February 22nd, 2016
And oooh boy, the vote incentive. All theories just got smashed. :P
posted at 12:13am on February 22nd, 2016
I LOVE U GUYS, I PROMISE, EVEN WHEN IM JOSSING YOUR THEORIES <3 <3 <3 <3
posted at 12:17am on February 22nd, 2016
Aww, I know, I know. <3
posted at 12:53am on February 22nd, 2016
I think it might just refer to her being a Runewriter. There is clearly religious support for them.
If something else, well, that's not promising. Being a "chosen one" is kind of like being a "hero". It's something other people have to call you, not something you decide you are.
posted at 4:41am on February 22nd, 2016
They also called her The Manifest, didn't they? Back on page 23 of this chapter, one of the religious dudes says she is "chosen of the Artist, manifestation of His will". So I'm guessing it's a religious calling of some sort?
posted at 11:46pm on February 22nd, 2016
Though, if I were like, twelve, and someone told me I was the chosen one, I would DEFINITELY tell EVERYONE xD
posted at 8:23am on February 23rd, 2016
She's twelve or thereabouts? Yeah, then I'd probably make a big deal of it too.
posted at 10:52am on February 23rd, 2016
Yeah, it's kind of hard to see she's short when we never see her standing.
posted at 12:27am on February 24th, 2016
"but how do you..."
...hear me if it's soundproof?
posted at 1:06am on February 22nd, 2016
My wild guess is that it's soundproof only in one direction.
Or Æmber has learned to read lips while she was trapped in there for years?
posted at 6:11am on February 22nd, 2016
Yeah, those two were my guesses as well. Either that or Æmber could already lipread to start with for some reason.
posted at 8:31pm on February 22nd, 2016
I think it's safe to say she's reading lips too. : > (Which would explain why she immediately assumed that's what Tareth was doing!)
posted at 8:26am on February 23rd, 2016
That last panel is just too adorable. Augh.
posted at 1:41am on February 22nd, 2016
Well I already love Ember
posted at 2:44am on February 22nd, 2016
Haha. I love how AEmber is just "oh yeah, forcefield, chosen one, who cares. This is my squirrel!" :3
posted at 4:32am on February 22nd, 2016
omg this is a perfect summary; LET'S JUST SKIP ALL THAT UNIMPORTANT STUFF
posted at 8:42am on February 23rd, 2016
So... anyone got any new theories on the whole "not eating" thing? I've got some theories on it being related to the whole Manifest/Chosen One thing, but that doesn't explain the squirrel. I guess "time magic" is still an option, whereby she might intermittently pause time for herself or rewind the effects of time on herself.
Also, I wonder how the priest guys are gonna react to this, if at all. I mean, this probably isn't the first time someone's managed to communicate with her, but on the other hand she sounds like she doesn't get a whole lot of conversation in there.
posted at 5:05am on February 22nd, 2016
Well, we know no objects can get in or out. But it's been previously established that runewriters with the right sort of powers can hydrate people from the outside, so perhaps runewriting effects can get in, and that's the sort of thing that's going on?
posted at 8:41pm on February 22nd, 2016
Aww, Æmber's been without company for far too long. I'm glad she gets to talk with Tari!
posted at 6:23am on February 22nd, 2016
Everyone else is all excited about the eating-problem but I'm just like nah maybe she, idk, does magic and gets food out of the air or something? (Or maybe she had more squirrels than the only one left OK SORRY NO.)
Or maybe she's the spiderman of this city. You know, bitten by a mutant squirrel and now she's got super powers and she can do miracles and talk to squirrels and, um, do squirrel things. And find food out of nowhere.
But what made me curious is that "everyone expects runewriters to have some stuff wrong with them". We can see Sev is very good at this, and Jonan has some minor problems too, and Aember is not doing much better. We even saw Iavin with his some kind of a scar thing on the head, and wasn't that guardian lady someone like that too? So - what about Xira? He doesn't seem to have any problems so far. Either he hasn't been doing witch stuff long enough to fail OR he's mentally insane. Or he's miscasts haven't hit him but the victim... I mean, he does stuff in people's HEADS. You can't convince me he's never made any big big mistakes. (Maybe that's why he's no longer with his family.)
posted at 10:00am on February 22nd, 2016
Very valid point! I know I pondered this too. I mean I don't even want to imagine what kind of disaster he could do without a miscast, not to mention with one.
Also the vote incentive suggests you can research rune of certain purposes? As in Jonan was looking for a rune that silences someone. So there must be SOME sort of known logic or system behind runewriting, one that even runewriters know of. I mean this far it was said that it is unlike other fantasy magic which you can just learn from books, that it is very intuitive. But this suggests, there is in fact an element of control over what kind of new spells you get.
That being said, it then says an awful lot about someone what kind of spells they can cast...
posted at 8:05am on February 23rd, 2016
I think Jonan's vote incentive bit is referencing how he created---from his healing magic---a rune to seal flesh together. Which he uses to bind people's lips together so they can't speak and thus can't say the verbal component of rune casting. I don't think Jonan necessarily got the spell from anyone.
posted at 6:25pm on February 23rd, 2016
I just have to say, I read the vote incentive and then walked away to run some errands, and couldn't stop grinning. Here I am walking to the post office thinking about how much I love how magic/Runewriting works in this world. And how chill Sev is with having horns. And then how Tareth says everyone expects Runewriters to have something wrong with them. Like it would be weird to have a talented Runewriter with no problems whatsoever. That's hilarious and so perfect and now I can't stop grinning and chuckling.
posted at 10:26am on February 22nd, 2016
omg I'm so glad, THANK YOU SO MUCH and thank you for this amazing comment
posted at 8:44am on February 23rd, 2016
Tareth could run a little class for Jonan and Æmber to learn Handsign. That'd be entertaining to watch XD
I wonder if there's something to the miscasts, they're apparently common, but if so, I doubt the Agorath order has ALWAYS been hunting them down and kidnapping them. Hmmm.
posted at 10:27am on February 22nd, 2016
Might also be worth nothing that Sev has always had the horns, but that never set off the Order's aberrant detection dagger.
posted at 8:34am on February 23rd, 2016
HMMMMMMM
posted at 12:38pm on February 23rd, 2016
Ominoussssss.
Maybe they are up to something?
...
Naaaah :D
posted at 7:58am on February 24th, 2016
WAIT WHAT YOU'RE THE CHOSEN ONE
Do you typically just throw that out in casual conversation, is that your usual lead-in
DANGIT MY CURIOSITY HAS GONE UP TEN NOTCHES ALKFJ
posted at 11:12am on February 22nd, 2016
Ember has been stuck in here rehearsing her small talk for FOR-EV-ER. She's worked out the best opening gambit.
posted at 2:06pm on February 22nd, 2016
Maybe her chosen-ness refers to being chosen to care for Chitter, the sacred squirrel.
posted at 8:43pm on February 22nd, 2016
That would certainly be a rather interesting plot-twist.
posted at 8:08am on February 23rd, 2016
I'm guessing that, unless she does something like air quotes, lip-reading doesn't show sarcasm or irony.
posted at 10:11pm on February 22nd, 2016
I don't know, but I assume that facial expressions can give you quite a lead when it comes to communication intentions. As long as the speaker uses appropriate facial expressions.
But this is an iteresting point.
posted at 8:09am on February 23rd, 2016
Yeah, I'd agree with Glew -- if you're just depending on tone of voice, I guess not, but I feel like usually you can tell from someone's expression that they are possibly being a bit sarcastic. xD
posted at 8:38am on February 23rd, 2016
Due to personally having sucky hearing such that all my sarcasm-detection comes from face, not voice: I can confirm both that you can see from their face, but also from the actual content of what they are saying; however, I am also notorious for missing a *lot* of sarcasm. People also miss my sarcasm a lot as I only do face-sarcasm which can lead to interesting scenarios (e.g. I was not *actually* planning to attend my school formal with live butterflies in my hair. Sigh.)
posted at 12:32am on February 24th, 2016
Second-to-last panel: Tareth asks the question we've all been asking since Æmber first appeared.
My theory is that Æmber survives through the power of cute. The laws of physics try to catch up with her, stop when they see her face, and then she brings out the squirrel and it's all over.
posted at 11:46pm on February 22nd, 2016
askdfjfk THIS IS MY FAVOURITE THEORY YET
posted at 8:39am on February 23rd, 2016
Why do I get the feeling the church people will be all, "You should stay and be our communicator with the chosen one!"
...Everybody keeps asking about her getting food. But what about using a bathroom? D: That might be quite awkward if it's not a time- or need-for-sustenance-freeze thing as well as a forcefield.
posted at 1:02am on February 23rd, 2016
They'd just use a chamber-pot that gets filled and taken out.
posted at 4:37am on February 23rd, 2016
I'm sure the church wouldn't mind keeping her for a bit. If anything, they might have a save spot for the nigh.
posted at 11:07am on February 23rd, 2016
I love this page. Dunno why, it's just really fun :)
posted at 2:51pm on February 23rd, 2016
New theories:
Firstly, that this has happened before- the vote incentive shows that Sev's main miscast-fix-technique is 'wait for it to go away'. So maybe this has happened before, on a more temporary basis, leading to maybe a rather hungry and thirsty 24 hours before it wore off, after which measures were sought such that should it happen again, she'd be ok. She's the 'chosen one' after all, I'm sure the church would go to great lengths to make sure she's all good.
My second theory is that the squirrel is no ordinary squirrel. Ember might be able to cast forcefields, but she's got nothing on the mighty magical powers of the squirrel. Ember's well fed in there, but she's super super sick of acorns by this point.
posted at 12:37am on February 24th, 2016
SHAZZBA I PANICED AND TOLD MY PROFESSOR I'D DO A PAPER ABOUT YOUR ART.
Specifically, how you talk about your art. Short artist statement of you can?
posted at 5:52am on February 27th, 2016
Please email me! <3 shazzbaa AT foskie DOT com
posted at 11:38am on February 27th, 2016
Comment is awaiting moderation.
posted at 9:16am on August 15th, 2023
Life, forcefields, hunters, eating. Yeah. Stuff. Now the important stuff. This is my name. This is my squirrel. Now we are friends.
posted at 5:48pm on September 21st, 2017
Comment by The Rancid
The chosen one? I wonder what that means...
posted at 12:10am on February 22nd, 2016