Guilded Age

Don’t think we argued or deliberated much over this one! It’s a nice simple image that shows urgent danger, whether you’re familiar with this comic or just joining us.

This chapter would bridge a lot of what we’d once outlined or imagined to be longer. The original plan was for the now ex-Peacemakers to become total refugees after losing their mandate. They would have journeyed across Arkerra by land, perhaps by air, and especially by sea, largely off the radar of Gastonia and Rebellion alike. Their mission would shift from peacekeeping to exploration, to discovering the undiscovered parts of this world, an idea we instead promoted in the final chapter. HR might’ve pursued them or had other setbacks. As is demonstrated in this chapter, his magicks are not infinite while he remains human, and his knowledge of this world doesn’t mean he can’t be surprised.

Could’ve been fun, could’ve ended up feeling like we were spinning our wheels.  But anyway, it was probably the least plot-essential story arc we could’ve cut, and we ended up having to cut one. We came up with that original plan in Flo’s apartment around the time we were starting Chapter 19. By the time we reached Chapter 34, as I’ve said elsewhere, we needed to shorten things due to not wanting to kill each other. So here’s where most of the sutures went.