Annotated 14-2
I don’t think this was quite conscious, but after the brutal scenes for Byron in the last chapter, I was a bit eager to rebalance his narrative with some broad comedy. Sorry for overusing the Bruce Banner line, though; we’d put it to bed after this.
It’s interesting to me to trace the development of Syr’Nj and Ardaic’s relationship (a term I use in the broad sense). His remarks on the last page were not a rhetorical trick: he is under pressure from the Heads to keep proving his Peacemaker initiative is a good idea, and that pressure has only increased now that the leadership of the Peacemakers no longer matches their demographic. But here he airs his own concerns: intellectual pursuits are all very well, and at this point he even respects Syr’Nj as a scholar. But you don’t put Stephen Hawking in charge when the boys are pinned down in Nam.
As usual for her, Syr’Nj gets her best results with weaponized, focused honesty. She and Ardaic will clash again after this, but he will never question her basic competence or focus again.
(Also, “Savage Races,” not “World’s Rebellion.” For one thing, Syr’Nj knows her audience here; for another, even she is only so civil about the preferences of a people whom she’s met once and who then killed her.)
Alt-text got et by Byron, it seems.
He Ka-chop’d it.
RIP Alt-text.
I was pretty swamped with other stuff this weekend, but the alt text should be restored as of a couple days ago. Thanks to y’all for keeping me honest there.
I know the Savage Races ultimately attack the Wood Elves to seize Gaia’s whatchamacallit, but when was it established that they wanted to anhilate them? Harky has it in for anyone allied with Gastonia which includes gnomes and non magic elves, but I thought it odd that he never sent any envoys to Syr’Ng’s father. Given his hatred of the humans he should be a natural ally. Or is all this something she’s telling Aradic as a way of assuring him the Wood Elves are not planning to join forces?
Character-wise it might make sense, but elves in their three different “types” all seem to be presented as extremely reclusive at the start of the story. um, more importantly though, in the sepia world HR mentions that he set up the entire attack to manipulate the war and…kill the adventurers faster (I think?). I guess Harky is still an NPC in the story, despite how good of a character he is.
I have the original alt-text as
“After years in the military, it’s understandable that Ardaic can deal with free thinkers like Syr’Nj and her elk.”
That needs to be reinstated, stat!
(Also, urgh, “your ilk” is such an instant cue to stop listening to whoever says it unironically.)
Along with ‘you people’.
Ardaic’s like “I’m fine with him killing friends and foes indiscriminately as long as he does it efficiently.” õ_õ
There are quite a few real-world warmonger types who take the same position re: collateral damage.
I’ll take overuse of Bruce Banner’s catchphrase over overuse of Peter Parker’s uncle’s catchphrase any day.