Celia and Roy share a philosophical moment.
Cast
Transcript
- Panel 1
Celia: You know, since that's an all-new body you've got, baby, I think I technically just deflowered you there.
Roy: That puts you in a very exclusive club with Sheila Finkelstein in the cloak check room at the 1175 Wizzy Award ceremony. My dad and her mom were up for the same category.
- Panel 2
Celia: Not that I'm not thrilled to have you back, but I am looking forward to going home. My GPA must be in the toilet by now... and...
Celia: And I'm not really cut out for this life.
Roy: I know. I want to ask you to stay, but it's only going to get more dangerous from here, I'm afraid.
- Panel 3
Celia: I just don't understand all the violence.
Celia: I'll admit that I got caught up in the thrill of it a few times, but I just can't stomach the idea of willfully deciding to end someone's life.
- Panel 4
Roy: It's an unfortunate reality. The fate of this entire world rests on our mission now. Haley does what she needs to do in order to keep the mission going.
Celia: No, she doesn't. She does what's convenient for her, and if it happens to help the mission, hey, bonus.
- Panel 5
Roy: Celia...
Celia: I'm sorry, I just can't fathom caring more about gold than about another person's very existence.
Roy: Neither can I, but we don't need to see eye-to-eye on it in order to work with her.
- Panel 6
Celia: Everything is different on the Plane of Air, you know. No one tries to kill you just because you, like, looked at them funny years ago.
Roy: Well, sure. You're not mortal.
Celia: Huh?
- Panel 7
Roy: Elementals and outsiders can't be raised from the dead normally, right? But humans, elves, dwarves, halflings—hell, even goblins—all can be.
Roy: Sure, it's not commonplace, but I think just knowing that it's a possibility encourages the mortal races to take risks. It's like a big metaphysical safety net.
- Panel 8
Roy: Then take the Afterlife.
Celia: We don't have one. We just sort of merge back into the plane we're from.
Roy: Right. But us? We have this elaborate system of rewards and punishments: heaven or hell, valhalla or the abyss, limbo or nirvana, or a dozen in-between.
- Panel 9
Roy: Most importantly, we KNOW it exists. So if we charge into battle and end up as a polearm depository, we know that we're going to end up somewhere we deserve.
Roy: Your people can't look forward to that, so there's no reason they would risk death as often as we do.
- Panel 10
Celia: So, you're saying that if mortals weren't sure of what awaited them after their deaths—
Roy: I'm pretty sure that, logically, there would be a lot less warfare in the world.
- Panel 11
Celia: I never thought about it that way.
Roy: Eh, it's not a terribly realistic idea.
Roy: Even without resurrection, how would people not know about the Afterlife? Someone would just Plane Shift over and look eventually!
- Panel 12
Roy: It'd be like if we somehow didn't know whether or not there were—I don't know—trees, or stars, or gods.
Celia: Or Skill Points?
Roy: Yeah, I mean, weird, you know?
Trivia
- This strip, in particular panel 10, is an ironic commentary on the real world where what happens at death is unknown and the existence of a god or gods is likewise uncertain, yet there is easily as much death as in the world of Order of the Stick.
- Roy was 20 when he lost his virginity. He was born in 1155.