Shojo tells of the Dawn of Time and the birth of the Snarl.
Cast
- Roy Greenhilt ◀ ▶
- Elan ◀ ▶
- Durkon Thundershield ◀ ▶
- Lord Shojo ◀ ▶
- The Northern Pantheon
- The Southern Pantheon
- The Western Pantheon
- The Eastern Pantheon
- The Snarl ▶
Transcript
Transcriber's note: all dialog except that of the gods is inset in the panel as a voiceover. None of the characters in the throne room appear in person, and the entire comic is done in a different style drawn with crayons.
- Panel 1, Page 1
Lord Shojo: At the Dawn of Time, there was chaos. A formless mass of possible realities, tangled together in a big fat pile.
Elan: Psst! Do you think this story will take a while? I have to use the bathroom!
Roy: I'm pretty sure you should have thought of that when he began with "At the Dawn of Time".
Elan: Awwww, man!
Lord Shojo: From beyond the chaos, the gods arrived. They saw the many possibilities and decided to shape a new world, one of myth and magic.
- Panel 2, Page 1
Lord Shojo: The gods were divided, as they are today, into several pantheons. We know them now by the regions of the world that worship them:
Lord Shojo: Odin, Thor, and the gods of the North.
Lord Shojo: Dragon, Tiger, Rooster, and the rest of the Twelve Gods of the South.
Lord Shojo: Marduk, Tiamat, and the gods of the West.
Lord Shojo: And finally, Zeus, Ares, and the gods of the East.
Durkon: Whoa, thar. Gods o' tha East? Never heard o' em.
Roy: Yeah, what kind of name is "Zeus" anyway?
Lord Shojo: Hey! Who's the wizened old man dispensing valuable plot points here? You? Didn't think so. Now pipe down!
- Panel 3, Page 1
Lord Shojo: Where was I? Oh, right. The gods began the project in harmony, but soon, arguments began to arise on how this new world should be created. For each facet that the four pantheons agreed upon, there were two they did not.
Thor: I think trolls should be hardworking blacksmiths, toiling away underground forging magical weapons.
Hades: No! Trolls should be vile monsters, living under bridges and harassing goats!
Pig: You're both wrong! Trolls should be tiny wrinkled men with big poofy hair that are collected by old women!
- Panel 1, Page 2
Lord Shojo: And when the pantheons could not agree, they would simply pull on the threads of reality, hoping to manifest their divine will on this new world through sheer force.
Thor: Hades, let GO!
Hades: YOU let go!
- Panel 2, Page 2
Lord Shojo: The world took shape, but for every argument, a new snag would develop in the fabric of the world.
Zeus: Elves should be making toys, not casting spells!
Lord Shojo: A new snarl in the threads of reality.
Dragon: Who ever heard of dragons that can't breathe fire??
- Panel 3, Page 2
Lord Shojo: And the gods, blinded by their petty squabbles, did not see the Snarl growing every day...
- Panel 4, Page 2
Lord Shojo: Growing more complex...
Lord Shojo: ...growing more intelligent...
- Panel 5, Page 2
Lord Shojo: ...growing more hateful.
D&D Context
- Tiamat is a well-known deity in the D&D universe, often an evil dragon god. In keeping with the Chromatic Dragon system of evil dragons in D&D, Tiamat is depicted as having one head for each of the five types, red, blue, green, black and white. Historically Tiamat was depicted more often as a glistening woman, but she does take the form of a dragon in depictions of her battle with Marduk. In D&D, her good dragon god counterpart is Bahamut, the Platinum Dragon, whose name is taken from a giant fish from Arabian mythology.
Trivia
- The Gods of the North are based on the Asgardian figures from Norse Mythology.
- The Gods of the East are based on the Olympic figures from Greek Mythology.
- The Gods of the West are based on the Babylonian Pantheon from Mesopotamian Mythology.
- The Gods of the South are based on the animals of the Chinese zodiac.
- This is the first appearance of the gods, except for the Northern (Asgardian) Pantheon, who have appeared earlier due to Durkon's worship of Thor. Gods making their first appearance are: Dragon, Tiger, Rooster, Dog, Pig, Zeus, Ares, Hades, Pan, Marduk, Tiamat, and Ishtar.
- This is also the first appearance of the Snarl, as the previous depictions of Dorukan's Gate and Soon's Gate did not include any image of the Snarl within them.
- This is the final appearance of Odin's Ravens, Huginn and Muninn. They first appeared in #137.