We are back to buffered comics for a bit.
Just because it’s sometimes a long time between we see these people, the name of all the characters in this scene as a refresher of who they are, using the top panel where they all appear.
- Regin Enkari – The head of the Enkari family, and belonging to the same Family as Eliana. His family is generally thought of one of the Families that supports the Consul and current government. As the only Family to posses a tactical mage and having strong connections to the Malsa military, are considered a major force among the Families.
- Yoav Cao – A member of the Bureau with a high rank, he was who Tyler reported to, and was in charge of the team the Consul assembled to determine the nature of Mium. Seems to be highly trusted by the Consul. Technically speaking, his position is the Bureau Chief of capital city of Malsa, but by his track record of involvement, it would seem he is tied to the Intelligence gathering operations.
- Camilla Canthi – The young head of the Canthi family, Ashian’s older sister and Arkady’s betrothed, she is often called the Princess of the Families. Due to serving as the Consul’s bodyguard and confidant, she appears to be the member of the Families closest to the Consul, as well as a vexing symbol to the Rogue Families. One of the more powerful Family heads in a duel, her notoriously destructive powers and high resilience make her difficult to deal with. Belongs to a younger generation than most of the other Family heads, she posses an infamous backstory due to earlier incidence in her life. Despite her great power and resilience, she found herself out matched by the more advanced techniques and magical knowledge of the IDS Witch Elizabeth, and has only recently recovered from her battle. Most recently she returned from the front after witnessing the power of both Ila and Kally in fighting Atter, she has experienced a rapid widening of her understanding of the scope power mages can wield, something she once thought herself well versed in.
- The Consul – The Consul of Malsa, she is highest political authority in the country, wielding great power over the government and Families alike. She is very popular among the population of Malsa, and political few can directly oppose her, leading her to hold great power over the actions of the country.
- Varkim – An adviser to the Consul, he has old ties within the country. Shrewd and cautious, he primarily deals with the economics and corporate relations of Malsa, doing what he can to temper the Consul’s more bold actions.
- Tyler Weber – A foreign mage who has risen meteorically through the ranks due to his power and complete loyalty to the Consul, he now stands elevated to the positions of the Families, though no one seems quite sure how exactly he fits into their dynamics. The favored pawn of the Consul, she seems to favor using him to cause trouble. Formerly the head of the fledgingly MSB, he has handed that title off to Peter due to his obligations to the army as a registered mage.
- Amy Selah – Once appointed observe Tyler when he first came to Levenworth by the Bureau, she has found herself as his diligent second in command. Remaining second in command of the MSB under Peter, her loyalty lies entirely with her old boss.
- Ashvalt Arduni– the Father of Arkday, and the head of the Arduni Family, he is feared and hated by the Rogue Families due to old grudges, and considered one of the most deadly mages among them. Shows great loyalty to the Consul, if not always deference, he is willing to push his own agenda. A paragon of Family behavior, he has a grim, ruthless, discipline and cold formality in his dealings. Arkady was always intimidated to introduce his friends to Ashvalt, but strangely Ashvalt seemed to tolerate the chaotic antics of Naomi and Mione unexpectedly well.
…while all that should be accurate, I did just type that up without referring to the outline or anything, so forgive any small inaccuracies if there are any, it’s just to serves a refresher and outline of who they are and we we’ve seen about them 🙂
If anything is correctly grammar’d thank the patrons for their many corrections. If anything managed to slip through, it’s probably because I rebroke making the fixes 😀
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Really like the summary under the comic. While I do remember all of those characters, I think it is helpful to see the additional insight and a few little details here and there. The world beyond the comic is one part of the comic that really fascinates me.
Heh. Poor guy. Talking like Peter needed to have that office for any of the classified information he’s worried about.
I love this scene.
And I think the Consul is a brilliant character. Though I think she is going to be disappointed… because Mium will still know what transpired.
And yes, she has a gift for understatement.
I don’t know if disappointed is the right term.
I get the idea that it takes a lot to disappoint her. If Mium CAN eavesdrop here, and the Consul already knows Mium will at least consider requests from her, that’s not really a failure for her.
It’s more of a challenge. How do I keep Mium talking to me? How do I keep his goals aligned with mine?
A potential threat? Sure. But she’s already got lots of those. One more that is also potentially a potent ally is hardly a negative.
I think she will be a bit disappointed if Mium is not fully aware of the meeting and its contents. He has shown a willingness to help her, doing favors and offering to close the gates. That is a lot for him to do for anyone outside of Peter’s immediate circle.
Sooo… Possibly this is at least partly the Consul fishing for information?
Who reacts to this news? Who runs after the meeting? In which direction do they run? DOES Mium comment on the meeting or react in a way that suggests he was aware?
That all sounds like a very Consul sort of approach.
If I were her I would definitely say “And I cannot confirm he isn’t listening to us right now. He’s compromised every listening device in the country, probably on the planet, and if we missed any he’s hearing this.”
She’s going to freak out when she finds out about Ila.
Out of curiosity, do large-amount-of-talk comics like this take more or less work than others?
There’s obviously a lot of art in them, so I’m wondering if the amount of talking just adds to it due to need for more scripting.
Marginally, mostly in the editing phase. While the outline roughly has what happens in a given scene, I write most of the dialogue as part of the page; with a lot of characters I have to give some thought to things like making sure that dialogue sounds like the character talking as much as possible, as well as do what editing I can in terms of making the grammar and what not legible.
That said, the writing takes less than 30% of the time, even for a page like this… probably closer to 10-20% of the time. All told a page like this generally still takes less time than an action page with more complicated full body poses; wide shots with lots of characters take a lot more time – the first panel of this page took as much as any other 3-4 panels of it.
But it also varies on practice. Since I haven’t been drawing much, I am probably slower at drawing currently, and things like paneling takes a little longer with a lot of dialogue as you have to plan out how to fit all the chattering 🙂
“May be rather urgent.”
THAT is a contender for understatement of the epoch.
Yes, that very much might be an understatement.
However I suspect that the Consul believes that many of the ramifications won’t be on _her_ side of the dimensional gate.
Still if Regin et al feel a bit of urgency…. That could certainly be useful.
I enjoy Blue Haired Elder Advisor acting like appointing Peter as head of anything gave him more information. More legitimate access maybe, but I’m fairly certain if Peter cared to know, he would already know.
Yeah, I imagined Tyler responding to that with, “Well, he already had access to all of that anyway, and he was already helping us out quite a bit, so it didn’t seem like a big risk.”
It didn’t go well. Imaginary Regin cut imaginary Tyler a verbal new one, as he explained how for all Tyler knew, Peter’s assistance was part of a planned I.D.S. assault on the M.S.B. Sure, maybe he’d given a lot of information about the IDS’ nefarious doings that you only suspected prior. But maybe that was just being spoon-fed, to give the impression that Peter could be trusted. And then Tyler went and gave Peter all the legitimate access he could reasonably have wanted from that particular effort.
This is, of course, a greatly abridged summary. Imaginary Regin’s fluency far exceeds mine, and his diatribe included words I don’t even know. It went on and on for pages.
Trust me, it’s much better with Past’s version than where I went with this.
Well now I want to hear the full diatribe
Yeah, same here.
Panel 6: if HE is still working…
Ashvalt Arduni– the Father of Arkday, I think you mean Arkady in this line.
Also, in the middle of the Camilla paragraph: *incidents, not incidence
Or maybe ‘an incident’.
If I remember correctly Camilla is also known as the “Doll of Destruction”, a nickname mostly used by commoners as they tell their boogyman stories about the power of the families. The only difference between her stories and other campfire tales is that hers are apparently true.
Sure, but compared to a number of the other pieces on the board, she seems a bit outclassed. Other than Weber (who as mentioned isn’t a native) it seems all the heavy hitters are IDS, work for Peter, or both. Even the rogue families aren’t much better off, given Naomi literally dismantled their teleporter.