King of Swords 2-13
“HEAD OF JOHN
An internal style focused on hardening the self. After many years of preparation and training, practitioners ram three metal studs into their skull, piercing the bone and blocking the flow of Atum at precise meridians. The studs extrude from the skull slightly and are said to be uncomfortable in cold weather. Once this ritual is accomplished, there is a healing, fasting, and meditation period of three weeks. After this, the practitioner finds that the skin of their head and neck becomes almost impermeable to harm and able to exert incredible force. It cannot be cut, severed, or scored by any blade, though I have seen many try.
The chief feature of this style is using the head as a blunt weapon. I have seen acolytes shatter bone with their headbutts in practice and an elder monk break a temple wall with the fierce application of his forehead. By practice of meditation they are also said to have accomplished unbelievable feats. It is a common story among the monks that their most senior member had his body destroyed and his head severed while defending the temple many years ago. His head survived for four weeks without a body, and was later sewn back on to the body of a deceased temple guard, which quickly revivified both the body and the head. I could not verify his claims but his neck did have a most spectacular scar. ”
– Manual of Hands and Feet
I wanna taste those buns.
Oglod’s cooking looks pretty good, too.
thus you are
what you eat
I’m going to assume that is a double entendre.
And I’m going to agree completely.
Same. The dumpling looks great as well.
…Aside from yourself, of course.
THE GODHEAD
I don’t know, Allison, the crazy lady with a freaking key doing pull ups on the literal skull of their goddes is probably a little stressful.
I’ve seen a few angels training in my time.
The fact that she has so few scars tells me she has a comparatively mild instructor.
Or, perhaps, she has taken to the teachings exceptionally well.
Perhaps it is both.
Those are mostly from that one time she slapped a goddess. Except the ones on her face, those are from a ‘lover’s quarrel’ with a demon.
Those are the leftovers from her run ins with Mottom and with Yabilchoath. I don’t see anything new.
why that lady in the fourth panel seems simply marvelous
Just on her way down to the comedy club.
Oh I see! She spent a year doing secondary quests by helping everyone in town! This way she will have plenty of XP for the main quest! It will be easy peasy.
Buwahaha!
Namely, grinding
well, glad to see shes helping out around here! someone had to!
“Now that I have finished stretching, I heard someone has been giving you trouble.”
“…yes, some crazy tunnel ape keeps defiling my shrine every night no matter how much I tell them to stop.”
Finished reading all of the archives – including the stories. This is a wonderful comic, and I praise The Great Father for this chance to read it.
Got to warm up, before you start beating miscreants up.
STEAMED BUNS STEAMED BUNS
Okay stop all the presses right now, where is this, I haven’t eaten steamed buns in years and I want one.
I once saw a man who’s head was pristine but his body was covered in so many scars it was as if he had no skin.
I asked him, “Why is your head so clean?”
He replied, “Because I am a fool who only trained his head to dodge.”
And so I bought a brother some wine.
As epic as folk hero Allison is, I have to ask how the demiurges, the pursuers, or really anyone who’s looking for haven’t found her is she’s been flashing her key/halo like that.
It’s a really big city.
They’re too busy fighting with another demiurges. There’s a war going on.
It sounds like Allison decided to become a superhero.
She just needs a spandex costume, and she’s set.
I know folks have gone mad with the whole “Al-YISUN’s gotten thicc” bit, but come on, Abbadon, do not tease me with such fine buns!
Pork dumplings of that quality are banned in 17 worlds!
If everyone (apart from the monk) on the twilight side of Throne knows Allison, how is that the demiurges have been leaving her alone? There’s no way they would not have sources all over the place.
The demiurges are not exactly the most attentive of individuals. Right now Mottom and Mammon are probably still too busy trying to kill each other over the aftermath of the breaching of Yre, and Solomon is preoccupied finding a successor and entertaining the illusion he can somehow stop the fighting. That leaves Incubus, who has no reason to go searching for her, Jagganoth, who doesn’t exactly spend much time in Throne, Jadis, whose trapped in glass, and Gog-agog, who, yeah…
The only reason Mottom bothered to breach Yre in the first place was that she was after Allison. Think “multiverse-spanning never-ending blood vendetta of the Bitch Queen from Hell”.
I can’t help feeling it’s unlikely that she would suddenly decide to take a year off from that. IMO a bit more back story is needed, at some point, to fill in a few gaps. Doesn’t have to be done straight away, but it’d help the flow of the whole thing.
Come to think of it, since the old Devil King said Cio would die if the raid on Yre failed, can anyone remember what his standard for success was?
I believe he did not give any standard. However, I would imagine that the destruction of Yre, the reignition of the Multi-Universal War, and failure to find what was sought after, might constitute a certain standard to which Himself finds somewhatlacking.
Oh goodness. All caught up to the present moment.
This is awkward.
“Aside from me and my exercise routine, I mean”
Purpose burns bright as any fire.
This scene would make a lot more sense if the Priestess hadn’t made it clear in the last page that Allison regularly defiles the Goddess’ skull.
Allison is playing this off as if she’s Angel Initiate Batman: I was just limbering up here before dealing with your problem. But what about all those other nights? Also, there’s no other place to limber up… except the ground (as we see her doing here), which is presumably everywhere?
If you can demonstrate a way to do pull ups off the ground I’d love to see it
I’m trying to think of something witty, but the beginning of this chapter of the Rising King’s chronicles is just too wonderful.
Gosh, I absolutely love how you’ve established Allison’s integration into the local community. It not only does a great job of world-building, but character-building too. Awesome stuff as always, and I can’t wait to see what goons Allison is gonna pound next!
i can’t believe they have burger king in throne
Ahhh… sidequests. A vital component to any training regimen.