All right, looks like everything’s up and working! I’ve been sitting on this site redesign too long, and just needed a couple days to get everything remade. And in a strange bit of good (?) timing, my Wacom tablet died a few days ago, which I assumed was the universe’s way of telling me to get off my ass and update the site already. Thankfully Wacom made a speedy repair and delivery back, so I’ve already sketched up the first few panels of the next OOPs page.
And a special shoutout to Xandispin, who first suggested a site update several months ago, then set up this snazzy new WordPress layout for me to customize (which I then sat on until this past week). Thanks man; it took me long enough to get around to it, but without you the site would still be looking like something from the early 2000’s!
Seriously, I was manually creating pages and re-entering every altered link when there was a new page, using a long-defunct version of Dreamweaver 2001. That gets tiring real quick.
Anyway! There’s some new stuff in the Art & Extras section now as well, which you might not have seen if you don’t frequent Deviantart and such.
They’re less amusing than the ones from the earlier parts of this sequence but we’re going strong on a streak of at least one incredible Yinglet face per page since Narklet showed up.
Having finally caught up, I have to agree that despite the seeming simplicity of the drawing, it’s unbelievably expressive, even for the creatures lacking faces.
Oooh, lore drop time?
This sounds like the kind of thing Vizlet shouldn’t be saying inside the enclave, where the walls are thin and the doors are made of cloth. I hope she can count on her spymaster to ensure nobody is eavesdropping and ready to rat her out. What will she say to Kass that she wouldn’t say to Viracroix directly? How deep is this rabbit hole with the antiquities?
ok so what do we want to bet that narklet is a human female turned ying male and the reason he is so adamant about kass taking ‘her’ rightful place at the enclave is actually jealousy/species and gender dysphoria in the opposite direction.
Not much, but it’s a cool idea. He does believe in guidance from the Heavens, after all, so that militates slightly against your idea. It WOUDL explain the naivete, but …
VIZ: “I know this is what Trademaster Viracroix has sent you among us to discover . . .”
KASS: “That makes one of us!”
VIZ: “?!”
KASS: “Seriously, he didn’t tell me shit. Like, you’re probably right, but if so I’m discovering the purpose of my spy mission by being explicitly told by the person I’m spying on.”
VIZ: “!?!?”
KASS: “But anyway yeah your secret’s safe with me, I’ll make sure no-one can trace this info back to you.”
When kass first meets the trademaster this is one of the things he wants to know. How the yings are so good at fimdimg antiquities when the traveling moon brings down the tides.
The answer is they have a Narklet.
Narklet gets…some kimd of insight from listening to the stars…
Oooo, the juicy things are happening!
Nark so small, so tiny, so baby. And yet still needs some dang perspective. I can only imagine what the Central Enclaves may truly be capable of, if they may have better access to Antiquities than most, but we really don’t want an interspecies war.
Most every Yinglet (at least those not aligned with Vizlet) seems predisposed to think that Humans are against them, only want to use them at best, and exterminate them at worst. That’s a bad recipe for trust and learning, and a viewpoint Vizlet and Viracroix seem adamant on trying to break, as well they should, and I hope they can.
Otherwise, I fear peaceful coexistence will be very, very difficult, as every other Yinglet will assume there’s an ulterior motive. And there may well be, especially with Viracroix, but why can’t that also bring good?
In 36 Kass meets the trademaster and this is high on the list of things he wants to know about yinglets. How do they know where to look when the traveling moon brings down the tides.
Is the traveling moon a giant ship? And narklet is picking up signals from it like a fluffy genetically bred for radio?
I don’t know if it’s the traveling moon, but I definitely think there’s an ancient satellite up there in orbit, sending messages, and someone in the central enclaves figured out how to pick up the messages. Narklet has been taught how to do it (or has a tool that he uses). His internal thoughts on some of the earlier pages show that he really does believe it’s the divine voice of ancestors, which might be what the central enclaves believe as well. Heck, if my theory is true, then from a certain point of view, that IS a voice from somebody’s ancestors.
It feels like Kass is coming into his own now, perhaps more so than when he was a soldier. His roots as the son of a merchant are bearing fruit.
Pretty sure he would have preferred becoming an Officer and coming into his own to have occurred without the species and gender alterations.
Oh, absolutely. Credit to him though, he’s doing the best he can with the bad luck he was dealt. And I know it’s unlikely, but I really do hope that by the end of the story he gets restored to his original human male form.
Panel 5: “We all make mistakes in the heat of passion, Kassen”
Inb4 Vizlet gives Kass a smek in return. (:
I have a conspiracy theory… this might be a long-shot, but hear me out.
… is it possible… that female yinglets… aren’t born? like, all yinglets are born male, 100%, with no females at birth.
… and the only reason why there ARE females… is that humans are kidnapped while they’re very young (or sometimes adults) and they’re given the green stuff that turns you into a female yinglet. That’s the reason why females are so rare, and that’s the stuff that Narklet and his zealot friends have been gathering.
I… might be WAY off the mark, but still.
there’s also the possibility that male yinglets are given the green stuff too, but still, that may explain a lot.
In the Art & Extras, there is a side story. In it, it is mentioned a female was born. And at the end of it, a baby girl yinglet is shown.
I…ENORMOUSLY dislike the idea of yinglets kidnapping infants with the intent of raising them into breeding females. That’s horrific.
This would either imply that Vizlet was converted when she was too young to remember being human, or she was REALLY good at feigning her surprise at Kass being a former human