Light At The End Of The Tunnel – Page 1039

78 thoughts on “Light At The End Of The Tunnel – Page 1039

  1. Shiiiiiiiiiii… wow!!!

  2. SamuraiDemonPuppy

    OK, I’ll bet Daddy is impressed now.

    1. *I*’m impressed and I’ve seen him cut loose before.

  3. Every once in a while, it’s fun going back to the beginning of the comic and seeing how far Mentl has come (and JED’s toolkit, as well 🙂

  4. Huh. I don’t understand Zona’s attitude here. She’s practically rolling her eyes. ?????

    1. Her attitude comes not from the subject of her words, but the person she’s addressing them to.

    2. I thought she was just looking at the Sudrac’s head, its most dangerous part so far.

      (And as far as I’m concerned, “Being Mentl” means “Seeing me hurt and getting all protective with utter disregard for his own safety” here.)

      1. I agree – both Zonn and Zona are watching the head, Eyes in the same place.

  5. Biiiig Bada BOOM! And Goes to show that Tula was rockin’ Aerosmith and no doubt other classic, metal and music in general back on Earth. Hmmm, think she was trying to keep in tune’ tune with Mentl? Would absolutely make sense and seems as if it would be something she would do in order to gauge Mentle and his abilities.

    1. May I remind you of this strip?
      https://barbarianprincess.com/comic/conflict-resolution-erogenian-style/page-300/
      I’m pretty sure Tula can feel when Mentyl has called up massive amounts of power without having to recognize the song.

      1. Yes, especially since she said that before Mentl started singing. If Tula could feel earthquakes in each fist before, every hair on her body was probably standing up this time.

        1. Notice her hair, the braids blowing back? The wind is picking up, fast. He’s brewing a storm just thinking about it, he hasn’t begun “chanting” yet, and what he wants is already happening. She can tell he’s gathering power for something big.

        2. MidnightDStroyer

          Yeah, Tula’s acting like the proverbial “EOD sergeant” compared to Mentl’s “EO.” Tula’s warning outranks everyone else, even if they were all generals.

      2. Judging by page 300, Tula can’t feel exactly what Mentl is trying to do. The lyrics Mentl was starting to chant then were likely to have had him go all Popeye on Pontgar’s Bluto, rather than incinerate him. However, since Erogenians don’t have the recuperative powers of cartoons, it probably would have been just as fatal if Mentl had completed his chant.

  6. Could have stopped with panel 3 for this update, then posted the rest later in the week. I might have stopped laughing by then.

    I expect a molten pool of glassed sand.

    Also thinking that that much electricity being discharged has a LOT of potential to jump … either toward our cast or possibly toward other things, such as other hidden things the desert swallowed long ago. Gods, tech, standing stones, etc.

  7. Adam Östergren

    He has gotten a major increase in power it seems.

  8. Whoa… Mentl would make a great pest-control wroker, for sure. 😛

  9. Whoa… Mentl would make a great pest-control worker, for sure. 😛

  10. What a shocking development

    1. Sibling, you rock. That was beautiful.

    2. Yeah, that really turned out to be a flash in the pan. Zona wa right to guess it would be “something flashy.”

  11. I love how Tula and Zona both were more scared that the splash damage may get them as well.

    They were not worried for Mentl, not for a moment did they think he was not going to slaughter the poor lizard.

    I am wondering is someone will now claim some lizard hide for boots… on that point… can Mentl use his music for non combat stuff? Could he sign a song about a cobbler and make some nice lizard skin boots?

    1. I’d guess he could conjure up some Boots [are] Made for Walking, or some Blue Suede Shoes, or even build a city on rock and roll if he so chose, yes.

    2. He used his music for psychological stuff in the short chapter beginning here: https://barbarianprincess.com/comic/here-comes-the-sun/page-474/ . (Not to mention the numerous times he made every straight woman and gay man madly attracted to him, which doesn’t count as combat either.)

    3. He did cure that poor old woman’s dementia the moment the sun peeked out from behind the clouds. Of course it begs the question of if her mind will start to wonder at night, or every time a cloud crosses before the sun… Could get a bit problematic for her.

    4. I’m not too sure anyone could get a pair of boots after this. After all, can you use the hide of a cow AFTER it’s BBQ’ed to a crisp?

  12. Thanks for the note about the song, Jed. 😉 And an awesome update. I hope Mentl got it under control and didn’t fry the rest of them.

    This was as great as the great balls of fire.

  13. I do SO love it when Mentl cuts loose.

    1. Mentl’s *targets* on the other hand, don’t enjoy it so much…

  14. Fight a sudrac and you’ll probably be dead within the hour.
    Kill a sudrac with lightning, and you can feed your tribe for a week! (If you can heft the carcass that far!)

    1. You’re assuming they’re good eating. There is some serious venom in there.

      1. Rattlesnake, just don’t eat the head.

        1. Tastes like chicken?

      2. There is a stage of preparation between the killing and the eating, you know. Food and Hygiene certificated culinary staff only.

  15. Yihaaaaaaaaa.
    And as everybory says here (Counting Tula and Zona): hope there is no backlash from this massive lightening.
    But cooooooooooooooool.
    I think ‘daddy’ was already liking Mentl, he seemed the kind of guy who like having someone being able to talk back to him. But now? I just hope Chera is not going to be freaked out by Mentl powers… That’S all.
    And I still want to know what happened with our scouts in far far away land… What about them?

    1. He respects the fact that Mentl was not at all cowed by him. He talked some s*** to Mentl, got s*** back. Balanced. Good.

      It is tough to say, but I think Chera’s powers work differently than Mentl’s. She’s invoking her god, and appears to be able to do so bang-bang rapid. Everything we’ve seen, Mentl has to take time to build it up. As I recall from the technical discussions, his kind of magic is not unknown in this world. About how much, it’s really hard to say. We’ve seen very little magic besides his so far. Moreover, we’ve never seen anyone discussing the limits of their abilities.

  16. Oooh! Lightning Strikes by Aerosmith! One of the first Aerosmith songs I ever heard and one of the best off their somewhat maligned “Rock in a hard place” album as this was the period where the band was missing both Joe Perry and Brad Whitford (replaced by Jimmy Crespo and Rick Dufay).

  17. Well, I called the lightning correctly, anyway.

    1. So does he! That being said, congratulations, brother!

  18. Nothing like hurting Zona to get Mentil back in touch with his magic side!

  19. Dear. God. In. Heaven….I love every panel of this update!

  20. I keep looking and trying to figure it out but I cannot tell what it is that Zona is ripping.

    1. I think it is the right shoulder strap to her top…a bandage perhaps?

      1. Or it’s melting from the acid.

        And I’ll admit it, I was not thinking of anything Aerosmith.

        1. I admit. I was hoping for Metallica: “Ride the Lightening”. But never EVER do “Call of Ktullu”.

        2. “Call of Ktulu” would be easy for Mentl to avoid. It’s a pure instrumental.

  21. Dammit with such a big reptile I was hoping for Blue Oyster Cult, and their song about a slightly larger reptile

    1. Tokyo residents would probably appreciate the fact that Ment didn’t send this particular problem their way.

    2. You expected Mentl to cross the Godzilla threshold over something this minor?

      1. Especially since the song seems to be *encouraging* Godzilla’s rampages. I doubt that Mentl would want to do that for the sudrac.

        1. Looking at the lyrics, you should look past the ‘go, go Godzilla’ part, and consider the repeated line ‘history shows again and again, how nature points out the folly of man’. Immediately calling out Godzilla as an example. I think the line ‘they say he’s got to go’ could be construed as a ‘keep him away!’ sentiment regarding the big G, so it could be summoning-neutral in overtone.

          Overall, I’d objectively say that the song is more about the inevitable triumph of natural forces over the works of sapients such as humans, portraying Godzilla as the personification of those natural forces.

  22. CRAkCLEBOoM! now what is daddies reaction to this? do I foresee headbutteriness here? or is it going to be just a “oh a mage, moving on” moment?

  23. I’m betting the latter. Mentl’s not the only power show in town. Bet Zonn’s taken a few down himself. If the author is generous, Zonn might make a comment to help us gage just how strong Mentl is compared to other mages. (Actually, during the technical discussion, I think Mentl was called an “enchanter”.)

  24. Who’s crispy & good with ketchup now??

  25. I just had a shiver from beyond… I have a really bad feeling that Mentl is going to end up being the main villain. This is Zona’s story after all. I hope I’m wrong, but I just had a vision of Zona having to kill Mentl for real.

    1. We already know that they have a daughter together ,when Mentl is middle aged, who is being tutored by Tula.

    2. I don’t want to take the time to find it, but may I refer you to the out-of-time series where we meet Zona and Mentl’s daughter?
      “get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged.”

      1. How do you know Zona doesn’t become pregnant BEFORE Mentl turns evil?

        1. Because Mentl fetches his errant, teenage, daughter from Zona’s past.
          He then checks in with her, when they get back to Earth.
          https://barbarianprincess.com/comic/something-completely-different/page-538/
          (The chapter starts one page earlier.)
          There was more, but I’m not finding it, where he checks in with his wife after, while she’s watching television on Earth.

        2. I think that was a bonus, out of the main series. I assume it will be brought back up at some point.

        3. The question is: which timeline are we following? The one from which those two came, or the one she inadvertently created?

  26. . . . ‘that’s the baby’?

    Most impressed that he pegged a moving drac in the head with a rock at that distance. His magic’s powerful, but he still needs to work on that fine control.

    1. He’s been training. Thrown weapons training in there somewhere, I’m sure.
      https://barbarianprincess.com/comic/friends-and-family-part-1/page-680/

    2. Not just hit the head, but in the same spot Chera just burned.

      1. Yes! Good eye.

  27. NICE!
    I was betting on BIG BALLS OF FIRE! XD

    1. As best I remember, Mentl has never used the same song twice. It’s as though each is a one-use key to unlock or direct power.

      1. Or he’s just a professionnal showman. Never give them the same trick twice.

  28. Lightning… Oh boy, that’s going to make a rather nasty shockwave along the ground…And quite a few people there have metal on them…

    1. Shouldn’t be a problem. The drac forms an easy path of least resistance to ground, and everyone’s standing a fair distance away on nice dry sand. Lightning is a neigh instantaneous high voltage DC discharge. If arc flash was going to happen, it would have happened. Worst they’ll get is some spatters of hot sand ablating off the strike. For Mentyl’s next trick he’ll have to add in a continuous current and some smoke –

    2. Bit of an understatement on the metal. They’re all erogenians – so ‘torcs’, except Mentl and he has a chain from Zona

  29. That Last panel needs to be made into a background or screen saver, the art just keeps getting better

  30. Brilliant as always! Yes, it justs gets better and better.
    This one made my hair stand on end. Literally!
    Well done, Jed! And Mentl 🙂
    Yes, that final panel would make a fantastic background… hint, hint.

  31. The blue in Mentl’s hair in the final panel. Is that dyed or magic.

    If magic, is he like the Biblical Samson? Would a close shave deprive him of his potency?

    1. It looks like a coronal discharge, so it’s part of the lightning charging the environment.

  32. after reading all the comments I feel bad I was hoping for thunderstruck

  33. God damn, that last panel is awesome!

  34. And THAT is how a Bard uses evocation to best advantage!

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