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Discuss the possible arcs for Ishterebinth. I'm motivated primarily by the idea that Sorweel is to be the character to confront Kellhus, due to speculation on the old Three-Seas. Also featuring:

Achamian bitchslapping Nin'ciljiras (I'm assuming the Betrayer's line aren't Quya, those scheming fucks)?
Serwa taking the Nonman seed... to term?
Moenghus being batshit crazy?
Sorweel whining and moping about a whole species using his crush as an incubator?

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Nonmen in suspended animation?  Or just sitting round polishing stones to keep their memories intact maybe.

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Wilshire and I debated some kind of inversion of DBZ's Hyperbolic Chamber .

[What Came Before]

Discuss the possible arcs for Ishterebinth. I'm motivated primarily by the idea that Sorweel is to be the character to confront Kellhus, due to speculation on the old Three-Seas. Also featuring:

Achamian bitchslapping Nin'ciljiras (I'm assuming the Betrayer's line aren't Quya, those scheming fucks)?
Serwa taking the Nonman seed... to term?
Moenghus being batshit crazy?
Sorweel whining and moping about a whole species using his crush as an incubator?

 :lol: @ bitchslapping and incubator.

From the excerpt I brought back, I think there will be a vary large amount of Sorweel whining/bitching/moping around at anything and everything that happens in Ishterebinth. We will probably only get his POV for a long time, and he will be all confused self-conflicted and miss 90% of whats important and not understand the much of the remaining 10% that he witnesses directly. Oh yeah, several masturbation scenes.

For example they'll be walking in a hallway and he'll look into a room and see a Nonman sitting on the ground polishing a stone and think to himself "fuck I wish I could sit around like that all day, carefree and pursuing a hoby such as rock cleaning". And that will be all there is about the intact nonmen.

I think the Nonmen will try to make some babies. Initially with Serwa (more crying/masturbating from Sorweel). Then regardless of if that works or not, when Mim shows up they will try to make some crazy babies with her as well (Akka masturbating/crying this time? Possible I think. Crying yes, masturbating maybe. Maybe our two moribund heroes will tag team this scene, Akka with the tears, Sor with the semen).

Akka will probably show up and get all pissed off, try to kill a few people, with mild success until he inevitably loses and gets chained up and then later rescued/set free under the pretext of a simple misunderstanding/blaming it on Seswatha.


Moe? No idea. He's just a crazy barbarian. The nonmen will probably just kill him.

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Madness, were you suggesting that the basically Nin'janjin's people were running the show?  Were you making assumptions about the "Nin" prefex of their names?  If so, I wouldn't say it's all his line but likely more like his clan or extended, extended family.

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Lmao...

Look, we're all seed crazy here. It matters - though I hope Wilshire and lockesnow don't have our First Honorary Row of the Second Apocalypse over it . Fuck... this place is a drug and my brain gets kicks out of hot topics.

I think the Nonmen will try to make some babies. Initially with Serwa (more crying/masturbating from Sorweel). Then regardless of if that works or not, when Mim shows up they will try to make some crazy babies with her as well (Akka masturbating/crying this time? Possible I think. Crying yes, masturbating maybe. Maybe our two moribund heroes will tag team this scene, Akka with the tears, Sor with the semen).

Madness, were you suggesting that the basically Nin'janjin's people were running the show? Were you making assumptions about the "Nin" prefex of their names? If so, I wouldn't say it's all his line but likely more like his clan or extended, extended family.

Firstly, quick yes, Trisk, but you're right - we should help ourselves define line, seed, etc, as it bears greatly on the themes. I'm assuming that all Nin's are related like all Bakker's are related. We have to remember that the Nonmen would have had better to worse records of lineage in their history, not the human worse to better gradient... not to mention that all the Nonmen alive are contemporaries of Cu'jara Cinmoi and Nin'janjin. These aren't likely distant cousins we're talking about here, and even if they are, they interacted far more regularly with them - albeit, with sword and sorcery - than I do mine.

I mean, none of us could have guessed that Bakker might take it farther but I'd long suspected he's intended to use Faith as a vehicle for the sexist critique he's got going on.

Heretics/Chapterhouse Dune:

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I remember my initial disgust at realizations of axolotl tanks.

The Inchoroi gave the Nonmen the worst possible racial memory - the loss of the Females... in this way, the Nonmen mirror the Ents - disguised as immortality, which itself cursed them with forgetting that loss.

Kellhus offers them nothing less than recovering their race... albeit, forever tainted by mannish blood.

Serwa is 100% the best possible combination of parents (Kellhus - the Bastard/Esmenet - Last Scion?) for preserving the true Anasurimbor bloodline, which contains aspects of the Nonmen genome. Mimara would be a close second, if she is the Last Scion.

There are added complications because we don't understand the relationship between the Outside and Earwa. Is there simultaneously a mundane and Soulful genome so that things like Righteousness or Piety, for instance, are hereditary - though, I could easily field an argument that those concepts are reflected in the meat regardless.

Serwa is sadly, probably, ignorant of her father's schemes...

+1 for Achamian being locked up. I reiterate, the moment that a Nonman sees Achamian wearing Nil'giccas armour, he will be the Kingslayer.

+1 for Sorweel finding a real girl... I mean, Mimara's gots to better than Serwa for him. Though, she isn't exactly sunshine and rainbows either: "Hi, I'm Mimara. I've already successfully seduced one Nonman Erratic this season (like weather - though double entendre ) and I'm ready for a whole Mansion more. I'm also pregnant with the Unborn Eye of God and will likely die when I give stillbirth to its childlike form." Way to go, Sorweel!

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I don't know about this breeding program speculation.
Mim's baby will probably be the first stillbirth of the second apocalypse when the No-god walks again (which is possibly why she's important to the Consult).
Which will make Serwa's possible ability to interbreed with non-men a moot point.

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dead babies better than no babies? maybe the tekne can fix that.

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Kellhus offers them nothing less than recovering their race... albeit, forever tainted by mannish blood.

Mim's baby will probably be the first stillbirth of the second apocalypse when the No-god walks again

If Mimara, like her mother, is able to carry the Nonman gene (which is very likely highly diluted in the Anasurimbor line after two millenia) to term, then the resurrection of the No-God and her subsequent stillbirth might rouse the Intact to join the Ordeal. I would expect nothing less than Kellhus to be making his gambit with the Nonmen on several levels (I know his gambling on Mimara getting pregnant by Nil'giccas is a hell of a stretch). The extinguishing of new hope might be the goad to rouse the Nonmen to join the Ordeal.

I also suspect that the Judging Eye is probably much more significant and better understood by a race that has existed for millenia. I think the Nonmen revering Mimara for possessing the vision of judgement would make for an interesting information dump, it strikes me as a fitting moment for Bakker to stretch his style of cryptic revelations that we all love so much.

Might start a new post if this garners more than passing attention: How much/what do we know of the ritual of Niom?

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Nothing, Camlost. A son, a daughter, and an enemy... Men say trust only the thieves among Nonmen and Nonmen view men as unrealiable... for Celmomas abandoning the First Investiture or for the Men of Cil'aujas? Or just general practice since the Tutelage.

Also, Serwa is the better combination of Esmenet and Kellhus.

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Also, Serwa is the better combination of Esmenet and Kellhus.

Yes team Serwa

Shes got a bit of the Nonman in her (assuming that its there to begin with) and a bit of whateverthefuck Esmenet had going for her. Maybe that will make it possible to carry a baby with a full Nonman father to term and not die birthing a 12 armed monster.

Maybe both Serwa and Mimara will get prego, and of course Mim's dies (that whole JE thing).
[flashback to Serwe and the concubines giving birth to 'blue babies' storiy. Would it be ironic is Serwa gets the living one and Mim's is the blue one?]

And then the Nonmen feel like 1 of 2 is pretty good odds so they join Kellhus for (in their eyes) his ability to find suitable Nonmen baby mommas.

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You're right. If I were placing odds on one of the two of them delivering a Nonmen child it would be Serwa.

Would it be ironic is Serwa gets the living one and Mim's is the blue one?

It would be hard not to side with a guy after him offering that

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Lol... ever Dunyain.

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I pity the child with Serwe for a mother and an Erratic for a father.

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Just to be clear:
Serwe is that dumb blond chick who's corpse was tied to Kellhus. I hope shes dead still.
Serwa is the badass Grandmistress of the Swayali Sisterhood.