Comment by mythee

She's viewing the world through... hydrangea-tinted glasses?

Reply by Shazzbaa

oh my goodness I stared at my computer for so long trying to figure out how to make a rose-coloured glasses joke, i'm so glad we're all on the same page here

Reply by Mythee

All for one, and one floral!

Comment by Kiri

...Huh. Has Sev used "hella" as an adjective before? Is there a hell in this general belief system? I don't know why that struck me as a super weird word for Sev to use. :OO

ALSO SEV, WHAT IF JONAN MAKES ALL YOUR SCARY STORIES COME TRUE IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT.

Reply by Shazzbaa

he hasn't used "hella" before, though he has used "hell!" But no, their general belief system doesn't quite have a hell. There's a general notion of karma and the vague promise of an afterlife, so I could definitely see someone deciding that something that looks like hell must exist, but they only know "hell" as a word to describe something hellish (e.g., "look like hell," "going through hell,") rather than referencing a specific place.

Reply by Kiri

Hmm, okay, interesting. It's difficult for me to imagine (? grasp? understand?!) 'hell' with a separate meaning from the place, or without specifically referencing back to the place, since even those phrases suggest it as a thing to "go through" or to compare to. I'm only guessing that hell-related words all stemmed out of Hell and not the other way around though; I don't actually know. :O Hmm.

Reply by MagpieM

This is a ymmv suggestion, (because I seem to read a lot of fantasy stories written in mostly current English/American vernacular even if the setting is very much Not Our World) but I tend to assume that fantasy worlds have their own languages so what we are reading is actually a translation and that the "translator" is doing their best to use words and phrases that most accurately convey the right sense of meaning and tone rather than trying to stick to straight word for word translation (which, as far as I understand it, is how translators really do work! Swear words and idioms are often very hard to translate, for example.).

But, uh, yeah this another of those topics in Fantasy Writing I have thought waaaay too much about.

Reply by Jade

Next question: what reason would Sev have to describe the place as "haunted", as opposed to "creepy"? Like...are there ghosts in this universe? Do angry spirits linger? Are there ghost stories?

Reply by Kiri

Sev mentions ghost stories in the voting incentive, so there must be some belief, whether or not they actually exist in canon. (If zombies are a thing, would ghosts be?)

Reply by Jade

Wellll, here, zombies are loosely defined as "reanimated corpses." In most cases, they're puppets for the necromancer to use. For example, those zombie servants seemed to be 'programmed' to do his bidding. They don't need a spirit to function - Jonan's spells do that for them. So zombies don't necessarily mean ghosts.

I think Necropony might actually be an exception. It seems to do things without Jonan's constant input. It has characteristics that Jonan didn't intend it to have. It could have its 'soul', 'spirit', 'psyche', or what-have-you completely intact.

Reply by Kiri

Yeah! This is something I think about a fair bit too, since so much of our casual language is entrenched in the terminology of the popular belief system, such that even people who don't subscribe to those beliefs use them extensively. The translation thing does make sense though, since we do know that the RW cast isn't speaking English.

It still makes me wonder what sort of words they're actually using though -- would it be a term more closely related to their belief system, or something else? A lot of foreign curse words are just sort of like "garbage" or "trash" and get used to become every single part of speech (adjective, adverb, verb, etc), but they're still relatively secular in origin, so maybe it's something like that here. HMMM. I love fantasy linguistics...

Comment by Ely

*imagining Jonan doing some sort of convoluted snapping and tap dancing ritual to raise the dead or something*

Comment by MagpieM

*headtilt* Huh.

I have questions now. So many questions.

Comment by The Quiet One

Huh...the world looks very different for Aember...*plot thickens*

Also, love that Sev just blurts out how creepy the inn is. Just remember guys, DON'T SPLIT UP!

Reply by Shazzbaa

Severian, think a thing and then keep it to himself?? PERISH THE THOUGHT

Comment by Glew

Haha, that last panel made me laugh :D
This is usually not a gag type comic, so the unexpected joke was very effective :D

Also, I like how Jonan can actually be useful for a change :P Also also, I totally see him communicating with snaps even when he is not muted. He looks like that kind of person.

Reply by Glew

OH WAIT!

Maybe I totally misinterpreted this? I'm not sure if it's just that she sees more colour and light bc of the forcefield, or if she actually sees a different image. There is a dead tree on the 4th panel, but live trees on last panel.... Is that just perspective or "PERSPECTIVE"?

Reply by Shazzbaa

Good catch! :D

Reply by Jade

Maybe she's seeing through a charm that someone cast over the place. Like, someone doesn't want people milling around, so they put up a charm to keep people from going into the Ultra-Spooky Place.

Reply by Heather

Or perhaps the inkeeper managed to annoy the wrong person, and got a curse cast on their inn as revenge? Doesn't seem like the sort of thing you'd intentionally do to yourself.

Reply by Jade

It could be a temporary charm, one that can be removed and set up. The innkeeper might be a shady guy, and he doesn't want nosy newcomers waltzing in on his secret conspiracies.

Reply by The Quiet One

"Also also, I totally see him communicating with snaps even when he is not muted. He looks like that kind of person."

Hah! I had a similar thought and just couldn't articulate it. I totally agree - especially being surrounded by zombies with no names. Just as easy to snap your fingers at them as go, "Hey, you, shambling zombie #3."

Reply by Lynx-Eye

You just reminded me of the scene in "Monsters vs. Aliens" where the villain (Galaxar?)tries to assign a task to a specific clone in an army of clones.

Comment by Fal

There are small bushes near the door and above the corner of the wall, too, that Aember sees and the others not. So it's not just tinted.
Hey, the wall perpendicular to the inn's is different too! It has crenels in Aember-look and archs in normal-look!

So Aember's forcefield probably makes her immune to illusions, since magic can't get inside. But why would an inn-keeper deliberately make their inn look creepy?

Reply by Glew

Oh, I think you are onto something! Magic can't get through the forcefeld, so illusions probably don't affect her.
hmmmm...............

Reply by Shazzbaa

Oho!

Reply by Obligatonym

Maybe it's the work of a ghost. One might even say... a mad ghost!

But, seriously, yeah, these clowns seem like they would be the sort to just show up in a random town and make a beeline for the nearest aberrant. We already knew there was something runewritery/aberranty going on here, it was only a matter of time before our heroes stuck their feet in it.

Reply by Random Passerby

Presuming it is the innkeeper doing it. It could be somebody else. A competitor? Someone trying to keep outsiders out of town?

Side note, why is Æmber's S backwards in the last panel?

Reply by Shazzbaa

OH I FORGOT TO MENTION THAT, she has a bit of a lisp! :>

Reply by Random Passerby

Ah, I see!

Comment by Toanovu

Is she seeing what it looked like in the past, based on when she was frozen? Can a building change that much in four years? ...probably? Wait, but she doesn't see PEOPLE as how they looked four years ago (Sev and Tari would both look much younger), so... ARGH magic is confusing, hold on, I need to think this through.

Reply by Heather

That is also a cool theory! However, I don't think she's seeing 4-years-younger versions of all the rest of the party, and I would think that would be the case if she was seeing things as they were four years ago.

Comment by Why?!?!

THIS RAISES SO MANY QUESTIONS. Is AEmber seeing the true building? What's making the haunted feeling? And (earning my name here) WHY?!

Comment by Ikwig

Hmmm, the arches vs crenelated wall is particularly confusing. We readers actually appear to view the group through the arches (panel 3), so I almost want to think that Aember is the one who's seeing an illusion . . . On the other hand, I also wouldn't mind seeing one of our group try to go through the arches and hit a wall (too slapstick?).

Also, I feel kinda dumb now, since I was very confused by Xira rushing past Sev and Sev calling him "sir" - now I note that Sev is actually talking to a different trader (Alaqan? I hope that someday you will have the time to put up a little FAQ regarding the world you've created so us readers can more easily absorb all of its nuances and act all knowledgeable!)

At any rate, that was totally worth waiting until Tuesday for the update! ^^

Reply by Shazzbaa

....OH! I understand what you guys are saying! Sorry for the confusion, the reason those arches with the brick columns aren't in that last panel is actually just that Æmber is past them, not that she's unable to see them!

A DIAGRAM:


Also yeah, Alaqan/Trader are the same thing! :D "Alaqa" is their name for their country, whereas Varænskis tend to just name things whatever they want and refer to that particular race as "Traders."

(and omg a world-info FAQ would actually be a lot of fun to make, MAYBE I COULD ACTUALLY FINALLY MAKE AN UPDATED MAP,,,,)

Reply by Ikwig

Ahhh, thank you for the diagram - that is most helpful!

(And in re the world-info FAQ, DO IT, DO IT, DO IT, DO IT . . . please? :D )

Reply by Anna

Also do the chipped pieces on the side of the door look different because of Aember seeing things differently, eg. we see two big fallen off pieces of wall/plaster next to the door's edge on the right side from out point of view, and more chipped wall on the left side of the door, while in Aember vision they are missing? That's the first thing I noticed, so I thought she might be seeing the past, when it wasn't so derelict.

Reply by Anna

And of course the bushes and trees, they make it seem so much different. :)

Also why is Jonan feeling/thinking in the vote incentive? Does he not want Sev to tell ghost stories for some reason?

Reply by Shazzbaa

I just wanted to clarify that there's not An Entire Structure Missing when Æmber looks at it, she's just not looking at the arches. xD But yeah, there are definitely differences! :>

(Jonan just wants Sev to shut his trap and not stay up late talking!! Unlike the rest of the party, he will hear it.)

Reply by Anna

Thanks! I competely understood what you meant, I just wanted to know if that's also the reason for the crumbling wall not being the same in her vision, or if that, like the bushes, was intentional.

And haha, cool! Yeah! He must be extra tired with not being able to eat or drink!

Btw did Jonan ever kill anyone via the use of his spell?

Reply by Anna

Oh wait, I already asked that before and got the answer, that according to hearsay, not. :D

Comment by Tehbeefer

Maybe the building is just enchanted to match the style/taste of the person with the most money (i.e. Jonan) within a certain distance. It sure seems like the place a necromancer might stay.

Also, those are some interesting shadows on the brickwork.

Reply by Capsin

That's a really neat idea

Comment by Heather

Perhaps it's the whole town that's gone creepy- either as a side effect of past rituals, or the reason they're setting a ritual up now? Magic has all kinds of weird side effects.

Reply by Jade

Ahhhhh, so it's not necessarily intentional? I like that!

Comment by Tama

Question: why look different?
Answer: magic is weird, bruh.

Comment by theotherghostgirl

Well I guess she IS inside an impenetrable magic box, so I guess sketchy situations are a little less dangerous for her

Reply by Heather

Jonan is her favourite person, sketchy is definitely not something she worries about.