If it’s not a nipple it’s an odd place to deliberately draw a bruise given that the positioning would naturally be confused with a nipple.
Given the skill of the artist, I think it is more likely a deliberate nipple than it is an accidental nipple.
“My master was the greatest lord general to the king Au Vam, Ryo-ten-Ryam, who first coaxed me into learning the ways of turning men into ghosts. As his interest quickly turned to the wholly uninteresting and most useless parts of my body, I returned the favor and relieved him of his.”
-Meti’s Sword Manual, Argument 3
To see brothers of the Iron temple bring knowledge and wit to the far corners of the great interwebs, it brings a tear to the eye. It seems as though lately many more are following the iron path, following it down to healthier and happier lifestyle.
In the first, that Cio grows further from her pretense at an internal skeleton is pleasing to me from a creature-design perspective.
In the second, that Cio’s blade was blocked by the very book which contains her chronicles of the Rising King and mysterious yet charming stranger is pleasing to me from a poetic perspective.
In the third, that Cio’s claws laid bare Alison’s breast is pleasing to me from a historical perspective (specifically, as a reader of Cioelle’s nice and accurate histories).
Blast and bother this vexsome comments box and bother and blast my own addled pate for relying too oft on auto-complete.
I forgot my own damn name.
It’s “Denies”, not “Devours”.
At least, for the moment.
It also helps when the book does not conform to typical 3-dimensional space and is several kilometers thick on the inside despite being mere centimeters on the outside.
Friend, while the words of a textbook may be heavy, they’re not nearly as heavy as the heart of those who bear them.
I’ve heard there’s a sort of tea that helps. It’s made from a strange bean. When this bean is roasted, ground, and placed in a filter through which boiling water is poured, it creates a tea that is pungent and sweet in odor. It’s quite bitter to drink, but restores life to those with weary minds and bodies. It’s called many things, but you may know it as “Coffee.”
Common is the liqueur of blue and grey. Red, less so, with gold grown rare and green rare still. Ebon liqueur is but myth and legend, in the earliest days from the shaping of masks and the wielding of names.
Yet rarest of all, most impossible of all things, is a devil’s tear. The devil is stone and fire, formless chaos twisted into impulse and desire. For what does the devil weep? To whom does the devil care for beyond itself? For the tear is born of Aesma’s mortal gift, waters shed in mourning for time forever ill spent.
Should you ever see such a wonder, hold it close. Bottle it in the finest trueglass, and bring it to the Reformed Archivists’ Guild, Shades Branch, in exchange for no less than five gilded saint’s skulls, jeweled inlaids and in pristine condition.
Price negotiable upon amount gathered and caliber of devil.
Once while I was training in the arts of combat I spied a blue devil watching me, and I swear on my shield I saw their eyes grow wet. For what reason I can’t imagine, maybe they thought me a delicious morsel they could never eat, or some other reason, but I never gave it thought. I’ve not seen them since I’d left my mentor’s house.
Had I known a devil’s tears were of value, I would’ve decked her in the chest and freed her tears from her eyes. Likely a mistake, I probably would’ve been fatally mauled, and perhaps the teary sheen was only a trick of the light, but the reward measures fairly worth the risk if that bounty can be vouched for.
Oh, good. They’ve made up. Maybe they can find Allison’s friend and get out of here alive. (Especially if they don’t try to take anything they didn’t bring in with them.)
I must admit I feel quite sorry for that long-suffering Servant who took the blade in Allison’s defense. Paper does not heal quite so readily as flesh, nor does it shrug off injury so well as the flesh of devils.
I will have it known that I am most emphatically *not* pleased by this turn of events. While it is preferable that the Key not fall into the hands of a demon, I would not sacrifice my kin to prevent that from coming to pass. They are both culpable in this murder, and by my hand they will both answer for it.
Gundhram the Reader, Belligerent Knight and Amateur Historian
Although I do request that you not try to murder the nascent King of Kings or her Chronicler. I am rather fond of both, and the reason for my joining of the Knights Belligerent rests squarely on a metahistorical text that tells a fragment of Alice-Un’s rise to infinite prominence.
Can one reconcile when they were never really friendly in the first place?
Because lets be honest here, Alison has been a asshole to Cio from the start well before any influence from Incubus.
The start of a freindship perhaps?
Haha, been there, done that. Nbd, your friend just briefly lost her mind and tried to stab you with a sword, but it’s okay because you’re cool now. We can all relate.
Ehhh, not that the rest of this story wasn’t awesome, but this is among the most awesome pages anyway. Especialy after immesurable brutality of previous two.
Will this show of forgiveness and friendship be enough for the Reverend Mother to believe them more than heartless wretches? Will Cio get her glasses and hat back too? And will Allison be able to find a new T-shirt amongst all that gold?
Stay tuned and find out in… KILL SIX BILLION DEMONS!
“again?”… How many times had she have to kill a close friend who tried to betray her and made her recede to her old ways?
Also, good detail the receding hair. Cio is fully back
Kudos! Kudos, I say!
To be brought forth,
in a cup brimming,
For the Princeling
of Verse Singing!
(Singing is one of the many Arts pursued by those who follow the Path of Truths/Lies. Not to be held inferior to Cutting, or other Dramatics)
Hmm… Never judge a book by its cover, maybe? Not tryin’ to sound terribly racist or nuthin, but most a’ y’all book-folks look about the same to the rest of us. I figured that was why book-folk wear their titles out in the open like that – so other folks could tell y’all apart. >.>
So the blood was indeed only in Yabalcio’s perception of reality. I feared that hypothesis was too naïve for this story but I am quite happy to be proven wrong.
I know everyone is very fond of the Cio-Alison ship, and I hate to be an iceberg, but I personally hope it’s permanently sunk after this.
I don’t care if Cio regrets this, I don’t care if they stay friends afterward or whatever, but I just don’t think it’s right to ship two characters when one of them brutalized the other like this, even if she just “lost herself” for a minute. That’s exactly what abusive relationships in real life are like. “Oh, I’m sorry, honey, I didn’t mean to hurt you, I just lost control!”
And that’s not to say Alison hasn’t also wronged Cio. Alison’s working out her own issues, with being a god now and all. I think she and Cio should just give each other some space.
Let the ship sink all the way to the bottom of the ocean. They can be friends together on the lifeboat.
And no, I just do not see Yab as analogous to anger management issues, nor do I see Cio and Allison’s relationship being abusive. In a fantasy story like this, you need more than an event like this, bloody as it was, to describe two characters as having an abusive, dysfunctional relationship.
An abusive relationship needs to be a far more prevalent aspect of the characters’ interactions, and Cio and Allison do not otherwise have a relationship colored by abuse.
Compare it to, say, Twilight, or its fanfiction offspring Fifty Shades of Grey. Those relationships are thoroughly dysfunctional and abusive, and it colors every aspect of the characters’ relationships even outside of the literally violent encounters. (tons of stalking, frequent privacy invasion, romantic coercion, severe jealousy and mistrust, etc)
Mistrust and suspicion has been the biggest wedge between Allison and Cio, and it’s basically gone now. They’ll be actual friends now regardless because of it, and I do not see this event as a ship sinker either. If it was, it wouldn’t even make sense for them to be friends.
Friendships can be abusive just like romantic relationships, and both are absolute nonos.
Denying possible positive romantic development yet accepting the forging of an actual friendship after this event would be hypocrisy and cherry-picking.
This story seems to be the kind where happily ever after type romance wouldn’t even happen, and I don’t think anybody really seriously ships these two. At least I personally don’t. I think they’d be cute together outside the context of this story in like a normal life situations and stuff, and that’s it.
I find it difficult to liken it to an abusive relationship.
Until recently Alison pretty much had a different part of herself driving, one that pretty much left Cio for dead. And who knows where things might have gone if the explosives hadn’t cut that conversation short.
Upon waking in the rubble Cio seemed to have another part of herself driving as well.
It just feels similar to me. Neither wanted what happened, and both alternates are pretty bad. This is just a setting where that is actually a thing, unlike real life.
Making Cio attacking Alison out like it similar to a common abusive relationship is nonsense. If this “ship sinks” it’s not because Cio is abusive, if anything it is the other way around.
It’s not like Alison’s wrong to her is a small thing, she intentionally left her to die under a pile of rubble (and with the way things were going in that scene if the explosion hadn’t done it for her she probably would have attacked her). Both Cio’s attacking Alison here and Alison leaving Cio to die could maybe be excused as them “under the influence” but Alison has also been treating Cio like trash before this.
Friends can be abusive, too, and Allison was at least as “abusive” as Cio earlier. Neither of them were themselves. This whole chapter has been about exploring the characters’ worst selves, and I’m inclined to forgive them their jaunt into evil.
Most abusive relationships don’t involve getting taken over by a bitchy part of yourself enhanced by the power of a God. Nor do they involve one member of the relationship slipping into a literal beastial demonic state and lose all control after getting betrayed and crushed under falling rubble
Having been in abusive, toxic relationships — both friendships and romantic — and on both sides of the abuse (I have gotten actual, professional therapy on this matter, and I know that I’m not ready for romance again yet… but that’s another story. And I am MUCH better than I was)… this isn’t an abusive relationship. Far, far from it. And as someone who has lived through the genuine article, I’m a bit insulted at the comparison. This feels more like an accusation by someone who dislikes the ship for other reasons to try to throw dirt on other people’s ships than a genuine expression of concern — something I see far too often in certain fan communities these days.
Up until Incubus’ meddling, Cio and Allison’s relationship was about as normal as could be expected in the bizarro-world circumstances of the Seven-Part World. Cio was a little bit fangirlish, but neither one was taking advantage of the other’s good faith, and (from what I can tell) Cio’s fangirling had never crossed the line into outright *stalking*. Neither was using violence (physical OR emotional) as a tool to control the other. I do not recall any incidents of gaslighting or even dishonesty — they were pretty up-front and open with each other. And they tried to help each other to the best of their confused, fish-out-of-water wow-wtf-is-happening abilities.
What’s going on RIGHT NOW is an extreme end of something that can happen in perfectly normal, even healthy relationships — there was a grave misunderstanding due to a lack of information (and illness, even, if we consider Allison’s mental split to be mental illness) and severe stress. Due to the nature of the actors involved (nascent god-king and former Black Devil) it escalated into severe physical violence, but that has more to do with the *nature of the world that this exists in* than any existence of abuse. Were this a slice of life high school AU, this would be Allison and Cio having planned a big prank on the SGA treasurer with the local school n’er do wells, said prank went super sideways, Cio and Allison’s egos both got in the way, and it ended with a vicious shouting match in which both said a lot of things neither should have which hurt each other very badly.
I digress with overwrought metaphors. The MAIN REASON this isn’t an example of an abusive relationship is the lack of antecedents to the abuse. UP UNTIL Incubus’ meddling & Cio feeling she needed to pull on her old self’s power, there was no manipulation, gaslighting, or abuse (physical or emotional). There really is a difference between an awful one-time fight and an ongoing problem of abuse. Now, if they CONTINUE to have this problem in the future, or if they resort to manipulative behavior, THAT’S abuse. But this incident in itself isn’t.
It is said in the Psalms “And Yisun spoke to a young Hansa at a crossroads as he stared at a young woman. Selfishness is at the heart of love, this is to be desired”
Truly, Yisun the omnipotent and non-existent is a consummate liar.
This is how the most clever ones get you: not through force of arms, not by trickery or a shiv in the back, but by offering a glimpse of themselves -through- the mask.
I just wonder how the rest of the party is getting on right now. Charon and Princess were looking especially worse for wear even before everything went explosively tits-up, but as they say, until you see the corpse, they’re not really dead.
@hungariantoast: Lol, reading this page for the first time and I’m so confused by all the nip/areola talk. Guess it was edited out. Whatever, I wasn’t too eager to see since I’m a straight woman XD
Cio’s berserker state and the ease with which she seems to enter and leave it is interesting. Also areola.
That’s a bruise
No, my sweet child. That is a nipple. Most women have two of them, one on each breast.
I think not, my friend.
No, I reckon Strider has got it correct. That ‘bruise’ is in the right place (more or less) for that.
That suspicious fold of her shirt hides the real one
If it’s not a nipple it’s an odd place to deliberately draw a bruise given that the positioning would naturally be confused with a nipple.
Given the skill of the artist, I think it is more likely a deliberate nipple than it is an accidental nipple.
Please don’t say strider like that
“My master was the greatest lord general to the king Au Vam, Ryo-ten-Ryam, who first coaxed me into learning the ways of turning men into ghosts. As his interest quickly turned to the wholly uninteresting and most useless parts of my body, I returned the favor and relieved him of his.”
-Meti’s Sword Manual, Argument 3
Well spotted, friend.
honestly no idea what you guys are talking about can’t see shit
I think it was changed since back then.
<3
the blade imparts a foreign bitterness. how could she betray me? i execute a partial curl. one last rep
and if you place your trust in steel
it will tarnish and turn heel.
Look, or let your fingers feel.
That’s why you learn to cut without steel, so that you can cut without limit.
To see brothers of the Iron temple bring knowledge and wit to the far corners of the great interwebs, it brings a tear to the eye. It seems as though lately many more are following the iron path, following it down to healthier and happier lifestyle.
Even a devil may cry once their flame is bonded to another, or so the old sages once said.
LIES!
Let tears wash away the stain of blood. You are once more born anew.
yaaaay!
dare i say it
devilmon crybabey
You stop that
(Are wa dare da, dare da, dare da~)
I cant believe INGVLD is fuckin dead.
Also this page is gay af
Cio/Alison/White Chain confirmed?
Also Idk if you were memeing but that isn’t INGSVLD (tho they are definitely fuckin dead).
Alison complimented her writing, they are definitely together now.
The Hellenians were right in concluding that the purest love is that between lovers of the same gender.
Once again, that’s not INGVLD, but his brother whose name I have forgotten.
Cio was using him as a fanfic journal.
Alas, poor Ingslvd, I knew you Horatio or something?
All will be healed.
Cio protecc
Cio attacc
But most importantly…
Cio come bacc
Not gonna lie, this comment gave me the feels.
Cio look at Al-YIS-UN’s racc
*Cio got bacc
Wisdom in jest.
In the first, that Cio grows further from her pretense at an internal skeleton is pleasing to me from a creature-design perspective.
In the second, that Cio’s blade was blocked by the very book which contains her chronicles of the Rising King and mysterious yet charming stranger is pleasing to me from a poetic perspective.
In the third, that Cio’s claws laid bare Alison’s breast is pleasing to me from a historical perspective (specifically, as a reader of Cioelle’s nice and accurate histories).
end of Devilman Crybaby (2018)
Blast and bother this vexsome comments box and bother and blast my own addled pate for relying too oft on auto-complete.
I forgot my own damn name.
It’s “Denies”, not “Devours”.
At least, for the moment.
Faust!
Yay!!!!!!!!!
Reconciliation AND a nipslip!
That would be some areola, I think.
A hands breadth from becoming unwound!
At least, Allison’s shirt is…
A dizzing blow to body and mind!
How quickly the tide turns….
You tease.
Forgiveness
Can you imagine?
Let this warning stand to all, my lovelies.
Thus always to books.
The crimes of literature will not go unpunished. Justice unto all novels and manuscripts.
omg allison’s boob
Yes…
Relish the meat, until it’s time is ended.
Behold, our heroes!
There’s not much left.
A little known fact: a large enough book can double as a shield, giving you a +2 bonus to armor.
It also helps when the book does not conform to typical 3-dimensional space and is several kilometers thick on the inside despite being mere centimeters on the outside.
I see you are referring to my organic chemistry textbook, an astute observation certainly
Friend, while the words of a textbook may be heavy, they’re not nearly as heavy as the heart of those who bear them.
I’ve heard there’s a sort of tea that helps. It’s made from a strange bean. When this bean is roasted, ground, and placed in a filter through which boiling water is poured, it creates a tea that is pungent and sweet in odor. It’s quite bitter to drink, but restores life to those with weary minds and bodies. It’s called many things, but you may know it as “Coffee.”
in a bout of rage, the demon leaves a mark on two parts of her self!
alas cio, neither of thee were in the right mind!
IA IA, the call goes out to all. Those that see are the ones blinded by frendship
I miss Cio’s thinner buggy limbs, she should have never gotten that gym membership.
lol wut?
>.<
I was wondering why it wasn't coming out her back…
I see the backpack now.
THE BOOK! IA!IA!!
PRAISE THE BOOK!! IA!
As a well-read individual, Same.
Dying on a pile of gold is how I would wish to go.
On an unrelated note, does that book appear exceptionally heavy to any of you?
I take it you’ve never moved boxes of large books.
I used to own a few hundred books. Movers hated me. Hell, I even hated my own book collection when I had to actually lift it.
Oh yeah, moving with books. It’s unhealthy, but you can’t throw them away. Throwing books away is like destroying the soul of their writer, piecemeal.
Sure, the book may look heavy, but that’s what the backpack was for. Where is the backpack, anyway?
I hope they didn’t need that book for anything.
They needed it for this.
Ah, the little woman remembers who she is.
And the Flesh-Eating Monster forgets.
It’s all a matter of perspective, aye…
Common is the liqueur of blue and grey. Red, less so, with gold grown rare and green rare still. Ebon liqueur is but myth and legend, in the earliest days from the shaping of masks and the wielding of names.
Yet rarest of all, most impossible of all things, is a devil’s tear. The devil is stone and fire, formless chaos twisted into impulse and desire. For what does the devil weep? To whom does the devil care for beyond itself? For the tear is born of Aesma’s mortal gift, waters shed in mourning for time forever ill spent.
Should you ever see such a wonder, hold it close. Bottle it in the finest trueglass, and bring it to the Reformed Archivists’ Guild, Shades Branch, in exchange for no less than five gilded saint’s skulls, jeweled inlaids and in pristine condition.
Price negotiable upon amount gathered and caliber of devil.
Wait are you serious
You’re serious aren’t you
GODS DAMMIT
Once while I was training in the arts of combat I spied a blue devil watching me, and I swear on my shield I saw their eyes grow wet. For what reason I can’t imagine, maybe they thought me a delicious morsel they could never eat, or some other reason, but I never gave it thought. I’ve not seen them since I’d left my mentor’s house.
Had I known a devil’s tears were of value, I would’ve decked her in the chest and freed her tears from her eyes. Likely a mistake, I probably would’ve been fatally mauled, and perhaps the teary sheen was only a trick of the light, but the reward measures fairly worth the risk if that bounty can be vouched for.
Your making me …..FEEEEEEEEEL
It seems that Devils too can shed tears.
oh thank god
i needed this page in my life
Backpacks are *not* stupid.
This is axiomatic.
What, no rhymes? Tsk, tsk, tsk…
An axiom will stand alone
without a court before it’s throne.
It finds worth in just being known.
Redemption is offered. Loyalty is won.
Oh, good. They’ve made up. Maybe they can find Allison’s friend and get out of here alive. (Especially if they don’t try to take anything they didn’t bring in with them.)
Too bad about Lucky Felicia though.
“Okay, let’s go get my boyfriend.”
“EX-boyfriend.”
“Right.”
Zaid will not tell this tale with joy. Doesn’t get to be king, much less ‘get the girl.’
If he’s wise, he won’t tell this tale at all. How would that even go?
Scene: The locker room. Zaid is bantering with some jock heads.
Jock Head #1: Zaid, Brah! Did you score with that ditz Alice?
Jock Head #2: Heh heh! You know blondes put out!
Zaid: Actually, when I started to take her bra off, hordes of demons poured out of the walls and dragged me to Hell.
[Long beat]
Jock Head #2: Wait, so… You mean, like… she has VD?
Zaid: No. Like, I actually got dragged into an alternate plane of existence by fallen angels, and met the dragon god of evil.
Jock Head #1: Whoa! You gotta get me the name of your weed guy, brah!
Book confirmed for main protagonist, true hero of the story.
Complete with Heroic Sacrifice. It died, so the girl could live.
R.I.P. in peace
It died on the sword for her sins!
Died and Reborn!
I must admit I feel quite sorry for that long-suffering Servant who took the blade in Allison’s defense. Paper does not heal quite so readily as flesh, nor does it shrug off injury so well as the flesh of devils.
INGSVLD, wherever he abides, will not be pleased.
I will have it known that I am most emphatically *not* pleased by this turn of events. While it is preferable that the Key not fall into the hands of a demon, I would not sacrifice my kin to prevent that from coming to pass. They are both culpable in this murder, and by my hand they will both answer for it.
It’s good to see you again, Geas Knight.
Although I do request that you not try to murder the nascent King of Kings or her Chronicler. I am rather fond of both, and the reason for my joining of the Knights Belligerent rests squarely on a metahistorical text that tells a fragment of Alice-Un’s rise to infinite prominence.
This is a very touching scene and all, but I’m just impressed with Allison’s reflexes.
At least her sense of humor isn’t damaged… >_<
Tender heartwood endures where timeworn bark fails.
Good books save lives.
And now kiss ôuô
The ship ain’t sinking yet!
God dammit Ab you fucker
I almost had a moment there! Almost…
A Cio-AL-YIS -N straddle moment wasn’t supposed to go down this way. Unless it was!
Mayhaps the king needed an angry blade to the gut to bring her back to reality?
Ha! I suspected Alice would reconcile with Cio over their mutual love of fan fiction!
Not the poor eye book!!!!!
Truly Cio is her own worst critic and has taken “kill your darlings” to heart.
For once I am glad to acknowledge the pleasure I take in seeing her fate not unwound, like some sort of Shaggy Dog.
This is heartwarming, almost…
A most vicious girl fight ends in tears, and hopefully a stronger friendship.
The pen truly is mightier than the sword.
Ever much so
*Applause*
Cio, that is not how you do copy-editing.
Aawww… Are they going to make love?
Patreons only…
Can one reconcile when they were never really friendly in the first place?
Because lets be honest here, Alison has been a asshole to Cio from the start well before any influence from Incubus.
The start of a freindship perhaps?
Haha, been there, done that. Nbd, your friend just briefly lost her mind and tried to stab you with a sword, but it’s okay because you’re cool now. We can all relate.
Ah, Alison is coming to understand that most social of greeds; friendship.
Now that was awesome.
Ehhh, not that the rest of this story wasn’t awesome, but this is among the most awesome pages anyway. Especialy after immesurable brutality of previous two.
1 -the snark is strong in this one.
2 -alas, poor book, we hardly knew ye.
3 -OK, but how much of that blade actually went through the book?
4 -“again” as in “I went full Yabalchoath”? Or “again” as in “this isn’t even the
first time I’ve killed someone I cared about”?
5 -now kiss.
Halleluja
AL-YISUN is gonna have quite the collection of scars by the end of this
now give her the glasses back, Alison. a demon like her needs her glasses
I’m not crying, you’re crying!
..Also Cio, and Allison.
Everyone is crying!
All? Is? Forgiven?
Together.
When you cut paper you must be ignorant of every page, or you will falter before the wall of content
Will this show of forgiveness and friendship be enough for the Reverend Mother to believe them more than heartless wretches? Will Cio get her glasses and hat back too? And will Allison be able to find a new T-shirt amongst all that gold?
Stay tuned and find out in… KILL SIX BILLION DEMONS!
Number One is not a person big on understanding or forgiveness, I think.
Truly, Yre is a place of Miracles.
What on Throne happened to her shirt between this page and the last?
Once again fandiction saves a life
Poor book!
Also, again?
“again?”… How many times had she have to kill a close friend who tried to betray her and made her recede to her old ways?
Also, good detail the receding hair. Cio is fully back
“receding hair”…::snort::
You made me scroll back up to check Cio’s hairline.
To The Brink
Holding on to
A Dark Devils’
Bright Dreams
Is A Scream.
Oh Contusions and Confusions.
Please – Someone – Cut Away
My many Illusions / Delusions !
Is Everyone In this Fray
On A Journey of Self-Discovery ?
Accepting Me, Accepting You.
What’s a Bumbling, Chosen One to Do ?
Oh….right…. YES, I’m heeding,
Perhaps it’s Time to stop the bleeding
Then again, we’ll have a BASH,
At the place where Demi-Urges CLASH.
0z79 is most pleased with this. Bravo!
!
Kudos! Kudos, I say!
To be brought forth,
in a cup brimming,
For the Princeling
of Verse Singing!
(Singing is one of the many Arts pursued by those who follow the Path of Truths/Lies. Not to be held inferior to Cutting, or other Dramatics)
Right in the fanfic!
daaawww
Avast Captain! There be a ship approaching!
Ah, the token of friendship served as a shield
Ah, another life saved by fanfiction
apparently getting stabbed in the book disintegrates your dress.
Hurray!
M-m-my heart!
Ingsvld, it appears your story is at an end.
Is it truly so difficult for humans to distinguish my kin? Have you taken aphorisms so deeply to heart that you do not even look at the book’s cover?
Hmm… Never judge a book by its cover, maybe? Not tryin’ to sound terribly racist or nuthin, but most a’ y’all book-folks look about the same to the rest of us. I figured that was why book-folk wear their titles out in the open like that – so other folks could tell y’all apart. >.>
Yeah! INGSVLD has a pretty blue eye!
Did she have a companion when she was at Yre the previous time? Her “…again?!” might refer to killing one.
So the blood was indeed only in Yabalcio’s perception of reality. I feared that hypothesis was too naïve for this story but I am quite happy to be proven wrong.
Why am I laughing and crying at the same time?
Reconciliation – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrG_x89Ke3g
What happened to her shirt, though? It was whole in the previous page.
You mean the one where she got thrown through a stone pillar at supersonic speeds?
Is she still Cio? Or Yabalchoath again? Or something else?
I know everyone is very fond of the Cio-Alison ship, and I hate to be an iceberg, but I personally hope it’s permanently sunk after this.
I don’t care if Cio regrets this, I don’t care if they stay friends afterward or whatever, but I just don’t think it’s right to ship two characters when one of them brutalized the other like this, even if she just “lost herself” for a minute. That’s exactly what abusive relationships in real life are like. “Oh, I’m sorry, honey, I didn’t mean to hurt you, I just lost control!”
And that’s not to say Alison hasn’t also wronged Cio. Alison’s working out her own issues, with being a god now and all. I think she and Cio should just give each other some space.
Let the ship sink all the way to the bottom of the ocean. They can be friends together on the lifeboat.
Over my cold, dead body.
And no, I just do not see Yab as analogous to anger management issues, nor do I see Cio and Allison’s relationship being abusive. In a fantasy story like this, you need more than an event like this, bloody as it was, to describe two characters as having an abusive, dysfunctional relationship.
An abusive relationship needs to be a far more prevalent aspect of the characters’ interactions, and Cio and Allison do not otherwise have a relationship colored by abuse.
Compare it to, say, Twilight, or its fanfiction offspring Fifty Shades of Grey. Those relationships are thoroughly dysfunctional and abusive, and it colors every aspect of the characters’ relationships even outside of the literally violent encounters. (tons of stalking, frequent privacy invasion, romantic coercion, severe jealousy and mistrust, etc)
Mistrust and suspicion has been the biggest wedge between Allison and Cio, and it’s basically gone now. They’ll be actual friends now regardless because of it, and I do not see this event as a ship sinker either. If it was, it wouldn’t even make sense for them to be friends.
Friendships can be abusive just like romantic relationships, and both are absolute nonos.
Denying possible positive romantic development yet accepting the forging of an actual friendship after this event would be hypocrisy and cherry-picking.
This story seems to be the kind where happily ever after type romance wouldn’t even happen, and I don’t think anybody really seriously ships these two. At least I personally don’t. I think they’d be cute together outside the context of this story in like a normal life situations and stuff, and that’s it.
I find it difficult to liken it to an abusive relationship.
Until recently Alison pretty much had a different part of herself driving, one that pretty much left Cio for dead. And who knows where things might have gone if the explosives hadn’t cut that conversation short.
Upon waking in the rubble Cio seemed to have another part of herself driving as well.
It just feels similar to me. Neither wanted what happened, and both alternates are pretty bad. This is just a setting where that is actually a thing, unlike real life.
This would be a legitimate perspective to hold if Cio wasn’t literally, in body and mind, a different person a moment ago.
Making Cio attacking Alison out like it similar to a common abusive relationship is nonsense. If this “ship sinks” it’s not because Cio is abusive, if anything it is the other way around.
It’s not like Alison’s wrong to her is a small thing, she intentionally left her to die under a pile of rubble (and with the way things were going in that scene if the explosion hadn’t done it for her she probably would have attacked her). Both Cio’s attacking Alison here and Alison leaving Cio to die could maybe be excused as them “under the influence” but Alison has also been treating Cio like trash before this.
It’s a cartoon.
Friends can be abusive, too, and Allison was at least as “abusive” as Cio earlier. Neither of them were themselves. This whole chapter has been about exploring the characters’ worst selves, and I’m inclined to forgive them their jaunt into evil.
sad but true, my friend
Most abusive relationships don’t involve getting taken over by a bitchy part of yourself enhanced by the power of a God. Nor do they involve one member of the relationship slipping into a literal beastial demonic state and lose all control after getting betrayed and crushed under falling rubble
Having been in abusive, toxic relationships — both friendships and romantic — and on both sides of the abuse (I have gotten actual, professional therapy on this matter, and I know that I’m not ready for romance again yet… but that’s another story. And I am MUCH better than I was)… this isn’t an abusive relationship. Far, far from it. And as someone who has lived through the genuine article, I’m a bit insulted at the comparison. This feels more like an accusation by someone who dislikes the ship for other reasons to try to throw dirt on other people’s ships than a genuine expression of concern — something I see far too often in certain fan communities these days.
Up until Incubus’ meddling, Cio and Allison’s relationship was about as normal as could be expected in the bizarro-world circumstances of the Seven-Part World. Cio was a little bit fangirlish, but neither one was taking advantage of the other’s good faith, and (from what I can tell) Cio’s fangirling had never crossed the line into outright *stalking*. Neither was using violence (physical OR emotional) as a tool to control the other. I do not recall any incidents of gaslighting or even dishonesty — they were pretty up-front and open with each other. And they tried to help each other to the best of their confused, fish-out-of-water wow-wtf-is-happening abilities.
What’s going on RIGHT NOW is an extreme end of something that can happen in perfectly normal, even healthy relationships — there was a grave misunderstanding due to a lack of information (and illness, even, if we consider Allison’s mental split to be mental illness) and severe stress. Due to the nature of the actors involved (nascent god-king and former Black Devil) it escalated into severe physical violence, but that has more to do with the *nature of the world that this exists in* than any existence of abuse. Were this a slice of life high school AU, this would be Allison and Cio having planned a big prank on the SGA treasurer with the local school n’er do wells, said prank went super sideways, Cio and Allison’s egos both got in the way, and it ended with a vicious shouting match in which both said a lot of things neither should have which hurt each other very badly.
I digress with overwrought metaphors. The MAIN REASON this isn’t an example of an abusive relationship is the lack of antecedents to the abuse. UP UNTIL Incubus’ meddling & Cio feeling she needed to pull on her old self’s power, there was no manipulation, gaslighting, or abuse (physical or emotional). There really is a difference between an awful one-time fight and an ongoing problem of abuse. Now, if they CONTINUE to have this problem in the future, or if they resort to manipulative behavior, THAT’S abuse. But this incident in itself isn’t.
/longwinded and incoherent rant over
first
Seems a bit abrupt, but I look forward to learning what happened with Cio before.
Whew. Was scared we’d have our first major character death.
I mean, I’m not the only one who thought that was YNGSVLD, right?
Finally! I’ve been waiting almost five years to see some nipple! I can finally stop pressing the remnants of my F5 key!
Honestly surprised me. I like it, The Father Mozgus way.
Woohoo! Saved by the book!
Alas, poor Ingsvald. I knew him, Cio. A book of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy.
(Yes, I know it’s not really Ingsvald. Just making fun.)
cio crying makes me want to die
Devilgirl Crybaby
Amazing punch…ehm stabline there. ^^
When we get to the part of the story set in some sort of demonic library, I expect the book-keepers to be very cross.
😛
YES.
Love It!
INGSVLD’s cousin! NOOOO!!
The ship is returning to the port!
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again:
I ship it.
Huzzah!!
Fanfic saves lives!
Apparently.
Put those murderous impulses back into writing likr the rest of us
Would you two just kiss already?
NOW KISS. C:<
Hmm… I want to call hijinx.
Allison’s face is healing with alarming speed, and the blood has disappeared off the blade.
Love cures all wounds
Perhaps, but it rarely cleans up afterwards.
Slash fic counters stab.
It’s super effective!
Rest in Peace backpack
We hardly knew ye, but we know that you are looking up at us even now, from your throne in hell.
Coup counted! Both tribes can now go home for another year.
aaaaaaaaand kiss
Again? Clio now remembers what was lost the last time she ventured thus far?
I demand more boob
Pity. I kinda like ol’ Yab. She’s got style.
Also, where is that cat, and are Oscar’s awesome pants ok?
INT builds are glass cannons they said. INT builds have shit AC they said. Well looks like book beats sword! Where’s your DPS now! INT builds FTW!
It is said in the Psalms “And Yisun spoke to a young Hansa at a crossroads as he stared at a young woman. Selfishness is at the heart of love, this is to be desired”
Truly, Yisun the omnipotent and non-existent is a consummate liar.
I guess you could say, the book IS stronger then the sword.
Fuckin’…. OK, I guess Cio’s the ultimate psycho gal-pal/girlfriend. One who you never, ever betray. On pain of mauling.
“I’m a devil and I’ll cry if I want to.”
Devil may cry
Oh, my heart….
So does this mean that Allison is gonna be an Amazon now?
So, uh, how did Cio not notice the book until we did?
wait, where was the book before?
This is how the most clever ones get you: not through force of arms, not by trickery or a shiv in the back, but by offering a glimpse of themselves -through- the mask.
Oh my
Came for the reveal, stood for the comments.
sheit
That a name which stands out. I sense a fellow spirit !
It is a commonly known feat of ROYALTY to be able to retroactively alter a lethal blow into an improbable parry, unbeknown to the attacker.
As a downside any clothes they are wearing will become shredded regardless of the attack made.
Downside?
Where you see a downside, the Rising King has merely Cut her garments into a superior form to support her bid for reconciliation.
To further the cio-devilman crybaby parallels (lol), in the previous chapter yab literally devilman runs
Awwwwww
NOW KITH :3
I imagine 00001 is just watching from a distance, gradually growing more and more annoyed with every second.
Just before they’re pulped by Scary Mary and eaten by Mammon.
A demon cries. And they aren’t crocodile tears. Many are the wonders under heaven.
gay
A sword is truly a double edged weapon that can be turned away by words
I still can’t get over this. Cio’s facial expression in the last panel makes me weep.
That is a top ten comics panel right there.
Easily in the top ten. And good contender for top five.
I just wonder how the rest of the party is getting on right now. Charon and Princess were looking especially worse for wear even before everything went explosively tits-up, but as they say, until you see the corpse, they’re not really dead.
*Freeze, record scratch*
*Cut to Incubus*
“You’re probably wondering how I could have let things get this far out of control; but I already have what I need. I have my path into Yre.”
I don’t know how this comment system works and at this point, I’m too afraid to ask.
Again? I wonder what stabbing in her past she regrets.
More of THIS stuff!!
Be not wrathful at first thought of many that came in to mine head as I stole eyes upon this page: “OMFG THE FEELS”
The wound on Allisons lip seems to match on of the lines on the hidden characters face from page 4-78.
What’s this? A titty?
Woah woah woah, I read this page like, two days ago, and there definitely was a nipple present. What happened to it? Some sorcery be amok…
@hungariantoast: Lol, reading this page for the first time and I’m so confused by all the nip/areola talk. Guess it was edited out. Whatever, I wasn’t too eager to see since I’m a straight woman XD
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