Hero Oh Hero

[Grim Portent]

Sadly they also have the nuke. Though hmm do they have a way to phone home during the mission? I forgot. If not someone could just kill these two off.

They mentioned radioing number 3 to set off the nuke if the mission goes pear shaped, so I'd assume they have a hand held radio of some sort.

Course the nuke needing a trigger command is a flaw in their plan, if 1 and 2 get killed before they can call then the nuke is left out of play unless 3 decides to use it on their own. A better method would be periodic check ins to prevent the nuking, but then that would jeopardise the stealth aspects of the mission.

In any case, I imagine the JSP will get killed at some point, which will then leave the nuke as a floating problem because there's no longer a way to tell number 3 that Cheryl is about to be neutralised if he winds up in a situation where he's going to die anyway.

[lord_khaine]

I feel pretty justified in earlier comments about the JSP being the biggest liability on this mission xD

Hopefully one of the nightmares will sooner or later put them out of our misery.

[Welf]

Hopefully one of the nightmares will sooner or later put them out of our misery.

Well....

Those chapters really put emphasise on the whole nightmare experience.

[Kantaki]

Well, that was unexpected.
This specific outcome that is.
Mr. "I'm not feeling so good, Mr. Secret Police" being (the container/vector for) a nightmare?
Predictable. We are in the middle of a horror story after all. Those survivors were always going to be a problem.
But the exploding into a entrails-tentacle-worm-abomination-thingy (Scientific term.)?
Can't say I saw that coming. Honestly expected some kind of zombie mutation deal.

[TeChameleon]

Meh. That's the trouble with 'secret police'... they seem to by their very nature end up with paranoid idiots in positions of absolute authority. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

... feel a little bad for the head-'splodey-worm-monster guy, though.

[Forum Explorer]

Meh. That's the trouble with 'secret police'... they seem to by their very nature end up with paranoid idiots in positions of absolute authority. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

... feel a little bad for the head-'splodey-worm-monster guy, though.

Well there is still one left. And I'm not counting #2 out yet either.

The question is, was he a monster guy, or a guy infected with a worm monster?

[Grim Portent]

I think Two is going to be mortally wounded if not outright dead. Feels about the right time.

Commander seems to want Noah and Noel to run with the civilians, presumably to continue pursuing their goal.

Good on him really, for the tool of an authoritarian police state he's not so bad. He at least has some empathy.

[Welf]

I guess this was a crappy day for Number 2. And Halmer probably saved the day by telling Theodore about Noah and Noel's abilities. So he'll die.

[Grim Portent]

Hmm, I have a suspicion that number 2 is dead. Just a vague idea, mostly based on how gribbly those worms are, nothing else to support it really.

[Forum Explorer]

I got to say, the Empire and it's people is actually really good at this whole 'horror genre' thing.

[Kantaki]

I got to say, the Empire and it's people is actually really good at this whole 'horror genre' thing.

Not really. They're doing it wrong.
They were supposed to ignore/dismiss those suspicions and then be all surprised when the dying starts.
You know, like the Secret Police.
...
Wait. You meant surviving it, didn't you?
Then yes, the smuggler seems to have the right idea.

Also, Noah's great here. "Don't underestimate my onboard AI observational ability.
Reminds me of Rimuru and his GREAT SAGE skill from That Time I was reborn as a Slime...
"I totally realized that on my own. It definitely wasn't my skill/magic power telling me."

[lord_khaine]

The biggest question is where the heck Noel is.
He slipped away earlier. Hopefully he isnt to far away.
Him and Noah is a lot more effective together.

And nuking the city increasingly looks less like a extreme option..

[Welf]

This seems to be the worst monster so far.

Spoiler

Show

On a side note: Don't have daughters, that's a death sentence. The Smile guy in Toby's story line also had a daughter.

[Grim Portent]

Good show on Noah's part, he's actually learning to use Spirit properly, even if his coordination needs work.

[Ibrinar]

Yeah. And he is separated making me more hopeful that this arc ends with him not being under the direct control of a horrible government anymore.

[Forum Explorer]

Yeah. And he is separated making me more hopeful that this arc ends with him not being under the direct control of a horrible government anymore.

I doubt that. My money is on him becoming a valued and respected member of the military and proving the worth of the program.

Also we've yet to see a government that doesn't suck horribly. Not counting Tobi's home village as that seems to be from a different world.

[TeChameleon]

And even Tobi's home village had some hints that not everything was entirely kosher in the upper echelons, although they seemed to have better intentions than most of the outer-world governments.

[Kantaki]

"Are you not the least useless you've ever been?"
You know things are bad when the voice in your head gives you a pep talk.
You know they're well and truly f-word-ed if that's the best tey come up with.

[TeChameleon]

Well, Ciel has never been one for sugarcoating. Or anything less than skull-shattering bluntness, really.

And Noah's learning real quick. He's always been my favourite of the three protags (as entertaining as Burk can be), and he's got some incredible potential. He may not have the ability to bring much force into play, but with his sensory abilities, he may not need to; if you can reliably find and hit the weakest points on your enemies, then you can bring them down without being a juggernaut like Burk or a... hobbit-elf-catperson-ninja-thingy?.. like Tobi.

But we'll have to see. I'm still withholding judgement as to whether Ciel is a manifestation of Noah's subconscious or one of those weird chaos-spirit things bonded to him; if it's his subconscious, the poor kid's got issues. And if it's a weird spirit thing, then... yeah. He's got different, and probably rather more dangerous issues.

[-D-]

I wish to congratulate Number One for being #1. Levin despite his best effort, was #2. Still, he has the best chance to win #1 spot next April.


These were fair and unbiased poll results. Do not question the date when they were made

[lord_khaine]

Well cant doubt what Number One says, as that gets you executed xD

edit.
But yeah.. i think perhaps thats the right attitude to have towards Number One.
Not like its not deserved. He has done more to sabotage the mission than anyone else.

[Kantaki]

New comic

Oh well, there's some hope Mr. "Most popular character" gets eaten by a spider. Or otherwise removed from the ranking.
Unfortunately I doubt he'd go down alone and Noah and Noel still need those meatshields.

[Welf]

Unfortunately I doubt he'd go down alone and Noah and Noel still need those meatshields.

You certainly were right about that. But not sure if that was the last that we've seen of No. 1

[Grim Portent]

Well that isn't very handy. Chernyl certainly has a lot of nightmares running around.

Nice to see what Noel can do to the more magical monsters as well. I wonder if espers have limits to how much they can do their spirit manipulation or if it's basically a complete counter to magic that's always on tap?



I do hope number 1 is at the very least badly injured if he shows up again. I don't expect secret police to be good people, but he's a good stretch past being evil to being paranoid and stupid about it. Still he only has a knife now, so even if he does come back he'd be less dangerous.

Was a bit foolish of them not to finish him off while he was unarmed and grappling with Barney, but I guess the spiders are more of a concern.

[Kantaki]

New comic

I guess "brave Sir Robin" is a descent strategy for dealing with many of those nightmares.

So many grabby arms though...
Is this all one monster or some kind of swarm?
Also, is it made from its victims('s arms)?
Oh well, there's still enough meatshields left we might find out.

[Gez]

New comic

I guess "brave Sir Robin" is a descent strategy for dealing with many of those nightmares.

Not just a decent strategy, but probably the only real strategy. They're all just obstacles and the more you interact with them, the more of them get spawned nearby. There's a theoretically infinite amount of them because every nightmare can exist in several copies -- like the tall grinners, the sw'arm, the heart spiders, etc. --so it's not like killing one nightmare actually gets you rid of it for good.

The only strategy here is to reach Chernyl and do whatever it takes to dispel all the nightmares at once.

[lord_khaine]

This really is the most horrible power we have seen so far.
And by far the most powerful one as well we have seen in action. Nothing else really comes close when all of this is unconcious action.
Though just as much it leaves the question of what the backup plan was for when Malhart kicked the bucket.
Is it Noel. Can an Esper shut all of this down if he reaches the source?

[-D-]

Is it Noel. Can an Esper shut all of this down if he reaches the source?

If Noel could do it, Malhart would have done something.

It is hard to believe Malhart would leave Chernyl a threat, even if he had to abandon his orphans.

[Forum Explorer]

If Noel could do it, Malhart would have done something.

It is hard to believe Malhart would leave Chernyl a threat, even if he had to abandon his orphans.

I mean, maybe. Perhaps Noel could do it, but it's risky and attempting it would unleash Chernyl. Obviously that's not a concern now, but it would be a reason to not risk it while Malhart had her shut down.

On a different note, I kinda want to call Noel a hypocrite here. He's willing to kill #1, but refuses to kill Chernyl? Sure, #1 is deciding to be a threat, and presumably Chernyl doesn't know what she's doing, but come on. Chernyl's power is literally killing hundreds of people, if not thousands. To the point where the plan to nuke the city actually seems like a pretty reasonable response. #1 might be cruel, stubborn, and a tyrant, but he's also actively risking his life to save the city.

Also strictly speaking, he is right about Noel being a hazard to the mission. The Empire will execute Chernyl if they get to her. Even if they can disable her power, her crimes mean she will be executed anyways. That means Noel's goal is inherently incompatible with everyone else's. So yeah, he's going to try and save her, and that means betraying the group in some way eventually.

#1's timing was awful, he should've just prepared to intercept and shut down Noel's betrayal when it happened rather than forcing the issue, but he's not wrong about Noel.

[TeChameleon]

It's hard to sympathize much with #1 when he's spent pretty much the entirety of his screen time acting like a frothing lunatic. Incompatible goals, yes, but at the same time, #1's been perfectly willing to murder everything in sight for perceived slights to his authority, even if it would mean endangering the mission. He thinks he (perhaps with the help of #2) can handle the mission on his own, even though this is transparently not the case.

Eh, whatever. I might be judging him a bit harshly because I find Noah tremendously amusing and do not wish him to be killed by some humourless twit.