Wouldn’t that be somewhere in the Hades-Gehenna spectrum?
As far as Good and Evil are concerned, Belkar’s been heading neutral-wards at a great rate of knots.
So maybe Limbo or even Ysgard?
Yeah, in order of likelihood, I’d probably put Belkar’s killer at Snarl > Durkula > Xykon or Redcloak, with very low chance of it being anyone else (like, say, some random giants). The Snarl is at the top of the list, because it would neatly explain why he doesn’t get raised, and Durkula is second because that’s an opponent who has personal significance to Belkar.
Hmm, if he dies in the snarl, maybe he has no afterlife.
Penultimate panel, I should think.
Or possibly Panel 7.
With what Blackwing saw in the Rift, we can’t even be sure he dies. It would be neat if [spoiler] Belkar kills Durkula but falls into the Rift as a result, “dying” as far as our heroes’ world is concerned. The story ends.
Then there is an epilog showing Belkar on a new world, sniffing flowers and talking to Mr. Scruffy, who went through the Rift with him. [/spoiler]
I think that’s Mr Scruffy’s paradise.
Yes, much closer.
Burlew has said that employment as Shojo’s chef is Belkar’s view of a perfect life, not afterlife.
I have a theory, that I won’t put any money on, that Belkar’s death will cause MITD’s Big Grow-up, make an adult decision and switch sides moment.
This one doesn’t really have anything new, but it’s fun.
Next strip it’s Elan’s turn to do something useful.
Maybe he could …
create an illusory duplicate of the ship, thus giving the giants two targets to aim for. It would effectively halve the damage. I’m not sure this is possible under the rules. I don’t know what limits bard illusions have.
More likely they’re going to encounter some being more powerful than an ordinary Frost Giant. Since this looks like an entire Giant tribe, either an adept or a Jarl. Maybe a white dragon. or perhaps more than one of these.
I wonder when we’re going to see Roy take his turn in the spotlight?
[spoiler]Silent Image only gives him ~twenty 10ft cubes to work with, which I don’t think the airship would fit inside. It also doesn’t produce sound, although in a windy pass I dunno how much effect that would have.
Major Image would include sound. There the problem is that you have to concentrate to account for damage done, which absent minded Elan will probably miss the save on the first rock thrown.
Interestingly, the restriction on handling damage is not included in the description for Silent Image, which is probably an oversight rather than intended.
In either case, I don’t think the giants will be fooled for long, although it might be long enough to turn a tide. Seems like team Doomsealer is on top of it though.[/spoiler]
The main reason that most standard illusions wouldn’t work is that they’re only movable within the set area of effect. Even if you could get an area big enough for a full mock-up of the ship, you couldn’t get one big enough for all of the space the ship will sweep through as it’s moving.
Huh, I interpreted the range and area restrictions as being a “distance to caster” and “overall size” limitation. That is, I interpreted it as Elan would be able to have a fake image glide along next to the Mechane as Elan is moving along with it.
That still doesn’t get around the overall size requirement, but it does mean that you could have the illusory ship move as long as it stays within range of the fake ship.
Maybe the frost giants are bad at depth perception and won’t notice that one ship is half the size of the other 
How illusions can move is actually described in the SRD. For Silent Image, it can only move within the size of the effect. Major Images can be moved within the limits of the range, which is a much larger area. It doesn’t say anything about what happens if the caster is moving. Does the area of effect and/or the range move along with the caster or are they fixed to the place where the caster was when the spell was cast? This would be something the DM would have to decide.
A smaller illusory ship (or magic carpet, or flying monster) could still draw some fire away from the Mechane. Just have to show it appear in a believable manner, like through a gate or teleport. (Believable for D&D, that is.)