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Episode 259: We're on the Edge!
0 Playsin 19 hours
Hello, Podwalkers, and welcome back to another episode of the Goblin Lore Podcast! Alex and Taya jump into the Edge as the goblins tackle the first four episodes of the EoE story. How does sci-fi work as a Magic setting? Is Mirri the best plot impetus ever?
We also finally have a Linktree with all of our discounts/resources
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As promised, we keep Mental Health Links available every episode. But For general Mental Health the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has great resources for people struggling with mental health concerns as well as their families. We also want to draw attention to this article on stigma from NAMI's site.
If you’re thinking about suicide or just need someone to talk to right now, you can get support from any of the resources below.
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 988
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- Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741-741
- International suicide hotlines: A comprehensive resource list for people outside the US.
- IMAlive: Click Chat Now to access a live online network of volunteers through instant messaging.
- TrevorLifeline, TrevorChat, and TrevorText (LGBTQ+ crisis support): 1-866-488-7386, or text “Trevor” to 1-202-304-1200
- Trans Lifeline (US): (877) 565-8860
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Opening and closing music by Wintergatan (@wintergatan). Logo art by Steven Raffael (@SteveRaffle)
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Apology
00:00:03
Speaker
are
00:00:09
Speaker
are
00:00:30
Speaker
Hello, Podwalkers, and welcome to and another episode of the Goblin Lore Podcast.
Host Introductions and Social Media Presence
00:00:35
Speaker
ah Sorry we yeah we missed last week. um Weren't feeling well. Just decided that um i I couldn't speak, essentially.
00:00:44
Speaker
um I hadn't spoken for about three days. I was sick and just spent the whole weekend at home. And then got on to talk, and Taya said, you don't sound well. I was like, fair.
00:00:55
Speaker
So we didn't record. Yeah. so Yeah, I think it would have been rough on you. Yes, yes, it would have. And and i over the next two or three days, I realized that as I like actually went back to work and realized how much I was coughing just from trying to talk.
00:01:12
Speaker
So, yeah, I'm glad but i took the evening
Magic Set Story Overview
00:01:15
Speaker
off. um But we are less than a minute in, so let me and say my name before we hit that on the counter. um I am Alex, found on... Not on Twitter.
00:01:26
Speaker
I don't know why that's such a habit of mine. I have not had an active Twitter account for over a year. I mean, you've said for years, but yeah. That's true. But yes, found nowhere. Well, Discord. i'm on I'm in the Goblin Lord Discord, but...
00:01:38
Speaker
Otherwise, found nowhere on the internet. um My pronouns are he, him, and why don't you introduce yourself and then we'll ah deal with the opening question. um I'm Taya. Pronouns are she, her, they, them. ah And I'm Taya Transcends on Blue Sky where I post um mostly magic and cat stuff, but a lot of also just depressing ah life stuff.
00:02:04
Speaker
Because that's... Kind of what's going on right now. But speaking of the the first item on that list, I think I think that was the first one, Magic. ah We've got a new set with a whole lot of new story to talk about, like um a lot, a lot of story.
00:02:23
Speaker
Yeah. Eleven episodes and most of them are longer than typical
Story as Marketing and Financial Viability Discussion
00:02:28
Speaker
episodes are, too. I i did most of them from the YouTube channel. recordings this time and and one of them was over an hour long yeah and five side stories too i don't know we've had 16 stories for a set ever maybe no i think it tops 15 which is what we usually got for like we got for ravnica i think uh yeah it's it's
00:02:55
Speaker
It's cool. I'm that I am very, very glad about like always kind of worried about story because it's well, you know, it's a marketing thing that doesn't make them money.
00:03:08
Speaker
And so I'm always glad when they decide to just keep to to commit to the stories for for
Planeswalkers and 'The Edge' Setting
00:03:14
Speaker
sets. And I'm wondering how much of getting extra story here is tied to the fact that they didn't have to do any of that for like Final Fantasy or the other.
00:03:23
Speaker
There's no story for them to do for the universes beyond. And so maybe that gives them a little bit more wiggle room. for the sets that actually have story. have loved a unique Final Fantasy story, though. They could have written something. oh absolutely. that would have That would have been great. Like, maybe something like They do this so with some of the supplemental sets every so often. We get some story stuff there, but...
Character Interactions and Fanfiction Speculations
00:03:45
Speaker
um i I have been talking around the fact that I don't really have an answer to the opening quest. Do you want to jump on that? and then i'll Sure. just so say so The question for this week is which Planeswalker we think would enjoy the Edge the most.
00:04:02
Speaker
and I have to go with Duretti on this one because Duretti would have a field day with all this tech. I'm not sure I'd want him to have access to fusion engines. Yeah.
00:04:17
Speaker
um Yeah, that could be interesting. Yeah, because we we do find out how hazardous they are in the story. You you know, something they gloss over on a lot of sci-fi, but, you know, just what happens if you fire an engine in atmosphere. Yeah, yeah, not not good.
00:04:40
Speaker
No. It does have me wondering, do you think the boost god is from around here? Perhaps. Perhaps. so We haven't seen any goblins yet. That's true. That's true. They very specifically come came from a goblin place.
00:04:56
Speaker
Okay. um I don't know. I guess the my first thought, which I think is wrong, was Karn because I'm not sure he can have fun. Yeah. that In general.
00:05:08
Speaker
i I don't think it's possible for him. Yeah. um and So maybe Saheeli?
Edge of Eternity Story Introduction
00:05:15
Speaker
She really wouldn't enjoy it, yeah. Similar similar reason as Duretti. I think the tech would fascinate her.
00:05:23
Speaker
um as I think she would enjoy delving into wild technology in you know compared to things that are accessible elsewhere in the sort of known multiverse.
00:05:37
Speaker
Yeah, ah she could make some really pretty filigree versions of some of these tech devices. Yes, absolutely. um i don't know. I think Saheeli deserves a spaceship.
00:05:54
Speaker
Yes, um absolutely. Her her and Huatli could have a spaceship to just cruise around. Yeah. Yeah. ah Duretti would probably be a disaster with his own spaceship.
00:06:09
Speaker
Yes. Also true.
00:06:13
Speaker
Oh, yeah. but um I don't know. Maybe him and PNLR can just fly around. They got along together pretty well. True, true. he He can kind of bleeding edge and then she can kind of soften those edges to explode less or more controlled fashion.
00:06:33
Speaker
I think that might be a good combo. Yeah. I don't know. I wonder know if there's some Pia Doretti fanfic out there. i You know what? I would actually kind of be disappointed after Aether Drift if there isn't.
00:06:50
Speaker
Yeah. But ah today we're here to talk about the Edge of Eternity story. um have neckck didn't actually say what set, did I? No. I just said a new set.
00:07:02
Speaker
yeah I mean, there's there's a new set every other week, so it does help to narrow it down. Yeah, though it is always an accurate statement. Yeah, um although we only get we only get story for a few sets a year now, so that does differentiate things a bit.
Religious Factions and Narrative Mechanics
00:07:20
Speaker
yeah Is there any more this year? Nope, because the next two sets are Spider-Man and Avatar, so we don't get anything until Lorwyn. keep forgetting Avatar is a full set. I do too. ah I keep forgetting Avatar is coming to Magic, but yes, it it is.
00:07:38
Speaker
yeah okay The art on that Aang card they previewed in Vegas is pretty damn sweet, too. It is. it is. And and and ah one of the reasons I keep remembering it's a full set is because that Aang card has like five named mechanics on Like, that's got to be a full set, because that's the only way that that makes sense.
00:08:00
Speaker
Yeah. oh I'll be very interested to see what bending does. Yes. Yes, that that'll be that'll be fun. And also, it's an effective like preview card. Like an early, early preview.
00:08:17
Speaker
Yeah. It's like, what does that do? We don't know yet. We'll find out. And weve we previewed a fancy version, so it doesn't have reminder text. Yep. On purpose. so Or at least like the fancy version, because those are the nicest looking versions.
00:08:32
Speaker
Yep. Okay, so I've been... trying to wrap my head around how to talk about this set. um The story for Edge of Eternity is dense. If you are listening to this and weren't familiar, this is the first like actual sci-fi set.
00:08:51
Speaker
This isn't steampunk ah or or some other fantasy trapping fantasy-ish setting with some sort of technology trappings. No, this is just sci-fi. Sci-fi literal starships traveling between planets.
00:09:08
Speaker
Right. They don't have magic, period. Yeah. And it's got some really, really cool art.
00:09:20
Speaker
um And some really, really dense world building to try to explain all of this technology and sci-fi-ness that's going on. Yeah.
00:09:35
Speaker
Yeah, there's a Planeswalker guide for this set. And most of them I kind of peruse and I tried to peruse this one and did not understand anything. And then I went and read some of the story and now I'm back and parsing things a little bit better. But it's there's just so much going on here.
00:09:49
Speaker
um So I guess maybe we just start with episode one and try to try to walk through. yeah done I mean, we can at least hit some of the highlights.
Main Characters and Central Mystery Introduction
00:10:02
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. um So episode one is really weird because it starts off with this like first person narration, but you have no idea who the narrator it is.
00:10:16
Speaker
And this because it's a like a choose your own adventure sort of thing. it's a second person because their narration is talking to you, the reader.
00:10:29
Speaker
which starts like outside of the very, very beginning, which I think is just far too conceptual where it's like, ah who is you? You are the person who imagines I am me.
00:10:41
Speaker
That doesn't mean anything. You were already a person. I didn't create you. This is too much for me. This I, but when you, when you start to get into it a little bit, I realized like, cause then it gets down to, could you choose to have someone find me?
00:10:52
Speaker
Yes or no? No. It goes back to end of timeline. This has failed. So have to start over again. But as it goes, I realize that this is, don't good way.
00:11:04
Speaker
It is a way to help with all the proper nouns. There's so many proper nouns in this thing. And so this is a good way for the the story to not try to find a way, because one of the difficult things in a story, always, all fiction, basically, especially second world fiction, which is a writing term for a world that isn't Earth, you you need to, the writer needs to explain to the reader all of the things that the reader doesn't know that the people in that world would know because they're from that world, they're from that place.
00:11:41
Speaker
This lets the writer very directly, specifically address the reader and say, here's a bunch of stuff that you don't know that you need to know. And so it's helpful there.
00:11:54
Speaker
Yeah, it was an interesting ah interesting framing device. Yeah. and And there's a little point. like It talks about this story, at least the first half, because I've only read six of the 11th story so far. So that's that's what we're focused on tonight.
00:12:07
Speaker
um is This whole story seems to be taking place within a single solar system. What we would understand it is a solar system. Yes, and they do have interstellar travel. Yes, there there' is interest and there's some folks who came from elsewhere to come here, and but there's a bunch of stuff happening in this solar system, and so they kind of start out explaining to you, well, the sun's name is Sothera, and then she's a grandmother. Here's all their all her children, which are the different worlds and the planets and on which all the story takes place.
00:12:40
Speaker
Mm-hmm. And then it introduces the two religious fanatic factions, ah which are basically a bunch of nutjobs that worship gravity and black holes and the end of all things.
00:12:55
Speaker
And then there's the entropy. Yeah, essentially. And then there's the ah other nutjobs who basically worship what they call the sum, which is the living time remaining in the universe. Yeah.
00:13:10
Speaker
Yeah, basically fighting to slow entropy. Yeah. It's kind of their thing. Except they're like, if they think it'll increase the sum, they have no problem killing a bunch of people for... Yes.
Colony Exploration and Space Horror Elements
00:13:25
Speaker
because Because their focus is so big, so large scale, it allows for a whole lot of tragedies on a small scale that are all considered good and and positive. Yeah.
00:13:38
Speaker
like yeah Like a really, really, really extremely large-scale utilitarianism, if you're a philosophy person. Yeah, we kind of have the nihilists and the utilitarians.
00:13:52
Speaker
Yeah, so ah at least those two major factions are fighting here. Yeah, and they've kind of torn the place up a bit. Everybody else is just trying to live and get along and try not to get killed by either of these...
00:14:08
Speaker
religious fanatic factions and then you have the this other faction whose name is escaping me who came the dricks yeah there's the dricks are like they're like the ancient ones easy you know they're the ones who gave people the ability of interstellar travel Yeah, and and ah from from what I'm understanding, before we really dig into the specifics of the story, but a lot of what's happening in this system is because like the sun is at its very end and is going to go nova and destroy a lot of what's in the system. So the Drix showed up to try to help people leave and to help people kind of preserve what's there, learn the history of of this place and preserve it after the sun
00:14:55
Speaker
destroys it basically yeah except um the sun going but isn't going to go nova anymore because the uh monoist turned it into a super so we black hole yes and so then that is part of the the conflict between those two religious factions and The monoists want it to be a black hole and connect it to their network of black holes, whilst the other faction wants to un-black hole it, which will then cause it to explode and kill everybody the system.
00:15:29
Speaker
ah Yeah. Yeah. No, they don't they don't cover how how the planets are still surviving with a black hole for a sun either. Yeah, another there's a decent amount of hand-waving for some of that stuff. Because, yeah, there's no so there's no star now producing light unless it seems like one of the... if i find Part of the part of the, the denseness for this too, is because this isn't science fiction from like earth. Like a lot of our science fiction stuff has earth somewhere in the background.
00:16:03
Speaker
So we can kind of just hand wave and say all the science terms that we use today in the 21st century are, they're using in the 28th century or whatever, because this is magic, this all exists in the magic multiverse.
00:16:17
Speaker
They have to come up with all of their own terms for all of the science that they're talking about. And I'm getting lost somewhere in that. Because from from one of the the grandchildren of Sothera, it sounded like might have been a gas giant that was ignited to be a second sun.
00:16:35
Speaker
And that might be... but They go to Althos in one of the stories, though. Okay, so I might... them yeah Maybe then me misunderstanding what they were talking about.
00:16:48
Speaker
Because then they were talking about something being bright. And there's a lot of ways for that to be taken. and i okay So, yeah, the first story, again, is ah is a lot of...
00:17:01
Speaker
world building lot of direct like some of it fairly poetic like it's kind of cool talking about the different races the different species that came out of the cav by the way i i love that this is how the back they took the cavu and made them a space race yeah this is like one of one of the lines in my notes is the uh the cav appeared humanoid cavu and that makes me happy yeah And then the next line, which I guess gets into what actual bit of story we have here in the first one, was a house cat named Miri feels like nostalgia bait, but it still makes me happy. Yes.
00:17:38
Speaker
um Miri... is kind of the center of the story in a lot of ways. she's She's the whole impetus for our main character, Sammy, to be out doing job questionable jobs in the first place. It's because they lost their cat and they've been searching the whole system for their cat for three years.
00:18:06
Speaker
Yeah, and that is, so there's these like little revision one, revision two. And the way the cat got away, this is kind of important to
Religious Fanaticism and Internal Conflict
00:18:13
Speaker
notice. The cats can do what's called weft walking, which is essentially open portals in space time.
00:18:19
Speaker
yeah For some reason, cats can just do that in this world. Yep, not explained. but just It's just a thing. It's just known. Yeah, revision six. Now we're ready. Now we can begin!
00:18:32
Speaker
Exclamation mark. That's the mule of a cat named Miri. And so then it's, it actually that's right, actually introduces Miri before the story introduces Sammy. Yes. it Perfect.
00:18:46
Speaker
Yep. ah And so Sammy is our main character. They're a ship captain. that They are non-binary. They use they, them pronouns.
00:18:57
Speaker
ah The art for Sammy is very kind of gender neutral. So... but also has I guess I'm guessing that's a space helmet with a little adorable cat and um go yeah in the first artwork with yeah yeah it does kind of look like they're painting a space helmet um or fixing it I can't tell because there's there's a little cat sticker on it ah but so they're they're an engineer and a captain of the ship
00:19:32
Speaker
Uh, that is basically the the main setting for the story.
00:19:39
Speaker
and, uh, then you meet their first mate, uh, who is a Kav, so big, giant, hulking creature. Uh,
00:19:52
Speaker
they're a lot of fun. Uh, but, uh, his name's Tanook and he, he's a very entertaining character throughout the, um, and one of the things that they talk
Faction Battle and Philosophical Conflicts
00:20:05
Speaker
about, ah is that Cobb don't like making decisions.
00:20:11
Speaker
Uh, and so, Tanook is always asking Sammy what they're going to do. oh but it even gets into more of his backstory on like how much they don't like making decisions. so we'll cover that more in the later chapter that talks about that. But, uh,
00:20:32
Speaker
And then we get a little bit of, ah we get this, if you click through, if you just read the story in order and, you know avoid the click throughs, you get this whole section about the Summist religion.
00:20:48
Speaker
ah And it's kind of batshit crazy. Yeah. Yeah.
00:20:59
Speaker
There is a lot there. And again, this is this is like set up in a second person where it's it's like talking to you directly.
00:21:12
Speaker
and it's all in caps. It's telling you to like boil water. I don't understand what's happening. Yeah. Is thy hand still burning? Yeah.
00:21:26
Speaker
it repeats, but yeah, it's basically supposed to be like a section of their litany. ah And yeah, these people are a little crazy.
00:21:37
Speaker
Yes. Yes. So yeah, then you get to that and then it moves you out. and And honestly, most of the click throughs Bring it on to the next section.
00:21:48
Speaker
That's kind of the of most of them. Yeah, that one, in that section you can easily skip over, though, if you don't ask more about the, ah the ask more about them. So as we, um ah the ship, ah by the way, is named the Suruma. That was the first, ah if I remember correctly, the first spaceship they previewed when they started previewing the cards.
00:22:12
Speaker
And it's this really cool looking, like, tri-wing, giant claw thing. ah And they're doing a job for someone called the Metal Man, which if you've seen any of the art for the series, you probably know who that is.
00:22:32
Speaker
ah Yeah, especially when there's a line, I like read this quote, loot a ghost colony and find whatever it there is the metal man thinks will change Sammy's fortunes. What did he call the device he sent Sammy to find? A component? A tool?
00:22:45
Speaker
No, he said artifact. Yeah. It's like clearly a reference to like someone from the normal part of the magic multiverse. Yeah, definitely. Yeah.
00:23:00
Speaker
um So Sammy and Tanook are off to this supposedly abandoned mining colony ah that that was supposed to have
Character Development and Prophecy Impact
00:23:09
Speaker
not even started up, that it was built but never populated.
00:23:15
Speaker
ah And they get there and they sense life signs for like 20,000 people, but they can't detect any life forms at all.
00:23:26
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. But then there's other stuff like, was it in this story or maybe it was in the next? Tanook found um evidence in just like the economics of the zone that there was material coming out of this mining.
00:23:41
Speaker
Like stuff was becoming cheaper because of increased supply, despite the fact that this mining thing seemed like it had never, this particular colony ever, never actually started.
00:23:56
Speaker
Yeah. Um, and they do briefly talk about who there is a section in here when they, when they first descend on, on the the planet called Sigma's reach, they do say that, uh, this is why the Sarema descends upon Sigma's reach from a dead sunset and unset. So there is now a super void, a black hole sun.
00:24:17
Speaker
but doesn't really qualify what makes a black hole also a sun. Like is like getting in, like getting out. No, we don't know. Yeah. Uh,
00:24:29
Speaker
But, um yeah, so they do kind of, and you know, and they say the source of the light is basically all the the nebula gases that are getting swallowed up by the black hole.
00:24:43
Speaker
they even mention keeping it warm enough to keep, you know, keeps it bright enough to warm the inner world. So, that I mean, they they do talk about it, but. I don't think the physics lines up.
00:24:57
Speaker
But this is magic. So physics-ish dish music Yeah, I mean, and there's even, it it feels very, I mean, there's the whole space opera side of of sci-fi where it's basically hand-waving a lot of the science anyway. And this is leading into some of that too, where they're just like, and we're just going to say this is how this works and believe us and it'll just move on. we Don't worry about it. We're not going to, it'll be fine.
00:25:24
Speaker
And that's kind of what they're doing. Yeah. And then it it talks about the Monoist religion a bit, uh, and how they made the sun into a black hole.
00:25:37
Speaker
Um, and then they actually land and then they get a they find a sign that says population 13,879 plus friends and family.
00:25:49
Speaker
and then they're like, uh, the metal man said there is no one here. oh and sam is just like well the men of men may have lied yeah but then they like realize it's empty and it's uh really weird and creepy yeah and that's kind of the end of story one so story two we get them
Episode Conclusion and Future Anticipations
00:26:15
Speaker
searching the colony ah They have no idea what they're actually looking for.
00:26:22
Speaker
metal man didn't tell them. They just know it's something weird. Yeah. And this whole time it's going on. like they're They're trying to find out what happened to the people. And they're talking to the like the computer system ah for the colony. And the computer just keeps saying there never was people here.
00:26:42
Speaker
Yeah. But there's like abandoned dinners and things that look like everybody just disappeared. Yeah. And i one wasn one of the lines ah like carbon. Yeah. And the computer is like, oh, that's nothing. That's just a residue from a storm.
00:27:00
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Carbon consistent with, you know, 15,000 people exhaling and breathing. oh no, no, no. it was just a storm. Like, you there's just an explanation. I was talking, you know, that was for the, I thought you were talking about like the the ah the plasma flashes or like the car.
00:27:15
Speaker
Yeah, that's what it is. Yeah. ah So Sammy eventually hears what sounds like a cat. And follows after it to the room where basically the automated mining machines toss anything that they don't understand.
00:27:37
Speaker
And they find this weird little rock in there. ah And ah it does a lot of really weird things around them.
00:27:53
Speaker
ah Like, it starts messing with their armor. And then they start hearing things. It just says chosen.
00:28:07
Speaker
and chosen one and
00:28:11
Speaker
Sammy's just like, oh, who doesn't want to be the chosen one?
00:28:17
Speaker
Because that always works out well, right? yup Yeah, and there's a little, like, um like through this story, before is there, like, looking for this because of some of the the things that this is kind of weirdness that that that thing is caught probably caused by that rock?
00:28:36
Speaker
I noticed it's going into, doing not a ton, but a little bit of the sort of alien-style, like, space horror. Yeah. Going through this facility. This whole section with this colony definitely was going for some space horror.
00:28:50
Speaker
Yeah, and I love – there was a line too where they they reference, sometimes in movies, slivers mimic the sounds they hear to lure you in. Of course, slivers aren't real, oh which kind of does two things. Like a is a specific reference of slivers as things, but also this story, like that references movies.
00:29:11
Speaker
They reference popcorn at some point too. And so this weird sci-fi setup, I guess, lets them kind of reference – real world things in a way that it fits the story in a way that hurt the story back in the Ravnica story we don't talk about.
00:29:30
Speaker
Yeah. Or, um, uh, Dusk Mourne also had some of that. That's true. does More in the cards than the story. The the story was, uh, did a better job isolating that than the cards did.
00:29:45
Speaker
yeah Yeah. That was mostly references in the cards. You'd have the like black and white TV that if you paid for it, you could, you have color. Yeah. Uh, that was, that was actually kind of a neat mechanical.
00:30:00
Speaker
That, yeah, that was a fun, like little, little milfos sort of thing going on there. Yeah. and mes and the The flavor. Sammy finds this rock basically shooting around and, uh,
00:30:14
Speaker
ah One line I really like here, Sammy may might be neat naive, but they're not naive enough to touch this thing. Proper handling. Mm-hmm. You don't just touch weird talking rocks. ah um But that doesn't work out well for them.
00:30:36
Speaker
ah Yeah, there's this whole conversation between Tan and the computer, and the computer just explaining away all these things. Sorry, I'm a little... Yeah.
00:30:49
Speaker
Yeah, but ah whether they want to or not, Sammy ends up touching the rock ah because of events that happen. Yes, because you you have to have the plot move forward.
00:31:00
Speaker
Yeah. ah And then they...
00:31:08
Speaker
they have some weird, uh, basic blackout, uh, and then they wake up back on the ship.
00:31:18
Speaker
Um, and then that's when they decide, Oh, we better get a storage, uh, basically a stasis unit for this thing, a storage cast.
00:31:30
Speaker
Um, so that kind of becomes the next stop for them. Yeah. Uh, And to get that, they need to go back to K'Varon, which is Tam's homeworld where he is exiled from.
00:31:47
Speaker
um And that's pretty much where Chapter 2 ends. And then we shift i' we chil focus.
00:31:58
Speaker
I do like this this rare material that was supposed to be mined here. It's called Moxite. Yeah, but that was good too. Yeah. that's all It's also, it's also neat that they end, they kind of use a little bit of that similar to the choice thing where you'd have the little links you would take.
00:32:15
Speaker
They use that to link to the next article, the next piece of the story for all of these at the end. So if you're reading it on the website, there's a little link that then just brings you to from episode two to episode three.
00:32:28
Speaker
Yes. A fun little, just a usability thing. Yeah, so episode three ah shifts focus to the character Alfriel, who is one of the monoists, the entropy-worshipping faction.
00:32:47
Speaker
ah Right when he finds out that his twin sister, Raphelia, is about to take the glorious undertaking of jumping into the black hole. Yep, a very important thing in their their religion.
00:33:01
Speaker
Yeah. Uh, which, um, he thinks he should be excited about, but for some reason isn't. Um, and then we get a, uh, a little bit more about the religion.
00:33:18
Speaker
um and And kind of the whole plan is they're basically going to be testing some kind of weapon, ah using her to test a weapon that they're going to use against the, the free company, which is a Summers faction here, their capital ship, which is a ship that's trying to reignite the supernova.
00:33:41
Speaker
um And ah so, yeah, Raffaella jumps into the black hole and um in a very uncomfortable bit, ah basically gets talking as she's starting to get crushed.
00:34:04
Speaker
And...
00:34:06
Speaker
and ah Then Afriel or Raffaella dies very painfully as to be expected when you jump into a black hole.
00:34:19
Speaker
um And Afriel immediately is like, Afriel realizes there is no next eternity. There is only hell.
00:34:33
Speaker
After seeing his sister get painfully killed. So what does he do here? ah He signs up for a suicide mission.
00:34:42
Speaker
ah He signs up to go attack that capital ship I was talking about. And they do this. that The way that they're attacking it. Since they can't don't really have a way to get around its shields or anything.
00:34:58
Speaker
They're. going to be using these injection pods that have a ah ah time dilation effect around them that basically will absorb 10 minutes of time ah that they would, where they would experience ah effects like, you know, the effect of slamming into a enemy capital ship.
00:35:20
Speaker
And it puts that on hold and they're hoping for long enough to sa ah sabotage the ship. ah But at the end of the 10 seconds, that impact immediately and everything else you would have experienced hits you.
00:35:32
Speaker
And you get turned into a fine pace. ah So everybody going on this mission knows they're going to die. um But they're monolith. So worship'ing they they carry these little mini black hole suicide pills.
00:35:51
Speaker
Yep, and that's that's supposed to be how they go out then. and that Yeah, before before they get turned into Pace, they're supposed to drop themselves into a mini black hole. Yep. And then hopefully take some some of the sunnest with them. Yep.
00:36:08
Speaker
That is... That's their setup for this. Yeah. ah he's He's really depressed, understandably. Mm-hmm.
00:36:21
Speaker
ah and And then everyone shouts, nothing tests our faith, because that's their mantra. I think in the first story we got we got that from the... your hand Is the hand still burning or something?
00:36:35
Speaker
Oh, that was from the summist side? From the summist? Yeah, so maybe there's maybe those are the countersigns. Yeah. Yeah. um i like this they're holy words or i take it holylly holyll holy holy you know three different spellings and meaning of the word yeah i i do appreciate the word play there yeah um but uh um So the rest of the is basically them, FRL getting ready to go on a suicide mission. And
00:37:17
Speaker
and then it switches over to the other side of the conflict and gives a point of view from Halea, who is a squire of the knights, basically the religious knights.
00:37:33
Speaker
um And specifically she works for Servandum, who is kind of this legendary badass.
00:37:43
Speaker
ah And they ah basically are preparing him because they know that there's an attack coming. They don't know when it's coming, but they they have all these preparedness rituals and ritual cleaning and ritual wrapping and everything to go through.
00:38:04
Speaker
ah and say some of their holy prayers, ah which is praising the light and the dawn. and Yep. And then like wrapping him in banners that will be under his armor.
00:38:19
Speaker
is the light something like wrapping a three meter long banner around his leg, left leg was what what she was doing at that as the story comes to her.
00:38:32
Speaker
And then there's a note where it's like, no one will actually see the, the himsari banners under Sir Vondin's battle armor, but Halea wants him to feel them perfectly wrapped, covered toe to crown and nightly oaths.
00:38:43
Speaker
e Yeah. Uh, the, these guys are hardcore paladin cosplayers.
00:38:52
Speaker
Um, they are definitely the, you know, uh, holy night, uh, And we've seen their cards, which are mostly white-red aligned.
00:39:07
Speaker
Yeah. but And they have a very knightly appearance. And then Summists are blue-black aligned largely. And ah they really like their black armor.
00:39:21
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, the other faction. Yeah. The Summists are these, the the Paladins. Yeah, the Summists are the Paladins and the Monoists are the void knights or whatever.
00:39:38
Speaker
Yeah, the the Entropy Worshippers. Yeah. um So we did a whole thing from their point of view. And um they're getting ready for this battle. ah And the captain of the ship they're on, the Dawn Sire, is this being made of light, which are basically like angels to these people.
00:40:05
Speaker
Uh, and the, um, the Monoists also have some kind of like darkness creature that they worship. Um, but they don't actually show up to help like the light beings do for the free company.
00:40:20
Speaker
Um, because there's some talk about It's like, it's always the, the people who face these challenges, you know, or none of them, whatever they're called, I can't find it right now are volunteer for these missions.
00:40:34
Speaker
It's always so. But the captain foresees the knight's death in this upcoming battle.
00:40:43
Speaker
And, of course, Helia doesn't like that at all because she thinks that Sir Vanden is, like, the greatest member in the entire army or greatest knight there is. And, know, the the sum will be diminished without him.
00:41:00
Speaker
Yeah, and and think there's also just kind of her image of her future, too, is is serving him. Mm-hmm. She has some major daddy issues.
00:41:11
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. and And maybe I guess I again haven't read all the stories, but also maybe believes that the best way for her to do good is to serve somebody else who is bigger and badder and can do better.
00:41:30
Speaker
Yeah. So less self-confidence. I don't know. Something like that. Mm hmm. so There's also just some whole explanation for how these prophecies work from this. It's like it's a little piece of the story at the bottom that it actually links to in the middle of the story. Again, if you're in the text version, there's a little link that it's like, you know, there's the Estelle, their prophecies are almost ever false.
00:41:54
Speaker
The grand cosmocordance physics as understood by the true faith say that only the unalterable can be foreseen. And so therefore, if it's something they see, it has to be unalterable.
00:42:05
Speaker
And there's a little explanation at the bottom that actually kind of explains more. Yeah, these light beams are called the Astelli. I don't know if we've seen any cards for an Astelli yet. Yeah, I'm not sure. I'll be honest. I haven't really been following the the previews for this set too closely right now.
00:42:23
Speaker
Yeah. um But that is the end of chapter three, and we get to basically right as they're getting ready to start the fight. Yep. yeah And we kind yeah get to see both both sides of this conflict, and then it sends us to the next...
00:42:43
Speaker
Yeah. Story. And then again, in the text, it gives links that are this one is a false choice where it kind of says the enemy is here or I think I like them better. Referencing. You think you like the monoists better?
00:42:57
Speaker
Both of them link to this episode for. Yeah, they both go to same place. And we pick up episode four again from Afriel's point of view. And he's basically with the suicide squad that are all going together to the literal suicide squad, ah because they all know that they're going to die. ah And ah spent some time introducing ah some of them. There's this old lady who's one of the people going, who's just like, as long as I take a night down with me, I'll be happy.
00:43:32
Speaker
Yeah. ah And um then they you and we get the basically them impacting the ship and talk a little bit about the kind of the the time dilation they use to survive, at least for the 10 minutes. It's kind of it's kind of cool, ah that whole idea that they could basically... And their armor works the same way. Their armor basically delays probabilities from happening ah until it reaches zero.
00:44:07
Speaker
ah it's i' like I like a lot of the character design or that the ah the yeah the the world building around the Monoists. there're Their gear is really cool. well and And there was even some some talk like right at the end of 3 from the the standpoint of the Summists 2 where they're like, we know they're going to attack.
00:44:27
Speaker
We know our armor is impenetrable. We know our weapons will take out any of their their things if they come at us conventionally. So they must be coming at us some way that isn't conventional. or something it's like they had even so again talking about the the time dilation and probability shifting yeah again this is where it's a lot of dense world building things yeah um so uh they board the ship they start smashing the place up um
00:45:00
Speaker
Some of the knights are there basically in they're in the area that's inside the time bubble, so they get to basically act at the same speed the other ones do. But for everyone outside the time bubble, that they can't react to this in time to stop it from happening. Which is, yeah, it's just some more kind of cool stuff. So...
00:45:22
Speaker
ah They immediately start fighting the Paladins. ah The Paladins have these kind of cool weapons called Bladiators, um which are like melee and beam weapons simultaneously. um i think they've been on some of the art revealed, but it just sounds really cool. I don't know if we've actually gotten equipment for one of them yet, but...
00:45:53
Speaker
Yeah, it's on some of the art. It's on
00:46:01
Speaker
They almost look like glaives, but they also can shoot off energy
00:46:14
Speaker
ah So they're fighting, and then we get Servandum and Hylia's point of view again ah And ah then we have we have what revision 10 was called Afril dies usefully, which which is what one of the people on the suicide ship told him that that's the best thing he can do is die usefully.
00:46:41
Speaker
ah And Afril does ah take... um It, know, spends a little bit of time from his point of view as he watches basically the, uh, the old lady that he was talking to run off and, ah he goes off to start, um, causing some mayhem to,
00:47:09
Speaker
ah get shot, but nothing happens. Um, ah Before tearing apart, the Summonist armor uses giant ripclaws as their primary weapons.
00:47:23
Speaker
ah Which just sound brutal and very black aligned as a weapon. Yeah. And I love this moment like where he's kind of panicking and he's like, you know, kill? Is that what he wants?
00:47:38
Speaker
He chose to be here. he vault You volunteered. You wanted this. Can you find an enemy and kill them? All I wanted to do was die. And then the line, then die usefully. So I love that. If old Simo wants to kill Solar Knights, that he will be her bait.
00:47:50
Speaker
So then he just starts yelling insults at them. Like i I love the, and empty, is this all the free company can muster? An empty church and a couple of flashlights. I thought this was your most powerful weapon. I don't believe in you. And you still are betraying my faith.
00:48:08
Speaker
Yeah, that was a good line. Uh, Afriel, uh, Afriel has a lot of, uh, a lot of entertaining lines in this story. Um,
00:48:20
Speaker
and Then we switch back to Helaya's point of view, and this is like her first real battle. um yeah She's never been in a real battle before, she's not very good she's not very good at it
00:48:40
Speaker
ah Yeah, she's she's also kind of struggling just at the start. like ah you know why Why doesn't she know what to do? It's like the knowledge that was in her brain, she's misplaced.
00:48:53
Speaker
her The knowledge that was in a part of her brain, she's displaced. Yeah. And she gets a really bad ah head injury, which would be lethal ah to, like, anyone else.
00:49:11
Speaker
ah But the... um So, yeah, this is like... The mono is clamps down his claws on both sides of her helmet and accelerates her brain into the side of her skull at 95 gravities. Left, right, and left again.
00:49:26
Speaker
Uh, but, uh, these, um, the summist warriors are all like biomechanically augmented. So that merely causes her a concussion.
00:49:38
Speaker
Yeah. This, like for a few seconds, she's nowhere. Her body deprived of discipline and direction asked for guidance from several million years of evolution and a more recent Pelham set of Jumal, Jumali modifications.
00:49:52
Speaker
It discovers its final ungoverned rage against extinction. The brain has failed, let the body fight. yes Her hands shove the gladiator into the monoist's armor and fires.
00:50:03
Speaker
Which again, in the text, is is a the word fires is a link that brings you to the next section, which is the very next line. Yeah. not sure why they structured that, but it does make the word fire blue in italics, which yeah accentuates it, I suppose.
00:50:20
Speaker
um And then we're back to Afril's point of view. And it starts with, he's never killed before, but it's easy to think, why should this wretched wet folly of a person get to live when my sister is gone? What right do they have to exist in a cosmos without her, without me?
00:50:36
Speaker
So, yeah our boy is really depressed. um He needs some counseling bad. yup And then instead he gets...
00:50:49
Speaker
sir uh yeah sir vandum shows up serve on them uh and uh and halea
00:51:01
Speaker
and then he's like well it's time to take my suicide pill which i call sakar uh and so he can go to the next eternity and be with his sister ah And then then we get actually the response that you talked about his challenge before earlier.
00:51:21
Speaker
You called out a challenge after all of secundity the Sunstar Nate Marks. I'm Sir Bondam of the Sunstar Free Company. I accept your... And then the old lady pounces on Sir Bondam. So...
00:51:33
Speaker
ah Afriel did his job. He was a good bait. And here' here's a good line, too. She hurtles out of the turbulence of the boiled water tank like a comet coming to end a whole geologic age. Yeah. ah Yeah.
00:51:53
Speaker
Again, you can make references like that because this is sci-fi. Yeah. And it's fun. Yeah. So Afriel basically gets to square off against Halea.
00:52:05
Speaker
And they start their enemies to lovers ah trap going. e
00:52:16
Speaker
And then we switch back to Halea's point of view. ah And she grabs Afril's ankle to keep him from interfering with the fight with Servandon.
00:52:29
Speaker
In other words, those ah her goal is to make sure the future has Servandon in it. That's all she's thinking about.
00:52:41
Speaker
Mm-hmm. And then she's like just thinking, you know, why won't he give up and take Sakaar hoping that ah her enemy will just um check themselves out of the fight.
00:52:53
Speaker
Yep. um And then, you know, what it says, the at what we know is Afriel, but it says the Mono, I'm going to live the Monoist cries. Yeah.
00:53:07
Speaker
And Ian Bondum is like, yes, you can live. We can put you in a stasis cast. We can cancel out your debt velocity and save your life. He's like, I'm going to live. ah And this is the point where Afriel makes the decision not to take his suicide um and yeah pill and instead chucks his little miniature black hole Sir Bondum.
00:53:32
Speaker
Yep.
00:53:34
Speaker
Uh... And Halea gets to see um what she is pretty sure Sir Vondam getting killed.
00:53:45
Speaker
ah Because he just had a black hole tossed through his head. Yep. ah And then we quickly search switch back to Afriel's point of view.
00:53:57
Speaker
And ah we get a little bit of like, can you grant Afriel mercy? We're back from that like second person point of view you were talking about. Yeah, but there's there's clearly some, again, only gotten halfway through the story, but it feels like there's clearly some person who's telling this whole thing as a framing device, which is interesting. And so we're kind of back to that framing story.
00:54:23
Speaker
And then there's, you know, can you, you know, pass, uh, give mercy to Afriel, you know, pass judgment, you know, but know that in my estimation, there's only one, uh, there's only one right choice.
00:54:38
Speaker
And again, there's two links. There's choose mercy, let Afriel live. No mercy. Afriel chose his path. And it leads like no mercy is again, it kind of like leads to a story. And so it's like, uh,
00:54:54
Speaker
Yeah. It's like and without Afriel, there's no way to complete what the the second person wants to accomplish. And then it says, you have failed me, but I'll grant you another chance.
00:55:07
Speaker
And then it's like, oh, go to mercy. And then you can go back to mercy. Yeah, because it's like events will proceed without Afriel. A moment will come when armies converge on me. And without Afriel, without the library of possibility ever ah archived in his word...
00:55:20
Speaker
um but i I will be taken. The feckless Drix will have me. This does not suit me. Sothera will not belong to the Drix. And that it... You have to go back and choose mercy.
00:55:34
Speaker
Yeah. Which... ah comes back to basically, uh, Afriel stares in giddy disbelief as, as Sir Vondam, uh, solar knight of the free company topples like a drunk.
00:55:47
Speaker
Uh, he killed a solar knight. He killed a solar knight. Uh, he's gotta live. He's gotta get back to the monastery and tell everyone. No one will believe
00:55:58
Speaker
But, ah so, oh he, uh, he also lost his hand when he threw his, uh, little black hole.
00:56:09
Speaker
Um, and so he runs away, ah because he knows that Halea has a concussion and, um, then he runs into the light being, uh, and another solar night and,
00:56:28
Speaker
um the light being is like, Oh, can we get someone to save them? Uh, because I want a prisoner. uh, they basically say, Oh, no, that's not going to hurt or not going to work. Uh, there's nobody inside the time bubble that can help them right now.
00:56:48
Speaker
Um, But then Afriel wakes back up and ah the light being ah is named Slats, which was short for a very long name. i don't it was like something about life the light that comes in through a window, Slats, or something weird like that.
00:57:09
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, and that's the other. whous saianss are The are the basic equivalent of them for the Monoist.
00:57:20
Speaker
ah That's where it mentions them here. ah but um
00:57:29
Speaker
Essentially, the um ah they talk for a bit, and the captain um essentially grants him mercy. Like the timeline said, it you know it would be very well, the light says, I sentence you to live.
00:57:45
Speaker
um And tells him that he's got basically four minutes to get himself to a ship that... um might be able to save his life by ah reversing the impact velocity. Another kind of, ah you know, sci-fi physics-y thing.
00:58:11
Speaker
ah And so then he gets to the, um he gets to the ah ship, but Hylia tries to stop him.
00:58:24
Speaker
ah And um it's funny. There's this one bit like stand down. A woman screams outside abort launch day code four, four, five, four. ah No, no, no. Alpha real prize launch emergency launch day code four, four, five, four.
00:58:40
Speaker
You just copied her code, the fighters. So there's a couple of times in this story where it's, and it's both times to Afriel where a machine is just like, what are you trying to do?
00:58:51
Speaker
but Yeah. ah And I do like the line. So it's like, it's counting down because he has this time before it happens, you know, because it starts with, he introduces himself as four minutes to live.
00:59:05
Speaker
So then Slash just calls him four minutes to live. And then at the end, he's like three minutes to live. You are very hung up on practicalities for a man who has just been given a miracle. So then as it kind of goes through this, this thing with Alfred, after all I love, there's the moment where it says 15 seconds and until he hits the side of the cockpit and becomes a physics problem.
00:59:26
Speaker
ah Um, so, ah and then we go back to Halea's point of view, who is basically what is going to happen to my life now. My knight is dead. I failed him.
00:59:40
Speaker
um you know, I'm weak. And then someone's like, oh, there's something you should see. and then go back and find Sir Vondon is still alive. He has a hole right through his head, but he's still alive.
00:59:55
Speaker
Uh, And they're like, oh, well, let's go follow the guy. We'll capture him. ah And, you you know, they both are like, they're they're both should see a medic. ah Hylia's knight has severe brain damage just as she.
01:00:16
Speaker
and they're like, nope. We got to go catch this guy. Yeah. Yeah. I do. do like And then yeah they talk a little bit about basically the, um, the finding out that the, uh, prophecy was, wasn't, uh, inevitable.
01:00:37
Speaker
And that kind of disproves one of the teachings of their faith. Uh, uh,
01:00:45
Speaker
Well, yeah, because it's some of the like, you know, it doesn't give the context. You just see a thing and it doesn't give the context. So it's like, well, that maybe that's why this isn't as infallible as you think.
01:00:57
Speaker
And so Sir Vaughn starts thinking at this point that he has to be under some kind of outside influence. ah And a blasphemy against reality and answer. And then he also says, I am also an answer of living blasphemy.
01:01:15
Speaker
ah And this is when they start, ah they basically are trying to figure out what what the influence actually is that altered the inevitable. Yep.
01:01:30
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Which I suspect, have have you read all 11 stories? I have read all 11 stories, yes. Yeah, I suspect this comes back to, again, that frame story.
01:01:44
Speaker
It relates somehow there. But again, I have not read the back half, which I will do before we record about that next week. I think it continually gets better as the story goes on. Okay, that's good to hear. Because I was enjoying the story, but it was so dense, especially to start with. I was i was struggling a little bit.
01:02:03
Speaker
yeah and i was also trying to cram all of this into monday before we recorded well hey after i had been sick for several days so that didn't help me i think this a good spot to start we're at the end of story four we're over an hour in this will probably end up being three episodes i'm guessing to talk about the whole story yeah um But I do hope you enjoy the rest of it. I did.
01:02:30
Speaker
i I had a hard time getting into it at first. It has kind of a slow start. You know, we just discussed the first four stories and we're just now really getting to the point where the story takes off.
01:02:44
Speaker
Yeah, we're we're kind of getting to events now, as opposed to the first half of this episode where we were just like setting up some world building to explain events. to give context to the story that we were going to talk about.
01:02:58
Speaker
who ah And yeah, so chapter five picks up with act three, ah and that's when things all start coming together. ah But we can talk more about that next week. For now, i just I hope people are enjoying the previews. There has been some really cool cards previewed.
01:03:19
Speaker
Yeah, I just noticed that one of them has Landfall, which has me excited. ah There's quite a bit of Landfall synergy, and after all the Landfall stuff in the last set, I think there's going to be a good Landfall deck.
01:03:33
Speaker
ah Yeah, there's there's even one called Mistform Harmonizer, um which doubles up on the same ability Tifa has. It's whenever a land you control enters, double the power of target creature you control to end a turn.
01:03:47
Speaker
So if you can play Tifa into that and then drop a land ah or drop multiple lands, it's just like quadrupling Tifa's power. Yikes.
01:04:03
Speaker
Well, cool. And I love the art style for the Monoists, though. They're so cool. Yeah, there's a lot of really, really cool art.
01:04:16
Speaker
uh, going on in this set, which I am, I'm very happy about. Uh, graph kill is an amazing piece. for oh We'll, we'll talk about the cards later, but yeah, there is. Yeah. We'll do the cards in their own episode too, at some point.
01:04:29
Speaker
Yeah. ah Uh, there's plenty of cool stuff to talk about there, but yeah, I hope you, uh, I hope you enjoyed the story. If you read it or I've got you interested in the story, like said, you can listen to it on, uh, YouTube.
01:04:44
Speaker
Um, Yep. Or ah they they have audio versions. Yeah. For all the stories and the side stories. Yep. Just on the, the wizard's website as well. For some reason you don't want to, or can't access to YouTube. Like you just go to the articles and embedded on the page for that article is just an audio version.
01:05:04
Speaker
Just click play and listen to the story. which is how I get through some of these stories when we're, we're doing recording. i I'll, I'll listen to them while I'm at work, like finishing up things I don't need to all my attention for. It's very nice.
01:05:19
Speaker
And again, that's another one of those, like, I'm really glad that they are still, the story is getting that treatment, getting the voice, getting people to do that for all the stories, even though it's, again, it's not something that earns them money. So I'm glad I, but it's part of their marketing budget like that.
01:05:35
Speaker
Yeah. you don't you don't expect direct return on marketing that's how marketing works but still it's it's nice to see them giving this much support to the story yeah hopefully they'll continue to do so and decide that it's not irrelevant when you know when they don't need to market universes beyond sets much uh and I hope that doesn't happen, but I am, I think it's promising that they had so many stories to set because they, they, yes, especially when the story is not really related to any magic story other than one character. um ah There's no direct relation to any of the ongoing magic story. They announced that like a month ahead of time. And I was pretty disappointed by that, especially with how little story,
01:06:26
Speaker
we get now yeah that's fair we basically had two sets with story relative to relevant to that this year the whole year yeah all we got was aether drift and dragon storm ah this is a good story.
01:06:45
Speaker
ah It's not a magic story. it's um But again, i am happily I am thankful, got to give give credit that there is this much story for it.
01:06:57
Speaker
And when we talked about with Tarkir too, where it felt like they were trying to fit too many things in too little space, even though they gave that that story a lot of they gave that set a lot of stories too Um, there was three plots happening all at once that they had to try to explain this one. I'm glad was given more space because it clearly needed it to with what they were trying to do.
01:07:17
Speaker
Yeah. They're just how much the the amount of world building they need alone. just Just to introduce all the different factions so that as people start to interact with them, you understand what their deal is. And and we don't even get one of the major factions in the main story. They're only in the side story, the insect, uh,
01:07:39
Speaker
the insect people. um Okay. yeah but But it's cool. If you're enjoying, if you enjoy the magic story, check this out. If you like sci-fi, I think there's some cool sci-fi stuff going on here, which is fun.
01:07:52
Speaker
Yeah. And they mentioned slivers and slivers are the best. Yeah.
01:07:58
Speaker
has been the Goblin Lore Podcast. Thank you for listening. We can be found both on Twitter and Blue Sky at GoblinLorePod. Check out our link tree for our Discord and our discounts.
01:08:09
Speaker
We appreciate you listening and welcome feedback via social media or Discord. Until next time, Podwalkers, remember that goblins, like snowflakes, are only dangerous in numbers.