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- Viviana: I killed them! … Three innocent people!
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Monster 029
└ posted on Tuesday, 26 July 2016, by Novil
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Poor Viv. This has so shaken her up she couldn’t even get out on her own. I commented on a Heroic BSOD last time… but it looks like I was on the money here.
Fortunately she’s got someone who loves her there to help her with this… and help her get where she needs to go.
I just wonder if she still feels she should be Queen. She does now have blood on her hands, even if it was in self defense.
Technically, Vivi, two were actively trying to harm you so… two justifiable deaths, one innocent who was trying to help you death.
Yes, you did. Later you can save three lives and it’ll be even. Right now you should really think about disguising your appearances and figuring out what’s going on.
Vivi, you didn’t kill them, the rainbow knife did.
People don’t kill people, rainbow knives kill people!
@ Tomana:
That is what it means to be a warrior, a Chooser of the Slain. One choice, you have their lives. The other choice, your life, the lives of your friends, and all the people you will eventually save. You can only choose one. Take no joy in the act, but be at peace with your choice.
Arky wrote:
With guns, pow!
fantasy result, months later when all is over:
🙂
Been playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution for the past three days.
My first thought when I saw Ilias was “you idiot! If you don’t crouch, they’ll hear you!”
Warning! Total dick comment to follow.
Come on Vivi, you’re queen! You can get away with that shit.
Strange as it may be, events such as this probably show why Vivi should be Queen. She becomes sick if she kills, or even harms people. Showing that she is passionate, and will make every life or death decision with great thought (and probably still feel sick afterwards). Of course, some people only look at the deeds, rather than the motives and feelings. “Was defending themselves? Feels physically sick afterwards? Regrets the action? Doesn’t matter, still killed them”
Then there are those people who think. ” Ha, you are weak, you cannot possibly lead, true leader will strike down field of enemies with no remorse.”
Aww poor Vivi. Harden your heart young queen, for there will be more difficult choices and events to make and bear, just not too hard lest you forget who and what you’re fighting for.
@ nameless:
Sounds good to me! (Poor Viv. :'( )
nameless wrote:
Technically this cannot happen. In a monarchy the Queen represents and embodies The People, so the people cannot bring a case against the Queen.
Thisguy wrote:
What Thisguy said.
Try to look on the bright side Vivi. You killed zero innocent people: the bar tender was hoarding some sort of illegal flower, & the guards were trying to arrest you, so you killed them in self-defense. Also, you didn’t kill them, your rainbow knife did: you had no idea it would do that. Plus, the three people who knew that you were in the city are dead, so no one’s going to come after you. & to top it all off, you’ve got a new awesome attack!
@ BarGamer:
Unfortunately, none of us have the omniscience to know all the consequences of that choice. Given that, I don’t think we should ever be at peace with killing.
No no, Vivi, you didn’t kill those people… you chopped them up with rainbows! 😀 😀 😀
I had wondered if they’d take the horses, but while they’d get away fast, they’d have evidence with them.
Question: Do we yet know what province they are in? The hypothetical case by nameless has the plaintiff as the “People of Illeasaar” –
Her real error was not cutting up those people, (something she never intended to do), but in relying on a weapon she couldn’t effectively control. She needs to get a second weapon that’s more easily controllable as soon as possible..
And next the realization is that Ilias would have had a fatal tasted of rainbow, if not for that protection spell. More emotional trauma inbound!
Dorje Sylas wrote:
It would have hit her as well, you can see the deflection marks on her shield. The knife was trying to destroy everything.
@ BarGamer: Wise words. Wise words in deed.
Eh, I’d liken it to, saying, a person picking up an unknown gun they found. They know it’s dangerous and that they don’t know all its capabilities, and might not be qualified to use it, but figure that it will work out. So it works more or less like they expect for awhile, and suddenly the next bullet is a grenade. Maybe should have learned a bit more about what your gun was carrying, huh?
If this was a real life court case (in the US, because that’s the only law I know), I’d expect her to be found not guilty of murder, possibly guilty of voluntary manslaughter, and probably guilty of involuntary manslaughter for the guards. The innkeeper would be involuntary manslaughter or reckless negligence.
Fred wrote:
As a British citizen, I can say that it’s perfectly possible to have a democratically-ruled society with a monarchy still in place, even if the royal family are a little lacking in the “absolute power” department. Oliver Cromwell made sure of that a few centuries ago. In the realm of Gaia, Vivi would certainly make a benevolent queen, but it wouldn’t surprise me to find that she prefers deferring most of her power to an electorate once things have settled down at least. For now though, she needs to pull herself up by her bootstraps and sort things out.
Hon, you’re a queen. Killing innocent people is the job description.
impstar wrote:
I do not see that comming… Mostly because Cania authorities consider her a terrorist (probably for blowing up a town… which Lilith did likely) so it will be far different charge than manslaughter… that might not even be considered.
and well If Ilessar breaks out in independence through conflict… again – victors are never put under trial… anything that happens is essentialy just wrote off as collateral damage of war.
@ Raen:
Heck, half the time it’s the qualification for being one.
@ Paeris Kiran:
Well yes, of course this isn’t likely to actually happen. I was talking hypotheticals. The two most likely scenarios in my mind is that either no one will ever figure out that it was her who killed the three, or they will and it will be a point of contention with her otherwise “benevolent” queen act. If she’s actually brought up on charges, something which is probably depend on how many people consider her an actual queen and how many an upstart wannabe, it won’t be about that (probably).
Ilias, the royal chariot.
Fred wrote:
Technically this cannot happen. In a monarchy the Queen represents and embodies The People, so the people cannot bring a case against the Queen.
Technically, that depends on how the particular monarchy is set up.
Traditionally, monarchies do not derive sovereignty from the people, but from the monarch.
Thus a verdict would be in the name of the King/Queen, not the name of the people.
I just opted in my fantasy result for them to adopt a very progressive constitution (or instrument of government) first, that acknowledges the people as the sovereign with the Queen as head of state only 😉
@ Tomana:
Justifyable deaths? Really?
So if two guards try to arrest you because you broke the law (sure the law can be wrong, but it’s still their job to follow it and beside they probably don’t realize it’s wrong) you have the right to kill them?
No, you haven’t.
@ Pony-kour:
One can’t replace lost lifes like that. Of course she can try to make up for it be saving other lifes etc. But that wouldn’t make up for what she done. Sure she didn’t mean to, but the fact is that she used the rainbow knife. She partly knew it was dangerous and to the extent she didn’t, ignorance isn’t an excuse.
That said i feel sorry for her, but if she doesn’t regret this for the rest of her life, the deed is taken to lightly…
Nothing is sacred, no one is safe…
Then again there is a difference between feeling guilty and letting guilt paralyse you, the latter not being productive at all. Looks like Illias has a lesson or two to teach Vivi about that.
Here’s an easy way to sooth your conscience my dear: none of them were innocent. The barkeep was a smuggler trading in illegal items, the two guards were willingly working for a tyrant and usurper. Innocence, like so much else, is merely a matter of perspective.
…even this comics and it’s characters…
@ forafreeIleasaar:
The only potential innocent she killed was the bartender. The other two guys were soldiers, who were actively attacking her and Illias. They weren’t just standing around trying to have a conversation. They had their swords out and the one guy swung his at Vivi, which she BLOCKED with the rainbow knife. He was trying to kill her, and she stopped the attack. The magic of the knife, which she didn’t apparently know about, lashed out and killed everybody in the room who wasn’t shielded. It would probably have wounded or killed her, too, as other people have said.
2 other things: We don’t know where they are. She’s the legitimate Queen of Ileasaar, a country which is separate from Cania, that was conquered and occupied by Canian forces. It’s not quite the same as if she declared herself Queen of the USA and a NYC police officer tried to arrest her IN NYC. She could be in her own country, in which case she just had contact with the enemy in a war she’s now fighting, due to coming out of the closet as Queen. There’s no possible way it’s a good idea for those soldiers to pass on intelligence about her whereabouts to their superiors, or to allow them to capture her.
@ BarGamer:
Did you write this quote yourself? I checked Google because I thought it was by Sun Tsu or someone, but I didn’t see any sign of it. It is truly an incredible, powerful statement.
@ Arky:
But that’s like saying when someone shoots a gin that the gun killed the person so the person who shot the gun doesn’t first degree murder. But I think vivi just accidentally made the rainbow knife activate when the soldier tried to strike her and she blocked it.
Pfft, 3 innocents?
More like 1, not to mention it being (for the most part) an accident.
Viv needs to pull herself together :I
Then again, I guess it’s something (some) humans like to do, isn’t it? Dwell upon things until it nearly cripples them, rather than accept and just have a nightmare from time to time until they can forgive themselves.
(When I say “human” I do not disclude myself.)
Funny. I don’t remember Vivi being so broken up about killing Silas Audin. Sure, she didn’t see him die, but at the time, she and Ilias were holding him hostage in his own house at the time, so in any case, she doen’t necessarily have the ethical high ground.
forafreeIleasaar wrote:
Views on standing law may differ, one man’s terrorist is another man’s fighter for freedom. In this instance, these guards tried arresting Jael Bara on king Olrik’s behalf. While they were operating under Cania’s law, it can be argued that were Ileasaar not an occupied territory (with occupation thing being very likely deemed unlawful by Ileasaarian population standards), and so these guards lacked legitimate authority to detain anyone. And so, self-defense stands as a valid point, were Jael tried under Ileasaar’s and not Cania’s laws. I’d say, it’s gross negligence (operating a thing one doesn’t fully understand), but this isolated event wouldn’t even be involuntary manslaughter. It would be justifiable self-defense. Repeated improper handling of rainbow knife, however…
@ Tomana:
Had they gotten away, he was going to die anyway after the guards called him a traitor. Still sad though 🙁
Regardless of whether the guards are justifiable death or not, Viviana does consider them innocent. She is also not someone who easily kills as demonstrated both after she tried to assassinate Eldor and Silas and in this chapter when she tried to get away without killing despite killing being a better option. It also doesn’t help that the rainbow knife made an incredible bloody mess. This is not something she will just walk off.
Anyway, I mentioned in an earlier strip that after one of the guards went down, they should not have allowed her to get up and draw her sword. It’s likely that had Viviana and Ilias handled the situation better (forcing Reva to stay down, taking better advantage of the bartender grabbing Finley and so on) things would have turned out better. Even without the rainbow knife misfiring, there was a lot of other things that could have gone wrong. They don’t need to become cold blooded killers, but they have to accept the idea that future dangerous situations may require them to harm or kill someone. This may be a problem, especially for Viviana.
Oh, and Viviana should definitely get herself a sword as soon as reasonable. I don’t care if she has not training with it, she is still better of with a sword than with a dagger.
Brandul was going to die anyway. Hadn’t the rainbowknife killed those 2 guards, he would be killed for protecting Vivi, they consider her a terrorist. Had the rainbowknife killed the guards but not him, he would be killed because of the dead bodies in his cellar, they would have thought he killed them.
You guys DO realize that Viv knew the Rainbow Knife has a 10% chance of backfiring and doing something like chopping off her own hand at the wrist. She likely knew the weapon was dangerous and had the ability to kill quite easily. Her problem was she went on the defensive. If she’d just stabbed then the guard would have died or been hurt and the others wouldn’t be dead.
She’s no innocent here. She knew the Rainbow Knife was a dangerous artifact. She even knew it had a chance of hurting her if something went awry… and the only reason she’s still alive now is Lillith cast those protection spells on her and Ilias. Who she also almost killed.
She was not wrong to defend herself. Those guards would have arrested her and Ilias without just cause, and consider her an Enemy of the State just because her nation, which was unlawfully annexed, wanted its liberty. But that doesn’t make her an innocent in all this.
Viviana: I killed them! … Three innocent people!
—Monster 029
Lilith is the titular Monster, right?
Man, Ilias is just stone! The guy could take an arrow to the eye and say, “You missed my knee!”
Echoeechoe89 wrote:
I was just mocking the “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” line the American gun lobby used to be fond of saying.