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A Deep Dive into R. Scott Bakker's 'The Warrior Prophet' Chapters 1-4
Embark on a literary crusade with us as we traverse the shadowy depths of R. Scott Bakker's "The Warrior Prophet." My compatriots Varsha, Carl, Mike, and I share a fireside chat about the entangled fates within this epic saga, where the warmth of human connections like Esmenet and Achamian's clashes with the chilling winds of war and prophecy. Our candid conversation peels back the layers of the narrative, revealing intricate character dynamics and the psychological labyrinths they navigate. From the complexities of love to the discomforting depictions of conflict, our dialogue is peppered with insights that will resonate with veterans of the series and newcomers alike.
As our discussion ventures further, we scrutinize Bakker's literary craftsmanship, considering the tangled skein of free will versus determinism that permeates the plot. The nuanced perspectives of characters like Kellhus, who grapples with the weight of prophecy and the illusion of choice, become a mirror for our own world's philosophical quandaries.
Finally, in a symphony of thematic exploration, we juxtapose the dark undercurrents of the tale with the vibrancy of human resilience and connection. The philosophical musings interwoven throughout our episode promise a journey through a realm where the boundaries between historical familiarity and fantastical innovation blur. Whether it's the potential for dragons to soar across Bakker's literary skies or the portentous return of the No-God, our conversation is an invitation to lose oneself in a world as rich and complex as our own. Join us, as each chapter brings us closer to unraveling the mysteries of the Prince of Nothing trilogy.
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Hi everyone. Welcome to the first discussion of the Warrior Prophet, which is the second book of the Prince of Nothing trilogy by R Scott Baker. We are reading, I think, now we've switched to a weekly cadence. We took a two week break there after the darkness had come before. We had a lot of fun discussing that book. Go check out our discussions on my channel reading by the Rainy Mountain and Steve's podcast, Patreon, If you'd like to join us on these read-alongs. We are reading about 100 pages every week and discussing them weekly. Yeah, I guess that's about it, and to sign up for the discussion sort of just do textual discussions. Come join us on the Patreon forum With me I have the usual group of friends. Carl, would you like to start us off with introductions?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I am Carl D Albert, a self-published fantasy author and very happy member of the Patreon forum, excited to get going on this book.
Speaker 1:Mike yes.
Speaker 3:Hi everyone, my name is Mike. This is my first time reading the series. I'm also a member of the Patreon forum and really looking forward to delving into the second book, the Warrior Prophet.
Speaker 4:And Steve and Mike. Don't forget to mention that you're a cohost of Patreon Comics Nice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're right. Oh, you made that happen.
Speaker 4:So yeah, Steve, and I'm very happy to be here. It's my second time reading the Warrior Prophet and I'm really curious to hear what everyone's thoughts are on this one.
Speaker 1:So I want to say for a book that has the reputation it does for a series, I guess not specifically this book for how dark it is. It had some really warm moments in this first part, which you know immediately started to sour because you know Esmen, ed and Akamian are flawed and don't know how to be happy together. But when they found each other that was just so brilliant.
Speaker 2:They were definitely a highlight for me, maybe the highlight it did. Actually I came out of that those sections loving it and loving to see the relationship further developed and seeing that warmth which definitely I know it's not going to end well for them and I know, like you know, they're destined for tragedy and this is just not the type of book series where they get a happily ever after. But it did make me frustrated with the end of the darkness that comes before the moment where we get the dramatic like reunion, and I was convinced something was like there was some weird magic stuff going on there, because it's like, why did it came in, not react to her? And I guess he was in shock. You know he kind of talks about it here, which is an interesting choice, but it just felt like forced melodrama for me at the end of the first book now, in a way that I didn't feel when I initially read it.
Speaker 2:But now seeing them immediately get back together at the start of this book really rubbed me the wrong way. I just felt like it like it cheapened that ending or in a way that that ending wasn't even necessarily needed, because I quite like them having the reunion, because I know, again, I know it's not going to last forever, so it's nice to have the warm moments to make what inevitably is going to follow all the more tragic and impactful. But yeah, I really, I mean, I think that was at the heart of this these first 100 pages, and I really enjoyed it, seeing their relationship and seeing how they're so clearly unable to communicate what they want and what they need with each other, but how they love each other so much anyway in their broken, confused way.
Speaker 1:Oh, how did you think?
Speaker 3:I just interject one thing that chapter, when they are reunited, is just nuts. I think it's like we're seeing all of the economy that comes out of war, I guess, and so people drinking and, you know, searching for pleasures if you will. But it's just like I kind of had a nasty feeling from that chapter. And then he's like he's with somebody else and then he thinks he sees her, but I didn't think they were going to connect. I really didn't expect that per se, but it didn't bother me that. I did want to see them come back together. I guess maybe a misofty in that way, but the chapter was really. Yeah, I just I remember writing down, like you know, this is just.
Speaker 3:There's a lot of kind of misogyny type of stuff happening, the way people are looking at women. I mean, this is something that I thought about quite a bit after reading the first book. But you know I still found that chapter very engaging and that the pacing was good. So I guess I was a little bit all over the place, but I really enjoyed this section. I don't know, I felt like I was enjoying this book a little bit more. I don't know, because I think it took me a long time to get used to the world and the darkness that comes before. I know, steve, you really loved that book and but maybe on your first read I don't know that was the case for you, because I feel like it took me a while to kind of get my footing. But I think a lot of you have read, like Malazan and I have not, and so but I've read you know I've read like other fantasy books, like fairly dense, but I did feel like more comfortable jumping into this book for some reason anyway.
Speaker 2:Is there something I always like about sequels is that you have that comfort and the familiarity with characters. You know, malazan is actually famous for even sort of subverting that, but it's I'm right there with you, mike that I definitely felt like a lot more, like I wasn't as stressed I guess I don't stress is a strong word but I definitely was a lot more comfortable coming into this book than I was for a lot of the first book is. You know, we're trying to get our footing in the world and to understand, you know, the different factions and how everything relates to everything else. I'm right there with you on the like that chapter was wild. That we go from came in, like having this like frankly, kind of disturbing, tragic, strange tense encounter with this prostitute, this who he repeatedly describes as looking like very young but is not young, and I was like I have no idea how I'm supposed to take it, like this was certainly on weird shaky ground there. But then you know, and then he sees as me and it he has to follow her and it's so moving and dramatic and you're like, oh, is that actually her? You know there's that question for a while. Did he actually see her? And I fully thought it wasn't her.
Speaker 2:I was fully convinced that he had just like imagined someone that looked like her, you know, and then it ended up being her and I was definitely surprising in how I had didn't expect that sort of type of heartwarming. I mean heartwarming. It is heartwarming, but again it has the dysfunction of their relationship. You know that, like there's immediately drama between them, there's immediately conflict, they immediately are arguing about things and not saying things to each other that they should be saying but they don't say, because they're broken and sad and thinking, you know, in their own personal ways they're undeserving of love. And yeah, it's powerful stuff.
Speaker 2:That was a really wild chapter in a very like quiet, very character focused way to which I really appreciate it. You know, not not every fantasy story stops to like, let you know, follow the character, deal with their inner demons psychosexually, you know, and then follow through with like then the relate, like it would have been so easy to skip that initial scene with the prostitutes or a camean even just like wandering around and just skip right to him, seeing as many that you know that that's would be a very common place to like kind of jump in. But, baker, really let us like dig into the scene and dig into camean's psychology in a way that again, is like kind of disturbing at times but is extremely compelling and certainly shows you a lot of complexity and humanity in ways that, yeah, I just found endlessly compelling.
Speaker 4:In this section too, I think it's with the quiet, more character moments.
Speaker 4:I think you get the sense that the Holy war is gearing up and people are starting to kind of you kind of almost like out of control, like there this bloodlust and there's all this debauchery going on and things are getting, you could feel things ramping up, that something is about to happen, like it's almost like something that's about to burst, like everyone is, you know, ready for violence, like everyone is kind of they have to let it out somehow, absolutely.
Speaker 4:But I did wonder, I wanted to hear all of you and you've already kind of touched on it but as far as the writing style goes, did you all find that this was more accessible than I guess you can say, than the first book, because I hear that a lot that this book is more accessible than the first book. And I wonder, as far as the writing style, I wonder if any of you noticed that, or is it just more of the focus on the characters and, like you said, it almost like slows down and it's not as there's not as much information or as history being thrown at us. It's more just kind of like almost like we take a break.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I think that's it. I think it's a combination of you know, like Mike and I were talking about. We're in book two now, so we have our feet under us, we kind of generally understand what's going on, you know, we know the factions and the main characters and that sort of thing, and I don't think that should be understated like that. That is a huge benefit that we didn't have at the start of the darkness that comes before, but also, yeah, it is slower. I mean the darkness that comes before very knowingly throws a lot at you. I mean I remember being shocked about how much happens in part one of that book, while this one, definitely up until this point, has been relatively, I guess, slow paced, but not in a way that I found boring at all. It's just, is very character focused and is like grounding you in the minutiae of the Holy War and that building emotional tension, like you were saying, steve.
Speaker 3:What about you, Marcia? What did you? What did you think?
Speaker 1:I can't say that I noticed that the writing style was any easier. I would attribute it to being more familiar with what. Like Carl said, I don't know that the writing style is significantly different, but I'm also not very good at grasping these things, so it wasn't much that much easier to read. Like I didn't feel like, oh, now I can understand everything I didn't before, maybe because the parts that I didn't get or was trying to like unfamiliar terms I tend to skip over. I mean, it'll come up often enough that I'll start to recognize it. So that's just how I read. So, given that I was in Bogdan by that, it didn't feel that much harder to that much easier or harder. Like it felt similar Like I did, like the feeling of familiarity and, using the word with a huge pile of salt, comfort in the world.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I definitely still couldn't tell you the differences between most of the different, like what are they? Western, eastern, what are they? Are they Norths or I can't know the Norths or I are like the far northern kingdoms but the ones that are on crusade, like that. We all got you know the callus. Like all those people that cal stopped and I think it was the end of the last book where he stopped and like looked at all of them and was like this is this person's deal, this is this person.
Speaker 2:I couldn't tell you the difference. I'm like I remember one of them has shrunken heads on a belt but like I think that's the T doni one. But beyond that I'm like I that all the stuff is all kind of a blur to me still. But the Empire stuff I, or all the different empires, I can kind of follow at this point.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I can't say that I can, but just yeah, I'm sorry, go ahead, mike.
Speaker 3:No, no One thing I will say in the first chapter. I will admit I read it twice because I think I was just thinking I was too comfortable, so there was a lot of exposition. There was a lot of exposition in the first chapter where basically Keles is spilling the beans about everything. You know Sorry, not Keles Akamian is telling Keles like everything about the console. He was just like he was just coming out of him because of, I guess, keles's abilities to pokes anything out of people. And so we learned about more, about the no God. We learned about dragons.
Speaker 3:There's a dragon that appears in the dreams, which I think Varsha wasn't you that said you were hoping there would be more dragons, or somebody said that maybe it was, maybe it was all of us. We learned about this weapon, the Heron spear. I mean I just kind of I was like I got to reread this there's a lot of stuff happening and then kind of learned. So I just that part was to me took a while to absorb. I don't know how much I need to know about all of that, but it was a lot in one go. But then the rest of the other three or four chapters to me were much more smooth sailing.
Speaker 2:I feel very confident the Heron spear will come back, yeah, and I have a couple of reasons for thinking that. One is just like on a like a basic narrative thing, like you don't introduce something like the Heron spear and then not pay it off later on, like that's just something that, like it's planted early on, that's going to come up again. There's a historical reason, I believe it, to which I'd be interested to discuss with y'all just a little bit of the historical parallels here, because there were some yes, tell us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm not going to get into the spear too much because I'm going to wait until it comes back. I do feel confident it will come back. I mean, I don't know that for certain, but the as Gileac, which is an awesome name, is definitely Antioch. I mean, I just assumed because that was like the first big victory for the like Western Frankish crusaders in the Holy war. The first crusade and what shocked me about this one, though, was Antioch is a huge like turning point in the first crusade, because it's one showing, oh, we can do this, you know, like we can take Jerusalem, like it gets everyone really fired up and as Gileac kind of function similarly, but it was also really hard fought and hard to do, and it's a very significant turning point.
Speaker 2:People, like one of the leading princes, ends up like deciding all right, I'm in charge of here, now I'm done, my war is over, the rest of you go on, and I don't know that that won't, we won't find out.
Speaker 2:Something like that has happened, but it didn't play out exactly like I expected. So I maybe I'm misreading things, you know, but certainly with the name like as Gileac versus Antioch, I was sort of latching on to that as a possible parallel. We'll see, but that was something I definitely kind of noticed and was curious about. Like the battle, the siege we sort of brushed over like we didn't even really cover. It was just like, oh yeah, and then they were we have as Gileac now, you know, and a lot of people are dead and and things like that, and really folks. I mean probably from a narrative perspective, importantly focused on the characters and their emotional relationships, which definitely these 100 pages. We talked about Akamian and Esmenet a lot, but Akamian and Kellis and then even Esmenet and Kellis were definitely other very central relationships in this section that I found very compelling.
Speaker 1:What did you think of Esmenet and Akamian's reunion, Steve?
Speaker 4:It's. I think you all kind of mentioned that it's the two people who don't know who can't seem to get it right. It was a heartwarming moment, it's. I'm trying to be really careful what I say to not spoil anything, but it does strike me that Foris is up and down and as much time as they spend apart, that Akamian feels comfortable telling Esmenet about the consult and Shiri reciprocates that by saying we have to keep this secret. So they have become like a unit and they have this deep trust in each other that they just speak to the way that they feel about each other, even if they go about it in very strange ways.
Speaker 3:One thing that I maybe I misremembered this, but I think there's a section where they have this.
Speaker 3:the two of them have this long conversation, but then we learn that something is listening in that, because I the whole time I kept thinking because of Esmenet's history, with this Sarcelas character from book one, that either she is, you know, she's been, she's going to be continued to be monitored. Of course we see Sarcelas comes back up. But to me I just kept questioning, like okay, we know that the consult is trying to track down Akamian, so to me there's no way that this them just coming together is not being monitored by whomever the consult, you know, a skin spy or whatever character it could be, because there's so many, there's so many possibilities now of people you know hiding their face or whatever, or being, you know, is that the right word skin spy? Anyway, I remember that being used and we learn, if I'm not mistaken, that that's not magic. That that's which I really kind of threw me, that they said it's like I'm not quite sure what it is tech-nay or something.
Speaker 2:They call it the old science. I definitely. I mean, I don't know if it actually is a science or not, I definitely just interpreted as magic, but maybe, yeah, they do call it the old science. You're right about that. Yeah, that was wild.
Speaker 3:I mean, I think that was also maybe mentioned in chapter one. Just a lot of you know new. Just I think Baker just throws a lot of different things at you and I really like that. You know, it's like you don't really any number of things could be happening. It's not just the, I feel, it's not just the story at face value. Hmm.
Speaker 2:What? Just a quick thing before we move on from a came in as Manette. I just wanted to comment on was a thing that occurred to me as I was reading. This is part of what's so interesting, just from like I guess, like an intellectual, literary perspective, and like I think it is one of the things that like ties them together too emotionally is that you know, these are, these are two people whose careers are like wearing masks and dealing in information.
Speaker 2:Right, you know, it came into spy and as Manette is a prostitute, and so they're both used to like playing, pretend, and it's only around each other that kind of those masks start to come off, but even then never all the way, right they?
Speaker 2:That that's part of the. You know, as comfortable as they feel around each other, there is still those walls, they still can't help. But you know, play the, the whore in the spy a bit, and you know, I think that's probably where kind of the seat of the tragedy of their relationship is. They can't shake their vocations, almost like define who they are as individuals too, and in a very tragic way, in a way that like I don't think you know, if you look at all the characters, I do think Kellis, in severing himself from the darkness that comes before, is the one least tied to his. I guess you could say like what he does, you know, like any sort of career, like he's the most flexible, malleable in that regard, like, even though his, like, his will is very strong and he clearly has distinct like motivations, things he's pursuing, he isn't so defined by what he does and what has been done to him, and I think that, I don't know, was just an interesting thing I was thinking about while reading this section.
Speaker 1:I really like how you put that. I think it defines them and it also defines, I guess, what's flawed about the relationship. What you said, the like Akamyan, can't get over the fact that she, she, has to sleep with other people as part of her job, and even when she stopped, he started to be himself by reminding himself of all the people she may have slept with in the past and and same with her. I mean, we're not seeing the cracks yet, but I feel like his constant weeping is going to come by their relationship in the back. You know it, every time we saw Akamyan he was miserable and weeping, understandably so. But you know, as Manette is a person of action, I think, and she she takes decisions and Akamyan doesn't. He just wallows in his indis in decision and I think that's going to hurt them. That's not necessarily because he's a spy, but you know his fundamental characteristic, whatever it is that's driving him, he. It's going to hurt the relationship, I think.
Speaker 2:He's definitely more of an observer than an actor, you know, he definitely is often not even so reactive as he is, just like, yeah, I mean, we know he's a historian, we know he chronicles and that almost feels like his role in all of this. You know, he's almost that like wizard, mentor in a strange way, where, like he, he's not actively like driving the story, as important as he is to it and as much as like time we spend with his POV. He's very much not someone who you know, like Keles is a force of nature. Like, even when people don't know it, keles is like driving their actions and moving things forward towards his own ends and that when he chooses not to act as we see him do here, to not reveal the Sarcellus which crazy tense scene, when Sarcellus showed up, I was, I was so stressed and unhappy for, as I mean, he talked about, like again, we know that if a came in found out, he would react poorly. Like that's one of those things where, like, I don't blame her for keeping that a secret because, like, even just regarding the fact that he's console, which would just eat a, came in alive, even more, like you know, he would react poorly to finding out about that, because he treats her so poorly about, as you said, sleeping with other people for her job, which it clearly goes beyond a job because she did it. You know, again, it's like form part of her identity, as we saw in the darkness that comes before.
Speaker 2:But yet, even when Keles is like deciding not to act, it is a very distinct decision. He doesn't dither, you know. He makes a decision and then he, like, commits to it and acts accordingly, as opposed to a came in who just lingers in misery and decision is caught, you know, in his darkness that comes before, beyond even, just like the emotions, and that's like psychological, sort of almost theological concept. He, the memories that he lives with, are almost, you know, another darkness that comes before that drives him and that shapes him, where, like he, how much of his will is his own, you know, when he's living someone else's memories every night and these horrible memories, right, I mean, he doesn't even like he speaks in the first person as if he is a certain what's, what's the guy's name? The name, yeah, say Swatha, like it. There's clearly emerging there that fundamentally impacts who he is and how he approaches things.
Speaker 3:There's moments, which also sorry.
Speaker 1:Sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 3:No, I was going to say there's moments when he says I've been here before, or you know when he's walking around. Yeah, I forget. Maybe it's as Giliac. I really for some reason I really appreciate that. But also one thing I will mention is from we learn what Skaos called a Kami, in which was Chigra, is the shrink word for Saswata. I noted that down. So that's fascinating that they use the shrink language. I don't know, there's just stuff that I was just like what is this? This is just nuts.
Speaker 3:But yeah, no, I just, it didn't mean to interrupt you, marcia.
Speaker 1:Oh no, yeah, I actually noticed that because of the question you asked on the forum about Chigra. I had that completely went over my head. I didn't. I didn't even notice that Chigra bit last time Sounds almost like an insult. No, I don't know if it's his name or if that's what they call him in shrank, but what was I going to say? What was Carl talking about earlier? I forgot.
Speaker 2:That's around a lot. The scene with Sarcelis. The Kellis is a willful actor versus a Kami and who did others. A Kami is influenced and you know like how much of a Kami is will is his own. When he's living someone else's memories, that's like additional darkness that comes before that one, the bit about other people's memories.
Speaker 1:I kind of wish we got another mandate schoolman perspective, although, like it's just more for, you know, experiment sake than anything else. It's how does this? Because, yes, akamian's being affected by the dreams he has a lot, and perhaps it's so much more intense because he's the one who discovered the console, he's the one who got to meet Anna Surimbar for the first time again, and so he has to. He's the messenger of all the bad news that the world ever wants to deal with, so maybe it's affecting him a lot more. But is there such a thing as a non normal school? Like, how does? How do any of them ever get out of bed and make decisions? You know, like what Akamian was saying about the rest of the schoolman, that if they ever find out about Kallus they're going to imprison him or whatever.
Speaker 1:Do what. Okay, I won't spoil other series over this. The thing that you expect them to like, just capture him and, I don't know, cut him open, I guess. Yeah, it's interesting. I guess, just for curiosity's sake, I would like to see another perspective, but if, for Akamian at least, I believe it's a crippling thing to have the dreams that he's subjected to constantly Do you think Sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 2:Just going off what you were saying, I think the dithering, the inability to make a decision, other than you know, deciding to put off making a decision, is to me I certainly read it as very much symptomatic of who he is as a person, like even separate from the memories. You know, you think about his relationship with Esmenet and that's how it functioned, like it very much. He could never pursue her, like properly because he just kept getting anxious and neurotic about it, which is something I can totally relate to. But, like, at a certain point, you know, you have to make a decision and he seems like he, I mean I don't think foundationally, fundamentally is incapable of it, but certainly he does not do it very often. At the same time, I do think where you would see the parallel this is just my theorizing, like I don't know for certain.
Speaker 2:I'm with you that I would love to see more in the heads of the other mandate schoolmen, beyond the little bit we got at the beginning of book one is that I imagine they all would be doing a lot of crying, because I imagine that does come from Sesswatha as much as it is their own personal experiences. Because, like, when you think of him and, like in all these memories, he's crying because everything he loves and knows around him is dying. And so suddenly you're finding out it's. You know it isn't over, it's here again. It's like you're going to have that PTSD response of like you're going to break down, and so I can certainly imagine that they would react very strongly to this news in a very similar way.
Speaker 2:Do I think that they would fail to make decisions like Akamion does? No, I imagine particularly the people at the top probably are more experienced at you know. I mean, akamion was in a leader. He was never been a leader. You know, he's a teacher and a spy, and I think that's what he's good at is like teaching people and learning things and gaining and sharing knowledge, as opposed to you know, I can't remember their names, but whoever the head schoolmen are who, like I imagine you know whether they decide to arrest Kallus or not or whatever, would make a decision and, wouldn't you know, dither over it endlessly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I imagine they're probably similar in character to the head of the scholar Spires, whose name escapes me at the moment, but similarly feeling in charge of everything. But I guess we're almost about ready to move on from Esmen and Akamion. I just want to say one more thing. Did you guys read the summary at the beginning of the book, of book one?
Speaker 2:I read parts of it I read, so there was.
Speaker 3:Go ahead. Sorry, go ahead, no, no, I was going to say I read most of it, yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay, so we were talking last time about why Kallus would be interested in serving server and I think we kind of got the answer in the summary that it is basically trying to get to. Now you're through her, which I should have seen but I did not. But also I think we probably knew this anyway. But that sort of confirms that, sure, there are cracks in Akamion's and Esmen's relationship which they've sort of fallen into a pattern of smoothing over, I guess, whenever they can. But Kallus is going to dig those holes deeper, right, he's going to expand them, make bigger. Yeah, I'm kind of terrified of where that's going to go, what adding the Kallus variable to their relationship is going to do that Absolutely.
Speaker 2:I have no doubt Kallus is going to lie at the center of the downfall of their relationship. That just seems dramatically like exactly the. It's the most dramatic place for it to go. So I think it makes perfect sense. I loved, you know, I was definitely someone who was.
Speaker 2:You know, I complained a little in our previous meetings about how, like everyone fell in love with Kallus so fast and like it was nice to see Esmen at put up a bit more of a fight and like even before, like here, I think what I really appreciate like she certainly still, like he played her and is certainly winning her over and I'm sure we'll win her over more. But particularly before she met him, it was nice having someone else be like his story is kind of sus right, like this is like why, why, why? You shouldn't trust it. Look like this pieces aren't fitting together here. It was so nice to hear it, but it came in was like no, but you don't understand. He's just so cool. Like it came in out, he's like this I don't know if I should like this guy. I just really like this guy, though, you know, no one makes me feel this way. Anyway, I think there's love.
Speaker 3:There's some foreshadowing in here. I think I don't remember where maybe second or third chapter. At some point, I think, a came in, says something like he's as powerful, he's as powerful as so, and so If he, if we could teach him sorcery, he could be another, another.
Speaker 1:So, swatha and I, was, yeah, I was like it's probably not.
Speaker 3:Such a genesis was a genesis.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's such a great idea.
Speaker 3:You know, I was like.
Speaker 1:Say what? That, while he was so sure, planted dreams in all of his followers, that traumatizing dreams, you know, and that kind of power.
Speaker 2:It does open the question right. It's like what does it take to stop something like the consult, right? You know, like sesswatha and the mandate thought that this was necessary, as horrible as it is and as much as it like Torments people for countless generations, generations, like you know, what does it take to stop that sort of Primal evil? You know this, this insanely powerful. I mean, they know things no one else does. The the old science right, like what's going on there? We don't know and I think you know that's certainly. The question is like is someone like Kelleis necessary to stop that force? And We'll see. You know what, we'll see what. What will he and the others become?
Speaker 3:you know, to stop it and and there's also a part in there that I want to mention too, where I think I've it must have been towards the end of this section, where I believe Kelleis knows a. You know something about the, the prophecy, but then he's like, well, I don't believe that there's certain things that he, he, doesn't believe. I think it maybe it's that he is going to be the downfall or I don't know what, but then I I don't trust anything that he says. There is a, I mean, but the point I wanted to note really about that is I Think that he's starting to doubt himself a Little bit. I think it's on I did find it. It's on page 90 where Starts to say something like Despite his initial skepticism, kelleis had believed about much of what a commune had claimed.
Speaker 3:He believed the stories of the first apocalypse, but not the Kalmomi and prophecy he did. He said this is a part where it to me is really important, where they say could what come after? Couldn't be what come before. So he's like starting to question his own, you know, junien philosophy. I don't know, maybe it's not significant, but I found it to be like this is such an important Component of maybe the philosophy in this book that Everything is supposedly you know, you know preordained or Determinism or what have you, but to me that that seemed to be like we're starting to see some, some moments where he's starting to question himself. Anyway, I Don't know what others know, it's interesting.
Speaker 2:That he has.
Speaker 2:I mean because, if you remember, he didn't know magic, right, like he didn't believe it existed until he saw it.
Speaker 2:And so, having he has this like pure rational sort of logic In some ways, like I Mean, I I almost want to compare it to like modern viewpoints, but even most people aren't so like, extreme as he is, and Now he's being confronted with the realities of, like this fantasy world that, like not only his magic real, but prophecy may be real. And you know what does that mean? You know, if the past in the past, they foretold the future and the future is foretold, and like you know what does that mean that? Because in a way that seems to like fundamentally undercut like you were saying, mike, their philosophy, like how do you predict the future? You know you're supposed to have this will over yourself and it's like how can you ever truly have Will, like this control over yourself and cut out the darkness that comes before, if the future is already, you know, been predicted? You know if everything is determined it's. It is certainly very interesting to see that and to see him doubt and learn it's.
Speaker 4:Good observation. I didn't even catch that, Because that is what if? Is it the first time that he's? We've even had like a hint of doubt from Carlos. He seems so sure of himself and so confident.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. Yeah, well, you had mentioned Carl it might have come earlier where he was like, oh there's, why did Nova magic or, you know, recursory or whatever? That might have actually come in the first book. But To me, I, one of the things that I took away from the first book that I'm Makes me not be able to really decide what rating or whatever I would give the, you know, the first book is. I really want to see how this plays out.
Speaker 3:You know, going back to the whole and I and I've actually heard other people talk about this as well, so this isn't necessarily an original thought, but, like I think I tuned into a Philip Chase's channel. He was talking about this book and so this, you know, this concept of Free will if there's no free will. Is that what Baker is saying or is it that? You know? That was the kind of thing that I kept wondering, like, is that what is going to be such an important theme throughout the book? I'm hoping that we I'm well, I know that there is kind of there's a very bleak and it's not a lot of Hope, hope going on here, which doesn't bother me as much as others, maybe, but I Am. I continue to wonder about where this is going with this character and this theme. So I guess maybe I'm reading into these things because I am hoping that you know that potentially, you know there is this you know, not every we do have free will, I guess is what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:It's definitely been explored. You know I mean a lot. I'm with you that, like we'll see how it all plays out and if there is a conclusion one way or another, if Baker leaves it open-ended. But that's definitely, I think is a is a fundamental aspect. I mean, I think it really has to be. When you're talking about things like prophecies and pre cognition and you know anything like that and predicting human behavior, it's like you have to. The dark news that comes before itself is like, in a way, talking about you know human behavior being predictable and Almost following like a path you know set for it. You know, through no Self-control, knows self-will and that you have to like break away from it to have any. And now Kellis is being confronted with the fact that, well, maybe that's not even enough, right. So I definitely think it's being explored and it's that's one that personally I'm very partial to.
Speaker 2:I love it. I love it in Dune. I love it, you know, just in general. I love it when you know asking questions of free will and like what even is free will? How do you determine if you have it? You know things like that. I think it's. It's very interesting the perspectives we're seeing on it here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I certainly don't. I agree that that's being explored and I love it. I'm with you, carl, and I Love the exploration of those questions. I feel like the character Kellis it.
Speaker 1:So here's the thing I don't know how you might conclude from anything in the first book that Baker is saying there's no free will, because the character Kellis potentially thinks that there's no free will, but he has free right. At least he is free to act based on something, and the others are apparently making decisions based on various Aspects like history and I don't know why I remember history more than the other things but many parts of their personality, and Kellis is basically learning to wipe all of those out so that he can manipulate them. But he's acting it and it's not that he's got some special abilities, that only, or that he's not human and the others are, and that's why he has free will. Anyone can train to be dunyan. They were Bread to have certain characteristics, but it sounds like it's a sort of meditation, philosophy or principle that you apply and you can maybe get partway there.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I watched that, that discussion too, and I Didn't feel like there was enough in the first book to conclude one way or the other. I sure the question was being explored, because Kellis is doing like statistical analysis in the prologue and Determining what the behavior might be, and then he's going on about how many variables there are later on which you know. You could say it's like a single variable calculus and like whatever the but the point is. The point is I don't like if that's Baker's point, I don't feel like he did a good job of making it for us book and I don't even think that that's his point.
Speaker 2:I mean it's only book one, like I feel like Very few stories that are long-form make their point in one book. You know, if anything, I feel like what he did in book one was ask a lot of questions and is now exploring those questions right and elaborating on them. I mean again, because Kellis seemingly is the definition of free will in a sense, and that's why he's so shaken by this idea of prophecy, because it's like that means fundamentally, the way he views the world is is incomplete and maybe wrong. You know, maybe free will as he views it doesn't exist. It's very compelling, you know.
Speaker 2:I mean I think in many ways we go to fiction to sort of help ourselves process things. And you know, I think we all in life find our personal philosophies and experiences and things like that challenged, and so we like to see that reflected in stories. And you know that's what's happening here for all the characters, and certainly Not, you know, kellis, not least among them now, although perhaps More often than not he is sort of imposing his philosophy upon the rest of them, even if they are not necessarily aware of it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was going to say something. Yeah, and that was one of the reasons why I was drawn to the series, right, because I know Baker is a philosopher and the question of free will is very fundamental to Studies in philosophy, as far as I know and not that I have studied a lot of philosophy myself, but I was very curious to see how you might. It has to be an exploration, right? Unless Baker himself strongly believes one way or the other about determinism and free will. It has to necessarily be an exploration of what if this was the case, or what if and Kellis Is representing a character with free will, the others but.
Speaker 1:But it's, it's down to people then, isn't it? It's not that the world as a whole has this. Like you know the starting point, you can predict everything about the end, because even in the analysis that Kellis does which, by the way, reminded me a lot of, like HIDs, paul's what, what were they called? Not scrying, I don't know. They were called something, yeah, and when he's calculating all the parts that something could take, it could still. There are a lot of Variables, and that's true Even if you have free will.
Speaker 2:There are many decisions that people can make, maybe to think that they are finite is flawed, and that's probably what's wrong and Kellis's philosophy or principles well, I think it again is still a question, that of whether Kellis is even imposing Whether he has free will, because, because I mean, I think sort of the I briefed like I took a class on this so like the whole idea of like determinism and like the sort of scientific philosophy, philosophical theory is that, like all time exists at the same time, like, if you think of it, almost like any given long shape, right, and so that like, if you're here, the future already exists, you're just not there yet, and that Any given time, like you may think it's this illusion that you're making decisions, but that what is going to happen and what has happened was always the case, because all time exists at the same time and it's only our human perspective are limited.
Speaker 2:You know, three-dimensional perspective that makes it seem as if we have free will. And I and I think that that is what Kellis is now grappling with is this idea that, well, if you can know the future, then that means the future has happened, is Happened, will happen, that it exists, and so now he's having to grapple the fact. Okay, I thought I freed myself by cutting myself off from the darkness that comes before, but if that, all the things I'm gonna do are destined to happen, then I'm not really free at all, right and I and I don't know, like we don't know, right.
Speaker 2:I think this is being continuing to be explored, right, and I think it's interesting. But certainly Kellis is a strong proponent and and certainly like anyone, like you know, like you might like I would like to believe, I have free will, you know, and what's the difference? Right like, how do you define it? What's the difference between, like the illusion itself and the reality? Right, like, if you, if, as far as you're aware, you're exercising free will and making decisions, you know certainly you could make decisions one way or another. So is that free will you know, versus like whether that decision was always gonna happen and you're just not aware of it, like you know? How do you define it? How do you define free will? I think it's 16.
Speaker 3:I love this stuff, but but I also think it's explored in the various characters as well. So if you look at the women Characters, as we've said many times, they have no agency. You know some of these characters that are maybe through Well, we know that there's caste in here. We know that. You know people are Round upon for whatever their livelihood may be sometimes or what their culture is. So, depending on where you are in the society also, I think helps determine, you know, your level Of power and agency and, I guess, free will.
Speaker 3:The one thing I wanted to say that I kept thinking about too Sorry it doesn't really come up in this section that much as I keep thinking that kellis has been in the laboratory, you know, like being in that, in the, in the dunyan world, right, so everything that maybe works extremely well in his conditioning and and the selective breeding etc.
Speaker 3:You know work can work well in in the wild, you know in the real world, but it's not going to be perfect and that's what I think you know we're seeing a little bit of you know here, not you know, anyway, but I just keep thinking because I that it's a little bit related to some of the work that I do for a living is, you know, we, we see things that work well in experimental conditions, right, and then people say, well, this is the, the greatest new thing and we're going to. This comes in in in business and technology and we try to scale it up and you know, whatever, maybe it's make the most profit or it's whatever Doesn't always happen sometimes. Uh, you know, in these, in these small, finite Conditions anyway, kept thinking about that.
Speaker 2:That's a really cool insight, you're totally right. It's that controlled environment right it is. It's like an experiment. He's like he grew up in a laboratory and now he's like having to see if all of the the hypotheses you know that were proposed and seemingly proven true and his little Control group is now like it. Does it still ring true once you're exposed to the chaos of the wider world? That's really cool. Wow, yeah, you're totally right. That has to be intentional too, baker, that isolated like Uber rationalist like. Wow, yeah, so. Does anyone else have any thoughts about this? Because otherwise there's something I have been dying to talk about.
Speaker 4:Just want to mention one thing really quickly, because we did, mike you brought up the book comes before there. As we get into later books, and not so much on this one, but as we get into later books there are revelations, there are history, and it adds a little bit every time as the books progress. So there is like nice little tidbits buried in them sometimes. So just a heads up.
Speaker 2:Very cool Talking about like the dreams, in particular Steve, like the past, like the past, the first apocalypse stuff. So are you also just meeting like generally?
Speaker 4:Most of the history. There's little tidbits of history from the first apocalypse, and other events and items from the past are mentioned.
Speaker 2:Hell yeah. So the thing I wanted to talk about I don't know what page it is I really should, Especially for this book group, but they talk about aliens. You guys caught that. That was crazy what.
Speaker 1:Yes, who Incoroy? I don't remember them, but someone told the Incoroy that they came from this. They were talking about stars.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Wait, is that this? That's how it started.
Speaker 2:As Manette was all like the classic medieval, like you know, the sun rotates around the earth, sort of thing. And that came in was like well, actually the non men think that it's the other way around and that like spaces avoid with lots of stars. And you know, untold, and the incoroy came and I was like whoa, hold up there, like who are these people? Like we've definitely heard that word before, but not like who are these people? They're aliens. What? Like this is crazy. That, yeah, that was. That was a hell of a ball. You know, drop right there.
Speaker 1:That was just casually throw that in there and Hmm, yeah, I just.
Speaker 3:I think I missed that. I remember reading that part.
Speaker 2:It's crazy, that's like it's literally what I mean. Who knows if it's true or not? But that is a hell of a thing to throw in there, that like the non men just like casually believe the aliens came and and like brought something. They was it was it the knowledge that spaces avoid? I think maybe that's what it was, but yeah, it was like straight up like these people are aliens. I mean again, who knows if it's true or not? But like that's what the non men supposedly believe, according to a canyon.
Speaker 1:Supposedly that's what the incoroy told them that they sailed here from the stars. That was from stars that were sons.
Speaker 2:There you go.
Speaker 3:I didn't spell that because I want to look it up.
Speaker 1:I'll type it here Sorry, thank you. I can figure out how to get there. Why? Can't I. Oh, I had a destination to post what. Ok, it's I and C H O R O.
Speaker 3:I OK, thank you.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Wow there's a lot of stuff. Yeah, I was cool. Also, I love the conversation about the stars and what has been a thanks to herself about the stars. It's all very pretty.
Speaker 3:I have a random question, similar, where I think so we learn that this is it like a castle or a town or temple that gets destroyed, but it's never really explained. They could think it's an earthquake, but it didn't really think it was. I thought Keles might have thrown a rock or something, or or it was the consult coming, or. But I think it was referred to a few times. The city is called Rue Homme, but I kept I I just wrote that down. Was it? Was it was a cause by something else? Because, right, that's like in the first chapter we hear about all of the destruction that that you know. I think that that happens. So I was just wondering is like is this, is they're going to be signs of the? You know? But maybe I read into that one way too much.
Speaker 1:No, that's a good point. I didn't. I didn't think much of it, but that that makes sense.
Speaker 2:Which I like. Remember this, this. This is like ringing bells, but I don't remember the OK, what page like? Where is it? If you have it marked and I think.
Speaker 3:I think it's at the beginning of chapter three.
Speaker 2:OK, I think it's so fun seeing what everyone latches on to, I mean aliens.
Speaker 3:for me I was like, oh, it's like they say, interesting how it survived the dragons and it survived the kings and it just collapsed. So I was just like I just found that interesting on it to be interesting. And then they go. Then they go to another kind of temple and we see the, the prophet. So Janus, his arms are outstretched, very similar to guess Jesus, and then I, yeah, anyway, just I don't know if that's a significant.
Speaker 3:I think it's going to maybe keep coming up because we but I do feel like I might have read into that- oh yeah, this was when they took as Gileok right, this is the big Citadel and as Gileok, yeah, yeah yeah, and you, you had said, carl, that they kind of just skipped over the battle, like I might have even missed that, because the battle is going on, but we're not seeing it like we're, like we're.
Speaker 2:That's it. Right, there is like that. It was like we suddenly cut from, like that I don't think they were at as Gileok at the end of chapter two and then chapter three opens and it's like they've taken as Gileok and I was like whoa, like yeah, like that was a seeming I mean again partially just because I bring my own, you know, assumptions, right, like I heard as Gileok and I went OK, that's Antioch, that's a huge turning point in the first Crusade, so it's going to be a really big deal. And then it's just like oh no, they have it now. It was interesting. Yeah, I think there is something very poetic too to the story of Rue-Oam, right, that like it is this citadel that like stood the test of time but fell to just a bunch of. You know, the people living there would call them heathens, probably, right, you know these people who just showed up and tore it all down and in their fur, right, is it?
Speaker 3:is it Rome? We keep seeing him changing letters around. Probably not, but I know I learned what Henry refers to, which maybe we. That's, the Jesus Nazarenes Rex, the Deorum I and RI. Jesus of Nazareth, the king of the Jews and the Enrithi.
Speaker 2:All these things. The etymological origins. Like Baker doesn't mess around, it's a jainist. All very intentional.
Speaker 3:Just change a few letters around. I don't know if I like that as much, I don't know. So for some reason I want it to be a little bit. I don't know, maybe that's just me.
Speaker 1:I would like the words to be more I was actually going to ask how everyone feels about that. I am with you, Mike, I'm not. I'm not sure I like the one to one parallelism with the real world, which you know it's a choice and I know I don't like the book more or less because of it, but I kind of wish it wasn't there.
Speaker 2:I don't mind it because I don't think it's one to one, right, Like there's clearly the etymological influence and like you know you talk about in Rithism, and like that's clearly a Christianity stand in. But the philosophies are also different and like what they believe in, like how things are structured, are different, right, I mean down to the fact that it's polytheistic, you know, which fundamentally changes, like the different sort of, you know, religions like that like have different philosophical undercurrents and like kind of the structures that they imply and the philosophies tied into that, you know, and the cultural attitudes, you know, I find it different enough that it doesn't bother me on the page. But that's just me, I mean, that's just my perspective. I also may be, you know, trained because of Game of Thrones, the Song of Ice and Fire, where it's all you know, Eddard is Edward, right, Like all the names you know, we literally just also just have Robert as just that's the name you know.
Speaker 2:So I don't know, I'm not too. I think you would do it better and worse than others. This one has been for me, at least in my knowledge of linguistics, and all that like is subtle enough, like it's not, you know, like G'san is the like you know, a holy figure, a prophet, like if it was a little more on the nose I think I would struggle with it. But like the Segenius, I don't know, I guess that, again, that's just me, yeah.
Speaker 1:What about you, Steve?
Speaker 4:Oh, I don't mind it too much. I think if it's too on the nose I think it would bother me more. But it is different enough and for me it kind of opens up different possibilities of where or when this is all happening and the parallels to our world. So I think you can kind of play with that a little bit too of is this something in the future? And in the future, and there's still remnants of other religions, and so I think it's kind of fun to play with and I think in a way it kind of helps me keep track of things and it kind of like little Easter eggs, like oh, that's this and this is that. But if it's too close, if it's too on the nose and it becomes I don't want to say lazy, but it just becomes like, okay, well, we've seen this before. But as long as there's that distance enough to where you can have different possibilities to go with it, and yeah so, but no, I can see why it would be not. I can see why not everyone is a fan.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I guess for me it's more of a are you trying to say something about this group of people or whoever you're referring to that I'm not getting or or that I don't necessarily agree with? But you know, if the parallels there is a parallel and you seem to be making a point about some of this, maybe whenever there is a point being made, I'm like do I like it forces me to think about whether I agree about that opinion, about the real world parallel, if that makes sense and I don't want to.
Speaker 2:That's fair. Yeah, I think for me it would be hard to not draw some parallels as a storyteller If you're intentionally basing the story off the first crusade, like I think there's enough distance, in that this is a fantasy world and that you know whether or not it is far future earth or whatever right, like it's there, there is that distance. At least for me it feels distant enough that I don't feel like it is necessarily casting. You know, it certainly has a point of view and a point of view is very cynical, but it's not, I don't know. I feel like it's derogatory, I guess you could say.
Speaker 2:But again, I think, like I just don't know how you could write a story that's at all supposed to be in conversation with the first crusade or any of the crusades and not draw those distinct parallels. And again, I'm actually shocked as someone who like knows the history, not like an expert, you know, scholar or anything, but like that there haven't been more. I mean, callous is really the wrench thrown in there. And the schools where, like there is no history, historical parallel there. I have no idea how all that's going to play in right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm totally ignorant to a lot of the history and learning from you, carl and, and I'm considering reading more about the crusades. I think one of the things is not not to beat this to hell, but I guess I'm not. One thing that, as you mentioned, you know, it doesn't seem like the actual religious aspects are taken very seriously at all. I think it's kind of in the background, so maybe it's not a big deal, you know. So I yeah, I don't.
Speaker 3:I guess I don't mind that there's a lot of parallels, because I don't. I'm still trying to figure out what this book is saying to me, maybe not necessarily what the author is saying, because it's maybe different to me, because that certainly happens to everybody, not just the book, but the series. Sorry, you made a good point earlier that it's going to take a while to get somewhere, and no, I, yeah, I, I don't think it's such a big deal. I wish I knew more. I actually wonder, carl, if you could recommend, if there's any good books maybe to recommend at some point.
Speaker 2:You'd have to do it now at the top of your head. Yeah, I would need to make sure I get all the names right, but I definitely do. I was very lucky that I studied under one of the big crusader scholars in the UK who actually has one of the best books on it. That would be one I could definitely recommend. It's readable too. It's not really overdry. There are some popular history books too that I think are well written. That will teach you a lot.
Speaker 2:I find it a very interesting time and certainly one that I think is a compelling choice to pick, based on a fantasy novel, just because there are a lot of very colorful figures and it's very complex. I think the narratives that are generally told and taught are not only far from the realities of what the crusades were actually like and about, but they whitewash things. You can talk either side. There are people that want to make heroes and villains, and it's not that simple. It's a history of a religious war and, if you're being honest, atrocities are committed all around these books. I respect, where it's not whitewashing, the fact that these people are doing horrible things or are complicit in these horrible acts, and that's war, let alone a holy war.
Speaker 3:It's sad to say, it's happening right now, in present day in many parts of the world too, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, it's the story, history repeating itself. It is, it's very sad, well pulling back around. Where are we going off of aliens? I'll be going off, so I don't even know how to springboard off of aliens. No but.
Speaker 2:Or no, we'll talk about room after that. What else? Oh, that was one thing I want to talk about was the quote at the beginning, I remember stood out to me as the well, there are a couple great epigraphs here. At the start of chapter three, the proposition I'm the sinner and need never be uttered is the assumption upon which all certainty and all doubt turns from a ginsous which is interesting and we can definitely talk about and also ties into the whole sun theory, right, and the idea, you know, that things orbit around the earth, or Irwa, as it were. And then the other one again just leans into how fricking cynical the series is, that you have this I know me problem, which it also tells you a lot about, the I know me as people see your enemies content and your lover's melancholy. There's a lot that is understated there. You know there's a lot of implication and not a lot of. It is very good and my reading of it at least I at first I thought it was a curse.
Speaker 1:No, it's a problem. Why is this a problem? It sounds like something that you would cast your enemies with. Yeah right.
Speaker 2:Regret is the opiate of fools, that's good, yeah, that is a really good one that one has, I think is a very. I think there's a lot to discuss in that one in particular too. Like I don't know the the I know any. Like see your enemies continue, your lovers, melancholy is like to me, is like almost just about like maintaining stability, at least in my reading of it is like if your enemies aren't actively trying to kill you, you're doing pretty good. And your lovers, you want to keep them like it under your like thumb. You know like you want them to be under your control.
Speaker 2:You know it feels very callous to be honest, like that, that proverb, the idea like manipulate people to your whims, and we know, you know I know in place the gin on that name of the like the game of thrones, that they do that, yeah, that it feels very true to that. As opposed to like, yeah, the regret being like the opiate of fools, I think is a is very, very. There are some interesting ideas there, right about like the nature of regret and what is its use, and you know what wounds are we potentially salving by lingering, wallowing in regret?
Speaker 1:That's a really beautiful way to put it. I like that.
Speaker 2:That was one I admit as someone I definitely I can be someone who's sometimes wallows and feelings and regrets and things, and so that definitely was one that like oh man, that's a gut punch, like yeah, those are good. What other. Steve, you're always good with the quotes. What other quotes do you got?
Speaker 4:Well, one of them was about the dragon the good. The great dragon reared his, his bull chest above the source for revealing a necklace of steaming human heads.
Speaker 2:That's part of what makes the series so readable is like, even when it's really bleak, it's so badass, Like there's just like crazy, like the most heavy metal things you know. It reminds me of Melas and a lot in that way, where you're like a dragon wearing a necklace of steaming human heads. That's insane. Like I don't want to smell it, Like I'm sure that that's disgusting, but that's so cool to it's oh man the dragon is like saving it for a snack for later, or or what. Like a trophy, I think it's a trophy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you never know when you're gonna get hungry, right, you know you got to keep that around like that was so cool that the dragon appeared in the dream.
Speaker 3:I don't know, I just that was so cool.
Speaker 2:I loved it. Yeah. I'm gonna like. That's why I read fantasy is like stuff like that scene, like I love, oh, love it Going back in that ancient history, dragons, you know the old politics like the, the, the so called like golden age, that you know fricking probably sucked but is like very dramatic and beautiful and it's melancholy way.
Speaker 3:I mean, we learn about the, the apocalypse itself. Talk about bleak Every infant still born for 11 years. Oh my God, I was right.
Speaker 3:All women were violated. It was, I mean, it's not a direct quote, but just just awful and one of the names of a dragon, I think, or I'm not sure if that's a dragon or not or something else. There's some mention of some other weird monsters which got me excited a little bit, but there was some of them called Cara since since annoy Angel of Endless Hunger, or that's no, that's the way. That's one of the names of the no God. I'm so sorry.
Speaker 3:That's the no God has like five different names, or four different names, depending on the language.
Speaker 2:But there you want to talk about the etymology stuff. It definitely is intentional that the his, one of his names is Mog, from Rao Mog Pharaoh, like definitely put in that little Pharaoh, you know, god King sort of thing in there and I think that definitely alludes to things about his character and what he is. Right I mean because he remains mysterious to us at this point, but I definitely think that there are implications based on, if you read into that potential etymology which I again, based off of how Baker writes, I think is intentional.
Speaker 3:So the other the other when we I assume it was the no God speaking again. This is still just chapter one, and he says what am I? I thought like that that blew me. That blew me away Because, like I said I had to read this multiple times is like he was brought back. He doesn't even know. It's like he was awoken from oblivion or something. So it was just like that, was just, you know, mind altering.
Speaker 2:Absolutely no, that was one of the real shocks to me. I'm so glad you brought that up. I actually totally had like that wasn't on my brain. That was crazy because he did not read at all like I imagined he would read. Like you said, he almost read like he was this like senile entity, you know, yeah, like, exactly like, had that like newborn aspect it. It didn't feel that malevolent, strangely, you know.
Speaker 2:But it's all of these very clearly malevolent forces summoning him and, you know, seemingly fighting for him, which certainly, you know, begs the question, right, like what are these people actually? You know, like they claim to be fighting for their God, but like, are they actually? Like, does the no God actually care? You know what's the no God's deal? Like we don't really know. We know what his followers say and like are pursuing and that sort of thing. You know very classic apocalyptic evil. But you know what is his deal personally, because that through a huge like that's a big question mark now, but I honestly it just kind of took for granted as him being this like pure evil force. But that's not how, like your traditional fantasy. You know that's not how Sauron talks. You know, like what's going on there? Like I don't know.
Speaker 4:I like the, and then the, the and then the voice spoken through the throats of 100,000 shrank. So cool, so cool.
Speaker 3:There's a the, the, the. I don't know if this is a beast the Bosch rag. I don't know if you know what that is from other fantasy stuff, but I didn't know that. So I'm assuming there's other kinds of monster type. You know, I don't know that we're going to encounter. So you know, I was just to get you, to get you excited and thinking about well, this console stuff is kind of a big deal, yeah.
Speaker 2:We have to get dragons again. The dragons have to come back. They can't keep teasing us with dragons. It can't just be in the past. They've got to come back. There's there's just no way.
Speaker 3:Steve, I assume this isn't the last time we see them.
Speaker 4:I don't know what was the way and see.
Speaker 3:There's at least four of four dip, four of them. And then I thought we learned that Saswatha is the one that struck down, the one that's in the dragon scaphera, that's in the dream, but we doesn't explain how. I think, yeah, I have to bring us all the way back to the beginning. But those were just some notes that I had that I just was like wow, this is just, you know, quite a, quite an opening.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 4:Not to bring us to the end of four chapters, but there was we had mentioned earlier I forgot to mention this at the time when Esminid and I came in we're together and there was the skin spy that was listening to them and watching on page, or it was right at the end of chapter three. He was the skin spy, was wearing a harlot's face. Was that the same same prostitute as the one that a commune is with earlier in the chapter? I wondered that that didn't occur to me the first time.
Speaker 1:Oh, I thought it could have been. I didn't think of her. I thought it was the person who Esminid greeted as they went in, the one who was her friend and who knew about a commune. I kind of thought it might have been her. I didn't think it was the one that a commune had before Esminid, because of proximity, like I thought he left her there, but it's possible that might she might have followed them.
Speaker 2:I do remember there being. I would have to reread it to really kind of analyze it, but I do remember it being kind of weird, like the way he was experiencing pleasure in that scene. That reminded me of the previous experiences that particularly Esminid had. And then there was like weird, maybe it was just the way it was written, like again I'd have to go back and reread it to see if it actually was like super weird and like maybe magic-y or if that was just being very deep into his perspective and his tortured psyche.
Speaker 1:That's a good point. Do they need to kill the person to wear their face? Or was it a consult who tell him? Because apparently she looked a lot like Esminid? So was it a consult who wore Esminid-ish face?
Speaker 2:Yeah, Like intentionally.
Speaker 1:That's interesting.
Speaker 2:If they like make up the faces, they don't have to. I just assumed that they killed the person and then like took their face, but I don't know if we know one way or another for certain. Still so freaky the coming like the face, yeah, yep. That was oh, we didn't get to talk about that last time because and we never did a full book wrap up you hadn't read that yet. Varsha yes, the face hugger shit Like yeah.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, that was interesting. I did not like the face being compared to a spider, but yeah, that was a really good ending, I thought.
Speaker 3:Didn't freak you out too much. No, no.
Speaker 2:Other than the spider.
Speaker 1:So I guess I was not as freaked out as I thought I might have been, based on how you guys described it, because I don't visualize, when I read, that much so yeah cool spider. There were just words. There's no actual spider crawling out of the page. I was okay with that.
Speaker 2:I definitely don't have as visceral reaction as I do when I like watch horror, but it wasn't even the like. I thought it was really cool the spider unfolding from the face, but when it was on a camean's face, that's when it got me against the face. Other thing from like aliens, like when that thing is on you, I'm like no, no, no, thank you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, oh well, but yeah, I didn't. I didn't imagine that they were. I thought for a long time or I was terrified throughout that scene, because we hadn't seen Espinette since the end of the previous book that she could have changed face, that she could be consult because, like Mike said earlier, anybody could be consult, but we and we need a callous perspective to tell us one way or the other, right. So yeah, unless that happens, we don't know. Anybody could be, anybody, I guess. And also we saw, but I don't think Espinette is consult, but we also saw callous deciding not to declare that someone is. So if we are in someone else's perspective and callous is not calling anyone out as a concept, that doesn't mean anything.
Speaker 2:So yeah, it's going to be interesting. We have to be in his perspective to know one way or another right, or in the consult's perspective, as it were. I definitely do think that to me felt like the shrewdest aspect of his not wanting to tell. Like he's part of me, I was really frustrated by him not identifying Sarcelus as a face thing skin spy. But I think the fact that the consult themselves don't know that he can identify them is a big like. That's a big weapon, that certainly if he identifies Sarcelus it starts to become clear like they'll figure out and then he will be targeted. And you know, it's probably a little too soon for him to directly confront the consult.
Speaker 1:Yeah, did anyone else think that Sirius's mother could be consult? My only piece of evidence is that she was interested in how he found out, which I guess could be just a matter of curiosity, but also she wants to know how he found out.
Speaker 3:It's a good point. I think she also doesn't she push is it Sirius. I think she's like really pushing him to be even more ambitious, so you got to wonder where that's really coming from too. Sometimes it's a good question.
Speaker 1:But it also seems like a wastage of resources. It's like you know they're planting spice wherever they think they need them. What do you need to with the emperor? You already have one who has this year, so seems unnecessary. So probably not, but we do get a.
Speaker 2:That was, yeah, we didn't even talk about that scene, that wasn't it. I love, love. Getting more of their mess. The world's worst family.
Speaker 1:Yeah, love it, yep in in the previous book. Whenever we went back to Sirius I was like, ah, not him again. But I think we got enough Akami in this time that I'll break from that. I think I was projecting on Espinitalia because I'm a little tired of his weeping, but I see why. I see why, but yeah.
Speaker 2:That's fair. I think the thing that annoys me about him is that he doesn't make decisions. You know, like that he is just so passive, which, like I can, like, I understand and I can sympathize again, like I'm a very neurotic person so I know what it's like but he's in a position where, like he really, if he wants I'm also someone who really likes control and Akami is actively choosing to not have control over the things going on around him. Like he is just being so passive and he has potentially so much power and he's not utilizing that power, which drives me nuts. But I like Akami in, I do like him. He's just frustrating.
Speaker 3:I will say, though I don't I'm not sensing it as much myself. He has wisdom, so he, I think he's feels he's damned if he does, he's damned if he doesn't. For a lot of things there's a there's once, there's one passage where he says something like I could like, I could like destroy everybody in this, in this room. Right, so he is, I think, like he is aware of what he can do, but because of what he, because of his, his, of his role with, with the it's called mandate, the mandate and, and the fact that he has these dreams of this person that died 2000 years ago, I think it does make him very challenging, causes him to be really challenged. And but I didn't notice the lack of decision-making as much. I think he's just very much pontificating and pondering, and I kind of relate to that. So I don't know, not that it's a good thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, again, I I think it is relatable. I think it is just frustrating sometimes from like, particularly knowing, because we, we can see all the pieces moving around him, right, and the people making decisions around him and he's actively choosing to like not enforce his will, which is, I think, part of the reason it's frustrating is because we know he's relatively more moral than a lot of the people around him, right like he is not a complete sociopath like half the characters you know, or so violently damaged you know, like Nair, who are not afraid to like, make things happen and pursue their ends, while he, again, I think, is very understandable where he comes from and you know, I mean, I think there's a real argument to be had that maybe it is the more moral, you know, or ethical choice to like not, you know, force things or potentially make unsavory decisions towards you know, whatever ends you're pursuing. But it he does do a lot of thinking and talking and crying, but I like him, I like him, I I do like.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I absolutely love his character and same with Esmini. I was really appreciating in this part of the book the fact that we have a harlot as a main character. I don't know if any other book that does that, but I feel like it gives a really compassionate exploration of a person who needs to resort to do that for a living right. I I'm really appreciating Esmini's character in this book. I love how she's written and, yeah, I'm really good to see you where it goes with her.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there are layers to her too. Right, like her sexuality is really important and I would you know, would certainly say it's one of the most important aspects of her character, but it's not the soul defining aspect of her character. Right, yeah, which is rare. So often when you look like noir stories or, like you know, a lot of cyberpunk sort like different ones where you do get kind of the POV of a prostitute, they're often defined like strictly by their sexuality and while she definitely is grappling with that, it is not the totality of her, which is something I really appreciate yeah, yeah, that was the thing that I I'm trying to find the quote.
Speaker 1:But what? The fact that she took during whatever their love making with Akamian, that that was the most a prostitute could give. I, that was such a beautiful line, I really. Oh, here it is tonight she would take and that Akamian knew was as much as any whore could give. Yeah, that and that was really interesting.
Speaker 2:Like that she could bring herself to love and yeah but I I read that as I mean beautiful in a poetic way, but to me that reeked of his like fucked up view of like prostitutes like to me. I thought that was a judgment he was casting on her. I read that as like very cynical and sad.
Speaker 1:I I read that as him understanding helplessness of prostitutes in that regard.
Speaker 2:But yeah, like I guess it could go either way, or maybe well, I think, I think it is an aspect of it right like to me, he like he titties, like he titties actually that's true yeah, prostitutes, but he doesn't like, he doesn't really try to understand and so he's like, yeah, like giving you know, the sort of body in time is like I don't know.
Speaker 2:Again, I mean, that was just my reading of it, but I also definitely the way I read Akamian is he is very judgmental of the whole business and of Esmene, which I think is part of the reason he loves her is because she is also something he loathes and you know, it's kind of classic self-destructive behavior.
Speaker 2:I think the thing that well, I'm so sorry, go ahead oh, I was just gonna say that, and I think one of the reasons Esmene and again, this is just my reading of it but one of the reasons I think Esmene loves him is because he is what she wants to be, you know, and they, they I think that's why I like Esmene more is I feel like she's less judgmental than he is. But that's also very much a symptom of like, like that's very intentional by my reading, very good, classic, like patriarchal sort of you know the judgments like it put upon women sort of thing and particularly women's sexualities and how they, you know, use them or don't use them, as it may be, but it's complex too, right, because you're like, yeah, I get it if you're like you're someone who wants to be monogamous with someone and their whole job is not being monogamous, like I see why that would be, you know, torturous. So certainly there are complexities.
Speaker 1:I think, you were saying yeah what, what?
Speaker 3:one thing I remembered it, or remember thinking, is the thing that the Kami in the reason why he loves Esmene, I think is because she's almost at his level intellectually, but more importantly, she believes in him. Where everybody thinks he's nuts, everybody thinks he's, you know. You know he's like the person that thinks the sky is falling or whatever all the time and and it cannot be easy to be around and to to have one person outside of the mandate school is, you know, probably keeps him going. You know, I don't know why those people aren't suicidal, frankly, I don't know, because their lives are, if you, I mean their whole rise on death is. You know we are watching for the apocalypse, you know it's not, doesn't get you out of bed in the morning, so much per se, of course they are waking up from nightmares, so that is the one thing that I think is really important about their relationship.
Speaker 3:Totally yeah, I want to be clear.
Speaker 2:I don't think that their relationship either way is defined by one thing.
Speaker 2:I think it's much more complex than that. I think they think you're speaking to Mike and I think that's a good thing to say, but I think that's speaking to Mike is part of what I really love and like, why I care about their relationship versus just being like screw this. You know, like there there is this very sweet, wholesome, human aspect of like they do fill niches for each other, like inside holes inside each other. You know, like Akamian respects her in a way that most of her customers do, not not only in how like gentle he can sometimes be with her, but like in the fact that he also includes her, you know, in the conversations and that he doesn't, you know, condescend to her. Well, he does condescend, but in the way he condescend to everyone, you know, because he's like always trying to explain everything. You know, it's just, you know, it's just an aspect of who he is, a very kind of classic, scholarly thing and, yeah, there's a lot of sweetness there. Yep, as opposed to the Ziriya.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we got to wrap up sorry, but I was trying to find a gap to say are there any closing thoughts? But if you guys want to carry on, I can drop off. I will be done in 10, 15 minutes though, so if you have, why thanks? To talk about. Okay, cool, cool, cool. So, uh, anything, anything else to say in closing? Does anybody have?
Speaker 4:just want to mention for anyone reading along with us, we will be discussing five through eight for next week oh yeah, I forgot to do that to the end of part one to the end of part one right yeah, yeah, cool any.
Speaker 2:I guess my last thought is that they messed up. Imperial Royal Dancer family. I agree with you, varsha want to say earlier they're best in small doses. When I get small doses, I find them so funny in a really like dark comedy way. Like I didn't immediately like to start, but particularly as I've like seen them over time and they've started like getting less and less powerful and so they're kind of more and more pathetic, I find them increasingly funny as they're just like grasping at everything and they're so horrible. They're just, they're just the worst people you're like. If it was like just like they were the only people in the world, I would be like consult, like go for it, like this, this is your planet. You take it, wipe them out, right, they're just so bad, but I love it, love it yep, I agree, they are funny in small doses.
Speaker 1:Cool, let's do our choice real quick. Sorry to rush, but yes, steve, steve, where can people find you?
Speaker 4:can find me on page tweencom. It's the best way. All the stuff is posted there. Join our forums and come in.
Speaker 3:Be your friend and Mike yeah, I'm also on page chewing forum and, as we mentioned earlier, I'm talking with Steve at the pick of the week discussion on the comics and manga page chewing podcast, so we hope people can join that as well. We got a lot. We got a lot to discuss in the next one, so yeah, a lot to talk about and Carl you can find me atop the lonely mountain guarding my horded books.
Speaker 2:No, I you can find me on page stream probably is the best place, but otherwise on most social media at Carl D Albert, and look forward to chatting with you oh and, and check out Carl's book.
Speaker 1:I'm about 160 pages in. It's a lot of fun. Did you already say the name? Sorry, truth of ground, cool. Um, yeah, we'll see everyone in a week discussing chapters five through eight. Yeah, happy Christmas holiday, whatever others you celebrate until then, if you listen to this before the holiday comes up, bye.
