Ha! :-D

(Siphy's iffy too, by the way.)

Riff only has the power of the one scroll he's in. Unless Gwynn makes a new book of e-ville. The scroll of binding and unbinding was one that used to be part of the book.

I still don't understand why they had to use death magic to unbind the book when that scroll was right there.

(I'm just brainstorming, I can't remember if it's been discussed before),
Maybe it's like an ingredient... Other spells might need only the power of the individual or entity, but that one needs death magic. Why that one needs it but I others don't, I'm not sure...

Actually, I think Riff might be the best possible jailor that PP could have.

He is largely motivated by a sense of responsibility to save the world, which is why he's always considering whether he should take out Alie.

After going through 4u city, where he felt responsible for the destruction of most of the world I think he won't resent being a jailor, he'll consider it a success where 4u city was a failure. Every day the world continues without being destroyed will be a day that he won. He'll feel useful.

I don't think he will ever go mad. Farahn was selfish, Riff has never been selfish.

I can imagine some comics where we might get the satisfaction of seeing that the bug has met his match and can have no effect on Riff at all.

There's also the little fact that Riff's father (and distant ancestor) made all this trouble and killed tons of people in attempts to release the bug. I can see him trying to be the one to make it right.

I wonder -- and this is a little heavy -- but if Riff is based on a friend that Pete lost, might this be his way of giving him immortality?

On a much lighter note: if Gwynn goes back and forth between human and paper form, how does she change clothes?

I can imagine that too. Dimension of Rain/4U City Riff could only mitigate what he had done and Riff almost despaired when he realized all he couldn't change. Even if he's trapped there for now, all he really has to do is say no and ignore the bug (until he figures out the next step)

So... We all root for a "...and they lived happily ever after" ending to our favorite tales, including Sluggy Freelance. At first, I accepted Gwynn's change - after all, it was foretold in the Dimension of Lame. But does her change have to be permanent? Could a half-godling undo the spell and return her to a normal mortal life? If so, Dunuloa seemed awfully pleased with Gwynn's "gift"... Just sayin'...

Time for Riff to build a space ship.

Oh, wait.

You know, I've been wondering what happens if you launch PP into space... but what if you launch the book with him (and Riff) in it?

I can't make the sluggy search work on my phone so I can't find it right now... but does anyone remember what (if any) the effects of stabbing the book with Chaz were?

I wonder/spec if Yffi wanted Chaz to find a way to use it against the Bug (given that his agenda **is** against the Bug of course). Maybe only a powered Chaz could have an effect on Poopy, and stabbing the book and Farahn at the same time would not activate the sword as Farahn was definitely not innocent. Maybe an innocent host is needed to truly harm the Bug.

This could all have been answered in the story, so I resolve to go check later.

It didn't really accomplish much, if at all:


Riff might not be considered innocent, or at least he might not consider himself to be, seeing how he tried to zap the bug in an other dimension.

A ha! Thank you!

Leaving aside the questions of whether Riff is innocent and of how Chaz actually determines innocence (is it defined by that person's interior self-image? is it something that is automatically determined? does Chaz make a value judgement? are these questions already answered in the story?) -

as Chaz passive-aggressively points out: "Farahn is a man. You must stab the man to kill the man, even a crowbar knows this."

Which means we might not yet know if killing the host, also kills the demon. Torg does point out that a couple of times he "killed a demon and the person it was possessing".

That means that if the Bug is possessing Farahn (or now Riff), killing the host kills (or at least harms) the demon. However, the Bug is not a regular demon. And also, was Farahn (and is now Riff) possessed? Is Riff now a body with two souls, or a cell holding a prisoner?

If the first is true, then a person needs to be sacrificed to kill the Bug. If the second... then even stabbing won't help. In fact it might free the Bug.

I'm speccing that this conundrum is exactly what Yffi has been working to solve, and that's why they need Chaz. If getting someone other than Farahn possessed was actually the initial plan (which means that they engineered the unbounding of the book, Farahn being freed and the Bug being released), perhaps Yffi is working towards changing the nature of the Bug's prison from "prisoner in a cell" to "body with two souls" (possession).

Which of course begs the question... where was Yffi when the Bug was possessing Gwynn and could have made a great target?

So I'm furtherspeccing (and I think this one's a safe bet) that we'll get an epilogue to the Immortal King on what's happening inside the book, and a cryptic cliffhangery epilogue with Yffi).

I do think it's likely Yffi wants Chaz to kill the bug. I do not believe his motives for doing so are at all altruistic. First of all, if we're to believe the fate spiders, the consequences of the end pillar being destroyed would be catastrophic on a much greater level than simply the end of a spark. It seems likely that Yffi would know this. Therefore, I think his motivation is either a) that he's tired of suffering and just wants to burn it all down or b) he believes he's found a way to replace the Bug as the End pillar and wishes to do so to put himself above Krohnus. Another possibility is that he's not gunning for the Bug at all, but rather Prozoato (given how powerful Yffi seems to be I assume he wants Chaz for the purpose of killing something that cannot be killed by any other means, which leaves the pillars as most likely, with I suppose Krohnus also being a reasonably likely target). If that's the case, he may want the Bug to end the spark so that Prozoato will appear to create a new spark and become vulnerable to attack by Chaz.

Side question: where is Krohnus these days? Have we ever seen him since the Mokhadun arc? I know Rana and Dunuloa have mentioned him in the present, but is there any clue as to his form, location, or recent activities?

No, he hasn't. But there is also the enigmatic Father Time from the Holiday Wars.