Latest Page Discussions/Comic Update Chitchat

[Buteo]

Akkk!

What a place for a chapter break!

Cliffhanger on steroids.

[Grade E cat]

There happens to be a video out there that sums up my current predictions for the next chapter surprisingly well. Just remember that I tend to lean on the optimistic side of things.

[Jethan]

I've had two nightmares about these dusklings breaking through to devour everyone.

They started out so cute and now they seem like the most terrifying monsters Minna has created.  Argh!

[Purple Wyrm]

For those curious there are apparently three species of snake native to Finland; the Smooth Snake (Coronella austriaca), the Grass Snake (Natrix natrix), and the Common Adder (Vipera berus aka the Common Viper). Only the adder is venomous.

There is also the Slowworm (Anguis fragilis), which is a variety of legless lizard. I assume Lalli would simply regard this as a 'weird snake'.

[thorny]

I sure hope there aren't thick clouds the next morning.

Presuming they get through to morning --

[Solokov]

unrelated to the current bit of the story, do we have casualty numbers from the over-run during the reclamation effort?

[JoB]

do we have casualty numbers from the over-run during the reclamation effort?

No, but the Danes supposedly inscribed the names of all the ones fallen at Kastrup on the inside of the Drogden tunnel's gate.

[Purple Wyrm]

unrelated to the current bit of the story, do we have casualty numbers from the over-run during the reclamation effort?

No, but the Danes supposedly inscribed the names of all the ones fallen at Kastrup on the inside of the Drogden tunnel's gate.

Some rough pixel counting, combined with a lot of squinting and not a few assumptions leads me to conclude there's about 490 names engraved on the gates and the arch above it.

[thorny]

I wonder whether the notoros will think -- as I did at first, and as some others in the comments apparently did -- that that was a gunshot?

And, if so, whether it'll cause them to at least partly retreat?

[wavewright62]

I wonder whether the notoros will think -- as I did at first, and as some others in the comments apparently did -- that that was a gunshot?

And, if so, whether it'll cause them to at least partly retreat?

I'm one of the ones who thinks it was a gunshot or other such projectile and not a head-bonk.  While we have seen trolls leaping great distances without regards to physics (Leaftroll I'mm looking at you), I still doubt that that is what this one did, based on the tower they were forming.

[elekia]

Just out of curiosity, and I'm not sure if this has been discussed before, but does anyone have any theories on what affects the kind of troll an infected human becomes?  For example, the Notoros are implied to be former children, yet they've shown an understanding of guns, problem solving abilities (catapulting one at a window, even though it didn't work), and can speak.  Plus, I'm curious about what caused them to grow those thick hides that allows them to withstand more light than other trolls.

Compare them to some of the other formerly human trolls the team has met, and they look quite different, like leaf troll (I think that's what it was called) or the one that was clinging to the ceiling in that hospital way back.  Leaf troll seemed somewhat intelligent, burrowing under the snow, but couldn't really speak, and the ceiling troll acted more like an animal.

The transformations' effects seemed random at first, but now we're seeing specific types, which I find pretty interesting. 

[thorny]

I have no theories on what affects it; but I wonder whether the Notoros were ever humans at all, or anything other than trolls. They show no signs of the distress of the trolls that used to be humans or other creatures. And they seem to be pretty close to identically shaped -- not as if they're the misshapen results of conversion, but as if this shape is normal for them.

[wavewright62]

I have no theories on what affects it; but I wonder whether the Notoros were ever humans at all, or anything other than trolls. They show no signs of the distress of the trolls that used to be humans or other creatures. And they seem to be pretty close to identically shaped -- not as if they're the misshapen results of conversion, but as if this shape is normal for them.

I'm inclined to think that too.  The segue into black speech is yet another puzzle, rather than an answer.

[Elleth]

I have no theories on what affects it; but I wonder whether the Notoros were ever humans at all, or anything other than trolls. They show no signs of the distress of the trolls that used to be humans or other creatures. And they seem to be pretty close to identically shaped -- not as if they're the misshapen results of conversion, but as if this shape is normal for them.

That's what I've been thinking, too. I've tossed around some ideas in the comments over time, that maybe the luonto/fylgja/other spirit-type companion creature of a person influences the shape of a troll (not so sure about that now, might as well be random or influenced by environmental factors, especially re: the Sjödraug adapting to underwater life), but that the instances of identical (or near-identical) trolls have never been human, and are a product of either nesting or budding off a parent organism (that may have been human once). So far they've all appeared in close proximity and moved in groups - the Splamps, the Squidwolves, and now the Notoros. In case of Splamps and Notoros we didn't see the parent organism (yet, in case of the Notoros? Maybe it's the eye thing Lalli is set against on the chapter cover, if that isn't the Hotakainens' "It"); in case of the Squidwolves it may have been the giant. That still doesn't answer the question of humanity, but assuming we're looking at a hivemind of the troll "siblings" that they share with their parent... maybe the Notoros' parent is a related case to Pastor A. who managed to hold on to some humanity, but not enough to combat troll instincts completely?

Okay, maybe I'm just overthinking.

[wavewright62]

The correlation in the imagery used in the last few pages intrigues me:

There is some breaking through to be done in both worlds.  I hope it will happen in one world, and fear it will happen in the other - I suspect it will happen in both.