When your worm is a trauma magnet
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Out-of-Placers
A story of inconvenient changes
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cute
Reasonable reaction. These things are practically unstoppable juggernauts in a medieval adjacent society. With the population of the city being what it is, and the context that he earned this injury while acting as a guard, she must assume either humans or yinglet bandits did this level of damage to him. Which is… unlikely, to say the least. The only thing that could threaten a baxxid without serious equipment and a significant numbers advantage would be another baxxid, and thanks to their careful cultivation of their reputation, the idea that another baxxid might have done this to him probably doesn’t even cross her mind.
This really puts into context just how scary the indrel are. One worker managed to do this damage. With no weapons. Even if our poor boy was holding back and didn’t want to hurt her, managing to hurt him so seriously is a nutty feat. Just imagine what a swarm of frenzied indrel could do. Given that as an insect hive they probably breed in very large numbers, I think even one hive could wipe Valsalia out if they were so inclined. It’s a darn good thing they don’t appear to have any interest in doing something like that… thus far.
I didn’t consider it from that perspective. If you weren’t there, you’d have a very hard time trying to figure out what happened. And if you didn’t know about the Indrel, you’d be completely baffled.
Yeah I was thinking about it a little more, and I realize that that is basically solid bone. Like this would be the equivalent of not simply injuring someone, but crushing a thick bone like a femur or hip, or taking a chunk out of a piece of solid rock. Sure, even Nell would be able to do it, but it would require the use of some pretty heavy tools, and it’s pretty obvious that this wasn’t done with tools, but with a sudden attack.. literally less than 24 hours into him getting this job, when he is still in the orientation period and hasn’t even been deployed.
Actually, it would be like coming home from your first day of on-the-job training as a security guard, and showing the charred remains of your helmet, like you worked at Black Mesa or something.
In fairness to Black Mesa, they were an equal opportunity employer, and it’s probably not fair to extrapolate it from the events of just one day…
That is a good point. I guess I should specify, black Mesa on the day of the Resonance Cascade.
Actually that makes it even better, because it’s like, imagine he’s just doing Barney’s job, the guy at the front desk at Black Mesa, a place where very little ever happens because they do in fact have some safety standards… And literally in his first day at the front desk there is an interdimensional alien invasion.
The redsmith recoiled · at that horn ruined
by clinging claw. Her beloved Kal,
indestructible · as he had seemed,
she found defaced, his crest fallen.
I was wondering how he was able to hide that from Nell, until it occurred to me that she probably didn’t notice until attention was called to it.
Zhink of it as a new friend showing up wizh a very bad haircut as an analogy.
Except for all you know, this is just what they look like with a bad case of bed Head, because remember, she doesn’t know that it’s not normal for them to just cleave off chunks of that headgear.
He needs a hug. And possibly assistance in filing down the rough damage. I bet that’s something a jewel smith can do. Used to handling gemstones, and all that Very delicate work. Not to mention, extremely intimate 😏
Something along the lines of kintsugi?
Then they’d first have to go and find the broken pieces…
Hence “along the lines of”. Besides, I don’t think this world has a Japan.
That silver sculpture in the first panel seems a bit…. Suggestive…
Well, it didn’t until you said something! Now I can’t unsee it haha
Golly, provocative…
Future me here: definitely a ying-nis, definitely a deliberate choice by the artist, definitely a deliberate choice for Nell to show that to him.
I’ve JUST realized, looking at the page for the probably like fifth time and counting all the previous pages she’s been on, that her little durag she wears on her head looks like one of the baxxid’s head spikes. Coincidence, or another reason Kalgkur has been drawn to her?
Oh crap, and her skin and smock are the same tone as the plating/ folds/ whatever that is beneath his head. Now that I’m looking at it and comparing the two, she could be a humanized interpretation of a baxxid…
I think part of what really pains me about how long new pages take to come out is that, on some level, I’m really just here to see the weird alien characters cuddle, and everyday that this page is the last is another day we have to wait to see this particular relationship progress.
I want to see the worms and the fluffy raptor creatures do more of the things.
More of the things includes Kalglur wrapping himself around Nell to give her a full body hug, like a snek.
There’s always Patreon, and EVENTUALLY Deviantart for the more, um Yinglet-y approved furry stuff. Lots of stuff zhere zhat isn’t cannon exactly, zhat de boss can’t post here.