This conversation is a roller coaster, my God!

Woah.

I will have to read it later again, for now it got an incredible bitter Taste.

Oooh boy, none of this bodes well for whatever's next.

Ohhh if Chilli knows that she is actually right?

And i bet there will be surely some surprises when Luna chooses the new knights.

Pretty sure Miralle and Chilli gonna go ape shit if Luna promotes Nigel to a Knight, Leo will begrudgingly accept Luna's decision.

I'm almost SURE that Nigel an Tristan will become Knights. As well as Leo, Mira and Chilli. I mean, when i remember right, there where at least SIX blessed scarves there.

And if we take the one that Nigel "ruined" away, there are five left. So everything comes together.

It is clear that she NEEDS Nigel as a Knight, she has seen him in his prime if he would open his heart to others, she now goes out of her way to force him to see what she wants him to see. So yeah she puts now a lot of effort into Nigel a bit to late for my taste. She even said it before as Nigel was trying to steal a scarf that "it was a shame what he did before his great day" implying that she would made him a Knight anyway.

Out of the cast, despite Luna's seemingly forceful approach in regards to Nigel, the one I'm most curious about is Tristan, considering out of the five, excluding Alexander and luna of course, from what I understand he's the only one who has no desire to become a Knight or Guardian, as well as being the only one, who had neither a genuine family or parents, a home, positive interactions aside from his chance encounter with Luna, and unless I'm mistaken he's also an outsider, being the only one to not actually come from the village that the other four reside in.

The sixth Knight will probably be Lily (Alexander's daughter), who has not yet been seen.
Although I must admit that I am curious to see how Luna could pass the candidacy proposal of a 6-8 years old girl!!!

Well that could be possible.


And, heh, i whould say its the classic "desperate times require desperate actions" thing.

She needs meat for the grinder.

Well Lilly is a Demigod so her powers will be more then welcome.

One more regret for Luna's actions, poor Tristan grew up to be a small fry criminal and now is in the Dungeon with the supposed chosen one Nigel. Yay!

So Chili has mood swings and could go on a berserker rampage? I wounder who she will hurt in the process, probably some innocent bystander.

No worries. Her butt acts as a fluffy magical crumple-zone for rage-based incidents.

Haha, dont make me thing about Chilli going "Hulk-Mode" XD

*imagen a fluffed up sparrow in the winter or a very fierce chicken poofed up*

Waiting for a page with a hug moment.
Seems she knows how things might roll out and wishes it could be a little nicer for everyone.
The group seems to be having a rocky start and she probably just wants to hug them.
Poor Luna just seems so worried and wants everyone happy.

She needs the hugs so bad.
Curious what she'd be like with a normal life without the goddess role or at least in good happy times without all the bad stuff going on.
Just wanna see her happy.

This is like. Real family conversation. The children not really looking at their mother as she talks so they didn't or don't see her pain oh what's to come for them.

Mom looks so desolately sad the whole time... Did she realized her daughter growed up being quite a spoiled dupe? I mean... She thinks the city master thief looks unskilled...

Well, at least someone paid attention to the only person in town helping the beggars.

Chili hulking out and just her butt gets bigger.

Hope Deer-Mom won't be sad all the time now.

And then Chilli does the Ground Pound!

I have a feeling you will get your wish, but not at all in the way you wish it. I think the biggest part of her sadness is knowing her own impending fate and her limited time to secure hope for the future, as evidenced by Nigel's Not-Nightmare on page 17.

HAH! So she DIDNT knew that tristan was in jail... so much for everyone who thought deer mommy was playing 4-D chess... hell.. even i believed that for a second.. makes her actions seem even more BS

I don't really see it that way - it strikes me more as a resignation, a remorseful exclamation, exactly as she does with Nigel in the previous page. I feel she's been keeping tabs on and well knows what sorts of things Nigel has been up to, just as she likely has with Tristan.

You misunderstand, many people on the pages before this one where all like "Oh she blinded him so he has to rely on Tristan and learns a lesson about compassion etc. etc." But that would mean that she knew tristan was allready in jail. This page and her reaction though show that she had no idea that Tristan was in jail. So she blinded Nigel without a plan! She isnt playing 4-D chess.. shes making shit up as she goes. Infact her response here is that its the first time she heard about Tristan being thrown in jail.

I mean, it is a reasonable interpretation of her actions, and again, I disagree. To me, it reads much more like a remoseful exclamation than any sort of reaction to a revelation. Only time will tell for certain, but I get the impression that she knew this course of action is necessary to even have a chance of Nigel acting like a Guardian for a change, and that his support will be essential in the coming days if the others have any hope against Chaos. It is established canon that she does have prophetic visions of the future, likely in a manner similar to Nigel rather than some absolute form of omniscience. It is entirely plausible that she knew that she would need to humble Nigel in some manner and send him to prison for a day, whether he's released or broken out by Tristan.

It's also strongly implied (from Rah'jan) that Luna is not as pure and good as she presents herself, and she openly admits that she is naive at some level. Even if she was purely well-meaning, even if she does have some unique level of insight into future events, that doesn't mean that she's perfect even though she definitely is engaging in some manner of foresight-based manipulation (i.e. 4-D Chess).

Im sorry but why should she ask "if anything interesting happened" if she allready knew that tristan was in jail allready? She is confirming her suspicion that Tristan was captured in the panels on this page not confirming what she allready knows... this is some serious twisting of what we are presented to fit a narrative

It isnt reasonable to believe she has it all planned out either because the implications of that would make her a horrible monster that toys with mortals like toys instead of a wellmeaning but disconnected from real life goddess! Lets take nigel trying to ruin the ceremony for example: If she had known that he would try to do that as people are implying and that he would be there, she could have easaly prevented him from actually ruining one of the scarfs and confront him with no need to actually blind him! But she didnt, and there are only TWO possible reasons as to why: either she didnt knew nigel would try and was genuinly surprised and disapointed that he did.. or because that would have meant her TRAP would not have worked, and that she would no longer have a reason to cripple nigel. It would have meant that she WANTED nigel to try and ruin the ceremony so that her machevillian plan would work out in the end. She NEEDED him to attempt to ruin the ceremony... wich would harken back like a red string all the way to nigels childhood when she denied his guardian candidacy in the first place despite making plenty of "unfit" candidates (according to her own standards btw) into full fledged guardians no problem!

THAT is what believing she has it all "planned out" would actually mean!

I personally dont believe shes that malevolent that she would inflict such a horrible live on a child just to get her will. I would rather see her as a well meaning but inept goddess then a cruel manipulator that would make the chaos gods of 40k nod in aproval.

So yeah.. i wholeheartedly disagree with this fan theory/narrative that has come up in the comment section to explain away Luna acting like a wrecking ball when it comes to nigels life.

I think you're over-analyzing a lot of this four-dimensional-chess stuff. I feel it's way simpler than that. "Oh, Nigel is going to be at tomorrow's ceremony, excellent! Oh...I see, he's going to be like that. Well, he still needs to be a Knight, but doing things this way is going to be really unpleasant. Maybe I can still get through to him by talking it out..." I'm not speaking for others, I hope, but I never thought Luna had things planned out to that degree. The story never gave me that impression, merely that she has a level of awareness and foresight far above that of others. In fact, and this is again my interpretation, I feel that Luna implies that Nigel's powers of foresight might exceed her own if he were to actually try honing them.

To simply rebut, I disagree - Nigel has been his own wrecking ball. Luna has done nothing but try to help him achieve his desire and speculative fate of becoming a Guardian. You are correct in that her methods haven't been effective, haven't been "perfect." But it's pretty well-established that none of the gods of this world are/were perfect. It's always been on Nigel to decide how to handle his parents' rejection. Him trashing their home is all on Nigel. Him blaming Luna for his parents' rejection is, again, all on Nigel. His parents' rejection of him isn't even Luna's fault, but instead lies squarely on their own now-deceased shoulders. Nigel rejecting her guidance and counsel is still all on Nigel. Luna does not have a duty to make him understand, to force him to comply, and is only now acting in this much more interventionalist manner because she sees no other option, another speculative prophetic vision - "If Nigel doesn't join the others, all life on this world is doomed to fall to Chaos. If he remains so self-righteously angry, at me and at the Guardians, he will never join the others." Up until this point Luna has overwhelmingly preferred to have others live their own lives and find their own path. She's always struck me as the kind of person to bend over backwards if they ask it of her. However, few do due to the unequal relationship of The Goddess of Life and regular mortal beings - those that do revere her don't want to seem demanding or imposing (e.g. Chili and Tristan) and ask what they feel is too much. Chili only asked to live with Luna at Mira's brash insistence that she do so, to which Luna happily agreed.

After reading the page here's my thoughts:

-It would seem that Chilli seems to have suspected or realized there's more to Tristan than meets the eye, which I'm very happy with, cause I'm assuming other than the Luna, no one else has actually to know the real him.

-Luna seems to have regrets about Tristan's present situation too, so from that, I guess that means, yes, she's been aware of what happened to him when she left to his own devices, as well as what he had to grow up with.

-Chilli has mood swings, I suppose in the Q and A's this was played for laughed, but I am intrigued to know that this is in fact quite a serious problem for her, so I am excited to see how this plays. I guessing Nigel's going to trigger this a lot, since he seems to really get on her nerve's.

-Luna seems to be unable to predict or sense things as well as she could, considering she's asking the two girls for details, in regards to what's happened during the day, she appears to have a shocked expression when Miralle is talking about Chilli's mood swings, and it also appears she was just reminded of Tristan. I could be wrong, but that's what I've concluded.

-Miralle doesn't seem to be observant in regards to seeing things beyond what she originally perceives, based on her opinions in regards to Tristan.

Overall I'm very interested into seeing how things develop in the future for these characters, and other potential interesting interactions between them.

I have to agree. It is all very interesting. I f***ing love this story. I find Mira's...level of density a little disconcerting. It might be my perspective, but I get the impression that she doesn't even remember Nigel from his childhood confrontation episode. I'd like to think I would remember an event like that where some hotheaded kid threw a rock at my mom, even if I didn't remember it with perfect clarity, but I suppose it's plausible...just troubling.

While I can’t speak for the others, Honestly I don’t hate Luna or think she is evil, but I am angry at her for mishandling the situation that is Nigel, which would make sense as a character flaw she has sense handling children (Especially Angry Emotionally Neglected Ones) is not something she is familiar with https://www.furaffinity.net/view/35609179 and that’s ok to be mad at a character for messing up a situation badly, it just means that your emotionally invested in that story and character.

For the record, I agree - she absolutely did mishandle Nigel, and I strongly get the impression that she realizes that and is disheartened by it. I don't think Luna is...evil, but the story thus far has implied that she isn't the faultlessly-pure soul that she lets on, that she, speculatively, has done some form of past atrocity that created Rah'jan or something along those lines.

What I reject is that Luna had some sort of duty to Nigel, an obligation, that she should have known every detail in advance and take the exact course of action that would have resulted in Nigel growing up much more like Toby. Firstly, even at their first meeting, that would have required a much higher level of interventionism than Luna is comfortable with, even if she did know future events with that level of clarity. As the Goddess of Life, she overwhelmingly seems to prefer people live their own life and find their own way, only nudging and guiding them in ways she thinks might be helpful. Even with Chili, she only accepted their request (at Mira's urging) to live with Luna - Luna didn't want to impose and offer such a situation herself. Remember that a lot of people in this world revere her, and give her words incredible weight - a fact that she is all too aware of. Luna strikes me as the kind of person to bend over backwards if you ask her to. Of course, that sort of relationship means a lot of people don't want to feel like they're asking too much of Luna, so they often don't even bother asking, as was the case with Chili initially and possibly with Tristan also.

As established, though, she's far from perfect and has plenty of her own faults. Furthermore, even if her form of guidance was faultless, flawless, and perfect, it's still on the other party to actually listen and follow through. Luna told him exactly what he was missing, both when he was angry-child and now as angry-young-adult, and both times he still dismissed and rejected it. I'm not saying blinding the poor guy, temporarily or otherwise, is justified in any objective measure, but Luna likely sees it as a last resort of necessity, what with her limited visions of future events, and is definitely not happy about doing so.

“What I reject is that Luna had some sort of duty to Nigel, an obligation, that she should have known every detail in advance and take the exact course of action that would have resulted in Nigel growing up much more like Toby” Considering that Nigel has a unique skill set that is essential to defeating the threat of chaos, she does sadly have an obligation to both his safety and mental development if she doesn’t want everything she built and cherish to be consumed by chaos.

“that would have required a much higher level of interventionism than Luna is comfortable with, even if she did know future” she wasn’t comfortable with blinding Nigel, that didn’t stop her, if anything had she intervene beyond her comfort level sooner rather than later things wouldn’t have escalated this far.

“Furthermore, even if her form of guidance was faultless, flawless, and perfect, it's still on the other party to actually listen and follow through. “ if her guidance was less flawed it would have taken into account that being emotionally compromised inhibits one sense of judgement. Luna only noticed and responded to the whole ‘blinded by anger’ thing after Nigel was a young adult and not when he was a child even if her ‘teaching method’ of getting around that involved literally blinding someone.

Next Knights are the boys in jail. Lol

"Tomorrow will be very special indeed."

Meaning something really bad is probably going to happen that will necessitate picking the worst knights imaginable, one of which is currently in jail.

Regardless that I like that the conversation between Luna, Miralle and Chili sounds like a family, which is a healthy thing by the way, I must say that even though I feel even more sorry for Luna regarding the Tristan thing, it's good to know that Chili senses that there is something good in him. Leaving that aside, I already want to know how this goes on; amazing page and amazing work.

I don't recall if this was established yet or not, but theory: perhaps an indicator of possible corruption is sudden, sharp, and/or frequent mood swings. Luna was surprised when she heard about the mood swings, at least. The panel with her shocked expression shows more concern than surprise, imo.

Judging by the Tree's sad expression, "Special" is meant like the Chinese Curse.

A very special day indeed. The end of an era.

You know what I like about this comic?

No one is perfect. Everyone has some flaw. Even the Tree herself as beautiful and kind as she is, trying to do the best she can, isn't flawless, she makes mistakes, she midjudges others, like she did with Nigel's parents. Like she did with Tristan's friends.

All in all. I love this comic and the characters are awesome and "realistic" despite their fantasy setting and capabilities.

I think I am seeing more and more where the exact problem lies. In the case of Nigel I think Luna's optimism has worked horribly against her intentions. She wants to believe in the best outcome and have faith in those around her but in this case, it backfired horrible. After rejecting Nigel she expected that his parents still love him and help to prepare Nigel and he would have time to reflect on her words. Instead what happened is, it turned out that his parents are complete cuntbags and even after trying to reason with them they would not stop their neglect. She then still had faith that Nigel could come around and rise above the whole situation, coming out a better person. Instead what happened is that he stewed in his resentment and developed some serious personal issues and if she wants to help him overcome those, then any soft nudging and just trying to have faith in him flat out is not going to work.

Karadalis and Vermin_Stronghold are such schmucks.

Mood Swings...that makes a lot of sense in regards to Chili.