Part 39: RECAP!

RECAP!

So we have our lead, Rhue. I've already done over the real odd stuff about him, but some more details can't hurt.
For one: He's a short-sighted, impulsive, vindictive, easily annoyed/angered, self-centred asshole and arguably psychotic. Also is extremely obsessed with finding his childhood love Serena.

I feel I should also post a summary of his recounting of his memory of the Landorin Massacre here along with the details we know about that night besides that.

So. Rhue's story of the massacre goes like this. Sometime not too long after he got Serena the pendant, she and the other children of the fists Rhues family travelled with decided to sneak out to play together late at night.
Their play was interrupted by wolves or wolf-like monsters attacking and killing the children. Only Serena and Rhue managed to escape. As they fled, a storm started. Tiring, and pursued by wolves... Rhue decided to fight back when they reached a river bank. Serena was knocked into the river by a surprise attack. Rhue, distracted, was then pounced on by the wolves.
He awoke some time later and immediately set off down The Way in search of Serena. Before long he came upon two men silently standing around. One gave Rhue his sword. They never said a word at all or even otherwise looked at him.

Now the actual details we know from Traziun are that none of the childrens bodies were ever found. Just lots of blood. He also said there was only one known survivor and he never heard of falling into the river as being mentioned as part of their story.
By now it's very very very very strongly implied that this survivor is Lyrra, to the point I'll just say it's a fact.



The ever lovable, badass, smart and handsome Strata was the first major character we met besides Rhue.
He's just an asshole that assaulted Rhue over a rabbit. Though he does complement his trash talk with a high level of skill. When he stopped by the Matalan Battle Grounds, he defeated all the rookie Blood Lyn with ease, and was so good the veterans refused to risk plunging him at all.
He seems to have noticed how easy it is to fuck with Rhue and is determined to do it at every opportunity.
Strata was also responsible for saving Lyrra from the Blue Scarve Camp, and now the two seem to be a couple as Strata helps her search for her father.
For his part, Strata DOES seem to care for her in his own way. He cared enough to ask why she looked so sad in one scene, anyway, and comforted her.



Slade first appeared saving Rhue from the first headhunter. We've since learned he's a Shadow Foot, an elite warrior of the Vigilance Council.
He has some kind of... issue with hitting on women, as he flipped out nearly beat Alan to death over just that.
He apparently has a great reputation, since Kygar fled rather than face him in battle.

Later, he arrested Cetsa/Dancing Violet, refusing Rhue the chance to speak to her a moment, because he's an asshole and they were right by a camp of Cetsa's minions. Also he didn't trust Rhue who'd lied to him repeatedly and might even turn on him depending on the answer to the question. That's my excuse anyway.
Since then, we've seen him rebuff Patura's advances, so she denied him the chance to participate in the Grand Tournament on behalf of the Vigilance Council.


Traziun is basically our deuteragonist. He befriended and mentored Rhue with no ulterior motive other than finding Rhue interesting because of his attitude.
He seems to seek to become a Forerunner and investigate the rumors of the End of the Way fast approaching. He also plans on killing his 'murderous father'.
After they spoke about the two infamous Delhara Battle Grounds escapees, Kloe recalled she knew Traziun from... someplace she didn't explicitly state. But the context makes it sound like Traziun also trained at Delhara. Traziun himself implies this by knowing about Alagard, the famous escapee, but commenting on what Kloe calls 'the second lesser known escape that no one talks about' and saying that it happened well after his time there.
Curious Note: He seemed to recall the name Gaius from somewhere when we first met Gaius.
Also, -possibly- has ownership of the great treasure Scatha was after, which is -possibly- the Shadow Sword from Lide.
The Blood Lyn want to kill Traziun at all costs. Like, he worried about the Blana Sera sensing him, which happened, and that was enough for them to forget about executing Kloe in their special ceremonial execution, they wanted Traziun so bad.


The ever mysterious Gaius is, debatably, our tritagonist.
We don't know much if anything about him personally, but he seems to be working with Lady Velicia of the Guided in investigating Sacrifa's subfaction of the Guided.
He and Rhue killed a guy together? And Rhue doesn't remember him or that anymore?
He has some kind of connection with Kloe, as he's twice now gone out of his way to avoid her, even running away from her the second time, as she desperately chased him. HMMMM


Lyrra, Jed's daughter and the only known survivor of the Landorin Massacre (besides Rhue and Serena maybe?).
She narrates her whole life like it's a childrens fairy tale, and was initially very taken with Rhue, as was made very obvious during the scene Rhue had to tell a story at the campfire at the end of Episode 1.
However, after he left her in Cetsa's tent and she was saved by Strata instead, she's become obssessed with idealising Strata as her knight in shining armour. She's also very anxious to find her father.


Rosmar was an independent wanderer travelling with Jed and Lyrra's fist. He's not very important but Rhue did 'accidentally' cut his face open during a mock plunge, which he now bears the scar of, as you can see. He's a jerk and Rhue made the mistake of assuming he was Lyrra's dead brother Jed referred to.



Jed, Lyrra's father. Not really important in himself, but Rhue absorbed his aura when he mercy-killed him, and later lived out his memory of the night of the Landorin Massacre, where he searched for Lyrra and Jeruh and found only a traumatised Lyrra.


In Lide Rhue met Cetsa, a beautiful woman who arranged a tournament so all the men could fight over her in a more civilised fashion...
Only for her to ultimately reveal the whole thing is a scam, as Kygar usually is good enough to kick everyone's ass so they can make a lot of cash. It's implied they've done this a lot of times.
Her plans change though, when Foreman Ballar tells her about the Shadow Sword kept beneath Lide and she decides she wants it. She's foiled, and seems to have had run ins with Scatha before.
She also turns out to be Dancing Violet of the infamous Blue Scarves. And she has the pendant Rhue gave to Serena, which catches Rhue's interest immediately. Finally, you -can- choose to make Serena's hair the same hair colour, which only intrigues Rhue further, but even if you don't, he considers it possible that she may be Serena dying her hair. She winds up getting arrested by Slade after Kygar betrays her.
She's now awaiting her fate in the highest cell in The Arm of Estrana. She'd have been excuted without trial already by the Vigilance Council, if the Guided under Sacrifa weren't vetoing the very thought.
... As a last note, Cetsa wonders if 'I was really all that bad' and seems to blame everything wrong with her life on the moment she got her pendant.


Kygar, Cetsa's right hand man. Gut punched her so he could flee and leave her to Slade. A skilled plunger and fighter.


Goofy, womanising fighter/bard wannabe that uses big words to sound smart. Rhue repeatedly saves the lucky bastards life. Here's to hoping that keeps up.


Kloe, a Blood Lyn that was contracted out to Foreman Ballar before her training was complete because her partner fled the Blood Lyn. This is interesting because... it sets up why Kloe would know about the escape that apparently has been kept quiet.
And she somehow seems to know Gaius and was desperate to speak to him. Traziun, who also knows about the second escape, was vaguely familiar with Gaius' name. How stinking odd.
Besides that, she's not really important to the plot despite being one of the most major characters. That's because she was meant to be a one off character only present in Lide until Lun realised he enjoyed writing for her. So she's a bit disconnected from everything else going on.
The Blana Sera sentenced her to death for... some reason. Traziun says such things only happen for extremely serious crimes.
Kloe herself seems to lack the will and a reason to live, but is also too scared to just die.


Masked woman who likes it down in the Pits, and claims to have travelled to The Reaches herself. As in, she claims she takes walks in the settings physical Hell.
She was also providing Jopaga with components for his formulas that she retrieved from the Pits in exchange for a formula to fix her face.
Has a problem with men... Calls Rhue a chauvinist pig and such things, though I feel she's completely accurate when she gives her speech about Rhue thinking he's a hero, something I've meant to talk abotu for a while and keep forgetting.
Also believes love isn't real and is just an excuse for men to have beautiful trophy wives they'll dump for even prettier trophy wives.
She seems... genuinely touched when Rhue says her hair is pretty though, but it doesn't last long.
HATES being touched and flips out when Rhue saves her life at the volcano by carrying her out.
She was VERY interested when Rhue mentions Serena, and was curious as to what he thought about her, if he genuinely loved her and where Serena currently is. When they parted ways, she went out of her way to save him from being stuck in the Pits, without Rhue knowing. And seemed to know who Rhue was now, pondering that 'he' was alive even if his name was strange.
As for the item she was after in the Pits? It's never clarified but it was probably the Shadow Sword from Lide, and it was -probably- Traziun who beat her to it.


Definitely not Red Zero.


Dirk, an eccentric pervert of an old man who claims to be, among many other things, names and titles, a Forerunner.
Seems knowledgeable about monsters though.


We first met Velicia way back on Marna Stretch. She's a ranking member of the Guided who seems to be under orders direct from Pontifex Maximus Tetzel (essentially the Pope of the Guided) to investigate Sacrifa and his Guided's activities.
Don't forget the name Tetzel either, it'll be coming up more.


Medmur, the third member of the Vigilante Council who we've only seen briefly thus far, does wind up being a bit important so don't forget he exists.


This old lady will be a bit important too. Her name wasn't mentioned but she had a nice friendly chat with Rhue at the park while she fed the birds. She spoke about the power of love and how it's the only thing that's kept her alive for a long time, that she'd have died long ago without it. She's good.




Now, about Rhue...

As we saw in the latest update Rosmar explicitly confirmed that he isn't Lyrra's brother. Something most of you probably suspected due to the uhh... strange flashback Rhue had to the night of the Landorin Massacre where he was looking for Lyrra and Jeruh, and not say, Lyrra and Rosmar.

Jed said Lyrra's brother is dead. So we're to assume he died on that night, a very long time ago. Probably like a decade ago, maybe even more. We're never given Lyrra or Rhue's age at present or at the time of the massacre.

Except, isn't that kind of strange? The name Jeruh's come up a couple times before we saw that flashback.

The first time was the headhunter in Episode 1, who attacked Rhue and co, suspecting they knew something about a Jeruh (or even that Rhue was Jeruh, it's implied.)

The second time was the much friendlier headhunter on Marna Stretch, who seemed to know Rhue and that he had long been searching for someone. Except instead of Serena, he asked if he'd found Jeruh yet. He even said they last spoke only a couple weeks ago. And then as he said his goodbyes, he called Rhue 'Midian'. A name that's not since come up.

And then there's the thing with both Scatha and Gaius. Scatha reacted strongly to the name of Serena and seemed very interested in knowing her location. Later, she mused that Rhue was still alive (as in, she'd long thought him dead), but that his name was odd.

And Gaius wondered why Rhue didn't seem to remember him or the man they killed together (though he says Rhue deserves most of the credit for the kill). He also thought that the name Rhue belonged to someone else instead. He even said Rhue's aura seems muddled and now that you know what an aura is... you have an idea of what that could mean.

Add to all that the fact Rhue seems to absorb aura's rather unnaturally, dreamed one of Jed's memories, and has a great antipathy towards mirrors and its sort of obvious what's going on with Rhue. The important questions are... how and why? And who the hell are Midian, Jeruh and... potentially, a real, separate Rhue? And how are they related?