The Linear Guild plots against the Order of the Stick.
Cast
- Roy Greenhilt ◀ ▶
- Belkar Bitterleaf ◀ ▶
- Silver ▶
- The Linear Guild
- Dwarf Blacksmith (the real one) ◀ ▶
- Two townspeople
Transcript
- Panel 1
Sabine (as Dwarf Blacksmith): Farewell! Bring me back the starmetal, laddie!
Roy: Yeah, yeah, I remember the plot.
Belkar: "Are you OK?" Heh heh, yeah right...
- Panel 2
Sabine is left alone.
- Panel 3
Sabine returns to her true appearance.
- Panel 4
Nale: I take it he bought the story?
Sabine: Hook, line and proverbial sinker, honey.
- Panel 5
Sabine: What I don't get, though, is why go through all the trouble to send Roy after this starmetal. Won't that just make his sword that much stronger?
Nale: Well, were the oaf to actually find and retrieve it, then yes, theoretically.
Two townspeople see Sabine in her true fiendish form.
Woman: Aaaah!!
- Panel 6
Nale: But the rumor about that meteorite has been around for decades. If it ever existed, some other group of adventurers would have claimed it by now.
Nale: I mean, seriously, it has "quest" written all over it.
- Panel 7
Nale: By sending him out there on a plausible fool's errand, it keeps the heat off of us while we engage in the business at hand.
Sabine: And what business would that be?
- Panel 8
Nale: Recruiting replacement members for a new Linear Guild, naturally.
Nale produces a Silent Image of the face of Hilgya, Yikyik, and Zz'dtri with red X's over them.
Nale: We lost three allies when we last faced my brother Elan. When I seek my revenge on him, I intend for the outcome to be more favorable.
- Panel 9
Flashback to Nale and Thog coming around the corner of the Barbarian's Guild just as Belkar is walking in. Thog carries a sleeping bag and a teddy bear, and wears a nightcap.
Nale (off-panel): We're just lucky I spotted the creepy little psychopath when I was picking Thog up from his Barbarian's Guild sleepover, or we'd have no idea they managed to escape Xykon.
- Panel 10
Cut back to Nale.
Nale: As an extra added bonus, if half the things I've heard regarding Wooden Forest are true, I wouldn't give you a copper piece for their chances to all make it back alive.
- Panel 11
Sabine: Hee. I hope the skank survives, though. I want to kill her myself.
Nale: Ooh, it gets me hot when you talk about snuffing out lives.
- Panel 12
They walk into the blacksmith's shop, where Thog has the real Dwarf Blacksmith on all fours in a dog collar and on a leash.
Nale: Thog! Pack up your stuff and say goodbye to Mr. Real Blacksmith. We're going to Cliffport.
Thog: Awwww. Bye-bye, Puppy! Be good while Daddy Thog is gone!
Blacksmith: Help me.
D&D Context
- Succubi like Sabine have the supernatural ability to change shape at will.
Trivia
- In the first panel Belkar is referring to his feigned concern from the previous strip.
- Thog's love of puppies from #51 returns in the darkest way possible at the end of this strip.
- This is the first appearance of the real Dwarf Blacksmith, his prior appearance is Sabine Shape Changed into his (somewhat more swarthy) likeness in #134.
- This is the first appearance of Silver, Roy's horse.