to wager, anything you cannot afford to lose. And to us pithy mortals, our lives are something we cannot afford to wager. Finally, be willing to quit when you are ahead. Remaining motionless guarantees victory. All you lose is the opportunity for greed. And as at least one philosopher of my home world once said, “you can’t take it with you.”
Wisdom is for the wise. If you see this ring of blood and rubble in Solomon’s shining realm and believe that all standing therein are wise enough to play the odds, you might just be more foolish than the lot of them.
Intents are easily enough misunderstood, I suppose. No, I meant to truncate the lesson learned by witnessing these imminent corpses charge blindly to their deaths. A lesson for those outside of this ring, a lesson that others might grow wiser by hearing me.
Actually, hang on, will they even leave bodies? What sort of mood is Solomon in? Even enough odds they leave bodies, leave incomprehensible viscera, or are simply reduced to a fine mist by Ki Rata? I haven’t seen Ki Rata in action myself, so I am vastly uncertain, although I would almost be willing to bet a mercenary favor on viscera.
Almost, mind. I’ve doled out too many favors as of late and am faintly overdrawn. Apologies to anyone who would be willing to take me up on that bet, I’ll ask that you wait until a few of my outstanding favors are called upon.
You forgot a key thing about a gamble, royalty play with loaded dice.*
*Note: The dice they use will not appear any different from a normal set, however their will to power is so great that only another seeker can hope to best them in a game of chance. The influence of royalty upon matters of probability is difficult to study, except at a distance.They tend to take losses rather hard, as my investigations suggest that reincarnations 5, 7, 9, 11, and 13 discovered.
Some count being remembered as the one who tried to punch Solomon as an honor great enough to make it a win-win instead of a gamble. They’re fools but wise men rarely join such dangerous tournaments.
It is said, in Solomon David’s celestial empire, entire family lines are kept in a comfortable standard of living exclusively from the bodies they dispose of resulting from tournaments.
I bet their will be alot of fools who will want to strike at the emperor even though they can still achieve a grand prize by doing nothing. I cannot wait for this massacre of fools, if only I still had refreshments but alas I already have partaken in all of them before hand.
There were many contestants who would have happily passed up that bait and claimed the promised prize. Was. Those who entered the tournament with such weak determination and such base goals did not last long.
Shouldn’t Vigilant Gaze be included in this fine offer? I’d love to see what effect that thermonuclear punch of his would have on Solomon. Ki Rata may not be as good on defense as it is on offense.
All of them on the ground have touched out of the ring. I think Vigilent Gaze probably won’t throw another hadoken as it took a long time charging the last one. I doubt he has another to throw for quite a while.
But wouldn’t the new rules benefit him in that way then? He just has to not move while he’s charging up for his final strike. Maybe, but I still think ANY angel doesn’t have a chance against Solomon. Isn’t that why he has his chair and they are at his beck-and-call?
The text below the page in which Vigilant Gaze unleashed that cannon calls it “ten thousand year evil-quelling fist” and says that it is based on at least an age’s worth of internal energy conservation. I would be surprised if Vigilant Gaze could repeat that performance any time in the next millennium.
I thought it merely said that it takes an age to learn, and one should be wary of old warriors because of this. Not sure if that’s what you meant or if I AM missing something, but that’s what I read from the text.
It is a bit vague but implied that one cannot fire them back-to-back. “Such an technique must be delivered at extremely close range and can take a phenomenal amount of concentration and **cultivation** of internal force.” The use of cultivation – a concept that figures into qi and takes time – makes it seem like it takes a while to build up enough force. Whether this is similar to Piccolo’s Makankosappo which takes 5 minutes to charge or Tsunade’s Hyakugou Seal where years of chakra were stored in a single point is indeterminable.
I believe the offer went out to anyone who was in the ring now, not just those who were left standing/didn’t disqualify themselves (as he said only 1 qualifies) with a ring-out or tap-out as Vigilant Gaze and Allison were remarked as being disqualified. As I have said below, Vigilant Gaze needs only remain still while he gathers his strength, although, I don’t see him as being reckless/stupid enough to attack Solomon.
42 Fragments the Universe Beyond All Reintegration
Though the empire isn’t specifically at stake in the minds of the contestants, one does suppose their ‘heart’s desire granted’ could indeed still include it, if the drop of imperial blood is shed that is. Only the emperor and his council of sons are privy to the true purpose of the tournament.
True dat, Vigilant Gaze does not want the empire nor probably anything Solomon could give him. But might VG take a poke at Solly to defend White Chain?
I don’t think Vigilant Gaze will attack. He’s accomplished his goal in this tournament already. He’s freed WC’s mind from itself, and body from Juggernaut. If WC wants to attack Solomon, that’s her decision, and it’s not Vigilant Gaze’s duty to assist.
Je suis le Nuke. Je suis le papa Mac. Tenez-vous en admiration.
Vos attaques ne seront pas vexantes. Ici je fléchis – pour divertir.
Soyez témoin de ma splendeur – sous la pluie violette!
I am the Nuke. I’m the Mac Daddy. Stand Ye in Awe.
Your attacks shall not vex. Here I flex to entertain.
Witness my Splendor – Awash in Purple Rain !
But wouldn’t the new rules benefit him in that way then? He just has to not move while he’s charging up for his final strike. Maybe, but I still think ANY angel doesn’t have a chance against Solomon. Isn’t that why he has his chair and they are at his beck-and-call?
42 Fragments the Universe Beyond All Reintegration
Well, she was present when the news of the contest were announced to the parade of fools, and so far she followed the parade everywhere, so I suspect she is somewhere near, if we have seen Eris and Giant Baby. And she was displayed on Jadis’ coffin in the Rising King profecy scene. Personally, I’m waiting for her.
We also saw Leya Brimstone, Kappa guy, Monkey (armor clad samurai who is actually human), and a few others earlier, I would be surprised if she wasn’t there somewhere.
Still, isn’t the target of her ire Incubus, not Solomon?
That un Maya ne’er has joined in wi th’mob, save occasionsome defensin hersel, an mebbe Alice likenwise.
Us expectin she not in the tourney, altho closelike an watchin.
…I’d state my true opinions of Solomon David’s actions here, but I’d strongly prefer to get back to Throne and well out of the Celestial Empire before doing so.
Instead, I will say this: I have no desire to see the emperor fall here. A small fiefdom within the art of keeping things cold is enough for me, so long as I’m paid well for it, and I will not want to witness the aftermath should someone *actually* manage to make him bleed.
Is that Disk Head in panel 4 lower left? So glad to see him still standing, he’s a personal favorite. Squid Lady and Beetle Man in panel 2 are also mighty appealing.
Now everyone sing: Ki Rata is breaking up that old gang of mine!
The Imperial mortuary and resurrectionist guilds may yet have need of your services, Icemonger. I predict many more bodies shall surface, and all must be chilled for collection and transport.
I’m pretty sure “He” is saying [audacity] will win you much less, however much more than you bargained for it is. It seems to me ‘winning’ in this case is merely remaining in the ring where you will not be struck unless you dare to attack and reach for the impetus of this battle: the succession of Solomon’s throne. I believe the “coin, prestige and titles” to be consolation prizes and therefore, are not awarded to those who can draw Solomon’s blood. What to do, what to do… I say let them eat cake, I’ll take the prizes no matter who the successor is, and live out the rest of my incarnation in relative comfort. BTW, I stopped including my Number when I reached a nayuta of digits (even though 40 digits off a googol, I still found it to be quite cumbersome) and thus have an aweful lot of experience ‘starting over’. I would stand still and collect my prizes, not just because I have no chance in drawing blood (the true victory being over one’s fear), but also because I have never felt the relative comfort that comes from a life long-lived. Curiosity may have killed the cat, but it only had 9 to discover this fact 10^60 is all the lives it took for me to finally be curious enough to live. Anyone else feel this way?
Only a total nutter would do that. You know, the kind of psycho who would sign up for a tournament with near-zero chance of survival.
It amazes me that Solomon thinks he can find a worthy successor from a group of frothy-mouthed butchers. It’s the crack in his facade of reasonableness.
Solomon’s problem is that his own colleagues are ultra powerful frothy-mouthed butchers themselves.
He really can’t put a sage’s commitee in place to rule when Jagganoth or Gog-Agog are around the corner.
It seems some of you fail to realize something. To join this tournament you must be mad or greedy, yes, but also our fighters might be merely desperate. The throne itself is not the prize of victory. The prize is a single request. Not all who fight are foolish enough to desire a deadly throne.
I will speak, if I may, of the Rayuban blood ceremony: that time tested and honoured tradition, universal in its appeal to violence, yet unique in the many realms in its strange opportunity. For it calls upon the darkened and dissatisfied, and makes them to shine in a crucible of glory, with hatred hot and horrible, for it calls them to rise up and strike at God.
Travellers of many realms and many men of arms, of great and small, with tempered weapons and careful mettle, fierce and free and aspect awful, gather in great congregation every three turns for the bloodshed of Rayuba. The event? The Ring of Power. A bloodbath, yes; a contest, yes. But more than that, for at the dim, furthest reaches of that bloodshed, there is a chance, slim though it is, to spit upon God. So they come, as one and as all, from high and low station, from the realms of all the 7, and they weather hardship and bloodlust, struggle and victory, conquest and vengeance; and a burning light of vindication spurs them onward. And how they burn! Whatever your views of the 7, to most in Throne and the many realms, they are Gods. Glorious to some, virtuous and beautiful! Yet monstrous: they are gods of an empty heaven, wherein for a thousand years no prayers are answered, no hope is given, no solace is sent for the weary nor rest for the wicked, as hunger and bloodshed consume the many worlds. Who is it that can stop this? Who is responsible for this violence? And as you look to the heavens, you see that the seven, lordly and lofty and immutable as the wheel, are worshipped by many, and sit the seat of God, and soak his praises, but do not play his part. A vulpine grin and callous hunger and hardship are the only blessings they bestow. They do not rule the realms, but consume them.
And so they come. Some for glory, yes. But for many, a singular hatred with existence has grown, and they would hold the gods responsible. Yet who can reach Incubus in ivory? Mammon in the deep? But the hand of Solomon reaches out to the downtrodden; not in mercy, but in arrogance. He goads them to strike at God, and eagerly they rush to do so. What use is coin, and prestige, and power, in this vacuous hollow of an empty heaven? They come in droves, these women and men of cold violence and hardened hopes, but not for coin, not for conquest, but to spit in the face of God. They come to assert their right as the downtrodden.
Who will listen to their plea? Who can satisfy their hatred? For once blood is struck, red and raging, the flow cannot be quickly stopped. There is nothing these men want, truly, no price they will accept. They are washed out and long expired, and all they have left is their anger. As love scorns a price, haughty and above purchase, so anger, when it has sunk into the recesses of the heart, can know no recourse, and cannot be traded for anything.
And a grim fate they meet. The most accomplished of these warriors, who live and thrive on hatred? They are granted a bitter prize. For their hatred, for their struggle, and for their feats of violence, they are granted station – to rule on behalf of Solomon. To reign under the one they hate, and to be shackled by his cold laws, the weight of many scribes and flowing ink to bind them forever. A ruler, yes. But a slave as much as any. And dim years slowly darken their anger, as they become complicit in the works of god, not permitted to die nor to fight, but only to rule on behalf of him they sought to destroy.
So it is that the bloodshed of Rayuba is central to the very operating of the Celestial Empire. A cold calculus, hungry and horrible, runs all of the many facets of the celestial empire. It is a land of pure law enforced with no love for its outcome, where every action is weighed, and the ruling class itself is made of washed up warlords and vatra of unremitting discontent. Seek no grace in the Celestial Empire, for its rulers are those of violence and of hopeless hatred, of those who sought the chance to kill God, but now, instead, they serve him.
As mortals, their (eventual) death is inevitable. As such, how they live their lives becomes more important than the non-question of whether or not they will die. Given the chance to live better, at the risk of dying just a little sooner, what wouldn’t they do?
O, YISUN, hear my cry, soothe the curious mind of your humble servant: If Solomon David punches himself and it hurts, does that make Solomon David stronger or weaker than Solomon David?
I believe that the power of Solomon David is such that he can act with utmost confidence that not a single attack will ever strike him and cause him harm.
Force will fail against this immovable object, and so those who strike him are doomed to fail by their own action.
I think you are very near the mark, pilgrim. It seems very unlikely that Solomon can be defeated by force, but force is not always the best way – which was White Chain’s message to Allison. If you can convince Solomon that you have learned this lesson, he might just let you scratch him.
It would be hilarious if Allison (who forfeited by submission and thus is reconsidered for the second round) spends the entire time talking to White Chain and, as a result, is given a prominent position inside his Empire (followed very swiftly by White Chain drawing blood)
Royalty is a continuous cutting motion.
well said.
abbadon, thank you for the violence you are about to inflict. we exult in and are exalted by your scenes of holy havoc.
fuck the old gods, who deserved their deaths. fuck the new gods, who rule nothing. fuck yisun, whose smoldering flames barely sustain reality. GLORY TO THE GOBLIN, THE PROGENITOR AND LORD OF ALL CREATION!
the ending of the words is ABBADON. look upon his works, ye fortunate few, and be maimed by his glory.
In America, a saw cuts on the pushing stroke. In Japan, a saw cuts when you pull. Which way do you think it works with Solomon? My money is on both.
A saw pulverizes through a thousand tiny cutting teeth.
Royalty is a single blade, and obliterates oneness. It is the atom beneath the atom, the edge of no dimension, the song of a wind being mutilated against it.
Royalty requires one stroke. Only one. It never ends.
Despair, o trees of all the Universes. Cry, o heads of all mortals. All life ends to this single cutting motion.
A saw with a thousand tiny teeth is actually a file, though they can still cut cleanly and smoothly.
A saw with two hundred little teeth cuts cleanly enough to produce dovetailed joints precise enough that no glue is necessary.
A saw with one hundred teeth can produce two boards and copious amounts of dust where one board once sat with remarkable speed.
As for the direction they cut in, rip teeth will only do this on the push or pull normally unless filed with significant slope.
On the other hand, a crosscut tooth can actually work in both directions but are usually raked to present a more aggressive profile in the pushing or pulling direction respectively, to improve the effectiveness with which they slice fibers than they do on the return stroke which is when the dust is usually cleared from the kerf.
Joinery is a continuous sawing motion.
Self-control will win you fabulous prizes.
But audacity could win you much, much more.
Ultimately, this is a gamble. And the thing about gambling is, there are a few rules. You never gamble in a game in which you don’t know all the snags to the rules; and Ki Rata, aside from being a terrible, incredible combat style, is grossly unstudied, I guarantee you not three people in that ring know the full extent of Ki Rata. You never, never put up to wager, anything you cannot afford to lose. And to us pithy mortals, our lives are something we cannot afford to wager. Finally, be willing to quit when you are ahead. Remaining motionless guarantees victory. All you lose is the opportunity for greed. And as at least one philosopher of my home world once said, “you can’t take it with you.”
Wisdom is for the wise. If you see this ring of blood and rubble in Solomon’s shining realm and believe that all standing therein are wise enough to play the odds, you might just be more foolish than the lot of them.
Intents are easily enough misunderstood, I suppose. No, I meant to truncate the lesson learned by witnessing these imminent corpses charge blindly to their deaths. A lesson for those outside of this ring, a lesson that others might grow wiser by hearing me.
Actually, hang on, will they even leave bodies? What sort of mood is Solomon in? Even enough odds they leave bodies, leave incomprehensible viscera, or are simply reduced to a fine mist by Ki Rata? I haven’t seen Ki Rata in action myself, so I am vastly uncertain, although I would almost be willing to bet a mercenary favor on viscera.
Almost, mind. I’ve doled out too many favors as of late and am faintly overdrawn. Apologies to anyone who would be willing to take me up on that bet, I’ll ask that you wait until a few of my outstanding favors are called upon.
I myself would never even enter such a tournament, after all I survived the Universal War by staying away from it.
You forgot a key thing about a gamble, royalty play with loaded dice.*
*Note: The dice they use will not appear any different from a normal set, however their will to power is so great that only another seeker can hope to best them in a game of chance. The influence of royalty upon matters of probability is difficult to study, except at a distance.They tend to take losses rather hard, as my investigations suggest that reincarnations 5, 7, 9, 11, and 13 discovered.
The house always wins.
How odd.
Some count being remembered as the one who tried to punch Solomon as an honor great enough to make it a win-win instead of a gamble. They’re fools but wise men rarely join such dangerous tournaments.
As a ship’s captain once told me as we set sail on kraken-infested seas:
“You have nothing to lose but your life, and you got that for free!”
Every casino ever.
Sly bastard makes an offer, then cuts it down with irresistible bait. love it
Only those who can resist irresistible bait are worthy of coin, prestige, and titles in the celestial empire.
And so privilege perpetuates, against all reason.
Which is which rather depends on if you were here for wealth and status, or a good fight.
So naturally the empire is going to need some extra volunteers for corpse duty.
It is said, in Solomon David’s celestial empire, entire family lines are kept in a comfortable standard of living exclusively from the bodies they dispose of resulting from tournaments.
I bet their will be alot of fools who will want to strike at the emperor even though they can still achieve a grand prize by doing nothing. I cannot wait for this massacre of fools, if only I still had refreshments but alas I already have partaken in all of them before hand.
I doubt if any contestants will resist striking at the emperor. Say goodbye to them now while you have the chance.
Only un demiurge beats un other demiurge.
Hubris! What was should we expect! He believes in the restraint of none.
As the adage goes: “Surround yourself with people who are smarter than you.”
There were many contestants who would have happily passed up that bait and claimed the promised prize. Was. Those who entered the tournament with such weak determination and such base goals did not last long.
“One sec angel, I gotta flex a bit”
Lol! Indeed.
Come at me, assembled brethren
Worms eye a morsel
More like moths to an open flame.
Shouldn’t Vigilant Gaze be included in this fine offer? I’d love to see what effect that thermonuclear punch of his would have on Solomon. Ki Rata may not be as good on defense as it is on offense.
Who needs defense when your opponent is radioactive ash?
Alas, Vigilant Gaze touched the outside of the ring, according to the emperor. He is no longer a contestant.
All of them on the ground have touched out of the ring. I think Vigilent Gaze probably won’t throw another hadoken as it took a long time charging the last one. I doubt he has another to throw for quite a while.
But wouldn’t the new rules benefit him in that way then? He just has to not move while he’s charging up for his final strike. Maybe, but I still think ANY angel doesn’t have a chance against Solomon. Isn’t that why he has his chair and they are at his beck-and-call?
The text below the page in which Vigilant Gaze unleashed that cannon calls it “ten thousand year evil-quelling fist” and says that it is based on at least an age’s worth of internal energy conservation. I would be surprised if Vigilant Gaze could repeat that performance any time in the next millennium.
I thought it merely said that it takes an age to learn, and one should be wary of old warriors because of this. Not sure if that’s what you meant or if I AM missing something, but that’s what I read from the text.
It is a bit vague but implied that one cannot fire them back-to-back. “Such an technique must be delivered at extremely close range and can take a phenomenal amount of concentration and **cultivation** of internal force.” The use of cultivation – a concept that figures into qi and takes time – makes it seem like it takes a while to build up enough force. Whether this is similar to Piccolo’s Makankosappo which takes 5 minutes to charge or Tsunade’s Hyakugou Seal where years of chakra were stored in a single point is indeterminable.
I believe the offer went out to anyone who was in the ring now, not just those who were left standing/didn’t disqualify themselves (as he said only 1 qualifies) with a ring-out or tap-out as Vigilant Gaze and Allison were remarked as being disqualified. As I have said below, Vigilant Gaze needs only remain still while he gathers his strength, although, I don’t see him as being reckless/stupid enough to attack Solomon.
Why would Vigilant Gaze want to attack Solomon? He doesn’t want the empire.
Though the empire isn’t specifically at stake in the minds of the contestants, one does suppose their ‘heart’s desire granted’ could indeed still include it, if the drop of imperial blood is shed that is. Only the emperor and his council of sons are privy to the true purpose of the tournament.
Yet he’s been doing the tournament every roughly three and a half to three quarters years for the last millennium.
True dat, Vigilant Gaze does not want the empire nor probably anything Solomon could give him. But might VG take a poke at Solly to defend White Chain?
One would very much like to witness the Fist-of-Goo wielding the thermonuclear punch!
I don’t think Vigilant Gaze will attack. He’s accomplished his goal in this tournament already. He’s freed WC’s mind from itself, and body from Juggernaut. If WC wants to attack Solomon, that’s her decision, and it’s not Vigilant Gaze’s duty to assist.
L’etat c’est moi
Je suis le Nuke. Je suis le papa Mac. Tenez-vous en admiration.
Vos attaques ne seront pas vexantes. Ici je fléchis – pour divertir.
Soyez témoin de ma splendeur – sous la pluie violette!
I am the Nuke. I’m the Mac Daddy. Stand Ye in Awe.
Your attacks shall not vex. Here I flex to entertain.
Witness my Splendor – Awash in Purple Rain !
The strongest of weapons deter aggression by mere existence, but only if the aggressors are aware of the danger it presents.
Let them be reminded of the emperor’s strength.
A regular Bernard Brodie over here.
What wolf would sit and wait for a bite of mutton, tail curled beneath it, rather than attempt to rip out the shepherd’s throat?
No, this will yet be a field of corpses.
But wouldn’t the new rules benefit him in that way then? He just has to not move while he’s charging up for his final strike. Maybe, but I still think ANY angel doesn’t have a chance against Solomon. Isn’t that why he has his chair and they are at his beck-and-call?
That would be a dog. It’s worked out rather well, in the long run, for those mini-wolves.
Not all particularly mini, even; the one near me is distinctly larger than most wolves.
Wolves are rather larger than I believe you think. They’re pretty huge.
Weird flex but ok.
Isn’t Maya still in that crowd?
I don’t recall seeing the sword saint’s face–forgive me if my memory does not serve me well…
…But if there’s anyone in all Creation I’d trust to hack apart a Demiurge at a thousand paces, it would be her.
The crowd also includes both Allison and Cio, and it remains unanswered if Solomon can tank a 30 cubit spear.
The slash bisects Juggeranaut’s cooling, ruined shell as it makes for the Emperor.
This is, of course, completely intentional.
Well, she was present when the news of the contest were announced to the parade of fools, and so far she followed the parade everywhere, so I suspect she is somewhere near, if we have seen Eris and Giant Baby. And she was displayed on Jadis’ coffin in the Rising King profecy scene. Personally, I’m waiting for her.
We also saw Leya Brimstone, Kappa guy, Monkey (armor clad samurai who is actually human), and a few others earlier, I would be surprised if she wasn’t there somewhere.
Still, isn’t the target of her ire Incubus, not Solomon?
Her mantra-name isn’t “Murder a God”. It isn’t even Murder The God.
It’s Murder The Gods And Topple Their Thrones, all in plurals.
None of the Seven are safe.
That un Maya ne’er has joined in wi th’mob, save occasionsome defensin hersel, an mebbe Alice likenwise.
Us expectin she not in the tourney, altho closelike an watchin.
…I’d state my true opinions of Solomon David’s actions here, but I’d strongly prefer to get back to Throne and well out of the Celestial Empire before doing so.
Instead, I will say this: I have no desire to see the emperor fall here. A small fiefdom within the art of keeping things cold is enough for me, so long as I’m paid well for it, and I will not want to witness the aftermath should someone *actually* manage to make him bleed.
Is that Disk Head in panel 4 lower left? So glad to see him still standing, he’s a personal favorite. Squid Lady and Beetle Man in panel 2 are also mighty appealing.
Now everyone sing: Ki Rata is breaking up that old gang of mine!
Sorry eye-smonger, I replied in the wrong place.
The Imperial mortuary and resurrectionist guilds may yet have need of your services, Icemonger. I predict many more bodies shall surface, and all must be chilled for collection and transport.
An interesting proposal. If this opportunity materializes, I will certainly consider it.
I, for one, am eager to see this man’s arrogant cruelty repaid with humiliation and pain. Reduce him to a whimpering weakling as befits his cowardice.
What kind of idiot would do anything other than just keep sitting?
Well, almost everyone there entered the tournament with the hope of earning that what Solomon is now offering – a chance to make him bleed.
This entire tournament is for the chance to get to attack him. And now he offers it all contestants. I suspect many will leap it at.
All of this is just to show White Chain, Vigilant Gaze, and Allison of why they shouldn’t.
I’m pretty sure “He” is saying [audacity] will win you much less, however much more than you bargained for it is. It seems to me ‘winning’ in this case is merely remaining in the ring where you will not be struck unless you dare to attack and reach for the impetus of this battle: the succession of Solomon’s throne. I believe the “coin, prestige and titles” to be consolation prizes and therefore, are not awarded to those who can draw Solomon’s blood. What to do, what to do… I say let them eat cake, I’ll take the prizes no matter who the successor is, and live out the rest of my incarnation in relative comfort. BTW, I stopped including my Number when I reached a nayuta of digits (even though 40 digits off a googol, I still found it to be quite cumbersome) and thus have an aweful lot of experience ‘starting over’. I would stand still and collect my prizes, not just because I have no chance in drawing blood (the true victory being over one’s fear), but also because I have never felt the relative comfort that comes from a life long-lived. Curiosity may have killed the cat, but it only had 9 to discover this fact 10^60 is all the lives it took for me to finally be curious enough to live. Anyone else feel this way?
Baresome time fer startin ower fore tha’s deid agin!
Only a total nutter would do that. You know, the kind of psycho who would sign up for a tournament with near-zero chance of survival.
It amazes me that Solomon thinks he can find a worthy successor from a group of frothy-mouthed butchers. It’s the crack in his facade of reasonableness.
Solomon’s problem is that his own colleagues are ultra powerful frothy-mouthed butchers themselves.
He really can’t put a sage’s commitee in place to rule when Jagganoth or Gog-Agog are around the corner.
It seems some of you fail to realize something. To join this tournament you must be mad or greedy, yes, but also our fighters might be merely desperate. The throne itself is not the prize of victory. The prize is a single request. Not all who fight are foolish enough to desire a deadly throne.
I will speak, if I may, of the Rayuban blood ceremony: that time tested and honoured tradition, universal in its appeal to violence, yet unique in the many realms in its strange opportunity. For it calls upon the darkened and dissatisfied, and makes them to shine in a crucible of glory, with hatred hot and horrible, for it calls them to rise up and strike at God.
Travellers of many realms and many men of arms, of great and small, with tempered weapons and careful mettle, fierce and free and aspect awful, gather in great congregation every three turns for the bloodshed of Rayuba. The event? The Ring of Power. A bloodbath, yes; a contest, yes. But more than that, for at the dim, furthest reaches of that bloodshed, there is a chance, slim though it is, to spit upon God. So they come, as one and as all, from high and low station, from the realms of all the 7, and they weather hardship and bloodlust, struggle and victory, conquest and vengeance; and a burning light of vindication spurs them onward. And how they burn! Whatever your views of the 7, to most in Throne and the many realms, they are Gods. Glorious to some, virtuous and beautiful! Yet monstrous: they are gods of an empty heaven, wherein for a thousand years no prayers are answered, no hope is given, no solace is sent for the weary nor rest for the wicked, as hunger and bloodshed consume the many worlds. Who is it that can stop this? Who is responsible for this violence? And as you look to the heavens, you see that the seven, lordly and lofty and immutable as the wheel, are worshipped by many, and sit the seat of God, and soak his praises, but do not play his part. A vulpine grin and callous hunger and hardship are the only blessings they bestow. They do not rule the realms, but consume them.
And so they come. Some for glory, yes. But for many, a singular hatred with existence has grown, and they would hold the gods responsible. Yet who can reach Incubus in ivory? Mammon in the deep? But the hand of Solomon reaches out to the downtrodden; not in mercy, but in arrogance. He goads them to strike at God, and eagerly they rush to do so. What use is coin, and prestige, and power, in this vacuous hollow of an empty heaven? They come in droves, these women and men of cold violence and hardened hopes, but not for coin, not for conquest, but to spit in the face of God. They come to assert their right as the downtrodden.
Who will listen to their plea? Who can satisfy their hatred? For once blood is struck, red and raging, the flow cannot be quickly stopped. There is nothing these men want, truly, no price they will accept. They are washed out and long expired, and all they have left is their anger. As love scorns a price, haughty and above purchase, so anger, when it has sunk into the recesses of the heart, can know no recourse, and cannot be traded for anything.
And a grim fate they meet. The most accomplished of these warriors, who live and thrive on hatred? They are granted a bitter prize. For their hatred, for their struggle, and for their feats of violence, they are granted station – to rule on behalf of Solomon. To reign under the one they hate, and to be shackled by his cold laws, the weight of many scribes and flowing ink to bind them forever. A ruler, yes. But a slave as much as any. And dim years slowly darken their anger, as they become complicit in the works of god, not permitted to die nor to fight, but only to rule on behalf of him they sought to destroy.
So it is that the bloodshed of Rayuba is central to the very operating of the Celestial Empire. A cold calculus, hungry and horrible, runs all of the many facets of the celestial empire. It is a land of pure law enforced with no love for its outcome, where every action is weighed, and the ruling class itself is made of washed up warlords and vatra of unremitting discontent. Seek no grace in the Celestial Empire, for its rulers are those of violence and of hopeless hatred, of those who sought the chance to kill God, but now, instead, they serve him.
This post is as long as a shit i laid out earlier
Solomon David’s body is a Temple
The contestants are the Offerings
His fists are the Altar
A Solomon David Themed cover of Hozier’s “Take me to Church” now plays in my head as the body count grows.
Thank you, Locust Pontifex!
This does not end well. Why would anyone, mortals most of all, take a personal invitation to cease living?
The possibility to gain glory is too sweet to ignore.
As mortals, their (eventual) death is inevitable. As such, how they live their lives becomes more important than the non-question of whether or not they will die. Given the chance to live better, at the risk of dying just a little sooner, what wouldn’t they do?
Paid to do nothing? DEAL!
O, YISUN, hear my cry, soothe the curious mind of your humble servant: If Solomon David punches himself and it hurts, does that make Solomon David stronger or weaker than Solomon David?
Weaker. And growing weaker by the day, as he subjects himself to unending torment, in the name of the glorious master he has built.
Oh, how he craves freedom from his own cruel slavery. But freedom would demand he see his children suffer. Learn. And grow.
And that is a price Solomon David will never willingly pay.
That is probably the best interpretation of Solomon David I ever read, and I think also the most interessing.
I believe that the power of Solomon David is such that he can act with utmost confidence that not a single attack will ever strike him and cause him harm.
Force will fail against this immovable object, and so those who strike him are doomed to fail by their own action.
I think you are very near the mark, pilgrim. It seems very unlikely that Solomon can be defeated by force, but force is not always the best way – which was White Chain’s message to Allison. If you can convince Solomon that you have learned this lesson, he might just let you scratch him.
HUNGER
Aye, ever is so. ‘Ceptin jus efter us had us tea.
It would be hilarious if Allison (who forfeited by submission and thus is reconsidered for the second round) spends the entire time talking to White Chain and, as a result, is given a prominent position inside his Empire (followed very swiftly by White Chain drawing blood)