:smack:
Dang it! There goes my giant firebreathing space hamster hypothesis.
Unless…
Oh course! It must be a half-djinn, half-giant firebreathing space hamster. That makes much more sense.
The Oracle’s mama?
Drat.
Also: w00t, MitD!
I suspect that O-Chul would beg to differ.
He, after all, pronounced CitD “A good man.” 
psst. Abomination
'Zactly. Just because they vanished when the MitD wanted them to escape doesn’t mean the MitD caused them to escape. What’s that term scientists use? “Corrolation is not causation.”
Note that the linked page mentions that abominations are immune to charms and other mind-affecting spells. Since Xykon has charmed the CitD (in Start of Darkness), that rules out the theory that he’s an abomination.
Fortunately, we are dealing with a work of fiction, which follows *dramatic *logic, rather than scientific.
Huh.
Learn something new every day, I guess.
Yeah, but it could be a fake-out on Rich’s part. The Monster wants them gone, they disappear, people start speculating- and it turns out it was something totally diferent that vanished them.
Hmm… the MiTD is roughly human-sized, can see out of the dark, and has huge strength. I remember that in one of the Monster Manuals, maybe the Fiend Folio, there was a race of dwarves which fit the bill. Were they called ‘Wind Throwers’?
Maybe, but Rich takes the emotional componant of his story very seriously. Why all the build-up regarding the Creature’s free will without a payoff?
Burlew is a lot like late-period Pratchett - the comedy is only on the surface; the stories themsleves are dead serious.
Precisely. This event was a) foreshadowed in #543, b) possibly reinforced in “Start of Darkness,” c) reinforced by the MiTD’s glowing eyes, d) reinforced by having all the demon roaches turn to look at him, and e) excluded from being very many other possibilities due to Cloister.
It is not a certainty, but the dramatic odds are in favor … just as with the “guess what spell I cast?” bit. People were swearing up and down that it couldn’t possibly be Explosive Runes, that we didn’t know for 100% sure. But it was.
Notice the MitD’s eyes when he says the word “ESCAPE!” – they’re glowy.* That’s pretty much Rich’s shorthand for “magical doin’s.” I think that older strip is a good indication that the monster is used to things happening sort of as a side effect from its wishes.
Fish, that’s a great obsevation that it might be enabling O-Chul’s wishes rather than merely wishing on its own. Which would explain why V was “escaped” too; the monster certainly doesn’t care about the elf leaving or not (at least he doesn’t mention V at all in its speech, unless I’m mistaken).
Just noticed the funny panel as O-Chul decides to carry V over to the MitD. I know O-Chul is strong and all, but is he really carrying a paralyzed V with one hand … by V’s head, no less? Pretty impressive.
- ETA: shakes fist at Fish
Never mind. Wind Throwers are in Dragon 101 and are evil dwarves. Not what I was thinking of.
Elves are pretty light, and O-Chul is amped. No problem for a paladin full of resolve.
I wonder who is going to catch the brunt of Xykon’s wrath now that his kills have escaped? Pity the goblin who walks into the room now.
Sigh. No, he never said that it’s something in the D&D universe. He did say that it’s not something he made up, and that people would recognize it when they saw it. Furthermore, Rich is quite aware that many of his readers follow D&D only superficially, or not at all: It’s not something from an obscure rulebook, or a combination of obscure rulebooks, because if that were the case, most folks wouldn’t recognize it. If it’s something from D&D at all, it would probably be something from one of the core rulebooks, but folks have already been over those with a fine-toothed comb and found nothing that matched, even before this latest tour de force. Therefore, it is probably not something from D&D, but from some other work of literature or art.
The very best argument against the MiTD being a “baby Snarl” or a “Snarlspawn” is as follows:
Redcloak has seen the MiTD; he therefore knows what it is, or what it looks like.
… and yet he doesn’t use the MiTD to help probe the Snarl gate.
Haley holding V by the ankles; V is apparently quite light. Also the one-handed carry is traditionally used to haul Durkon along – and he’s a dwarf, in full plate.
But has Redcloak ever seen the Snarl?