With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

Thank you, corrected.

Do you have any references for intelligent dragons as of 4th edition?

 

We dont have an overview of the various non-YJ crossovers somewhere do we? It would be nice to read up on the chapters set in the other universes, there are hears between some of those chapters.

 

I was reading earlier chapters from the anti-life apocalypse going on and was wondering, since anti-life is spreading through the thaumosphere and getting on people's souls and whatnot.

Would Paul be immune if he still was soulless, not having absorbed enough magic? Unless I'm missing something with the vector of transmission. From a meta perspective it seems sensible since there was nothing Source-like in his home reality.

 

Magic can affect non-magical stuff. Paul was extra vulnerable to magic attacks before he had a soul, not immune. The thaumosphere wouldn’t directly affect him like it does people with souls, but if it can infect him like it can affect apocalypse the planet (ie made of non living stuff), so it wouldn’t help much

 

Despite Tyrion's disagreements with Teclis on what goes on outside of Ulthuan, he's oft considered the more charismatic of the two though, and add on Paolo's ENORMOUS contribution to elfkind, (that would surely have earned the favor of The Everqueen and commoner elves everywhere, if the majority of Asur nobility are too proud be grateful to a human), as well as helping out his brother with his medical issues, I rather doubt he'd be entirely unpleasant to be around.

Let me guess, he's incessantly cheerful with a small amount of condescending compassion without realizing it, due to not being acclimated to talking to humans?

 

Do you have a reference saying they don't exist? It's a big world. As I recall, your grounds for stupidity was an animal-handling check for dragonriders. All that proves is that the majority of Elven dragonriders ride bestial dragons; it doesn't even prove the Ulthuan special characters rode dumb beasts. Let alone Wood Elves, Chaos, and whoever else I'm forgetting.

Also I'm pretty sure Egrimm van Horstmann's story includes him making deals with his intelligent dragon mount. Which wouldn't pe proof, since he's a two-headed Chaos monstrosity, except I remember he outright says he made a deal with Chaos, meaning he was intelligent before.

 

Yes. The original description of Prince Imrik noted that he could rouse the greatest dragons, and gave his mount +1 on the monster reaction table. The greatest dragon in Ulthuan was still an animal, just a slightly more loyal one

Baudros didn't even get the +1.

I'm not saying that they haven't retconned it since, I'm saying that's how it was in 4th and 5th.

 

use it

 

Oh, joy. They've been led astray already? Or is Mercury just not that good at navigating in Fairyland? I mean, this particular one was just born today. So she has an excuse for not being very good... I guess OL got what he paid for.

Spoiler: Commentary spoilered for length

Certainly, the land would have evolved over time. In which case I'd have half-expected a wilderness. Perhaps a blasted heath or looming forest...

And that's really a reflection of ancient cultures. Where anything more than a couple of day's travel from home may as well have been on the moon as far as most were concerned.

I'm guessing she's working from echoes in Rob's metaphysique, the psychic scent of his ancestor.

Oh, that's not good. Some sort of earth elemental?

Man, life around here must be fraught with risk, given a Hero fighting a Monster could break out and rearrange the landscape at any time.

Ah, the style of physical features as seen in the Discworld Trolls. Since they were more like ambulatory geology as much as living beings.

Sometimes it can be hard to see the shape of things when you're dangerously close to them.

Ah. That'll be Captain Cornwall the elder.

...I hope he's tough enough to withstand what is basically a landslide.

Okay, definitely tough enough. No doubt in a mystical realm like this, Thaumovores like the Cornwalls are immensely strong.

Well, shit. Guess that confirms that this place can be affected by it, at least.

I doubt there's any sort of mind-control-breaking ones in his arsenal.

Ah, damn, regeneration via excavation.

Antaeus, for the record. A godling
of sorts who was invincible while touching his 'mother', the Earth.

Well, Hercules beat him by lifting and... Squeezing by way of bear hug. Hopefully they won't need to go that lethal here.

Heh. Will-o'-the-wisps. Naturally a spell for misdirection would take that form.

I can't imagine she's looking forwards to touching a mind infected by Anti-Life a second time today.

Clever, OL. Peeling away one hook at a time, slowly unravelling the torn bits and pushing them back into place. Letting his mind heal them on its own.

hopefully that doesn't count as 'consuming local food' for the purposes of binding him to this realm...

Don't take it personally, old man. They don't have time to play games.

Especially if it's particularly aggressive once it's out. It might well take a pseudo-physical form in here.

...I hope he knows what he's doing, because this looks rather...

Well, good to know now. Mister Marrack could have said something sooner.

So, something akin to a giant protoplasmic sheathe. Kind of like the old Malibu character, Prime. Except his shell was made of the local landscape.

Oh, this should be amusing. First time they're technically met in the flesh, so to speak, rather than in spirit.

All right, then. Contact made. I expect there'll be an explanation for the giant stone-man thing, but really, all OL needs is whether or not they can contact Erebus from here. One step closer to their original objective... Unless Graham knows someone suitable to command the Yellow Ring around here. That would be a good time-saver, assuming they don't get hit by otherworldly time-displacement issues.

 

‘trailing’?

’an’?

So fomorians are just normal-sized people who make giant magic armour?

 

I mean, it is a land of old school fae.

It's bound to be weird.

Fairy: Ha! Good luck trying to get out of this landscape! It is so confounding that even I don't know how to get out of it!

In combat you may sometimes not be able to say what you want because you're in a rush.

 

use it

 

Giant stone creature makes me ponder what Markovia and how the royal family is doing. How many metahumans are having their metagene trigger from the stress of the current event? I'd assume the Sheeda invasion could have caused some as well, but can't find a line for it.

Time to ditch the concrete walls of Belle Reve and start borrowing from the Norwegians, building a fairyland Bastøy Prison! A prison dimension for a better, more reform focused prison system after the current social order comes crumbling down.

 

Thank you, corrected.

No, they're a little larger and have a number of subtle differences. And it isn't really armour so much as an more elemental body.

Yes. Weirdly, I've actually read some of those.

 

What episode was it where he merged with ophidian?

 

Contingency, I believe? And then the following chapter, Reordered is when it gets resolved?

 

If Paolo is going going to introduce chocolate to the World of Warhammer, would this make him the "Candy Man" to Paul's "Cake Guy"?

If THIS is what firmly cements his legend in the minds of mortalkind, not the Greenskin purge, not setting off the Beastmen conversion to Taal, not the expanded Waystone network, not enabling the big baby boom of the Elves, not the other hundred-thousand different things he's done in ensuring the prosperity of the whole world, but the invention of CHOCOLATE, I look forward to his ongoing irritation and everyone else's amusement.

And God help him if it turns out Chocolate is essentially what Ginger is to The Race from the Worldwar series. Aranei will be even more clingy than usual.... the other reformed Druchii and Teclis included, possibly.

 

I hope he doesn't underestimate the Anti-Life for long, because thinking it only affects the weak willed is just asking for an infection.

That should say 'Robert'.

 

Heh. Stern fellow, but aren't all Grandfathers when their descendant has apparently been up to no good? I guess the robes are more practical than a set of tights like Graham might have worn in his heroing days. And allow for some measure of armour beneath them.

Spoiler: Commentary spoilered for length

Since OL is more or less the commander of this mission, after all. So it's up to him if they can discuss it...

No doubt Graham is well-read enough to know who Melinoë is. Wonder what he thinks of the fact his young lad is hob-nobbing with Olympians.

Since fearlessness tends to be something of a requirement, especially amongst the Celtish tales.

And any choice they can think of is just... No.

Heh, It took him a second to remember Rob's name, eh? Been a busy time, I guess. And working for or with Cernunnos, the Horned god? I suppose he's the closest thing to an ultimate authority in this realm

No doubt whatever gateway they're using to force their way in is going to be heavily guarded... Joy.

Feeling uncertain about your final destination, Rob?

That's a lot of folks. An average of four a century, maybe more depending on mortality rates...

Ah, OL. Blind to the gentle mocking of your teammates.

Surprised he hasn't been using it more. Trying not to rely on it, I suppose.

...Which just raises questions about how it works when he's not directly connected to his shadow, say, by flying. That's magick for you.

How civic-minded of you, OL.

I bet many of them will just look at him like he's a foolish child playing dress-up. Given the super-suit and all. Such is the prerogative of the old.

I'm guessing there's a few layers of interpretation needed, given he probably doesn't speak anything resembling modern Welsh or English.

Grandpa might be one Rob's interested in visiting. Did he even ever meet the man while alive?

Knowing your family line goes back fifteen centuries or more is one thing, but actually getting to meet all of those ancestors is quite another.

More into it than his father or grandfather, I see. We already knew that, of course.

No doubt the old man's proud of him for upholding the family duty and taking it more seriously than his predecessors.

Don't be surprised if old ties still bind some families. They might make a stopover here before moving on to the Silver City, maybe.

Admittedly, before the super-hero era, it's only be appropriate to use that title if they held that military rank, commanded a ship, or both.

The drawback of it being a waypoint. Not much in the way of long-term occupancy.

Heh. Asking the questions OL was just wondering about. Fortuitous.

I suppose there's a certain comfort in knowing what will happen to you when you pass on. Especially an afterlife that comes with the option of full-time work.

I suppose the elder Marrack has seen some shit in his time, both in the living world and the next. Given the way he just rolled with all this. And it looks like the chain of subquests rolls on, with the need to protect Otherworld from a Justifier incursion. At least it's less likely that there'll be a Finality interrupt on this side of the dimensional barrier. Hopefully...

 

Cernunnos, that’s an odd piece of human history… Across many cultures there are creatures of legends who pop up separately. Giants, brownies, sea horrors, creatures associated with death or undeath… and Cernunnos. Horned men, typically ram horns, but sometimes elk antlers. Worshipped sporadically and associated with natural spaces like groves.

This Cernunnos would be associated with the faiths of Otherworld. A god? Maybe. Tainted by Anti-Life? Perhaps, but more like a city leader than a slave. Annoyed at Paul? Probably not.

 

"keep to"

I remember a scene in the American Gods TV show where a Muslim woman dies and Anubis comes for her soul.

She asks him why he's there when she doesn't worship him and he replies that the stories about him and his family greatly inspired her and were dear to her, so she falls under his purview.

The religion that they practice may not necessarily mean that they'll go to that religions afterlife.

When Paul died and went to Heaven an angel there told him that they sometimes get pagans coming there because while they worship gods that are not the Abrahamic one, their faith may not be that big and they'd be influenced to a significant degree by Abrahamic beliefs, so they go to the Abrahamic afterlife.

The people in places like Ireland, Wales, Scotland and Britain may be majority Christian, but if they keep the old stories close to their hearts then that could influence a lot of their actions.

Even if they just view them as entertainment, that could still have a big impact on their development as people.

A lot of people can be influenced by characters and events from fiction books, TV and movies, so the same may apply here.

 

Hed probably tell him to watch his back.

Especially around Zeus.

Yeah, Celtic myth is really iffy on who's in charge and it tendeed to change a lot.

There was Bres, then Nuada, the Lugh and Dagda etc.

Or indignation.

Remember that Robin was hit with AL and Graham saying that it only affects fools and wastrels would be incredibly insulting.

Imagine getting traumatized by something horrible happening to you and someone calling you weak for being traumatized.

Or they may just think that the clothing just changed for their little order.

They already know about Graham and his son, so they may not care anymore about them choosing such clothing

They could use translation spells.

Or he may have learned the language.

 

Thank you, corrected.

 

‘whose’

‘Those infected’?

I am surprised to learn that they are actually called crane grab buckets. Feels like a really clunky name.

‘an oracle’

I was surprised to learn that there are almost a million Wiccans according to Wikipedia, but I imagine that they’re much less pious than the Celts on average, as well as being much less numerous than the Celts, and some of them probably believe in stuff that doesn’t ‘count’ properly for going to Otherworld.

 

Wicca isn't a singular religion.

There are a dozen different interpretations of what it is and it tends to include practices and beliefs from a lot of different religions and regions.

Celtic practices are present and prominent, but you can also find practices and beliefs from old Norse religions, old Egyptian religions, Native American religions etc.

So yeah, a person can be Wiccan but may do things a lot differently compared to another Wiccan.

 

I wonder how long or often she'll be doing that. She's eaten food from both the Otherworld and Earth, and the fact that she wanted food from Earth might be meaningful (id est she might not be as trapped in the Otherworld as suggested). If Shard Mercury resents Main Mercury enough, she might do things to try to distinguish herself that could lead to her being around Paul after this mission... or maybe I'm tired and reading to much into this.

 

Thank you, corrected.

 

I suspect a lot of the old magical traditions and beliefs will come back when it turns out they helped in protecting people form the Anti-Life.

Which brings me to: what are Hepheastian and the others doing? Is there an area in Greece that is protected?