Not that I’m cheering for Jhalm, but I can think of at least 2 indirect ways for him to incapacitate Murai, without even unsheathing his sword, at least 3 ways without cutting her, and if he decides to just kill her and be done with it, well, that’s a depressingly large number.
It’s not that Jhalm is evil. He’s not. He is however one of those dangerous people who *knows* that he is Right. And once he gets fixated on something (like Wombat=bad) he can’t change from that position without some sort of massive change to his worldview. I wonder if Murai can give him one?
I’m touched by the genuine concern that Jhalm is showing for Murai’s well-being here. He’s a misguided figure, sure, but I think we need a bit of reminding at this point that he’s not really evil and that Murai, even knowing what she has to do, could be justified in adoring him. It makes the scene that much more poignant.
Is it wrong that, due to his obvious concern for her well-being and anger at the first person to come to mind who could have caused it, I ship it now?
Regarding the sword, it’s *possible* that his first reaction was to assume that she’s being a good Veiled and guarding the temple in these interesting times. Then again, they usually seem to do that with the weapons sheathed until a threat presents itself.
It’s also entirely possible that he is choosing to disregard the sword and to see if by not calling attention to it he can defuse the problem by getting slightly unstable little Murai who is waving cutlery around to come see the nice men with the tranquilizers.
Just saying. Because Jhalm isn’t really stupid, or evil…That isn’t an evil thing to do, and it’s certainly an intelligent thing to do.
I smell an epic fight scene coming up.
Oh, and everyone, remember that Ursula’s birthday is on the 28th. I say we celebrate next Thursday.
One last thing, don’t forget to VOTE! http://topwebcomics.com/vote/10180/default.aspx
Actually, she wouldn’t have been injured at all if Digger had followed her instincts (or recognized the prophesy in time) and stayed off the unstable snowfield. So technically it actually is Digger’s fault, but that’s beside the point …
Remember Digger’s comment about wounded veterans? Jhalm sees Murai as someone who was injured in service. He may be misguided, arrogant and close-minded, but he believes he’s doing the right thing. Murai is a member of his order wounded in the line of duty. He has every reason to be protective of her. He’s an excellent example of why absolute certainty is so scary.
@Your Obedient Serpent
The button you press to vote doesn’t actually say “vote” on it. There should be a picture of a character from some other webcomic, and the picture has that character’s name on it. You have to press the button that matches the name on the picture. That’s just it’s way of knowing whether or not you’re human.
As happy as I am to come back to Murai, perfect pacing to maintain dramatic tension by the way, I am dying to know how Ed makes a purple dye. The only method I can think of off the top of my head involves shellfish, a type of conch to be specific, and I doubt that would be much use to the Skins. So unless the People have advanced petrochemical industry, I am stumped for the moment.
Am i the only one who was half-expecting “Your arm! It has a sword on the end of it, and it’s being held in a menacing manner!” or something of the sort?
Your Obedient Serpent says: “Jhalm has “a mind like a steel trap”, as I define it: once it clamps down on an idea, it’s gonna take a crowbar to pry the poor wounded thing loose.”
“A mind like a steel trap….
yeah, rusted shut!”
I sure hope that some communication gets established before violence happens. :-{(
It’s at this point in the story that my mind wants to follow both stories at once and am quite tempted to stop reading for a few months so i can read them both at once in a glory of goodness….. like a book that you just stay up waayy too late reading until you’ve finished all the requisite chapters and have come to a plot lull. Unfortunately Ursula has me addicted and I can’t seem to stay away that long. Damn my hide.
> Everyone keeps saying “vote vote vote”, but the page has no vote buttons that I can see.
For some reason Ursula has never added a Vote Button to the page (nor a vote incentive at TWC, either). Nevertheless, someone always posts the voting link; if you look for it, find it, click on it, and then follow the instructions at TWC, you should be able to vote successfully.
@Poppiesnroses. I’m thinking Jhalm may have encountered some of the Hyenas or possibly an angry shrew and her trolls. He probably didn’t walk away unscathed.
It would be less exciting story telling, but maybe Murai could take Jhalm up on his offer to get her to a healer. That would at least force him to delay while taking Murai to a healer which would give Digger, Ed, and Skin Lizards more time to get where they need to go.
@Jewelwolf Is there anything our humble community, um that’d be us, could do for her Birthday?
Still rooting for the breath of fresh air that is Murai at least keeping Jhalm from going underground, if not converting him to The Way of the Wombat. 😛
Now, after Jhalm’s arc we will get back to Digger and Ed just in time to hear (see?) the skins say:
“Yay! This is wonderful way for making purple ink, but lets mention it no more now. We will take you to the god. Lets go”
😀
@Duck Whisperer: I think we could just say “happy birthday.” Other than that, there’s nothing we can really do. Unless we all decide to make fan art and post links. Actually… I might do that if I didn’t suck at drawing.
I’m still thinking he’s an excellently charismatic man who can weasel his words into any form he wishes. I’m worried he’s going to try to get closer and maybe disarm her by just taking the sword from her hands–though we known Murai would definitely see that one coming. She’s no idiot when it comes to Jhalm–after all, she’s had to work with him. She knows he’s had to talk gods down from doing “crazy” things before, and this is prolly no different for him. And yes, ignore the blade until absolutely necessary….diffuse the situation long enough to distract Murai…and then take her down. That’s his thought process, I bet.
This is another point where my dislike of violence and my adherence to the pragmatic maxim come into conflict. Yes, i feel all malicious violence is wrong, yes Jhalm is, if measured by his intentions, a good man. And yet, as a pragmatist in the original sense of the word, I believe that the only morality any action can have IS its consequences. If the intent behind an act does not alter the end result, then the intent has no bearing on the morality of the act. Clobber the bugger before his good intentions screw everything up Murai! Without malice and, if reasonably possible, non-lethally, but clobber him now whilst he’s worrying about your arm and you’ve got a chance. Why didn’t you just say “Yeah, my arm aches here, can you have a look at it please?” and club him unconscious with the pommel/ poke him in the good eye with the sword whilst you had the opening? But know, you’re going to do this according to a set of formal rules and custom and let him draw his sword and face off to you because you, for some mad reason, hold that to be the same as honour. Madness.
Then again, I would be lying if I said I wanted the story to end without that extra drama the fight and Digger’s inevitable face of with Jhalm in the tunnels would bring. If a little genera blindness is what the plot needs, then I’m for it. I suppose there are worse idiot balls to be carrying that misplaced martial honour.
Oh well. Happy birthday Ursula if I forget to post on the 28th.
Go Murai! Wooo!
How long before he wonders about the sword?
Yay Murai~
Not that I’m cheering for Jhalm, but I can think of at least 2 indirect ways for him to incapacitate Murai, without even unsheathing his sword, at least 3 ways without cutting her, and if he decides to just kill her and be done with it, well, that’s a depressingly large number.
It’s not that Jhalm is evil. He’s not. He is however one of those dangerous people who *knows* that he is Right. And once he gets fixated on something (like Wombat=bad) he can’t change from that position without some sort of massive change to his worldview. I wonder if Murai can give him one?
I’m touched by the genuine concern that Jhalm is showing for Murai’s well-being here. He’s a misguided figure, sure, but I think we need a bit of reminding at this point that he’s not really evil and that Murai, even knowing what she has to do, could be justified in adoring him. It makes the scene that much more poignant.
Is it wrong that, due to his obvious concern for her well-being and anger at the first person to come to mind who could have caused it, I ship it now?
Regarding the sword, it’s *possible* that his first reaction was to assume that she’s being a good Veiled and guarding the temple in these interesting times. Then again, they usually seem to do that with the weapons sheathed until a threat presents itself.
It’s also entirely possible that he is choosing to disregard the sword and to see if by not calling attention to it he can defuse the problem by getting slightly unstable little Murai who is waving cutlery around to come see the nice men with the tranquilizers.
Just saying. Because Jhalm isn’t really stupid, or evil…That isn’t an evil thing to do, and it’s certainly an intelligent thing to do.
One way or another, this is going to hurt.
Both of them.
Plain and simple, Ursula rulez the intarnetz. Let’s make sure everyone else knows that, too. Go vote!
http://www.graphicsmash.com/comics/digger.php?view=current
I smell an epic fight scene coming up.
Oh, and everyone, remember that Ursula’s birthday is on the 28th. I say we celebrate next Thursday.
One last thing, don’t forget to VOTE! http://topwebcomics.com/vote/10180/default.aspx
He’s blaming DIGGER for her arm being injured?
(How did that happen again?)
@Hunter: She fell into the cravasse on the Peacock’s Tail.
In all fairness to Jhalm, she might not have been injured quite so badly if Digger hadn’t fallen on top of her. 🙂
http://www.diggercomic.com/?p=586
Actually, she wouldn’t have been injured at all if Digger had followed her instincts (or recognized the prophesy in time) and stayed off the unstable snowfield. So technically it actually is Digger’s fault, but that’s beside the point …
😉
What happened to Jhalms eye? I don’t remember him wearing an eyepatch before.
Jhalm may be misguided, but it looks like Murai Isn’t Being Taken Seriously. Hopefully, this will soon be remedied.
Jhalm has “a mind like a steel trap”, as I define it: once it clamps down on an idea, it’s gonna take a crowbar to pry the poor wounded thing loose.
(Everyone keeps saying “vote vote vote”, but the page has no vote buttons that I can see. =/ )
Remember Digger’s comment about wounded veterans? Jhalm sees Murai as someone who was injured in service. He may be misguided, arrogant and close-minded, but he believes he’s doing the right thing. Murai is a member of his order wounded in the line of duty. He has every reason to be protective of her. He’s an excellent example of why absolute certainty is so scary.
@Your Obedient Serpent
The button you press to vote doesn’t actually say “vote” on it. There should be a picture of a character from some other webcomic, and the picture has that character’s name on it. You have to press the button that matches the name on the picture. That’s just it’s way of knowing whether or not you’re human.
My first response is “Ohhhh, here it comes!”
Of course, Jhalm immediately blames Digger. >:(
But I suppose he does have rational reasoning in his head, considering that he sees Murai’s ingury as something of improtance.
As happy as I am to come back to Murai, perfect pacing to maintain dramatic tension by the way, I am dying to know how Ed makes a purple dye. The only method I can think of off the top of my head involves shellfish, a type of conch to be specific, and I doubt that would be much use to the Skins. So unless the People have advanced petrochemical industry, I am stumped for the moment.
Am i the only one who was half-expecting “Your arm! It has a sword on the end of it, and it’s being held in a menacing manner!” or something of the sort?
Your Obedient Serpent says: “Jhalm has “a mind like a steel trap”, as I define it: once it clamps down on an idea, it’s gonna take a crowbar to pry the poor wounded thing loose.”
“A mind like a steel trap….
yeah, rusted shut!”
I sure hope that some communication gets established before violence happens. :-{(
It’s at this point in the story that my mind wants to follow both stories at once and am quite tempted to stop reading for a few months so i can read them both at once in a glory of goodness….. like a book that you just stay up waayy too late reading until you’ve finished all the requisite chapters and have come to a plot lull. Unfortunately Ursula has me addicted and I can’t seem to stay away that long. Damn my hide.
> Everyone keeps saying “vote vote vote”, but the page has no vote buttons that I can see.
For some reason Ursula has never added a Vote Button to the page (nor a vote incentive at TWC, either). Nevertheless, someone always posts the voting link; if you look for it, find it, click on it, and then follow the instructions at TWC, you should be able to vote successfully.
In case you missed it in JewelWolf’s post, here’s the link: http://topwebcomics.com/vote/10180/default.aspx
Hi! Am I missing something, or has Jhalm recently undergone an eye injury? Because I don’t remember him having an eyepatch when we first met him.
@poppiesnroses: I’m wondering about that myself.
@Poppiesnroses. I’m thinking Jhalm may have encountered some of the Hyenas or possibly an angry shrew and her trolls. He probably didn’t walk away unscathed.
It would be less exciting story telling, but maybe Murai could take Jhalm up on his offer to get her to a healer. That would at least force him to delay while taking Murai to a healer which would give Digger, Ed, and Skin Lizards more time to get where they need to go.
@Jewelwolf Is there anything our humble community, um that’d be us, could do for her Birthday?
He got it back when the Cold Ones surfaced for the first time, first shown here. http://www.diggercomic.com/?p=351
I love Murai’s expression in the third panel.
Still rooting for the breath of fresh air that is Murai at least keeping Jhalm from going underground, if not converting him to The Way of the Wombat. 😛
Now, after Jhalm’s arc we will get back to Digger and Ed just in time to hear (see?) the skins say:
“Yay! This is wonderful way for making purple ink, but lets mention it no more now. We will take you to the god. Lets go”
😀
@Duck Whisperer: I think we could just say “happy birthday.” Other than that, there’s nothing we can really do. Unless we all decide to make fan art and post links. Actually… I might do that if I didn’t suck at drawing.
@JewelWolf & Duck Whisperer: There are other arts than visual. 🙂
(Serendipity rocks. Tune in tomorrow, same wombat-time, same wombat-channel.)
Then just what are you suggesting, Madam Atom?
@Jewelwolf. I would absolutely love to make fan art, alas my drawing prowess is pretty pathetic. I did draw a pretty good Anteater once.
I’m still thinking he’s an excellently charismatic man who can weasel his words into any form he wishes. I’m worried he’s going to try to get closer and maybe disarm her by just taking the sword from her hands–though we known Murai would definitely see that one coming. She’s no idiot when it comes to Jhalm–after all, she’s had to work with him. She knows he’s had to talk gods down from doing “crazy” things before, and this is prolly no different for him. And yes, ignore the blade until absolutely necessary….diffuse the situation long enough to distract Murai…and then take her down. That’s his thought process, I bet.
It would be less dramatic, but if she’d let him take her to the medics, it might have bought Digger more time…
This is another point where my dislike of violence and my adherence to the pragmatic maxim come into conflict. Yes, i feel all malicious violence is wrong, yes Jhalm is, if measured by his intentions, a good man. And yet, as a pragmatist in the original sense of the word, I believe that the only morality any action can have IS its consequences. If the intent behind an act does not alter the end result, then the intent has no bearing on the morality of the act. Clobber the bugger before his good intentions screw everything up Murai! Without malice and, if reasonably possible, non-lethally, but clobber him now whilst he’s worrying about your arm and you’ve got a chance. Why didn’t you just say “Yeah, my arm aches here, can you have a look at it please?” and club him unconscious with the pommel/ poke him in the good eye with the sword whilst you had the opening? But know, you’re going to do this according to a set of formal rules and custom and let him draw his sword and face off to you because you, for some mad reason, hold that to be the same as honour. Madness.
Then again, I would be lying if I said I wanted the story to end without that extra drama the fight and Digger’s inevitable face of with Jhalm in the tunnels would bring. If a little genera blindness is what the plot needs, then I’m for it. I suppose there are worse idiot balls to be carrying that misplaced martial honour.
Oh well. Happy birthday Ursula if I forget to post on the 28th.
Jhalm’s asking if Murai if Digger hurt her is strikingly similar to how Digger asked Ed if Jhalm hurt him.